--- Drawing a Blank ---
Twilight had formulated a few ideas about what would happen when she left the Ponyville Town Guard Station. She had gotten it into her head that the second she stepped out those doors, she'd be swarmed by just about every living thing in the town. Hundreds of curious ponies gathering around to behold the alicorn that had suddenly appeared in their humble little country town, drawn to her like moths to a flame, bringing with them an endless torrent of questions and concerns that would all blend together in an incomprehensible mess of pointless noise. Her wings would be irritatingly tugged at and her horn would get yanked to and fro by the more rowdy members of the herd in an attempt to disprove her status as an alicorn. Without a doubt, Spike would have been caught up in this chaos as well, either lost in the sea of swarming ponies or an unfortunate victim of the same poking and prodding that Twilight was. Thus, Twilight was on high alert the second the sun's light touched her cloakless form, the young alicorn ready to protect her personal space and dignity.
The reality of the situation, however, was far different from what she was expecting.
She had been walking alongside Rainbow Dash and Spike for a decent portion of time now, long enough to have made it back to the primarily residential area of town at least. And over that entire length of time, they hadn't been accosted once. Not a single pony approached them or even spoke with them, much to Twilight's confusion. It wasn't as if there wasn't anyone around, either, the trio had passed a number of individuals as they went about their business, and they were certainly noticed. There were people who stared, people who murmured amongst themselves at the sight of the group, and those who tried to go about their days in spite of the oddity walking through town. It was a bit unsettling, to put a word to it.
"So this isn't what I was expecting..." Twilight's eyes slowly scanned the street where she had made her home. There were fewer people here at this time of day than there were at, say, the market street, but there was a noticeable number. And just like all the others, their reactions were just the same as all the others.
"I figured someone would have jumped us by now..." Spike added before turning his head to look every which way to scan for possible interlopers. This alone was enough to tell that he was just as anxious as Twilight was, if not more.
"I'm shocked Pinkie hasn't jumped us yet," Dash gave a snorting chuckle before taking on a marginally more professional tone, "But you two can calm down, I went out of my way to make sure you two wouldn't have any trouble."
Understandably so, this alarmed Twilight more than it eased her mind. "What did you do?"
"Had the mayor make a public statement about the you-subject. Long story short: she told everyone to act like adults."
"And that actually worked?"
"I don't see you drawing a crowd, so my money says yes." Rainbow Dash smirked alongside a wave of her wing as if to emphasize the lack of people who were swarming Twilight at the moment. "Besides, if you were one of us mere mortals, would you be the one to do something to piss off an alicorn?"
That was a very good point, Twilight realized alongside an uncomfortable mixture of embarrassment and shame. The thought hadn't crossed her mind, but thinking it over now, it made perfect sense as to why nobody was approaching her. Nobody wanted to be the one to push the wrong button and risk sending Twilight over the edge, the incident with the guards yesterday probably didn't help with that either. While it was a given that everyone knew of Twilight being an alicorn at this point, who knew just how many people had heard rumors about her little standoff at the apple farm? If that information was floating freely about the town, it would be a miracle if anyone even spoke to Twilight again. But this wasn't her chief concern right now, not by a longshot, as there were far more prevalent issues at hoof right now.
"So... anyway... her message said that I'd know where to find her," Twilight changed the subject promptly, not wanting to dwell on the current topic any longer. "So that either means the Everfree or the library." They were already walking in the dirrection of Golden Oak's anyway, for one reason or another. It was the closer of the two possible options anyway, it only made sense to check there first.
Dash shot a glance and a raised brow towards Twilight with that, seemingly as if to question the sudden decision to change the conversation's heading like that. But if the pegasus had any strong opinions about it, she kept them to herself without much of a fuss. "You absolutely sure about that?"
"Positive... ish..."
The pegasus furrowed her brow in frustration "Ish?"
"The message said I'd know, and I don't know where else she'd go."
"Uh... guys?" Spike chimed in meekly, "I feel like I'm missing something here... you keep talking about a message... did I miss something?"
That was when Twilight stopped walking, her two companions stopping shortly afterward to see what was wrong. This was lost on the alicorn at the moment as she began to think very heavily on Spike's question. At Twilight's own doing, Spike was entierly unaware of the memory-altering spell that had been cast upon him, and up until now, Twilight had planned on keeping it that way until they had gotten to Starlight Glimmer. The plan had been to have her undo the spell, have Spike remember, and figure out exactly what had happened when he had his run-in with Starlight Glimmer. It had happened in their home, Twilight knew that much, but aside from that, nothing.
