It’s only an hour or so after Rainbow Dash’s and Shatterstorm’s fateful encounter of the Wharg. Elsewhere, more trouble brewed that day. Take for example, the events earlier that morning in the Canterlot Public Archive.
The Chronomage curses as he shuts yet another book. He tosses it over his shoulder to join its brothers on the floor beneath him. Book after book after book lands in the pile, followed by curse after curse after nonsensical curse.
Finally, the Chronomage kicks the shelf, his patience at its end. “There isn’t a twiddly-bit of the clues we seek,” he grumbles.
Not that he cares for any of this, honestly: Actrise’s forceful addition of him into this situation had drained his attachment to it. Nothing in this public archive contained anything about undoing… whatever spell that blasted bibliophile had cast before. Nothing.
This mission has been a total waste of the Chronomage’s time. And if it’s one thing he hates, it’s wasting time. And cold tea. And wasting his time drinking cold tea. So three things. But this situation is just the first one. So only that one, right now.
“Funkles and beans,” Chronomage mutters.
“Keep searching,” demands a voice behind him. Its tone is harsh, its pitch is womanly, its accent French.
He rotates his head a whole 180 degrees and catches the shuddering darkness of Actrise’s long skirt as she drifts across the ground. More books are pulled from the shelves by her own invisible demands, opening, pages fluttering, then dropped once none of the information was discovered. She growls.
Legions of her underlings—witches of all natures, though sadly not much variety by way of beauty—scour the library along with them, knowing better than to so much as murmur or whisper between each other in the presence of their Mother. Books hover above and around, suspended in midair by foul magic, their covers colored by the ugly light vomited from the windows. Above, hustling feet are heard on the second floor, their haphazard drumbeat underlying the picking and replacing and discarding of books.
A large thundercloud has grown over the overall atmosphere of the Public Archive since they arrived. It’s been this way for the past day, but the end of the Chronomage’s patience also ends his fear, and subsequent obedience, of Actrise.
“Searching for what?” Chronomage says, finally. “That spell she flimmered upon us is likely only found in the Royal Archive.”
All witches in the library freeze in place, turning timidly to watch this scene unfold. Actrise turns her head sharply, drawing quiet gasps from her witches. Her red eyes burn hotly as the Chronomage scowls, cleaning his monocle with a fish he’d pulled from his pocket as he returns her glare with his own.
“You know,” the Chronomage continues as he replaces his monocle, “the Archive that’s on the very property of the castle our Master chose to repropose?”
A bone-white hand worms fingers around his rabbit ears and yanks him harshly to a face with red eyes bulging, nostrils flaring, teeth clenched. “There has to be a counter-spell available!” Actrise hisses. “It makes no sense for them not to have one!”
“I am giving you three of your own seconds to relinquease my ears before I age your face into an old crone’s,” the Chronomage threatens.
Nearby witches draw in quiet, shocked breaths at the Chronomage’s tone. It is rare indeed to hear his voice reach such a venomous pitch. Two of those seconds pass before Actrise’s fingers peel off his ears, one by one. The menacing scowl on her face does not subside. In fact, coupled with her eyes, she appears even angrier than before.
“We’ve searched this library—and we’ve searched that other library—and even the other other library—and we’ve searched and searched and searched,” the Chronomage continues, slapping one gnarled hand against the other at every search. “The undoing of the Purple Padonkabonk’s spell lies elseplace! Certainly, you must understand that wherever it is, it is. Not. Here.”
Actrise’s breathing goes from an angered braying through clenched teeth, slowly into something more even and elegant. The look on her face finally subsides once she realizes it’s the crazy one—the one even Dracula’s other lieutenants think is mad—who’s talking sense.
“You’re right,” she says with a sigh. “You are right. This isn’t like me at all. I’m the schemer, the planner. I shouldn’t go running about a likely-senseless errand based on a hunch and a knee-jerk reaction. I’ve wasted enough of my time searching for that spell.”
“Glad to see you’ve replamented your wits and have—”
“Which is why, while I work on my next plan of attack, I am going to have you search for it.”
