//------------------------------// // Chapter 11. Blue diamond // Story: Final Corruption // by Epsilon-Delta //------------------------------// Twilight woke up, but just barely. She felt terribly ill, thought the room was freezing at first but soon realized she had a horrible chill, one that felt like it was coming from deep inside her. Her entire body ached, and her eyes didn’t want to open, but after a few minutes, Twilight forced them to. She was lying on the bed in Rarity’s guest room, the one she stayed in often enough to think of as her room. But Twilight didn’t remember falling asleep over here. She didn’t remember falling asleep at all. The only thing she remembered was- Vampires! They were vampires! They were serious, for real vampires! Vampires were real and- And maybe Twilight was a vampire now too? Twilight sat up, feeling she had to do something, but her chill forced her back under the covers. Lifting the covers was like opening the doors to an arctic wasteland. The feeling of cold was just too much to stand outside of the relatively warm bed. Staying under the covers, she felt her ears with a trembling hoof, but there was no tuft. She ran her tongue along her teeth but there were no fangs. Maybe that was just a dream. Twilight was horribly ill right now. She remembered it all so vividly, whereas she usually forgot her dreams quickly, but then she’d never had a fever dream before. The motion caught the attention of another pony in the room, one Twilight was just now noticing had been sitting next to her the whole time. The pony had white fur and white hair, her slitted eyes glowed red in the darkness. Twilight could see, at her side, bat-like wings. It was an albino vampire! There was no doubt last night happened now. But who the buck was this?! Were there millions of vampires in this town? Twilight and the albino vampire stared into one another’s eyes for a moment, the albino vampire smiling wider and wider. And the moment Twilight saw that smile it clicked in her foggy brain that this was Pinkie! Or at least her sister or something. The moment Twilight realized this, Pinkie hissed at her loudly, forcing Twilight to retreat even deeper under the covers. “Oh!” Pinkie covered her mouth. “Sorry! That was a friendly hiss! Like I was hissing with you, not at you. I guess you can’t tell the difference yet.” That was Pinkie’s voice. “Pinkie?” Twilight peeked out of the covers as much as she could. “I’m so cold.” “That’s normal!” Pinkie Pie jumped into bed with Twilight, pulling herself under the covers as well. “See like, that stuff, it makes your blood vessels uh-“ Pinkie moved her hooves closer, then farther apart, then closer again, trying to decide if Twilight’s blood vessels were expanding or contracting. “Uh, I don’t remember. But you got blood vessels, Twitwi. Makes you super cold.” Pinkie nodded. “But I’ve been making hot chocolate every fifteen minutes on the fifteen minutes for twelve hours straight! That’ll help!” Pinkie grabbed a mug, one of a dozen, from the nightstand next to Twilight’s bed and offered it. Her legs felt weak and she was shivering badly, but Twilight was able to take the mug and drink it. Unlike the last drink, this one made her feel better. She could feel the warmth flowing down her throat and radiating from her belly. It was the single best cup of anything Twilight ever had. Once Twilight finished drinking, Pinkie lied down with her, draping her wing over Twilight like a blanket. Having a featherless wing over her felt a little weird, but it was silky and warm. Having Pinkie under the covers with her felt medically necessary at this point. Twilight didn’t blame anypony for not finding out that you could eventually eat those fruits anymore. This was like a near-death experience! And she’d had just a tiny little bit of juice. Anypony who did this twice on their own was too stupid to make it to adulthood alive. “That stuff’s intense!” Twilight closed her eyes again for a minute. “It’s not going to be like this for a whole year, is it?” “Don’t worry! Eating Everfree fruit gets easy fast!” Pinkie was quick to assure Twilight. “Next time, it’ll be like half this, then half that the next time. It goes in halves like that! And then you’ll be eating fruit with us every day! Also, you got like ten thousand Pinkie points for this. As far as I’m concerned, you’re a monster now, too!” Pinkie hissed loudly again, but this time it did feel like she was hissing with Twilight. “This means you’ve been promoted from honorary vampire to fledgling, Twitwi!” Pinkie nuzzled her. “You’re one of us now! Our kind considers one of your kind one of our kind the moment you start eating fruit from the Everfree Forest.” “Th-thanks.” Twilight smiled; Pinkie’s enthusiastic acceptance was just good enough to cut through her illness for a moment. “Where’s everypony else?” “They’re with Fluttershy right now, but they’ll be back in just a little bit. Oh! Do you want me to read to you until they get back? You like books!” “I do.” Twilight nodded. “But I think I need a minute to process all this.” “Right! Processing!” Twilight put her chin back down on the pillow and closed her eyes. At least she had plenty of time to think now. So vampires were real. Twilight ate the fruit. Pinkie didn’t seem too interested in eating Twilight and Twilight was welcome to become one of them if she wanted to. That was the situation. But there was still so much Twilight didn’t know! There were so many ways this could be horrible. She tried thinking of ways this might be bad. She decided to think ahead of time what any deal breakers would be. She could have eternal youth and be with Rarity. She could have a way to leave this oppressive society if she wanted. And she didn’t get a chance to ask last night, but she was pretty sure Rarity could use dark magic