Epilogue - Hoofprints
Twilight found Celestia in the royal gardens. Not so much a garden anymore. The rows of chrysanthemums had been torn out and cast aside, the brown of the earth piled high as guardsponies worked their shovels tirelessly, casting the heavy scent of dirt to the wind. Celestia sat on the only visible patch of grass, just off the pearlescent flagstones leading to the Dais of the Sun. The chrysanthemum petals danced about her in the wind, their colors of gold and white saturated by evening’s orange glow. Twilight sat down next to her.
Neither of them spoke for a long while, the sound of earth being moved more than making up for their silence. Twilight looked at her hooves, not for a loss of words, but for an understanding that Celestia should be first to speak. Her presence spoke its own volumes.
“Thank you for coming,” Celestia said. Her voice held its usual shimmer, but on its back rode a chill hollowness. Out of the corner of her eye, Twilight could see how absently Celestia stared into the holes before them.
“Of course, Princess.” She left it at that, unsure what to say after hurdling the greeting.
“My advisors are busy running Day Court, and I couldn’t bring myself to disturb Luna.”
“I would have come whether you asked me to or not,” Twilight said. She turned a smile to her mentor, one she surprisingly received in return. Love shone in Celestia’s eyes and squared her shoulders. But the light blew out of them just as quickly, and she turned away.
“I am sorry for what I almost did to you, Twilight. How blind I was to not see you standing right in front of me.” Her mouth hung open, words poised on the tip of her tongue. “I…” The rest didn’t come.
Twilight’s ears fell back against her head. “I should have told you from the beginning. I was afraid if I had been forthcoming that you wouldn’t have believed me, and with how much Mirror knew about me…”
She trailed into silence, the sound of shovels again taking the reins.
“So why the digging?”
Celestia didn’t answer immediately, but Twilight saw out the corner of her eye a tiny, hurt-filled smile play across her lips. “Mirror always knew chrysanthemums were my favorite. This garden specifically.” Her eyes gravitated toward a little swirl of petals an errant breeze kicked up. “The last place I’d look for Smoke Screen...”
Twilight shied away. The day before came back all too real. The honey-drop eyes smiling down at her. The threat of living her last moments inside a coffin of mirrors had fortune not smiled brighter...
“How is she?”
A pause. “She’s feeling better. I arranged for her and Sylissyth to share a cell, by your suggestion. They’re cooperative, and it seems we have you to thank for that.”
Twilight glanced back to catch her smile, like a ray of sunshine peeking through the clouds. She thought back to how she had let the changeling down from the wall to comfort Mirror. The chirruping sounds it had made. True friendship.
She blinked away the memory and found herself staring up at the sun, not needing to squint. It wasn't particularly bright that evening. “They might have made bad, unforgivable choices, but their love is real. And if that exists, then maybe there’s hope they’ll learn to love others, too.”
Celestia chuckled. “It seems you’ve learned a valuable lesson these last few days.”
Twilight restrained a sigh. A lesson learned through an ordeal that could have had disastrous consequences. It was hard to see it as a lesson. How it had been aimed at her, out of malice rather than the vague sense of conquest all her other adversaries had sought, took it to a personal level she had never felt before.
But she had a responsibility to uphold a standard, to be the beacon of friendship despite the hurt they had conspired to cause, to give of herself and take charge of rather than succumbing to a situation anypony else would warrant her deserving of playing the victim.
Princess Twilight Sparkle.
She had a lot to learn. About herself, and about the world. “Yeah…” She stared at the grass beneath her hooves. “I guess I have. We went through a lot,” Twilight said, her voice becoming distant. “Me and Rainbow Dash.”
“I can only imagine how it felt, Twilight.”
Twilight looked down. She heard in Celestia’s voice the careful treading, the specially picked words, avoiding the pitfalls of what had happened in the throne room. Things like that didn’t leave the heart any time soon.
“It’s not so much that. She went through it with me, that… that nightmare. She believed me. She believed in me.” She looked up at Celestia. “She trusted me with her life.”
