//------------------------------//
// Epilogue: Hope 
// Story: Of Men and Insects 
// by VeganSpyro97 
//------------------------------//

It was over. Vancouver was a ghost town, the entire population concentrated in the largest building so that medical personnel from both worlds could work to undo the damage that had been done to the vast population of the city, and to the infrastructure itself. Dozens of buildings had been demolished, and the tower had collapsed just moments after the Elements had finally beaten Chrysalis. The floor had gone first, taking Anna’s cage with it as it hurtled down towards the floor so far below. Then the walls had caved in, forcing them all to flee. 
They had only had time to pick up Allan's limp body.
As many others were celebrating the victory, or working hard to get things back into working order as swiftly as possible, a group of friends, and family, sat silently in a darkened hospital room, none of them wanting to speak, or even break the silence by moving more than a few millimeters.
There was no victory to be had. Anna was dead. Allan was…..
Even now, they couldn’t bring themselves to think the word. 
Twilight was the one who was going over things one last time. She was in the morgue, the only place that suited the job she had taken upon herself to do. She hoped that, in doing this, the paperwork involved in the death of, well, anyone, she might be able to work though what she was feeling. She had so often sought solace in paperwork, researching and studying, that it was second nature now. 
It wasn’t working. Not this time.
Wiping yet more tears off the page, the Princess of Magic and Friendship tried to deal with the idea of actually losing a friend. For good. 
More tear stains. 
She didn’t bother wiping them off. 
She stared down at the death certificate in front of her, ready to put her name on the signature line, and make it official.
Instead, she put the quill down, and moved over to the cold, inert mass of stone that coated the body of her friend, and laid her head down on his chest, and started to cry again. The Princess of Friendship had never lost a friend before, not really. She’d never faced such an alien concept of death like this. 	
Her ear flicked, and her horn tingled, but she ignored them. Why pay them any mind at all? Guilt gnawed at her. She’d wanted to help him get home, whether that meant making him human again, or helping him to build a life on Equus. And now she couldn’t. She’d pinkie promised. Now not only was Allan….gone, but Pinkie wouldn’t talk to her. 
Her horn tingled again. 
Growling, she slammed her head into the table, hoping to distract herself from the annoyance. 
Instead, it just grew worse.
Still angry, she turned her attention to her horn, and instinctively started to cast the spell that her element had brought to mind. It extended from her horn to encompass everything around her, lighting up the world and showing all the things that had become saturated with magic, or had that little spark of magic that all living things had, like the plants on the cabinet, the many people in the ward upstairs, both pony and  human, the body in front of her, the fly on the wall and….
Twilight stopped, blinking, as she brought her eyes back to Alan's petrified form, and she cast the spell again. 
A tiny, flickering light rested within his chest.
Her face broke into a grin, before she started casting other spells taking in all the details of his damaged body before she dashed off, mouth breaking into a grin. 
There was still time. 


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Allan stopped his pacing in the white expanse, not sure if he had heard something, or if he was just imagining it. 
No, there it was again. A dull, whooshing sound, like the sound of a windstorm ripping through a forest. 
“Chrysanthemum? What is that?” He asked, head cocked to one side.
The Alicorn simply smiled. “I would imagine that that’s your friends, calling you home.”
“......What? Calling me home….?”
“Not quite gone, remember?” She smirked. The Alicorn climbed to her hooves, and brushed herself off, before giving him her best smile. “I think you’ll be alright now, Allan Ryder.”
“Hey…..” Allan called, as she walked away, starting to fade from view. “Hey, wait up! Don’t go! You can come back with me! You can live again!”
“No thank you, my friend. Your life is your own to lead, and I will not force you to share it.” Chryssi smiled, a bright, joyful thing that brought happiness to Allan jus by looking at it. “I am old, and I have had my time. Besides. I think I’ve kept him waiting long enough, don’t you?”
“Him?” Allan called. “Who are talking about?”
Chrysanthemum just smiled again, before walking away. A second figure, with both wings and a horn, appeared at her side, where they curled their wings around each others, and walked out of sight, their green and blue eyes meeting his one last time before they vanished. 
“Oh...right.” He chuckled, sheepishly. “I almost forgot about him.”
The world pulsed again, the bright whites giving way to red and yellow lights, that swirled around his eyes, the tendrils of light reaching out to claim him, pulling him back up through the murk. 
The further he climbed, the harder it became to keep going, as if his body was simply too large to hold up. So he let it go, an insect shedding it’s carapace in favour of supple muscle and skin. His wings thickened and broadened, giving him the power to rise up, faster and faster. His soul burned with new strength, pushing past that barrier with all his might, until it felt like a stone wall against his outstretched hooves. 
But he kept going, fighting against the unseen hands that tried to keep him in the eternal white below, while his own hoof was outstretched for the bright, warm glow that beckoned him onward above. As he rose higher, slowly, feeling the barrier stretch and bend around him, Allan thought of his friends. 
Pinkie. Rainbow. Twilight. Applejack. Rarity. Josh. Mike. Celestia. Luna. Cadence. 
Fluttershy.
The body of the transforming changeling evaporated into a fine mist as he finally shattered the flimsy barrier that separated the journey beyond life, from the journey that always came before it, leaving behind only the echoing sounds of joyous laughter. 


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Somewhere In The World Of Dreams:

Princess Luna stared at the door in the dreamscape, her eyes tracing the metal frame and strange device fixed into the wall next to it. It was not a pony dream, nor a Gryphon, a Dragon, Changeling, or even  Breezie. It was something new.
Uncertain, Luna stepped closer, before pushing the door open, and peering inside. 
Something whispered in the dark beyond the door, and a strange silhouetted figure rose up from where it had been kneeling. 
The voices rose higher, until she could make out the words, and her mouth fell open, aghast, as she realized what she was seeing. 
“Never forget….” Said one voice, full of kindness. 
“Never forgive…..” Said another, full of hatred. 
Those two phrases repeated in the dream, over and over, burning her ears.
Luna stared at the figure, unable to take her eyes off of it, nor the second figure in it’s arms. The periwinkle Unicorn’s horn was gone, nothing but a cracked, bloody stump left on her forehead as she dangled limply in the strong arms that held her. Those arms ended in nailed fingers, and were a pale, almost white, creamy colour, marred by harsh red lines and symbols, that glowed fiercely in the shadows. She couldn’t see it’s face, except for the two, burning red eyes that stared back with a rage she had only witnessed once in her entire life. She stepped backwards, flank brushing the door frame as the figure rose to its full height, revealing it’s long, muscled legs, five toed feet, and it’s short, cropped mane. 
The figure’s face remained in shadow, but the words he spoke, while alien, were perfectly understandable to her. 
“I’ll never forgive you for this.” 
Then the dream exploded into red flames.
Luna stared at the door as it faded away, eyes wide, not in fear, but in sadness. 
“Oh you poor, poor thing…”

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	Our heroes will return….