//------------------------------//
// Cosmos 
// Story: The Immortal Dream 
// by Czar_Yoshi 
//------------------------------//

I rotated the Verdandi in a circle as we gained height over Ironridge, taking in everything the horizon had to offer.

A mid-afternoon sun was edging toward the west, illuminating mountain after snow-capped mountain. Those mountains had been home to the sum of my existence so far, Icereach tucked neatly into their western border, and Ironridge their east.

Twelve days, it took us to cross them, flying in cramped quarters on Gerardo's airship meant for two. And yet, to the south, they hit the Aldenfold's cliff face, and against the Aldenfold they were barely a blip in the terrain, their soaring slopes and deep valleys amounting to naught against the king of all mountain chains. Those mountains - the Aldenfold - were my destination and prize.

Perhaps I should have asked Valey how long it would take to cross them. Though, since she had taken charge of provisioning the ship, I figured we'd be fine.

To the east, the land grew less and less mountainous, mossy coniferous forests finding purchase on the gentler slopes. The Ironridge crater stood out like a tropical bloom, its floor filled with canopies of unimaginably lush foliage that soaked in the heat like ambrosia and grew denser and denser still. But beyond the crater's rim, trees grew tall instead of broad, their blue-green foliage sloped for weathering rainstorms, a completely different ecosystem than what now grew in the shade of the crystal tower.

The tower itself became easier to see as we gained altitude, rising into the lifeless sky. There was a beauty in the way its roots latticed themselves together to make up the body, a pattern to its weave that looked too deliberate to be organic, and yet too organic to be deliberate. It had tiers, I could see as I rose, each one about one mountain-height apart, where the structure became slightly thinner and slightly more intentional all at once. And then, just before its needle-like peak, it bloomed like a flower, several large, crystalline petals arrayed like a satellite dish around the tower's tip.

Free-floating petals, I realized. Held up by nothing, unattached to the spire itself - or if so, by only the flimsiest of crystal filaments, too small for me to yet make out. And they were slowly moving, tracing a gentle orbit around the core.

"What do you suppose it's for?" I heard my own voice say.

I jumped a little. "Procyon?"

"No," the voice said. "Just me. Faye... if you still want to call me that. Too lifelike for a voice that's just in your head? I figured I should find a way for us to talk. One that didn't involve switching over, at least."

I rubbed at my ears. "Sure doesn't sound like it's in my head. Are you floating around? Like a ghost, the way I was?"

"No..." Faye sounded regretful. "I don't think I can do that. You're a special case, since I more or less made you and passed control over to you. But this was my original body, so I don't think I can evict myself so easily. If I could, I'd be long gone by now."

Guess it was pointless asking if she had tried, then.

...How about this? Is this better? Faye asked, this time sounding as if her voice was in my head, rather than my ears.

"Either one works." I shrugged, looking again at the crystal tower.

Okay. Faye remained in my head. So... The tower. What do you think it does?

I studied it again. "...Dunno. I guess it does look kind of functional. At first, when I saw the crystals on my way to rescue Leif, it felt like they were growing upward to run away from something. Maybe they wound together like that for structural stability, so they could get higher and farther away? But it still does look deliberate."

I wonder if there's a way to ask the flame we absorbed, Faye mused. I can feel it, deep inside us. It feels... dormant. I don't think it would respond, even if we knew how to poke it. If we need to know, I guess there's nothing for it but to find this Fluttershy champion.

"You think Ludwig would know?" I craned my neck at the tower's peak, which was getting closer as we continued our ascent. "Not that I'm unhappy with his silence, or any-"

"You called, stupid cigar?"

I sighed.

Ludwig floated out of the ground.

"What do you want?" I chanced, feeling like anything I uttered would break a fragile, beneficial status quo.

"Well, I was sort of hoping for my body back," Ludwig explained, bobbing in place. "And I am pretty sure my face is still supposed to be trying to murderize King Father, though who knows what the status of that plan is these days. And I would also like to see an epic brawl between you and the stowaways on your ship I should probably not tell you about-"

"What!?" My ears stood straight up.

