//------------------------------// // Chapter 2: Departure // Story: Proxy // by Thithle Candytufth //------------------------------// “Everypony everywhere has a special magical connection with her friends, maybe even before she's met them.” Those words echoed painfully in Twilight’s mind. Reverberating relentlessly, they ricocheted off of the walls of her cranium. I never met them. Does that mean I can say I had a special connection before I met them, even though I never got to? No. When I wrote, well, I didn’t write, back then, I meant there was some mutuality. We’re not looking at the same rainbow. I’m gazing longingly at what I thought was a rainbow, but I just was staring at the sun too long and my eyes began to deceive me. But that doesn’t mean no one else is out there… Do you feel comfortable abandoning your former friends? Find new ones that suit your tastes in tangibility? Come on. As disgusting as it sounds, they won’t even notice. They don’t exist. They never existed as you knew them. If they were ever aware of your presence, they’d want you to find friends. They’d want you to stop sulking and get out there. There’s a whole world filled with wonderful ponies. Not like them. There will be somepony out there. Somepony who is looking out to that same fake world with repugnance, who wants to help you see the glimmer in the grime. Twilight raised her head, her tired eyes shimmering ever so slightly with determination. I have to start anew. Twilight thought, still sprawled on her bed. She was unsure as to whether or not she was doing this because she felt the need for the company of others, or simply because she could not simply lie in her own perplexed sadness for the rest of her life. Her tears had long since dried on the pillows. The feeling of lying in this foreign bed, however, did nothing to sedate her. Did I ever even leave this bed before yesterday? What does my family think happened— Twilight gasped. Shining! She bolted for the door. In moments Twilight found herself at the front steps of Shining Armor’s new home— the tower in the east wing of Canterlot Castle. She banged on the door with her hoof. A warped eye manifested itself from the other side of the peephole. Twilight could hear an excited gasp before the door quickly opened. “Twily!” Shining Armor’s face was beaming with excitement. Joyful tears clouded his aqua eyes. He bounded forward and embraced Twilight. She shivered slightly at his touch and inched backwards, breaking his grip. Shining Armor relented, taking a step back and diverting the cascade from his eyes with a wipe of his hoof. Millions of different responses raced through Twilight’s head. They all halted as she opened her mouth. “I’m awake.” “I know, sis,” he wiped his face with his hoof again, “I know.” Twilight shifted to the left, catching a glimpse of the inside of Shining Armor’s room. Presents littered the floor, and a few bouquets that were on the verge of wilting were scattered on various surfaces. Shining Armor shook his head as if trying to jump-start his brain. “Oh, Twily, you won’t believe this, when you—” “How’s Cadance?” Twilight interrupted. Shining Armor’s face went blank. “How did you—” Twilight tilted her head as she walked into the room, passing her motionless brother. “Is she not your—” “Yes, she is, but how—” Twilight began pacing around, her tail swishing back and forth impatiently. “And Mom and Dad, they’re still Night Light and Twilight Velvet?” “What in the world are you—” She spun around and walked up uncomfortably close to her brother’s face. “Everything was a lie, Shining Armor!” “What?” “I said,” Twilight inhaled deeply, “Everything was a lie!” “I heard you; I don’t know what you—” Twilight groaned histrionically. “Spike woke me up this morning!” “I know, and that’s wonderful but—” “He saved me!” “Yes, I got that—” “They never even existed! They never existed and he killed them and now I’m awake!” “Who’s ‘they’?” “My friends!” “Your friends?” Twilight nodded vigorously. Shining Armor raised a hoof to his face and squinted. “What were your friends’ names?” “Don’t you—” Twilight’s voice became somber. “Their names… they were…” She lowered her head and her tail finally stilled. To him, they all died nine hundred years ago… Twilight mumbled their names. Shining Armor lowered his head and gave a low sigh. “Twily? Are you sure you’re okay? I know this must be really difficult for you—” “Of course it’s difficult! I can’t explain it!” Twilight exhaled deeply. She could feel her muscles begin to relax slightly, having been incredibly tense ever since the previous morning’s happenings. “Why don’t you and I both go out for some fresh air? We can go visit the Princess—” Twilight’s eyes opened wide. Her entire body grew stiff. She felt her spine tingle, and her mane stand on end. She began to wobble to the side and tip over. Shining Armor dove to her aid, lifting her back onto her hooves. New tears began to form in his eyes. “What’s wrong, Twily A-are you… alright?” Alright? Am I alright? That witch… “Keep me away from her.” “Why? She’s your mentor, don’t you remember? I’m sure she will be thrilled to see you again! She can shed some light on—” “She’s a lie! I don’t even know if you’re not a lie! It’s all this twisted convoluted crazy weird nonsense I don’t even know if I’m still trapped in a fantasy I don’t know where anything began or ended or—” Shining Armor placed