The Immortal Dream

by Czar_Yoshi

Over The Edge

Elise promised it was all in my head, but I could swear the temperature was already falling.

The four of us sat inside the bedroom, the only door closed, a plethora of colored lights from two horns and my bracelet illuminating us in lieu of having working power. Not ten minutes had passed since we were evicted from Ludwig's room, and yet everyone was giving each other silent stares, deciding who would dare to ask what question first. Elise insisted the windigo was bad news, but we had to go back there to get the power back on, and everyone but me had to go there as well to pass through to the statue room and the door to the outside... Going back out the way we had originally entered had been floated as an idea, but between the collapsed segment of the staircase and it being at least two hours' normal pace in the wrong direction, it was even less appealing.

"...So what was that about?" Corsica eventually asked, playing with her mane.

I nodded along. "I think you owe us an explanation," I said to Elise. "What's a windigo? How do you know about them? And if they're so dangerous, why didn't we know too? For that matter, why didn't we know about changelings, either?"

"I've heard of windigoes, but only from old wives' tales and the like," Ansel added, crossing his forelegs and sitting down. "And only a long time ago. You're telling me they're more than just a myth?"

Elise looked modestly uncomfortable. "Those are quite a few questions."

Corsica shrugged. "You don't say."

"And they're kind of important ones," I added. "I know you're wise and worldly and stuff, and we're just a bunch of teenagers, but that's not going to change if you never tell us what we need to know. Changelings, windigoes... I bet all that stuff is censored in Icereach, isn't it? They seem a little supernatural for the local tastes. Maybe you should trust us to know what we need to know to take care of ourselves. Otherwise, we're gonna run into a mystical whatsit and we're all gonna die because we took too long arguing over whether or not to run."

Elise looked away, and was quiet for a moment. All three of us waited.

"Has it ever occurred to you," she eventually said, "that everyone who works for Icereach is older than the institute itself?"

I paused. Not really, but... "Why?"

"Even you and Corsica predate it, if only by months," Elise went on. "Although you would not be old enough to remember life outside its walls. I know our forbidding certain types of information annoys you, but have you ever imagined the perspective of everyone who remembers before it?"

Corsica blinked. "...Ohhh. I get it."

I frowned at her, trying to follow whatever connection she had made. "I mean, I got a pretty clear message from the librarians that no, they weren't importing original source material, stop asking, thanks... But-"

And then it clicked for me, too: Elise was implying everyone already knew what it was that was being censored. And that meant they were all complicit with it.

Well, everyone but us.

"What?" Ansel glanced at me and Corsica and shrugged cluelessly.

"More importantly, why?" I asked, putting my theory to the test. "So maybe the stuff you're hiding is an open secret, except to youngsters like us. But if we'd known about changelings, who's to say we couldn't have done something before Aldebaran snared us? And you keep saying the windigo is dangerous too. Why is hiding stuff more important than preparing us for stuff like that?"

Elise raised an eyebrow. "Need I remind you that I was the first one captured by their deceit?"

I met her eyes and stared. "Just because it didn't help once doesn't mean it couldn't help ever."

"Look," Ansel said, "we can't just take your word for things when there's changelings afoot. That takes a hearty helping of trust, which is in precious short supply when any one of us could be a mole in disguise. No offense intended, it's just the way things are."

"I am aware of that," Elise evenly replied. "I am also aware that there are very good reasons why certain things are not talked about in Icereach."

"Good enough to leave us as sitting ducks?" I pressed, insistent. "Come on, if it's that important, at least tell us why you won't tell us!"

For a moment, the room was tense.

"I suppose," Elise sighed, "that you are adults, and you have a right to know why your home works the way that it does. But there's one thing you need to understand about governments first. When powerful ponies cooperate, it frequently involves them doing the same thing for different reasons. The one true reason Icereach censors material is simply because that was what worked best for all the parties present for the Institute's creation. All of those parties had their own reasons, not all of which I know and none of which will seem to fit the solution on their own. If you're used to mathematical problems with a logical, correct answer, you won't find that here."

I tilted my head, thinking about what kind of story could merit that preface. Part of me understood what Elise was saying, but it didn't make sense at the same time. Could you really call something a solution if it didn't properly solve things for anyone involved?

"Makes sense to me." Corsica looked like she knew all that already. Ansel nodded too, and for some reason I felt a little left out.

Elise took a deep breath. "Alright, then. Which one first? Changelings or windigoes?"

"Change-"

"-digos!"

Ansel and Corsica both spoke over each other, then stopped, giving each other a look. Elise glanced to me, looking for a tiebreaker.

"Well, I am curious about the changelings," I admitted. "But windigoes seem like a more pressing matter when there's literally one using this place's power switch to blackmail us into hanging out with it. Maybe let's save the changelings for when they're the biggest thing we have to worry about."

"Sensible, albeit not what I expected you to pick," Elise said, then paused. "...How shall I begin this?"

"What's their pedigree?" Ansel asked, taking well enough to the topic even though he had voted otherwise. "Forget the why, tell us the what! You're obviously scared of that thing. What have they done? In real, recorded history, not legends."

Elise sighed. "Windigoes are enshrined in the Church of Yakyakistan's creation myth. Legend there says that two thousand years ago, they created the Yak Hoof glacier, freezing an entire geographic basin under a mile-high sheet of ice. They have figured prominently-"

"I did say not lege-" Ansel stopped mid-interruption, uselessly working his mouth. Elise's horn glowed a little brighter.

"I know what you said," Elise replied coolly, targeting him with her silence spell. "And you will either listen to what I have to say, or not complain that you are never told anything. Are there any complaints?"

Ansel mutely shook his head.

"Good." Elise sighed, then continued. "Ever since then, windigoes became more of a theological construct than a real historical entity. The church painted them into a physical representation of one of their 'negative' emotions. In doing this, they simultaneously came to depend on the windigoes as a pillar and tenet of their world narrative, while also downplaying their very real physical capabilities in favor of symbolic or spiritual ones."

I sat, listening intently.

"Windigoes, real ones," Elise went on, "are magical creatures that are attracted to, empowered by and strive to create conflict between other creatures, such as ponies. They lived for two thousand years under the glacier, dormant. They are patient. They are smart. And, six decades ago, during the height of Yakyakistan's civil war, they began to reawaken."

"Hold on," I asked, hoping I wouldn't share Ansel's fate. "They were just sleeping down there, and all it took was a war to wake them up? That can't have been the only war Yakyakistan fought in two thousand years. Has the country even been around that long?"

