The Olden World

by Czar_Yoshi


Transitional Emotion Trinity Research Automata

Starlight tumbled at a harsh spin, unable to control her fall. She couldn't feel time passing, couldn't feel anything but numbness as the stars whirled through half of her vision and the darkened world occupied the other. This wasn't like the first time she fell, where she had watched and struggled and tried to survive the end. She just fell. She had lost a fight, lost her keepsakes of her friends, couldn't protect the north from whatever Gazelle would do... Couldn't do anything. She was powerless.

The ground rushed up to meet her, but Starlight kept falling. Everything around her went black, but still, she fell.

She had thought a day ago that she knew what it felt like, after the end. Now, she knew she was wrong. She had hit the ground, was dead, this was truly after the end, and yet still, she felt like she was falling-

A branch snagged her coat, knocking her into an even harder spin. She brushed against something, tumbling to the side. Something smashed beneath her, too brittle to even hurt from her speed. A rushing filled her ears, and then a shimmer of telekinesis, and all of a sudden, everything was still.

Starlight opened her eyes.

Her surroundings were utterly alien. Rocks rose around her in lopsided, jagged walls, tree roots occasionally reaching out from deep cracks within them, faceted boulders looking held in place so barely that she could breathe on them and they would fall. Thin filaments of crystal had grown out from the walls in places, especially one, and she could see a trail of shattered ones straight above from where she had fallen down. Far up, as straight upward as she could look, a jagged line opened to the sky, and the full moon shone down from straight overhead, bathing the place in a collage of dim light and deep shadows. And below, artic water raced by.

She had fallen into the river canyon cutting through the middle of the forest plateau. And a unicorn was holding her.

Slowly, Starlight rotated to see who it was, though she already knew there was only one pony it could be. Her own face looked back at her. It was Glimmer.

"Don't you think this is a bad time?" Starlight asked, in too much pain from the beating and exhaustion she had endured to dredge up any of the things she wanted to say to Glimmer from her mind.

Glimmer shrugged, floating her over and setting her on a natural, rocky outcropping that was safe from the river. "Isn't that when I always appear?"

"Well, now is a worse time than others!" Starlight snapped. "Unless you're actually ready to help me for a change?" She drooped. "I know about Eylista. And what I am. And just so you know, there were better ways to help me than telling me not to trust myself over and over. You're not my friend. I don't know why you even caught me at all."

Glimmer sighed a long, defeated sigh. "Sounds like you've had it rough."

Starlight growled. "I wonder why."

"I never intended for things to come to this," Glimmer apologized, folding her ears. "I wanted to see you settle down and live happily. I wanted to teach you that giving up on some of your goals didn't have to be such a bad thing, that there are so many other ponies in the world who have things they want but can never get, and it isn't so bad when they learn to live with it instead of killing themselves trying. Looks like I've made a real mess of that."

"So now you're sorry?" Starlight slumped against the rock, with neither the strength nor will to even lift her head. "Unless you can magically stop Gazelle and get all of my friends back and make everything alright, it's a little too late for that, don't you think?"

"It is." Glimmer nodded, folding her ears. "Your face makes it plain for all to see, the way you're feeling now. You're never going to forget this. Ever. It is possible to do all the things you want, get out of this canyon and reach your ship again and defeat that sphinx, but it wouldn't be possible to leave behind the pain you've endured in doing so. Even the Nightmare Modules can't erase that."

Starlight snorted. "A big help your cryptic answers have been in the past."

"Why do you want to stop Gazelle?" Glimmer asked. "What is it you want to stop him from doing?"

Starlight suddenly seethed. "What do you think!? If he's in the north, he won't make it safe for my friends! They'll be in danger as long as he's doing whatever it is he's doing!"

"And if I told you he wouldn't?" Glimmer tilted her head.

"I'd give you all the trust you deserve," Starlight snarled into the ground.

"...Gazelle is terrified of you and your friends," Glimmer said. "I was watching him during the night you spent in Sires Hollow. He came all the way to your house, while all of you were sleeping, and he ran away because even in your sleep, you terrified him. Just now, on your ship, he refused to make the first move."