a hoof on Twilight’s mouth. Tears were running down his face. “Please, Twilight,” He sniffled, “calm down. I can’t bear—” Twilight pushed his strong foreleg out of her face. “‘You can’t bear to see me as I was’? Are you going to wake me up too?!” Shining Armor whimpered weakly. “I don’t even know what you’re trying to say to me!” “You want to kill off this reality so you don’t have to see me suffer?” Shining Armor remained agonizingly silent. The look of dejectedness and hopelessness on her loving brother’s face cleared up Twilight's rage and confusion. She knelt on the ground. She could see him mouthing words, but could not recognize them. “I’m sorry, Shining. I… don’t know—” “I-it’s okay, Twily. I’m here for you. I can take whatever you say, because I know you don’t mean it.” I do, though… “Thank you, Shining.” Beneath a faint smile, Twilight grimaced slightly. I’ll never get him to understand. I’ll never get anypony to understand. “If you need to collect your thoughts, you’re welcome to stay here. I don’t want you staying in your place alone.” “Thank you, Shining,” Twilight repeated, “But there’s some place I need to be.” “Where?” “I need to go to Ponyville.” “Why would you ever—” “I need to make some friends.” “That’s great, but—” “Friendgic is maship! I gotta go!” “Those aren’t even—” Twilight’s tail was out the door before Shining Armor could finish his thought. He crumpled down on the floor, his lip quivering and eyes twitching. Goodbye, Shining Armor. --- No light penetrated the stained-glass windows of the Canterlot throne room. The moon had found its place in the sky at the hooves of Luna, but clouds shrouded it sheepishly, afraid to let its gaudy glowing light fill the night air. Celestia sat in the corner of the throne room. Her flowing mane caught the night breeze from the open window she gazed out of. She was entirely tense and twitched occasionally. Luna slipped through the door, raised a hoof, and spoke quietly. “Sister…” “They’re dead again, Luna! I didn’t even get to see them grow together. It all ended so quickly.” Luna instantly dropped the façade of comfort. Her voice became immensely harsh as she walked forward. “That is enough. You are hurting yourself and others. You may have ruined that mare’s life. The scars you created with your selfishness are never going to heal.” “Do you think I do not know that?!” Celestia lifted herself from the floor, spun around and snarled. “Do you think I care?! What’s one mare to me? What’s this one feeble apprentice to a thousand-year-old demi-goddess?” “You feel terrible and you know it. Your friends would have—” Celestia smashed down a powerful hoof on the tiled floor. “Don’t you dare invoke their names. You do not deserve to even be in the same breath as them.” “I am the princess of the night. Your sister and co-ruler. You have nothing above me. I am afraid I will invoke the names of your five little fantasies as I wish and—” “You vile little— I—” “I am speaking. As your equal I demand respect. I am abhorred that during my leave, the sole ruler of Equestria would conduct herself in such a manner. Regardless of the time you spent together with these five mares, no matter what magic you experienced with them, they are long dead and gone. But instead of moving on as a mature ruler would, and coming to terms with the nature of being a higher being, you paste the faces of your friends onto every blank surface you see.” “You do not understand. You never knew them as I did.” “Do you think friendship is a magic only you experienced? Do you think you are the only creature on the face of this planet that experienced the pain of outliving those she loves? I can assure you, sister, nopony else has ever done as you have. Do you not feel pain in forcing a mare to feel the same loss you did? If she was never awakened—” “I am no monster, Luna. I don’t want them to have to feel the hurt I did, just as I do not want to watch them feeling it.” “I am repulsed even to ask how many times you’ve done this before, just as I am repulsed by the idea that you assuage their potential mental pain by killing them before Fluttershy dies.” “If each knew what loomed before her, she would greet death gladly before witnessing that.” “So since you did not have the luxury to die before her—” “I am the ruler of Equestria. There is only one me… Just as they cannot be replaced. But there are myriads of young, awkward mares unaware of friendship. And I show it to them, Luna. I give them the gift they could never have—” “Silence!” Luna leapt forward, her tail slashing side to side furiously. “You know that is not what you are doing. You know there is no mutuality here. You’re a parasite, a succubus. You’re an entirely sordid creature! Look upon your subject, your ‘faithful student’! You may have shaped her into the same hallucinating, confused, depressed and self-destructive mare as you!” “I am the sordid creature? You would have let the entirety of Equestria die before you out of spite.” “Don’t make this about me. It’s not about you, either.” Luna sighed heavily. “It’s about how there is one mare in Equestria whom you irreparably damaged.” “And what, pray tell, should I do about that, dear sister?” “Nothing different from what you were doing. I want you to watch her live out her days, her transient little life. But in this reality. I want you to witness what horrible pain you’ve inflicted on her.”