The Skeleton had vanished at some point.
That should have brought Pinkie some relief, or allowed her to relax just a smidge. Instead, it made her question where it'd disappeared to, if it had crawled to some other corner of her room, waiting for her to stumble across it once she thought it was gone. Maybe it had fallen at some point and she'd somehow missed it, only to realize her folly when she'd bump into it.
All of which assumed she could muster the energy to get out of bed, of course.
Her lamps weren't the primary light source for long; quickly outshone by the sun herself as she pierced through the numerous windows, letting her know that another day had passed without her getting any sleep.
She saw Gummy wake up one eye at a time, turn to her, and lick his eyeball.
With huge strain, she rose, bringing her hooves to her face and tugging at her eyes. Pinkie felt gross on top of her exhaustion. Her coat was matted and sticky, and a sensation of dirtiness seeped into her bones. She'd bathed yesterday, but that didn't seem to matter.
These past two days—Celestia, had it only been two days?—had taught her how lengthy a day could truly be. The passing night, filled with a fear bordering on despair, had dragged on with every second.
She glanced at her bathroom door, furrowing her brow in contemplation as she asked herself if she should bother with her usual routine. A shower would wake her up just a little, unless it was a warm one.
Then it would pass, and she'd somehow end up more drained than before. Why should she even bother? Was there a party today? She sat there and trudged through the fog that obscured her mind, hoping to reach out and grab somepony's birthday or some other party-spurring occasions.
None came to mind.
Pinkie placed a hoof on her chest, airing out her tension with a sigh. She couldn't throw a party with how tired she was; Pina's party was already pushing it. Heck, the idea of going downstairs filled her with such dread she wasn't sure if she'd be able to get out of bed.
Fear of not just The Skeleton, but also of her appearence kept her there. The grayness of her mane terrified her, and the weight of fear crushed her with thoughts of it spreading. Not to mention how downright awful her coat must have been from lying drenched in her own sweat all night; how she didn't smell was another unanswerable question for the pile.
What was even waiting for her downstairs? More stares? More questions about how she was doing and if she'd tried all the things she'd already tried multiple times to get to sleep? As good-intentioned as they were, hearing it over and over and giving the same practiced answers was agonizing.
Then again, staying in her bed would just make them more concerned. There was nothing for her outside today, yet even less inside.
She ran her hooves through her mane, making a half-baked attempt to poof it up in a fleeting wish for normalcy. It didn't work, of course; it still draped over her back like a cape of seaweed yanked straight out of the ocean. In a window she passed, she saw that more of it had faded to gray, two more strands at least.
Seeing it made her heart fracture, even though some part of her knew it was the only sight that awaited her. What disturbed her even more about it was that, when she was younger, she wanted to be gray like the rest of her family was. Marble, her twin sister, had a mane identical to hers in all ways but color. They both got it from their mother, Cloudy. Who had a mane as long and straight as any Pinkie had ever seen.
That was before she desired to be different, when she wanted to be the same as the only ponies she'd ever known. Now, when she'd come to love her uniqueness, that long-dead foalhood wish was coming true.
She hated it.
_______
After filling her thermos to the brim with creamer-blended coffee, she tried to help get everything ready for the Cakes like she had the day before. About halfway through setting things, Mrs. Cake pointed out that she'd misplaced some stuff—utensils not cleaned or set out, ingredients not opened properly. It was all easily fixed, barely even an inconvenience.
But she'd never messed up like that before.
Not even when she was first being taught how to do everything did she make so many mistakes, as small as they may be.
She needed to see Twilight again. Even if the sleeping spell didn't work, there had to be something that did. It was Twilight Sparkle, after all! The protégée of Celestia, the embodiment of magic, the princess of friendship, a genius problem solver!
If Twilight couldn't help her, then nobody could.
-------
"Twilight?"
Pinkie knocked on the doors to Twilight's castle, fighting the urge to peek over her shoulder. The entire way there, dozens of ponies kept her in their concerned attention. It was the same as yesterday, but today she had a little less patience for it.
The worried whispering.
The staring when they thought she wasn't looking.
The same question they pestered her with every time: 'Are you okay?'
It was because they cared, and she knew that deep down; it was becoming something she needed to keep reminding herself. She was friends with each and every creature in Ponyville, so of course they wanted to know how she was doing.
And if she said no, what then? Would they magically remedy a solution? Say exactly what she needed to hear to feel better? No, they wouldn't. They couldn't.
