//------------------------------// // Amnesia // Story: Little Memories // by Skijarama //------------------------------// The wind outside the Golden Oaks Library howled and roared in the darkness, making the panicking alicorn think of a ghost that would love nothing more than to make her join it in the grave. Somewhere up in the loft, a tree branch repeatedly slapped against a window, creating a rhythmic tapping noise that reverberated loudly with every repetition. The world outside was obscured in total darkness, and the only light inside the library was the flickering orange glow of a dozen candles scattered about on tables, shelves, and even over the floor. Sitting in the middle of it all with her breath coming in ragged, frightened gasps, was Twilight Sparkle. She reached out towards a book on a shelf with her magic, a strangled cry of frustration and dread worming its way out of her throat when she realized that, just like all the others, the book was beyond the reach of her magic. It was as if the spell just slid right off of the cover, the bindings, even the pages. It was like water off a duck’s back. She tried again with a different book, this one closer, and was met with identical results. The wind howled louder outside, causing the entire library to shudder and creak in protest. The tapping branch on the window struck louder than before, and the flames of several of the candles winked out of existence. Twilight’s ears went flat against her head when she felt the temperature drop and saw the light decrease. She quickly rose to her hooves and galloped over to one wall that was lined with shelves upon shelves, each one packed with books. But as she ran, the shelves retreated from her, causing the central room of the Library to distort and stretch unnaturally. With a shout of effort and an instinctual flap of her wings, Twilight managed to close the distance long enough to pluck a single book from the shelf. She hit the floor with a thud and a gasp of pain. After a moment, she rose back up to her haunches to look down at the book. With a sigh, she went to open it. That sigh quickly escalated into a horrified, panicking shout as the book crumbled in her hooves, the dust being scattered in a wind that wasn’t there. “No, no no no NO!” She cried, feebly reaching for the particles even as they vanished from the world. This was bad. She needed to find something. She didn’t know what it was yet, just that she would know it when she saw it. It was hiding in one of these books, and once she found it, it’d drive away the darkness and the cold. She just had to keep looking and trying. But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t get a good look into any of these books. Her magic wouldn’t work, and if they touched her hooves, they crumbled away, rendering her efforts pointless. The wind outside grew stronger again, and again, several of Twilight’s candles went out, leaving her with only three. Now on the verge of hyperventilating, Twilight spun around. “Come on!” she cried in desperation, galloping towards the opposite wall and reaching for the books with her magic. Again, the shelf retreated from her, this time faster than she could hope to keep up with. The shelves faded into distant darkness, and she had to end her pursuit at the edge of what little light her candles were still putting off. She backed away into the center of the light, trying desperately to calm down. After a few seconds, she finally managed to get a hold of herself. “Oh… I wish there was somepony that could help me…” she mumbled in a despondent voice. She stood there for several moments, shivering in the could, when something nudged the tip of her hoof. Opening her eyes, she saw a square-shaped book staring back at her. Swallowing heavily, Twilight reached out with a hoof to touch the book. To her relief and shock, it remained intact, and when she tried to lift it in her magic, she was delighted to find that she could. She quickly brought it up to her face and flipped it open, hoping to find the answer to her problems. She paused at what she saw. There were no words written on the pages. Instead, there was a single picture. In it, she saw herself without wings resting on the ground with a large smile on her face. Right next to her on the left was a cyan pegasus with magenta eyes and a messy mane and tail made up of all the colors of the rainbow. They had their forelegs draped over each other’s shoulders and were smiling happily. Twilight felt her heart thump slightly harder with recognition at the mare in the picture. Rainbow Dash… her name was Rainbow Dash. There were several other mares around them, too. A yellow pegasus with a pink mane and tail was settled on her belly in front of them, a reserved and timid smile on her face. There was a white unicorn with a stylish purple mane and tail next to Rainbow, an orange earth pony with a blond mane and tail next to Twilight, and an excitable and obnoxiously pink earth pony behind the whole group, waving at the camera and whoever was holding it. They all looked so happy… but she didn’t know any of them except for Rainbow. And even then, the pegasus was something of a stranger... Twilight frowned and held the book close to her chest, her spirits falling even more. This wasn’t of any help... Another candle went out. Twilight gasped in fear and turned to the next page of the book, hoping for more pictures. Much to her dismay, there weren’t any other photos in the book, just discolored rectangles in the parchment where they had used to be. There were small rips in the pages around those rectangles. someone had taken all of the photos out. She turned the page back to the one picture that remained, trying to take solace in the one familiar thing she had found. Another candle. There was only one left. The air was freezing. Twilight could see her own breath condensing in the air, and she was starting to shiver uncontrollably. With an audible gulp, she set the photo album down at her hooves and looked back at the shelves. Whatever hope she had fell away completely when she realized that there were no shelves left. They had all retreated from her, leaving her completely alone in the darkness with only a candle and a photo. At that moment, she knew it was hopeless. The last candle went out. All at once, everything went completely and utterly silent. Twilight held still, her ears standing at attention and listening intently to her surroundings. There was nothing. It was just her and the darkness. The air was getting harder to breathe, and her head was getting heavy. With a withering sigh, Twilight collapsed onto the ground and covered her face with her hooves. She shivered again, pulling her wings closer to her body in a useless effort to stave off the cold. Her eyes fell on the photo album, and she choked down a terrified whimper.  “Rainbow Dash… Somepony… anypony... help me…” she whispered to herself, curling into a ball. “I don’t know what’s going on, or what to do… Help me...” Several seconds passed by, the only noise being her shaky breaths and whispered pleas for help. In the end, even those faded into nothing but silence. Twilight closed her eyes, letting herself succumb to the cold... Out of nowhere, something tapped her shoulder, prompting her to open her eyes and look up. Her gaze was met with a bright light right in front of her, one which illuminated everything around her for dozens of feet. Once her eyes adjusted, Twilight saw the source of that light. There, standing in front of her, looking back down with a warm smile, was Rainbow Dash. The cyan pegasus slowly lowered herself down onto her belly in front of Twilight, never once looking away from her eyes. “Hey, Twilight… you okay?” she asked in a soft tone. Twilight mouthed voicelessly for a few seconds as she tried to find the words. Eventually, she settled for a slow shake of her head. Rainbow’s smile fell away, replaced with a knowing frown. “You’re scared, aren’t you?” she asked simply, and Twilight nodded. Rainbow looked down for a moment, then got back to her hooves. “Well, Don’t worry…” she gave Twilight a small wink. “I got your back. Now wake up.” “...huh?” “I said wake up.” "Twilight, wake up!"     Twilight’s eyes shot open at the same time that she inhaled sharply through her nostrils. With her heart still beating in her chest, her eyes darted around to take in her surroundings. She was resting on her side on a soft mattress, her body covered in a thick and warm blanket, partially dampened by cold sweat. As she looked around, she recognized where she was as the loft of the Golden Oaks Library, and her heart rate began to decrease. She felt something shaking her from behind and turned to look. She saw Rainbow Dash standing by the bedside with a concerned look on her face. “You okay, Twilight?” She asked before taking a step back to give her some room. “You were mumbling to yourself and sweating buckets… bad dream?”     Twilight took a deep breath and slowly sat up in the bed to scan the rest of the room. She noticed that there were large beams of golden sunlight streaming in through the large circular window on the wall, and she could hear birds chirping and ponies talking outside. She let herself relax entirely before giving a slow nod and looking at Rainbow again. “Yeah, it was just a bad dream. I’m okay.”     Rainbow was visibly relieved and took a step back. “Good to know…” she said softly before her eyes turned to look at the door that would take them back downstairs. “Anyways, you about ready to get up? Spike and I have been up for a while already, but we figured you’d like to sleep in a bit.”     Twilight answered her question by slipping out of bed and giving a languid stretch. Her new wings extended from her back as she did so, drawing her attention. She had had them for as long as she could remember, but she was still very unused to how they felt. Of course, as long as she could remember was less than a week at this point. She shook her head and drove away that thought for the time being, instead choosing to look at Rainbow again. “Thanks, Rainbow. I think the extra sleep did me some good,” she said while offering a grateful smile. She then glanced towards the door that would lead downstairs. “Is Spike downstairs right now?”     “Yeah, he’s making you some breakfast as we speak,” Rainbow confirmed while looking that way as well. “Head on down and eat up. I’m gonna tidy myself up a bit before we go to see the others.”     Twilight almost slapped her forehead as she remembered. “Right! We’re supposed to be meeting my… friends… today, right?” she asked, briefly hanging on the word ‘friend.’ It felt so wrong to her to say it. She couldn’t remember anything about any of them, after all, and calling them her friends just didn’t feel right without that kind of context.     “Yup!” Rainbow nodded as she turned for the bathroom. She paused after a second and glanced back at Twilight, her expression one of worry. “But before you go, I gotta ask… have you remembered anything, yet?”     Twilight paused for a moment, her muzzle scrunching as she gave it some thought. They had only gotten back to Ponyville from the Crystal Empire last night, and they had spent the majority of the evening after having dinner going through items she apparently held close to her heart. Several books in the ‘Daring Do’ series of adventure novels, a small, old stuffed pony that was named ‘Smarty Pants,’ and several pages in Spike’s photo album. They had done all of this to see if it might jog her memory, but alas, she may as well have been looking at all of those things for the first time.     She had listened with rapt attention as Rainbow regaled her with her favorite moments from the Daring Do books, she had giggled in amusement when Spike told her about some of the weird things Twilight used to do with the doll when she was a filly, and she had been completely enraptured when Rainbow and Spike told her story after story about the pictures in the photo album. However, much to her supreme disappointment, when she scoured her mind, she found it was just as blank as it had been when she woke up in the Empire’s hospital. Every event of her life and pony she had met before that day was lost to her.     With a sigh, she shook her head. “Nothing… I’m sorry.”     Rainbow let out a quiet snort and gave Twilight a playful nudge in the side with her elbow. “Eh, don’t apologize, it’s not your fault and we don’t blame you. Your memories will come back sooner or later, I’m sure,” she said with a big smile, although Twilight was quick to deduce that it was a little too big to be completely genuine. Rainbow then cleared her throat and lightly nudged Twilight for the door. “Anyways, get a move on. You’ve got a meal to eat, and then we’ve got ponies to meet.”     Twilight nodded and began heading for the door. She was about to push it open when Rainbow let out a bark of laughter, making her turn and look at her inquisitively. Rainbow forced down her chortles and waved dismissively. “Sorry, sorry. I just think I’m turning into Zecora. I rhymed.”     Twilight blinked in confusion. “Who’s… Zecora?”     Rainbow just sighed and shook her head. “I’ll tell you later,” was all she said before stepping away and disappearing into the bathroom. Twilight watched after her for a moment, and then made her way downstairs with a dismissive shake of her head.     "One thing at a time, Twilight."     And as she descended the steps, she could just pick out the potent and mouth-watering aroma of Spike’s cooking.