Twilight Sparkle shivered and wrapped her wings around her body as she groaned and wondered aloud why it was so cold today. She reached for her blanket, but felt only air. The purple alicorn groaned in a way that only Twilight Sparkle was capable of, and rolled onto her back. She was not prepared for the two-story fall that followed. Panicked, she immediately began flapping her wings in conjunction with quickly turning her body. Her eyes had been shut hard in anticipation of a terrible crash, but while she hit the ground with some force, she stuck the landing with a grace that surprised even her. She blinked rapidly and looked herself over. There was no damage, and after a moment, she processed the smooth landing from a rather short, sudden fall. The novice flyer hopped happily for a moment, thinking that Rainbow Dash would be proud of her if she could’ve seen it. Twilight started to wonder if placing her outside on one of the branches was some prank of Rainbow’s, or some indirect way of teaching her. As she turned around, she noticed that there was no “inside” to speak of as far as the tree she lived in was concerned.
There were no windows, no lights, and no doors. No balcony, no hollowed-out recesses, and no trace of any books. The enormous tree was circled three times to be certain, but no trace of her normal living space or the library remained. She turned, preparing to run in the direction of Carousel Boutique to seek out Rarity’s help, since she was closer than any of her other friends, making her the first choice in spreading word of whatever this was to the others. Before she got three steps in, however, she finally noticed that it was not merely her own tree house which had changed.
Trees spread out in every direction, and the sounds of wolves howling could be heard in the distance. A dense overgrowth of blue flowers that seemed strangely familiar was clearly visible from her position and only then did she notice that the trees themselves were more chaotic, wilder than any tree within a town should be. Confusion overtook the young alicorn as she surveyed the sight before her. She was no longer in Ponyville. That much was certain. Twilight started to panic, but took several deep breaths culminating with her calmly inhaling and bringing her hoof across her chest and swept it out in front of her with an exhale.
“Okay, Twilight, think. Your house is gone, but the tree it is made of seems to be here. The rest of Ponyville is gone with it and nopony else seems to be here.”
She began walking forward, towards the strange blue flowers.
“Is this time magic? No, that can’t be. I already tried that and it was only for a brief period, and it was only for a single target. Alteration magic can’t be done on this sort of scale without somepony noticing, either. Besides which, other ponies would be around TO notice if that’s what this was. This would be easy if I could just find...poison joke?”
The flowers were certainly familiar, and their unusual effects were still vivid in the magic student’s mind. They were varied in size but all possessed large, sky-blue bell-like petals with navy blue dividing lines along their centers and thin, extended stamen ending in ball-like spheres. The plants before her were undoubtedly poison joke, a realization that made Twilight jump back once she had confirmed as much. More howling rang out in the distance, though closer. With the poison joke in mind and the unnatural resonance to the howl, it was an easy deduction that it belonged to a timberwolf; more than one, actually, with an increase in the number of howls which soon followed. Not eager to find out just how many were in this group, she looked towards the canopy of the forest and concentrated with some difficulty on her still relatively new appendages. With effort, she managed to awkwardly climb through the air to reach the upper branches of a tree near what was once her home. She settled on a thick branch near the top of the tree and climbed among other branches until she was above the ceiling of the forest. A sense of dread fell over her, despite her safety now from the creatures in the forest below. The feel of this entire situation was surreal and unnatural, and the lack of any pony nearby troubled Twilight more than she wanted to admit.
She gazed out, and there was little but forest as far as she could see in most directions, save for mountains far to the northwest. One welcome sight was the tall, complex castle that clung to the side of a mountain near its waterfalls, still apparently safe and sound. Twilight sighed in relief. She reared back in preparation of hovering above the canopy of the Everfree Forest, now much more expansive than it should be, when she heard a rustling of leaves immediately behind her. Twilight turned on her hooves with speed and precision that would make even Rainbow Dash proud. She glared towards the direction of the sound with an incandescent purple aura emanating from her horn and teeth gritted. She saw nothing. The lone observer blinked curiously, certain that the sound was not merely her imagination. Whatever it, was there was no longer present, and she began to hope that this was not going to become a common occurrence. Cautiously and slowly, she took to the air but hung low enough to the forest that she could catch an upper branch if her wings failed her. As she hovered towards that mountain range, thoughts of her missing friends flooded her mind along with those of her mentor. She hoped they were all alright, and hoped to find answers upon reaching Canterlot.
It was dusk by the time Twilight Sparkle reached the beginning of the trail leading to Canterlot Castle. Her flying ability had certainly improved during her flight over the Everfree, though the slow and steady pace combined with a need to forage for food and a constant lookout for trouble meant that what might’ve been a much shorter trip took the bulk of the day. Now out of the Everfree Forest, she was tempted to rest. With so many unanswered questions, though, and with Canterlot mere minutes away, she was determined to press on.