to cast spells now… and that meant Twilight could do it too. She could have her magic back, maybe better than ever! And if there was something like a vampire village out there, Twilight might even be able to become a mage as she’d always wanted! There’d have to be something seriously wrong for her to turn all that away. If they did have some evil, hidden agenda here, Twilight knew that she was turning into one of them so at least she’d get to be in on it. It’d have to be disgustingly evil for her to break away. Like, if it turned out Applejack was right in accusing them of killing Lyra and Bonbon, among other ponies. And then she wondered… even if they were serial killers would that make her decide to go back to being a flat-out daywalker? Twilight decided it wouldn’t. She didn’t want to get old and was too interested in dark magic now. She would just find some other, less evil vampire and beg them to change her if that was the case. Just knowing about eating the fruit of the forest meant she could probably change herself, though that’d likely be rough without somepony who’d gone through the same thing around to help her. So she probably was going to go through with this. Only if it turned out she had to eat other ponies or else that there was an especially bad curse would Twilight change her mind. But there were still so many questions that Twilight could barely even think which to ask first. Rarity promised that eating some of that fruit would earn more answers and Twilight had done what she asked. She looked over at Pinkie, wondering how much she could ask now. Pinkie looked like she was trying hard to stay chill for Twilight, but her eyes were darting all over the place. Though now that Twilight was watching her, she could tell Pinkie was nervous rather than inpatient. She kept giving Twilight these worried looks before turning away. Their eyes met for a moment and Pinkie took on a withering expression. Pinkie’s ears drooped and her glowing red eyes looked back at Twilight with sorrow. Twilight was about to ask what was wrong if there was some horrible catch, but Pinkie spoke first. “Are you mad at me?” Pinkie lowered her head, putting her chin against the bed, and looked up at Twilight. “Huh?” Twilight wasn’t expecting any questions from Pinkie. “For lying this whole time! Cause I know you were upset about the daywalkers lying to you and I felt so bad about it the whole time. It’s just- if we tell everypony right away we’ll get chased back into the woods and the other vampires will get mad at us and we’d never make any new friends!” Twilight didn’t feel any anger, no. Not until just now, anyway. Lying down next to Pinkie, looked down at her begging eyes, it brought memories of another night. Suddenly Twilight felt robbed of something. The other two had had always been so casual about their fake disabilities, barely even mentioned them outside of not being able to go out during the day. But Pinkie went further than that. “I’m not sure.” Twilight broke eye contact. “Was that whole sob story about phantasmagorical mitochondria just a load of crap? We had a moment back there! I can understand maybe you needed a cover, but you went too far with that!” “Oh no!” Pinkie grabbed onto Twilight like she was terrified Twilight might get up and leave right then. As if that was even possible in her current state. “That was a true sob story, I swear! I really was born with phantasmagorical mitochondria! We were lying about the other two, but not me! The only part that wasn’t a hundred billion percent true was that Rarity showed me how to be a vampire in a super literal way!” “Well-“ She had researched this and as far as she could tell it really did look like Pinkie used to have that disease. She likely still did. “Also I found them because I went out looking for vampires,” said Pinkie. “Not the other way around. I thought the stories were true and that vampires would be the only ponies who’d accept me. And you know what? I was right about both of those things! But that’s the true story! I promise! I hated lying to you cause- cause I got lied to a lot growing up too!” Twilight’s anger didn’t hold out long against Pinkie’s puppy do eyes. “I believe you,” Twilight relented. “And I don't want to be mad at any of you. So I understand why you did it. I forgive you.” “You’re a good pony Twilight!” Pinkie hugged Twilight again. Hugs were especially good right now because Twilight needed to absorb her warmth. “That’s why you get to be a vampire.” “But I have a lot of questions still,” said Twilight. “And I want actual answers now!” “Rarity says I can answer most of your questions now!” Pinkie nodded. “So what did you wanna know?” Now the question was which of her millions of questions to ask first. She should probably ask the most important ones first, but still. There was one unavoidable question here, literally staring at her right now, blocking out everything else Twilight could think of. She could see one of Pinkie’s glowing red eyes, the other hidden behind her white mane. The fact that Pinkie wasn’t pink felt flat out wrong. Pinkie noticed Twilight was staring at her and gave Twilight a curious look, tilting her head. “So, uh. You’re actually albino?” Twilight looked over her white fur and wings. “No, I’m pink!” Pinkie put her hoof on her chest. “Pinkie!” “Yeah, but- no.” “Oh, Twilight. All color is delusional, right?” “What?” “Our eyeballs are different from your eyeballs!” Pinkie pointed to her eye. “We see color differently. You see me as white; I see me as pink.” “Wait. Really?” Twilight never thought such a thing could be possible. She struggled to imagine any sort of wavelength shift that could explain that but couldn’t. “Yeah! When I’m disguised, I look white to me. It’s opposites like that. For me, real Rainbow Dash has rainbow hair, but for you