"-which I was totally making up to annoy you, friendo." Ludwig's light orb floated in a cheeky circle. "But we have pretty firmly established you are an outrageous crone who only cares about your own face and nobody else's - congratulations, I knew you would get there one day - and thus you couldn't care less about a poor cool guy like me. So I am sort of scratching my intelligent head about why you would ask me what I want."

I gritted my teeth. "Rewind. What was that about stowaways?"

Ludwig whistled. "I am stoking your paranoia, little cigar. Knowing you, now you will not be able to get the image out of your head of this whole entire ship getting blown to smithereens because you brought along someone whose face does not have a Writ of Harmonic Sanction. That is how you work, eh eh eh?"

I held up my bracelet. "I'll burn you."

Ludwig blew a raspberry. "Unfortunately, friendo, you burned me too badly last time and now I am a roasty-toasty charbroiled windigo with nothing left to burn, so that will probably not work again. Threat taken, though. I understand my face is not desired, so I will make like you and run away. I hope there was nothing about that tower you wanted to ask your super-ancient, all-knowing windigo friend!"

He darted into the floor and was gone.

I felt a vein in my brow twitch.

Not to say I told you so, Faye apologized, but there was a reason I made you afraid of using our powers. I didn't want something like this to happen. Now we're stuck to him and I have no idea how to undo it.

As irked as I was - at Ludwig, not Faye - the potential that Ludwig wasn't pulling my leg about un-writted stowaways took precedence. "Do you think you-"

Yes, Faye interrupted, I know it was me who made you a ghost in the first place, and then absorbed Ludwig to put us back together! Please don't remind me...

My ears folded. "I'm not blaming you. I'm not even talking about that. I was gonna ask if you could take over piloting for a bit so I can float around and search the ship for stowaways, just in case."

...Oh. Faye sounded dejected. Right. I... Forget I said anything. Sure. We can... do that. Here goes...





Another mask swap later, and I was disembodied, hovering over Faye's shoulder as she stood at the ship's controls.

We were almost clear of the Aldenfold's initial cliff face, but our new height only served to drive home just how much higher the mountains went. That sheer barrier, a wall of rock and waterfalls so high that the trees looked like green sand below and the Ironridge mountains were indiscernible in elevation from the flatlands to the north, wasn't the primary bulk of the mountains: it was the entrance gate, a test to weed out unqualified adventurers from the real trial yet to come.

I drifted through the windshield for a better look, and abruptly realized that my flight was based on my frame of reference: now that I no longer thought of myself as inside the ship, I could see it moving, and had to fly to keep up with it. But the sensation of doing so was almost exhilarating enough to make me forget about Ludwig, and I looped and soared, taking a circuit around the aircraft and a final look at the crystal tower, its pinnacle now not that far above us. It was hard for the tower to impress, though, now that I could see the Aldenfold up close.

These were mountains on a scale that dwarfed Icereach, the valleys three times as wide and five times as deep, whole ecosystems opening up at the bottom of each basin as we grew high enough to see inside. Lakes and forests and rivers, plains and meadows, fields of flowers and gentle cliffs and fallen trees all nestled between more mountain walls that, up close, looked as imposing as the Aldenfold had from below.

Miles below, the mountains that separated Icereach and Ironridge were soaked in snow that never thawed, yet here the climate seemed to start and stop at whims. The Verdandi accelerated, finally high enough to begin moving southward, and I saw springtime fields bounded by slopes of autumn-colored trees, moving up to snowy mountain faces and peaks, except those peaks were just the edges of plateaus that were in the full grip of summer. Deserts were rare, but lakes had sandy beaches, and as we advanced further into the sky I began to see pocket-sized rainstorms wandering the atmosphere like intelligent creatures. And always, we rose, mountains stacked upon mountains awaiting us ahead, three and then four and then five layers high. Each ridge we crested was just an invitation for more to join our sights.

The terrain was surreal. It was impossible. It was like someone had taken what I knew in my heart the wider world to be, then scrunched it up and thrown it in a blender and poured out the result on top of a mountain chain, the environments and residues pooling in the valleys and draping over the mountaintops like sheets of snowy, forested film.

