Frothing waves of oblivion crashed into themselves, raging against the eternal nothingness with a roaring fury that was absolutely silent. This was the Void; the incomprehensible emptiness, the greatest kind of hell unimaginable. Very few had ever ventured into this place, the common bedrock and nexus of the omniverse. An incalculably small number had ever made it out, whether dead, alive, or somewhere in between. Princess Luna’s spirit darted back and forth through the white blackness, her silver essence doing its best to stay together against the inhospitable environment all around. Her attention was divided, however.
Why are you even bothering with this mad quest? Nightmare Moon thought in agitation, Equestria, for the briefest moment, was ours. Ours! Even if we do find dear old Celestia alive, what happens then? We return to Canterlot to continue playing ‘second princess’?
There is no ‘we’, Princess Luna retorted; there will never be a ‘we’ ever again. Why do you even exist anymore? I don’t have any lingering doubts, or buried hatred for Tia, so why do you still plague me with your accursed presence? Why can’t you just go away?
Perhaps you’re in denial? Nightmare Moon’s chuckle permeated Princess Luna’s own. The Elements still bind me, but I think you keep coming back to hear me voice my little opinions because you want to feel guilty. Princess Luna could practically hear her darker half smile, After all, who else can you possibly rely on to be honest to you, to show you your faults, to help make you stronger?
Shut up, Princess Luna said half-heartedly.
Oh please, Nightmare Moon scoffed, Where’s the mare who faced down dragons more than a thousand years ago, who’s powers are considered god-like? Where is the mare who helped to imprison the lord of Chaos in his stony sarcophagus? Is she still here? Or am I just talking to a trembling little filly that can’t wait to stand behind her older sister, so that decrepit, old Celestia can handle the big things while she hides behind her technicolor tail.
SHUT UP! Princess Luna’s thoughts roared throughout her essence, You are nothing without me. You’re nothing but words. You fooled me once when you took advantage of my suffering and stole my body. I will not let you entrap me with your empty mutterings and blatant lies!
Come this way, a strange thought called out to the Princess, The one you seek is this way.
Did you hear that? she asked. There was no reply. The Princess would have sighed if she had been in a corporeal form; Nightmare Moon’s entrances and exits into her consciousness were erratic, but not unexpected, as she had done this before. Perhaps, she mused to herself, her darker persona was always present and was simply waiting for the opportune time to give a deprecating jab, while giving her the silent treatment at other times.
Come this way, the voice repeated, Now is your chance.
A faint point of light appeared in the Void; a true and real light. Princess Luna could feel several very faint but familiar powers come from the tiny portal. One was that of her sister, which caused her to internally scream with joy. She was alive! Her sister was alive after all! The second power confused her momentarily, because it was identical to her own. Something she had created resided in this new place. In a moment, she realized what it was. Before he had been returned to his own universe by the Doctor, the human named Adam had been bequeathed an amulet by the Princess as a gift for his help in rediscovering hers and her sister’s origins, along with the origin of all of Equestria. There also was a large outflow of magic coming from the Void into the universe just across the breach, which was transmitting somewhere very close to her amulet, and consequently Adam.
If I am to enter this branch of reality, she thought to herself, I will need a different form. She reached out with her essence to enter the small window into that other place. Slowly, the natural resistance created by this reality’s initial rejection of a being from another stream ebbed away, allowing the Princess to enter the light, into a very strange world: a home to the race that gave Equestria its chance at life; Earth.
In a small orphanage in Eastern Europe, there lived a young girl. The poor child had been abandoned at said orphanage only a few weeks after she had been born; she was one too many for her family, and she had been born without legs. Within the cold walls of the building she lived in, but never called home, she had spent the last thirteen years of her life. She had had to learn how to be strong for herself, to look after herself nearly to the point of self-sufficience. She would be tossed out into an uncaring world very soon, where she was not expected to survive long given her condition. Her dream of ever being taken into a family had died years ago, and she had no idea where her birth family was, not that she cared to even try and find them. She had never been taught how to pray, and she didn’t know if there was some kind of higher power out there who would listen or even care if she lived or died. She very much doubted it, though. Even so, it was on a milder than usual summer’s evening that she rolled her wheelchair out into the courtyard of the orphanage, and looked for the first star that would come out that night. She did not know how to pray, but she did know how to wish, and even how to hope. She waited as the sun went down in the west, obscured by the heights of the orphanage roof, and finally, the first star twinkled in the deep fuchsia expanse above. With its growing light shining on her face, the young girl wished with all her might. She wasn’t sure of even what to wish for, whether a job, decent food for the next few weeks, love of any kind, or even something as absurd as getting a pair of legs, but she wished all the same for all of it, any of it.
Several minutes passed; nothing happened.
Cynical before her time, the young girl eased her heart’s pain and innocent belief with bitter thoughts that it was stupid to have done such a thing in the first place, thinking that any wish of hers could possibly come true. Before she could fully turn her wheelchair around, a pale light fell on her. As she looked back, unsure of what she would see, hope springing anew anyway, she found herself facing a silvery cloud that appeared from out of a shimmering portal. The young girl began to babble incoherently in her native tongue, wondering aloud if this was one of the nature spirits the old fairy tales spoke of, and if it meant her harm or good. The cloud embraced her, washed over her, and scrutinized her to her very soul. She could feel a warm, tingling sensation reaching through her entire being, from her head right down to her toes. Gasping in surprise, the young girl looked down past her lap to find that the knots in the thread bare jeans that she had always tied off were gone, ripped apart and hanging loose against her thin but very muscular legs. She couldn’t believe what she saw, and as she slowly lifted herself from her wheelchair, it felt as natural as if she had always been able to do so. She looked up at the silvery spirit which had healed her. Slowly, from out of the cloud of clear, beauteous light came the form of a woman. She was clothed in dark and royal purple armor, with shades of darkest ebony and silver scattered throughout her outfit and regal cape. A dark crown graced her head, but it did not compare to the night-like hair that adorned it, which ebbed in an unseen current of stars and emptiness. The young girl could not believe the woman’s alien beauty, but she understood that the woman was something from beyond normal life. She looked middle aged, but the way she carried herself made her seem ancient beyond measure, and unquestionably powerful.
The young girl could feel the woman inside her mind, sifting through thoughts, her memories, what amounted to her life. Taking a sword from her side that the young girl had not noticed before, the alien woman traced the tip of its dark blade against the ground, and from out of it sprung six thick bars of pure gold.
Through her mind, in her own language, the woman spoke to the young girl in a deep but beautiful voice, Use these well. Live well. Peace.
With that, the woman was gone, as she shot into the skies like a shooting star.
The young girl waved after the woman, laughing in pure ecstatic joy as she leapt up and down on her newly made feet, saying over and over again, “Multumesc! Multumesc mult! Thank you! Thank you so much!” She still wasn’t sure if the old tales or talk of spirits were true, but she had found one who had blessed her, and though she never saw the woman again, she told everyone who would listen about the spirit of the stars who had given her her legs.