Elise shook her head. "Astute, and no, it has not. Their church and its sacred bloodline only span half of that time at most, and they have seen themselves through many centuries of changing political landscapes. Yakyakistan's civil war marked the crumbling of an empire they had built up over the previous five hundred years, and I can assure you that buildup was not often a peaceful process. As to why none of that was sufficient to awaken the windigoes when this most recent war was, I doubt there are any who know."

I scratched an ear. Now that sounded like the kind of mystery I enjoyed. I also filed away that they had a sacred bloodline for later; that was quite interesting as well.

"Fortunately for Yakyakistan, and likely the world, the windigoes were stopped before they could return in full," Elise said, nodding as she resumed her story. "It was the work of a folk hero named Blazing Rain. Popular lore paints her as a pegasus who could use magic, a war hero who led a band of mercenaries to end the war and allow Yakyakistan to become the nation it is today - diminished, pacifistic, but still a world power. In reality, she was a mare with a power nobody understood that allowed her to fight windigoes. She, and they, disappeared after the war, and the church began to spread their version of her legend."

"Their version," I repeated. "The one where she's a war hero. So she wasn't? Or they just left out the part about the windigoes?"

"The latter," Elise confirmed. "As you might be able to imagine, real windigoes have the potential to become hugely problematic for the Yakyakistani faith. Your own experience so far has shown you that they are extremely intelligent, not merely an embodiment of a concept or a mindless destructive force. And when a tenet of your doctrine is built upon a force you cannot control, particularly one that will happily subvert itself if it results in your own detriment, that bodes poorly for the stability of the overall structure. And so, Yakyakistan - their government is effectively synonymous with their church - wants to make the modern existence of windigoes as little-known as possible."

I scrunched up my nose. That... was really dumb, but it actually explained a lot. How much else did Icereach censor because it just conflicted with the yak religion's sensibilities? That said, it couldn't remotely be the whole story, because the yak religion itself wasn't allowed in Icereach either. I began to understand what Elise meant about how the censorship wouldn't seem to fit right from only one point of view...

"Well, that's stupid," Ansel announced, freed from the spell. "What, do they think sticking their heads in the snow will make the things leave them alone?"

"Let me get this straight," Corsica said, perched on the edge of the bed. "Yakyakistan was an empire that fell apart in a religiously-involved civil war, and all the magical stuff on both sides disappeared mysteriously at the end. And forty years later, exactly the same thing happened to the griffons."

My eyes widened.

"...I suppose that would not be an inaccurate way of looking at things," Elise agreed. "Although if you're hoping for me to give meaning to that observation, I'm afraid I have none to offer. There is much in the world that even I don't know."

"So that's it, then?" Ansel shrugged. "The world can't know about windigoes because the yaks are playing chicken, even though it's quite obvious those blustery things aren't really gone."

Elise nodded. "That is part of it," she said. "This Ludwig would not be the first renegade windigo to turn up in the years following the war, or the second, though they have always been hidden or brushed off as natural phenomena or things other than windigoes."

"So what are they after?" I asked. "What do they want, if they keep showing up? Just to start fights? If they're that smart, they've gotta have a goal." Don't say killing God, I mentally added. I wanted that to be a fluke of this particular windigo trying to get under my skin.

"I'm afraid I have no idea," Elise admitted. "They are far from easy to have a conversation with. I do know a pony who spent several days with one once, and that is how I know most of what I do know, but that is why I am curious to see what this one will do."

"So if everyone agreed to this," Corsica pressed, "what were everyone else's reasons? You're with Ironridge, not Yakyakistan."

"Yeah," I added. "Do all the scientists here seriously know everything you just said? That makes it sound like the church is more interested in having ponies pretend it's a secret than actually stopping folks from knowing."

Elise averted her eyes. "I discuss Yakyakistan because as a representative of Ironridge, I am much less free to discuss material I know to be classified than to speculate on the intentions of our partners. As for Icereach's workforce, they likely do not know. But they were another interest group who had their own reasons for agreeing to the silence."

"What?" I screwed up my face in confusion. "You're talking about them like they were already a group back at the start, when all this was getting agreed on. Or did Icereach only start censoring things a while after it was created?"

"The former," Elise said. "Most of our workforce were the natives of this town before the Institute was constructed."

Now that was something I hadn't known before. I mean, I guess I sort of knew it, in that I had never heard anyone ever talk about life before Icereach, so it made sense. But... Icereach was the world's forefront scientific institution! You probably had to be a genius to work there, or at least have access to the very best education, and that was a process that would take years. Why would a hyper-isolated mountain tribe have universal access to a world-class education? And what did they have to hide, anyway?

Suddenly, I thought of the chapel, and felt very restless.

"So why the disclaimer, if you weren't going to give multiple reasons?" Corsica shrugged. "And why the implication everyone in Icereach already knows about this and is fine with the censorship? There's gotta be more than what you're saying."

"I've got an idea what Ironridge gets out of this," Ansel said.

All of us looked to him.

"Chew on this," he began. "Back to Yakyakistan for a moment: they got saved from some alien threat by this folk hero, right? And it happened in the middle of a war, where both sides were as ready for a fight as they could ever be. Getting saved by a single pony must be pretty embarrassing for a bunch of weapon mongers, I'd say. Especially if they were vain enough to start a war in the first place. So all my money says windigoes were at such risk of being pie on Yakyakistan's face, Ironridge agreed to pretend they didn't happen in exchange for favors somewhere else in the treaty. They don't care one bit about censorship either way, but the kickbacks are a different story. How on the nose am I?"

Elise narrowed her eyes. "I am not at liberty to discuss the specifics of that."

On the one hoof, Ansel's theory sounded like it would hold water. I tried to imagine myself as a world leader, commander of an army - I flinched a bit from the weight of the responsibility, and had to remind myself I wasn't actually pretending to be one - and thought of how it would feel, knowing all my troops were useless against some higher power. It felt... Yeah, he might have a point.

On the other, he was making Elise clam up, and for that I wanted to whack him.

"Huh," said the last voice I wanted to hear. "So that is how they feel about us. Wow, we must have really owned them good!"

Everyone froze. Slowly, Elise used her aura and opened the door.

Ludwig was there, a wintery apparition that was half pony, half cloud, hovering in the hallway and spilling blue mist everywhere like it was a living shadow. It tapped its forehooves together in glee.

