“Can I take it off now?” Twilight asked for what she was sure was the fifth time this trip. She currently had a white blindfold over her eyes and was sitting with her friends, brother, and fellow princesses in a carriage big enough for all of them while Discord hung in the air and relaxed behind it, the end of his tail wrapped around the back of it so he was along for the ride. They’d said goodbye to Twilight and Shining’s parents a little while ago while the Royal Guard pegasi retrieved the carriage. Once they were all seated and were on their way to Ponyville, Spike had gotten up behind her and put the blindfold on her, saying there was a surprise waiting for her back home when she questioned it.
“Nope!” Spike cheekily said, sitting next to her to make sure she didn’t try to take it off before they got to Ponyville.
Twilight let out an annoyed sigh and asked, “I really need to have this on the entire trip to Ponyville?”
Pinkie piped up, “Yep! No peeking, you little diary peeker!”
Twilight sighed again and said, “This must be some big surprise…”
Cadance smiled, “It certainly is, Twilight. Trust me, the wait is going to be worth it.”
Shining spoke up, “You know, you could help pass the time by telling us a little more if you’d like, Twily.”
Twilight asked a bit incredulously, “Haven’t I talked enough these last two days?”
Shining replied, “Yeah, but you were telling us about all the things you went through while you were away, and you said there weren’t any other major events between Paz trying to steal ZEKE and you coming home.” Twilight’s mouth scrunched up a little at that, but he didn’t notice. “I’m sure there’s some other things you could tell us about. Like, how do you know Paz was older than she looked? What in her diary indicated that?”
Twilight let out a sigh between her lips and started, “There was a day where some of us went out to the coast just to have a relaxing day. The guys were still in uniform, but they were still having fun. A bunch of guys in uniform building a sandcastle together…”
There were a few snickers before Rainbow asked, “Okay, so…?”
Twilight continued, “The entry in Paz’s diary focused on her encounter with Dr. Strangelove that day. I wasn’t watching them at the time, but Paz said Strangelove threw a bit of a fit about her sunbathing, telling her about how overexposure to the Sun can cause skin to develop a more… aged appearance.”
Rarity made a loud gasp and asked, “You mean like… wrinkles?!”
Twilight nodded, “Yes, and apparently Paz wasn’t aware of that before given how much she freaked out about it in her diary. She also made a remark about Strangelove’s age, but it’s more her concerns about premature aging and dropping the whole ‘teen with a dream’ thing that indicated she was not as young as she looked.”
Rarity spoke, “I’d love to know what her secret was. If she was, say, twenty or thirty years older than she looked, she must’ve had quite the treatment to maintain such a youthful appearance…” She noticed some of the others looking at her oddly and she argued, “I care about my beauty! I don’t want to know so I can try to infiltrate someone’s group!”
Twilight said, “I’m willing to bet it was nothing like a spa day, whatever it was. I mean, she talked about being trained to scuba dive at a young age, how her time in the water was so relaxing. I’m pretty sure she said that, before she came to Mother Base, those were the most peaceful days of her life.”
Rarity held a hoof to her muzzle, “I see.”
Rainbow asked, “So that’s it? That’s all she said about her age?”
Twilight replied, “Yeah. I kind of think that’s all she really needed to mention about her age in her own diary. The rest of the entry was about her dealing with how she felt about Strangelove’s… advances.”
Luna leaned over to look at the younger alicorn and asked, “What do you mean by ‘advances’, Twilight?”
Twilight answered, “Well, offering Paz her special sunscreen, applying it for her, letting her keep it… Strangelove ended up being a very fitting name for her.”
Luna started, “I’m sure it was, but what…” She stopped short as she suddenly had an idea of what Twilight was getting at. “Oh,” she uttered, sitting up straight again with a slight blush on her cheeks.
Rainbow began, “Wait, so she was…”
Twilight quickly interjected, “Yes. She was in love with The Boss and she developed feelings for Paz before she hijacked ZEKE. That makes it even more amazing that she was willing to give Huey a chance if the rumors were true.”
There was silence in the carriage for a minute as almost everyone realized which team Strangelove swung for. Spike, who didn’t entirely get it, looked up at Twilight and asked, “Hey Twilight?” She looked down in his direction, “What’s with that weird skull patch you have? Does that mean something? I mean, it looks like a broken, uh, human skull.”
Twilight answered, “Oh, you mean how it looks on the top? Those aren’t bone fragments; they’re landmasses.”
Rainbow asked, “What do you mean landmasses, egghead?”
