Not My Destiny

by Smayds

Chapter 07: Misfires

A downcast Twilight Sparkle appeared in Celestia's cozy tower-top room with a small pop and a flash of light. "It happened again."

Celestia looked up from the enormous book, now on a specially-made stand, and gave Twilight a knowing smile. "Who was it today?"

"Rainbow Dash. I nearly killed her. I mean, I nearly killed her on purpose." Twilight shook her head glumly as she trotted to stand beside her once-ruler, now-equal. "Anything in there about that? I was going to fly into her and stab her with my horn."

"You didn't do her any harm. No, I don't recall any horn-impalings. But then, you're not really in this book any more, Twilight. Well, apart from page one."

A sheaf of notes appeared on the stand next to the book, magicked from the library bedroom's writing desk. Twilight started to riffle through them. "What does this mean? I found it this morning and I didn't know what to make of it. And I wasn't going to interrupt your court session," Twilight added, forestalling Celestia's protest. "It could wait until now. I had to leave anyway. Flying lesson."

"Oh, yes! How did it go?"

"Well, I've got one more little bit of motivation to get everypony safely through this now. Flying is amazing," Twilight smiled up at Celestia, "and it pushes just about everything else out of my head. It almost feels like... as if it's just the old me alone in here."

Celestia nodded gravely. "I can't get The Lunacy out of you, Twilight. That is something only you can accomplish. It's not controlling you, like it did Luna. It's waiting for you to control it. To embrace it. It will whisper to you. Remember, your thoughts are not all your own. But your will belongs only to you."

Twilight nodded. "I was hoping for a little more time, I guess. I mean, I'm still me." Twilight sighed softly. "But I've thought about killing two of my friends now. Applejack was pretty mad at me, saying I'd taken all the fun out of applebucking by clearing a whole orchard at once, but... Grabbing her with my telekinesis... I did get her laughing. Saying that I was playing around and now we get to spend more time together without work in the way. And we did have a lot of fun that afternoon. I don't really think I would have thrown her through the barn."

Twilight's eyes shifted focus. "But I wanted to," she finished softly. Her head drooped.

After a moment, she was able to speak again. "It's more than just those two. I've thought about killing all of my friends. I just had the opportunity with AJ and Dash." A pause, then Twilight continued, almost whistfully. "The spa's going to be a lot of fun tomorrow. Maybe I'll drown Fluttershy and Rarity. Or strangle them with their towels. Or I could get them to strangle each other. That'd be entertaini-"

Twilight started in shock and disgust.

How can I even THINK stuff like that?!

She sat down on her haunches and looked at the ancient stone floor.

A gentle hoof on her shoulder. An enveloping wing. "We will find a way through this, Twilight. We are trying everything we can. Luna and myself will never give up, if it means saving our beloved Equestria."

"She can't even stay in the same room as me anymore," Twilight said sadly, looking at the carved patterns on the stones.

"Can you blame her for that? It is not your fault that The Lunacy is inside you, waiting to be called forth willingly. My Little Sister has no problem with you at all. But to ask her to face the thing we now see hiding behind your eyes..." Celestia's wing was quite steady against Twilight's side, but the tiniest quaver was creeping into her voice. "I believe such a thing will forever remain beyond her ability. The monster that held her under its unbreakable control for a thousand years is now sitting politely and obediently in your mind, tame as a kitten, waiting to be let out on a leash. She looks at you and she sees The Night Mare waiting to be reborn."

The two alicorns sat in silence for a few minutes. Celestia stirred. "You had something you wanted to ask me?"

Twilight jerked her head upright. "Oh! Yes. I found this," she said, magicking a piece of paper into Celestia's telekinetic grip, making sure not to pull or tug on her fellow alicorn's magic.

They've only just got the wall repainted.

Celestia held the paper up and read the notes Twilight had been making. "'The Master of Magic will abandon her friends when chaos drives a spike between them.' You are worried about this passage?"

"I'm not sure. I thought it might be talking about Discord."

Celestia's regal face assumed a thoughtful look. "It could well be. Discord isn't mentioned in here, you know."

"Huh?" Twilight was astonished. "I thought this records everything Starshine saw of the future?"