Could someone live here? How had these mountains been created? Was this a fluke of nature, or a gift from some divine entity, hidden away where only the most adventurous could ever lay eyes on it? I felt like, if I looked away, it could disappear, like the mountains were in a state of flux and only assumed physical form when I beheld them, like each individual forest and meadow only existed for me, right here and now, like they had snapped into existence out of the fabric of creation purely to provide a backdrop for my travels.

Maybe I was right. Maybe these rivers and waterfalls had only ever been beheld before by me, and no one would ever behold them again. Maybe the mountains were so vast that even if all the ponies in the world came and settled here and flew across these peaks day after day after day, this particular viewpoint might still go forever un-rediscovered.

I had... given myself so many reasons to live, in Ironridge. Coda. Chrysalis. The war. The pink flame. Those were the duties that spurred me forward. And yet, I had none of them when something pushed me to leave Icereach, to see the world as a whole.

This, these mountains, this sense of wonder... This was what I had originally been looking for. This was what I always wanted. This flight, this freedom, seeing the world open up like a book and knowing its beauty.

Someday, I had to learn, I needed to know: why was it here? What was it all for?

Flying across the Aldenfold, the wind sharp and powerful beneath my ghostly wings, I knew there was an answer, and I knew it was beautiful.

...Searching for stowaways could wait. Being paranoid, taking precautions, all of that was meaningless. Right now, I held my heart's desire in my forehooves, and it was mine to appreciate.





Corsica strolled onto the bridge, taking a proper tour of the airship that was going to be her home for the next who-knew-how-long. Halcyon was here, sitting in the wide-backed pilot's chair at the controls.

Halcyon gasped a little, her ears pointing straight at Corsica's hoofsteps, and when she didn't turn around or call a greeting, Corsica frowned.

"You again?" Corsica guessed, stepping closer.

"Hi," Halcyon said, tucked into herself, eyes not straying from the mountains as the ship streaked forward, continuing to climb.

Corsica took a seat in a co-pilot's chair, not having a clue what to do with the instruments in front of her and ignoring them as a result. "Been wondering when I'd run into you a second time."

"Why?" Halcyon asked. "We've... been over this. You and I aren't friends. The me you know isn't here right now. Spend your time with her, instead. I'm just taking a shift as pilot."

"I'm curious," Corsica said, ignoring her question. "You talk about how you don't wanna be friends with me because we've got bad history together. Fair enough. I probably didn't make myself very easy to get along with back then either. But if you really didn't want to change that, why'd it change? I don't know how you work, with multiple ponies in the same head, or whatever. But the other you sure was persistent about getting on my good side after the avalanche."

Halcyon frowned at the mountains. "You're whitewashing your memories. I was always like that. It was you who changed and let her in... too late for it to matter to me."

"Maybe I am." Corsica shrugged. "I try to stop myself from dwelling on the past. Most of the time, at least. Reminds me of too many things I'll never get back. But if I was so bad to you, what did you see in me in the first place?"

Halcyon clammed up.

"Come on," Corsica beckoned. "I won't tell the other you, if it's embarrassing."

"...It's not embarrassing," she said. "I just don't want to remind myself."

Corsica tilted her head. "You haven't been reminded about it already?"

Halcyon gritted her teeth. "That's the point."

"And how bad is it, really?" Corsica leaned back in her chair. "I dunno, maybe it's awful. I'm not you. But now that I've committed the egregious sin of making you dwell on our awful shared history, why not think out loud?"

"...Fine." Halcyon sighed. "I admired your fearlessness. You never seemed bothered by the consequences of your actions, or afraid of your future. I followed you around because I wanted to know how you did it."

"You wanted someone to hide behind?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Huh. Well, guess you can see where all that not-being-bothered got me now."

Halcyon shook her head. "Getting the talent you did, when you got it... That wasn't your fault. Even if you consider it karma for the way you treated me, you were a victim. It didn't happen due to a flaw in your worldview."

Corsica blinked. "You sure about that? I thought special talents appear because you believe in them, or something."

Halcyon stubbornly stared at the mountains.

"Though mine is pretty abnormal..." Corsica rubbed at her flank, a mess of triangles and geometry sitting on it, looking like the first drawing a foal produced using a stencil. "And I dunno what I was believing in while unconscious. Wonder what the rest of the world knows about how you get these. Icereach never had much to say, and I didn't research it in Ironridge."

Halcyon still refused to speak.