Then they'd be left feeling as bad as she did.
So she lied, telling them she was fine and was just having a bad mane day. Not explaining the gray in her mane, or the bags under her eyes, or how poorly groomed her coat was. They looked at each other a certain way, gave her a nod, and trotted away. Joining the others in giving her awkward stares, like they were expecting her to break down at any given moment.
If things kept going like they were, she just might.
"Pinkie?"
Spike's voice was the distraction from her rumination she needed, opening the door just enough for her to slink her way in, shutting it behind her and startling Spike. The inside of the castle was cool, empty, and most importantly: well lit.
No dark corners.
No creeping shadows on the edge of a wall.
No bony hooves reaching from the black veil.
No Skeleton.
"Holy crap, are you okay?"
She sucked in cold air through her teeth, closing her eyes and ignoring that hot sourness in her mouth.
"I'm fine."
She wasn't. Neither was she under the guise that he'd believe her, tilting his head and pressing his lips into a fine line.
"Are you sure? I can make some hot cocoa with extra sugar if you—"
"Spike!"
He flinched, ears falling as he took a step back like he'd just been scolded. Guilt impaled her heart, leaving her stuck to the wall. She grimaced, dropping her chin to her chest as she turned away from him.
"Just take me to Twilight, please."
He shrank, nodding and shuffling over into one of the hallways. With dragging hooves she followed, occasionally darting her eyes up to the ceiling. Nothing was there, of course. No bony figure hiding behind the chandeliers.
No creaking.
Spike led her to the kitchen, where Twilight was trying to cook an omelet while reading something. The door had been left open, leaving the sound of eggs sizzling audible from just outside. Without having to be asked, he shut the door behind them. The suddenness of which startled Twilight and caused her to drop her book, catching it in her magic inches before it hit the ground.
"Spike, I told you not to distract me while I'm—" Once her eyes landed on Pinkie, the aura holding the book lost its grip as it clattered to the ground. "Oh, Pinkie. Are you—"
"Don't."
The brittleness of her voice was painfully unfamiliar to her own ears, more grating than an out-of-tune melody. At least her mess of a mane covered half of her face, preventing Twilight from seeing how bloodshot her eyes had become.
"I don't want to be asked that anymore. Just..." Pinkie sat on the stool, not having realized how much every inch of her body ached with fatigue until she let it rest. She placed her forelegs onto the counter and buried her head until all the light was gone, closing her eyes to stop that incessant burning for a few precious seconds.
It was waiting for her there.
Behind her eyelids, in the blotches of darkness. Its jaw open and crooked, hanging on by the splinters of ligament that decay hadn't rotted away yet. Somehow, the marks carved into its skull stuck out amongst the black. Shining, as if they had some profound importance. A whistling noise caressed her ears, wordless whispering from a corpse that wished to tell her something.
Unfortunately for Pinkie, she was a clairvoyant reliant on her body's whims and signals, not a medium.
"Pinkie?"
She yanked her head out of the hole she'd made for herself, hissing at the returning inflammation in her eyes.
"Twilight, I need your help."
Within a few moments, Twilight opened the fridge and poured milk into two empty mugs, casting a spell on them that caused steam to irradiate. Pinkie hesitantly touched it, but the mug itself remained relatively cold while the milk was just barely hot enough not to burn.
"I can tell. Did the spell not work?"
Pinkie shook her head, tapping her hoof against the mug. The warmth spread to her face, letting the tension drain and the muscles rest.
"No, I think it just made everything worse. As soon as I got home, it just made me so exhausted that sleep was all I cared about. Then, I got this awful headache, so bad I couldn't move. It—" she cringed at the memory, trying not to reflexively press a hoof against her temple "—really hurt."
"Hmm, that sounds like Manstra's Feedback." Twilight magick'd a pencil and notepad over, scribbling something at the top of it and then underlining it without breaking eye contact. "I'm sorry. I was certain it was a biological cause, some underlying health condition caused by severe stress maybe. If I thought it was magical, I wouldn't have tried a sleeping spell."
She placed her hoof on Pinkie's, gently giving physical comfort. It hardly registered with her, the ringing in her ears becoming her only focus as her entire body went slack.
"It's magical? So, someone did this to me?"