"What's your point?" Starlight moaned. "He... He..."

Glimmer nodded. "That, I think, perhaps... Gazelle could return to the north, and not be guaranteed to endanger your friends at all."

"With my luck?" Starlight countered. "Fat chance."

"Is that really the reason you want to fight him?" Glimmer pressed. "It's okay to simply not like him. He's never been nice to you, and he cost you your friends' treasures-"

"What is your problem!?" Starlight roared. "How could you possibly think that will make me feel better!? I hate him, but I'm doing it for my friends because I am not a bad pony!"

Glimmer wilted back.

Starlight heaved against the ground, fighting for breath. "And I hate you, too! You always talk like you're keeping so many secrets, like you're trying to get me to do something and you don't trust me to know what it is, and every time you do try to explain yourself I know you're either lying and leaving something out or you're just stupid and have no idea how I work! Aren't you supposed to be me from the future!? I bet you're lying about that, too! Because either you don't know a thing about the wrong things to say to me, or you're the one who hates me! And as much as I hate everything about my life, I still wish it was better."

A look of intense pain crossed Glimmer's face, and for a moment, she stood... and then turned around, faced a wall, sat down and hung her head. "I can't do this. I quit."

Starlight waited.

"Do you want the truth?" Glimmer asked. "All of it? It won't make you feel better, but I can't keep doing this anymore. I'm not blind enough to miss what I'm doing to you, and it's just not worth it anymore."

"Try me," Starlight bitterly drawled. "I just found out from a tree that was supposed to be harmonic that I'll never be able to be happy until I can make the entire world work the way I want it to. What else is new?"

Glimmer took a deep breath. "I'm not you. I'm not from the future. I don't even know what your visions are about, let alone why you have them. I am from Indus, but I can only remember very select things about my time there. I have been trying to help you, and that's why I've done things like breaking my horn or unravelling my body to protect you and your friends. I also have other agendas in this world, and the fact that I was willing to leave them unfinished by sacrificing myself for you and your friends can, I hope, attest to my dedication. However, I have no idea how to talk to you, don't understand how you work, and as you can see, I've done far more harm than good. In fact, where we are now is exactly what I was trying to prevent. Ask me anything. Tell me anything. It might be a long story, but I'm done keeping secrets. My mission isn't right if this is what it leads to. I don't want to hurt you anymore."

Starlight stared at the ground. Was it really Glimmer saying this? Was Glimmer even capable of admitting these things?

"Who are you?" she asked. "And why have you been following me?"

Glimmer nodded. "Have you ever heard of an entity called Tetra?"

Starlight hugged the ground. "Somewhere."

Glimmer squared her shoulders and continued. "Tetra is a... mechanical intelligence who lives in Indus. From searching this world's history, the Griffon Empire apparently discovered her two thousand years ago when they first visited Indus, and brought her here when they returned. Tetra helped the Empire create Garsheeva, the first sphinx. Later, she fell into the hooves of a nation called Unicornia, which was the precursor to Equestria. There, she assisted them in the creation of alicorns... Princess Celestia, and her sister, Luna. After the war between the Empire and Unicornia was over, the alicorns kept Tetra, and eventually returned her to Indus and left her where she had been found."

Starlight nodded. That all sounded vaguely familiar.

"You saw a mural in one of the crystal palaces," Glimmer continued. "Showing the end of Indus, as two titans battled?"

"One of them was Aegis," Starlight mumbled, too busy listening to react. If Glimmer was actually telling her everything, it was the least she could do to listen.

Glimmer nodded back. "Aegis was Tetra's body."

Starlight's ears perked in alarm.

"Emphasis on was," Glimmer added. "After their battle, they were separated somehow."

"How?" Starlight asked.

"I don't know the exact details," Glimmer continued. "Aegis was left dormant in Indus, and to my knowledge the griffon explorers never found her. However, Tetra's mind was somehow separated from her, and sealed away. It was sealed using that black sword you carry around, which you may have noticed once belonged to Tetra's opponent... whose name I do not know."