Corsica gave her a look, then settled back into her chair. "Well, let's talk about something else, then. If you were so eager to have everything to do with me, why did you stop?"

"Isn't that what you always wanted me to do?" Halcyon's brow shadowed. "I just got the message. That's all."

"If that's really all there is to it, you sure you wanna stick by that now that my message has changed?" Corsica gave up on looking at Halcyon and joined her in staring out the window. "Sure, I've changed. But with your reasoning, I can't even tell whether you think that's a good thing or a bad thing. Did you like the way I used to be, or not?"

She could practically hear Halcyon's scowl. "That's the problem. You don't know what it's like to be attracted to something that's bad for you. And besides, you keep asking why I wanted to be friends with you back then. Well, why do you want to be friends with me now?"

"That's a pretty bold assumption," Corsica countered. "I'm curious about you. Whether you think of yourselves as distinct ponies or not, your thoughts are still floating around in the same head, right? I am friends with at least a part of you. I just wanna learn about other sides of her." She crossed her forelegs.

"There's nothing interesting about me to learn," Halcyon said, her voice turning glum. "You already proved that to yourself when you rejected me over and over before the avalanche. Trying to second-guess yourself, you're just wasting your time."

"No. I'm doing science," Corsica countered. "Old me was young and stupid. I was blind to my limitations, or the way the world worked. And I knew nothing about the kinds of relationships I'd want to have in the future. What reason is there to re-evaluate a conclusion if not finding a new viewpoint and evidence?"

Halcyon sighed. "Right. So, now that your old privileged life has fallen apart, you're seeing me as a replacement to fill in the gaps."

"Is that so bad?" Corsica shrugged. "The fact that those gaps appeared meant I was doing something wrong in the first place. Wouldn't have happened if my life had really been perfect. Maybe you're just better than all that."

"Do you really believe that?" Halcyon's tone darkened. "Do you earnestly think that the only reason bad things ever happen to ponies is because they deserve them? What about the eastern continent, and all the ponies who died or worse because Chrysalis did what she did? That would imply that every time a pony sins, they're acting as an agent of justice, because whoever was hurt by it deserved what was coming. You're saying everyone can surrender to the darkest parts of themselves with no moral-"

"Where's that coming from?" Corsica forcefully interrupted. "Sorry if I'm not a philosopher who thinks through the important ramifications of every word I utter before saying it. I'm just saying I messed up, and you deserve a chance."

Halcyon was silent for a moment, but eventually she sighed. "That's kind of you to say. Maybe you have changed. But you still have no idea what you're talking about. Be friends with the other me. Enjoy her company. But that's not my place in the world to fill."

Corsica turned in her chair to face her. "What are you, the voice of doubt that whispers in the back of Halcyon's head?"

"Yes," Halcyon said, still staring out the windshield. "I suppose you could say I am."

"Lucky her," Corsica grumbled. "Wish I could separate myself from my own doubts and fears. Just pretend we're two different people. Maybe if I could, I'd have a half of me that only got along with her, and a half of me that only got along with you. But since I can't, I guess I'll just have to settle for both of you."

Halcyon should have smiled. It really felt like that should have got a smile out of her... but instead, she just sighed. "Where do you get so much optimism?" she asked. "You're starting to sound like her."

"The other you?" Corsica shrugged. "Guess she's just rubbing off on me. Or maybe anything just looks sunny next to your gloomy butt."

Once again, Halcyon failed to smile... though she at least had the decency to look conflicted, as if she was considering it. More than anything, Corsica was pushing this because it was a challenge, and even a talent like hers couldn't fully squash her old competitive spirit. And besides, it felt nice to be stubborn about something when her determination was usually in such short supply. But at the same time, this Halcyon...

The filly she befriended in Icereach had a too-good-to-be-true aura about her. She was cute and innocent and stubborn and cheerful, but it always felt like she lacked an edge she by all rights should have had with all they had been through together. An edge that anyone should have had, really, just by living through the more mundane trials that occurred in life.

