Luna watches the ponies in Canterlot from a distance, her bedroom balcony. The hammers from the work crews busy repairing the damage caused by her and Despair’s storm is an incessant clatter. Fortunately, most of the damage done was just broken windows and shattered roof tiles, one large window she can see being carried by a team of Pegasus is heading toward Stardust’s tower.
Fluttering wings and the sound of shoes on stone announces the arrival of someone to her little corner of the palace. She doesn’t need to look over to know who it is, but she does anyway. Celestia, with her mane cleaned and brushed and wearing her regalia, seems like she’s managed to get a few more hours of sleep after the excitement of last night. She looks better than Luna feels, she knows she must be a mess but hasn’t found the time or willpower to clean herself up beyond tying her mane out of her face. Enveloped in Celestia’s yellow aura is a silver object.
“We found the other mask.” Celestia passes it to Luna, giving her the chance to inspect it in the sunlight. The shattered left eye socket and the lightning filigree don’t mock her the way the other one did, despite the fact they are nearly identical. “A guard found it up on the roof when he was replacing one of the flags.”
“Thank you, sister.” She sets it down on the railing, the empty socket almost seems to watch her. “We may need both masks to understand what was done to his mind.” The first mask, the one which she had given to Celestia, is safely secured in the vault until they have some idea what to do with it. It’s too dangerous to leave where Stardust might find it, at least in his current state of mind.
“How is he?” Celestia gestures to Luna’s room, the curtains have been drawn. Luna knows who she means. They brought Stardust here last night so she could keep an eye on him. He hadn’t spoken, refused even to meet them eye to eye. Luna doesn’t know if he didn’t want to or couldn’t.
“Resting.” Sleeping, actually. It had taken Luna most of an hour to lull him to sleep, even using magic. The stress of the battle on his mind had been intense.
“Even in his dreams?” At least Celestia is keeping her voice down.
“I can only assume so.” Luna sighs. “I wasn’t able to find them.”
“That’s very strange.”
“I believe it has to do with the overlapping memories as the mask tried to re-write his mind. I won’t be certain until I can study them.”
“And then what?” Of course, Celestia is thinking ahead.
“I… don’t know.” Luna hasn’t thought that far, there are too many variables. “We can’t remove the memories of what happened to him.”
“We could. You know that.” Luna shoots her sister an ugly glare for even suggesting it. Celestia backs slightly away.
“Would you have done it to me?” Her sister is silent, knowing she never would. Luna takes a deep breath, so she doesn’t lose her temper. “I won’t deny what has happened to him, just as I won’t deny what I did to myself.” They both know what she means. “It’s changed him, he is not the pony whom Twilight first met, not anymore.”
“Then what do we do with him?”
“That depends on him.” Luna looks back at her room. Stardust is still sleeping. “He must make his own destiny. I can only help him along the path he chooses, and only if he asks for it.”
“You are very set on letting him make this decision.” The white Alicorn steps up beside the blue one. “What is it about him that makes you so hesitant?”
“Aside from the fact that it is his own mind at stake?” She shakes her head. “I don’t know his entire life story, but it feels to me that he has spent his life struggling to find his own place in this world.”
“That’s true of every pony.” She shrugs.
“For him, it is… more significant.” Luna considers how to explain. Surely Celestia saw his blank flank, but given the situation last night, she may not have noticed. “From what Twilight has told me and from what little he has said himself, I can only guess that he feels… dominated by forces outside his control. Jerked around by fate.”
“If you want to help him, you can’t take his control away.” Tia understands, Luna smiles softly. Then her smile dies.
“Especially since I may be partially responsible for what just happened.”
“What do you mean?”
“Yesterday…” was it really only yesterday? “I brought Twilight here, thinking she could help repair what I thought was damage to his mind. Stardust blames her for what happened to him. The stress of their encounter triggered last night’s events.” She lets her head droop. “If I hadn’t called for Twilight, it wouldn’t have occurred.”