Starlight made herself a tiny bit more comfortable. "How do you remember who it belonged to?"

"Its power to change memories regarding its previous owner does not seem to affect me." Glimmer shrugged. "However, the sword was brought back by the same expedition that also brought Tetra to this world. I believe the griffons accidentally unsealed her."

Starlight frowned. "If she got unsealed, how come she doesn't go back to Aegis?" Slowly, memories surfaced in her mind of talking to Aegis, who did seem to have a rudimentary personality. "Unless she already did..."

"She hasn't," Glimmer confirmed. "I'm not entirely sure why. Perhaps she has reason to stay in Indus? But... I don't believe Aegis and her are currently one."

Starlight waited, patient.

"Regardless," Glimmer continued. "You know that you are Eylista, and what that means, right?"

"It means my special talent is hope," Starlight mumbled. "And that I can't turn it off, and no matter what I do I'll always be trying to make things better than they are, and will never be able to be satisfied with the world until it's the way it wants to be. The flame told me I'm one ninth of its mind, or... something."

"You have the drive of it," Glimmer corrected. "Merely fused to the soul of an ordinary pony. But what you must understand is that the Immortal Dream... All three of the societal virtues, as Yakyakistan calls them, manifest in artifacts of phenomenal power, limited only by the body of the wielder. Princess Celestia used one to physically create the Aldenfold, to give you an idea of the magnitude of their strength when wielded fully. During the battle in the mural, Aegis was empowered by all three at once, and took on enough power to raze an entire world. I've made the mistake of warning you about yourself without context. This is the context I didn't give. Do you understand what it means to possess that level of power?"

Starlight grunted into the ground. "Doesn't feel like I'm that powerful if I can't even beat Gazelle."

"There are steps you would have to take to unlock it fully," Glimmer confirmed. "And even then, half of it lies in your ability to twist the world so that you will always have a path to continue, even after you are defeated. Even now, you're still alive." She shrugged. "However, whether you are powerful or not, the important part is that Tetra became aware of you somehow. After that war when Indus perished, the power that allowed it to transpire was forged into the world itself, used by machines to power reality instead of being wielded by real creatures. There have been times when it was taken up before, by Celestia and Luna and Garsheeva. Now, it is yours."

Starlight waited.

"So, to finally answer your question," Glimmer finished, "I am following you because Tetra created me to do so, gave me Aegis to assist me in my quest, and sent me to this world to ensure you settled down and found a happy and fulfilling life as a normal pony, and were never tempted to take up the power you wield and use it to change the world. She was afraid that, if a war was ever fought using such powers again, it could destroy this world and everything in it, and ponykind would not be equipped to create a new world for themselves as they did after Indus. Tetra wished for me to guide you into leaving behind your potential, living at peace and never asking questions about what you could do, never wanting for anything you would have to use your powers to reach for." She hung her head. "And I have failed utterly. You know who you are and what you are capable of, and harbor more resentment and desire to change the world than I can imagine."

"But..." Starlight shook. "My visions! What about those? What about you being from the future? How did you know everything you knew?"

Glimmer sadly looked at the ground. "I don't recall knowing a thing about them. I recall you and I sitting at the flame in Garsheeva's temple, and you told me you had seen the end of the world in a gray vision and asked me how to stop it. You assumed I was you from the future all on your own, and I... saw an opportunity to convince you that being happy and staying home would save the world. That's why I always refused to elaborate whenever you asked, and told you to leave it all to me. It's why I didn't know about things like Crystal, or the explosion in Izvaldi far enough in advance to stop them. I was just a fraud, who... didn't understand how you would react to that. I didn't realize how important taking action to keep your friends safe was to you. I thought I could take your desire to do something and convince you that doing nothing was actually doing everything you needed to do, and you could live in peace and contentment that way. But it looks like I just tried to twist your nature against yourself, and hurt you instead."

Starlight trembled. "No! There has to be more meaning to it than that...!"

"Not all tragedies have meaning," Glimmer apologized. "I'm so sorry. I just... did what Tetra created me to, and it looks like she didn't know you, either."