This was Halcyon's missing half. The cynicism to brace against life's ills, to take a few punches without being caught flat-hoofed. Not that Corsica was frequently open about her personal struggles, but when she was, it was hard to feel like Halcyon would really understand and empathize. Instead, she might try to understand and then confuse herself, because she lacked the framework for processing... all of this. Often, Corsica felt like she was bracing herself against Halcyon's problems for her, like that day when Halcyon submitted their research paper under the wrong name, and it fell to her to reassure her friend that it wasn't the end of the world as a result.

Here, though, was the side of Halcyon that was missing any belief that it was worth getting up to try again. Everything the other Halcyon had in abundance, this one was lacking. Trying to be optimistic in her presence made Corsica feel like a sandwich, one Halcyon on either side of her, both needing different things from her - or, her wanting to give both of them different things. The things they really needed from each other to be complete.

Maybe if they were complete, then Corsica wouldn't feel so awkward thinking about... Well, never mind.

Cynical Halcyon had stopped complaining about her presence, at least. Maybe they could just hang out for-

Like a light switch being flipped, the dead gray sky turned blue.

"Woah!" Corsica sat straight up, paying attention again to their surroundings. "You see that too?"

Halcyon was quickly looking between several meters on the dashboard. "We're so high," she muttered, almost reverent. "I think this is the peak."

Corsica stared out the window. Around them, the peaks were as jagged as jagged could be, triangles so perfect they would make a geometry teacher swoon. The environmental variation in the foothills had given way to an immaculate glacier at the top of the world, and the suddenly-blue sky was tinged with black on the horizon, as if the atmosphere itself buckled to keep the mountains covered. If they could maintain this elevation while going straight forward, they could be in outer space.

A chill of wonder ran through Corsica's fur as they crested the edge of the glacier and the Aldenfold began to descend, an infinite sea of terraced peaks stair-stepping down before them.

"Glad I got to see this with someone," she murmured.

"...Yeah," Halcyon agreed. "I bet... not many ponies have ever seen this before."

Together, they stared out the window, matters of friendship forgotten as they took in the world.





I had more important things to be doing, I knew. And yet, what could be more important than experiencing this?

Gravity didn't pull on me as a ghost. I could decide for myself which was was down, and as we skipped over ridge after ridge and peak after peak, I started to let myself believe that the slope was actually level.

Ahead, miles in the distance, the Aldenfold ended, too distantly for me to make out exactly how. But my angle made the flat ground beyond the mountains appear to rise like a mountain itself, higher and higher into the heavens. Mountains and forests, rivers and valleys disappeared into the fog of distance, covered by clouds and weather that were far lower than I was, spreading out to a distant, faintly-glowing horizon.

Beyond that horizon was the blackness of space.

Blue sky and starry space touched in a luminous arc. Below that arc were weather systems, clouds and continents, oceans and islands, geographic features the size of my hoof that would take a week to cross by airship. Above that arc were stars and galaxies, the presence of the evening sun not strong enough to block them out through the thin atmosphere. From this point, at the apex of the Aldenfold, I could behold the south in its entirety.

It occurred to me to look back, but it was too late, the north having already been swallowed by the glacier's peaks. Part of me wanted to return and witness the north the same way, but that view could wait: after all, I was bound by oath to return. The sight would just have to be my reward.

Once again, the south consumed my view, stretching from the world's tallest mountain to its very edge, lit from above by the sun and from behind by countless stars. As the sun drew lower, shadows began to stretch, and I could make out mountains not by their height but by the darkness they shed over the land. Come night, would I see cities, patches of light where ponies thrived?

Would that they could see their home from such an angle. Taking it all in, I could almost understand why Equestria wouldn't want this sight to be free and available to all ponies. A view of creation like this should be reserved for the one who created it.

...Or maybe not. Perhaps the world would be a better place if everyone could see it in its entirety, comprehend its scale, know beyond the secluded lives they had led up until this point. I had thought Ironridge was big, that I was breaking my isolation by going there and witnessing the world as a whole. And yet Ironridge was insignificant compared to the scale I now beheld.

If you wanted a better view of the world than this, about your only recourse would be from the surface of the moon.





"Makes you wonder where these mountains came from," Corsica mused as the Verdandi sped down the slopes, passing peak after peak, the otherworldly diversity returning to the mountains' ecology as Equestria drew nearer and nearer.

