Do Not Go Gentle

by ShinigamiDad

No Deal

Twilight had just settled comfortably, when she felt the hair raise up along her spine. She shuddered.

“B-back so soon?” she stammered as Reaper’s form came into sharper focus, and his eyes slowly opened.

“Well,” he replied, “Luna’s kind of “gone missing,” so I figured I’d take the opportunity to touch base with you, and give you our first “report,” as it were.”

“So did you find out anything useful?” asked Twilight.

“Yeah--I learned Luna still has a lot of issues to work out!”

Twilight scowled.

“Ah, never mind. Anyway…” he shifted and looked directly into Twilight’s dilating pupils. “Let me transfer the memories of my past few experiences to you. These will encompass the death vision of the earth pony, Golden Leaf, and the final nightmare of pegasus Firebrand.”

“F-final nightmare? Did you get a look at the killer, like you hoped?”

“No. And “hoped” is a good word, here. I hoped for a quick strike, but didn’t really expect one. Still, it was useful. Now, empty your mind, and let my memories become yours.” He leaned forward slightly.

A series of emotions rapidly played across Twilight’s face: pity, confusion, hope, embarrassment, and abject horror. Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes.

“How terrible!” she blurted out as Reaper closed his eyes and leaned back. “Poor Firebrand! Is Luna OK?”

Reaper glanced over at Luna’s slumbering form. “Kind of hard to tell from here. When I shift back into the dreamscape, I hope I don’t find myself sitting on a single cracked flagstone from the ruins of her old castle, suspended in nothingness, again!”

His eyes rolled upward and crossed, focusing above his forehead.

“Well, the thread is still there, so she must be somewhere in the dreamscape.” He sighed. “Guess I’d better go find her. See you soon!”

With that he closed his eyes, and faded slightly, as though he were an old, sun-bleached photograph.

Twilight took a deep breath and slumped forward with a relieved sigh.

She turned to the small table, levitated a quill and jotted down a few notes, paying particular attention to Reaper’s recollection of the final crushing darkness that ended Firebrand’s fatal nightmare.

She looked intently at Luna’s lined face. “Please be OK, Luna!” she whispered.

---

Reaper reemerged into the emptiness he had left minutes before, suspended in an inky void.

He shook his head sadly. “Not now, Princess!” he shouted into the void. “We have business to attend to! I know what you saw really tore into you, but we need to keep going--we don’t have enough information. All Firebrand did was back-up what little I already knew from Dew Drop’s death.”

“No!” Luna yelled from the darkness, her voice cracking. “Firebrand showed me that I should have been destroyed, not exiled! I remember everything about that scene, now, in lurid, burning detail!

“Yes, I understand,” Reaper replied, “but as you pointed out, you’re no longer that pony--you’ve been redeemed, and shown yourself worthy of love and trust more than once!” He strained his eyes, trying to pierce the darkness, and catch a glimpse of Luna.

Luna dropped down out of the darkness, and another weathered flagstone appeared beneath her hooves, hovering a few yards from Reaper.

She confronted him, eyes wide with anguish: “I know that you, too, were feared, but…”

He cut her off archly, “am feared, and frequently loathed, thank you very much!”

“But,“ she continued, “you are not reviled and remembered for wanton, capricious cruelty, such as that which I inflicted on Firebrand! That was but a few years ago, and I can still remember it vividly! I thought it would be such a lark to let him take me as he would any other mare, then reveal myself at the moment of his greatest ecstasy, destroying his last happy memory of life before being swallowed by death!”

She squeezed her eyes tightly, tears running down her cheeks, jaw clenched to stop its trembling.

Reaper nodded: “Yeah, that was pretty shitty, I’ll grant you…”

Luna’s eyes snapped open and blazed with anger. She began to speak.

“But,” Reaper interjected before she could cut him off, “at least you had cause to be reviled and accused of cruelty--which, may I remind you, is no longer the case. Come with me--I’ve found our next subject, and I believe she may help prove my point…”

Luna ground her teeth, but acquiesced: “Fine. Where or when are we bound this time?”

