//------------------------------// // Chapter 8 - The Dream Keeper's Assistant // Story: Your Faithful Student, Buggy Brush // by BUGFlower413 //------------------------------// Chapter 8: The Dream Keeper’s Assistant “dude, you have been hyperventilating all the way here. you better get your shit together.” “I know I know! I’m just really so excited and so nervous!!” “we know, but you literally seem like you’re going to explode.” “Can you really blame him? This is something huge, Beatz!” Darky looked at the unicorn, both smiling from ear to ear. “Not everyday you get asked by the Princess of the Night herself to be her personal assistant!” “EXACTLY!” he replied while prancing in his place with his eyes closed. Darky and Buggy were heading to the castle as the Princess requested them last night, when they came across their friend Zweet Beatz, who decided to accompany them the way there. They gave her the whole context of what happened the night before. She was more than happy for them, yet somepony had to be the one keeping them calm. After several minutes of walking, they arrived. “you two better tell me how everything went next time we meet, ok?” “Don’t worry, we will,” responded the daemonequus before hugging her, Buggy joining the hug soon after. “Take care, Zweet.” “you too, you royal ponies.” The three of the giggled as Zweet Beatz took flight. Not being the first time they entered to the castle, the royal guards already recognize their faces, just allowing them to walk in. Unlike most of the times they went there, this time there was nopony waiting for them outside, luckily Darky still remembered the layout of the castle, most of it at least. “Where do you think we should go?” “The most logical place would be the Throne Room, I suppose. If they are there, then bingo. If they aren’t, there should be somepony we could ask for their whereabouts.” “Good point. Do you remember how to get to there?” “Sure thing!” When they arrived to the Throne Room, the two Alicorn Sisters were waiting for them as they expected, but they were not alone, there was another alicorn in the room. A young purple alicorn with an indigo mane with some pink stripes was standing next to Celestia and, at her side, was standing a little purple dragon with green spikes, holding a scroll and a feather. Neither Buggy nor Darky had met the other two in person, but they are well aware who they are. “WOW.” “OH, SWEET CELESTIA!!” “Yes?” “No, sorry, it was an expression.” She giggled. “We are sorry, we were not expecting this at all.” The two then proceed to bow to greet Celestia and Luna. “And I assume you must be the Princess of Friendship, Twilight Sparkle, right?” “Yes, I am. It’s a pleasure to meet you,” responded the mare with an evident face of excitement. “I haven’t met a daemonequus before in my entire life, so the moment Princesses Celestia and Luna told me about you, Darky Spell, I just had to meet you in person. I have so many questions for you!” Imagine one day meeting a world-famous alicorn Princess who saved the world a dozen of times and she being the most excited in the room about meeting you. Yup, that was kind of what Darky was going through at that moment. “It’s a real honor for me as well to meet you, Princess Twilight, and-“ He couldn’t help but let out a little squeal “-It’s a real, REAL honor too to meet you, Spike, the Brave and Glorious.” The young dragon seemed a little surprise somepony out of the Crystal Empire knew him by that name. He was flattered. The unicorn was shaking his tail in the air in excitement. “Can I have your autograph?” he said with the biggest smile while giving him a paper sheet. “Sure! What’s the name?” responded the dragon also with a sincere smile of his own. The three alicorns and the daemonequus couldn’t help but giggle. “THANK YOU so much!!” Buggy said while prancing after looking at the autographed paper. He was definitely putting that on his wall that night. “Anything for my fans,” he replied with great pride in his voice. Twilight looked at him with a smile before rolling her eyes. “So,” started saying the tallest alicorn “I’m glad you accepted my invitation, Darky Spell.” “Thank you for inviting me, Princess. I will be more than happy to answer any doubt you may have about the Daemonequus Kingdom and about how I arrived here.” While Celestia and Darky were talking, Luna got closer to Buggy. “So, my dear student, are you ready to be filled in what it means to be my Royal Assistant?” “Yes! I’m so ready,” he answered barely holding his excitement. “Alright then. Follow me, please.” He turned to see Darky again before parting ways and both waved their hooves at each other, Darky winking an eye at him and him replying with a smile. Luna and Buggy walked through hallways, corridors and staircases until reaching one of the highest