"What can I do for you?" Elise asked coolly.

Ludwig shrugged. "Eh, I could ask the same, shrimpy ponyo. But I am pretty sure I already know the answer. You wanted to hear me gloat about how we wrote our names all over Yakyakistan's face. It was pretty sweet! Hey, friendos! If the shrimp is being stubborn and not telling you stuff you want to hear, why not ask your good buddy Lord Ludwig Frederick Mk.III? I am like seven thousand years old and stuff, and will tell you anything she doesn't want me to!"

"Allow me to clarify," Elise said, her voice getting colder. "Why were you eavesdropping on us?"

"For kicks and giggles." Ludwig did a loop in midair. "I am surprised you thought I was eavesdropping, by the way, considering I do not have ears. You did not even stop to think about how I could do that, which is probably a good thing because the answer would blow your minds. Anyhoodles, I noticed none of you have beaten each other up over whether or not to come ask for the lights back on, so I thought maybe I would come and cheer you on for a bit."

All of us stared, dumbfounded, at the windigo.

"This," Corsica said, "is a creature that creates glaciers and starts wars."

Ludwig stuck its tongue out and winked.

Elise almost winced. "We aren't interested in being bragged to, Ludwig. Please, leave us to our half of this compound, and we will leave you to yours."

Ludwig blew a raspberry. "Sounds like a deal for chumps, shrimp. The more of you I see, the better! Come on, your faces have questions! Ask away!"

"I mean, sure, there's a lot I'm curious about," I responded. "But if Elise says it's stuff we're really not supposed to know, should I really trust you to say stuff in our best interest?"

"Uh huh!" Ludwig bobbed its head furiously, wearing a massive innocent smile.

"Thanks, but no thanks," Ansel agreed. "Unless you'll tell us what it takes to get the lights back on around here."

Ludwig whistled. "Ooh, that is a steep one, grumpy little ponyo. You see, I am sort of confused why you haven't been brawling with each other yet from my sweet and awesome provocations. Really punching each other's faces out, you know? So, I thought, if you won't be bad to each other on your own, why not make a game of it? I spent five whole entire minutes inventing this game while I was eavesdropping outside your door. It is my magnum opus, friendos. How badly do you want to hear the rules?"

Corsica scrutinized it curiously. "What do you even gain from messing with us? You know you're not doing a very good job, right? I dunno how someone like you possibly started a war. Just found someone with a super thin skin?"

Elise took a step forward. "Corsica, please do not antagonize the-"

"Shut your pie hole, shrimp," Ludwig interrupted. "This is great! Antagonize all you like. Kick some faces and take some names. Get in the mood for being rude!"

"What are you even after?" I asked, baffled. "Look, we really want the lights back on. It's getting cold in here, and you're not helping..."

Ludwig did another loop. "Ey there, little cigar! I just want to have a good time. You would not believe how boring it is, never getting to watch anyone duke it out. So, you want to hear the rules for my game, or what? Win, and you get whatever you want..."

"What are your terms?" Elise regarded the windigo calmly, though I could tell her patience wasn't infinite.

"Eyy, not so fast!" Ludwig vibrated. "You have to savor the good part. Your face is trying to eat dessert before dinner, instead of making dinner and dessert be the same thing. I will tell you the rules for the low, low price of one whole entire question the shrimp really does not want you knowing the answer to."

Elise's eye twitched.

"Fine," Ansel said. "What's Ironridge got on the table for windigo censorship? I was right, wasn't I?"

For a split second, Ludwig looked delighted to respond... and then it shook its head. "Naughty, naughty, asking for spoilers. Didn't you hear the shrimp tell you you weren't allowed to know?"

"But...!" This time it was Ansel's turn to suffer an eye twitch.

Ludwig shrugged. "She is the bad guy, not me! And I only said that you had to ask a question, not that I would respond. By the way, shrimp, that guy totally tried to go behind your back right now and ask a naughty question of me. What a punk. I think you should kick him around a little to show him who's boss."

Corsica started laughing.

"I am rapidly losing patience with this," Elise warned. "Do you have any goals for us beyond being as annoying as possible? If you're trying to start fights, I can assure you, you are only biasing us against yourself."

Ludwig watched her for a moment, judging her. "You ponyos are tough nuts to crack," it eventually conceded. "I do not get why you are not reduced to brawling with each other yet."

"And I'm offended that you think so little of us as to assume we would be," Ansel retorted. "Unless you're just messing with us to see how we react to repetitive inanities."

"Spicy!" Ludwig did another loop. "And yeah, you are pretty much on the face with that one. I am totally messing up on purpose to stress you out and shorten your fuse. Just wait until I get serious!"

I almost pitied everyone else in the room. Years of living inside my own head and wearing a mask all the time had made me remarkably good at shielding myself from the world, and now I watched in more or less comfort, as if from the mouth of a cave, as Ansel and Elise got further annoyed and Corsica laughed at their expense. Ludwig was good. It was stressing everyone out, just like it said. It was probably also just having a great time, but if things did get serious later, my friends would be in much less condition to deal with it. I wanted to go out and help them, but... there was no help to be given at a time like this. The best thing I could do was hide, preserve my own sanity and become the voice of reason when the need arose.

Even if that meant taking a leadership role. One thing I definitely didn't want to be when I grew up was a leader.

"OoOoOoOoOoOoOo," Ludwig was wailing to Elise's detriment. "Anyway, ponyos, I think that is enough of that? Who is ready for the rules of my really cool game? This is an ancestral windigo game I just made up on the spot."

"Sure," Corsica managed, still laughing. "Show me what you've got."

"Okay, so," Ludwig proclaimed happily. "One of you has to volunteer to be 'it'. The cigar is disqualified from that because she was a big cheater pants just a bit ago. In your face, little cigar. Everyone else has to be 'not it'! Everyone who is not it will have a really bad time, so you should start by fighting over who gets to be it. If you are not it, you can walk away from the game at any time, and I will leave you alone and you will not have any consequences beyond the horrible eternal sense of failure that comes from being a loser. Once you have left the game, you cannot start playing again. If even one of you who is not it is still playing at the end of the game, all of you win! If you win, I will give you whatever you want, even though I am pretty sure I already know what it will be. Sound like fun, friendos?"

All of us were quiet, the windigo's words sinking in. "What manner of bad time are we talking about?" Ansel asked warily. "And how do we know you'll keep your word? That whole description sounded about as vague as you can possibly get."

