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Chapter 151,330 words

Chapter 8

A lot of thoughts flew through her head, but not a single one could come out. So did a lot of explanations, but she found herself unable to give those. She could not think straight any more. So much had happened, and Twilight pacing around in her room did not help her to get her mind straight. “Twi, could you stop pacing and just sit down for a moment?”

The magenta pony sat down on one of the pillows, opposing the bed Rainbow Dash was laying on. “I’m sorry Rainbow, but I have to ask you what went on in that dream. We need to know everything we can if we want to stop this magic.”

A faint sigh came from the bed. She had known she would have to explain, and was planning on doing it as soon as possible. But right now, it just was not possible. She could not explain. “I... Look Twilight, I would love to, but it is kinda a big deal to me. And I don’t get what is going on either. Why don’t you go first?”

Twilight shook her head, a bit disappointed. “What is it you don’t understand?”

She could better have asked the exact opposite. This afternoon a lot of words had been spoken, and a lot of tears had been shed. But none of it made sense to her. It was just too much. For an egghead like Twilight it could be obvious, but currently she had no clue. “Well, just about everything I guess...”

Twilight switched her voice to one she used to explain things. It was a calm, tutor like voice. She began to explain. “Okay, let’s start at the beginning. Before Luna turned into Nightmare Moon, she used to have personal students from time to time, just like Celestia. However, one of those students betrayed her.

“This student was supposed to be studying the magic of stars. He did that, but it was only a cover. When he had the chance, he would use his resources to study the magic of hatred. Like friendship and love, hatred is a strong magic. His studies of hatred corrupted him and his magic.

“When the princesses went out to deal with the first Griffon war, he took his chance. As soon as the princesses were gone, he released his hatred into Canterlot, and shielded Canterlot off of the rest of Equestria with a force field. You have seen one of those before, right?”

Rainbow nodded. They had. When they came to the wedding of Shining Armor and princess Cadence, a forcefield had been raised over Canterlot. However, that one was made by Shining Armor’s magic, not by hatred.

“So when the princesses returned, the hatred had grown. Hatred can spread quickly when not controlled. Luna’s student realised that only Luna and Celestia could pose a real threat to him. Therefore, he decided he had to defeat them. When they arrived at the force field, he challenged Luna. Since she was the younger sister, she would be the easiest to defeat. After defeating her, Celestia would be too broken to pose a real threat.

“But his plan did not work out the way he wanted it to. He struck Luna, but his hatred was transferred into her.”

Now it went too quickly. “Ho ho, hang on a second, hatred transferred? How?”

“You see, Rainbow, when Cadence uses her magic it spreads love. When Celestia uses hers, it brings light. When Luna uses her, it brings freshness and rest. If your magic is based on hatred, it will spread hatred.”

Now that did make sense.

“So when he hit her, Luna got filled with hatred. But fortunately, this hatred was focussed. It was focussed at the one who had betrayed her, her own personal student.”

“So basically what you are saying is that he made Luna hate himself?”

Twilight nodded. “It was not his intention to do that, but that was what happened indeed. Blinded by this hatred, Luna killed him.”

Rainbow shook her head. “First you tell me an alicorn can not be killed, but then he gets killed.”

Now it was Twilight’s turn to shake her head. “No Rainbow, an alicorn’s magic can not be killed. The body around it can. But when the body gets killed, the magic will get released into the air, forming some kind of force. The magic can get destroyed, but that will have to happen separately from the body. I am not sure exactly how that works, there aren’t a lot of books on that subject. None, actually.

“And I think you already understand the rest of the story. His magic travelled around, took over ponies and took away their powers by killing them. That way the magic slowly grew into what it was. Then the outburst came, and they managed to destroy most of the magic. But the magic had settled into one pony specifically. They were unable to drive the magic out of that pony, and killing him would cause the magic to grow in power and spread to the next.

“So they locked him away in a silver cage, in an eternal sleep to die in peace. However, the spell was not strong enough and before passing away he managed to punch a hole in the cage, allowing a bit of the magic to escape. This magic did exactly the same thing as it had done before. Taking over ponies, killing them, and growing bit by bit.