The Chronomage’s voice becomes a spitting contest between himself and himself. “What!” he cries finally, waving an arm across the library, pointing a finger at her own underlings. “Why can’t you just get one of your witches to do this?!”
“My witches are all busy with their own assignments,” Actrise says, turning around. “Such as Allie’s—”
Her words are cut short as she nearly bumps into the fluttering dark cloak and rancid, contorted face of Death. His scythe is out, its single menacing, crescent tooth glittering even in this low lighting. Cold clouds wisp from the gaps in his teeth as tiny red fireballs burn brightly somewhere deep in the caves of his eyes.
Actrise jumps back, her hands instinctively in front of her face. “M-My lord!” she cries. “My apologies, but I d-don’t understand! I th-thought I had enough time to—”
“I tire of your excuses, Actrise.” The way his words slither out of his mouth inject indescribable fear into his underlings. The Chronomage backs away from the range of the scythe as Death brings it up. “It is time I gave you the retribution you so richly deserve for your failure.”
“I d-don’t un-un-understand!” Actrise babbles from behind a genuine sob, falling to her knees.
The scythe is swung.
The scythe… is rubber.
Actrise looks at the scythe that had gently bounced against her face. Then back up to Death’s face. It contorts again, but this time the rest of his form does likewise, becoming nebulous as its colors wash into a mystical blue. Before all the watching eyes, this shape takes the form of Actrise herself, on her knees, hands clasped together as if begging, her lips stuck in a comical pout.
“Oh, p-b-b-b-please, Death!” cries the Actrise-thing in a histrionic whine. “Give me more tiiiiiiime! I’ll get dat wascally unicorn! Just one more chaaaaaaance!”
Actrise—the real one—swings her staff at her unflattering reflection, growling as it dodges too easily. “I am in no mood for your pranks, Doppelganger!”
The Chronomage snickers, half in relief and half in amusement, but stops once Actrise shoots him a stink-eye. The witches watch a little longer before going back to their original business of searching the library, small smiles touching their lips.
While the Doppelganger was never on good terms with most any of the demons of Dracula’s Castle, it got on well enough with at least a few of them, the Chronomage included. Its uncanny air for acting should have endeared it to Actrise, and perhaps at first it did, but that interest soon grew into mistrust and from there to disgust. Nobody had ever seen the Doppelganger in its original shape, if it ever had one, and it preferred to masquerade as its comrades or its enemies, depending on its mood.
The Doppelganger’s form once again melts, warping until four legs lift a lavender unicorn body and purple eyes blink and a mane and tail the colors of night just before dawn weave before going still. She looks sideways at Actrise. Her lips turn up in a smirk.
“Everypony’s talking about it, you know,” it says, its voice colored with Twilight Sparkle’s own syrupy sweetness. It begins walking in a circle around Actrise mockingly. “How Actrise, the Greatest Witch of Paris, got beaten in a game of wits by a unicorn...”
Actrise’s glare does not change.
“How she fouled up so badly, it’s set back our forces considerably…”
Actrise harrumphs, her scowl growing large enough almost to split her face in two.
Finally, the Doppelganger leans against Actrise in a way that feels almost coy, and says in perhaps the kind of mocking tone you’d hear from an adolescent, “How she’s on Death’s shit list if she fails!”
Though it is an entertaining thought to beat and kick and bite this Twilight imitation as if it were the real McCoy, Actrise settles for shoving the Doppelganger away. The Doppelganger giggles again. “Hey, maybe Death will go easy on you like he did with Slogra and Gaibon! If you’re lucky, you’ll be cleaning the holding cells alongside them!”
“Hear this, you shapeless rodent,” Actrise growls. “I will destroy Twilight Sparkle. She will fall by my hand. I am working tirelessly not just to undo the damage she has done, but to crush her utterly. Unlike some lazy, ambitionless creatures who idle their time playing pranks upon the industrious.”