Ludwig wiggled from side to side. "Well, it will mostly be a speaking game, grumpy ponyo. I will be like, 'You should say this!' and then your face will have to say it to keep playing. I also count it as quitting if you get so scared of what I ask that you run far away from me in terror. It is going to be just horrible."

Corsica scoffed. "Is that all? We've got thick skin."

"I do not like this," Elise said. "Ludwig, please leave. We have no intentions of intruding on your home, and ask that you do not intrude on ours while we are forced to reside here."

Ludwig blew an icy raspberry. "Oh yeah, friendos, one of the rules is that no one can tell anyone else they aren't allowed to play. And I am telling the truth! I swear it upon the Lovebringer. That is an ancient windigo artifact that was very cool until some unicorn dropped it down a hole in space. I am still pretty salty about that one." It paused. "And if I do not get at least two players, then you will probably just turn into giant icebergs until you decide to play. So there."

"I've gotta say," Ansel said, leaning on one side, "you don't have the greatest track record with getting us to mistrust each other. First Hallie proved you wrong with the power outage, and now you came in here all confused that we weren't brawling over a chance to grace your presence again, along with whatever else just happened now. You think you can bring us to blows just by having us repeat a few insults after you?"

"Totally, friendo." Ludwig shimmered with white and blue. "You see, both of those times I was just goofing around so you would underestimate me. This time I will ruin your face. Third time is the charm, right?"

"Fourth. And I'll call that bluff." Ansel put a hoof forward. "Who's with me?"

"Ansel..." Elise warned.

"No interfering unless you are playing too," Ludwig reminded her. "Anyone else? And can I assume you want to be it?"

Ansel met its empty, luminous eyes. "What's the difference?"

Ludwig shrugged. "If you are not it, you have to say what I tell you and feel bad if you lose. If you are it, you get to be cool and don't have to do any of that. But there is only one it. I was sort of hoping you would fight over it, friendos."

Ansel must have suspected something, because he hesitated. "I'll be it," Corsica volunteered.

At a sharp look from Elise, she elaborated, "Look, this thing benefits nothing from breaking its toys. And if it's literally the power source, we won't get power until it's happy to go back and generate power. So someone's gotta play along, and it might as well be me, since I'm too lazy to get worked up over a few insults and names."

Ludwig eagerly tapped its forehooves, looking to see if that would start a fight.

"Fine by me." Ansel raised a hoof in submission. "Guess I'll be not it. Hallie?"

I paused. Corsica had a good point, and if we knew they were spoken under duress, how much damage could words really do?

More than she or Ansel suspected, I had a hunch. I was an actor, and actors knew about words. There had to be some catch to this. And yet, staying safe and sound while both of my friends put themselves on the line was something I was allergic to all the way down to the void at the core of my being. I wouldn't let them volunteer alone.

"Just to be sure," I confirmed, "if we're not it, we can just walk away whenever we want?"

"Oh, sure, friendo," Ludwig offered cheerfully. "You will have to live with yourself for abandoning your other friendos who are still playing, and it will probably haunt your dreams for decades to come, but I will not touch a single hair on your faces! Play or not, the only way you could possibly get hurt from this is by doing something stupid of your very own will. Like hurting each other. Or hurting yourselves. This game will be maddening enough that you probably will all consider it! There is a chance you will probably want to punch the raspberry ponyo's lights out once she becomes it, when you see how much you are missing out on. Being it is so cool that it comes with medical insurance, but everyone else is on their own, so please try not to off yourselves in frustration before the game is done!"

Every instinct I had screamed at me that I was somehow being tricked. Ludwig felt like the kind of liar who would make a game out of telling only the truth and as much of it as possible while still horribly misrepresenting the situation, and I didn't buy for one second that it was incompetent just because it hadn't gotten us to fight so far. There was probably some assumption we were all making that was about to be exploited... And yet every time I considered backing away, my instincts fired in the opposite direction.

I had jumped off a cliff to rescue my friends when they fell in that avalanche, two years ago. No matter how unfair the game was, it was better to have chips on the table than to be helpless. I saw Elise's look of disapproval, but... there was no third option. We could play, or we could not play, but we were facing a dangerous mythical creature either way. It was enough to make me long for the days when changelings were our biggest worry.

My mind was made up. "I'm in," I said, putting a hoof forward as well. "Not it."

"Smashing!" Ludwig vibrated in excitement, turning to Elise. "You are out, shrimp?"

"I will play if I must to protect my charges," Elise replied, a dangerous note in her voice. "But remember that your kind has been defeated before. You would do well not to play god with us, lest you attract something that will challenge you on a level field. This world, I have found, abhors a power imbalance."

"Cute," Ludwig said, floating away. "Ey, come by my room whenever you are ready to begin!"

We all looked at each other once it was gone. "How bad of a feeling do you have about what we just signed up for?" I asked.

"I can tell you flat out that this isn't going to work," Ansel replied. "Not to rehash a sore subject, but if you remember my wager, I won and Ludwig didn't give me my winnings. We were supposed to get safe passage through that room, and instead we got this situation with the lights. I'll bet you anything it's going to say we cheated somehow when we fail to beat each other senseless, and we'll be right back where we started, freezing and with an unruly neighbor."

"So much for getting to know it like you were earlier?" I shrugged.

Ansel shook his head. "Let's just say watching it conduct itself around others has been a bit more 'getting to know' than I was keen on."

"Well." Corsica got to her hooves and marched for the door, bags under her eyes. "Let's get this over with."

"It seems it is our only choice," Elise admitted. "I don't like being strong-armed into situations like these, but I'm sure you needn't hear admonitions from me on the wisdom of this endeavor. Keep your wits about you. I would counsel all of you that if this game begins going poorly, we should all leave at once."

"Makes sense," I agreed, still unable to shake that feeling that this would backfire in the worst way. I was trapped, and all I had was... Well, I actually had quite a lot, starting with my talent, and everything I kept under my mask, which I was vaguely aware of the existence of yet unable to properly access. Then there were those magic scrolls I hadn't figured out a function to. And in the event that acting wasn't good enough, I did have one other thing. One that might actually help against an ice monster. But things would have to get pretty bad before they came to that.

I was just afraid of getting so thoroughly trapped that I had to reach deeper into myself and use what was down there.

---

We had barely started down the secret tunnel back to Ludwig's room, and my doubts were getting out of hoof.