The warm gaze Twilight had dropped as she turned her head. "I don't know what else it could be. Your reaction is typical of Manstra's Feedback, which is what happens when two conflicting spells are cast on one individual. It causes migraines, nausea, and often partial, if not total, paralysis." She listed off the symptoms in a clinical tone, clearly having them well memorized. "You've somehow caught a spell that prevents you from being able to sleep. To my extensive knowledge, such a thing doesn't even exist. Or at least not one that last more than a few hours for obvious reasons. If it does, it hasn't been written down anywhere.
Pinkie's mind drifted to the hole, struggling to grasp that that had been only three days ago. When the corpse cornered her, it was clearly trying to do something. Fear had convinced her it was wanted to hurt her, but maybe that was never its intention.
Maybe it wasn't trying to tell her something.
Maybe it was trying to give her something.
It wasn't a dream.
"What if it's not a spell?" The fur on the back of Pinkie's neck stood straight, an icy wind creeping its way down her spine. Was that creaking coming from her fidgeting on the stool, or from the ceiling? She couldn't bring herself to look up. "W-what if it's a curse, like Poison Joke?"
"A curse that prevents you from sleeping? Where have I—" Twilight narrowed her gaze, tapping the tip of her pencil against the notepad. "Something about that rings a bell. Yes, with curses just about anything is possible. They aren't very common, though. Poison Joke is only really abundant in the Everfree, and every other known curse has come from artifacts. What makes you think it's a curse? They're exceedingly rare nowadays."
Pinkie held on tightly to the mug trembling as she chewed on her lip. She slowly lifted her head, peeking through the mess of her mane to the ceiling above her. Twilight's castle ceiling didn't have much hanging from it, only occasional tree roots and lamps that had been attached to the walls.
The Skeleton had nothing to hide behind had it attached itself like a parasite to her ceiling. She couldn't find it.
It wasn't there.
For now.
She couldn't take it anymore
"I've been…"
Then why was it so hard for her to bring it up? Her teeth chattered in spite of how warm the room was. The words lodged right in the back of her throat, afraid to come out in fear of provoking it. Would it show up when called, like The Boogeypony?
Maybe it was always around. Hiding in the shadows of her eyelids, waiting to stick itself into a ceiling or lying on the ground like a pile of leaves.
And it would continue to haunt her with its existence till she died—which, if she didn't tell Twilight, that might not be very long.
"Seeing The Skeleton."
"As in..." Twilight leaned forward, ears flickering as she furrowed her eyebrows. "Hallucinating it?"
Was it hallucinations? It felt so incredibly real: its stench, the same as when she first encountered it. Just its weight as it pushed on its bed was tangible. It didn't feel like a hallucination.
Then again, neither did Mr. Turnip, Sir Lintsalot, or Madame Le Flour
"I don't know."
The way Twilight wrote that down on her notepad was grating for a reason she couldn't quite place. Pinkie gritted her teeth, swallowing that gross taste of frustration she'd been getting used to.
"Are you seeing it right now?"
Pinkie reluctantly closed her eyes, awaiting the bony figure painted there. Only to find that it wasn't there. Not an inch of its pale death could be seen.
"No, for once."
"I really hate to ask this of you, Pinkie." Twilight brought the mug of milk to her muzzle, just letting it hover there as she moved it around in a circle. "Describe it to me? Is there anything about it that stands out?"
"Yes, actually. There are these weird marks on its eye sockets that I don't think were there when I saw it. They're like..." She tried picturing them, begging that doing so wouldn't summon the entity. "Tally marks?"
"Tally marks? That's… wait a minute."
Pinkie heard the sound of a book opening—presumably the one she had been reading earlier—and being placed on the counter.
"How many?"
"Uhm, ten?" She mentally counted again, opening her eyes. "Yeah, ten."
"Pinkie." Twilight flipped the book around, showing that it was actually a report of some kind. Paragraphs separated by headlines, dotted and formatted to an organized perfection. The right side holding a catalog of photos, various angles taken from the cadaver she'd been forcefully acquainted with. "This is a report of the autopsy they performed on the pony you found. I had them send it to me. They discovered those same ten tally marks under its eyes. Are you sure you didn't see them when you first fell down?"
Did she?
She didn't stare at it any longer than she had to. Just a few seconds enough to recognize it for what it was. At least, that was the case right up to when it started walking towards her. There were so many things about it she found herself stuck paying attention to, its eyes only one of which. Soon, nothing at all when she made herself turn away from it.
Try as she might, she couldn't recall seeing those marks. Not then, anyway.