Celestia returned her gaze with a smile. “From the sound of it, Rainbow Dash isn’t the only one.”
Twilight looked off into the distance, into the dark memories of the last three days. When she was alone, Rainbow Dash was there. Where she ran, Rainbow Dash followed. Where she had fallen, Rainbow Dash picked her up.
In many places, only four hooves left prints.
“Do you know why she trusted you?”
Twilight met her eyes. Celestia didn’t speak immediately, but Twilight could already hear the words the radiance in her eyes bespoke.
“Because I would have trusted her.”
Celestia’s smile widened a hair’s width. She looked back out onto the piles of earth growing ever higher around them. “More than that. You did trust her—to trust you when you needed it most. She followed you into the dark, even though neither of you knew the outcome.” Her wings partly unfolded from her sides. “And if there’s one thing I’ve learned in my years, Twilight, it’s that friendship like that isn’t given. It’s earned.”
Twilight absently followed her gaze, letting the statement bounce around in her head. She had endured many hardships both great and small since moving to Ponyville, and her friends had seen her through them time and again. Not a moment had passed when she ever felt unable to ask for help, or they were unwilling to give it.
Spike held a special place in her heart for that simple truth. Her unfailing voice of reason, now lying silent in a hospital bed. No number of needles or wound cleanings could have driven her from that room, but she would have been lying had she said the sight didn’t tear her up inside. She would have traded a thousand enchanted blades to the heart for his injuries.
Reading him the entire series of Power Ponies and the bags beneath her eyes could never make up for his bravery, but the smile on his face all through the night was worth her weight in gold.
“Is everything alright, Twilight?”
She tensed, wiping away tears she just noticed. “Yeah, everything’s fine.” He was in the hooves of the best doctors in Equestria, and Fluttershy had volunteered to stay by his side in her absence, even after all that had happened to her. She had no reason to get teary eyed. He’d be okay. He was a strong, brave dragon. “Will… will Mirror’s magic ever come back?”
“No.” Celestia’s voice came out cold, grieving. “Our best mages broke down her knife’s enchantment. Dark magic, from ages older than myself.”
The sentence hung in the air, a subject unwanted but unwilling to leave. Twilight desired nothing more to do with it, but a question gnawed at her. She looked up to Celestia. “Then why did mine?”
A genuine smile crossed Celestia’s lips. “I do not know. But I do know that I’ve never had a student with as much talent as you, Twilight.” Her eyes flicked to Twilight’s cutie mark. “And with a talent in magic, I can only speculate.”
They returned their gazes to the holes after a while, and the crunch of shovel against dirt filled increasingly uncomfortable minutes.
“Princess…” she said.
“Hmm?”
“Mirror had said... Mirror had said that I had taken everything from her. That… I had taken you from her.”
Only the sounds of the guards answered her, and as much as Twilight wanted to, she couldn’t bring herself to look her mentor in the eyes. Not with the weight of her last words on her shoulders.
“It was many years ago, Twilight.” Celestia spoke plainly, her voice neither floating like a summer breeze as was its norm, nor laden with guilt or heartache as it had been on their last meeting. “Smoke Screen and Mirror Image were sisters, Smoke the eldest. I had taken her under my wing for her gift in illusion magic. Like you, she always had her nose in a book, and she never bothered with making friends.” A light chuckle, and a glance. “Just like you.
“But where you discovered friendship, Smoke dove further into her studies, to the point of never even leaving her study.” She lowered her head. “Mirror was fascinated with her sister’s abilities long before they applied to the School for Gifted Unicorns. When I met them, she latched onto the idea that I would teach them both.” Something tensed her eyebrows ever so slightly, and her ears fell back. “She latched onto me.
“She followed me around wherever I went. At least, wherever she was allowed to follow. Half the castle thought she was my personal student instead of Smoke.” She chuckled. “That little smile of hers…
“But as much as I would have enjoyed teaching her, Mirror simply didn’t have the prowess of her bigger sister, and I was fool enough to direct her to Canterlot Academy’s standard classes. I had no idea how deep it hurt her, and even less how much it consumed her.