And it was only now, after Spike asked for some clarification, that Twilight saw the mountain-sized hole in her plan. Starlight Glimmer was an enigma, there was no reason to trusting her at this point, if at all. Would she even undo her memory spell in the first place? She could very easily refuse to do so—or, more likely, spin a different spell to put false memories in place of Spike's true ones to make her seem more trustworthy? There were too many variables at play here, and Twilight was infuriated at herself for not seeing them sooner. But as quickly as she found these immeasurable errors in her initial plan, the astute alicorn was able to devise a countermeasure. She absolutely hated this idea, and herself more for even coming up with it, but it was the only way she could figure out how to get around Starlight's potential trickery.
"We need to go home first..." That was the only explanation Twilight offered before changing her course, ignoring the group of ponies that scattered off of the street she was now headed down.
"Uh, why?" Rainbow Dash asked, clearly upset, as she and Spike closed the distance Twilight had made in a few short steps. "In case you forgot, we need intel, and time is definitely a factor here. What could we possibly need from your house?"
"Intel," Twilight grimaced. Ever so subtly, she gestured towards Spike. The signal was thankfully lost upon the reptile, but Rainbow Dash was quick to pick up on the subliminal message.
"Are... what?" The pegasus asked, something about the situation had gone over her head. It seemed that perhaps Dash wasn't exactly on the same page as Twilight in regards to Spike's current memory issues, after all. It only made sense, Twilight had never outright said it, she had only implied it when Dash had tried to speak Starlight's name. The confusion was to be expected, really. "How're we gonna get intel at your place?"
Twilight grimaced, not looking forward to what was about to transpire. "The same way she got Knox to deliver that message."
The implications were lost on Rainbow for a short time, but it wasn't long before the pieces came together and the picture formed itself within her mind's eye. And what she saw didn't seem very pleasant to her, if the subtle yet telling reaction was anything to go off of.
"You... sure that's a good idea?"
"Absolutely not," Twilight's answer lacked any sort of confidence, her eyes staring a thousand yards ahead of her. "But we can't just go in unprepared. We need everything we can get before we go up there."
That was all that needed to be said, and that was all that Twilight wanted to say on the subject. This wasn't going to be an easy thing for her to do, and she needed the time to prepare herself for it. There was still time to avoid the colossal mistake she was about to make, but she knew deep down that doing this now would save them all a lot of time and headache later down the road. If he found out about his affliction during the confrontation, he'd certainly go into a panic, something that he didn't need any more of right now. The only way to prevent that, if possible, was to make him aware of it in some form or fashion. She didn't want to continually keep triggering the flaw in the memory-blocking charm affecting him, but right now it was the best option she had.
Trying to undo the spell herself could prove disastrous if Starlight had put any kind of countermeasures in place, and the idea of accidentally turning her son into a vegetable did more than enough to intimidate the alicorn into this half-baked plan of hers. The looming sense of silent dread hanging over Twilight wasn't lost on Spike, and he didn't hesitate to ask what was wrong, though all Twilight gave him was calm reassurance that everything was going to be alright. She didn't believe that herself at the moment, but she was at least able to calm Spike's nerves long enough for them to reach their domicile.
The house was still a mess. The couch's remains were still an irreparable mess in the center of the space, and if one looked closely they could see some of the aftermaths of Twilight and Spike's unfortunate disagreement, now dried onto the wooden floor. It wasn't spared much time or thought on anyone's behalf, even left entierly ignored by Rainbow Dash, perhaps because she simply didn't notice the now dark and dried droplets. Twilight tried her best not to linger on it, something she was able to accomplish by going to check on her long discarded saddlebags. Anyone could have accessed her home last night, and it was likely someone tired all things considered, but a cursory glance showed that nothing was out of place.
"I don't think anything's gone," Spike announced in a relieved tone, apparently having shared Twilight's idea and followed her lead of checking for missing belongings. "That's good, we have enough stuff to worry about right now."
He chuckled, Twilight stifled a groan. There was no backing out of this now, it had to be done. It was best to rip off the bandaid quickly if nothing else.