Twilight replied, “It’s meant to be a symbol of MSF’s strength. Millions of year ago, their world was just one landmass, before natural forces broke it apart and the pieces drifted away to form smaller continents. Today, they refer to this supercontinent as Pangaea.”
Celestia spoke, “Hmm. And Snake and Miller decided that that was something that was important to their organization?”
Twilight nodded, “Exactly, Princess. Miller said that the concept was the core of MSF’s strength.”
After a moment, Shining asked, “Twily, I’ve been wondering… what happened the night you came home? How did you get hurt?”
Twilight was a bit defensive as she replied, “I don’t know! I was knocked out; my memory of that night is still pretty fuzzy. I was… probably doing another intense experiment session and I actually managed to teleport home at some point during it. I really don’t know how it happened.”
Shining raised an eyebrow, but said normally, “I… see.”
Twilight placed her face in her hooves and let out a sigh. “Can we stop talking about me already? What about everyone else? I’ve spent nearly five months wondering what was happening back here in Equestria,” she uttered. Although it was a bit surprising, her friends and family knew it was like her to want to move the subject away from herself, so they relented. They passed the rest of the trip getting her caught up on recent events in Ponyville and the Crystal Empire, though not everything regarding the former.
The Sun was going down by the time the carriage touched down in Ponyville, landing on the dirt path in a corner of the town. Feeling this, Twilight reached up with her hooves to take the blindfold off, but Spike quickly jumped onto her back and grabbed the sides of it saying, “No, not yet, Twilight! I’ll guide you the rest of the way!” Twilight let out an annoyed sigh and stood up. Spike guided her down and had her take a couple of steps forward before saying, “Okay, stop!” He eagerly reached up to the blindfold, the others looking on in anticipation as they disembarked.
Before he could reach it, Twilight sat down, almost throwing him off, and reached up with her hooves, pushing the blindfold up to her forehead. It took her eyes a few moments to adjust after being covered for so long, but once she could see normally again and looked straight ahead, her eyes widened. In front of her was a crystal castle held in an equally crystal tree. “What… is this?” she breathed.
Pinkie suddenly popped up next to her and exclaimed, “SURPRISE! It’s your new home, Twilight! And Spike’s too!”
Rainbow flew up in front of her and asked, “Isn’t it awesome?! The box from the Tree of Harmony came here after we defeated Tirek and planted itself in the ground, and then this castle just rose up out of the ground!”
Twilight continued to stare at the castle in surprise as the rest of her friends walked up beside her. “It’s… mine?” she uttered.
“I believe it is,” Celestia said as she, Luna, Cadance, Shining, and Discord came up behind everyone, the white alicorn gesturing up at the castle’s flag with her head when the younger alicorn looked back at her. Twilight’s gaze returned to the castle and, after a few more moments, her friends helped her up and guided her towards it.
As they got closer, Twilight took note of the two Royal Guards standing at the sides of the front doors. “Why the guards?” she asked, concerned.
Cadance answered, “They were just sent here to watch over the castle until you returned, Twilight. Partly to keep anypony from going inside without permission, but mainly because the mirror was moved here from the Crystal Empire for safekeeping.” Twilight immediately knew which mirror she was referring to and nodded in understanding. The unicorn guards bowed slightly as the group approached before using their magic to open the doors.
As they stepped inside, Twilight noticed the rug that stretched from the entrance across the castle’s crystal floor, going straight towards a staircase further back, splitting off to the left and right halfway down and going past more doors both ways. “We found this lavish rug already here in case you were wondering, darling. It seems the Tree of Harmony provided not only the essentials, but did so with good tastes,” Rarity explained.
As they started walking through the castle, Twilight said, “So… you’ve all already been in here.”
Discord piped up, “Well, I haven’t! This is my first time as well!”
Rarity shook her head and looked back at Twilight, “Of course we did, Twilight. When a large crystal tree suddenly rises out of the ground in your town, even as beautiful as it is, you have to be sure there’s nothing dangerous about it.”
The first stop on their tour was a large room that had numerous long shelves lining the walls, some longer than others. Rainbow flew into the middle of the room and exclaimed, “It’s empty now, but this would make a great new library! It’d be perfect for all the Daring Do books! …Oh, and any other egghead books you want to have.”
Moving on, they explored a number of bedrooms. Many of them were fairly sized and similar in appearance, suggesting they were guest rooms. One bedroom was bigger than the rest and had a bed with a canopy to match, no doubt the master, or rather the princess’, bedroom. They also found another that had different appearance, being shorter across from the door and longer in length. There was also a small set of shelves in the same wall as the door. Upon seeing it, Spike’s eyes lit up and he leapt into the room on all fours, proclaiming, “I call this room! This one’s mine! It’s perfect for me!” Everyone smiled at the dragon’s enthusiasm, happy that he’d managed to find a bedroom that fit him so quickly.
