The train ride to Canterlot was uncomfortable for Twilight. She tried to nap along the way, but couldn't get a wink of sleep over the first half of the trip. The events of the past two days were haunting her thoughts, and deep down inside her barrel, she felt like any action she took from this point on was bound to be the wrong one.
"I can't let a little foal's random prediction do this to me," she whispered to herself. "He might be talented for his age, but he's still just a child. Even Celestia doesn't believe him. And if all foals know about this Quifons place, then there's nothing special about him knowing it exists, either."
Those words were true, and should have been comforting to her, but Twilight knew that Amethyst Eclipse's prediction wasn't the real problem. Princess Celestia was hiding something from her, and Twilight wouldn't be able to stop searching until she uncovered the secret. Twilight Sparkle was the Princess of Friendship, Bearer of the Element of Magic, and the savior of two kingdoms on multiple occasions. She deserved to know. She needed to know.
Revealing what she knew to Celestia made the most horse sense, of course, but Twilight had to pursue the option which led to the highest probability of success. She needed more information before she could lay her entire hoof on the table. Unless evidence emerged that she was doing something terribly dangerous, nothing was going to make her stop.
As the train continued to rumble along its tracks, Twilight glanced up at the hand brake signal that passengers could pull in an emergency to slow down the train. She sighed and shook her head.
"There are no brakes on the Twilight train," the young alicorn mumbled, as the whirling dervish in her mind finally spun down just enough to allow her a quick reprieve from consciousness...
warmth but not by name
a soothing heartbeat but not by name
waiting... dizzy...
pressure but not...
struggle but...
pressure
pressure
pressure
struggle
force
LIGHT
noise outside
impulse within vomiting?
noise within coughing?
coldness within FEAR
DISCOMFORT
more noise within
coldness on hide
texture and warmth
MORE LIGHT
MORE LIGHT
struggle
confusion
a soft sparkling, all around, at the edges of sensation... from all senses unified as one
calmness
Mother
Twilight Sparkle gasped and jerked upright in her seat, her wings flapping open and bowling over the train conductor next to her in the process.
"P-Princess?" said the pony, slowly rising back to her feet. "Is everything alright?"
It took a moment for Twilight's mind to clear. She was certain she could smell chocolate and lilac. Her flesh was tingling with an electric feeling, and she could taste something like lemon custard in the back of her throat. Little rainbow streaks bounced in front of her eyes, then slowly faded. Her magic sense was sparking, and for the briefest moment it felt like she could touch every living creature for miles—most of whom were insects, like the millions upon millions of worms churning deep within the earth. And there was something else, a perception even more curious: a vibration of sorts, a feeling somehow between magic and scent, which told her conclusively that the mare next to her was feeling nervous and embarrassed...
"Where is this, am I... Canterlot?" said Twilight, shaking her head as the sensations finally left her. The rest of the train appeared to be empty.
"Yes, Princess Twilight Sparkle," said the conductor. "We, um... we need you to disembark now, unless you're planning on continuing on to Hollow Shades."
Twilight stood up on shaky legs. "Th-thank you. Sorry," she said, then yawned as she grabbed her saddlebags and began walking to the exit.
As she disembarked, Twilight Sparkle could see it was still the middle of the night, which meant her train had likely arrived on schedule. Twilight estimated she'd only eked out about an hour of REM sleep on the train. She could go to the castle and get free boarding there, or wake her parents and stay at home. Neither choice was appropriate. Twilight still owned a home of her own in Canterlot, and it was already filled with the exact resources she needed.
Arriving at the front door, Twilight was surprised to find the garden outside well-maintained. Perhaps Moondancer or her parents had been keeping it up. She fumbled magically through her saddlebags until she found the keys, then opened the door and headed inside.
It was very dark, but familiar. Dropping her saddlebags by the door, Twilight wandered up the steps to her bed by rote memory, then slipped under the covers. There was something warm and fuzzy right next to her. Did she have a large stuffed toy she'd left here? She couldn't remember, but her mind was saddled with fatigue and confusion. So she blindly cuddled herself to sleep.
Twilight Sparkle awoke to the distinct sensation of warm breath on her muzzle. Her eyes opened, and she saw a face both familiar and unfamiliar. It was a bit like looking in a mirror, except her eyebrows weren't that bush—
"Twilight, I'm sorry!" whispered the strange pony. It took a few seconds to register to Twilight that she was presently holding Moondancer in her legs, in her bed. Judging by the bright light streaming in the house, this had probably been the situation for the past few hours.
