Land of Dreams

by JoyceCarleton

Chapter 2

As the griffons flew for several hours, Twilight made several attempts to get more information out of them. The soldiers completely ignored her. Below, Twilight could see various parts of the landscape had been devastated and knew that some of areas of destruction they passed were former towns. During the flight, Twilight had estimated that the next town they would fly over would be Appleloosa. Nearing closer to where it should be, Twilight saw only ravaged landscape. However, it was here the griffons began to make their descent towards the barren fields.

They landed towards one end of the valley that once had the town’s apple orchard. Gilda walked along the edge of the cliff face and eventually found the spot she was looking for. There was an unusual rock jutting out from the ground and Gilda pulled on it. There was a rumbling sound as a wall of stone pulled back and then slid into the cliff. Gilda led the way into the new passageway and the griffons finally let go of Twilight and let her walk.

After they all went through the opening, the last griffon pulled on another rock hanging from the ceiling and the wall closed behind them. It was now completely dark by the previous opening but as they headed down, torches on the walls lit their way deeper underground. It was about ten minutes before they had finally left the passageway. Twilight gasped at what she saw.

The underground chambers had been completely excavated and now a full-sized town lay below them. A set of steps running down the cliff face led the way to the entrance of the town. This town was like a collage of the various types of pony towns across Equestria. Part of the town reminded her exactly of Ponyville, one part looked like Appleloosa, and there were even a couple of much taller buildings similar to those from Manehattan. Hanging from the high ceilings was a massive network of dim, little orbs. In the center of this makeshift starry sky floated a gigantic, glowing sphere of light.

“Welcome to Haven, one of Equestria’s last shelters,” Gilda announced.

The griffons led Twilight down the steps and before they even reached the town, a couple of onlookers had already noticed the purple unicorn being escorted by the griffons. They quickly spread the news, it was not long before a small mass of ponies and griffons had gathered. As they began making their way through, Twilight could feel the stares of everyone around her. Some were excited, some were afraid, most were surprised. They all murmured to one another, sharing thoughts as to who was being brought in and why.

Suddenly, the murmuring became more excited, but it wasn’t about the unicorn being escorted. Many of the ponies turned their heads in another direction and started to spread apart, making way for a group of ponies wearing the armour of the Canterlot Royal Guard. In the centre of the group was a white unicorn with a long, blue mane. The griffons stopped in their tracks and saluted to him. Tears started to well up in Twilight’s eyes as he came closer.

“Commander Shining!” Gilda said as she saluted to him last. Shining Armor saluted back and looked at Twilight with an unreadable expression. Twilight, losing control of herself, jumped at her brother in glee but the griffons immediately held her back.

“Big brother!” she cried out. Shining’s expression still did not change as he continued to speak with Gilda.

“Captain, status report.”

“Big brother! Big brother!” Twilight continued to cry out as she struggled against the griffons. To cease her shouting, one of the griffons covered her mouth with his hands.

“During our patrol of the skies under enemy territory we came across a unicorn. Upon questioning, she claimed to be Twilight Sparkle so we immediately seized her and brought her here.”

“I see. Where are you headed now?” Shining asked very calmly.

“We will be taking her to a holding cell.” Twilight bit at the hands of the griffon and continued to yell.

“Shining! It’s me, Twilight! Don’t you recognize me?!” For the first time, Shining stared directly at Twilight, but his expression still did not change. The griffons then became more aggressive and brought her completely to the ground. “Brother!” Twilight cried out one last time. Shining looked back to Gilda.

“Are you positive that this is the Twilight Sparkle?”

“That is what she claims.” Shining turned to briefly look at Twilight one last time.

“Continue on with bringing her to the holding cell. I will interrogate her myself, later.”

“Yes, Commander!” Gilda saluted again and Shining and his guards left. Twilight began to cry loudly and the griffons had to carry her again. The crowd of ponies and griffons continued to watch, most of them unsympathetic to her emotional display. Twilight still did not know why exactly, but to the general masses, her name had become synonymous with evil itself.

The griffons threw Twilight into her cell as she continued to cry, but before they left, Gilda had something else to say to her.

“You can stop with that crying; it won’t help.” Gilda had said this insultingly, but for some reason Twilight obeyed and slowly tried to stem her tears. “Whether or not you are suffering doesn’t matter; you have no idea what kind of suffering we’ve all been through as well.”

“Gilda, please tell me what happened.” Gilda’s eyes looked up a bit, as if remembering something. Then, she looked back down coldly.

“Figure it out yourself; I have no intention of helping you in any way.”

Gilda and the griffons left and Twilight sniffled a few more times as she wiped away her last tear. Just what happened? All the towns have been destroyed and all the ponies were living underground now. Her brother, Shining, wouldn’t even speak to her! As she continued to mull over more depressing thoughts, she heard somepony approach her cell. She went over to the bars of her cell and waited for whoever it was to arrive. It was Shining. Twilight subconsciously delighted in his reappearance, but after quickly remembering their last exchange, she cast her gaze downwards and sighed. Shining said nothing and Twilight finally forced herself to speak to him again.

