A soft hiss filled the room, and billowing steam made vision near-impossible even after finding she could open her eyes. Eventually, the gas faded, dissipating into the rest of the room, and she found herself face to face with a grinning white muzzle.
"So you CAN wake up! C'mon, sleepy head!"
Twilight moaned in pain, stretching her limbs out far, feeling very much as if she had been sleeping on her side awkwardly for the last thousand years. Upon stretching, she came face to hoof with herself for the first time, and nearly screamed; her leg was twisted, bent at unnatural angles, and riddled with holes- matted hair barely clung to it, completing the cancerous look of her own body. Looking up at her waker wasn't much better; the exact same twisted bastardization of a face looked back at her, gaunt and shrunken, but still smiling widely.
"C'mon, let a friend in- What's going on?"
"I..."
Twilight caught a look at the rest of the room for the first time, noting the long metal corridor stretching on before slanting upwards. She had been sleeping in a green pod, an odd fusion of biological and metallic, with wires and metal plates snaking inside and covering the organism, seemingly breathing in and out slowly, as if on the edge of death. Similar pods sat against the walls down the hallway, all of which either open and cobweb covered or closed, the insides fogged up and impenetrable by the naked eye.
"...I don't know. Where are we?"
"I don't know! Kind of exciting! Come on, we can't stay in here forever!"
Celestia- Yes, that was her name, of course... How had she forgotten?- took her hoof, pulling her out of the steam and sludge onto the cold metal floor, happily bouncing between legs and smiling down at her. Twilight stumbled to her feet, steadying herself against the larger mare and looking down the long hallway.
---*---
The double doors may have been locked at some point, but the bolts had long since rusted apart, and sat on the inside at that. Twilight gently levitated the doors apart and was instantly hit with a wave of heat, nearly suffocating in its intensity. Waves of light danced over her eyes, and she awkwardly stumbled onto the blistering hot surface, colliding with something metallic as she did.
Her vision finally cleared, and she saw a small computer on a pedestal in front of her- which quickly became forgotten as she saw what lay beyond it. An endless plain of yellow sand, shimmering in her vision the further out she looked. In the distance, small houses and buildings could be spotted. Turning around, she saw the tip of a large mountain hanging over everything, and the city below they stood in; streets covered in sand, buildings and houses sunken down, and broken remains trailing down the cliffsides of the mountain, as if the entire city had slid down from its peak.
Celestia trotted up next to her, smiling in awe as they looked around. After a moment of silence, she headed over to the computer, curiously tapping at the screen with her muzzle. The screen flickered, screen permanently wavy in the heat, and the vague outline of a face appeared. For several tantalizing moments, a voice rang out clearly, but never lasted long, and eventually died in the heat.
"You- Backu- Celes- Sun- In case of-"
The computer depressingly sagged, as if beginning to melt, and the two turned to each other.
"Something's wrong." Twilight gravely stated the obvious.
"Do YOU remember what this place used to look like?"
"N-No?"
"Then what's the problem? We're just in the desert. I'm sure we're fine." Celestia casually blew off the obvious.
"Well..." Twilight looked around, searching for any clue that could validate her suspicions. "We... We should get up high. Are you sure you don't remember anything?"
Celestia looked thoughtful, staring blankly into space and biting her lip.
"I... Hmm... There will come..."
"You remember something?"
"Not anything about my life, but... I remember a poem! Or maybe it's a song? I'm not sure."
She cleared her throat and began to recite, straining to remember each individual line.
"There will come soft rains, and the smell of the ground... And swallows calling with their shimmering sound... Robins will wear their feathery fire... Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire... And not one... Um...duhduhduh.... And Spring herself... Ah, darn."
"Well... Alright, let's try and get higher up, okay?" Twilight awkwardly smiled, trying to make herself feel better.
---*---
Twilight pulled herself onto an outcropping of stone, letting her wings rest from the long fly up. What remained of a house sat strewn around her, colliding with the outcropping on the way down and staying there. Celestia fluttered down next to her, taking a minute to enjoy the view. Twilight couldn't help but sigh, looking out on the day.
"Aww, you alright there?" Celestia warmly smiled down at her.
"We both know something happened."
"Yeah, but come on! We can't stay sad about it forever! We lasted, didn't we? We've still got each other. All we have to do is keep moving forward, and we'll be alright. Tomorrow is another day. Forget your troubles, come on get happy, get ready for... Pfft. Why can't I remember any of these?"
She goofily shook her head, quickly forgetting about it, and chose instead to nuzzle against Twilight. She bristled in the taller mare's embrace, but eventually found herself sinking in, worried briefly ebbing. Everything was not okay, but Tia was right. She couldn't worry. All she had to do was pretend everything was okay, and maybe it would be.
The heat beat down on them, growing less powerful as it fell beneath the horizon, seeming to swallow everything under it with its sheer mass, looming over distant villages and slowly loosening the its hold over the land as the gargantuan blood-red sun sunk softly.