Path of Redemption

by Lucidenn

Prologue

"Welcome Princess, to the Shadow Realm."

That would have to be the last thing Twilight would have guessed this place to be. She was surrounded by an enormous forest absolutely teeming with life. She could hear birds chirping in the air and squirrels darting across the branches. The ferns at her feet rustled with the movements of small mammals, and somewhere nearby she thought she could hear a river babbling away. The light shining through the canopy of each tree was gentle and somehow distorted, as if there was some large mass of water overhead that the sun was shining through.

"Not quite what you expected, is it?"

Twilight slowly shook her head no, it was nothing like she would have imagined a place called the Shadow Realm to be.

"The Shadow Realm molds itself to reflect the mind of whoever enters it. Since I've already been here several times, it's focusing all of its attention on you. What you see around you is the reflection of the darkness within your very soul."

Twilight realized now then why this place seemed so strange yet so familiar. She'd seen it before. With a glance to the sky she searched as hard as she could, until she finally caught a glimmer through the tree branches. Water, she was in the forest on the ocean floor of her mind, but it looked nothing like how she'd seen it from above.

"How can my inner darkness look so....?"

"Beautiful? Why shouldn't it? Those who are evil are simply doing what they believe to be right. It doesn't see itself as evil after all, that's just the word others describe it by."

"You brought me here to face my inner darkness you said, but now that I'm looking at it, how am I supposed to do that?"

"Look behind you for that answer"

Where there had been a simple clearing in the woods now stood a rocky cave entrance, sticking out of the ground at a 35 degree angle. In the darkness of the tunnel, a faint light could be seen at the very end of it. Sombra strode up next to Twilight and gave her a comforting nuzzle. "You don't have to do this you know, you can still go back to your friends and your home. It's not too late, not until you step into that cave."

The concern in his words and in his eyes melted Twilight a little, and combined with his gentle touch helped replace her apprehension with happiness. She was making the right decision, she just knew it. "It's alright Sombra, I know that together we can..."

"I will not be able to assist you love, only you can pass over the cave's threshold. Only you can meet whatever waits you down there. Be very careful Twilight, you can still die in this place, and there is no way of knowing what you might come up against. I can only guarantee that when you come back up you won't be the internally divided princess anymore. The choices you make beneath, will define you for the rest of your life."

"I can do this, I know I can, and I think I already knew that I wouldn't come out of this unchanged. Just...promise me one thing? That you won't..."

"I already love you for everything you are Princess. Whichever side of you wins the battle below, I could never love you any less."

Twilight smiled, blushing a little but otherwise glowing with happiness. That was all that she needed to hear, and more. With a deep breath she smiled. She was ready, despite the cheeky voice in her mind that commented on the number of life-changing events happening to her beneath the ground recently. "I'll be back up soon, try not to wonder off." She said with a smirk.

"I have nowhere to go if not with you my love."

His unexpected romanticism caused her face to flush with blood once more, and after a long, passionate parting kiss (she had originally intended it to be a quick peck on the cheek, but her body had other had other ideas that gave it a mind of its own) Twilight took her first steps beneath the ground. On and on the tunnel stretched, the light at the end never growing any nearer, and the tunnel around her never changing. For all she knew she could have been walking in place for 5 minutes, 10, an hour, a week. Time had lost all meaning except for the rhythmic clopping of her hooves upon stone. After an eternity, or perhaps less than a day, she finally reached a wall of brilliant light. Without missing a beat Twilight strode calmly through to the other side, blinking furiously to adjust to the change in illumination.

What she saw once again reminded her about the foolish nature of preconceptions. She was back at her home, the Golden Oaks Library in Ponyville. Just behind her was her front door, now closed. She half expected to find Spike engulfed in one of his favorite comic books. Instead in the middle of the room was a rather large book fort, occupied by one decidedly smug Twilight Sparkle.

"Ah Twilight! We're just on time, quickly now into the fort, before the trolls and weedlesnips capture us for their nefarious purposes!"

Thoroughly bewildered, Twilight sat down midst the heavy fortification with Twilight, who seemed to be preoccupied with scanning the room for signs of danger and threateningly wielding a filly's picture book. Catching the look Twilight was giving her, she smiled winningly, "It's the best weapon in existence! Remember how the pen is mightier than the sword? Well, a picture is worth a thousand words, so that means this picture book is a weapon of mass destruction!"

"Who are you?"

Twilight looked at her in surprise, as if it should have been obvious. "We're Twilight Sparkle of course! That makes you the goody-four-shoes, and me the far less socially acceptable." Still maintaining the grin she hefted the book mightily over the wall and was rewarded by a bloodcurdling scream silenced by an explosion like dynamite. With a wet splat the upper half of a leg landed within the fort. "Drat, a femur. I've got quite a lot of those; trying to collect a full set." A magical flash later and the body part was gone, teleported away to who knew where.