"Hey, Spike? Could you come here for a second? We need to talk..." She didn't wait for a response before walking into the dining area, seeing that Dash was already waiting at the table with a mixed look of anxiety and boredom. As she sat down at the table herself, Twilight caught a glimpse of the long dragon's reaction. Spike had quickly read the room and took on a similarly distraught expression to the two ponies waiting for him.
"Uh... sure..." He slinked up into the third chair with only a short bout of hesitation, sitting up and looking from Dash to Twilight with blatant concern. "Is, uh, everything okay?"
"Yes... almost..." Twilight's eyes fell to the floor from the shame of this all. For the life of her, she didn't know exactly how to go about saying this. "... I need you to promise not to panic."
This, understandably so, only heightened the visible sense of panic coursing through him at the moment. "N-not panic about what?"
"Well... the thing is..." Twilight slowly looked back up to her son's pleading eyes. She had gone about this in the completely wrong way, and now Spike was starting to stress out over this. All she had to do was just tell him the truth about this, and then hopefully get him to tell her enough information through the gaps in Starlight's spell to figure out something. Then, all they'd have to do was find that unicorn and have her undo the spell entierly, and this mess would be done with.
That was it, that was all she had to say. So why was it so difficult for her? She could almost feel the words welling up in her throat, threatening to choke the life out of her, yet she couldn't spit out the words. Spike's worried eyes weighed on her heavily, as if she had been suddenly sent to the deepest darkest depths of the ocean. And just like in that scenario, Twilight felt like she was about to drown. What she needed to tell him wasn't even that bad, all things considered, yet she still couldn't muster up the strength to tell him.
Thankfully, or not so thankfully, Rainbow Dash knew just how to get the conversation moving again.
"Someone messed with your head and locked up some of your memories," Dash blurted out in an unapologetically straightforward way. "Or at least that's what I think this is about."
Twilight and Spike both turned towards Rainbow with wide, shocked eyes. Twilight was quick to chastise the pegasus for being so brazen about that, with Dash's defense being that time was a factor in this situation, and they couldn't afford for Twilight to keep beating around the bush. An argument formed around this pattern, the two mares going back and forth for some time in much the same way. It wasn't until Spike interjected did the two stop their pointless bickering and turn their focus to more important matters.
"I'm sorry, what?" Spike asked with great alarm and authority, demanding to learn more about this situation he'd just been made aware of. His eyes wide and dilated, looking back and forth between the two ponies in the room as if waiting for one of them to speak up. An appropriate reaction, if ever there was one. "What do you mean someone messed with my head?!"
"Spike, I need you to calm down," Twilight spoke sternly, staring deeply into Spike's eyes whenever they were passed back to her. Soon enough he stopped and focused on her, giving Twilight a window to break back through to him. "You're going to be alright. We're going to get this fixed. Breathe, please."
"I don't even know what this is!" He shouted back at her, albeit slightly less panicked than previously, with an exaggerated gesture with one claw. "What happened to me?!"
Twilight hesitated for a moment or three before allowing herself to sigh heavily, the weight upon her shoulders causing her to slump forward in her seat. Well, she had wanted to rip it off like a bandaid anyway, she supposed this was for the best. Even if she didn't like it. The lull in the conversation was also an opportunity for Spike to lower his temperature a little bit, transitioning from flat out frenzy into more subdued anxiety as the seconds ticked by. Something that Twilight chose to help him with by guiding him through a series of slow, deep breaths.
"It's... exactly what she said," the alicorn admitted slowly, "Remember how someone 'left me a message' using Knox last night?"
Slowly, Spike nodded. "Yeah... you were talking about that earlier. I was there." The small bit of sarcasm that managed to shine through his confusion was a decent sign, though it wasn't exactly appreciated at the moment. "What's that got to do with this?"
"Well... that same pony apparently met you at some point, and used some spell to block out your memory of it. I don't know when or why." Twilight made sure to choose her words very carefully in this instance. The true complexities of this spell were still largely unknown and triggering its reset feature would make explaining things even harder than it had to be.
The young dragon continued to nod at a snail's pace, a signal that the information was reaching him even if he couldn't fully parse it right now. "... And how do you know about this?"