the fake one does. Swap it and she’s got that seven shades of blue thing going on.” “Really?” Twilight thought about that for a moment. “So if I’m getting this right, then my fur is going to change color but I won’t notice because my eyes are also going to change?” “Exactly! Only us three will see a difference. I’ll have to get used to having a purple Twilight around. You are purple, right?” “Technically lavender. What do I look like now? To you, I mean?” Twilight asked. “Grey-“ Pinkie tapped Twilight’s chest, then moved her hoof to Twilight’s mane, “-and blue! Your stripy thing is white.” It was only just now dawning on her, but Twilight would effectively be turning into another tribe of pony. Her body was going to change even more than during puberty. There were probably thousands of little details like that she hadn’t even thought up yet. Her sense of taste would likely change too if Pinkie thought those fruits tasted good. Maybe when they said daywalkers smelled they meant that literally too, meaning her sense of smell might change. But what else? She was glad that this was a slow process now, that she’d have time to adjust. And she needed somepony who’d already gone through this transformation if Twilight was going to do this without dying of anxiety. It made her wonder just how many ponies had gone through this before. Applejack’s book said there was, at the very least, a village filled with vampires somewhere deep in the forest. “How many of you are there?” Twilight asked her first important question. “How many of us are there.” Pinkie grabbed Twilight. “Huh? Oh!” Twilight smiled despite everything. She loved how enthusiastically Pinkie acknowledged her now. “Right. How many of us are there?” “Well in Ponyville!” Pinkie stopped to think about it, then came up close like she was about to whisper something to Twilight. “Actually there is one other vampire I’m supposed to tell you about. Besides the four of us, I mean. Oo! Do you want to try and guess who before I tell you? I'll give you a hint: it's incredibly obvious.” Twilight blinked. That wasn’t what she meant with her question, but now that she thought about it, the number of vampires in Ponyville was of more immediate importance. Twilight hadn’t even considered there were other vampires in town. “Um.” Twilight thought about it for one second. “Applejack? No, that'd be completely stupid. Oh! Right! It’s gotta be Fluttershy! Cause if she knew Rarity when she was little, then she’s gotta be hundreds of years old.” “Yeah! You got it! You really are the smart one!” Pinkie cheered. "Mom is on our side. She's like the head, head vampire! The oldest one! We just didn't want to say anything to her cause revealing you're a vampire is the most fun you can have for free, you know?" “But you’re a hundred percent sure nopony else in this town is a vampire?" Twilight asked. "Is it easy to tell?” “Yep! Most of us don’t like going outside the forest, so you probably won’t see any more vampires till we take you down there. Though! If this was a movie, another vampire would show up as soon as I said that!” Pinkie pondered that conundrum for a moment. “Well, at any rate, I go sniffing around for other vampires who might be on our turf once a week! I’m good at sniffing out other vampires and if I find one, I’ll let you know.” “When you say 'sniff' do you mean that literally?" “Oh! Uh, no. We can feel dark magic and dark magic just gushes out of us like a geyser of blood!” Pinkie made a little head-exploding gesture with her hoof complete with ‘psh’ sound effects. “Since there’s not a lot of dark magic around here, you can sense other vampires from pretty far away.” Twilight wondered if she could do that yet. She was getting better at sensing dark magic already. Twilight tried to focus, to feel what she was now certain was dark magic again. She could feel it so much easier now! That fruit must have heightened her abilities already. The draft was coming off Pinkie, more distantly from out of the forest and faintly lingering around the room. “Ah!” Pinkie stood up on the bed. “What great timing! See, like I just felt the other two come home right now! Be right back!” But Twilight didn’t pick up on whatever Pinkie felt. So there was still a ways to go. Pinkie rushed out of the room. “She’s awake!” Pinkie yelled down from the banister. Already with Pinkie gone, Twilight was getting rocked by chills again. Pinkie rushed back in and lied down next to Twilight, to Twilight’s relief. A moment later, Rarity, in her daywalker form, peeked into the room with a giddy smile, an expression Twilight found herself matching. She said something to Dash behind her, then closed the door. Another moment passed and the door opened a second time, this time both trotting in as their true selves. Twilight tried to keep her head up as the others came into the room, but she quickly lost her energy and ended up with her chin against the edge of the bed, looking up at them with her eyes. And yet Twilight couldn’t help but return their excited smiles. “Sparks! Congratulations!” Dash came to one side of the bed and gave Twilight a rough jab. “This is the best decision you’ve ever made, Sparks. Trust me!” “How are you feeling, dear?” Rarity rested her chin on the bed to be eye level with Twilight. Twilight looked into Rarity’s eyes, studying her changed features. Overall, she looked just a bit less soft than she did when she was ‘normal’. Twilight decided she like the way Rarity looked in her disguise more, save maybe her eyes. It was a little weird that they were slitted, but they shinned the most brilliant blue Twilight had ever seen in her life. “I feel pretty sick,” said Twilight. “Like if I get out of this bed, I’m gonna freeze to death.” “Well nopony’s going to make you get up.” Rarity rubbed small circles on Twilight’s