“What do you want, Shining?” Twilight suddenly felt his hoof touch hers from between the bars. Twilight looked back up and saw that her brother now wore a very pained expression.

“Is it really you, Twilie?” Twilight’s heart almost stopped at his words. Her cheeks began to quiver and her vision became blurry from the oncoming tears.

“Yes!” she cried out, trying to jump at him but hitting the bars. She cried loudly, but not from pain. Shining brought both of his forelegs through the bars and tried to pull her in close. Then, the two embraced each other between the bars.

“Twilie!”

“Big brother!” There was nothing else that they could say to each other at the moment. The two just laughed and cried together for several minutes. For those minutes, it was almost as if this was a regular reunion, perhaps meeting him in Canterlot again. Eventually, they sobered up enough from their reunion and could speak more.

“Twilight, where have you been? What have you been doing?”

“I don’t know, Shining. I really don’t know. Shining, what happened?” Shining’s expression hardened.

“Pain. Destruction. War…”

“Why?”

“They say it all happened when somepony unleashed an ancient evil upon the land. At first, it seemed like a minor problem, and not something to worry about. Over the years though, it grew much more powerful and something else started to happen.”

“What happened?”

“Change.”

“Change? What do you mean by change?”

“Ponies would change. First, they would fall asleep for a long time. But then, they would wake up and seem to be normal. Over time though, they started to become a bit different but we thought they were just re-adjusting. At this time, the evil took shape and tried to attack Canterlot itself. I created a barrier to protect Canterlot, and this time I was sure that nothing would break it, but…” Shining took a deep gulp before continuing. “But I was wrong. The ponies who had changed turned against us and took over Canterlot. We were forced to abandon the capital.”

“And the Princesses?” Twilight asked, already fearing for the worst news.

“The Princesses are gone.” Shining looked down at the floor and tears of sadness started to appear. As much as she wanted to, Twilight asked no more painful questions of her brother. Instead, she hugged him tightly again until he cheered up a bit. He smiled at her, but then his expression turned serious. “Twilight, I believe in your innocence, but nopony knows exactly what happened. They say that you were the one who unleashed the ancient evil.”

“Why do they say that?”

“You disappeared just before this all started and there were also accounts stating that you took something from the Canterlot Library.”

“What did I take?”

“I don’t know. However, that doesn’t matter. You’ve been gone for more than eight years, and all this time, many of the ponies and griffons had blamed you in one way or another for causing everything.”

“But I didn’t! Or, at least I don’t remember doing anything like that…”

“I believe you, Twilight; I know that you would never do anything like this on purpose. But, that doesn’t matter to the others. They have all suffered from the ongoing war and they needed an identifiable enemy for causing it. Some blame your thirst for knowledge; some blame your negligence; and there are even some who blame you for secretly wanting to bring about the end of the world.”

“Why would anypony want to bring about the end of the world?!”

“The distress has caused many rumours to get out of control.” Twilight shook her head at everything her brother was telling her and tried to make sense of his story.

“Wait, what about you? Didn’t something happen to you for being my brother?” Shining looked away again.

“Most just think I was blind to any of your intentions. Some think I was betrayed by you like everypony else.” Twilight swallowed. There were so many other things she wanted to ask, but she would let it be for now. Twilight nuzzled her brother and the two just stood by each other in silence.
**

After meeting with Twilight, Shining had to leave to go meet with the other high-ranking officers. On his way out, though, he noticed that another ruckus was happening in the town. He rushed to the scene and found that the other air unit had returned. They too had a captured pony, a pegasus this time. The Pegasus wore a uniform that resembled that of the Wonderbolts, but it was black and purple instead of blue. Shining made his way through the crowd that had gathered and went up to the pony in charge: a grey pegasus with a blonde mane.

“Commodore, status report.” The pegasus focused her eyes to look back at him and then saluted. Immediately after the salute, her eyes drifted apart once more.

“We found this one hanging around near the valley entrance. We captured him and brought him here for questioning.”

“I see.” Shining went up to the pegasus and the captors removed the goggles on his face so that he could get a look at him. Shining did not recognize the pegasus, but somepony probably would. But before that, there was the first phase: interrogation. “State your name and intention.”

“You think I’ll tell you anything?!” the pegasus snarled at Shining. Shining ignored him and continued.

“What are you doing here?”

The pegasus smiled.

“It’s over for all of you!”

“Why’s that?”

“Marshal Shadowbolt’s gonna come and end all of you! You didn’t have any hope at all!”

“Is that so?”

The pegasus smiled wider and started laughing.

“What is this? Acting so calm? What, were you expecting this day to come eventually?!” Shining’s calm expression remained unchanged.

“If Shadowbolt is coming, then we will meet her, and we will defeat her.” The pegasus just laughed maniacally. From the crowd, there was a loud gasp and an earth pony tried to make her way over to them, but she was stopped by a pair of griffons.

“Nimbus?! Is that you?!” she cried out to him. Shining motioned for the griffons to release her and the earth pony went up to the pegasus. “Nimbus, it’s me, Melody!” The pegasus put on a disgusted look.

