//------------------------------//
// Twinkle Like Much Stars 
// Story: Ofolrodi 
// by Imploding Colon 
//------------------------------//

"Was she your maid?  Mailmare?  Bodyguard?"  Pinkie Pie bounced on invisible ghost platforms as she kept alongside Rainbow Dash.  "Godmare?  Buckball partner?"

"Pinkie!  Shhh!"  Rainbow finished gliding into an office room filled with a jumble of discarded junk and paperwork.  "Okay, Ariel.  What have you got for me?"

The mare in question turned around, holding a manacrystal lantern.  "Rainbow!"  She placed the light source down and proudly held out a stack of ancient, yellowed manuscripts.  "Take a look for yourself!"

Rainbow trotted closer while Pinkie Pie hovered just behind her.  "Are these the maps you were talking about?"

"Yup yup yup!"  Ariel pointed at one sheet in particular.  "See?  There's the mesa that houses Darkreach.  Over here—scribbled with wavy lines—is the remains of a forest that was once destroyed.  Then beyond that—"

"'Alpha' and 'Omega'..."  Rainbow Dash squinted at the symbols.  "I wonder what those mean?"

"Well... uh... they're letters, Rainbow."

"But what do they stand for?"

"I know I'm no Kepler, but..."  Ariel pointed.  "This side is the edge of the world, and it's perpendicular to both sides labeled by the letters, right?"

"Sure..."

"Well, I think the Emeraldinians made up their own 'north' and 'south'," Ariel said.  "Or perhaps East and West.  I dunno."

"So..."  Rainbow Dash gestured with one hoof while she held the paper up in the other.  "If we had our backs to the Edge of the World and were facing the curve..."

"'Alpha' would be on the left side," Ariel said.

"And 'Omega' would be on the right," Rainbow muttered.  "Our predecessors made practical names for the lengthy edges of the plane."

"Coolies!"  Pinkie Pie beamed.  "Must have made pizza-delivery a whole lot easier!"  She grinned at Rainbow and let her tongue hang out.  "Was Roarke a pizza-delivery pony?"

"Pinkie, hush."  Rainbow pointed at the map.  "Who or what are 'Bloodwings?'"

"I dunno," Ariel said.  "Only they're located closer towards the 'Omega' side and they're past the area where a forest was cut down."

"I wonder if we can see the ruins of that forest," Rainbow thought out loud."

"It was hundreds of years ago, Rainbow.  I doubt anything's left."

"Still, it would be good to get a survey of the landscape before we attempted to go further in our journey."

"Wassssssssssssssssss..."  Pinkie rubbed her nose and brightened.  "...she a forest ranger?"

Rainbow ignored her, pointing at another word on the page.  "'Spindlers'... name of a mountain range, perhaps?"

"That looks like a sketch of a city to me."

Rainbow did a double-take.  "A city?  On the Dark side?"

Ariel shrugged.  "A lot of time has passed on this side of the plane as well.  Who knows what those living here could be capable of?"

"Well, sure, but..."  Rainbow fidgeted.  "...I didn't expect any faction of the Trinary War to be capable of making an entire friggin' city."

"Maybe she was a mayor!" Pinkie exclaimed.  "'Mayor Roarke or Roarketown!'"

"What makes you think there are only three factions living on the Dark Side?" Ariel remarked.

Rainbow stared at her blankly.

"I dunno..."  Ariel shrugged.  "It's just a thought that occurred to me.  This used to be a piece of Urohringr, right?  You think only ponies and griffins lived on that thing?"

"Yeah, but to survive eons and eons without the sun and moon..."

"The Divines are as old as this plane, and they've lived nearly as long."

"True."  Rainbow nodded.  "But all of them but Endrax have dwelled on the Light Side."

"Dragon Tamer!"  Pinkie grinned wide.  "Maybe Roarke was a dragon tamer!"  A sly grin.  "So that was your secret for kicking Nevlamas' teeth in."

Rainbow grunted, turning around.  "Dang it, Pinkie—"  She froze in place, blinking.

"What?"  Pinkie shrugged.  "Is there something in my ghost teeth?"

Rainbow marched straight through the phantom mare.  She approached a cabinet where a framed sketch lay crooked against the wall.  She rubbed her pendant so she could cast ruby light directly on the illustration.

"What do you see?"  Ariel trotted slowly behind her.  "Looks... almost like a monkey?"

Rainbow's eyes traced the edges of a gangly bipedal figure wearing a loin cloth and possessing leafy, pointy ears.  Fanged teeth protruded from an noticeable overbite.  The skin was rough and leathery.

"It's a goblin," Rainbow exhaled.

"A what?"

"Bunch of freaky two-legged imps who hail from Alafreo," Rainbow said.  "At least... I thought they did."  Her ears drooped slightly.  "Not a very pleasant bunch, those guys.  And that was just the Light Side."

"Well, there you have it!"  Ariel gestured with a smile.  "Maybe they came from this place!"

"That's... a long distance for them to have traveled," Rainbow muttered.  "And despite their love of technology, they're not always... consistent with the quality of what they build."  A cold shudder.  "The naga, on the other hoof..."

"What are those things next to it?"

"Huh?" Rainbow asked.

"Here..."  Ariel reached over with her feathertips and leaned another framed picture into view.  "See?"