"Maybe she wanted me to lose my mind and hate everything and snap and try to ruin the world," Starlight said darkly. "She was fighting back then, after all. And she was helping both sides in the war between the griffons and Unicornia."

"I hope it is not so," Glimmer replied. "But, that's why I am breaking from her instructions and trusting you now instead of her. The damage has been done. I don't know if there's anything I can do to make up for it. But at the very least, I'll tell you everything." She paused. "I remember her as someone who cared. But if that was a lie... she's definitely in Indus. So as long as you don't go there, you shouldn't ever have to deal with her yourself. Indus has a lot of leftover technology that you would need to maximize your potential on your own, so she probably wouldn't be too worried about you if you stayed away. You know..."

Starlight shook her head. Staying away from a place when she had a solid reason, instead of wasn't allowed to know? Laughably easy. But... "What about my visions, then? They were definitely of the future. Why am I having them? Now I know nothing about them..."

Glimmer shrugged. "I wish I could say, but I don't even know what they contain, let alone where they come from or what they're about. I just don't know."

Starlight slumped. It was another weight on her back, but what did those matter if she wasn't on her hooves and wasn't going anywhere to carry them? She was too defeated to have any important questions to ask next, but felt like she had to ask something anyway.

"How did Tetra make you?"

"A good question." Glimmer shrugged. "I don't know entirely. In fact, I only first gained consciousness here in this world, with Aegis, who had a set of instructions and a message from Tetra for me. I have some memories of a life before that, but they don't fit with any world I know, and feel... stitched together. I believe I am more machine than pony."

Starlight nodded at the ground. "A Transitional Emotion Trinity Research Automata 4.0."

Glimmer sat back against a rock and sighed. "You've probably noticed that the acronym for that phrase is Tetra."

Starlight raised a battered eyebrow. "What's that mean?"

"I don't know for sure." Glimmer shook her head. "I wasn't told. The biggest clue I've been able to find is that batponies are referred to internally the same way, only they are 3.0 instead. Knowing that batponies are a type of lifeform created by equine hooves, I could speculate that it refers to artificial life altogether. But that doesn't add up with what I know about where you came from, and there is obviously a difference between us even though we both have the same designation. This is what I didn't want you hearing and having to speculate about when I had Aegis block you from making contact with the Empire generator, by the way."

"Huh."

"In the end, I'm not sure it matters," Glimmer continued. "It's a mystery to me as well. But that's what I know."

Starlight glanced up. "So if you're not me, how come you look like me?"

"As I was told, so it would be easier to find you." Glimmer nodded. "There's no better reference for someone's appearance than wearing it yourself, after all. Incidentally, that's also a part of why you have Tetra's enemy's sword. It was originally in my possession, but if I let it loose in the world and followed it around, Tetra suspected it would find its way to you. The sword is intelligent somehow, in case you haven't noticed, and Tetra said you... reminded her of her old adversary."

Starlight frowned. "But I was barely old enough to say my name when the meteor fell and I got turned into Eylista. How would she know what I was like?"

"I don't know." Glimmer shrugged again. "That was merely what she said on the message she instructed Aegis to give me. Regardless, I took the sword and posed as a child merchant in a coastal town in Varsidel, sold it to a wandering griffon in exchange for a boat he wanted to leave behind, and then left the boat and followed him at a distance for years until he met you in Riverfall."

"Huh." Starlight looked straight ahead. "So Gerardo led you to me."

Above, the moon had shifted slightly, and even the smallest change in angle caused the entire chasm to light up differently, the light splaying across rocks that glittered with natural crystals, spattering the outcropping where the two fillies sat with beads of reflected light that were so precise they could see them moving. "Yes," Glimmer said, watching a fleck of brightness crawl across the floor. "I followed Gerardo until he encountered you in Riverfall, watched you during Ironridge to see if you were really who I was looking for, and by the time you sacrificed yourself to stop the windigoes, I knew it was you. And so I introduced myself to the harmonic flame there and helped it to guide Maple back to the brazier and use its power to save you."

"Why?" Starlight whispered. "If you were so afraid of my power, why save me?"