Afterwards, they explored some more, showing Twilight the castle’s smaller rooms, one of which contained the Crystal Mirror, as well as what seemed to be a kitchen and even a dining room, a big circular table in the center of the latter. As they were standing in it, Pinkie announced, “This is gonna be perfect for the big castle-warming party I’ve been planning for the last month! Now that Twilight’s home, we can finally start setting up for it!” Twilight’s eyes widened and she started to look uneasy at this.
Rarity walked over to Pinkie, who was happily bouncing in place, and put a hoof on her muzzle saying, “Yes, Pinkie dear, we know. You told us this the day we received word that Twilight was found. Well, you didn’t tell Twilight, Discord, her brother, or any of the princesses, but I think it’s safe to say we all expected you to be planning a party.”
Applejack spoke, “Ain’t quite done yet. We got one more room ta look at.” Twilight tried to hide the look on her face as she fell in step with her friends.
The final room’s size was only outmatched by that of the library, but it contained the most interesting thing of all: six thrones that had Twilight and her friends’ cutie marks on them and a seventh, smaller throne next to the one with Twilight’s cutie mark right across from Rarity’s. As they all stepped further into the room, Pinkie popped up in front of everyone and exclaimed, “Isn’t this great?! Imagine all the things we could do with these thrones now that we all have one!” She then hopped over to her throne and flopped down into it and sprawled out while Rainbow, Rarity, and Spike made their way over to their thrones and sat down in them.
While Applejack and Fluttershy walked over to their thrones to take a look at them, Twilight, who was feeling more than a little overwhelmed by everything, backed up against the wall behind her and sat down. “Wow… All this…” she uttered, leaning back against the wall. The crystal felt very cool and soothing to her.
After a moment, Discord spoke up, “HEY! Where’s my throne?!”
Fluttershy flew up to his face and said, “I’m not sure you’re ready for that yet.”
Discord looked off to the side for a moment before looking back at her with a sheepish grin, “Uh, I suppose not.”
Princess Celestia, who remained silent for most of the tour along with Shining Armor, Luna, and Cadance as Twilight’s friends talked about the castle, smiled and closed her eyes as she prepared to say what she had been waiting a month to say. “Twilight, I know it has been much longer for you, but it wasn’t that long ago that you wondered about your part in Equestria’s future, of what role you were meant to play as a princess. Do you think you know the answer now?” She opened her eyes expecting an almost immediate answer, but after several moments of silence, her smile eased off and she looked back, “Twilight?”
Everyone turned their heads to look at the mare at that. She was still sitting against the wall, but now she was leaning forward slightly, her eyes closed and her head bobbing a bit. Cadance walked over to her and gave her shoulder a light shake. “Twilight?” she asked.
Twilight opened her eyes most of the way and raised her head at the sound of her name. “Uh…?” she uttered.
“Are you feeling okay?” Cadance asked.
Twilight nodded slightly, “Y-Yeah, I-I’m fine. I-I just… it’s very comfortable right here.”
Celestia raised an eyebrow, but said, “I see.” She closed her eyes again, “Now, as I was saying, Twilight…” She stopped when she heard a light thud and opened her eyes to see Twilight lying on her front on the floor, her hooves tucked under her head and her eyes shut, and Cadance looking down at her in surprise.
This was too much for Discord; he burst out laughing, his guffaws doing little to wake Twilight. “Oh…! Oh, this is so good! You actually managed to bore Twilight to sleep, Celestia! Oh! I didn’t think the day would come so soon!” he managed to say.
Shining gave the draconequus a dark look for a moment before he trotted over to Twilight and grabbed her by the shoulders with his hooves. “Wake up, Twilight!” he said loudly while shaking her.
The shaking did the trick more than the noise, Twilight’s eyes shooting open after a moment of being shaken. Shining stopped after a few seconds, at which point Twilight’s head flopped down on the ground before she raised it up. “Ah… what?!” she whined.
“Why are you falling asleep? The princess is trying to tell you something very important!” Shining chastised, Twilight’s friends moving a little closer to her, worried.
Twilight rubbed her eyes with a hoof as she groaned, “Ngh… I’m sorry! I haven’t caught up on my sleep yet…”
Rarity asked, “Darling, weren’t you in a bed for a week while you recovered?”
Twilight lowered her hoof and looked up at her friends with half-lidded eyes, “That’s not sleep, Rarity. Have you ever heard of anyone who feels refreshed after regaining consciousness from being beaten over the head?” Rarity had to admit that was a good point.