"My guess is that something slips through when you hear her name," Rainbow Dash made herself heard after her absence from the discussion altogether, "Egghead shut me down pretty fast when I tried to bring it up."
"That's it exactly," Twilight confirmed dreadfully, "Whatever spell she cast isn't perfect. It has holes that can be exploited, if only for a few seconds at most. I found out about it last night while talking to Knox about... her."
The silence was all-consuming as Spike sat there processing the information that had just been dumped upon him. His eyes fell onto the wooden table before him, glazed over and unfocused in a show of him clearly putting some deep thought into all of this. If Twilight knew him half as well as she thought she did, he was trying for the life of him to try and remember anything that seemed out of the ordinary. A conscious attempt to break through the enchantment with the sheer force of will and regain what had been stolen from him. But it was obvious enough that this wasn't going to work, something that Twilight already knew fully. And as this all-encompassing silence pressed onward, the tension in the room began to subside. Spike, in particular, took a significant turn for the better. If nothing else, he wasn't shaking as much.
"So... you wanna try and poke some holes and figure out what happened... right?" He slowly looked back up to his parental figure, curiosity seeming to have overtaken some of the anxiety that had built up over this painful discussion.
"Dang, ya hit the nail on the head, kiddo," Dash congratulated with the first smile any of them had seen in what felt like decades.
Spike swallowed hard. "Is... it going to hurt?"
"I... don't know... but it's probably going to be scary..." And once again, Twilight felt as if she had just had her heart torn straight out of her body. The subtle reaction to Twilight's unnerving words could have been enough to kill her right then and there, it was that painful. And she hated herself for even bringing this up to him in the first place. She should have left him in peaceful, ignorant bliss until after they had weathered the storm. "If you don't want to, that's completely fine. I'm not going to make you go through with this if you aren't comfortable with it... If nothing else, I just wanted you to be at least a little bit aware of what was going on."
Much to Twilight's relief, her words seemed to put Spike's mind at ease, at least a little bit. He didn't give an answer, not straight away at least, and was clearly putting some heavy thought into this conundrum that he had been thrust into. Once again, Spike caused the room to fall into silence as he mused over his options and how he felt about them, both Twilight and Rainbow displaying a great deal of patience with him on this matter. Irritatingly enough on Dash's behalf, or at least that's how Twilight felt considering how the pegasus saw fit to make a big deal out of not wasting much time with this. So it was okay for Spike to take his time but not her? She considered calling out the Black Hoof for this blatant hypocrisy, but swiftly decided against it and kept her tongue in check. If given the choice, Twilight preferred this small kindness being granted to Spike above herself. This wasn't the time or place to be petty about something so seemingly insignificant.
A sudden knocking at the door was enough to shatter the silence like glass, everyone turning their heads towards the front entrance in perfect unison. The identity of the unexpected guest was a mystery to all, one whose siren call was threatening to whisk them all away from the subject at hoof. Rainbow Dash was the first one to stand to attention, quickly declaring that she'd get this all signed and sorted. With the way that she explained her plan, alongside how quickly she made her way to the door, Twilight was able to guess that maybe Rainbow was a bit put off by this whole situation. Or, more likely, it was just another way to "save time." Whatever reason she may have had, Dash was quick to slip through the door and shut it behind her, leaving Spike and Twilight alone again in their house.
"Okay... so doing this is going to help you?" Spike asked after yet another few seconds of silence, a pensive yet resolved look upon his face.
"It should... I hope..." There was no hiding the uncertainties and anxieties Twilight held about this entire situation, which was both a boon and a bane. On the one hoof, she at least wasn't lying to Spike. But on the other, she likely wasn't doing much to quell his anxieties.
"Alrighty then... so how do we do this?"
Needless to say, Twilight was caught a little off guard. "Are you sure?"
"Not really... but I wasn't ready for a lot of things recently. May as well just get it over with."
I couldn't agree more. "Okay... So, what I'm going to do is keep saying her name. After a while, you should start remembering things. When you do, I'm going to need you to keep calm and tell me everything you can remember."
Another set of nods confirmed Spike's understanding of what the plan was, another set of deep breaths serving to help him calm down a bit more for the plan to work. Twilight offered help where she could in helping Spike ease through this endeavor she was asking of him, an act that hopefully did more on the inside than she was seeing on the outside. It would all be over soon, that's what Twilight kept telling herself to keep herself calm and cool for what was to come soon. A bitter taste still lingered in her mouth from thrusting all of this onto Spike all at once, something that she'd be working very hard to make up for once everything was all said and done.