“Oh say it with flowers, Precious,” the Doppelganger retorts facetiously, wiggling its rump suggestively as it saunters away. “Besides, I’m busy helping another with her own schemes. Seems we have some rats in the base and many of us have been tasked with flushing the little bastards out.” Its eyes widen as if a light had turned on in its head. “That reminds me!”
It turns around, once again becoming a blue gelatinous thing before it melts into the familiar form of a certain storybook character. its blue dress, blonde hair, and white apron all bob cutely as it approaches the Chronomage. It curtsies politely, and the Chronomage returns the gesture with a bow and a removal of his hat. “Who are you?” he asks, his grin a mile wide.
“I hardly know, Sir, just at present,” the Doppelganger replies in mock-confusion. “At least I know who I was when I got up this morning…” It places a girlish hand over its mouth as if to refrain from bursting out laughing. “…But I think I must have changed several times since then!”
Actrise rolls her eyes. How many times must she sit through this Alice in Wonderland routine?
“But whether I am me or you,” the Doppelganger continues, shapeshifting into the Chronomage as it says you, “I come bearing a message from Death.”
“Bearing a message?” the Chronomage asks. It’s no secret to any of Dracula’s servants that Death bears no particular fondness for practitioners or observers of chronomancy. It comes as no surprise to the Chronomage that Death would prefer to not give this message in person.
“You are to join me in this most prinkling venture.”
It also comes as no surprise to the Chronomage Death would employ him as a mere rat-flusher. Still, it beats being Actrise’s errand-rabbit. He hides a snort of disgust, instead nodding his head. “I see.”
He turns to Actrise. He raises his arm—his arm shooting along until it’s six-feet-long and noodly—and shakes her hand as, with his other (normal-length) hand tips his hat. “As much unfun as we were having, Actrise m’l’ass, it appears I’m off on a new quessignment of sorts. Good luck with your mobitiorions.”
And away the Chonomages walk, arm in arm, surreal alongside the unreal. It’s a portrait, to be sure. Actrise looks at the library, noting how quiet it’s become, and glares at the witches who stopped to watch these exchanges. They heed her wordless command and return to their work. Books are pulled off shelves, searched, then discarded.
Something tugs at Actrise’s sleeve. She casts her red eyes downward.
Blue eyes, blonde hair, pale face, dark and loose-fitting clothes. Gloria. Another of Actrise’s witches. The look on her face betrays something worrisome. Gloria whispers into her Mother Actrise’s ear. Actrise’s eyes widen, then sharpen, her lips twisting, then pursing. She sighs.
“I’d love to stay, children, but I alas! I am called away,” she says sweetly, taking her first few steps out the Archive. “Hermione is in charge until my return. Do have fun with your chores. Ta-ta!”
The expedience in which she makes her exit suggests Actrise is angry about something. Gloria leads her out of the room, out of the Archive, and into the fog where they disappear—vanishing in bursts of light.
They sit and talk for a while, long after the whispering memories have run their course and fallen silent. And there is so much to speak of. The questions Twilight asks are simple, tersely worded things that are returned by strange answers.
When she asks, “Where are we?”
She receives, “Inside the book. Duh. Where else would we be?”
When she asks, “What exactly is this place, then?”
She receives, “It’s what you made it to be.”
Twilight’s face deflates with a groan. Evidently, her new mentor—shrewd and coarse as they come—is playing yet another game with her. Carefully, Twilight pieces together a much more exact question. “So, outside, where we met in the snow,” she says. “I saw this… ocean-thingy. What was that?”
Sypha stretches and lays down on the carpet, folding her arms behind her head, her royal blue eyes gazing at the ceiling. “That’s the world inside this book. It’s its own universe. Intangible, yet there.”
“…That doesn’t explain anything.”
Sypha turns her head, her eyes squinting mischievously over a Cheshire smile. “Good.”
Finally, Twilight stamps the ground with an angered whinny. “Why can’t you just give me a straight answer?! These are simple questions, and there have to be good, scientific explanations for—”
But before she can continue her rant, Sypha explodes with laughter. She sits up, clutching her sides. Even as her guffaws melt into giggling, her wide grin earns a scowl from Twilight. “Sorry, kid,” Sypha says, wiping a tear from her eye. “You just—God, you’re a riot. Hell! You remind me so much of myself when I was your age.”