Applejack said, “You were there for a few nights after ya woke up.”
Twilight sighed, “Not everyone has an easy time falling asleep in a hospital, Applejack.”
Rainbow spoke up, “Hey, I hear that.” She walked over to Twilight and stood next to her as she looked back at everyone, “You guys remember when I broke my wing. I was bored out of my skull in that hospital room, and I couldn’t fall asleep! Yeah, Daring Do gave me something to pass the time with, but even that didn’t help me get to sleep! I totally get where she’s coming from.”
Rarity raised an eyebrow, “That’s a bit unusual, isn’t it?”
She turned to look down at Twilight and helped her up with her hooves, “Come on, Twi’. Let me help you back to your new bedroom. We can pick this up tomorrow.”
As the pegasus walked with her out of the throne room, Twilight turned to her and smiled, “That sounds great.” Everyone else could only watch them walk away in silence, most of them not quite sure to make of what just happened. Fluttershy was the first to move, saying she had to go get Spike’s bed from her cottage, the other mares deciding to head home for the night as well shortly afterwards. Shining and the princesses decided to spend the night in the castle’s guest rooms, with Luna taking the room closest to Twilight’s. She had a sneaking suspicion that Twilight was not sleeping well and what might be causing it.
________________________________________
Twilight opened her eyes and looked around. She was surrounded by pitch blackness, yet she could see herself just fine. She looked down at her forelegs. She wasn’t wearing her Sneaking Suit and her bandages were gone, allowing her to see a small circular injury on the back of her left foreleg. She set it back down and raised her right hoof to her cheek. Her bandage patch was missing as well and she could feel the skin underneath, still rough from being burnt.
Deciding she didn’t really have to check if the rest of her injuries were present, she looked around again and noticed a distinct shape behind her. She walked towards it, noticing two things: one, that while it didn’t brighten up as she got closer, she could still make some details about how it looked, and two, there seemed to be more things beyond it. It looked to be a metal girder, probably used as a support, but it seemed to be broken and twisted. She could make out more ruined metalwork littering the ground as she walked, some of them bobbing up and down slightly like they were floating in water.
Not long afterwards, the trail of metalwork came to an end and she began to see something new. It appeared to be some sort of box, which seemed to be big enough to fit a person inside. Twilight froze and her eyes widened in dread as she realized it was a coffin, much like the one Wolf was buried at sea in. She looked ahead; there were more, many more, and they were laid out in neat rows. Some of them were bobbing up and down too, and as she watched, their silhouettes began to sink out of sight.
She gasped at this and ran forward. “No, no, no, no…” she muttered, trying to reach them before they could disappear. She couldn’t stop them, though; her hooves couldn’t reach them in time and her magic wasn’t working, and while she was distracted, the others began to sink as well, even the ones that weren’t moving before. Soon, they were all gone.
Twilight flopped back onto her haunches, alone and on the verge of tears. She couldn’t save them, no matter how hard she tried. She was shaken from her thoughts by the sound of clanging metal. She looked up to see the silhouette of a pair of tall metal gates swinging open ahead of her, the metal creaking as they opened all the way. Despite her teary eyes, Twilight rose and walked forward, going past them.
Once again, she saw something new. As she walked, she passed by what appeared to be large cages, though they appeared to be covered by something. She kept looking at them as she walked, afraid to look underneath the covering and see what was inside them. It didn’t take long for her to come to the end of the cages as she stopped seeing them at her sides or anything ahead of her, but she soon noticed something. It sounded like singing.
Here’s to you, Nicola and Bart
Rest forever here in our hearts
The last and final moment is yours
The agony is your triumph
It was singing. There were voices singing a familiar song. She kept walking and soon began to see the silhouettes of grave markers and what appeared to be a hill with some sort of monument on it up ahead. She stopped at where the markers seemed to begin and stood there, listening to the song. The singers were mostly males as well as a few females. She recognized them all, but no matter how hard she tried, there was one voice she couldn’t hear, one she should’ve been able to hear. “Where is she? Why can’t I hear her?” she wondered quietly.
She suddenly became aware of another presence behind her and turned to see Luna standing in the blackness, pointedly looking around like she was searching for something. “Luna?” she asked.
The Lunar Princess looked in her direction, looking relieved. “Twilight,” she said softly before she blinked and started looking around again. “What happened here? This shouldn’t be like this. This is worse than I thought…” she uttered. Twilight was about to ask her what she was talking about, but was blown back a bit by Luna’s use of the Royal Canterlot Voice, “WHERE ARE YOU, TANTABUS?! SHOW YOURSELF! I KNOW YOU ARE HERE!”