“Luna.” A white wing is placed over her back; it’s warm. “You can’t blame yourself, it won’t help. That’s exactly what he’s doing.” Luna takes several deep breaths and nods.
“Rebuilding his life is something only he can do. I’ll aid him if he lets me.” She frowns and turns away from her sister. “If I can.”
“Oh, Luna.” It’s Celestia’s turn to sigh. “Even if you can’t magic away his problems, you are maybe the only pony in all of Equestria who understands what he has experienced. I have no doubt you will see him through this.” Celestia holds her tighter, the warmth in her wing spreading throughout Luna’s body. She can’t stop herself from smiling, and she wouldn’t if she could.
“Thank you.” Luna’s stress has only just begun to melt away when her hair suddenly stands on end as an electric charge fills the air. When the immediate thundercrack comes, she flinches involuntarily, last night’s experience has taught her to expect an attack. Celestia winces as well, releasing the darker Alicorn and glancing up at the sky, looking for clouds that aren’t there.
“What was that? The storm has already past.”
“I know exactly what that was.” Luna sighs, sticking her head back through the curtains to be sure. Her bedroom is empty, so is her bed, and Stardust’s coat isn’t hanging where she left it. She returns her attention to the white Alicorn. “Don’t worry. It was just Stardust teleporting. His control over the spell is somewhat sub-par.” She rubs at her head, frustrated. “I’m going to have to track him down before he hurts himself.”
“I don’t think that will be difficult.” Celestia gestures into the garden with one wing. Luna approaches the railing and looks down. Sure enough, a lone pony wearing a black coat is wandering away from the palace. Magenta eyes turn from the Unicorn down below towards Luna. “Do you want me to go with you?”
“No. No, I should speak with him alone.” Luna spreads her wings and cringes when her shoulders complain. Before she leaps off the balcony, she meets her sister’s gaze. “Thank you, for asking.” Celestia is silent, smiling softly.
Luna glides down from the balcony, landing harder than she wanted to. The muscles in her right shoulder ache, her wing is very stiff. She may have sprained something during the fight, she stretches the wing a few times to try and loosen it before putting them away. She saw which way Stardust had gone, and he wasn’t moving quickly. Catching up to him is trivial, he was neither hiding nor running.
When she finds him, he’s walking along a flowerbed. He looks miserable, almost as bad as last night. It’s probably going to take him a while to get all the tangles and knots out of his tail and mane. There’s a bit of limp in his gait, he’s probably bruised from falling down the stairs and ugly impact against the window. It’s a minor miracle they weren’t sliced to bits when they hit it.
Luna doesn’t hide her presence, but she doesn’t impose on him immediately. Still, he glances back at her with badly bloodshot eyes before resuming his slow shameful walk beside the flowers. He had spent much of last night crying; it’s one of several reasons she had so much trouble getting him to rest.
With his limp and his slow pace, Luna has no difficulty staying nearby. In fact, she has plenty of time to enjoy the garden herself. The flowers are in bloom after the rain, soaking in the sunlight. It’s a sight she doesn’t get to see nearly as often as she’d like. At night all the flowers here are bundled up to wait for the dawn. For a brief moment, she allows herself to revel in their vibrant colors and pleasant scents.
“How many did I hurt?” Stardust speaks, hoarse. She lifts her head from a large rose. He’s sitting not far off, although his face is also downcast towards the flowers. The eye towards her is weakly flicking from her to the flowers and back. Even if the fact that his first thoughts are for others reassures her, this still won’t be pleasant.
“A lot of frightened fillies and foals, but nopony was seriously wounded.” He nearly falls over, slumping deeply in relief. “The worst of the damage was several broken windows and some roofing tiles.” Luna glances up at the many towers of the palace, bereft of most of their pennants. “We are going to have to replace all the flags, though.”
“At least I didn’t kill anypony this time.” Wearily he picks himself up and resumes his walk. Luna follows alongside, with enough distance between them that she doesn’t aggravate him. She remains silent, hoping he will find something to say before she does.