Twilight lifts an eyebrow as a pause sneaks by them. “…You don’t look that old…”
“Thanks,” says Sypha. “But. Surrus’ly. When I designed this book and the pocket universe inside it, I had to choose a form for myself if I were to exist as its guardian. Instead, however, I let my husband choose that form.”
She stops, and giggles, lifting a hand to her mouth as if trying to hide her girlish smile. “Now, Trevor—my husband—was always a sweet, gentle guy, but he had this sense of humor I swear he picked up from this friend of ours. I half-expected him to pick a form like a… flying pig or something.”
Her smile slowly shifts from girlish to wistful. The intensity in her royal blue eyes grows distant. “But, instead, he thought of that pretty-faced, abrasive twenty-something he found in a swamp one evening.”
Twilight grins. “You two met in a swamp?”
Sypha rolls her eyes. “Looooooong story.” She stands up, dusting herself off. “I’ll tell it to you on the way home.”
Twilight glances awkwardly around the hallway. “And, uh… where is home?”
Sypha nods, hands on hips. “Where the heart is. Where else?”
Another riddle. Twilight snuffles as she hoists herself back up on all four hooves.
“Don’t be like that,” Sypha says, nearly chuckling as she waves a finger. “Believe it or not, you’re the only one who knows the way out of here. This place is you, after all. So if you want to see my own house—where I’ll begin your training in earnest—you’re gonna have to be the one who leads the way.”
Instead of asking Sypha what she means (as this conversation has only managed to reveal how effectively and whimsically she can dodge a question), Twilight merely walks ahead, her lips purse, ruminating, mulling over her options. This place IS me, she thought, and if it IS me, then I should know my own way around here, right?
But if the sudden terrain changes are any indication, this place is volatile. Its form depends almost entirely on my memories. Maybe my emotions and desires play into it as well? What if I just really want to get out of here? Would this place listen?
She focuses her attention on this objective. It’s funny now, but when she was younger, she always reacted poorly when a pegasus or earth pony asked her if magic was like just making a wish. She’d hee and haw about it—unattractive behavior in hindsight—about how magic was far, far more complicated, how it involved an almost micro-management mental level to achieve a goal. Anypony who’s had to master a teleportation spell could tell you horror stories about what could happen should it go wrong.
She focuses. She closes her eyes, and focuses on the simple demand for an exit with the same simplicity and ignorance of the earth ponies and pegasi who thought that was all there was to magic. Like making a wish on a genie from a magic lamp.
Twilight keeps her eyes closed, and focuses.
She focuses harder.
Harder.
The beginnings of a giggle bubble nearby. Twilight’s eyes shoot open, glancing aside and spotting Sypha with a hand over her mouth, her cheeks burning from a laugh threatening to break. “What are you laughing about?” Twilight asks.
“Oh, nothing, nothing—I’m just waiting to hear what you sound like when you fart.”
Twilight’s face locks into an image of hairy eyeballs and lips stretched by a nonplussed frown.
Sypha’s laughter breaks like a dam. “Can I help it? You looked like you were trying to force a fart.”
Twilight’s lips shift from nonplussed to disbelief at her mentor’s juvenile sense of humor. A snort ripples from her nostrils.
“Sorry, sorry,” Sypha says, waving a hand. “I—my husband and I used to travel with this one guy, a sailor. You know sailors, they gotta have this… very colorful sense of humor. He rubbed off on us both.” She wipes her nose, another giggle escaping her. “He used to wonder what a unicorn sounded like when it… uh, when they would fart, so…”
Twilight waves a hoof. “I was trying to focus on making an exit out of here.”
Sypha points behind Twilight. “You mean like that one?”
With a jerk of her head, Twilight finds that one of the stained-glass windows has a giant door surrounded by clouds emblazoned on it, cherubic pegasi blowing trumpets on either side of the door, the bright green word “EXIT” sitting right above it. The pause that follows this discovery is long and palpable. Another fit of giggles strikes Sypha.