"I'm pretty sure. I would have remembered that."
"Hmm." Twilight skimmed over the report, letting the mug float next to her like she wasn't sure if she wanted to drink any more of it or not. "I see. It might just be a curse then."
"What are they?"
"I don't know." She got off the stool, leaving the mug on the counter. "The mortician explained that they couldn't be postmortem, so was it something they did to themselves before they passed away? And if they're tallies, what are they counting? Ten of what?"
Pinkie followed her, chugging the rest of her milk and taking the mugs over to the sink. A warmth filled her for a few seconds as it made its way through her and was just as suddenly gone, leaving her with only the chill of lethargy.
"Can you fix it if it's a curse?"
"It's hard to say. Curses can't usually be 'fixed'; Poison Joke is an outlier. They typically have certain conditions that must be met to stop them. In some cases, the only way to get rid of them is to pass it to someone else through just as complex rituals."
Several books floated in from the room next to them, Twilight only reading the title of one book before moving to the next one, going through a couple of them before settling on one and opening it.
"Those complex rituals, often following some obscure condition, are why curses are so strictly forbidden; there's no such thing as a good curse. They are magic at its cruelest."
"Then…" With each word, Pinkie put less energy in her steps. Scraping her hooves against the ground until eventually stopping. Sitting on the cold floor with her mane over her face, lacking the motivation to push it out. "I'm stuck like this? I can't ever sleep again?"
"Of course not!" Twilight pivoted, wings spreading as she placed a hoof on her chest. "Pinkie, you're one of my best friends. I can't let you go through this, and absolutely not by yourself. Not after everything we've done together, and that you've done for me."
She placed a hoof on Pinkie's shoulder, offering her right wing for a hug. Pinkie didn't accept this one, as much as she wanted to. She felt too gross, too tense, too tired.
Twilight saw her reluctance, opening her mouth to say something only to pause and shake her head.
"You know what? I Pinkie Promise I will help you sleep again." She smiled, sitting down beside Pinkie. "Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye."
As expected, Twilight did each gesture with the sacred rhyme. It was comforting to see her friend trying so hard for her, but it didn't make her any less tired. She forced herself to her hooves, cranking out the best smile her body would allow.
She could only hope it didn't look as painful as it felt.
"Thank you, Twi. Really, it means a lot."
Pinkie attempted a side hug, only for her muscles to make that difficult. She ended up just sorta smooshing herself against Twilight, leaning against her like a pillar for support.
"You mean a lot to me, silly." Twilight stood up, her wings receded to her sides as she walked towards the doorway. "Come on, I think I know a good place to start. Do you remember the device I used to try to measure your Pinkie Sense?"
"Uhm, the—" Pinkie started to follow her, only to find her limbs were sluggish and heavier than usual. She managed to open her thermos and take a hefty swig, still being hot enough to wake her up with temperature alone. "Brain-wave scan thingy?"
"The electroencephalogram, yes. I think looking at your brain waves right now can tell me a lot, since there are at least four different waves associated with the sleep cycle. Magic, even curses, always carries some physical effect that can be measured. That should give me a direction if nothing else."
Pinkie nodded along, more concentrated on keeping her balance than Twilight's explanation. It was such an odd sensation for each of her limbs to feel a different weight, making her question every step she took. Getting down the stairs was more challenging than walking had ever been. On more than a few occasions she nearly tripped over herself and rolled her way down the rest of the stairs. Twilight had her horn lit and watched her out of the corner of her eye, muzzle scrunched in worry.
It wasn't until she got to the bottom of the stairs did she realize something was wrong.
"T-Twilight—"
No longer was it restricted to her limbs, coiling her entire body in a rigid inertness. Her knees buckled beneath her, collapsing to the icy floor of the basement. Her jaw was weak and face what she could only describe as 'droopy', as everything stopped listening to her. Bones became brittle branches of wood trapped in the muck of her dead muscles.
She slammed headfirst into the floor, a crushing pressure crashing into her muzzle and spreading to the rest of her face; just raising her head was more effort than that time she tried to swim through a pond of honey. Tilting to where she was resting on the side of her face was the most she could manage.
"Pinkie!"
It was so bizarre feeling everything that happened to her body, but being unable to move it. The familiar tickle of Twilight's magic encompassed her as she was flipped over, now facing the ceiling.
The Skeleton had embedded itself there.
No creaking noise came with it.