"I guess so," Halcyon replied, not sounding excited to talk, but much less reticent now that the topic had changed from her relationship with Corsica. "Maybe they've always been here."

"Always, huh?" The blackness had disappeared from the horizon, and the edges of the world faded from view as the ship lost elevation. "Maybe."

A few more ridges, and Corsica no longer felt like it would be futile to count the mountains between them and flat land. Already, Halcyon had re-oriented the ship and started lowering their speed, slowing their descent so they wouldn't slam into Equestria the moment they cleared the last of the Aldenfold. It didn't look like there was a southern counterpart to the mountain wall, the peaks and ridges instead fading away into lesser and lesser foothills that were still mountainous, but no longer stacked in an incline.

They passed another ridge, and Corsica recounted. One more, and then it looked like there was a trench they could fly through, and a large plateau after that. Then one more ridge, and... just normal mountains beyond there. She felt the floor press against her as the ship leveled off, saving height to clear the next ridge.

"That's not right," Halcyon said under her breath as the ship reacted, the ridge squeaking past underneath.

"What?" Corsica looked up in passive alarm.

"Had to push it harder than usual to get enough altitude," Halcyon said. "This is supposed to be powered by Coda's throne, so it shouldn't be a fuel issue. Maybe we've pushed it too hard for one day and need to let the engine rest?"

Loud hoofsteps announced someone entering the bridge. Louder, certainly, than Leif or Nehaley would use.

Corsica and Halcyon both looked back in alarm, trusting that the ship wouldn't mysteriously veer sideways and crash into a wall of the trench they were now skimming down. It was Papyrus.

"What are you doing here?" Corsica asked, her eyebrows raised in alarm. She got up, stepped between him and Halcyon, and gave her a motion that would hopefully be interpreted as I've got this, see to the ship.

Papyrus shrugged. "I don't know, something about pretty pony Halcyon not choosing to spend one of her outrageously expensive writs on a qualified airship technician and Unless not having a whole lot of other writ-bearing and generally handsome friends she could ask to cover for that mistake. By the by, do you happen to have a fuel light on that dashboard? Because your friendly local engine room dweller is now here in person to tell you you're running on fumes."

Halcyon bristled.

"Hmm..." Papyrus strolled to the front. "Still got plenty to land her, I bet. Think we can make it to that plateau?"

"You want us to land in the Aldenfold?" Halcyon sounded as if she was forcing herself to function through her terror, but also doing a pretty good job of it. "Who knows how many miles away from civilization? How does this ship even run out of fuel?"

Papyrus shrugged, rubbing his chin with a wing. "Well, dumpster corps intel does say Coda fed herself on the emotional equivalent of junk food, so you can't expect the energy from that to last forever. And it's been a while, but unless I'm mistaking this particular upcoming plateau for another that looks just like it, there's a village not far below with nice enough houses they probably have trade lines to the rest of civilization."

"I want to look at the throne myself," Halcyon said shakily. "But I'm the pilot, so we'll need to land first. You're certain landing here is a good idea?"

Papyrus whistled an over-the-top innocent whistle. "A whole lot fewer ways it could go wrong than being in an airborne airship that's out of fuel."

"Point taken." Halcyon gritted her teeth and shifted several levers, causing the ship to slow further. "Just gotta do this gently..."





My journey through the Aldenfold had reached the fringes. I needed to get back, be responsible, take the next shift piloting so Faye could rest, maybe figure out how I was going to let our body sleep, since night was falling and it undoubtedly needed sleep too. By now, the magical climate had relaxed its hold on the mountains, and the terrain I soared through was little more than run-of-the-mill crags and canyons, just at scale. But part of me just wasn't ready to relinquish that feeling, the freedom and wonder of gliding above the entire world. Just a little more...

The trench the ship flew through came to an end, opening out onto a wide plateau with long grass and a thick grove in the distance ahead. The sun was low enough on the horizon that the shadow of mountains to the west had started to cross the grass. And instead of flying on, the ship extended its landing gear and came to a bumpy rest near a river that flowed out of the trench. It rocked once, twice and then was still, the glowing comet that formed its engine winking out in a twist of magical fog.

Huh. Apparently Faye wasn't waiting for me before taking a break. Well, nothing for it but to get back and rest in my own body.