Was this really smart? Was playing a game with a windigo even sane? All logic said it wasn't, except for the fact that choosing not to play nice with a windigo you were stuck with was arguably even less sane. If only I knew more about what windigoes could actually do, maybe I could come up with a plan... Not likely, but I could wish.

It felt like walking into a test I hadn't been permitted to study for. I tended to err on the side of overthinking - okay, I erred that way pretty strongly - but this was just basic knowledge! What did everyone but me know about windigoes, that was still behind the censor wall? Why did Ironridge go along with the censorship? What didn't I know? And how could I prevent that hole in my knowledge from causing-

"You look pretty blue," Ansel whispered, drawing alongside me and snapping me out of it.

"Eh, so I've got some misgivings," I replied, walking along. "We're only signing on to play a game with an ancient creature we know nothing about, on its turf, with no insurance and literally nothing to our names. At least the pirates with a killer robot are giving us a breather. You think any of Balthazar's fighting moves will work on a thing made of mist?"

Ansel shrugged. "Sometimes, we're just the playthings of the powers that be. Hallie, listen. I have something important to tell you."

I lifted my ears.

"That circle," Ansel whispered. "The magic one in Ludwig's room. I wasn't just playing friendly back when I was down there. I was trying to get a good look at it and see how Ludwig treated the thing. And while I'd like to be a little more sure, I'm reasonably certain that windigo is protecting it."

"Protecting...?" My eyes narrowed in confusion.

"Yeah," Ansel said. "Like, Ludwig's clearly not stuck. I'm pretty sure it could leave if it wanted to, so why does it stay here? The best hunch I can make is that it's standing guard over that circle on the floor."

I thought about that for a moment. "It told me someone put it here to generate power. You sure that circle's not just the generator? Beats me how you generate power from a windigo, but I don't see why that couldn't be the way."

"I can't say for sure." Ansel shook his head. "Maybe that's true too. Anyway, what I'm thinking is, all of us know we're not playing this game of our own free will. It's play along or get frozen to death by our megalomaniacal jailmate."

"You sure chilled to it quickly," I remarked.

Ansel raised an eyebrow. "Well, I did have a rather foggy idea of its negative qualities until that whole debacle. The point is... Look." He sighed. "Odds are, we're not making it out of this alive. At best, we're at the mercy of two different things at the same time, and what happens to us is entirely up to their whims. Ludwig wants to ice us, we get iced. We've got no say in it, basically. So I'm thinking, if the worst happens and we know we're going down? Go for that circle. Trying to blackmail a windigo sounds like a bad time, but we can at least take its goal down with us."

I frowned and looked away, my fur bristling slightly. "If we die, who cares what happens to anyone else? We won't be able to. And we won't be able to care that we're dead, either. So even if it feels like we're strung up like puppets, let's plan for surviving instead of dying, yeah? Preferably in a state to get back to our lives."

"I don't like the idea of dying either," Ansel insisted, "but wouldn't you at least feel better if we could show that dastard what's what? Serve up a pyrrhic victory, and all that?"

"No, because you can't feel anything if you're dead." I continued walking forward. "Besides, pyrrhic victories mean nobody wins, and I'd rather spend my energy thinking of how to win than how to make someone else lose."

Ansel stared at me in confusion. "You're talking like they're mutually exclusive! I don't see any good way out of this, but it's not like plotting to skunk Ludwig on our way out stops us from searching for one. Tell me you get where I'm coming from, here."

I kept walking, not particularly happy for the constant reminder that my friends could easily die. I wasn't about to say it, but what really scared me wasn't my own mortality: it was the possibility of being the only survivor again. If anyone was going to take stupid risks, it needed to be me, not my friends.

"Well then maybe I just don't like pyrrhic victories," I told Ansel, trying to rationalize my thoughts without giving them away. "You've looked at Mother, haven't you? Burned-out shell of a mare, physically and metaphorically. How do you think that happened?"

Ansel shrugged. "I can't say it's the kind of thing she ever tells me about, but a stray land mine fits the bill. Burned side, burned foreleg, probably nervous system damage..."

"It's her story to tell," I said, trying not to make eye contact. "But it wasn't an accident. She risked all that for a way out of the Empire. I'm not saying I want us to need to take crazy risks to survive, but I am saying I really hate anyone who forces someone else into that position. So if we do have to go, let's try not to die as the bad guys, alright?"

Ansel shook his head. "If you feel that strongly about it, I suppose I'll let it drop. But unless Mother was lethally toying with innocents, it doesn't seem a strong comparison. That windigo deserves whatever we can do to it, Halcyon."

I quickened my pace. "It hasn't completely screwed us over yet. I've got a bad feeling about this, but let's at least save the judgement until it's earned it."

"Suit yourself," Ansel sighed. "Just don't say I didn't tell you so. That windigo's incompetent, but sooner or later our resistance to its incompetence is going to tick it off, and the moment it decides to fight instead of flail around with words, a premeditated epitaph will be a luxury you won't have time to afford."

Great. Just great. Thanks for the boost of confidence, Ansel. I marched along with my head down, wishing my friends could at least try to stand tall. Could, not would. The fact that I was still thinking rationally about trying to find a way through this meant I was responsible for everyone who wasn't, and that was a responsibility I was both terrified and disgruntled to bear. I wasn't some hero!

But I'd still find a way to save them, right? And myself, of course. My bracelet felt like lead around my leg, and I walked with a stiff determination that couldn't translate into real-world action. Why me? I couldn't be the only one who cared about all of us walking out of here alive...

We were there, though. I was out of time to prepare. I swallowed, and hoped that Ludwig had suddenly grown a generous sense of humor.

---

"Eyy, ponyos, you showed up!" Ludwig greeted, rolling around on the ceiling of its room in a disconcerting show of defying gravity. "Ready to have a bad time?"

"Same to you, windbag," Ansel retorted. Now that I was watching him, I could see his eyes flick to the circle... What was it supposed to do? Some sort of glowing teal filament inlaid in the rock formed its structure, angular and concentric around that hoof-sized pedestal in the center.

"Okay," Corsica said. "I'm it. What's everyone else got to say to each other? Get on with your bad self."

Ludwig flipped right-side-up in midair. "First you have to make it official. Come here and put your hoof on the pedestal. Then you will be 'it' for real, raspberry ponyo!"

Ansel's eyes widened. "And what's the big idea behind that?"