It was just…there. So deeply lodged into the crystals its chest wasn't even visible, fleshless limbs dangling as they waited to detach like everything else had. It pressed its hooves against the ceiling, pushing up with all the unholy might it had. With a revolting pop, it lurched out leaving holes where its ribs had been.
Then it started crawling.
"Pinkie, please listen to me."
Pinkie had started hyperventilating, begging for one of those breaths to revitalize her so she could get as far as possible.
"Whatever you're seeing is not real. The Skeleton is in Manehattan, and there's nothing else here."
It clattered onto the stairs, taking only a few seconds to stand up. The patter of its bare hooves was louder than Twilight's voice, making any other noise effectively mute. No matter how much she tried to move, the only thing that complied was her heart beating against the inside of her ribcage.
It tried to open its jaws, only for the tendons that kept it connected to the skull to come loose. Clutching on for a few seconds until giving out entirely, dropping and clattering to the ground like a piece of a broken toy.
Even from where Pinkie was, she could smell its rot. Each time it spread into the room it got worse, corrupting the air and making it so thick and stale with decay inhaling it put her on the cusp of vomiting.
Her gruff breathing devolved into a shallow whimpering, stuck trying to will a body that had given up on moving. Twilight's touch and magic hardly registered, a single ember of warmth buried in ice. She knew it wasn't real—it couldn't be real—yet it was there. As visibly visceral as anything else in the room, taking every bit of her attention.
It soon towered over her, a whispering noise coming from its mangled mouth. Hushed, indistinguishable, closer to multiple ponies whispering at once than just one. Different tones, deep and high, masculine and feminine, all impossibly loud. It was all she could hear, despite the fact that it wasn't saying anything.
Was it trying to tell her something? No matter how close it got, it didn't make a syllable of sense. Her eyes grew blurry with tears as its stench skewered her every sense, stuck staring at a mark on The Skeleton's forehead. It was ebony and stood out among the barren white, identical to the ones etched into its eye sockets. Instead of being vertical, this one was horizontal and new.
She got a closer look as it lowered its head to meet hers, so close it very nearly touched her. The whispering didn't become coherent, only more concentrated and morphing into a blaring screech of disembodied murmurs. If she could just move her hooves to cover her ears, maybe it'd be bearable. Without that, all it did was stab her ears with an array of acoustic agony.
All Pinkie could do was close her eyes and hold her breath for as long as possible, just so she wouldn't have to inhale that putrid stench anymore. Wordlessly praying that it would vanish before touching her like it had all the times before, or that Twilight would cast some spell that would give her the ability to move again.
Something to save her.
Please.
A few seconds passed before the odor dissipated, and the cramp of her muscles loosened as her limbs twitched. She opened her eyes, expecting The Skeleton to have vanished like before. It didn't, standing just a few inches in front of her.
The unknown voices had gone mute, vanished along with the decay. It stared at her, dragging its head from her and retracting its entire body as it started casually walking backwards until it reached the point it dropped to. With a disgusting crunching noise, its ribs cracked and curved backwards, defying physics by not snapping no matter how much they bent.
As if it was falling in reverse, it ascended to the ceiling, piercing it with its malformed bones and staying there. Swinging like all the times before, only now being cradled in a cot of its own decomposition.
The moment she could turn her head, Pinkie cried. Cried until her chest hurt, until the pressure in her stomach was gone, until the fur of her face was matted with tears and snot. She desperately held on to Twilight, who stayed silent and unmoving, her magic having been long dispelled. Stroking Pinkie's splayed heap of a mane.
It didn't take long for her to run out of energy to sob, lying on the ground and trying to wipe away the stickiness of dried tears. Some morbidly curious part of her wanted to check if The Skeleton was still dangling there, but the answer either way was terrifying.
"I'm so sorry, I wish I could help. There's just—" Twilight sucked air through her teeth, chin falling to her chest. "There's too many variables, too many things that could go wrong if I cast a spell, especially if it's a curse."
"What was that? I, I couldn't—" Pinkie pushed herself up, hooves quivered as her muscles were filled to the brim with tension. "I couldn't move."
"Was it your muscles? Did they..." Twilight clenched her jaw. "Gradually get heavier, then so heavy you couldn't move them?"
Pinkie rubbed her forearm, hoping to crease out the leftover rigidness.
"I think so."
"Then it's likely cataplexy."
"Catawhatsy?"