He wanders more-or-less aimlessly, pausing every now and then to take a long look at a flower or listen to the birds. Towards the center of the garden, in an open area with a gazebo at its center, he pauses and looks around for something missing.
“That’s… odd.” His tone is not as down as he was before, although he’s still hoarse. “Something is strange here, it was here a little while ago, where’s the gravestone?”
“Gravestone?” He jerks into motion when she speaks, spinning towards her with a yelp.
“Princess Luna? You’re alive?!” That he’s suffering another attack is quite clear. Luna sighs, massaging her head. This task she has taken on may be quite the challenge to her patience.
“Stardust, look around. This is not the world of ash.” She holds her place, letting him stare at her and then look around again. It takes him several deep breaths and a moment to think before blinking repeatedly. His expression shifts away from wide-eyed surprise back to his previous dour downcast.
“Of course. You’re right. I’m sorry.”
“Do not be sorry for something outside your control.”
“I don’t know what else to say.” He shakes his head, turning back to his wandering. “I hate this. I can’t even trust my own memories.”
“You can trust me.” Luna steps up next to him, blocking his way with a wing. “If you ever get confused or scared, you can come find me. If you let me, I’ll ground you to this reality.”
“Why are you doing this?” Stardust doesn’t answer her directly. His neon-blue eyes turn up towards her. She can still see the burns Despair’s lightning left on his face; hopefully, they will heal, and he won’t be permanently scarred. The mark on his chest is worse, and will almost certainly leave a true scar. She considers her response carefully, both for his sake and for hers.
“Because I do not wish to see you injured. Because you are my friend.” She hesitates a little before continuing. “And, to be honest, because it might be nice to have even one pony to talk to.” She had chosen her exact words very intentionally. Stardust works up the gumption to look her in the eye, and despite himself, he can’t help but smile faintly.
“You aren’t that isolated.”
“I meant, for both of us.” He nearly laughs at her, weakly, for using his own words against him. “I wasn’t joking.” His mirth fades quickly. “I am not entirely altruistic in this. I really do have very few close friends to speak with. I don’t want to lose one to some terror that doesn’t exist… anymore.” She adds the last word both to stave off a retort she expects and to emphasize that he can move beyond it.
“It doesn’t feel like it doesn’t exist. Not to me.” He drops his head again, and Luna sighs. She knows she’ll have to change the subject or he’ll run around in mental circles. The shadow of a guard flying overhead passes over them, and Stardust flinches. Her cyan eyes track the guard for a moment, and then her gaze lingers on the mountain.
“Are you up for a flight? I have something I would like to show you.” He blinks and glances at his sides. His glass wings disintegrated last night, and he hasn’t replaced them yet.
“Show me what?”
“It’s not very far.” Luna stretches out her wings, still sore but working out the stiffness, and leaps into the air. “If you want to know, you’ll have to come along.” She hovers nearby, waiting for him to make the decision. She expects he will want to know, and she’s using his curiosity to distract him from darker thoughts. There is the possibility he’ll decide it’s not worth the effort, and she doesn’t know if she’s willing to leave him here alone if he doesn’t come along.
Fortunately, she doesn’t have to figure that out. After a moment of hesitation, a neon-blue aura envelops him, radiating from his horn. Panes of black glass fold and materialize around him, encasing him briefly before dissolving away. The fragments reform on his shoulders as his wing spell completes. She nods, smiling lightly.
Stardust rises into the air slowly, using the magic of the wings instead of the strength of his legs to get off the ground. He remains silent, following along at a leisurely pace while they fly out of the city and a bit further into the mountains.
Their storm has left marks here as well, a few trees knocked down or splintered by a lightning bolt. As they fly, she watches for other ponies, but there seems to be none out this far from the city today. No surprise there, this part of the Canterlot mountain range is mostly ignored. As slow as they are, it takes longer than she’s used to to get to the grotto.