“And now, it is trying to strike again. Still filled with hatred, especially against princess Luna. She had killed him after all.”

Rainbow laid down on her bed. “Okay, I think I get it now. You know, I’m really tired. How about I tell you what you want to know tomorrow?” She did not feel like telling Twilight anything she did not absolutely had to. This memory was one that was supposed to stay locked away. Even though she did not remember anything, it was not a nice memory.

She closed her eyes hoping Twilight would let her sleep. “Eeh, Rainbow, aren’t you forgetting something?”

She opened her eyes again and looked at Twilight. Forgetting something? What would there be to forget? “No?”

Twilight smiled. “Rainbow, the spell... You can’t just sleep right now.”

“Oh... yeah... Of course... But I’m pretty tired.”

Twilight walked up to the bed and laid down in front of Rainbow. “Okay, you can try to sleep, but I will have to watch.” Rainbow extended her wings, but Twilight responded. “That is not needed any more Rainbow, that was just to cast the spell.”

“Oh, yeah, of course, I knew that.” Quickly Rainbow folded her wings again, and closed her eyes.

The bed was a pretty soft bed. It was a lot better than the hospital beds, but it was also warm. Every Time she tried to get comfortable, one of her feathers got pinned underneath her and poked her skin. “Twi, do you know any sleep spells?”

Twilight looked up. She clearly was not keen on the idea of using a spell for sleep. “Look, Rainbow, I do but it won’t help. I know only the one I already used. You will have to sleep normally.”

But, that was the point. Those beds just were not normal to Rainbow. She was used to fluffy, soft and fresh clouds. Not these beds. They just did not feel right. “I can’t, Twi... I can’t sleep on this bed.”

Twilight let out a sigh, and stood up. Her horn began to close. Rainbow closed her eyes again, expecting to fall asleep, but instead she heard Twilight laugh. “Rainbow, I told you, no sleeping spells.”

“Then what did you cast?”

Twilight grinned. “Cloud walking spell. Let’s find a nice cloud for you to sleep on.”

All of a sudden Rainbow was fully awake again. “Great idea Twi!” She ran to the door, and opened it. But then she remembered she did not know the way. “Eeh, you know the way around here, don’t you?”

Twilight was already in front of her. Of course she knew the way. This castle had practically been her house ever since she became Celestia’s student, until she got assigned to study friendship in Ponyville. “Just follow me.”

They walked through the castle silently. A couple guards walked by, doing their routine night shifts. Before Rainbow knew it, they were in a garden. It was a different one than the one she had been to already. This one was a bit smaller. It had a small pond with a fountain in the center, and one picnic bench. Around the edge there was a marble guardrail, preventing you from falling into the depths on the other side.

“Hmm, not a single cloud in sight... I’ll fly around a bit to see if there are any a bit higher up.” With that rainbow took off. First a bit away from the castle, then higher and higher. But no matter how far she looked, not a single cloud in sight. Hmm, those Canterlot weather ponies sure are boring... Not a single cloud to take a quick nap... As Landed again, her hopes sank in. “Well, I guess this will be a sleepless night then... I guess I’ll have to ask the weather team if they could leave me a cloud here tomorrow.

Twilight giggled, and her horn began to glow. “Eeh, Twi, what are you doing?” Rainbow looked around, but saw nothing happening. Then she noticed that the fountain was changing a bit. There was steam coming from it. More steam, and more steam. Eventually the steam formed a thick layer of fog around the lake.

“I think you should be able to do something with this, right?” Rainbow was already busy. Flying around the outer border of the mist she pushed it inwards. It became smaller and thicker, and eventually formed a nice cloud. “Thanks Twi! I’d never have thought about that! How did you know how to do that?”

Twilight walked up to the cloud and stepped on it. “Pegasi studies. I’ve used this pond before to create clouds. It’s the only pond here where I can do that without emptying it out. They made this one after I emptied a different one. It is connected to a lake in the mountains.”