"What, um," said Twilight. Moondancer was blushing furiously. Twilight was fairly certain the burning sensation in her cheeks meant the blush was mutual.
"You climbed in bed with me in the middle of the night, and, um... you pinned my legs, so I was afraid if I got up I would wake you," said Moondancer, her voice still quiet. "I... I hope that was okay."
"Ohmygosh. Moondancer, I didn't mean," said Twilight, her eyes wide as she willed her legs to release her friend. Oddly enough, those legs weren't presently responding to commands from her central nervous system.
Moondancer grinned sheepishly. "It's okay, I... well, I don't mind," she said. "But, um, I should have gone down to the couch. This was dumb. I'm not surprised you didn't notice, given how tired you were."
Twilight wracked her brain, trying to put together the pieces. "Oh. Oh horse apples, I'm sorry Moondancer! I forgot you were staying here sometimes," she said, shivering in place. "I... Huh. I didn't realize you were sleeping in my bed, too. Er, but that's fine, though! All of this is fine."
"All of it?" asked Moondancer, biting furtively at her lower lip. "You... didn't mind either?"
Twilight Sparkle's eyes danced back and forth between the bed and Moondancer's face. "I, um, sure, it's fine, and I sh-should get up," she said, finally pulling herself free from the embrace and toppling off the small bed entirely. "Wow. Sorry, I, um. Huh."
Moondancer sighed. She reached over to the nightstand and nabbed her glasses, then pulled her bangs up and out of her eyes with a mane-tie. "Right. Yeah, I've been here a lot. You have amazing books and equipment, and it's just easier to sleep here," she said. "I can, like, go home if you need me to..."
Twilight stood up and shook her head. "No, please stay! Actually, I came to Canterlot looking for you in particular. I have... I have a very long story to tell you."
"I'll brew the coffee," said Moondancer, slipping on her sweater.
"That is, without a doubt, the stupidest story I've ever heard," said Moondancer, between sips of her third cup of java. "There's no way you made any of this up. It sounds like... like young adult fanfiction written by a schizophrenic timber wolf."
Twilight chuckled. "Actually, I was thinking the same thing. I told Starlight Glimmer that I had no choice but to believe the vision. I literally could not have made it up."
Moondancer pursed her lips. "We have to tell Celestia, Twilight," she said. "I want to know as badly as you do, but there's just too much at stake here."
"Do you really think Amethyst Eclipse knows what he's talking about?" asked Twilight.
"Not for a second. I mean, ignore his age, and what do you have? A fairly competent, yet neophyte, mage with a prediction," she said. "Predictions require time or fate-based magic spells, most of which are proscribed, and even then there's no chance a foal his age could cast one."
"Exactly. So I don't think we need to worry about any—" began Twilight.
"Wait, I'm not done. He's obviously weird, and he never said anything about the prediction coming from his ability to use magic, did he?" said Moondancer, stirring the remains of her coffee with magic. "He can see this Quifons, apparently, or at the very least he has clear memories of it."
"All foals can, if the facts from my vision of the War Room remain true today," said Twilight.
"This little guy is different. He was able to communicate with you at, what, maybe a fifth-grade level, and he can still remember Quifons at the same time," said Moondancer. "It seems likely that most foals lose touch with Quifons sometime before the interfascicular oligodendrocytes finish turning grey matter into white matter via myelination. The foal you're describing sounds like he's already been through that process. He has the capacity to think abstractly, but at the same time, he can remember being much younger than any adult can. I mean, you'd be hard pressed to find an adult pony who could remember being four years old with any clarity. That data gets overwritten as a natural part of the learning process."
Twilight paused for a moment and closed her eyes. "I had a weird dream on the train," she said, then opened her eyes and stared out the window at a passing cloud. "I think I was somehow... remembering my own birth? Naturally, this should be impossible. Young memories like that shouldn't be in my brain at all, like you said."
"Interesting. Well, there must be magic involved, then," said Moondancer. "You're reaching into the past to recover the memories from when they used to be there, or the memories are falsified by the magic."
"I don't think it's magic. Not exactly, anyway. I think Quifons is involved." Twilight fidgeted in her seat.