Her shoes leave deep imprints on the soft earth where she lands. The shore of a small lake, little more than a large pond, surrounded on all sides by the mountains and cliffs. At the far side of the grotto, a little waterfall fills the pool. A tiny island, barely more substantial than a rock at the center of the lake, holds a single tree.
“What is this place?” Stardust lands nearby, taking it all in. “A secret garden?”
“It’s not a secret. Not really. I just don’t tell anypony where it is.” She almost manages to draw a smile from him with that one. “Celestia knows about it.” Now she eyes him carefully, waiting to see how he responds to what she says next. “So does Princess Sparkle.” She isn’t sure what she expected to see. He barely even noticed, just a quick darting of his eyes towards her before he resumes looking around the grotto.
“I expect there are also a few random ponies who have stumbled on it as well.” Not wanting to get his coat drenched or muddy, he sits down on a rock at the water’s edge. Luna joins him there, sitting nearby. Neither of them makes any attempt to move closer to the other. “I’m going to guess.” He speaks after several minutes of listening to the waterfall and the wind. “Why you brought me here.” She slides one eye towards him, waiting. “You want me to know of a place I can go to be alone, where I can’t harm anypony.”
“Not entirely accurate, although that is part of it. I want you to know this place is here, so if you feel overwhelmed or confused, you’ll have somewhere to go without being disturbed.” She turns all the way towards him. “I know you’ve had difficulty finding a place to think. Canterlot can be a crowded city, and the palace garden is often occupied.” She waves a hoof at the grotto. “Out here, you can be alone if you need to.” He affixes his neon-blue eyes on her.
“What makes you think I want to be alone?” Luna considers her response. She could say that she knows him now, unlike when they first met. She could say that it what she might want in his situation. That’s not what she says.
“Then you don’t have to be.” She stands, taking it as an invitation, and walks over to sit beside him. “You have the option, either way.” He is quiet for a few moments.
“Thank you.” The tone in his voice is something she hasn’t heard from him before, and she doesn’t quite know what to make of it. “You must be exhausted. You should go get some sleep. I’ll do some thinking out here and head back myself in a while.” She is exhausted, especially after last night’s exertions. Luna nods and stands, but hesitates before taking into the air.
“Before I go, there is one thing I am going to have to ask of you.”
“Anything.” There’s that tone again, but he isn’t looking at her. She waits until he lifts his eyes from the water. It takes some effort to keep her tone stern without being severe.
“I need you to swear to me you’ll never do that again.” She doesn’t have to say what she means. He understands, she can see it in his pained expression. “Promise me.” He hesitates, for almost an instant too long.
“I promise.”
Letting go with my magic, the last stone sockets into place, and I release my held breath.
“That was… much harder than the others.” I stand over the grave marker, made from the shattered remains of the friendship map, wiping away my tears for the third or fourth time since I started and then look around. Ponyvile is dead; the trees are slowly withering, and the color fading from the once vibrant buildings. Nopony is around. Nopony alive anyway.
I’m alone. Absolutely alone. The only thing moving in this awful grey place is the falling ash.
That was my last chance to undo this hell. I’ve failed again. Worse than being alone, I’m still here.
I’m stuck here.
I look at the grave at my feet, and then at the array of others. At least she can be with them now, our friends. I don’t know if that’s a comfort or not. It was the only thing I could do for her, in the end.
“In the end, huh?” How many times did I think it was the end, and then it wasn’t? It really is the end this time.
So what do I do now? I stand there for a while, breathing slowly, trying not to think. But my mind won’t let me be still.
I told her I would search for survivors or for powers that could take me back. I had promised her, and I need to keep it.
Where to go first? The Crystal Empire is the only place anywhere remotely nearby which might have survived; there’s a possibility the Crystal Heart may have protected it. I should really head that way first. But before I go north, I have one last thing I really should do.
My eyes drift to the Canterlot mountain, somewhere behind the ever-grey clouds. There was only one pony we met before the battle with Despair that wasn't crippled by Despair's spell, and she might still be alive.
“Princess Luna…”