“She did everything she had to gain my approval, to take what she believed was her rightful place as my personal student, but when I didn’t grant her her wish, she left in a fit of rage.” She took a tremulous breath. “I don’t know when it happened, but…”
They both looked at the holes dug before them.
“You’d think after ruling for hundreds of years, I’d notice cues like that more easily. That I would have noticed the differences in Smoke’s attitude sooner, connected the dots like anypony else would have been able to.”
“Princess…” Twilight raised a hoof, but put it back down, instead leaning toward her. “It’s not your fault. You know that.”
A weak smile slowly crept onto Celestia’s face. “They say time heals all wounds.” She turned to Twilight. “But the only ponies to ever say that weren’t alicorns.”
The urge to refute and comfort—to say that time did indeed heal all wounds—rolled to the tip of Twilight’s tongue, but Celestia’s voice rang of experience, not just wisdom. She swallowed her words, looking down. All she could do was stay by her side, remind her she wasn’t alone.
The shouts around them grew louder, and Celestia perked up, looking to the far end of the garden. There, the guards gathered around one of the holes.
Twilight could feel the tension in her mentor, the way her ears swivelled forward, wings slightly open. She wanted to be there for her, to help her through what must have been a tempest of emotions. But she knew herself to be just one student in a list that could span the globe, and that never lessened how special each and every name was to Celestia. She couldn’t intrude on that sanctity.
“I’ll be here, Princess.”
Celestia leaned back, her ears flicking toward her. Her face came around, bringing with it a smile warmer than the sun above suddenly felt. “Thank you, Twilight.” With that, she took to the air, landing before the coffin the guardsponies were pulling out with ropes.
Cherry, Twilight couldn’t help but notice. A bright polish that flashed in the sunlight, despite unknown years underground. She saw the tiny figure of Celestia raise a hoof to its side, her horn aglow. The casket opened, and for a long time, nopony moved.
Slowly, Celestia’s wings fell limp to her sides, her head lowered to the casket, and the sky fell dim. Bodies gathered around Celestia, obscuring her from view.
Though she could see no more, Twilight remained. She was a mare of her word, and no matter how much it hurt to not stand by Celestia’s side, she held firm. She let out a sigh, watching, waiting, as the sun slipped behind the Clefthoof mountains across the valley, until all but Celestia departed from the casket.
The moon shone full despite its waning schedule to cast the world in a brighter candescence, twinkling off the pearlescent flagstones and distant Dais. Condolences from Luna, Twilight knew. She wondered where in the castle, what tall tower she watched from, sympathizing from afar.
Twilight’s eyes rose to the castle skyline, where innumerable shadows reached up to blend with the night sky. Though she caught no glimpse of Luna, she saw her image spread across the starry backdrop.
She had been consumed by jealousy once, had let it drive her to destroy all she had once loved. The Elements of Harmony brought her back from that ledge, and long since had her worries of reinstatement been banished. She found love again, despite a thousand years spent alone in darkness. And if Luna had, then hope remained for Mirror.
The thought lowered her eyes to Celestia in the distance. She could no longer see the casket, and likewise Celestia’s mane had long since melded with the shadows. But the way her shoulders dipped, Twilight knew her head hung low, possibly nestled beside Smoke’s as she caressed her mane.
What lengths Celestia would have gone to had she known of Mirror’s deceit. How wholly it must have consumed her once she did.
If only Mirror could have seen it.
She would have to visit her soon. Twilight had never been fond of the dungeons, but her duty—her friendship—exceeded her reluctance. No creature stepped beyond that brink, as Zecora had said. No matter how far they had fallen.
But that was not now. Now belonged to Celestia, as she had promised. So Twilight waited, beside the holes and cast-aside chrysanthemums, the still night air long spent of its earthy smell. For Celestia. For as long as she needed.
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Huh, hard to believe after all that wait it's over so fast.
i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/PrimitiveScrewhead1973/9593166.jpg
6194257
The Love album version of the song is more appropriate here.