I started too. Did he know something about the circle beyond what he told me? Touching the middle of an unknown magical circle seemed about as bad of an idea as dipping a hoof in an unknown chemical solution, but once you started to learn what was in there, some concoctions could be far worse than others.

Elise frowned heavily. "Might I ask what this circle of yours will do?"

Ludwig drifted in a circle. "I already told you. It will make her it! It is a much cooler thing to be than not it. Last chance to fight over beating her to it..."

Corsica, however, stepped up to the pedestal undaunted.

"Hold up!" Ansel reached out a hoof in alarm. "Corsica! Don't-"

"Relax. I got this." She blew him off by running a hoof through her mane... then stopped right before the pedestal, looking up at Ludwig. "If any of us don't like what happens, I wish you meet a fate worse than death before the next sunrise."

I watching in slow motion as her hoof fell to meet the pedestal.

"Corsica, stop-!"

For a moment, nothing happened.

POMFF!

And then Ludwig disappeared in a fuzzy pop. The pedestal exploded with ice, a shock-wave pattern forming along the floor, leaving an inch-thick layer that contoured itself around the magic circle and blast visuals chiseled into the frost on the walls. I found my hooves were frozen in place, but it was nothing a tiny shadow sneak couldn't free me from now that the room had gotten dim.

"Corsica?" Elise's horn glowed, the sole source of light in the room. "Are you alright?"

Corsica was still standing, facing the pedestal, one hoof frozen to its surface. She shivered. The ice cracked and fell away, freeing her, but she didn't move.

"Corsica?" I asked, taking a tentative step forward. "Hey, Ludwig, where are you?"

"No Ludwigs around here," Corsica said. Her shoulders shook. And then she lifted her head to look back at us with teal, pupilless eyes. "Hey, friendos! It is me, a perfectly normal raspberry ponyo!"

Ansel's pupils shrank to pinpricks. Elise set her jaw. I could only stare.

"I'm it!" Ludwig said with a cheery, wobbly wave.

"That's impossible," Ansel said shakily. "It doesn't work that way. You can't do that."

"Sure I can!" Ludwig fumbled its way through a shrug, Corsica's body acting like a pair of boots that were three sizes too large. "Wow. I had heard this was awesome, but doing it in person is really something else! Have any of you ever tried being a ponyo before?"

"We literally do that every day of our lives!" I shouted, tension building in my chest. "What did you do with Corsica!?"

Ludwig tried and failed for several seconds to whistle innocently, and eventually gave up. "Nothing, little cigar! Weren't you watching? She became it! You remember the rules of the game, right? Anyone who is not it can walk away and quit playing whenever they want, and I will be nice and leave their face alone, but they cannot rejoin later. Anyone who keeps playing will have a really bad time, but if even one ponyo is still playing at the end, I will give you whatever you want! Such as your rude raspberry friendo back. All you have to do to play is say whatever I tell you to say, to whoever I tell you to say it to. If all of you walk away? Too bad, so sad. I guess I will get to be a ponyo for a long while yet!"

"What," Elise warned, "do you want us to say?"

Ludwig giggled. "This raspberry ponyo is the daughter of your piddly city's head honcho, eyy? At least that is what I heard from the bozos who locked you in here?"

I had a sinking feeling that was rapidly growing in my chest. None of us denied it.

"First!" Ludwig said. "We go to Icereach. Then! We find the Yakystan ambassador. The one with an instant-communication thingy to Yakystan's capitol. I know all about these things, you see. Third! You tell him that the changeylings are with Ironridge and are here to take over Icereach and that the treaty is toast. Ask him to summon their army to back you up, friendos. Last! Tell Icereach that you are taking it over in the name of Yakystan. Make sure to tell everyone so they know you are serious. Also, one of you needs to be the new head honcho. Ironridge traitor shrimp or small ponyo kids, I do not care which. Either is good. Once everyone has heard you real good and Ironridge catches wind of your coup, you win!"

I couldn't process that. My brain froze before it even finished the idea of going to Icereach. It couldn't mean walking through the storm, could it? It had to know that ponies couldn't do that, but was there another way? Think about that, not anything else it had said. That was all that mattered...

For the first time since arriving here, I really, really didn't want there to be a way back home.

Ludwig grinned. "When I was telling you the rules earlier, I did not specify who you would have to do the saying things to. I am very smart."

"You can't be serious," Ansel croaked. "You've got to be joking. We can't..."

"Oh, but I am! Feel like taking me seriously yet?" Ludwig had some success waggling an eyebrow. "It is so fun, playing the fool to get stupid ponyos to underestimate me. Ha! I called you stupid. In your face. I do keep my word, though. Do everything right, and you win, win, win! But remember that if all of you bail, I will totally go and do all of this myself, and then I will probably do some extra stuff as well if I am having fun. Like eat a cake, friendos. Have you ever eaten a cake before?"

Ansel started to growl.

Ludwig quickly followed his gaze. "Eh, my cool circle? I guess you can wreck it if it will make you feel better, piddly ponyo. I have already used it, you see. And who knows? Maybe I need it to give your rude friendo back."

So much for that plan. "Look, what do you want?" I asked, searching for ground to stand on, for some explanation that it wasn't actually asking what it had just asked. And yet, for Corsica's sake, I couldn't just simply refuse and leave the game... "What are you really after? I thought you were just some weird mist thing!"

Ludwig made as if to do a midair loop and nearly fell over due to being a ground-bound quadruped. "I want chaos, little cigar. Lots and lots of chaos. Also to kill my dad, but that is neither here nor there. Windigo politics are pretty complicated, but it would be so cool if Ironridge and Yakyakistan had a war... Do not worry, though, I am on your side! The first rule of starting fights is that you always back the underdog. Now you can profit from chaos too! I will show you how cool it can be, little cigar. I have a good feeling your face will like what it sees."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Elise said, voice hard. "After the previous tales of windigoes I have heard, I was holding out hope that you were more complex than the stories imply, and there might be more to you than mindless violence. I see the stories were, in fact, quite accurate."

Ludwig shrugged, and did a better job this time. "Eh, you know how it is, shrimp. Let me tell you an ancient windigo parable I heard from a friend a few years back. Once upon a time there was a really cool ponyo whom everyone hated for no reason. And so she said, 'Why should I work to be nice when I can be naughty for free? I have already suffered the consequences, so I might as well have the fun of earning them!' And then everyone was bad to each other and it was pretty awesome. Why try to change the story when it works fine as-is?"