"Cataplexy. It's—" Twilight grabbed a piece of paper from a random pile on a desk. "Like sleep paralysis, except it happens while you're awake. It starts as abruptly feeling really tired, then it gets harder to move, soon you can't move at all. And, well, like with sleep paralysis you tend to—" She raised a hoof, biting her lip and glancing away. "Hallucinate. Like you have been. I knew a pony in Celestia's school who had narcolepsy, and she'd function normally most of the time. Before she'd suddenly get really slow, start slumping, and then stop moving entirely."
"Narcolepsy? But Twilight, I don't—" Pinkie gritted her teeth as a tinge of pain punched her right in her brain, pressuring her back on her knees. "I don't have narcolepsy!"
"I know; that's what worries me most. The worst part about narcolepsy is what causes the cataplexy itself. Chemically, it happens because the orexinergic neurons degrade during the shift to adolescence, so the medulla starts struggling with what initiates sleep in the brain. Any extreme excitation could cause it, or any particularly intense emotion. Anger, depression, even—"
She hung her head, moving away from Pinkie as her wings hugged her sides.
"In some cases, joy can trigger it."
"Joy?"
The word was incredibly foreign on her lips, distant from her thoughts in any way but a memory. Like sleep, it'd become such a core part of her life that she missed more than anything.
Pinkie dropped back on her flank, hooves resting on the cold ground.
"So, if you're right, I can't cry? I can't get upset? I can't even—" All her tears had been dried up, leaving a pained grimace as she squeezed her eyes shut. "I can't be happy? I can't laugh!?"
Twilight stepped back, lip trembling as she tried not to look Pinkie in the eye.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
She rushed over to her desk, frantically lifting all of the papers off her desk and tossing them aside as they piled on the floor. Twilight eventually stopped when she came across a faded yellow scroll, scribbling something on it.
Pinkie watched her do so, seeing her mutter what she was writing as the pen made its descent.
"What are you—" She sniffled, rubbing her muzzle as she once again tried to clean her face. "What are you writing?"
"A letter to Luna. Sleep is her specialty, and no pony has more experience in it than her. I'll tell her it's an emergency and she'll come see you tonight. Meanwhile, I won't sleep until I figure this out."
"You don't have to lose sleep over me, Twilight. I can—"
"Of course I do!" Twilight's eyes watered as she shouted. "I'm The Princess of Friendship! I should be able to help my friend's problems with ease. Especially when they're suffering because of it! You can't sleep, you can't party, you can't—" She choked back a sob, tears streaming down the sides of her face. "You can't laugh! I miss your laugh, Pinkie. I can't fix it this time, and I won't be able to sleep soundly knowing you can’t."
"Twilight..." With a suppressed grunt, Pinkie wobbled over to her. Embracing her in a hug that only had a fraction of the passion they usually did. "It's ok."
"No." She returned it with vigor, wrapping Pinkie in her gentle wings as well as hooves. "It's not."
_____________
After Twilight scanned her brainwaves, Pinkie decided she couldn't even scrape together the gusto to put on a facade of composure. She always used to enjoy talking to ponies no matter where she was going, catching up with them and being as friendly as she'd always been.
Now, if she heard one more pony say how sorry they were for her, she was going to scream.
She needed to keep herself busy until nightfall, preferably in a way that didn't involve being around ponies prodding her with pointless concern.
Her party cave was as good a chore as any. It was in constant need of cleaning, reorganization, and double-checking for any upcoming parties. Celestia knew her memory wasn't reliable in that regard.
It took her most of the day to sort through it all, leaving her as mentally fatigued as she was physically. Pinkie struggled to accept how she used to do it nearly every day with such contentment, and then went on to throw parties on top of making time to hang out with her friends.
The longer she stayed without motivation to do anything, the more she came to realize how absurd the energy she had before was.
She didn't bother getting in her bed once the sun vanished from the horizon. If she did, she knew deep down that she wouldn't be able to convince herself to get back up. Pinkie would just stay there, eyes closed and begging for sleep to forgive her and once more hold her in the unconscious sanctuary of rest.
And it would never come.
So she sat in the center of her room, having a staring contest with Gummy. Against her will, she'd come to live with the constant wall of fire on her eyes. It burned all the time, even when her eyelids were closed.
On the plus side, that let her win.
Luna came in through her window, though Pinkie was fairly certain she hadn't left it open. The nightlight from her moon made her glow like a majestic beacon, illuminating her midnight blue figure as she landed on Pinkie's bed. Luna pulled in her spread out wings as she hopped off the bed.
