Dawn awoke with a start. A quick glance around told her that she was in an unfamiliar place, though with some familiar aspects. It was an endless void of color, in this case a field of the most brilliant golds and the most luscious silvers that Dawn had ever seen, mixed together in a swirling, churning, almost liquidy material.
She rose to her hooves without the slightest effort or even the tiniest hint of pain, then glanced about some more to try and get her bearings, which she found quite impossible in this endless void.
"You've done well, my dearest daughter," came her father's voice from behind her.
She turned to him, surprised. "Father? But, if you are present, then… is this the Dreaming?"
He nodded and stepped towards her. "Indeed it is, in its true, wondrous appearance, at least insofar as your mind is rationalizing it to you."
"But… I thought the Dreaming was an empty void? That is how it always has appeared to me in our past conversations."
"That would be a similar rationalization of the place, though one of your choosing. Now, however, there are not only other elements in play here, but you entered the Dreaming involuntarily, so your mind did not have time to visualize it to your liking, so to speak."
She gulped. "Involuntarily entered, you say…"
He tilted his head and gave her a small grin. "Worry not, Dawn. You've not left the mortal coil just yet, though you were very close to it at some points. Though I suppose that is to be expected when one battles with Nihila in the capacity that you did. You should be proud of yourself for standing against her so bravely."
"I feel less brave than I do foolish," she muttered, unable to meet his eyes. "My contributions to the battle seemed more of a hindrance than an aid. Nihila resisted me at every turn, and did so effortlessly. I was nothing before her, Father."
"Hmm. Well, why it may be that you were unable to defeat her yourself, I wouldn't say that you contributed nothing to the fight. Ultimately, I feel that Twilight Sparkle would not have been able to defeat Nihila without your involvement. Her power is tremendous, true, but she lacks the conviction to use that power to its fullest.
"She is afraid of herself, I feel. Afraid of the power that she is capable of, afraid of what she can do with it, or rather, afraid of what might happen if she were to ever lose control. I understand her fear, of course; it is only natural to be afraid of oneself when one gains so much power so quickly, has it thrust upon them without their consent."
Dawn considered this a moment, then nodded. "It is my understanding that she never desired the power that she has, or the leadership position that she now holds. Still, I—"
Her father interrupted her by stepping forward again and wrapping her up in an impossibly warm, tender hug. "Don't disparage yourself for your perceived shortcomings, my dear. Everyone involved in this plot of ours played their role, yourself included. I am proud of what you've accomplished here today, and of what you've accomplished over years of effort; this plan would not have worked if not for the groundwork that you have provided."
Dawn felt her heart swelling with such joy and pride that she was afraid it might burst. "Father… thank you," she breathed as she melted into the hug. "Thank you…" She sniffed back tears. "I was afraid, Father. I was afraid that I had failed you, failed everyone."
"There is nothing to be afraid of anymore, Dawn. Nihila is no more, and this world is forever free of her influence."
Dawn nodded, then pulled away from the hug slightly to look around some more. "Father, the Dreaming… I never imagined that it would be so beautiful. Is this truly how it looks in its natural state?"
"Again, it is just how your mortal senses comprehend it. I couldn't possibly give you a proper description that would do it justice." He looked incredibly sad as he said this, looking up into the void. "Though I know not what will become of this place, or of me and Harmonia when our world combines with Twilight's. Their world lacks a realm like this, you see."
"I am certain that we will devise some solution to the problem, Father," Dawn said firmly. "I will not lose you, no matter what it takes."
He gave her a little smile and ran his hoof through her mane. "You do not need to fear for me. I have lived a good life many times over, and I have earned an eternal rest should that be what comes to pass. But you will never be alone, my dear. Remember that."
Dawn sniffed again, then nodded. "I will, Father." She paused. "I love you."
"And I love you. You are a good daughter, Dawn, one who any father would be proud to call his own. No matter what happens with me, with the Dreaming, know I will always be with you."
*****
Dawn woke up slowly, her head throbbing and her body weary. Her left forelimb was entirely numb, though she could at least feel a little sensation in the other three. Wherever she was, the temperature wasn't all that bad; in fact, it was pleasantly cool and comfortable, as was whatever surface she was resting on at the moment. Was there a pillow under her head? The light above her wasn't unbearably bright, but it was taking a moment to get used to.