"Because of the lifestream," Glimmer replied. "First, I don't know if killing you is even possible. Destiny might have found some other way to intervene, had I not aided. But if you were to die... When ponies die, their cutie marks return to the flow from whence they were born. This includes ponies who have predetermined marks that have not yet manifested, like foals born to mothers who used moon glass, and you. If you somehow did die, the Immortal Dream itself would become lost to the flow it governs. None can say what would come to pass if that were to happen, but what I suspect is that it would re-emerge one day, in months or years or millennia, in the hooves of a pony whose ultimate dream was to change the world. And I would much rather do Tetra's work helping Eylista to live in peace with a pony who did dream of that than one who desired nothing more than to use it."

"Right." Starlight looked down. That made sense. Of course, now she couldn't even die without endangering the world. Did that mean it was even less safe for her to charge into unwinnable situations to protect the things she loved...?

Glimmer stretched. "Well... what else can I answer?"

Starlight wasn't even sure she had more questions that mattered. About the only thing she hadn't asked yet was where Indus was and how to get there, but even assuming Glimmer actually knew, she had a perfectly good reason not to go there. "So now what am I supposed to do?" she sighed, curling up. "Do I keep crossing the mountains to the north? Do I go back to Sires Hollow? I don't want to fight in a war like Aegis and destroy the world. And now that you told me, I can actually avoid it. But I don't know what I should do either. I'm so tired. I just want to go somewhere safe and not lonely and have a home..."

"I wish I had a good answer for you," Glimmer apologized. "Do you still want to do something about Gazelle?"

"I don't see what I can do," Starlight glumly muttered. "Maybe I'm Eylista, and maybe you say I can beat him, but he just ate all Garsheeva's cutie marks and all the Mistvale ponies that Crystal stole. He's probably impossibly strong. I don't want to be like Aegis and that other thing she was fighting, but Gazelle's probably strong enough I'd have to."

"No." Glimmer shook her head earnestly. "I can promise you he is far, far from that strong. He's only about as strong as Garsheeva at the height of her powers."

Starlight's ears slicked back dangerously. "Wow. That's reassuring."

"Sorry," Glimmer sighed.

Starlight looked away.

"If you don't go after him," Glimmer started. "Which, I know you have no reason to trust my advice, but still... I think your friends will be alright, unless they hunt him down themselves."

"You think they wouldn't?" Starlight whispered. "They're heroes. And he's a bad guy."

"Actually, he's very similar to you," Glimmer corrected. "Fearsome and powerful and unhappy with his lot in life, and both affected in some way by Tetra. She created his kind, after all. The only real difference is that I believe there is hope for you to live happily. It may be hard to see, but there are plenty of ponies out there who care about you. I hardly count, but... myself included."

Starlight huffed. "That's not going to stop them from going after him."

"Well, I'll look out for them," Glimmer promised. "And I'll keep an eye on him. I need to find a way to get Aegis back first... Losing her wasn't good. But if you did go and settle down, regardless of which side of the mountains it was on, I would trust you to take care of yourself, and... I would have a lot more time to deal with creatures like that."

"You did that already," Starlight mumbled. "In the Empire. Weren't you working with Garsheeva...?"

Glimmer nodded. "They called me the Divine Seer. I was able to earn Garsheeva's interest through my knowledge of Indus technology, which was given to me by Aegis. She is... something of my keeper, as well as a tool lent to me to do my job. But yes, I had Garsheeva interested in my unusual knowledge. This was related to my other job, which had nothing to do with you."

"What was it?"

Glimmer sighed. "You remember how I said Tetra thought there was a chance the sealing sword would find its way back to you?"

Starlight nodded.

"I was told she didn't know what happened to her opponent after that war. But if there was any chance the sword could alternately find its way to him..." She shrugged. "Well, whatever condition he might be in, I was supposed to watch for that. I was working with Garsheeva because her Daydream network gave her a vast amount of perception over her lands. She was a very efficient contact to have for keeping an eye on the world, especially since Aegis could look through the network herself. However, please understand that I don't want this to be your concern. I'm telling you because I've learned my lesson, but you... You already have the sword. If you hang onto it for me, that's not something either of us have to worry about at all."