cheek. “We already told everypony you have a terrible flu. You can just rest and let me coddle you for a few days. Doesn’t that sound nice?” It did sound not too bad at that exact moment. So long as one of them was constantly in bed with Twilight she could live with this for a little while. “Will it take a few days just to recover from that first bit of fruit?” Twilight asked. “Not from what you’ve had, but you’re going to have some more in a few hours. You’re going to eat a little bit every day from now on,” said Rarity. “That’s what I'd like you to do anyway.” “Are you sure I don’t need a few days before I eat another one?” Twilight wasn’t sure if she could survive any more. “Hey, don’t underestimate yourself!” Dash sat down next to Twilight. “We didn’t think you’d be up for hours! You’re tough, Sparks! This is the worst of it. You’ll be fine.” “Really?” Twilight looked at her skeptically. “You’re saying I'm doing well? Then what would somepony reacting poorly be like?” “Oh yes,” said Rarity. “Some ponies have a better natural affinity for dark magic. I can tell yours is exceptionally high. It might be the highest I’ve ever seen. And I’m 319, remember.” “Yeah!” Dash put a foreleg around Twilight. “You were meant to be one of us, Sparks. You got up in what, eighteen hours? None of us woke up in under a day. I don’t think anypony I know woke up in under a day!” “Really?” Twilight sat up a little and turned to Rarity. “How long were you asleep for?” “Oh, I was in a coma for nearly three days,” said Rarity. “And I was an absolute wreck for two weeks after that. I needed Fluttershy to brush my mane and tail for me. Every day, she’d remind me that we weren’t even going outside, and I’d ask her if she even knew who I was. I assure you, Twilight, I can make being sick look good.” Rarity gave her mane a little flick before turning to Pinkie with a little frown. “You did tell her about Fluttershy, yes?” “Uh uh.” Pinkie nodded. “Eating my first piece of fruit turned me into my alter ego, Pukie Pie! I was puking everywhere, but my chills were so bad that I needed somepony in bed with me at all times. So Rarity remained my medically necessary cuddle buddy the whole time even after I puked right in her face like four times!" “We don’t need to tell ponies that part of the story, Pinkie,” said Rarity. “But it’s so heartwarming!” “Puking in ponies’ faces is not heartwarming.” “But it not being heartwarming is what made it heartwarming! Cause like- you stayed with me anyway!” Pinkie and then Twilight looked over at Dash expectantly. “Huh?” Dash realized they wanted her to talk and shrugged. “Oh, I was a little different. I was kinda retarded when I was your age. I was on the bad guy's side and they kept sending me down to the cavern grove cause I was just an expendable tool to them. If you're a daywalker, hanging around in that place totally destroys your body, if you're lucky. When I stopped being a dumbass and swore my loyalty to Rarity, I was basically already on my death bed so getting sick like this felt like a relief." “I had to spend far more than a few weeks nursing Dashie back to health.” Rarity winked at Twilight, then nuzzled Dash lovingly. “Dashie was like a scared little kitten for months." “Well I think it was impressive I only needed a few months.” Dash turned away from the nuzzling heroically. “You know, considering how bad I got messed up. It’d take an hour just to list all the injuries I had.” “Aw!” Pinkie complained. “Tell her the whole story!” “It takes too long!” Dash waved her way. “Later.” All this talk made Twilight’s chills less worrying. Now they were feeling more like a rite of passage. “So it sounds like I’ll be fine in a week or so?” Twilight asked. “If that. And we’ll take care of you until then.” Rarity got up and trotted over to the nightstand next to Twilight, wearing a giddy smile. “But for now, I do have something that might make you feel a little better.” Twilight liked the way Rarity was smiling but had no idea where this was going. “What is it?” Twilight leaned forward. “Well I’ve been working on a little present for you.” Rarity put her hoof on the drawer of the nightstand. “It’s right in here!” Twilight’s eyes opened a little wider. She didn’t want to get her hopes up too much, but one idea came to mind. Rarity slowly opened the drawer, smiling like she was the one about to get a present. Her jaw almost dropped the moment when she saw what it was. Exactly what she was hoping for! Twilight snatched it and pulled it close to make sure the second she saw it! “But this is-!” Twilight looked it over. It was a jacket just like theirs! Wings slits were torn into it, Rarity’s cutie mark was on the back, and Twilight’s on the shoulders! It was perfectly crafted to the last detail! “Yes! Yes, yes yes!” Twilight hugged the jacket tightly. “I’ve never been this happy about any present ever! Thank you so much!” For a moment, her illness vanished as Twilight put the jacket on. It felt a little heavy for her weak limbs, but she loved the feeling. "This is the best day of my life!" And then Twilight gagged, almost puking only nothing came out. She likely would have puked had she eaten a real meal yesterday. "Still the best." Twilight rubbed the corner of her mouth “Daw.” Rarity crawled onto the bed and hugged Twilight gently. Her being a monster only made her touch feel all the gentler. “I simply adore how excited you are to be wearing my cutie mark.” Twilight blushed silently. She kind of liked the idea too. “Yay, Twilight!” Pinkie grabbed onto Twilight too. “Now you’re officially one of us. You're a Blue Diamond now!” “Just don’t do anything to make us look bad, huh?” Dash joined in the hug too. Twilight felt tears of joy welling up in her eyes. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt like this! Like she really belonged somewhere! But somehow here, surrounded by literal vampires… “Thank you so much!” Twilight whipped away a tear, then opened her forelegs wide to grab all three of them at once, though she could only grip them with the strength of a particularly weak kitten. "And- and I get to live forever now, right?! I'm immortal and can never die?" "Well you can still die, retard." Dash was the first to pull out of the hug. "So don't go jumping off cliffs or anything. You just don't age and can't get cancer or heart disease and stuff like that." "That's still pretty good." Twilight looked down at her hooves, still unable to fully process this. For months after the incident, it felt like death was just right behind Twilight like she was just waiting for herself or one of her friends to die suddenly. But now she was very nearly free of it, was suddenly so far away from death. And most importantly, all of her friends were in the same boat. "I could potentially stay with you forever, right?" Twilight turned to Rarity. "That's been my plan the whole time." Rarity rubbed her nose against Twilight. "It gets lonely without other ponies like myself around and it takes ever so long to find somepony you might want to keep around forever." “We’re not gonna have a party next week since you’ll still be too sick,” Pinkie said. “But the week after, on your day off, I’m gonna throw one that’s four- No! Five times bigger than normal! It’s gonna be a ‘hurray for Twilight’ party!” “Though we’re just telling them you joined the gang," said Dash. “Well I’m sure it’ll be the second-best day of my life,” said Twilight. “I’m afraid we do have a little bit to get through before you can have your party.” Rarity let go of Twilight but began playing with Twilight's hair instead. “I wanted to go over the less savory parts of becoming one of us as soon as you woke up.” “Bad parts?” Twilight remembered a story Pinkie told her not too long ago. “Wait, does that mean there really is a curse? Am I bucking cursed?! If I got cursed, I’m gonna be peeved!” “There’s no curse.” Rarity shook her head. “Not unless you count light magic becoming poisonous but you already know that. Though there are parts of this transformation that ponies sometimes dislike, change their mind over even. I think it’s best to go over them all at the start before you change too much and we’re all drowning in drama.” Right now, Twilight didn’t want to change her mind. She wanted this to be where she belonged and didn’t want there to be anything that could ruin that. But she knew she’d have to get this over with eventually. She nodded slowly, hoping nothing bad was about to happen. "I suppose the first thing is a consequence of eternal youth few ponies think of," said Rarity. "Eternal youth means your brain doesn’t really age in the same way. It remains young forever too. And that has a few effects some ponies find just a tad distasteful.” This was absolutely one of those things that Twilight never would have thought of on her own. “So you’re saying I maintain full neuroplasticity for my entire life?” Twilight tried to think of what drawbacks that might have. “But what’s bad about that? I’d imagine it’d just mean my ability to learn and adapt never declines. Unless there’s something else?” “Most ponies I explain this to don’t even get that much themselves! It does mean what you said, yes. But it also means it’s more difficult to gain a lot of traits you associate with maturity. To put it less charitably, you’d remain a bit immature forever.” It did make sense that some parts of maturity would be due to an aging brain. “I’m not sure exactly what you mean, though,” said Twilight. “Immature how?” “Look, I’m eighty-three, Sparks.” Dash hit her chest. “At some point, that’s gonna make you say something like ‘hey, I’m somehow fine with Rares being three hundred but you don’t act like you’re bucking eighty.’ And it’s true, I don’t act like an eighty-year-old daywalker, no vampire who changes in her twenties does. It’s like, a sixteen-year-old dog doesn’t act like a sixteen-year-old pony. You know? Same with us! We mature totally differently.” She felt like she understood now. She couldn’t imagine a normal eighty-year-old acting anything like Dash did. “So I’ll be like Dash?” Twilight looked at Pinkie, then Dash. She could excuse somepony calling them immature, but then she turned to Rarity. “Does it just take a long time? You seem pretty mature to me.” “Oh, thank you.” Rarity put her hoof on her cheek and fluttered her eyes, exaggerating how flattered she was. “But I didn’t act that differently in my twenties. A few unscrupulous ponies might even accuse me of being just a tad self-centered or fickle. You aren’t going to act much more ‘mature’ when you’re three hundred than you do now.” Twilight was less sure how she felt about that one. “We do mature,” said Dash. “Just not the same way. It freaks a lot of daywalkers out, but I say it’s better. After thirty, daywalkers are basically dead on the inside. You hate everything new and get stuck in this time loop endlessly complaining about how everything was better when you were a kid. All that stops you from growing in other ways. The only wisdom a filthy daywalker ever has is repeating the status quo and stupid clichés.” “Yeah!” Pinkie agreed enthusiastically. “Filthy daywalkers are super boring! They never wanna go anywhere or try anything new or have any fun! They take themselves seriously and never want to play any kind of game. They’re all into boring stuff like doing your taxes and building tables and screaming at clouds and stuff. If being mature means being boring then I don’t want it!” “I’m not sure if it’s better or worse, really,” said Rarity. “You can say we remain passionate, open-minded, adventurous, optimistic, accepting. Or you could call us