"Ah, Pinkie. You are—" her wonderfully sincere smile faltered as she got a better glance at Pinkie, hovering her stare on Pinkie's mane "—less jovial than we recall."
She sucked on her teeth, struggling to swallow that wad of frustration hanging in her throat.
"Sorry, three days without sleep took the bounce right out of my hooves."
"Three days?!" Luna's head jerked back, voice briefly hitching. "Well, that would explain why I have not been able to view your dreams these passing nights. Hmm." Luna's horn lit up in a cobalt blue, circling Pinkie as she lowered her chin. "I see. This is quite severe insomnia; Twilight's urgency was well warranted. I can cast a sleeping spell if tha—"
"No!" Pinkie swiveled around to face Luna, shaking her head and putting up her hooves. "Please, no. Twilight already tried that and it didn't work. I think it's—" She slumped, fidgeting her hooves. "I think it's a curse. It would explain everything."
"And what have you done recently to think someone would curse you?"
"Nothing, I hope." Her face tightened. "Desecrate a grave, maybe."
"You desecrated a grave?"
"Not on purpose!" Pinkie's voice cracked. Just raising it was exhausting now. "Now I see it everywhere, and it won't let me sleep. So, please, can you help?"
"If it's a curse..." She narrowed her eyes, averting her gaze. "Then you may not wish for my help."
"What? But you can break curses!" Pinkie found herself questioning the bits of everything she knew about curses, and how little she really could say for certain about the Princess. "Can't you?"
"Can, yes. However—" Luna made a humming noise, tapping her hoof rhythmically against the floor. "Tia has told me metaphors make explanations much simpler. Perhaps lockpicking would be the most appropriate. Twilight informed you that curses have conditions, yes?"
"Uhm, yes?"
"'Breaking' a curse is attempting to use stronger magic to trick it into thinking that condition has been filled, similar to how lockpicking a door is tricking the tumblers into believing you used the key. That being the case," she trailed off, and her magic came together in a cloud, shifting into a shape that resembled a doorknob. A separate thin rod was inserted into it. "If that lockpick were to break, it would get stuck. Preventing the key from being able to unlock the door in the first place. I have not tried breaking a curse in over a thousand years."
The magic thin rod snapped in half, causing the doorknob to vanish.
"You're saying..." A shudder went down her spine as she realized what Luna was implying, leaving her shaking like a foal without a blanket. "That if you try to fix it and mess up, then I'll be stuck with the curse even if I figure out what the condition is? For the rest of my life?"
Luna bowed her head, her chest caving in as she exhaled.
"I'm sorry."
Those words again.
She was so tired of hearing them.
A shriek bubbled out of her stomach and into the back of her throat, rising to her mouth with a hot fury. She dug her hooves into the floor, chin quivering as she tried to keep it down.
She wanted to scream. She wanted to cry. She wanted to break everything in this room just to feel better. But she couldn't do any of those things, or she might find herself paralyzed and helpless on the floor.
Instead, she sat in silence.
Luna made no effort to break it.
She had no idea how long she sat there before opening her eyes, finding Luna had stayed in the same place. Waiting patiently for her.
"Can you—"
Creaking.
Right above them.
Not that Luna heard it, because of course she didn't.
Pinkie didn't look up, there was no point. She knew what awaited her. The second Luna left, it would come to the ground to meet her.
Just for one night, it'd be nice not to have to deal with that.
"Stay with me tonight? Please? I don't..." She tore herself away from Luna, pulling her hooves closer to her chest. "Want to be alone. I know you have hundreds of other ponies' dream problems to take care, so I get it if—"
"Say no more. I have no complaints."
"Really?"
"Certainly. You've risked your own life to save Equestria numerous times; a single night is a trivial request."
A genuine smile threatened its way on her lips.
"Thank you."
She stood up, pursing her lips as she tried to think of what they could even do all night. Pinkie hadn't expected Luna to actually say yes.
"Do you like board games?"
"Bored games?" She raised an eyebrow. "Why would one wish to play a game that makes them bored?"
"They don't. They play them to avoid being bored."
"Oh." Luna awkwardly rubbed her hoof against the ground. "That makes more sense."
Pinkie reached under her bed, retrieving the box of emergency board games she kept under there.
For tonight, the creaking was a lot easier to ignore.