6574811 Look, we have different standards for liking/disliking. My standards are if I like something, I click the like button, if I dislike something, I press the dislike button. Whenever I press dislike, I make a comment about why, since I'm pretty sure most authors like to know why people dislike it. It's not a perfect system, I admit it's horribly biased and this story might not deserve the dislike, but it's what I go with. I'll do it your way if knighty, or even a mod, says it's the correct way.
I suppose everyone can probably tell by the description that, despite the title, this story has nothing to do with the Beatles or music in general. But... why is Mr. Kite a mare? Seriously, why? If they were a stallion, or at the very least disguised as a stallion, then the title would have been clever. With them being a mare, it feels the title was just stapled on to the story in a strangely underhanded attempt to attract more readers.
Given how this story has significantly less than average likes, and significantly greater than average dislikes, I don't think it worked. Now this was a bit of a nitpick, but I bring it up because it's literally the least of this fic's many bizarre problems. With all the out-of-character behavior, poorly constructed sequences, and a horribly thought out overarching motif, I could talk about this for a while.
The characters are all off. Twilight is dumb in some very odd ways. For example, she feels like time is flying and interprets it as a bad omen in Chapter 1. Has she never experienced losing track of time before? And then there's how the townspeople seem a bit too... out for blood in later chapters. In a show called "Friendship is Magic", I think a bit more was needed to trigger such bloodlust.
There's a few sequences which are absolutely incomprehensible. At least 3 times in the first half of the fic, there are passages where one thing is happening, and then another thing is happening, and I can't tell where one thing ends and the other starts. Often the writing seems so wrapped up in conveying every minute emotion that it forgets to actually describe things properly.
The way this story is wrapped up in illusions is just not executed well. There's a sense of there being some set of rules to the smoke and mirrors, but it's so convoluted that I can't believe it wasn't just being made up as the story progressed. I mean, there's that spell to see through illusions in Chapter 10,, and yet Twilight never used it on herself despite seeming to know about.
This story is a spectacular mess. Granted, I have to put emphasis on "spectacular", as there was something mesmerizing about the story until Chapter 8. It was so sure of itself, yet not pretentious, and that was a bit enjoyable. The remainder of the story was noticeably worse in quality. With Twilight's incredibly stupid plan in meeting with Celestia, her even dumber decision to put the hex back on herself after Zecora removed it, the final fight scene which is very hard to follow, and the resolution which tries to make me feel sorry for characters who are barely explained, the final third cements this as a very bad story. With the multitude wrong with it, "mess" is the best word I can think of to describe this fic.
Okay, so on the whole, I liked this story. Going in (especially with the cover art in mind), I wasn't expecting the dark aspects to be quite so… frustrating—so much to do with Twilight not being able to make herself understood. And that frustration was very effective, with me feeling it right along with her.
And I was very happy that that wasn't all there was to the story, too. I'd been worried that the story would be confined to the circus, and that the scope widened as it went was a big relief. It wasn't constantly dark, I wasn't constantly worried that what I was seeing was an illusion. It's worth noting that the latter was a bit of a problem early on, though—the weird emphasis on the illusions book at the start (weird in that Rainbow's interest wasn't entirely believable and that the existence of the book was so convenient to the plot) had me convinced for far too long that all the rules Twilight was so sure of, including her later assertion that “Illusions cannot alter past knowledge”, were just the product of a book that was itself an illusion. It was so hard for me to trust anything towards the start, Twilight sometimes felt less cautious than I'd expect from her characterization elsewhere in the story.
Still, like I said, the way the piece grew outwards into a fuller story with a larger setting down the line made it a lot more enjoyable. Pretty much from the point that Twilight wakes up in that clinic, I knew I wasn't going to leave the story disappointed.
Also, you're pretty good at zebra dialogue, man. Way too rare.