When she finally managed to get her eyes back in order and could see almost properly—she didn't have her glasses—she realized that she was in a room. A medical room, it looked like; in fact, one of the medical care rooms at Pandora Tower. She'd only ever been in one of these rooms a few times, just for routine physicals and nothing more. Based on the layout of the room Dawn was fairly certain that this room was where Nurse Soft Touch had first discovered Dawn's vision problems.
She wasn't alone, though, because when she turned her head, she noticed that all of her sisters were present, though they were all in the midst of conversations amongst each other at the moment. It was Curaçao who noticed her first, as her eldest sister was always the most observant between the six of them, and drew the attention of the others over to her. Dawn was worried that it would suddenly get quite loud in here, but thankfully, everypony kept relatively quiet.
"How're you feeling?" Curaçao asked, pulling up a chair to sit closest to Dawn's bed.
"Like I just finished fighting against an immortal goddess of death and darkness," was Dawn's simple reply. She glanced down the bed and noticed that her left foreleg was wrapped up in a tremendous amount of gause and hoisted up so that she couldn't move it. "I must assume that I sustained some injuries in the engagement. How did I come to arrive here?"
"Twilight found you and Winter and brought you guys here immediately afterwards," Gray said with a nod. She gestured with her wing towards the door. "They're in the room right across from yours, just the two of them. Winter got banged up pretty badly, worse than you did."
"Is she well now?"
Curaçao nodded. "She's experienced a ley line fracture, but is otherwise unhurt. C'est chanceux."
"And Twilight?"
"Healthier than I've ever seen her."
"You want me to go get Twilight for ya?" Velvet offered. "She was pretty worried about the both of you, but she can't be in two places at once."
Dawn shook her head with as much vigor as she could manage, which wasn't a lot. "No, that will not be necessary. I will converse with Twilight at a more convenient time. A significant amount of planning lies ahead of us if we are to continue forward with this 'world merger'." She gave her sisters a weak smile. "I assume that since we are having this conversation at the moment, that our strategy was a success?"
Havoc thumped her hoof to her chest. "Hell yeah! We got everything all taken care of on our end, and then some!"
"'And then some'?"
"Oh, right, you probably have no idea. So, uh, this giant phoenix bird thing flew towards the city and started doing some damage in the western Outer District and stuff, but Gray, Dash, and I helped Fluttershy calm the thing down so that it'd stop wrecking shit! It was dope! Guess the four of us can add 'Savior of New Pandemonium' to our business cards."
Dawn blinked, considering Havoc's claims, then nodded. "Nihila claimed that she unleashed some sort of 'Calamity' upon us. I must assume that this 'phoenix' was the Calamity of which she spoke. Did it inflict much damage?"
"Er… yeah, it burned down a huge chunk of the west slums. We don't have any estimates on the damages or how many casualties there were yet, but I don't imagine it was good. That fucker was big, let me tell ya."
"Hmm. Well done, in that case; Nihila was quite adamant that the Calamity would destroy everything, including—"
She paused, eyes wide, then looked to her sisters in a panic. "The fleets! What happened to the fleets?!"
Havoc set her hoof on Dawn's shoulder gently. "Easy, sis, easy. You're not in any shape to get all riled up, yeah? I should know. I've been where you're sitting."
"I have received some updates in the past hour regarding that, actually," Curaçao said with a sad smile. "Admiral Jetstream is alive and uninjured, but the entire fleet that he brought with him was destroyed. The Dragon-class is barely even salvageable. Thankfully he only brought AMP units to operate the ships, so we suffered no lives lost.
"As for the Hope's Point fleet, my most recent report indicates that only four ships out of the original thirty made it home, though some crews managed to jettison escape pods. They gave everything they could to keep the phoenix from reaching the city limits, and only retreated when it was clear that there was nothing more that they could do; Jetstream himself demanded that they fall back."
"Only four ships…" Dawn breathed, resting her head back and staring up at the ceiling. "Please tell me that Blackburn was among the survivors."
Curaçao nodded. "She was."
"Good. Did Twilight inform you or her about the kirin that we rescued?"
"She did, and I have passed the information along to Her Majesty already. I'll know more later, once we reestablish our communication network. Outgoing and incoming messages are still a little finicky due to the attack on the tower."
Dawn let out a breath and glanced at her hoisted forelimb. "I do not suppose you have been made aware of my condition to the fullest extent possible?"
Curaçao nodded again. "Soft Touch gave me the results of her examination. I can tell you now, if you want—"
"No, that will not be necessary either, I was just curious. I do not anticipate a pleasant reading, but am hopeful for the results of her prognosis." Dawn gave her sisters a small smile. "I am just glad to be here with all of you at the moment. That is all that matters: Nihila has been defeated, and now we can be a family."