Rainbow squinted at a sketch made obviously by the same artist as the first.  This time, however, the illustration showed two other bipedal creatures that were significantly different than the first.  One was hunched over and pale with long claws and pronounced vertebrae.  The other one stood upright at a scale nearly ten times the size of the "goblin," only it was heavy-set with a pudgy belly and a single round eye in the center of its skull.

Rainbow gulped.  "I don't think I wanna know..."

"All Hail Roarke the Beast Mistress!" Pinkie Pie bellowed.

"Rnnnngh!"  Rainbow gnashed her teeth.  "Pinkie, for crying out loud—"

Just then, the intercom system crackled, frightening both pegasi.

"Hey!  Ariel!  Is Rainbow Dash down there with you?"

"Guhhh..."  Ariel rubbed one of her ears, wincing.  "Yes she is, Flynn.  You don't have yell."

"Whoops!  Sorry!"  A whining hiss, followed by:  "I still haven't gotten the volume settings quite calibrated—"

"Just get to the point!" Rainbow's voice cracked.

"Why don't you hop up here to the HQ, Rainbow?  Kepler's made a significant discovery."

"Uhhhhhhhhh... what's the 'HQ?' again?"

"... ... ...the cramped, super-important room with the snazzy map made out of metal pins."

"Oh!  Right!  Got it!"  Rainbow turned to nod at Ariel.  "Sorry to cut this short."

"I feel like we've only just begun to scrape the surface of this place," Ariel said.

"Well, you keep on scraping," Rainbow said, flapping her wings.  "I've got a wyvern to humor."





"Dashiiiiiiiiiiiiie."  Pinkie Pie pouted.  "You're ignoring meeeeeee."

"I'm not ignoring you, Pinkie," Rainbow said, swiftly and smoothely gliding up the corridors and stairwells of Darkreach.

"Then why won't you tell me more about this 'Roarke' pony?"

"Mrmmmfff... it's all in the past."

"Yeah?  So?  It's your past!"  Pinkie grinned.  "That makes it super duper special!"

"Not as important as the future," Rainbow said.  Her brow furrowed as she continued ascending the interior of the mesa.  "The future of Equestria... Urohringr... you and the girls—"

"None of which would be made possible if it weren't for all of your awesome adventuring!"

"Meh."

"Dashieeeeee?"  Pinkie pouted some more.  "What's with you?  You weren't always so glum in the tum-tum!"

"I've got a lot on my shoulders, Pinkie."

"Well, they're on our shoulders too!"

"No.  They're not."

"Pffft!"  Pinkie stuck her tongue out.  "They are too!"

"Not like they are on mine!" Rainbow growled.  She felt the echo her tone of voice made, and she slowed her ascent.  With a defeated sigh, she landed on all fours and resumed her pace at a lethargic trot.  "I'm sorry, Pinkie.  I wish I could be like the Rainbow Dash you used to know, but—"

"You left it behind...?"  Pinkie blinked—bright blue innocent eyes.  "In Ponyville?"

Rainbow clenched her jaw.

Pinkie glanced at the walls... at the ceiling... then straight at Rainbow.  "You left it with Roarke."

"Mrmmmm..."  Rainbow's ears folded.  "....yyyyyyyyyyyyeahhhhhh..."

Pinkie smiled.  "She must have been very important to you."

"The importantest."

"Heeheehee..."  Pinkie bore a warm grin.  "Did you love her?"

Rainbow Dash scuffled to a stop.

Pinkie simply stared.  And waited.

"There was a time when I lived in the moment," Rainbow Dash muttered.  "Because the moment was all I had.  You... Twilight... Fluttershy... you all were gone.  I made do with those around me... and I found a family."  Rainbow's tail flicked happily at the thought.  "I thought I had lost my opportunity to be happy.  But then I found it again.  And for a while there... happiness was something I could fold around me like a blanket."  A heavy exhale.  "Then I had to leave it all... I had to leave her."

Pinkie floated around to face her.  "You can still live in the moment, Dashie."

"No..."  Rainbow shook her head.  "I can't."  A gulp.  "The moment you girls came back from the dead, it all changed.  Now I have a future to save.  I have harmony to restore.  Before, I didn't even think I'd make it to the Edge of the World—much less the Midnight Armory.  Now that I've come so far and there's so much to lose, I just can't afford to be silly about it anymore.  And..."  She clenched her teeth, shivering.  "...now that there's Discord—"

"But you're awesome, Dashie!" Pinkie said.  "I know you can do both at once!  Be adventurous and be happy!"

Rainbow blinked moisture out of her eyes.  "... ... ...I'm not sure I remember how, Pinkie."

"Hmmmm..."  Pinkie floated within a hug's reach.  "You've got us, now.  We can help remind you."

"I... I don't know..."

"Heehee... it's okay... baby steps!"  Pinkie stuck her tongue out.  "Like what Fluttershy said!"

"Uh huh..."

"Maybe the first baby step is talking to all of us about Roarke!"  Pinkie giggle-snorted.  "Heck, the whole Noble Jury!"

Rainbow sighed slowly.  "Maybe."  She trotted up the stairwell again.  "Once I get things done here first."

"Awwwwwwww, Dashieeeeeeeee..."

"Can't have fought the changeling for nothing, Pinkie."

"But you can't keep telling yourself that!"  Pinkie hovered briskly after her.  "You never know when you'll run out of time to put off!"

Rainbow had nothing to respond with other than a cold, exhausted:  "Yeah..."