And… *ahem*. Not to white knight, but…
6749493
Friend, I've got no clue where you're coming from with some of your points, and this is probably the main one. The story may not have much to do with Beatles music or music in general, but it has quite a bit to do with that particular song—a song that suggests in its apathetic tone the thin veneer of a happy circus over something darker or emptier beneath, which applies here both to the circus and to Mr. Kite herself. And it's a stretch, but you could here take the performance being for the benefit of Mr. Kite literally, as a statement that it's all for Mr. Kite's benefit rather than that of an audience. And as to Mr. Kite being a mare, I'm amazed not only that you don't find it clever, but that you can't seem to fathom the point of it; I took it as being like Willy Wonka's first onscreen appearance in Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, where he acts decrepit and leans on a cane as he walks, then proceeds to abandon the cane and do a somersault for the crowd—like with Wonka, the revelation that Kite is a mare establishes immediately that she isn't to be trusted, and, more than that, that she's been lying to Twilight and the reader from the first page of the story.
She was losing hours in conversations and walks that should've been taking minutes. If you're lose track of time like that, something's wrong.
Someone had, to their eyes, beaten their friend and princess bloody and was about to stab her. Then Sylissyth yelled to the gathered mob that they had to stop her. I feel like that's a lot.
I'll agree with you, though, that parts of the story were very difficult to follow, especially the final fight scene. Past that, I definitely don't agree that the story on the whole was poorly executed, or that the later parts of the story were of a lower quality.
6760580
Hey, don't worry about it. I'm completely open to debate, and you've made some constructive points.
I think it was pretty obvious from the outset, given how the story treats the circus as suspicious immediately, that Kite wasn't to be trusted. If the purpose is to make her seem untrustworthy, than it's redundant, especially with how at that point she'd already kidnapped Spike. All it is to me is confusing.
I still think this can be attributed to losing track of time, especially considering her tendency to be neurotic at times. But barring that, the story immediately concludes it has something to do with the circus, then just drops the subject. We never get a more plausible reason for this weird sense of time than her just losing track of it. If it had something to do with this circus, the story never explains how, it just insists this is the case for a bit, then seems to forget about it. I find that sloppy at best.
Fair enough. Maybe my issue here has more to do with how hard to follow it was leading up to that scene (how did the entire town suddenly get gathered there, etc).
I should clarify myself with why I thought the last bit was weaker. The issues I saw in the latter third were in the ways the story presents things plot points which were quite simply ludicrous. Earlier in the story, when Twilight is essentially being carried by the torrent of events, I find myself caring about her plight. I care a whole lot less once, when she suddenly has some control, she proves herself to be incompetent. I slogged through the last few chapters because I no longer cared and was no longer hooked, and to me, that is one of the biggest things a story can do wrong.
6760914
I'll grant you that she was already untrustworthy, but in my eyes, the name takes it to a new level. If this were a stallion saying he was named "Mr. Kite", I might well just nod along and then groan when it comes out that that's not actually his name as though that's actually anything of an impactful twist. With a mare, the name is recognizably false to the point that it underlines how much of a complete unknown she is even as we're finding out about her, and when we do learn her name, it fills in an established blank rather than trying to seem clever. And what about it is confusing? A performer can take any name they want.
That's something I'll stand with you on. Minus the bit about her losing track of time being the most plausible thing (again, hours in minutes is just too much for me to have come to that conclusion), I thought the same.
I was actually hooked more from that point, myself—lack of character agency bothers me hugely, even if that was kind of the crux of what Kite was doing to Twilight. I guess I didn't really see most of her choices as incompetent. Twilight's decision not to come clean to Celestia was adequately reasoned out even if it wound up probably being a mistake, and the fact that she recognized it might have been a mistake in hindsight put to bed any of my lingering discomfort about it. Her decision to put the hexes back on again, in particular, made perfect sense to me for exactly the reasons she stated.
Which isn't to say I didn't take issue with some of her choices, mind: namely the bit where she ties her utterly recognizable handkerchief on her train car so Rainbow will know which she's in for no discernible reason apart from that it moves the plot forward for the search party to see her—she could have just waited until the train was out of the station to do that if she really felt she had to, anyway. Also the fact that she leaps from the Canterlot Castle window without having Rainbow fly her down—at the time, I thought maybe Rainbow's changeling wings might be too weak for that, but then the moment comes a bit later where Rainbow catches her just fine in free fall, Twilight even expecting it.