"Maybe," said Moondancer, "but it sounds like Quifons is just a 'passive' flavor of magic we don't know about. It's still magic, just not the kind you can control directly."
"In the dream, I could sense Quifons at the edges of my vision, just before I saw Mom—er, Twilight Velvet. It was calm and peaceful, but absolutely overwhelming at the same time. And I certainly couldn't 'see' it. It was the tiniest, peripheral glimpse, but that was enough to flood my senses."
"I know who your mother is, Princess Dork," said Moondancer, snickering. "Pretty much half of Equestria does."
Twilight blushed. "Right, right. But I... I felt it, somehow, Moonie! And then I woke up with all sorts of weird sensations, and I think I could even detect emotions for a moment, but then it all faded away."
Moondancer raised a thick eyebrow at 'Moonie', but didn't comment. "All of this is fascinating, but we still gotta tell her, Twi. There are too many unknowns here. There's weird magic we don't understand—or whatever phenomenon is causing this—and it's already starting to affect you, even though you only caught the tiniest glimpse of it through somepony else's memories," said Moondancer. "That's a big red flag. Obviously I stand behind your passion for inquiry, but Princesses Celestia and Luna are the only ponies we know that could have the answers and be willing to divulge them. They need to be our first stop."
"So you don't want to do even a little astronomy first?" said Twilight, wincing.
"Tartarus, yes, I do! Right now, even! But we need to well-order our priorities," said Moondancer. "You're not thinking clearly because this thing you were exposed to is overwhelming your senses already."
"I don't know that it matters. I certainly can't be the one to tell her. If she shuts me down, I'll lose my mind. I'm already starting to lose it, if you haven't noticed." Twilight hung her head and sighed.
"Fine. We won't tell her you know," said Moondancer, with a gentle smirk.
"What? How?"
"Easy peasy. I'll go ask her myself, under the ruse that we haven't spoken in a long time. I can pretend I overheard about this place while passing a playground, or something like that, and that I'm starting to have the memories you're describing," said Moondancer. "I'll add that I'm interested in doing astronomy research since I have access to this place."
"Hmm. I'm having a hard time believing Princess Celestia will buy any part of that story," said Twilight.
"Probably not, but I'm a good liar. I won't give up anything you've done or learned so far," replied Moondancer. "Besides, if I mention I'm using your old place, that will probably convince her you're not involved, ironically enough."
"How... oh! Because it already sounds suspicious if you mention you're using my facilities, and you probably would omit that detail if you were trying to hide my involvement."
"Bingo," said Moondancer, polishing off her third cup with a deep slurp.
"Well, I guess it's a reasonable plan," said Twilight, frowning. "I mean, in the worst case, we'll learn if she thinks we're doing something dangerous..."
"...which at the very least, will give us more data to help us make the decision on whether to proceed," finished Moondancer.
Twilight nodded several times. "We're definitely on the same page."
"Same paragraph, even."
Twilight smiled. "Yeah."
"Princess Celestia... she doesn't have access to memory magic of some sort, does she?" asked Moondancer.
"I'm sure she does. Even I know some, but most of it's alicorn-level stuff and it's still illegal to cast it. It's even illegal for Celestia to use it, or at least unconstitutional since it violates the rule of law. Then again, Quifons seems to be related to memory magic, so that may throw a wrench in any expectations we should hold," said Twilight. "Look, I know what you're thinking, and I've been a little paranoid she might try to make us forget Quifons again too. I don't think there's an easy way she could do it at this point, though. There's too much in my brain."
"Well, that's another good reason you shouldn't be the one to confront her," said Moondancer. "Hay, hoof me that silver marker. I have an idea."
After Twilight hoofed Moondancer the permanent marker, her friend quickly drew something on the bottom of her left front hoof with it.
"What's that?" asked Twilight.
"Insurance," said Moondancer, winking, which elicited a blush. "Hopefully I won't need to use it, but I'll keep it a surprise for now."
"Wait, are you leaving already?" asked Twilight. "Like, right now?"
"Don't see why not," said Moondancer, with a shrug. "I'll brush my teeth first and trot over for an audience. Her schedule's usually less busy this early, especially on a Monday. You might want to wait in the dining room with the shades down, though."