There really was everything in this book. Everything from the end of the world right down to innumerable anonymous colts and fillies that had banged their knees. It was maddening as hell, because nothing was in any sort of order, chronological or otherwise. There were no given names, just ones that would appear to seem symbolic after the fact.

The occasional nugget of actual interesting and helpful information was buried in amongst thousands upon thousands of lines like "The one whose father's father built the first of six houses on this spot will break his leg when tripping down the stairs." MADDENING. You couldn't figure out who most of these ponies ever were or ever would be.

And, what was worse, of the occasional line that seemed promising, such as "The longest night of the shortest winter shall set the stars in motion to reveal the path of true peace", there were no dates, almost no way of knowing what events were being referred to, and absolutely no way to know how important the cryptic passage might be, compared to those around it.

How are you supposed to know what's important, and what's not?

Well, I suppose the single most important thing in here DOES have the whole first page all to itself...

"Mother saw everything, that is true. But there is no explicit mention of Discord in this book. Neither is there a mention of the Elements of Harmony."

Twilight shook her head. "Do they have some sort of, I don't know. Some sort of, uh, other name? Um, allegorical?"

Celestia smiled a very sad smile. "I don't know why neither the Elements of Harmony, nor the Spirit of Disharmony, are in here. I know everything this book has to offer. I've even guessed correctly about some particularly bad scrapes and bruises. Those cuts and bruises didn't happen. And I don't think the end of the world will, either."

Twilight strongly disagreed. A week ago, she would have accepted Celestia's words without question. Now, however, she could question all she wanted.

But she didn't. There was too much to do.

Celestia and Twilight resumed their examination of every word in the enormous volume. Somewhere in here, there might be a clue, something that Celestia may have taken out of context. They were up to page nine hundred and forty one. There were more than seventy thousand pages. Each page was almost as big as a door, and the ancient characters were the size of ants. Twilight was extremely glad that sleep was optional for alicorns.

Twilight pulled her eyes away from page one thousand, six hundred and twenty three, and saw Celestia at the chamber's large east-facing window out of the corner of her eye. She tore her concentration from the book, and watched in wonder.

Celestia's horn was glowing faintly. Then, the glow spread and enclosed her entire regal body. She held a perfect pose, front hoof raised, head high, eyes closed. As Twilight watched, she saw the stars begin to fade from the sky, and a faint rim of blue begin to spread across the entire eastern horizon.

It must be morning. Luna just put the stars to bed. And now Celestia is raising the sun... How... how beautiful.

Celestia remained as still as a statue for nearly two minutes. Then she stepped back a pace, rested on her haunches, breathed deeply, and opened her eyes, gazing at the brightening blue line of the horizon.

She turned back to the book-stand, and opened her eyes wider when she saw Twilight looking at her in fascination.

"Raising the sun?"

"More than that, Twilight. It takes a short while to cast the spell that moves it across the sky for an entire day."

"It was beautiful."

Celestia actually blushed. "Thank you, Twilight. As long as just a single pony appreciates my effort every day, I am happy. You must try it."

"Really?!" Twilight couldn't believe this. Sure, she'd moved the sun once... But to cast the spell that shepherded it across the sky for a whole day... "I'd be honoured!"

Celestia smiled. "Then you can do it tomorrow."

Twilight's jaw would have hurt last week. Now she just felt the joints stretching. Then, her brain clunked back into gear.

It's morning. We've been working all night. And I'm not even remotely tired. I'll try and catch a nap later on, though. Not sleeping is too... weird.

"Hey, I'd better be getting back to the library. I hope Spike's alright. For a baby dragon, he seems pretty good at taking care of himself." An extremely sheepish grin. "He takes pretty good care of me, too." Celestia giggled.

"I'll be back. I'm going to the spa today. I really want to see Rarity and Fluttershy. I haven't seen them in days."

"I'll be waiting. We'll figure this out, Twilight."

"See you soon, Celestia."

Both alicorns were smiling at each other as the smaller of the two disappeared in a flash of deep red light.

Twilight broke her hug with Fluttershy and smiled. The buttercup-yellow pegasus smiled back, despite a flicker of fear in her eyes.

No, no, no! My friends are not going to be afraid of me!

Even though I think about killing them...

NO!

"Hey, Fluttershy, are you okay? You look nervous. It's not me, is it?"