“First things first…” Reaper dipped his horn low, and the flagstone on which he was standing expanded in all directions, rushing off to infinity. The space around the two ponies became brighter grey, then washed out to a pale white, all-suffusing glow.

“Ah, home sweet home,” snarked Luna. “And you have the temerity to criticize my astral refuge!”

Reaper grinned: “Like I said, world-building isn't my forte!” He gestured behind Luna: “Pick a door.”

She looked over her shoulder and rolled her eyes: “Given there is but one door, your offer of a choice seems pointless.”

“Yeah, giving options isn’t a real strength of mine, either. Case in point…” The door swung open, and Luna found herself standing on a riverbank, swollen flood waters swirling dangerously all around. She started, and took to the air, hovering above the wreckage of a raft.

“Please help me! Anypony!” cried an old stallion, sprawled across the crumbling planks and poles. Luna squinted through the lashing rain, and saw that the elderly unicorn wasn’t the impending victim--a smaller, younger unicorn was.

She was clinging to the edge of what remained of the raft, which was being swept into the center of the debris-filled river. The older unicorn was reaching for her hooves.

Luna resisted the urge to swoop down, knowing the scene to be just a vision, and hovered helplessly above.

“Celestia, please! Anypony! Don’t let my daughter die! I’m old--take me! Spare her! I’ll do anything!” shouted the old stallion into the teeth of the storm.

Reaper walked calmly across the raging water, and shook his head sadly: “Sorry, old-timer--it doesn’t work like that.”

The stallion’s ears perked up for a moment: “Please!” He pleaded, looking about wildly, “anything--just save Snow Sprite!”

Reaper sighed and stepped toward the front of the crumbling craft as the old pony’s daughter slipped from its edge, screaming and choking on the brown waters rushing over her head.

Moments later there was a tearing crash as the jumble of wood and canvas rammed into a half-submerged tree, pinning the young mare with a crunch. Her eyes flew open, and blood spurted from her mouth.

Luna leaned it, horrified but fascinated as images of places and ponies flickered by before the mare’s sightless, ice-blue eyes.

Blood sputtered from between her lips: “Haymaker...help. Dad? Is that...love...you. Haymake--”

Her head flopped back as the river pulled her broken, ivory-white body free of the tangled wood, and sucked it under. Reaper dipped his head below the churning foam for a moment, then reemerged.

The doorway reappeared and collapsed around the scene, leaving Snow Sprite’s father’s cries ringing in Luna’s ears as she dropped back on the endless gray expanse of Reaper’s chamber.

Luna blinked away a tear, and opened her eyes to find Reaper standing before her.

“How awful to see your child killed mere feet away!” Luna exclaimed.

Reaper nodded. “And to make it worse, old Woody died some days later of his injuries, cursing fate--i.e. me--for the loss of Snow Sprite.”

Luna furrowed her brow: “Did he actually hear you when you spoke?”

“It’s never entirely clear. I do make an impression on most ponies, at the moment of death, and occasionally others may also sense me.”

Reaper sat down next to Luna.

He looked at Luna, who was still lost in her thoughts. “So,” he began, ”what about this “Haymaker?” Real, or not? I’ve accounted for the other images that flitted by, and “Dad” is obvious.”

Luna took a deep breath. ”I am loath to venture back into the dreamscape again, so soon.”

Reaper’s eyes narrowed and he opened his mouth.

Luna raised a hoof in front of his face before he could speak: “However, I realize how vital this is, and so must do my part!”

Reaper shut his mouth and nodded.

Luna closed her eyes and began to breath softly but deeply.

“I believe she meant Mister Haymaker, an old teacher of hers from when she was a filly. He seems to fit the image I saw at the last moment, and I believe I know the source of many earlier dreams.”

She stood and steeled herself: “Let’s go.”