//------------------------------//
// Chapter 12 
// Story: Them 
// by Ether Echoes 
//------------------------------//

	Two specks careened through infinity. As the new world took shape, one clung to the other and kept it from falling. Like shooting stars, they flitted across the sky in a twinkle of light.

“Let me go!” Hawa demanded. “Firefly, what are you doing?”

Firefly tightened her grip. It was will that glued them together more than any mere physical force, but she wasn’t really in the mood for overthinking it. “Getting answers.”

Hawa struggled to tear away uselessly. “There’s none to be had,” she said, her voice heavy and broken. “It’s finished. Let me rest, please.”

“Not until I find out what’s ‘finished.’ What happened to Rainbow Dash?”

Hawa turned her face away from Firefly’s intense gaze. “She’s gone.”

“Gone? Gone where?”

“Up. Out.” Hawa sighed heavily. “I don’t know—all I know is that she’s gone. There are nine-hundred and ninety-nine of us, now, not a thousand. And I’m already stretched so thin… Firefly, please. I’ve carried a whole world on my shoulders for longer than you can conceivably imagine, and now there’s one less person to share that burden with.”

Firefly stared at her for a long time. “Rainbow Dash… you know what, I don’t have the slightest damned idea what you’re talking about. Start from the beginning, and then we’ll talk about letting you go.”

Hawa shook her head, and did. She told Firefly the truth, the entire truth about their world and the cosmos as it stood—how all things begin with a dreamer who brings the world to be. The purpose of the world divisions. How Rainbow Dash was the next dreamer in line, called to replace Hawa. She told Firefly of her pain in failing to keep the world running and how it eventually fell apart, and how Rainbow Dash, on confronting this truth, refused to participate and perpetuate it.

With her voice near to breaking, Hawa whispered, “So, rather than take her place, she… left. Rainbow Dash peeled off her wants and needs, she denied herself… and whatever remained, the core of who she was, departed where the Traveler had gone. Up and out. Emptiness.”

“The only way to win is not to play, huh?” Firefly muttered.

“Evidently.” Hawa lowered her head. “Are you satisfied?”

“No.”

“I thought not.” Hawa shifted awkwardly in her embrace. “You’ve always been a sort of hungry ghost. You couldn’t sit still through your iterations in my world, so I suppose it was too much to ask for you to sit still here.” She smiled slightly. “Perhaps you are that nagging spark of rebellion within us.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Firefly waved her hoof dismissively. “How do we get her back?”

Hawa shrugged her shoulders. “She is beyond us, in every sense of the word. You might as well ask how an ant signals a passing spaceship. Even if we did, why would she respond? She’s made her decision clear—she refuses, categorically, to perpetuate a system that must end in failure.”

Firefly snorted. “It’s not over until it’s over. The universe hasn’t ground to a halt yet, sister.” She glanced around, perceiving the reality around her as best she could, which was not at all. “She owes me an explanation. Whatever else has happened, she’s still in debt to us, for all we did.”

“I’m not entirely sure that’s how it works.”

“But you’re not sure it doesn’t, right?” Firefly asked with a grin. Hawa gave her a flat stare in return. “Let’s start with the obvious, then: how do we find her fragments?”

Hawa rubbed her face. “Is this how you and Rainbow Dash managed to fight your way to the moon? By stubbornly refusing to accept defeat?”

“Pretty much.”

“All right. Well,” Hawa narrowed her brow. “Normally, when a dreamer is replaced, she goes to sleep and is reborn in the world below. There’s a certain amount of logic in the idea that Rainbow Dash’s fragments have incarnated in some form as well.”

“That’s just the sort of wild guesswork that we need!” Firefly frowned. “How do we incarnate, then, without losing a sense of who we are and what we’re about?”

“The same way I did in the first iteration of my world. Cheat outrageously.” When Hawa lifted her head again, she seemed more solid than before. Perhaps some fragment of Firefly’s spark of determination had lit within her, or maybe she just wanted to get this over with—either way, Firefly exulted. “Vinyl?” she called into the void.

With a disorienting shift, they found themselves plopped down on a dance floor in a large, dark room lit only by flashing stage lights. Vinyl Scratch herself stood at a turntable, her now-multi hued hair in the same spiky style it had adopted in her last earthly identity.

Firefly groaned and flipped back to her feet. She flexed the kinks out of her wings and turned to face Vinyl Scratch. “So. You too, huh?”

“Apparently.” Vinyl shrugged. “I was due after Rainbow Dash, but her Entelecheia tried to foist me into the role instead of herself. You’ve been caught up?”

“As much as I can be. You don’t mind… uh, Rainbow Scratch?” Firefly asked, glancing around uncertainly. “This doesn’t look like a new world.”