brash, disrespectful, fickle, selfish, impatient. You can still become patient, of course, but it isn’t as easy.” Twilight really wasn’t sure how she felt about this. It sounded wrong, but Twilight hardly trusted the voice that told her those things. Was it even a bad thing? She certainly liked the idea of her brain remaining plastic and never having her ability to learn new things decline. “I need more time to think about that one,” Twilight concluded. “You’ll have it,” said Rarity. That was good. Twilight wanted to pour over the topic before making up her mind. Already she was building a mental checklist of all the subjects she’d need to read up on before she could make a proper decision. But a familiar sense of intimidation began to return. There were lots of things Twilight discovered that were horrible when she first started studying them for real. What if she discovered this was horrible too? Not just her brain remaining youthful but anything about this. If she did run into something she couldn’t accept, would she lose her friends? They were the only thing in her world anymore. And how much would she accept just to stay with them? “But what happens if I do change my mind?” Twilight asked. “Could we still be friends even if I decide not to change?” “You can do anything you want,” Rarity promised her. “I won’t kick you out or anything, but I also can’t promise I’ll take you with me wherever I go. Or that you’ll want to for long.” “Yeah.” Dash folded her forelegs. “I’ll tell you right now if you stay a daywalker, we won’t be friends for too long. I’ve tried being friends with daywalkers a couple of times. They start off cool, but they go full dork real fast. We start hating each other in like twenty tops. It’s cause of exactly what we were just talking about. We get too different and can’t get along anymore. We probably won’t even make it to that part where you die at eighty and we gotta feel sad and replace you with a new friend.” A twinge of fear hit Twilight when Dash mentioned Twilight dying and getting replaced. That was inevitable if she didn’t go through with this. Somepony else would get to take her place. “Now that you bring that up.” Twilight looked down at the floor. Suddenly, immaturity felt like a small price, if it even was a price. “I think I’d rather be like you when I’m eighty than well… dead. Besides, I feel like I’m already pretty mature!” “Buck yeah!” Dash hit Twilight’s withers. “It’s not like you’re changing when you’re twelve. That’s something I don’t bucking recommend.” Twilight felt suddenly relieved by this little breakthrough. It was better to be immature than dead! She could accept this. “We’ll the good news is we’ve gotten to the last major point of contention,” said Rarity. “There’s a reason very few of us ever come out of the forest, besides Equestria being a rather toxic place for our kind. Celestia doesn’t like us. She sees the other types of ponies as her most perfect creation and us as perversions of it, a sort of insult. A lot of ponies don’t like the idea of the creator of our species disliking them so much.” “Well Celestia already hates everything I like anyway.” Twilight couldn’t feel too bad about that. “So that doesn’t seem too different than right now." “It’s a bit more dangerous than you’re thinking,” said Dash. “There’s more to this.” “Yes, you’ve earned the right to know this,” said Rarity. “Fluttershy wouldn’t want me telling you this just yet, but I hardly care much for rules. Though I would appreciate it if you pretend I told you about Celestia a month from now.” Twilight nodded. They did know more about Celestia! And Twilight would finally get to hear the answer to a mystery she thought she’d never solve. So far, this decision was getting better and better. “Now remember, this is something you should absolutely never repeat. Spreading this could get us all killed,” Rarity warned. “Everything I’m about to tell you comes mostly from Fluttershy. She’s the oldest vampire and she was present at the great battle, knew Celestia before she got injured and disappeared from the public view.” “Do you know if that actually happened, by the way?” Twilight asked. “Because in the back of my mind I keep thinking what if Celestia just told everypony she killed six chaos gods in a row? Or what if she just killed Discord, who was actually a wimp, and then exaggerated it to be all six of them?” “Fluttershy saw the whole thing,” Rarity said. “Cosmos, Eris, Loki… Celestia fought all of them at the same time exactly like you’ve heard. And as far as we can tell she did destroy all the chaos magic. None of us have ever found any of it left. But that sort of thing takes an incomprehensible amount of energy. Getting rid of them all left her in much worse shape than anypony will tell you. I suppose that’s the lie.” “And is Celestia-“ Twilight hesitated to ask it. The amount of light magic radiating from her was less every year. They always said Celestia would recover eventually, but deep down there was a forbidden question in everypony’s mind. “Is she dying?” “As far as I know, alicorns can’t die.” Rarity shook her head. “Celestia is merely running out of power. Fluttershy told me this, that an alicorn wakes up with a vast, but finite amount of magic. They stay awake for ten thousand years, their magic slowly radiating out of them, then sleep for ten thousand years to regain it. Normally, Celestia would have gone to sleep long before she got this low, but because she was attacked by all the chaos gods she ended up in this low magic state. And being this low on magic is making her a little crazy, if you haven’t noticed, is driving her to stay awake hundreds of years longer than she should. It really is the alicorn version of sleep deprivation.” “Right,” said Twilight, “so she used too much magic in the great battle and now she’s powerless? Is