“You put that there, didn’t you?” Twilight asks dryly.
Sypha shrugs. “Maybe.”
I really have to learn to stop asking her questions, Twilight thinks, shaking her head with a sigh.
Both sorceress and unicorn walk up to the Exit, its sparkling luminescence falling upon them like a prismatic spotlight, coloring them in spots of red, white, gold, blue, green. Finally, Twilight stands before the Exit, and after a pause—and at a loss for what else she should do—she gives it a knock. Once, twice, three times her hoof timidly bats upon the door.
Silence and time, both in abundance, stumble by. They wait and wait, until finally, Twilight gives Sypha an aside glare. This time, Sypha shares it: reading everything Twilight intends to say just by her glare. “That’s no attitude to take with your mentor,” she warns.
“I mean no disrespect,” Twilight says after releasing a tired sigh, “but in the hour I’ve known you, you’ve spoken to me indifferently the first ten minutes, tried to kill me in the next thirty, and have been playing prank after prank on me in the remaining twenty. I would like an answer that is concrete, if anything. That’s all I ask of you.”
Sypha sniffs, turning her royal blue eyes back forward back to the Exit. “You want an answer?” she asks. “Eyes slideways, kid. It’s about to show up.”
Twilight pops an eyebrow, suddenly pulling her attention to the Exit as she hears something rattling on the other end.
The rattling grows louder.
It’s coupled with a deep growl.
Behind the door comes a slithering, shuddering noise.
Something—something dark—grips Twilight suddenly. It stabs her unexpectedly, pumping its venom right into her heart and brain, filling her to the brim with senseless panic. Sweat begins to jewel on her forehead as she slowly backs away, heavy breaths rasping from her open jaw. A hand slaps forward, gripping her by the mane and jerking her to a halt before she can escape whatever is on the other side of the door.
“Wait,” Sypha says.
There’s no impish twinkle in her eyes. No Cheshire grin touches her lips. Her face is the same sculpture of impatience and austerity it was when they first met an hour ago. Slowly, they both look to the Exit as the sounds grow louder. Then the doors buckle forward with a slam that makes Twilight flinch.
Silence.
Another slam.
Then another. And another. And another.
Each time, the Exit’s doors bend and squeal and break little by little. Twilight’s heart jumps to her mouth, her breathing catching and growing thick and hoarse as she fills with primal terror. The things in the dark—the things that hunt her under the shadows—the things she could do and become if nopony were watching—all the terrible, blackened thoughts that race through her mind occasionally—all the deadly mistakes she has made, can make, and will make—everything horrible she could possibly experience splash into her face at once the moment the Exit breaks open and all those horrible things escape.
Screaming.
Weeping.
Blackness.
Twilight turns and takes flight, her mane torn by Sypha’s clandestine grip, her hooves pounding the ground, rocketing her forth across the stained-glass hallway towards the hole Sypha had made. Behind her, those sounds grow warped and piercing, and give relentless chase. Twilight bounds from the hole, and into a watery depth.
What memory is this? Twilight’s mind races with what it could even be, but it falls behind the more important matter of self-preservation. She glances beneath her, where the hole remains unfilled by the water.
It is instead filled by a screaming, squirming blackness, with wet, glittery lights looking up. The thousands of such lights blink out of sync with each other, suddenly focusing on her the moment they realize she’s looking at it. Black tentacles reach out of the massive thing, slamming squealing, sobbing suckers onto the floor of this body of water, and force itself up and out and after her.
Twilight kicks her legs quickly as she looks up to the shimmering whiteness above. Safety. Upwards she swims, away from the blackness below as the small amount of air caged in her lungs begins to burn.
She breaks the surface of the water with a loud crash, diamonds of water shimmering as they are tossed out of her way. She quickly inhales the cool, beautiful oxygen, her eyes wide and seeing nothing but dark around her. She races for the edge of the pool.