“Don’t act so familiar with me, you stupid pony! The only ones I know are those loyal to Marshal Shadowbolt!”

“Nimbus! We’re friends! We lived next-door to each other! We went to school together! Don’t you remember any of that?” she asked with tears in her eyes. The pegasus spat at the earth pony’s face.

“No!” the pegasus yelled in response. The pony fell to her knees and wept loudly. Well, that was the second phase, Shining thought to himself. Only one part left to do.

“Take the pegasus to the grounds,” Shining ordered. They dragged the pegasus off to a small plateau at the other end of the town. Just as they reached the plateau, Gilda had also arrived. She went over to the Commodore pegasus.

“Another one, Commodore Derpy?” Derpy’s eyes looked downward at two different angles.

“Yeah.”

“Since he’s been taken to the grounds already…”

“Yeah.”

“Another one, huh? It’s a real shame, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

Gilda left Derpy and then went to the plateau, noticing Melody still crying some distance away. It didn’t take a genius to guess why. Gilda went over to Shining and saluted.

“Captain, you’re here.”

“Well, I was informed that another pony was captured so I made my way over here.”

“Are you here do it?”

“It seems I’m the only one who’s been doing it recently.”

“Then I’ll leave it to you.”

Shining made sure that the pegasus was properly tied down on the plateau and then he and the others left Gilda alone with him. Gilda made her way to the pegasus and readied her spear. Surrounding the platform was a massive crowd of ponies and griffons that came to watch the spectacle. Their faces varied from horror to a steeled resolve; everyone knew what was about to happen and it would be far from the first time of witnessing it. Gilda looked down at the pegasus and asked the final question before carrying out the third phase.

“Any last words?”

“Go die!”

“Maybe later.”

Gilda thrust the spear down through the pegasus’ heart, instantly killing him. This was no glorified execution; there were no cheers to be heard. It was merely a necessity. A hard lesson learned from previous acts of mercy. The third phase that followed interrogation and a failed attempt at bringing back their memories: execution.

Gilda withdrew her spear from the lifeless pony and got off the plateau. One of her subordinates handed her a towel to clean her spear and the ponies gave her a noticeably wider gap than usual. They had accepted that this was something that needed to be done, but few were comfortable with it. Melody continued to softly cry as a few other ponies tried to comfort her. Gilda recognized one of them. His brother was caught a year ago and Gilda had carried out the same act. Their eyes met briefly, but there was no malice; his eyes were listless.

A team of ponies went to clean up the grounds and the dead pegasus was placed into a pre-made coffin. He would be buried in a cemetery outside town unless Melody, a living pony that was closest to him, wanted him cremated. That decision would be made later, though. Shining and his guards gathered and Derpy and Gilda went up to him as well.

“Well, it looks like there is another topic we are going to have to discuss during our meeting.” They all nodded in solemn agreement. “I am going to have Twilight Sparkle momentarily released so she can sit in it.” This was not silently agreed to.

“What? You are going to let her sit in on the meeting?!” Gilda cried out.

“I believe she will prove to be a valuable asset in our discussion.”

“No, I agree with Captain Grizelda,” one of Shining’s guards said. “Despite what you may think, Commander, it is too dangerous to let somepony like her be present for our discussions. Especially since she will be the major topic of discussion.”

“I believe that is all the more reason she should be present; she must be given an opportunity to make her case.”

“That should be saved for a later tribunal, Commander.”

“I didn’t think you were so distressed earlier, but clearly you have let your judgement become clouded,” Gilda added. Shining looked around but his other guards did not seem to want to side with his decision. Suddenly, a loud, pompous voice came from behind them.

“It appears I am not too late to meet up with all of you!” The speaker was a blue unicorn wearing a hat and cape. Gilda clicked her tongue.

“General Trixie.”

“Yes, it is I, The Great and Powerful General Trixie!”

“We get it,” Gilda said, taking off her helmet to massage her temples.

“The meeting will be held at the city hall; what are you doing here?” Shining asked.

“Did you not think I would hear about another one being captured?”

“Well, I suppose not.”

“Anyways, the Great and Powerful General Trixie couldn’t help but overhear your little conversation! It appears the world ender, Twilight Sparkle, has finally been caught and her dear older brother is being unreasonable!”

“That is not so,” Shining said.

“Oh really?” Shining did not know what to reply with. “Well, The Great and Powerful General Trixie thinks your decision is right!”

“What? You do? I mean, of course.”

“Yes, it is only natural to bring her in! After all, an interrogation by all of the high officers should prove to be more effective at garnering more information about our enemies!” This was not what Shining wanted but he had no other choice.

“Yes, those were my thoughts as well.” At this, the other guards nodded in agreement and Gilda begrudgingly agreed as well. “I want Twilight Sparkle to be taken out from her cell and brought to the meeting room at city hall immediately!” Shining ordered from some of his soldiers. They nodded and hurried off.

“Well, let us not waste any more time! Goodness knows how precious The Great and Powerful General Trixie’s time is!” They all made their way to city hall and there they met the remaining high officers. When they had all gathered, Shining had now realized that there was an obvious question that Twilight had not asked her. Well, she would get her answer when she arrives.