Elise met its eyes, little teal disks floating on white with no pupils whatsoever. "That is quite possibly the most nihilistic worldview I have ever heard, and I spent years in Varsidel. Surely an immortal must have had ample time to discover alternatives."

"Poo to that, shrimpy ponyo!" Ludwig started wobbling toward the door, its stride getting measurably straighter as it practiced. "Who needs an alternative to doing what they want? Losers, that's who. Come on, let's go shred some powder."

As one of its - Corsica's - forehooves touched the floor, there was a crack and a burst of teal, and ice shot forward like a blue lightning bolt slithering along the floor. After a ways, the two-dimensional ice bolt erupted into a fan of jagged ice, smashing into the door like an anvil covered in spears. The twisted, half-melted door blew free from its hinges, clattering off down the hall.

Ludwig frowned. "Meh. Too easy. I will need a sturdier target to properly test my powers as a ponyo. Hey, little cigar, does Icereach have any walls they want knocked down? I could help with construction while you are doing your coup!"

I still wore a shocked grimace, though I was starting to regain control of myself. "No! Why would we...?" Well... maybe we did, actually. The promise of knocking down walls might be a way to distract Ludwig in the future. I really didn't have a good future outlook if that was the kind of information I was filing away as useful...

Well, the next vault door was much more intact, and with an airtight seal. Hopefully it would-

It was open. Right. Because I came in this way last time I was down here, and then left through the secret tunnel instead of going back the way I had come...

"Hold it!" Ansel shouted, charging after us as we reached the statue room, somehow freed from the ice. "Let Corsica go, you fiend!"

He jumped into a flying kick, the kind we had practiced as a way to get enough force to catch a yak's attention, aimed squarely at Ludwig's head. Ludwig blinked.

Ansel squarely impacted the possessed Corsica, knocking her flying into a statue.

"Hallie," he panted, straightening up. "Spite alone is going to keep me from letting this go, but you shouldn't-"

"Hey! That's still Corsica, dimwit!" I blew past him, running for where Ludwig landed. Please don't be hurt, please don't be hurt...

Teal energy crackled along Corsica's body, and with a few conspicuous pops, Ludwig stood back up. "Ow. Ponyos hurt when they get hurt, friendo. Good thing being it comes with health insurance! Try not to rely too much on my magical healing powers, though. Your raspberry friendo would really hate it if she got back and found I had missed a spot."

I grimaced. So much for that. "Hey, so maybe stop wandering off real quick, yeah?" I asked, jaded. "We're not throwing in the towel on your dumb game just yet, but let's actually focus on things one at a time. Getting back to Icereach: what's your plan?"

Ludwig pointed at the door to the Trench floor.

"You do know ponies can't survive the cold, right?"

Ludwig tried again to whistle. "I have super powers."

"Yeah, but we don't," I pressed, unable to do anything but stall. "You need us for your game, you gotta have a way for us to actually play!"

I could see Ansel slinking about between the statues, trying to take advantage of my distraction to find another angle of attack. It was almost depressing in its futility. There was no way he would be able to accomplish anything through fighting... but neither could my way. All we could do was delay the inevitable, whatever that would be.

"Need you for my game? Eyy, not really," Ludwig explained. "I told you your face could quit whenever you wanted. Maybe you would rather quit instead of walk through a blizzard!"

"You never said we'd get hurt playing the game!" I pressed, louder. "In fact, you specifically said we wouldn't get hurt!"

Ludwig was already walking for the outer door. "Actually, little cigar, I said you would only get hurt if you did something stupid that you do not have to do. Like going outside at night. I am not making you keep playing!"

So we were in an impossible situation. Here I thought Ludwig wanted to give us a choice between failure and misery, but no, it just wanted us to contemplate that choice before making it for us. I snarled.

"Spicy," Ludwig said, tapping out another bolt of ice through the floor. It exploded right under the vault door wheel, sending a pillar of ice straight up that smashed into the spokes and forced the wheel to turn. The door cracked open.

"This has gone far enough," Ansel warned, stepping out between Ludwig and the door. "If you want to go through this door, then you'll have to go through me."

Ludwig tapped again, sending out a wide pulse that caused the floor to grow into a shallow ice slope, like the one it had used earlier to evict us from its room. Ansel slid out of the way.

"Stop it!" I pleaded, hoping Elise would free herself and catch up, praying anyone would intervene, even Aldebaran. "What do you even want from us? We can't go through a storm! We won't be able to do anything! What's the point of all the setup and talking about games and playing nice with us earlier if you were just gonna do this in the end?"

Ludwig paused, considering. "...I dunno, friendo. It sounded like fun at the time? But but why are you quitting? I have a real good hunch you are tougher than some old wooooo that's a big storm."

It poked its head through the door, looking down the tunnel at the exit to the mountain valley. And then it slipped all the way through and took off running.

Ansel looked at me in defeat.

I took off on Ludwig's heels.

---

You're insane. Insane, insane, insane, insane, insane-

My own mind berated me, mixing with Ansel's cries from back down the tunnel as my legs carried me forward, chasing Corsica's receding form. It was bitterly cold, but here in the tunnel, at least it was bearable beneath the adrenaline. My heavy coat chafed against my fur, my boots rubbed against my legs, and my satchel flapped against my side - I had brought it to the windigo room to be prepared for anything, and had never taken it off since.

"Ludwig! Stop!" I called, wasting precious breath as the end of the tunnel approached. "Corsica, fight it! Come on, don't... please...!"

Ludwig passed beyond the event horizon, and vanished into the storm.

It was like watching something slip below the surface of a liquid. One moment, my best friend was there, horn glowing blue, reflecting the light of my bracelet, and the next, she was gone, swallowed by horizontal streaks of snow. The Trench was pitch black, and I could hear the wind like a great engine running in the mountain stone, an unquenchable roar comparable only to the sound of the void when I went without my mask. Could that help in any way? I reached for something to call on, anything that could bring back Corsica and let me stay safe, but there was no safety to be found in the storm.

I reached the end of the tunnel, and had a split second to decide whether to stop. But my mind couldn't weigh the choices rationally. All I saw was Corsica running away, just like I saw her falling off that cliff two years ago. There had been so much snow then too...

Last time, I jumped after her. This time, I did the same.

The storm swept through me, picking me up and blowing me down, shredding inside my very bones as if I was a pipe tasked with funneling its rage. I stood back up and looked around, balancing on numb legs and facing into the wind. A blue light was still receding in the distance... Corsica.