Twilight again wanted to ask her what she was talking about, but they both quickly noticed the dream had changed. The singing came to an abrupt stop and their surroundings were starting to get brighter, but it didn’t appear to be ordinary light. It was orange-tinted and flickering, as if it was coming from a fire. It continued to get brighter until there were no more silhouettes and everything could be seen. Flames burned at the edges of the dreamscape against the blackness, surrounding them.
Both Luna and Twilight turned to look down at the ground next to them as they heard the sound of something emerging. They saw humans pushing and pulling the rest of their bodies out of the ground, but they weren’t just any humans. They were wearing MSF uniforms and masks, which were covered in blood. They became more horrific as they got closer to pulling themselves free. Some had wounds that were spurting blood, some became enshrouded by flames, and some appeared to be blue in the face from what could be seen underneath their masks. And their eyes… they all had empty, blank, white eyes that still seemed to be able to see the two ponies.
Luna took a few steps back as four soldiers finished climbing out of the ground. They looked at her before they began to shamble slowly towards her. The Lunar Princess could hear them speaking as they got closer.
“It hurts so bad!”
“I can’t… breathe…”
“Those bastards will pay for what they’ve done!”
“Boss? Where are you? Don’t leave us behind…”
Luna looked between them for a moment before she steeled herself. Her magic surged into her horn as she prepared to vanquish the horrors that the nightmare was imparting on the dreamscape. To her shock, however, when she fired a beam of magic at one of the soldiers, his form distorted and he let out an unearthly wail as it simply passed through him, returning to normal afterwards. Luna couldn’t believe it; the only time her magic failed to have an impact on a dream was when…
Her head quickly turned in Twilight’s direction, remembering. She was surrounded by more soldiers, all of them forming a circle around her. Even though they were closing in on her, she wasn’t doing anything to try to stop them. In fact, she was cowering, her forelegs covering her head as she shook crazily. The soldiers were chanting, “One of us, one of us…” as they neared her.
Luna turned back to the soldiers approaching her and spread her wings, flying up and backwards to get away from them. The soldiers kept moving towards her even though they couldn’t reach her, moving with the pointed determination of zombies. Ignoring them, Luna turned and flew towards Twilight, seeing an orange light beginning to glow underneath her. “Twilight!” she cried as she flew as fast as she could, reaching for her friend…
________________________________________
Twilight shot up, panting and sweating terribly. She looked around; she was back in her bed in the new castle. She managed to get her breathing under control after a few moments, but what she’d seen in her dream still haunted her. She raised her hooves and pressed them against her eyes, but she couldn’t get it out of her mind no matter how hard she tried.
After a minute, she lowered her hooves and swung her legs out from under the blankets. As she sat on the edge of the bed, she used her magic to grab her Sneaking Suit and bring it over. Once she was finished putting it on, she slid out of bed and exited her bedroom. Her mane and tail were a frizzy mess, but she didn’t care; she felt cold and wanted some fresh air.
As she stepped out through the front doors of her castle, she noticed that the Sun was coming up. It wasn’t as early as it was when she woke up the other day, but it was still fairly early. It seemed as though Ponyville should’ve been pretty quiet. Looking to her sides, she realized that the Royal Guards were still standing watch at the doors. They turned their eyes to look at her, but their expressions didn’t change at her appearance. Before they or Twilight could say anything, they heard another pony say, “Twilight?”
Twilight faced forward and saw Mayor Mare walking up to the steps of the castle, the earth pony’s brushed mane and tail, perfectly balanced glasses, and neatly pressed collar making her feel even more conscious about her appearance. “M-Miss Mayor!” she blurted out.
The Mayor seemed equally surprised to see the lavender alicorn so early. “I… didn’t know you were up already,” she admitted as she came to a stop at the base of the steps.
Twilight stammered, “Well, I… I just… I was up and I was going to take a walk.” She looked back at the mare, “Did you… know I was back?”
Mayor Mare adjusted her glasses as she replied, “Well… I heard ponies talking last night. I overheard them saying that a carriage landed here during the evening, a few claiming they even saw you. I was up, so I was going to drop off a note asking you to stop by the Town Hall later. If it was true that you were back, of course.”
Twilight looked worried at this. “Why? Is something wrong?” she asked.
Mayor Mare answered, “I’m afraid so. Were it up to me, I would rather have a more casual conversation with you about the matter, but I’ve had ponies constantly bothering me about it for the last month. They’ve been getting impatient, so I thought it would be best to bring the matter to your attention as soon as possible. If you have the time now, I’d like to talk to you about, erm… your old home.”