that it?” “Yeah, I wish,” said Dash. “You have no idea how tough an alicorn is Twilight. Celestia’s at a millionth of a percent of her power and she could still blow an entire continent with her mind if she wanted. There’s no way anypony could ever challenge her.” That much Twilight could hardly doubt, she felt a little embarrassed for even thinking Celestia was powerless when she herself had felt Celestia’s magic radiating from the castle. Twilight blamed her sickness for her mind being this sluggish. Every spell in the world was still ultimately powered by Celestia’s light magic, either through the magic that radiated from her or her sun. Saying she was stronger than every other unicorn combined would be an understatement. “You see, that’s another thing ponies take issue with,” said Rarity. “Celestia does despise us and she could hypothetically destroy us all in an instant. The only reason she doesn’t is that it would take the last of her magic and she’d fall asleep for another ten thousand years afterwards. So we have something of a truce with her.” “We keep the number of ponies we transform below a certain amount each year and Celestia doesn’t use the last of her magic against us. She extends her rule for as long as possible, but eventually, she will fall asleep and the world will be ours.” “We can’t possibly fight Celestia,” said Dash, “but if we just wait a few hundred more years she’ll get too tired and fall asleep. That’s pretty much the plan for dealing with her.” “That does sound incredibly dangerous.” But then again there was a hundred percent chance of Twilight dying within a hundred years to the contrary. “All of this is an incredible discovery! I never thought I’d learn this much about alicorns! Does Fluttershy know more? Can she come over now? I want more details about- about-!” Twilight got too excited. Sitting up was a horrible mistake. She leaned over the bed, feeling like she had to puke but couldn’t. Her throat tensed up like it was trying hard to push something out of her, but in the end, Twilight just gagged on nothing. She almost wished she had puked like that’d have been more satisfying. And all this left Twilight with an unbearable chill, left her shivering violently. Pinkie pulled Twilight in close and tried snuggling against her, but that could only help so much. “Would you like to take a nap first?” Rarity offed. “N-no!” Twilight tried to look composed. Her bones felt like they were made of ice, but the fire of curiosity would warm her up. “I want to know!” “Oh, I can’t say no to spoiling you.” Rarity kissed Twilight’s forehead. “I just love your enthusiasm. I’m so glad you’re mine now. Pinkie, go get her something warm to drink.” Pinkie saluted Rarity and jumped out of the bed, rushing off to the kitchen. Dash quickly took her place, lying down next to Twilight and draping a wing over her. “Now what else do you want to know?” Rarity asked. Twilight tried to think this time of what the most forbidden question she could ask was. Of course it was about the forest, the darkest part of the forest. “You know what’s really at the center of the forest, don’t you?” Twilight asked. “The source of all the dark magic. Is it another god?” “Yes.” Rarity nodded. “And they’re evil too? If they’re creating the forest-” “Well evil is subjective, isn’t it? But I can’t say if they’re responsible for the forest. The god that dark magic comes from has been asleep for over ten thousand years, since the end of the age of fire. They can hardly control the magic radiating from them if they aren’t conscious.” “Really?” Somehow that made it even more disturbing. “So you’re saying this dark god just lying around is enough to make civilization collapse? Just walking towards them when they’re asleep can kill you? But then she’d have to be as powerful as Celestia herself during the high magic era. Should we be worried about her? What if she wakes up?” “Hard to say. I can’t tell you much about them,” said Rarity. “They’ve been asleep for a long time. Fluttershy’s the only living person who’s ever met this god but she’s rather keen on this individual. She literally worships the forest god. You could ask her about them.” “Fluttershy’s a little too keen,” said Dash. “If you do ask Fluttershy about this, be ready for a sermon. Oh and if she asks you to come to some castle with her, don’t. Anypony who falls asleep there becomes obsessed with waking the dark god up. It’s kinda creepy.” “Hm.” Twilight’s mind was a bit sluggish right now. Maybe now really wasn’t the best time for this conversation. The other two seemed to understand her closing her eyes for a minute. Twilight wasn’t sure how long she lied down between them with her eyes closed, mulling this information over. There was something about their story that was a little too coincidental. An idea came into Twilight’s mind, one that made no sense but a lot of sense all at the same time. She was worried it might have been the poison making her a touch delirious. “Did she fall back asleep?” Pinkie, who apparently just got back, whispered. “No.” Twilight lifted her head again. “I was just thinking.” Pinkie handed Twilight another mug of something hot. Twilight could barely taste anything, but the heat of it was the nicest thing in the world. It gave her just enough strength to keep going. “I’m not sure if this my brain just being asleep, but- there’s a god that’s been asleep for ten thousand years,” said Twilight, “which is the approximately the same amount of time you said alicorns sleep for, so- is this dark god another alicorn?” “You really should be a detective.” Rarity nuzzled Twilight’s mane. “Yes. There is a second alicorn. Celestia has been awake too long and she’s been asleep too long. Celestia has almost no magic left and the other is overflowing with magic that she can’t control