Twilight notes that she is in a cave of some kind—and the memories come back, whispers between herself and Pinkie Pie. She remembers: this is the cavern that housed the Mirror Pool Pinkie had used to clone herself a month ago.
She crawls out of the pool, flopping inelegantly onto the ice-cold stone floor much like the ancestor of land animals must have done millions of years before. There’s a desire inside her to draw as many breaths as she can, but the need for survival far outweighs it. She pulls herself along on legs worn into gelatin from her difficult and unexpected swim, her eyes wide and her mouth grumbling for sweet, sweet air as her mane and tail, both grown heavy with wetness, respectively cling to her face and drag behind her.
Shouts and squeals and hateful screams burst from the pool behind her, the blackness just pouring out. Twilight chances a glance at it, perhaps out of some kind of morbid curiosity, and beholds the blackness suddenly begin to change shape.
It isn’t like a slimy thing being molded by the unseen hands of a clay-sculptor. It appears more to Twilight that it’s like millions of mechanical implements simply dropping into place, connecting one to another, circuits humming to life and oil greasing the parts and steam hissing from pipes as the coal inside its belly burns. The shape it takes drives the machine imagery home, though combined with the image of a twisted, divine creature.
Six long, verminous legs descend, each knee possessing a face that holds perverted leers and hanging tongues and squinting eyes. Its front legs end with the upper part of unicorns, their faces melted into an unrecognizable expression and their forelegs forming the creature’s fingers. The other four legs end in the hind parts of ponies, their hind legs forming toes and their tails sweeping the ground with every step.
Its body is saurian, with the dimensions of a dragon: the spine and the long, long tail are decorated with what could only be unicorn horns, the tail ending with a familiar-looking head, its dark mane hanging like a flag while the horn shimmers with a fire as black as forever. Its body is carried from the pool with four angelic wings, almost like an alicorn.
Like the main body, its neck is built in sections, the marble colors and gold trimming making it look like a fantastic treasure. The neck however, ends with the most horrific sight Twilight has seen, a form that registers in her mind as incomprehensible.
It has but one head, yet three faces share it (not unlike a Tatzlwurm’s), meeting together in the center as if their lips have locked into a three-way kiss they cannot break from. All six eyes—two to each face—glow with a black light, all six nostrils flaring, all three horns shimmering the same black fire as the head on the creature’s tail. Forming the top of its head was a chest that led up to the neck and head of another unicorn, this one just as pale-white, with the same gold trimmings, same black eyes and black fire and dark mane, but looking far more mighty and menacing. Its horn must be longer than Sypha Belnades is tall. Five crowns adorn its horn, sparkling with treasures.
The head’s faces all open their singular mouth and let loose a scream that could rupture hearts. The inside of its mouth is a cavern that goes on and on eternally, filled with a frightful orgy of tongues of various lengths.
Twilight suddenly regains the energy she lost in her swim and before she is even aware of what she is doing, she is running up the spiraling ramp up to the entrance of the Mirror Pool’s cavern, running on all four cylinders, her legs pumping like pistons as she speeds along.
The entire cavern shakes as the creature gives chase, its shuddering, screaming parts carrying it an alarming distance with each step. There is something… nostalgic about this creature. As if she were aware of its existence long before, and had forgotten about it until this encounter. A nightmare that, in her childhood, had chased her from her dreams screaming into the waking world, then forgotten about upon the morning?
Whatever it is, its crooked legs carry it up the walls of the cavern, all its faces with all their legion eyes focusing on her. Its head flowers open again, slightly, several of its black tongues sweeping along the edge of the mouth as a low gurgle escapes it.
Am I supposed to FIGHT this thing?! Twilight thinks to herself. Is this my test?
Twilight screeches to a halt, the entire cavern still shaking under each thunderous footstep of the creature. She turns as her horn begins to glow, and sees it crawling up the wall like a giant, divinely warped lizard. A magenta bolt sings from the tip of Twilight’s horn to the unicorn-head of the creature.