"Right, she might send a guard or something, just to check on the place," said Twilight Sparkle. "Wow... all this cloak and dagger stuff is escalating so quickly! I hope Starlight isn't this nervous."
"From what little I gather, she's used to this sort of thing," said Moondancer. "Rarity should get a kick out of it too. Rainbow Dash told me all about how she loves playing 'detective'."
"Starlight and Rarity are definitely competent enough to pull off the heist without getting in trouble," said Twilight, grabbing her saddlebags and retreating to the dining room. "Even if they screw up royally, they basically have diplomatic immunity."
"You might have 'diplomatic' and 'royal' switched," Moondancer called from the bathroom. Twilight heard her spit, then watched her trot toward the exit. "I'm sure this Quifons thing is just a big misunderstanding or something, and we'll be laughing it off later today. Especially after your other friends commit a felony or two over in Manehattan. But just in case... could you wish me luck?" she said.
Twilight could barely see her standing by the door from where she sat in the dining room. Even from here, Moondancer looked strangely vulnerable.
"Absolutely, I wish you the best of luck. You're a good friend, Moondancer," said Twilight.
"You're... um... y-yeah, I know I am. Thanks," said Moondancer. She locked the door from the inside with the door open, then quickly left and shut it behind her. Twilight breathed a sigh of relief at being free from the social anxiety. Moondancer was a good friend, but something about spending time with her made her feel... antsy.
"Oh, Moonie—er, I mean Moondancer. I really hope I'm not doing something bad to you," she whispered to herself. Then she opened her saddlebags, took something small out, and began to spin it in the air.
It was the shot glass, already filled with goo and shrink-wrapped so that it wouldn't spill. Twilight had prepared the dose shortly before speaking with Starlight, and brought it with her just in case.
Should I wait for her report, or just go ahead and take another dose now? Waiting was the only option that made sense. There was a lot more that could be done before Twilight would need to reopen Princess Celestia's treasured memories, and the potion should be an item of last resort. Swallowing the goo was, in a way, a much more invasive theft than what Rarity and Starlight were preparing for.
But waiting was just excruciating.
With the remaining shreds of her willpower, Twilight put the wrapped dose back into her backpack and latched the side shut. "I need a book," she said, trotting out of the room to grab one.
Five minutes later, she returned to the dining room with one of Spike's old, oversized beanbag chairs (repaired about a dozen times—it took a while to learn how to properly file down his scales). Also at her side were five books on the subjects of magic theory, cosmology and dimensional theory, astronomy, advanced magical practice, and architecture. The last one was just for fun, in case she became bored with the others.
Twilight decided to keep the lights off just to be safe, and read with her horn to light the pages. It felt a lot like being a little kid again, and this tickled something deep in her innards. It also scared her for reasons she didn't fully understand, but she brushed off the negative feeling.
Somewhere in the middle of Chapter 5 of Astronomical Annotations, Twilight had dozed off. The knocking sound on the door abruptly woke her up from a dreamless sleep.
The knocking repeated itself, and then a third time. It was rapid and insistent. Twilight turned on the lights in the dining room (still hidden from view from the outside, at least), slunk to the edge of the room, and flipped the lock from a distance with her magic.
Looking over at the clock, Twilight realized nearly two hours had passed. Walking to or from the castle from here should have taken Moondancer less than ten minutes.
Moondancer opened the door, looked left and right, then shut it behind her and locked it. Her eyes widened as she spotted Twilight staring back at her from the dining room.
"I had a sneaking suspicion you'd be here," she said, frowning as she marched forward. She looked rather upset.
"W-what? Moondancer, what happened?" said Twilight.
Moondancer exhaled slowly, then extended her hoof upward toward Twilight's face. "I was hoping you could tell me. Do you have any idea what the buck this means?"
On the frog of her hoof were, in silver marker, symbols clearly in Moondancer's magewriting. Twilight didn't recognize them.
"I... don't know what those symbols mean," said Twilight.
Moondancer sighed. "It reads, 'PLAY DUMB', in a code I used to write with when I was a young foal."
"Ah, I see," said Twilight, grimacing. "Okay, this time, I'll brew the coffee."
"This time? Oh Twilight Sparkle shenanigans, how dearly I've missed you," said Moondancer, shaking her head. "That was sarcasm, just in case it didn't come across."
"Yeah, I get it," said Twilight, rolling her eyes.