balconies of the castle with a plain view of the sunset taking place in the distance. It was a breezy, fresh afternoon in Canterlot. “Well, first things first, thank you again, Buggy Brush, for accepting helping me with this. It really means a lot to me.” “No problem, Princess Luna,” he replied looking at her before looking into the sky. “It’s the least I can do after how much you have helped me, you know? So, if I can repay that favor in any way, I’ll do it.” She smiled and looked at him. “You really are a good friend, Buggy.” She contained the urge of giving him a hug. They might be friends by now, but she still wanted to keep a little bit of professionalism in this. He just blushed at the compliment and turned his eyes back at her with a huge, warm smile. “Alright.” -She cleared her throat- “To be able to help me with my duties, you are going to need a part of my magic.” He was confused. Can magic be splitted into two ponies? And wouldn’t that leave her with less magic? Luna could read those questions passing through his mind just by looking at his confused eyes. “Do not worry, I won’t actually lose a fraction of my magical powers or anything like that. I just need an object to canalize my magic so I can ‘clone’ a certain amount of it in it.” “An object? Like, any object?” “Well, I have not done this before, so I assume it could work with at least most objects.” After thinking for a little, the unicorn looked down to his necklace. “What about this?” he said rising it with a hoof. Luna looked at it with a smile. “Perfect! Would you hoof me your necklace?” He took it off and gave it to her. She looked at it for a moment while levitating it, then she closed her eyes to focus while her horn started to glow. Her eyes opened suddenly, they were completely white and shining brightly, and an equally bright stream of magic was directed to the necklace, also causing it to glow before falling into Buggy’s hooves. He was looking at the entire process while trying to understand what was happening, and then Luna’s horn stopped glowing and her eyes went back to normal. “Are you okay?” he asked worried, getting closer to her. “Yes, do not worry.” He put the necklace on again and could already feel it’s magic inside. “Wait, but, how do I use it? I’m terrible at magic. I can barely levitate stuff!” “You only need a little bit of magic to use the necklace, since you would be using my magic. I will still have to teach you a couple of spells.” She looked at the sky again. “You still know how to levitate stuff though, so, just as a little test of it, what if you attempt rising the moon?” His jaw dropped and his eyes widened. She couldn’t be serious, could she? “Just focus on the necklace to trigger its magic, and then try to focus on the moon,” she said while rising slightly the moon so he would be able to see it. “You think you are able to do it?” “I’m not really sure, but I can try.” He closed his eyes and his horn started to glow, as well as his necklace. He grinded his teeth and closed his eyes with even more strength. Eventually, the moon moved a little, but then it stopped again as the unicorn reopened his eyes panting with exhaustion. “Sorry,” he said embarrassed while looking at the ground. “You did well, Buggy,” she replied while rising the moon by herself. “You cannot expect to master it completely when you have not done anything like this before. The fact you managed to move it, even if it was just a little, is already good enough.” He looked at her again, feeling better after hearing that and replying with a little smile. “So… What’s next?” “Since we just proved that the necklace in fact works, the next step would be to guide you through the Dream Realm. I will teach you the spell for that later, but this time, I will be the one taking you there.” “Wait, is the Dream Realm like outside of the dreams? To put it in a way, some kind of hub for them?” “Yes, you can say it is kind of like that.” She pulled him closer with her wing. “I will teach you how to navigate through it, going in and out of the dreams, and, before having to face nightmares, I will teach you how to deal with them as well.” Her horn started to glow again. “Having Nightmare Night been not so long ago, some children are still having nightmares, and I am sure they will not mind if my assistant follows me inside their dreams.” He couldn’t help but smile every time she called him her assistant. He did an attempt to canalize his own magic into the necklace to help Luna getting into the Dream Realm. Even if he didn’t know the spell, he wanted her to know he was willing to do his best to be the best Royal Assistant Equestria has ever seen. She smiled at him before both of them appeared in a dark, huge place full of glowing bubbles with every kind of dreams inside them. They entered to the Dream Realm.