Rainbow lifted the cloud from the ground. About five meters above the ground she stopped it. “This should be high enough. So, pegasi studies?” She laid down on the cloud, and blinked. “You should really... *yawn* tell me” She blinked again, but found herself unable to open her eyes again. She drifted away into a deep sleep.

She stood on one end of a table. The table looked like they were eating, but she felt the wall behind her. She was trying to walk back further, through the wall, away from the table. On the other side of the table there were two ponies. One was a full grown pegasus, and the other one was just a small foal. The full grown pegasi looked at her, eyes full of fire. The foal just watched, a small evil grin on his face.

As soon as she looked him in the eyes, a magenta mist appeared from the corners of the room. The mist became denser and denser, covering the entire room until she couldn’t see a hoof in front of her own eyes. But then, just as sudden as the mist started to appear, it also started to clear.

She was no longer in her old house. Instead, she was back in ponyville at Rarities place. Rarity looked at a small creature flying in front of her. “Me too, oh, they’re perfect.” Rainbow and Rarity both grabbed one of the small creatures Twilight brought with her.

Pinkie stood in the open door. “Does anypony know where to find an accordion? Gals! Hello! This is important. Durgh! Thanks a lot.”

Everything around her became covered in a blanket of darkness. Then slowly, the darkness became lighter. Rainbow’s eyes started to adjust to the light. As they opened, she saw one of the best sights she had ever seen. In front of her laid Canterlot. Shining gold and bright purple covered the rooftops of hundreds of houses, towers and other buildings. Around the city there was a bright white marble wall. The wall stood on the edge of a cliff, separating Canterlot from the rest of Equestria.

In the distance she could see Ponyville. The small village laid peacefully in the green valleys. To the right of ponyville, hovering high in the sky, there was a distinct rainbow on top of a group of clouds. To an unknowing pony it might have looked like a couple of clouds, but it was actually the bottom of cloudsdale. The city of the pegasi, the city of her youth. Her youth...

Tears started to form in her eyes, as she thought back to those terrible years there in cloudsdale. The years before she went to flight camp. She had not thought about those years for a long time. She had managed to forget them. Almost. She did not think about them until her crash a couple weeks ago. It was then when she started dreaming about it again, and started to remember what happened. Next to her, a lavender pony started moving.

“Morning Twi.”

“Good morning Rainbow Dash.” Twilight yawned, and her horn began to glow. From a nearby window, two quills, a pot of ink and two scrolls came flying towards them. “I think we should start writing down some notes? Just the first dream, not the second one.” Twilight casted her writing spell on Rainbow and one of the quills.

Wake up in cloudhouse, next to a table. Across the table there are a full grown Stallion (dad) and a filly. Stallion looks angry at me, filly has an evil grin on his face. Pink mist enters from the corners of my vision.

It was not much, but it also wasn’t a really long dream. “Hey Twi, what was that pink mist?”

Twilight was already done writing, her note was a lot longer. Every single detail seemed to be described in there. “That pink mist, Rainbow, is something that appears when I change your dreams.”

Rainbow’s mouth dropped open. “You can change my dreams?! How? Can I do it as well?”

“Yes, yes you can. But only my dreams. The advantage of the spell Luna used is that others can project their thoughts. I saw that we, or you actually, had already had this dream. You still have to explain me what goes in there, so I thought I should give you some time to explain me first. And of course, you needed some good rest. So when I decided the dream should change, I just had to think of what it needed to change to. However, that part is a bit harder. So I thought of something random. And what is more random than Pinkie looking for a trombone?”

“Okay, I guess now I owe you an explanation of that dream, don’t I? Well, make yourself comfortable, you’re in for a long story. And it is not a fun one.”

Author's Note:

Well, this chapter took a bit longer to write. It also wasn't an easy chapter, but I think, in the end, it was worth it. I know it is a lot of dialog in the first section, but that's what happens when somepony explains something to somepony else.

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