Dawn wasn't really expecting much of anything to happen after that, but least of all, she wasn't expecting her sisters to gather around her medical bed and lean in to give her a very awkwardly-positioned group hug. But it didn't matter to her how unexpected it was, or how awkwardly they all had to stand so that they could position themselves, or even how it was just a little uncomfortable.
What mattered was exactly what she said mattered most: she was here with her family, all as one.
*****
Hourglass had known Winter for a very long time. She'd seen her friend and mentor do all sorts of crazy things to get a job done, even when she sometimes got hurt in the process. But she had never seen Winter get injured enough that she needed actual medical care from a professional, no sir, not once, not ever. Just a bottle of bourbon or whiskey and a good night's sleep was all Winter would ever take.
So, seeing Winter resting in a medical bed here in Pandora Tower was quite weird indeed. But it was far from the weirdest thing that had happened in the span of the past five minutes or so. She'd just arrived here to see Winter after hearing that she was back at the tower, and while it was already strange to get called to the medical floor to see her, it was even stranger seeing her company.
Not that Twilight being here with Winter was strange in and of itself, of course; the two were in love and practically joined at the hip now that they'd patched things up. What was weird was how Twilight looked. Was she taller? She looked taller. Hourglass couldn't help but think about how awkward Winter must feel now that her fillyfriend was nearly as tall as Pandemonia was while Winter was still barely taller than Hourglass.
Also, Twilight's mane was a lot longer now than it had been a couple of hours ago, her tail too, and they both flowed behind her in an unseen wind, billowing like grand capes. Hourglass was rather reminded of how the sky looked in the twilight hours. There were even little sparkles in there, like stars. It was astonishingly appropriate given the other mare's name, actually.
The next strange thing that came about, after the three mares briefly discussed what had happened in the volcano and Winter's condition—a ley line fracture! How terrible—was when Winter asked Twilight to give her and Hourglass a minute—a few minutes, truthfully—alone. Twilight didn't hesitate to give them that time, and Winter didn't waste any time in getting straight to the point:
"I need you to take this," Winter said, passing over her Timekeeper to Hourglass, "back to the TARDIS at home as soon as possible."
She was clearly tired, exhausted even, but was already recovering well thanks to Twilight; it was just an acceleration of the natural healing process, but that was better than nothing at all. And sure, it meant that Winter would be dealing with a lot of the discomfort and pain more rapidly than spread out over several days or longer, but she didn't seem to care.
"Sure thing," Hourglass replied, taking the little pocket watch and setting it in her pocket, right next to the gift that Sunspire had given her. "What am I doing with it?"
"Send a call to HQ using the emergency channel and put in a request for Old Timer and Doctor Likita to take a look at the data. They'll give this case priority since they've been waitin' for an update. I recorded all of the data I could over the past few weeks, and a heaping helpin' of data from the past few hours, so it oughta give 'em a bit of work to do."
"How'd you manage to get any relevant data while you were fighting with Nihila?" Hourglass asked. "Or while recovering from a ley line fracture?"
"Had to use Operation Zero protocols to make sure this all worked out after I heard the things Nihila said."
Hourglass's eyes widened, shocked. "You bloody— What?! Winter, Operation Zero is restricted—"
"Don't quote protocol with me, squirt," Winter grunted. "I know the rules, and once Old Timer and Doctor Likita overview the case file they'll find that I was completely in the right on this one. Just get that data to them so that they can start puttin' together the world merger procedures. We need to know their solutions before these two worlds can start plannin' their new future."
"Okay, if you say so. Could I ask… what was Nihila that made Operation Zero okay to use? Because I was with you at the ruins of Athenos, and I didn't hear anything about her that made her seem that dangerous."
Winter sighed. "She pretty much flat-out admitted that her intentions weren't to rule any one world or even to just take advantage of her knowledge of Twilight's world so that she could conquer that one. Conquerin' shit isn't her thing; she was only concerned with destroyin', and she said she's destroyed other worlds in the past and wanted to destroy more. I don't know if she knew about Equestria Prime or not, but it's not relevant.
"I don't know what she was in the end, but that doesn't matter. What matters is that she's been destroyed for good thanks to everyone's work here. She won't be a threat to the world merger anymore, or to any other world for that matter. That good enough for ya?"
Hourglass nodded. "Yeah, that'll do. What about you in the meantime? Anything I can do for you?"