"I'm going to start now, you ready?" Twilight was just as nervous as Spike was about all of this, something that the long dragon was seemingly able to pick up on as he gave his confirmation and consent. "Alright then... does the name 'Starlight Glimmer' sound familiar at all?"
"Not at all." Spike's answer was to be expected. From his perspective, at the moment, this was the first that name had ever been uttered in his presence. "... I'm guessing she's the one who messed with my head?"
"Yes... Starlight Glimmer was the one who did that to you," Twilight placed great emphasis on that mare's name, taking note from the time she had witnessed Applejack trigger this very spell's reset on Rarity. A night that felt like it had been years ago at this point, even though it was only the other day. "She was in our house, I was apparently asleep. Does any of this sound familiar?"
"She was in our house?" Spike began to slip back into that initial state of panic that had formed at the beginning of this conversation. "How did she get in our house?!"
"I don't know how Starlight Glimmer got in here, but I need to know what she did," Twilight did her best to keep a calm, stern demeanor as she pressed forward. Honestly, she was surprised that the spell hadn't given in by now. "You were there. You met her. And I really need you to remember what happened with you and Starlight Glimmer."
"But you just said that I—" something clicked in Spike's head at that very moment, his eyes going wide in time with some great revelation that was suddenly made crystal clear in his mind. "Wait... I remember now!"
With nothing more than a swift gesture for Twilight to follow, Spike leaped down from the chair and dashed towards his own bedroom. Twilight didn't need to be told twice and was hot on his heels, ears perked, and listening
"I woke up in the middle of the night... I had heard something and got freaked out, so I went to go find you." Spike stopped for but a moment, peering into his bedroom for but a moment, tracing his path with a pointed claw before turning back and heading the other dirrection. "That's when I heard someone talking... I thought you'd brought a friend over or something like that, but she was saying some really... really weird stuff." They reached Twilight's room and he didn't waste any time rushing over to the side of her bed. "She was standing right here... tucking you into bed, talking to you... Then she noticed me... she didn't freak out or anything... like she knew about me ahead of time..."
Twilight was taking in every last word as if it were gospel, nodding and remaining silent to encourage the dragon to keep going with his explanation. There were dozens of questions she wanted to bombard him with, but time was a precious resource here and she couldn't afford to waste another second of it. Unfortunately, it wasn't long after he had started that he began to peter off, his gaze becoming less and less sharp as the fog around his memories began to fill in again. The alicorn recognized what was about to happen, and made a move to try and at least stall it for another few seconds.
"Spike, I need you to focus really right now," Twilight pleaded with great intensity, rushing over and gently turning his head to face her. She peered deeply into his eyes, hoping that she could at least get something more before the reset took full effect. "I need you to tell me about Starlight Glimmer, remember? What was she doing in our house?"
"She was..." Spike's face slowly fell into an open claw, which he rubbed back and forth across his features as if trying to soothe some headache. This lasted for a few, painful seconds before he managed to look back up to her. He looked so tired, Twilight could tell that he was fighting against whatever it was she had afflicted him with. Hard enough to at least give her something else to work with. "She was talking like she knew you... like she knew you personally..."
Twilight froze up, she had not been expecting that answer of all things. The all too familiar sensation of one question leading to a hundred more returned to her at this moment, all of them bouncing around in her head like an army of incoherently screaming, sugar-high Pinkie Pies. She had known since day one that there was something up with Starlight, her first encounter with that nervous wreck of a unicorn was more than a little bit odd. Though now, with this newly acquired piece of information from Spike, Twilight found herself looking upon that encounter in a new shade of light. Like Starlight hadn't been expecting to see Twilight at that library in the first place, or something of that nature. Of course, that clarification didn't answer the question of how Starlight already knew about Twilight ahead of time. Unless, of course, there had been some form of interaction between the two of them in the past that Twilight was just conveniently forgetting about—through magical means, she hypothesized. Yet more questions that demanded answers were born alongside that little theory, but all of them were cut off as Spike spoke up again.
"Starlight Glimmer... I was here to help... even if I didn't do a very good job..."