because she’s asleep. You see the situation?” “Really?” Twilight had been the one to bring up the idea, but even still she was skeptical. “Like are you a hundred percent sure? Saying there’s a second alicorn is like saying there’s a second sun I just never noticed!” “There is!” Pinkie answered immediately. “Mom calls it ‘the moon’! It’s how we’re not gonna die once Celestia peaces out!” “Wait. What?” Twilight’s brain couldn’t process this at all. “Moon? What’s a moon?” “Allegedly,” said Rarity, “this second alicorn can raise something similar to the sun which radiates dark magic instead of light. That’ll keep creatures like us alive. I always imagine it as a sort of dark sun.” “But the daywalkers? And all the plants and animals outside the forest?” Twilight asked. Really, if she’d been fully awake she would have asked this sooner. “Won’t they all die off without the sun? Dark magic would just kill them all. That moon thing would just burn them all to death.” “Or transform them,” said Rarity. “That’s what dark magic did to the four of us. Every species in the forest is something that was transformed by dark magic. But either way, pegasi, unicorns and the rest will all likely go extinct without Celestia.” “I don’t think I like the thought of that,” said Twilight. But it did seem hopeless. At the least, Twilight wouldn’t be able to think of a solution until she stopped being on the verge of death. “Isn’t there anything we can do?” “Unlikely,” said Rarity. “You’re not the only vampire who dislikes the idea. One of Fluttershy’s daughters has been trying to find a way to raise the sun without Celestia for 600 years and hasn’t gotten close. I suppose if you did find a way, a lot of ponies would consider you a hero.” “Fluttershy has a daughter?” Twilight coughed, then started gagging again. This latest round of gagging took a lot out of Twilight and she lied down and closed her eyes again. Right now, just lifting her eyelids felt like an impossible job. For a second she forgot what they were even just talking about. “Maybe we can continue this later?” Rarity pulled Twilight's head under her chin. “No!” Twilight buried her face in the pillow. She felt like she’d just gotten a million Hearth’s Warming presents but she wasn’t allowed to play with them. “Information good.” Twilight doubted she was doing a good job convincing Rarity. “Maybe we can just do less mind-blowing questions?” Twilight struggled to keep her eyes open and look up at Rarity. “Please?” “Oh, alright,” said Rarity. “But just fifteen more minutes, then I’m ordering you to sleep. I’m your leader now, remember.” “Thanks, boss. Uh. How many of us are there?” Twilight asked the first simple question to slog its way into her brain. “Like, the exact number in the entire world?” “How are supposed to know the exact number?” Dash asked. “There’s like a few cities down in the cavern grove. None of them are much bigger than Ponyville.” “Hold on. The cavern grove?” Twilight opened her weary eye but didn’t have the energy to turn around and look at Rainbow Dash. “Weren’t you hyping up how dangerous that place is? And you live there?” “It’s not bad for us! The Cavern Grove is so much fun!” Pinkie assured her. “If you’re a daywalker, the Cavern Grove is a place of pure nightmares and death! But once you go vampire, it’s super, super comfy down there. You don’t even know how comfy it is cause there’s nothing like it! The poison is delicious and the monsters are friendly! It’s eternal night and the weather is so nice you don’t even need a house! You can just sleep outside on the ground and it’s better than sleeping on a bed up here!” “Do they not have houses?” Twilight asked. “Is that thing about living in trees for real? Do you just run around naked in the woods foraging?” “Those are basically houses, Twilight.” Rarity smiled bemusedly. “This type of house doesn’t last very long in the forest. There are also those massive castles from the high magic era. Some of them are bigger than Canterlot Castle. We’ve maintained a lot of them, a lot of ponies like living inside those.” "We're gonna take you to Hallow Hold!" Pinkie promised. "Once you transform enough to go there! That's where the candy master lives! And everypony lives inside this one huge castle so it's like a giant slumber party forever and it's so great, Twitwi! Wait till you see it!" “I guess none of this sounds too bad,” said Twilight. She wanted to live in a freer society at this point. “It probably is better for me to just see it myself.” Hopefully, Twilight would have a chance to see the place more before she fully transformed and became part of vampire society or whatever. And once she was there... It was then Twilight remembered something important, something she needed so badly to know about, the thing she should have asked first. Even if she had to wait a little while-! “Rarity?” Twilight picked her head back up. “There’s no such thing as passive magic is there? You’ve been showing me dark magic. That’s what you use to cast spells!” "That wasn't entirely a lie," said Rarity. "You do cast it like I told you, but the source I use is dark magic, yes. I know some ponies have a problem with that too." “Teach it to me!” Twilight put her hoof on her heart and leaned forward without hesitation. “I can feel it now! I know I can do it if you show me how!” Rarity smiled wide and laughed at Twilight’s enthusiastic reaction. “Now see, I really like you.” Rarity held her smile for a few moments. “You know what? I’m not supposed to teach you dark magic this earlier either, but I can’t possibly resist. So I’ll start teaching you, just a little at first. But remember that dark magic is still poisonous to you and you shouldn’t do it when we aren’t around.” And just like that, an entirely new world opened up. This was the best day of Twilight’s life!