"That can't be true, I would never take pleasure in...", Twilight motioned to the wet bloodstain on the floor, "whatever it is that you're doing."

"Oh but you do Twilight. We're more powerful than anypony out there, and deep down you love the feeling of exerting that power over others."

Looking for a way to fault her argument, Twilight's eyes lit up. "Not Sombra, we, I mean I'm not more powerful then him or the other princesses."

"Hmmm yes, Sombra is certainly our equal. We caught a real dreamboat didn't we?"

Twilight was most uncomfortable with the way Twilight's eyes gleamed with lusty satisfaction, so she quickly changed the topic. Other self or not, she absolutely did not want to see or hear that about her Sombra from anypony other than herself. "So, what happens next then, what are we supposed to do?"

"Now, we talk, fight, or do whatever works. One way or another, we're both trapped in this room until we are resolved. We're here because we are divided Twilight, and neither of us is ever going to leave this room again. Instead we'll finally be whole, complete, one with our self. It's up to us now to determine the truth of who it is we really want to be."

Hefting another picture book into the seemingly empty room, Twilight was rewarded with another scream and bloody body part.

"Oooooh, a scapula! Those are rare!"
****

Sombra's ears perked up at the sound of hoof-steps getting closer. From the depths of the cave entrance a regal purple form began to emerge. Twilight was clearly exhausted, and yet she still managed to exude an air of self-assuredness. She was somehow taller, and more vibrant before, and as she reached him her perfect smile lit up her eyes and his heart. He couldn't help but to feel a bit astonished, and perhaps dissapointed as well. After all his memories, his teachings, his inner demons; after having betrayed her very home, her friends, her country, and used black magic to the greatest level of mastery he'd seen since himself, still she had chosen to side with good.

"I'm back my King...what's wrong?"

"I must admit my heart is confused. I don't understand how you could have faced everything that I have faced, and still choose the side of light. What is to happen to us now? I'm unsure of how to proceed."

She smiled in response, warmer than the sun, "Then perhaps it is my turn to teach you my love. Let me show you how to embrace your evil and become even greater for it, how to take your knowledge of pain and use it to ease the pain of others."

"But I made a different choice than you my love, long ago I decided on my path, and that path lasts for a lifetime."

"And you have lived dozens of lifetimes in your centuries of darkness. I promised you that I would take the time to learn from you so that I could truly understand, and you would know it. Let me complete my promise my King, give me a chance to show you a path you haven't walked since Indigo Melody." Sombra winced visibly at the name, it was still painful to think about his beloved sister, even after so many years. "Besides, consider it my challenge to you. They say an old dog can't learn new tricks, and you're just about the oldest dog alive. Let's prove them all wrong."

Sombra was quiet, eyes downcast in contemplation, when suddenly he threw his head back in laughter. "Perhaps you know me even better than I know myself my Queen...."

"Challenge, accepted."

Comments

[Moongaze14]

Love the alternate depiction of the chapter. And I love the Twibra cover art. God, I miss the Twibra blog.

[djthomp]

Awesome! And here I was thinking there would be a bit of a wait before we got this version of the sequel.

[Nealend86]

A jump cut to after she conquers her inner evil? I hope you plan on revisiting her inner battle later because that's a bit of a let down.

[Kenny]

Ah, I see. Path of Redemption is an AU-divergence between what occurs when Twilight faces Dark-Twilight; very nice, very nice.

...Now i kinda want to see that fight of both AU's versus the other in an epic multiversal clash; maybe have an overabundance of dark magic in the Damnation Path tweak the EQG Mirror-Portal to the Redemption Path?

Either way, I'm happy to see both options presented before me!

[Banshee]

Don't really know where your going with these alternate versions of the story but I like (you might want to find yourself an editor though, I've noticed some minor mistakes in your stories)

[Tephera]

Twilight looked at her in surprise, as if it should have been obvious. "We're Twilight Sparkle of course! That makes you the goody-four-shoes, and me the far less socially acceptable." Still maintaining the grin she hefted the book mightily over the wall and was rewarded by a bloodcurdling scream silenced by an explosion like dynamite.

Was that the Bombinomicon?

[Nethaufer]

4534341 Nope, just a picture book. As said earlier in this chapter, words are power and pictures are worth a thousand words. Therefore, picture books are weapons of mass destruction.

[dj-pone3fan]

4537175
I need to use that logic in a joke at some point

[zimmerwald1915]

4531631
I can't help but agree. Lucidenn did, however, put the jump cut in both Prologues. Since we have been told he has more ideas for the other timeline, he could not have included the jump cut for lack of an idea of what to show.

[King of Kings]

"We're Twilight Sparkle of course! That makes you the goody-four-shoes, and me the far less socially acceptable."