"Nah, you're doin' just fine kid. Just get that data to HQ so that we can all put this whole fuckin' mess behind us. You and I gotta have a long conversation after that's all said and done, eh?"
Hourglass patted the watch on her chest. "Righto then, I'll get right on it." She gave Winter a little friendly salute and a smile, then turned and headed out the door, tilting her head to Twilight as she did so. "She's ready for you again, Twilight. And hey, don't let her convince you to let her get out of that bed for any reason."
Twilight smiled and nodded back. "I won't. I know Winter could probably convince me of a lot of things, but letting her walk around like nothing happened after all of that? No way, not a chance."
*****
Though it took until the following morning, eventually things calmed down enough—relatively-speaking, as the entire northern continent was in a state of chaos and panic—that Rarity was able to make contact with Hope's Point. It was amazing what the two cities could do when they worked together, and she hoped that this was a sign of the future between them.
She'd never used one of these odd "video calls" before, but she'd heard from Havoc and her sisters that they worked spectacularly… when you were chatting with somepony here in the city. When chatting with somepony on the other side of the continent, it was supposedly a little more choppy, but still doable; it would never compare to the real thing, however, but that was okay.
Rarity's heart swelled with relief when she saw Blackburn and Lockwood's faces on the other end of the call. Though their motions were slightly stilted because of the call quality, she could still tell that Blackburn was healthy and uninjured, just like Curaçao had said was the case. She gave the other two thirds of her ménage à trois an excitable wave; they gave her the same, after a slight delay.
"Oh thank goodness you two are alright," she said, putting her hoof over her heart. "You haven't any idea how anxious I've been. I couldn't sleep a wink!" She fluffed her mane just slightly. "I'll have you know that if I start developing any stress wrinkles, it's your fault."
"We're just as glad to hear that you're safe and sound too, Rarity," Lockwood said with a grin. "And you don't need to tell me of all ponies what it was like to worry. Both of my favorite mares were out there putting their lives on the line while I was sitting cushy here at home."
"And you shouldn't feel ashamed of that, love," Rarity replied. "Considering what I saw and what I heard from the others, you'd have been more of a liability than a help. No offense."
His grin became a winning smile. "Ha! None taken. I know that I'm useless when it comes to conflicts like that. I don't have it in me to get violent with anypony."
"Have tried teaching self-defense," Blackburn quipped, grinning at him and shaking her head. "Would be more useful to have guard puppy; guard dogs common in southern households, even noble ones. Lockwood more 'puppy' than dog, though."
Rarity giggled. "Well, as long as he stays safe when the going gets tough, I don't mind if he is a puppy. Because he's our puppy. So, I hear that Twilight sent some new 'guests' your way?"
"Oh, the kirins?" Lockwood asked. "Yeah, we're getting that all situated right now, actually. You called us just as I was heading to speak formally with their leader about further arrangements and such and what they want to do. She's young, but I think she's got it in her to be a good leader for her people."
Rarity let out another sigh of relief, turning her attention to Blackburn. "Blackburn, sweetheart, you're certain that you're alright? Completely alright? No injuries at all, no… complications?"
Blackburn shook her head, though she did look rather sad. "No, none. Stress issues, mostly. Not just from battle, but from results; have funeral arrangements to make for those lost. You are the same? Stressed, but healthy?"
"Oh yes, quite so. The nurse here in the tower, Soft Touch, is a wonderful sort. She's been awfully busy, but she did a quick little check-up on me after all the fighting was over and gave me a clean bill of health. She did say that it's tough to tell if there were any potential issues with… with my foal and all, but she's confident, so I'm confident."
"Hmm." Blackburn nodded. "Will accept this, also offer medical services here for second opinion. Just to be sure."
Rarity smiled again. "You know… speaking of which, I suppose we'll need to start discussing those sorts of things pretty soon, won't we? Living arrangements and things like that? I know we'd already put a few plans in place but I imagine that we'll have to adjust them as we go."
"We will, absolutely," Lockwood said. "But for now, let's just relax and take it easy while we all figure out how this merger's gonna work out. Both of our worlds are going to change entirely, and we don't get too much say or knowledge about how it's going to happen. Just when.
"All that matters is that when it all happens, the three of us will make things work, no matter what that takes. You know that I'd upend the entire world for you, Rarity, and Blackburn would do the same, and I know you'd do it for us too. We're in this together, 'til the end of the road, wherever that takes us."
"Well said, my love," she replied.
*****
Pinkie was in full-on Party Panic Mode!