Fluttershy's entire face was now hidden behind her light-pink hair. "Oh, no," she began, in barely more than a whisper. "It's not you at all. I'm just... Rarity..."

Twilight got it. Absolutely nothing in her expression changed.

Fluttershy wants Rarity here as a safety margin. She's afraid to be alone with me.

"...Rarity had a big order come in, and she had to cancel. I'm sorry, Twilight," Fluttershy whispered. "I really wanted to spend this morning with you both." She was practically shaking.

"Hey! That's a real shame! Don't worry about it! I'm sure we'll have a great time! C'mon, let's go get pampered!" Twilight was all smiles as she magically wrenched open the door to the Ponyville Spa. "After you! Gotta work out that stress!"

Fluttershy walked inside, her hooves practically buzzing against the doorsill in her fear.

Twilight spotted one of the attendants. "Hi! I'm Twilight Sparkle. I'm an alicorn." She extended her wings. "My friend and I have an appointment. Gotta make a really important point, okay? No horn filing. Alicorn horn, see? The little sparkly things give it away. Don't touch it. It'll blow your bucking face off."

Twilight sank slowly into the boiling-hot spabath. She felt her fury at Fluttershy melting away with every extra inch of luxuriously-scented water that enveloped her. Her pegasus friend was still at the sinks, washing off the remnants of her facemask.

I'll tell her that she's got nothing to fear. That it's just me, her friend Twilight Sparkle. What, she doesn't think I'm going to bite her face off, does she?

Yeah. Yeah, I could do that. Eat her face. That won't kill her. I can kill her later. Make her suffer first.

Twilight didn't reprimand herself for this thought.

"Um, Tw-wi... Twilight?" Fluttershy squeaked.

Twilight opened her eyes, stared at the shrinking violet with palpable, smoldering hatred, and smiled her friendliest smile.

"Hey, are you getting in? This water isn't gonna stay this hot forever, ya know! It's great!"

"Um, T... Twi... Twilight, I, um, I have to, um, I, uh..."

Twilight harumphed. "I'm not going to hurt you, Fluttershy. If you don't want to be around me, that's fine." She sank lower into the glorious bath. The water was lapping her neck.

"Oh! Oh. I'm..." The shy little pegasus coughed the tiniest cough. When she looked back at Twilight, her eyes were sparkling with tears. "I'm so sorry, Twilight. I really am. I... I don't know what's gotten into me. I know you're just, um, you, you know, but I... I feel..." She let out a squeak.

"You're scared of me."

Fluttershy didn't answer.

"Oh, fine. Look, just get outta here. I know all my friends think I'm a freak who's just gonna murder them the first chance I get. Who knows, maybe I will. Go on, go see your animals or something." Twilight dunked her head under the water. She was too angry to remember to choke off her magic.

The bathwater lapped at the base of her horn.

All of the water in the oversized tub exploded into superheated steam. The windows blew out. The doors were ripped to splinters. The wall into the main spa disintegrated. Ceiling beams fell. The lights went out.

Twilight leaped from the now-empty tub and squinted through the mist. She hadn't been so much as nudged by the explosion. The fractured tile of the tub crumbled behind her as she bolted to one of the smaller holes in the walls.

Fluttershy was lying in a changing room, up against a badly-dented locker. Her perfect yellow hide was covered with angry red blotches. One of her wings was twisted at an unnatural angle. Her other wing was nowhere to be seen.

Twilight stared, thunderstruck. Coughing, swearing ponies were moving through the thick mist towards her friend.

I did that.

I'll never do it again.

Twilight Sparkle closed her eyes. Her horn ignited, the deep red aura extending and expanding.

I'll never hurt another pony again.

She pictured her destination.

Not ever.

She gritted her teeth.

There was an enormous, violent explosion of light.

She opened her eyes. Her last breath whooshed out of her lungs.

She sat back onto the snow-like ground and looked up at the world. Everypony she loved was there.

And I can't hurt them from here.

Oh, Fluttershy, I hope you're alright. They can regrow your wing. They can fix your burns.

But I can never look you in the eye again.

Her tears had frozen solid in the vacuum before they fell softly, like snow, to the fine, powdery surface.

When Luna raised her crescent moon that evening, the dark image of a crying winged unicorn was plain for all to see.