The clean and well-maintained gray stone road which punctuated a verdant landscape was now a well-worn dirt path, surrounded by decaying, yellow grass and gnarled graying husks of what were once trees. It unsettled her. She felt that she had stepped into some weird future or past, though she couldn’t reconcile that with her own experience and knowledge regarding time magic. Everywhere she walked now and had flown before, she tended to look all around her, hoping to see somepony although no longer particularly expecting it. She didn’t know if Princess Celestia would have answers for whatever strange affliction had befallen the world, but she would be happy to see the white alicorn regardless. For many reasons. Twilight kept those thoughts in her head as she walked, using them to stay calm amidst what was shaping up more and more by every hour to be a crisis. What troubled the young alicorn was not the crisis itself or even facing it alone nearly as much as not understanding the nature of it.
She soon arrived around the final bend of the mountain between her and the castle entrance. What she saw was consistent with the path until now, but it was still difficult to see. The waterfall, which she only glanced at a distance, was now clearly running thin and with a sickly chartreuse liquid. The grass, trees, and flowers were all dead or dying, much as the vegetation on the preceding path had been, but even more stark compared to her memory was the castle itself. Several of the turrets and battlements had completely crumbled away. The lively patterns of purple and gold that adorned so much of the castle were nowhere to be seen, replaced by architecture decaying and gray, some with wooden supports showing through. The mangled iron portcullis which should have been at the front gate rested on the dead grass some distance away from the gate itself, rusted almost beyond recognition from the polished black set of metal bars that diligently guarded the castle that she recognized. It was not Canterlot. It was not the visage of the proud city that she knew.
This was not the home that she and Shining Armor had known for so many years.
Twilight felt her stomach lurch at her own misgivings, though she continued inside what was left of the castle gate at a brisk walking pace after swallowing and taking a deep breath. She ignored the rest of the city and headed straight for the castle. If she was correct, nopony would be in the city anyway. She had no logical reason to suspect Celestia’s chambers would be any more populated, but she hoped for it just the same. She didn’t want to face what this reality would be if even she wasn’t a part of it.
As she reached the only major road intersection between the gate and the first interior section of castle, she stopped. The sound of very light but unmistakable hoofbeats were right behind her in the street, but as soon as she looked, she saw nothing. There was no delay in her action. There was simply nothing anywhere around her save for dilapidated architecture and a dying ecosystem. The city was silent for all but the sound of wind blowing through it, but it did not feel dead. Nor did it feel alive. It was different from the Everfree; there, life was abundant and clear if not the type she was hoping to encounter. Here was…different. Here, every gust of wind felt like a cold chill running a finger over her bare spine and every sound misheard as a hoofbeat made her want to run. It was not due to loneliness, she knew, though it was probably exacerbated by that. Just the same, she gave in to that desire. She ran.
When she reached the grand stairway at the center of the central tower, she recalled the Grand Galloping Gala. She wore that starry dress for the first time, and Celestia greeted her right where she was standing now. She reminisced on that vivid memory as she slowly walked through what was unmistakably that room, though…wrong. Dust had accrued over many years, though there were no cobwebs. No insects. No sign of anything that would make this seem normal even FOR an abandoned kingdom. She hurried up the stairs towards anywhere, any place, any room that might have SOMETHING other than more questions and more hair-raising emptiness. Within minutes of running up stairs, she arrived at the central throne room hall. It was a tall, grand place with lavender and purple along the ceilings and walls, an excessively long and well-made red carpet leading to the throne itself, and stained glass windows running the length of the hall that were gifts from Ashlar the Kind, when the Classical Era was new. It was a place of elegance and beauty, yet a simple one. This was the hall that Twilight remembered, but not the one before her. What she saw here was a hallway with shattered windows, cracked floors, and no decoration or color of any kind beyond sun-bleached stone and black pillars cracking with gray. She walked towards the empty throne slowly and with a sense of forlornness that she punctuated with a loud sigh. With a heavy heart, Twilight slumped to a sitting position as she looked toward the throne as memories of Celestia, of her brother, of her dear friends flooded into her mind. She wished for just one thing at that moment.
“Somepony…ANYPONY…just talk to me.”
It was a silly, unlikely wish. One from an entirely different world, although one that was as close as yesterday. She was so confused, so alone, and so nervous that she would take solace in nearly anypony’s presence now.
With those words almost still in the air, a reply came to her from close by, the breath hot on her ear. The voice was a mare’s, though uniquely layered and toxic in a way that was familiar.
“And what would you like to talk about, Princess?”
The last word was punctuated with a viciously mocking tone, and Twilight could see a black coat and a flash of bright green out of the corner of her eye.