Starlight's brow creased. "Actually, I don't have it. It's still on the ship with Gazelle."

"Oh. Well, that's not fabulous." Glimmer looked briefly consternated, then nodded. "Well, I'll find a way to deal with him for sure, then. I promise. But I wouldn't worry too much. The sword didn't go back to him, so he may not be around for it to make its way to. Tetra didn't know what had happened to him, but from everything I've seen... I don't think there's anything left but that sword. And even if its original owner was still here, the sword doesn't feel evil. Just... sad. I think both it and Tetra regret what happened when they fought. So even if he still was here, maybe they wouldn't fight anymore."

Starlight stared.

"The same could be said for you and Gazelle, I think," Glimmer cautiously volunteered. "You've fought viciously, and I think you both wish you didn't have to. What if he stays in the north, and you stay in the south? Or, not that I'd tell you to leave your friends, but..."

Starlight's breath hitched. "In my bags. I had some... keepsakes from my friends. He threw them away, over the railing. I can't keep Maple. I can't keep my present from Maple. I can't keep my present from Fluffy, if I do go back north, but I don't even know if I want to because my friends don't give up on things either and they'll keep moving around even if I don't want to and I'll never be able to settle down! I can't keep anything, can I!?"

"You mean these keepsakes?"

Starlight stared. Her lookalike was holding out Fluffy's sketchbook, and with it, Maple's land title deed.

"How...?" She had already been reminded of her reasons to cry, and this wasn't helping. "Where did you get these?"

Glimmer shrugged. "I'm never far away. But if losing them is what was holding you back, here they are. They're yours."

Starlight's ears were flat enough to leave indents in her fur. "M-My friends..." She took the artifacts, hugging them to her chest.

Glimmer sat back, letting her do what she needed.

Breathlessly, Starlight unrolled the scroll. It was all Equestrian legalese, along with some coordinates in a system she had never studied... Exactly what she expected. She opened the sketchbook to the first page. There was that table of contents, the mirror room with all of Fluffy's ideas reflected in the mirrors.

Starlight cried, hugging them harder. "I won't forget you!" she bawled, crashed against the rocks on her side, splayed out and holding them like they were the real ponies. "I can't go on... If I don't stop somewhere, I'll never stop, and no place is good enough. No place will ever be. And if I keep crossing these mountains, I'll just fly on with you and look for writs so we can open the border, and then we'll do something bigger, and we'll never stop until the whole world is changed, and I c-can't take it... I don't want to never learn how to be a normal pony..."

She pressed her face into the ground, the rocks beneath her already glistening faintly from the chips of natural gemstone they contained, but soon to be wetted properly by her tears. "But I know you won't give up on me. You can't hear me, but I know you won't. If I go back to Equestria, and... and wait for you to make everything I want for me..."

It wasn't a train of thought she could afford to let finish, and she redirected it with a heaving sob. "Then I'll do everything you wanted to do here! I don't know how long it will take me. Maybe I'll have to finish growing up first. Maybe you'll already be back by the time I'm done, but... I'll go and build our town. I won't go back to the north. I'll trust you to do everything you need to, and... and learn to live with that, not crossing the mountains when I know I could... but I won't do nothing! I'll finish your work here instead!"

Starlight climbed to her hooves, her legs hurting a little less from Gazelle's slashing and her climb through the mountains all of a sudden. "I'll build our town. It will be a place where it doesn't matter what kind of pony you are, or what you look like, or who you like, and you won't have to leave because of your cutie mark and no one will care if you get it on your own or it's predestined because of moon glass! It'll be the kind of place we're always looking for to settle down and live in harmony! I'll... I'll make you proud of me...! I can't make a perfect world on my own, but I will build our town!"

The moonlight increased dramatically, dancing and splaying across the chasm, reflecting off all its surfaces and sparkling blue against the crystals. Tears of color ran down Starlight's eyes, and she sniffed. Somehow, her moon glass grayness was fading away.