The creature remains undaunted, its pearly flesh devouring the bolt as if it had anticipated it in advance. The strangest aspect, however, is that Twilight feels a horrible burning sensation on her head—right where the bolt would have struck the beast—and it robs her of her senses for one second, knocking her to the ground.
The tremors in the cavern shake her back awake. Her eyes snap open as her lungs sharply inflate with the cold, wet air around her. Something primal grabs her legs, charges them up, and with more energy than she thought she had, Twilight powers off to the hole at the top of this sloping path.
Twilight is nearly deafened its awful steps behind her, the impact from each “hoof” shaking the entire cavern.
She sees the tiny hole that leads to the surface.
They become louder. Closer.
The hole draws closer under the sound of her rasping breaths.
Jaws powered by three heads clap shut just at the tip of her tail as Twilight leaps through the hole. She claws her way through this tight tunnel—going up—going down—spiraling left—turning right—up again—until finally, she pops out of the large hole above.
Her lungs are on fire, her throat shaking with the effort to force air in and out. She glances about quickly, expecting the familiar greens and humidity of the Everfree Forest, but skips a breath when she sees nothing but the cold dirt and sparkling jewels and columns and basic masonry of the Diamond Dogs mine, where Rarity had been kept as their prisoner a few years ago. Just ahead are the sounds of the battle she and her friends had waged with the Diamond Dogs.
A sound shudders from inside the hole she’d crawled out of. Tremors crawl across the ground. It comes!
Twilight takes off, not really knowing where she would go. Ironically, though this place is part of her memories, she doesn’t recall much of the layout. Her hooves smack against the dirt and rock beneath her as she runs towards the sound of her memory ahead.
She can hear it belch forth from the hole. It must assume that black mass form when it’s confronted with terrain it can’t fit through or cross one way or another. The ominous gurgling becomes louder, the screams and the squeals taking shape.
Columns and stalactites rush by Twilight almost eternally, as if this hall were simply growing another twelve feet with every step she took. Suddenly, there was another figure running alongside her, vanishing behind the columns and the stalactites as a shadow. As it gets closer, Twilight can make out the intense royal blue eyes, the masculine strides of a feminine body, the flowing ice-blue robes and golden hair.
“Follow me,” says Sypha as she races by.
Twilight obeys.
They navigate this labyrinth with surprising ease, with the gurgling screams just behind them. A glance behind them reveals the awful creature again, its unicorn-hands reaching forth and yanking it forward with an alien gate and unreal speed.
“Hey,” Sypha says almost breathlessly.
“What?” Twilight asks, hoping for an explanation to all this madness. Behind them, the creature snarls, readying for a pounce.
“I’ve always wanted to say this,” she continues as they approach a light at the end of the tunnel. “It looks like we’re gonna have to juuuuump!”
An arm reaches around Twilight’s neck and hoists her up and off the ground, followed by a leap out the hole and a scream erupting from Twilight’s mouth. The new world outside the hole is an everchanging image: sky, land, sky, land… a few seconds into their fall reveals to Twilight that they are tumbling through the skies over Equestria. Nearby, a burst air balloon and its basket are frozen midair. There are screams of fear all around her, quieted only because they’re memories from that unfortunate incident at the Wonderbolts Academy.
Another group of screams join them. Twilight looks up to find the monster has taken flight, its beating wings carrying its divine patchwork body through the sky. Its face flowers open, all eyes trained on Twilight, its tongues extending wildly in anticipation of the taste of her flesh.
Both of Sypha’s arms wrap around Twilight. The warmth of her body pressed against Twilight feels motherly, warm and welcome. “Twilight,” she says. “Do your teleporting thing.”
“Wh-What?”
“Hell!” Sypha spits, suddenly impatient. “Think of the happiest place you can think of, then teleport there!”
“I don’t know why I didn’t think of th—”
“Twilight—Twilight, honey, dearest, we are going to die if you don’t—”
But as Sypha speaks, Twilight focuses her energy on what, to her, is the happiest place in Equestria (not a difficult decision), and before she can finish her sentence, before the creature can close its menacing maw around them, they disappear in a pop of magenta light.