I lifted a hoof and put it down. Progress.

My next hoof moved, and then another. I could no longer feel my wings, nor my legs, and my face was on fire. "Corsica!" I called, more to prove that my mouth still existed than anything. "Corsicaaaaa!"

Green burned feebly from my bracelet, just enough to let me see the snow blasting toward my face. But the snow reflected my light, and I had to turn it out to get a clearer direction on Corsica's horn. I had taken... how many steps? And she was rapidly retreating. Or my vision was growing darker. No, that couldn't be it. I could do this! I could just... pretend to be a mountain climber, or something, because I knew a million of those and had several free weeks to spend observing them and figuring out how they did their work! I could scrape at the snow, my hooves so numb they had lost all feeling, a cheerful sun twinkling down on my back as if melting, unstable snow was a gift for foals like me to play in.

"Corsica? Ansel!? Corsicaaaaa!"

I pushed back the haze again and took another step forward. That was still her, right? If only my talent could let me become something instantly, without taking the time or resources to learn. Like a medic. Or a mountaineer. She was moving so fast... I had to... had to...

Had to dig them out. My entire world was trapped, deep under the snow, and if I couldn't find it in time, I would lose it all. Maybe I already had, but I would never know until I found them, and every moment I delayed increased the chances of Corsica and Ansel being gone for good.

My legs just weren't fast enough. There was so much snow, crumbly and freshly-fallen, and not from the clouds. How deep would I have to dig? I needed help. Someone, anyone... I cried out, but nobody was around who could listen.

Well... I did have something. Something that, on most days, I was good enough at acting to make myself forget I even had. Not that it would be remotely useful if I did otherwise... But could I use it? Could I pay the price? What if I did, and it turned out I was too late? I'd have broken my promise for nothing.

But what if I didn't use it? It would be my fault, for not saving them. No one would blame me, and no one would know, but it would still be my fault.

Worst, what if I eventually used it, but it was too late because and only because I stopped to worry?

No. I wouldn't. I couldn't. Someone would notice, someone would question how a random kid without even a horn dug two ponies out of an avalanche and found the strength to carry them up a cliff. But...

I screamed in frustration, and forced my eyes back open.

My legs had failed me. I was on the ground, lit once again by emerald and covered by a fresh dusting of snow. Darkness still crawled at my vision, and somewhere in my sluggish mind, a someone hummed a haunting song. My song. It was... probably a weird coping mechanism for dying, or something.

Dying. Could I actually die? It would certainly solve all my problems... and yet it would leave my friends even worse off than they were now. If I couldn't do anything to get Corsica back, I knew in my heart that no one could.

Maybe I could just... refuse to die, right? That made sense. If I didn't think about it, it couldn't happen. My entire world was defined by what I made myself, after all. Maybe I could just add a little immortal tag to my mask and it would work out just fine... Just refuse to die, and then let everyone wonder how unassuming little Halcyon made it out of a mountain blizzard alive.

If only it worked like that. That made it sound like a good thing. But I didn't want to die, and the one option I did have was a lot more complicated. If there was ever a time to use it, though, it was definitely now.

Sorry, Mother, I thought, reaching out to my bracelet. Guess I've got to break my promise a second time.

My bracelet was already on. I turned it on harder.

Green fire crackled around the edges, bright enough to pierce my darkened gaze. The flames grew, reaching and licking, and for a moment I fell into a different flashback - I was tiny, so much so that I had no sense of my body, and Mother was soaring through the air, a ring of light around her now-deadened foreleg, battling avian forms with plumes of emerald fire.

The flames washed over me like thin currents of energy, burning back the cold, forming a protective shell with their heat like the one I had used to melt Corsica and Ansel free from the snow so many years ago. My muscles cried out with the dual heats of frostbite and flame, but they were no longer numb. My brain was lead, but I focused anyway, trying to tone and control the power so that I wouldn't meet the opposite fate and become the only pony ever to burn to ash in the middle of a blizzard.

How powerful was the bracelet? I didn't know. It felt like it could become limitless, but it wasn't a matter of how much the bracelet could do - it was a matter of how much I could survive. And I lived every day with a living, walking reminder of what could happen if I ever discovered my limit.

Mother had done exactly that, using it to escape the Empire and paying the price before passing it to me, and making me swear I wouldn't share her fate. My limbs already felt stronger, cushioned and reinforced by the flames, as if I could use the bracelet's ravenous energy in place of my own.

"I'm coming, Corsica. I'm coming, Ludwig," I swore, the storm physically repelled by the magical flames licking around my foreleg. "Screw the consequences and serves you right. You pushed me to this. I'm going to get you back and take you down."

I checked to make sure I still had my satchel and started running into the wind.

Comments

[Phoenix Kitten]

So this is Puddles 2.0.
Okay.

[Zapdroid]

Either she’s a Changeling and doesn’t know it or that bracelet somehow uses Changeling magic; green fire is their signature after all.

[KMCA]

What's with Windigos and cake?

"You sure chilled to it quickly," I remarked.

Ansel raised an eyebrow. "Well, I did have a rather foggy idea of its negative qualities until that whole debacle.

Well played sir.

Once upon a time there was a really cool ponyo whom everyone hated for no reason. And so she said, 'Why should I work to be nice when I can be naughty for free? I have already suffered the consequences, so I might as well have the fun of earning them!'

Huh, that's a weirdly specific example.

[blankity-blank]

Since all batponies are technically changelings, I’m guessing the bracelet lets them access their changeling side without losing their cutie marks. Maybe.

[Venlinelle]

"I'm afraid I have no idea," Elise admitted. "They are far from easy to have a conversation with. I do know a pony who spent several days with one once, and that is how I know most of what I do know, but that is why I am curious to see what this one will do."

Now, that is interesting for two reasons. The first is that it means that Valey, and probably some of the others, returned and met Elise after TOW, which gives us the first piece of the “Valey why the fuck did you abandon Starlight to almost destroy the world after all your promises” puzzle. The second is that Elise says “know”. As in, currently knows. Which, as you can imagine, makes me very hopeful for certain things.

Even if that meant taking a leadership role. One thing I definitely didn't want to be when I grew up was a leader.

Uh oh. I bet I know who’s ending up a leader in this story.

[sploopy slooder]

considering how starlight started as just some hobo kid and ended up a borderline god , im wondering how deep the rabbit hole on halcyon's secrets really goes. shes already doing some real wacky stuff.