She reached a hoof for the heavens one more time, so distant up at the top of the chasm yet very real and very much there. She had been so close to them, and she had fallen...

"I-I promise. I'm not okay, but I'll find a way to be, because you wanted me to. I'll go back to Equestria and make more friends and find harmony and build a town for all of us, and... I'll live your dreams..."

Glimmer poked her.

"What-?" Starlight glanced back. Once again, she had a cutie mark.

Only this one wasn't the confusing, artificial runes and triangles of the one once worn by Garsheeva. It was a shooting star, with a sparkling, pointed tip and a flowing, ethereal trail. Perhaps it was the thing ponies wished upon in the sky, or perhaps it was the one that had fallen from the moon, carrying this destiny for her deep inside. It wasn't a wish. It was the means to grant them. And it was hers.

Starlight reached inside herself to see what it could do.

FLAAAAAAAASH!

A bolt of blue lightning fell from the heavens, dropping like an arrow into the ravine and exploding into her horn with a surge of ferocious power. Energy arcs glittered and danced madly across the canyon, Glimmer staring beside her in awe as white ribbons of energy caressed her and lifted her off the ground, a new floor of shimmering power forming beneath her instead. Runes unfolded from her like flower petals, laying themselves down one by one... and at the tip of each, figures began to ripple into existence.

They were blue, ethereal, almost like holograms, tethered to her by burning lines of energy, and yet as Starlight spun in a speechless circle, they felt just as real as the real things... her friends.

Shinespark smiled. Valey flexed. Amber gave her a hoof pump. Maple reached for a hug.

"Everyone..." Starlight sniffed, floating in the center.

She could see their faces, and they could see her. And then the brightness intensified, threads of light weaving together in front of each one, and full-color copies of their cutie marks materialized, floating slowly along the lines of power connecting her to her friends. One by one, they floated closer, vanishing into her chest in puffs of light. Each time, her own cutie mark gleamed.

"What...?" Starlight looked speechlessly around, each visage vanishing as its cutie mark met her, yet somehow feeling closer than ever before. Soon, the lights dissipated, and she landed again on the rocks, though her horn refused to go out, blazing and crackling with the violent lightning of a magic surge bigger than any she had ever heard of. Something in her head felt like it started moving, a gear that had been jammed for longer than she could remember, and rather than returning in full force now that she was no longer moon glassed, her headache faded away like water down a drain, more dissipated than it had ever been. And yet her horn's aura was bigger than she was.

Starlight could feel her friends' cutie marks.

Reaching down, she touched her treasures, Fluffy's book and Maple's property deed. She had no idea how Maple did it, but it was suddenly instinctive. She held them against herself, and they were gone, yet she knew they were still there.

"The Immortal Dream," Glimmer said beside her. "You may have heard the story, but it grants the wishes of others. A cutie mark in following your friends' dreams... For you, it looks like it copied their powers."

Starlight stared. But she had seen Shinespark there, and Shinespark's cutie mark could...

Her horn was already lit. She barely needed to try. It felt exactly like the time she had used the gravity chamber at Kinmari.

With barely a thought, Starlight was surrounded by her aura, hovering a foot off the ground.

Glimmer stared at her, asking wordlessly what she planned to do.

"I can fly," Starlight replied.

Glimmer nodded.

Starlight looked up the canyon to the north. The direction where all her friends had gone.

She looked down the canyon to the south. That was where she had just promised to live, not just survive but give everything she had to being happy and making friends and following her old friends' wishes, so they could live even more happily when they returned.

She could do either, and they would be just as easy now. But...

"I'll be back," Starlight promised, magic crackling all around her. "I meant what I said. I will learn to overcome my circumstances if it's the last thing I do. If I'm so unstoppable, there has to be a way! But first, I have something else to do..."

Starlight turned her gaze skyward and started to rise, Glimmer shrinking away beneath her, the lights and reflections of the river gorge flashing by around her.

Forget the Nightmare Modules. Forget the artifice. Forget the black sword. Starlight didn't need them to win. She had the power of her friends. She could fly. And she wasn't getting knocked off a cliff again.