So yeah, there are sloppy bits, but not as many in my eyes as I suppose were in your eyes, and far from enough to ruin the last few chapters for me.
6761057
Alright. I think we're basically on the same page now, and our disagreements are largely just about personal interpretation. Thanks for being willing to debate with me, I enjoyed it.
6764771
Same to you, man.
yes this was just as awesome the second time 'round
Intriguing, interesting, and very compelling; what you did here was amazing Mirror Image was a very scary and interesting villain that dripped evil but was never really cliché. A villain that actually has an issue with Twilight personally was something I've been wanting since I first saw Return of Harmony. [Spoilers?] We kind of got it with Starlight but she's good now and only threated the fabric of time and Twilight's past, never Twi directly (really).
Mirror on the other hand is well developed, charismatic, and down right haunting. Another compelling foil to Twilight that has the edge turned up to 11. Her background is fascinating and tragic. I really would have liked to learn more about her, seen her with Celestia, her relation ship with her sister, her travals around the world looking and meeting Sylissyth.
However, this wasn't about the villain but Twilight and I think you did her fantastically. All stories that go this really mature route are kind of suspect being that we don't know how any of the characters would react to these situations but I think Twi was really well done here. Her choices in confronting Celestia were questionable but understandable and I take no real issue with them, I doubt 'Tia would have believed her and that she would have responded poorly to Smoke Screen showing up talking about body switching.
And speaking of which, Celestia, Zacora, and Rainbow Dash. You just chose my favorite characters from the show for the supporting roles.
They were all well done and enjoyable and just so much yes about this story 
any way the moral was fantastical job 9/10 have reread and will do so again
Well, here I was with two chapters of a story called "For the Benefit of Mr. Kite" about a mysterious and evil circus coming into town sitting in my Onedrive, and then I find a story just like it in the related stories of my one FiMFiction story. Well, I'm still gonna work on my own, as it is a non-MLP story and has some differences. But dang, what a coincidence! An from what I'm seeing in these comments, this story is pretty good. I'll have to read it some time!
I was thoroughly creeped out by this story in the way a reader wants to be. Amazing story.
I have one cluster of questions: Where was Fluttershy being held? How did she escape / how was she rescued? Did Ssisylith reveal her location after the big fight, or did I miss something in the story itself?
I thought it was a very good example of Baudrillard's concept of simulacrum how despite the fact that their body-swap spells were hexes, not illusions, Twilight and Rainbow recognized each other because they both understood magical illusions; the rules acted as a doppelganger test, even as they failed to be a spell-breaker.
7228261
Glad you liked it!
Sorry to say, but no, you didn't miss anything; those never really had a definite answer. Not because I didn't care, but because those details never had any relevance to the story other than 'they happened, cue story consequences.' If you want a general answer from my brain, Fluttershy (and Rarity and Spike, you forgetful monster
) was thrown bound and gagged into some dark room, until the inevitable rescue. Fluttershy was left longer than the other two, simply because Syllisyth needed a body to impersonate, while the others were saved and their horror stories used to solidify Kite's version of events.
After the events of chapter 10, I like to think they did reveal her location, whether out of a change of heart, or out of some semblance of self-preservation. Again, these details weren't important to the story, only their consequences to the story itself.
Hope that helps!
7228745 I was hoping it was something like that. I guess there is some good in everypony.
You can has review!
8079364
Why not??
I remember reading this as it was coming out years ago, finishing it and enjoying it very much. Now here we are 9 years later, and I suddenly had the urge to reread this story. Out of all the many stories I've read here on filmfiction.net, this is one of the ones that has stuck with me for life.
I would call this a classic, required reading for those who enjoy mlp fanfiction. 10 out of 10.
11656430
Thank you for the help! I'll definitely put it to good use