She'd planned thousands and thousands of parties over the years, that much was a fact. Another fact was that she'd planned parties for several different types of important occasions centered around a certain pony, like birthday parties, foal showers, and housewarming parties. Yet another fact is that she'd even planned parties celebrating the achievements of a group of ponies, like hoofball team pizza parties, family get-togethers, and Hearth's Warming parties.
But how did one set up a party that was implicitly designed for celebrating an important event in a single pony's life—a cuteceñara in this case—for over thirty such ponies that had all achieved it at the same time?
Because that was the predicament that Pinkie was now in. Okay, sure, she had her Best-Friend-Who-Was-Actually-Her-Clone helping her, and she was a big help, but the predicament of trying to plan a cuteceñara for all of the Shadows was proving difficult. They'd all gotten their Cutie Marks at the exact same time, according to Hourglass: the exact instant that the Beacon had been deactivated. Nopony knew why, but it was wonderful!
And terrible, because again, Pinkie needed to somehow plan out a cuteceñara for all of them.
"The way I figure it, there are two solutions here," Pinkie said as she looked over her Party Planner Notebook with Velvet. "Solution one: we celebrate each one of their cuteceñaras separately at a rate of one per day, since a cuteceñara is supposed to be a Pretty Big Deal in a little pony's life. Orrr, solution two: we hold one big party for all of them at the same time and essentially just celebrate them all at once!"
Velvet tapped her chin. "Both plans have their pros and cons, of course. This is complicated! But it's also important! I want my kids to all feel special, but this needs to be done just right or it's gonna suck!"
"Right." Pinkie scratched her noggin with her pencil. "Now, the benefit to the first solution is that every little colt or filly gets to feel like the day is their special day. However! The ponies who go at the end of the line are gonna feel baaaaad. And everypony's gonna be sick of parties every day—as impossible as that sounds!—by like the seventh or eighth one in a row."
"We could spread them out more? Skip a day or two in between?"
"That'll just make the colts and fillies towards the end feel even worse. If we did one, say, once a week, whoever's last would have to wait almost a whole year! Uh-uh, no can do, Red."
Velvet nodded sagely. "True, true."
"But then, if we just do it all in one day, how are all of those little colts and fillies gonna feel special? A cuteceñara is supposed to be a big, big, BIG event in a young pony's life, a coming of age thing that only happens once. It's a special day just for them! But if we're doing all of them at once, then we can't give them the attention that a cuteceñara is supposed to have!"
"Well, what if we combine the two?"
"Huh?"
"Combine the two together. We'll celebrate the cuteceñaras all in one day, and we'll make it a big all-day thing. I figure if we wait until after the merger, we can rent out a huge space like a… a park or something." Velvet's eyes widened and she nodded enthusiastically to herself. "Yeah! We can rent out a park, and we can get things like a bouncy castle and a barbeque and a water slide—"
Pinkie held up her hoof. "Yeah yeah yeah, I get all that stuff. That's the actual planning part, that's easy. Get to the whole 'combination' thing."
"Right, right. So, we do it all in one day, and we make, like, each half-hour feel like it's own little mini cuteceñara! If we do them in half-hour chunks, then we'll be able to get through all of the kids if we start right when they wake up—nice and early, of course—until it's time to send them to sleep—later than usual, of course."
Pinkie hummed and nodded. "Hmm, that might work. No no, I can definitely make that work. And each colt or filly will get their own theme with the music and the snacks and food and drinks available—" She paused. "No, no, that won't work. We'd have to offer different food and drinks for each kid, and if they're constantly changing around, eventually they're gonna get sick."
"Ah… yeah, okay, I didn't think of that…" Velvet shook her head. "Well, who says we have to do a traditional cuteceñara? What if we just do a big ol' party for them like a… a graduation party?"
"Hmm. Yeah, we could do that. I'm worried that it'll take away from the experience, is all. This kind of party is supposed to be a Big Deal."
Velvet set her hoof on Pinkie's shoulder. "Pinks, listen, these kids have lived their whole lives together. They eat together, play together, learn together, and when they get older, I have no doubt that they'll probably hook up together to—responsibly, of course. They're a unit, a team. Celebrating them getting their Cutie Marks together just seems… right. Y'know?"
Pinkie nodded again. "You're right. Okay! Still, I want to offer as many things for the lil' cuties as I can that they'll enjoy, so, let's get some lists going! I need everypony's favorite snack, favorite food, favorite drink, favorite music, favorite color, favorite everything! This… is gonna be my Best. Party. Ever."