“It isn’t. I’ve created a little side world for you to fiddle around in, based on Ponyville, so you don’t cause too much damage.” Vinyl shook her head. “It’s already pretty fragile. As for minding, I don’t know how long my world will last. If you get Rainbow Dash back, my work becomes easier.” She flicked her tail. “Maybe I see her point, too. This is a terrible job, and if there’s a way out… well, let me know how it goes. I’ll drop the incarnations in for you one at a time, but I warn you, they’re not easy to control.” She pointed behind Firefly and Hawa. “Whenever you’re ready, just step through that door.”

Firefly turned to look at a push door with a glowing rainbow “EXIT” sign planted above it. She nodded. “All right.” With that, she turned and walked towards it.

Hawa trotted alongside her, her long, sinuous tail flicking nervously. “Just what is your plan, anyway?”

“You’ve made it clear that Rainbow Dash isn’t going to come back without a reason,” Firefly said, pausing in front of the door. “That she’ll refuse because she doesn’t want to perpetuate the process. Well… I have one guaranteed way to ensure she comes back and talks to me.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m going to take her place,” Firefly said grimly. “I’m going to become a rainbow-maned mare, by taking on what she left behind.”

“Okay, that’s… insane, and I’m pretty sure it won’t work,” Hawa said slowly, “but even if it did, how will that bring her back?”

Firefly smirked. “Spoilers.” She paused with her hoof on the door. “Oh! I forgot something. Just a sec. Vinyl, buddy? There’s something I need.”


* * *


With a resounding clang, Red Dash’s face collided with a cast-iron skillet and she flew back through the air, rebounding from the blow with incredible force. She plowed through several cottages before smashing into a storefront. Quills rained in her wake, and a sofa caught her fall.

Firefly grinned and spun the skillet in her hooves. She looked to Hawa, “Eh?”

Hawa looked at the teeth on the grass, where they had been beaten out by Firefly’s strike. “You and Rainbow Dash are barbarians.”

“We were meant for each other.” Firefly beat her wings and raced ahead. She came down on Red Dash, pinning her to the floor of the shop before she could stand.

Despite the stunning blow, Red Dash snarled and snapped in fury, trying to bite the creature holding her down. Hawa cast a spell to keep her immobile with a reluctant little wave of her horn, its tip lighting up.

Firefly planted her hooves on the struggling emanation’s shoulders and looked down at her. “You’re angry, I can tell.”

“Hah. Hah,” Red Dash spat. “I should have broken that thing over your face a long time ago.”

“You and what army?” Firefly smirked. “But, come on. I’m seriously not here to fight. I know you want to rant and rage and destroy things, I can see that. You’re passion, you’re the hero who saves the day. Thing is, you weren’t allowed to, were you?”

The tension drained from Red Dash’s muscles as Firefly spoke. She turned her head aside. “There’s no point in being a hero,” she muttered. “There’s no way to win.”

“Perhaps,” Firefly conceded. “But just because there’s no hope doesn’t mean we shouldn’t fight anyway. Sometimes, making a stand is just as important as actually winning.”

Red Dash gave her a narrow look. “That’s a stupid platitude.”

“Yeah, it totally, totally is.” Firefly nodded. “But you look like a mare stupid enough to fight for a hopeless cause. How about it?”

The red-maned Rainbow Dash licked her lips uncertainly. She glanced up at Firefly, then at Hawa, and then back to Firefly. Their eyes met and locked. Slowly, a smile spread across Red Dash’s swollen face, and she shifted subtly, her coat turning from blue to hot pink. The differences between Rainbow Dash’s body and Firefly’s were minor, but distinct, and when she spoke it was in Firefly’s clearer tones. “Yeah. Let’s do it.”

Red Firefly vanished, and Firefly’s mane sizzled. She yelped and shuddered. “Whoa. That’s… ow. My face.” She rubbed the side of her cheek, the same one that she had struck on Red Dash.

That’s what you get.

She pulled a lock of mane forward and marveled at the red stripe among her cerulean locks.

“How do you feel?” Hawa asked, watching Firefly uncertainly. “You’re… pretty much a novel creation, after all. No pony in all the cycles has done this before, so I think that an entirely reasonable question for me to ask.”

“Great! Like I could beat a mountain to death.” She glanced around and fixed her eyes on Canterlot Mountain in the distance. As she lifted up to race towards it, though, Hawa snapped a telekinetic field about her tail and held her in place.

“You’re also exploding with borrowed passion,” Hawa said dryly. “Try to remain focused.”

“Oh, right. Uh…” Firefly rubbed her chin. She held it up towards the heavens. “Next track, Vinyl?”

“I’m on it!” her voice boomed from the heavens. The clouds parted, and a celestial DJ lifted a blank record from a turntable and set an orange one in its place.


* * *


Pushing the door open to Carousel Boutique, Firefly frowned as she picked her way among ruined pony forms and shredded bolts of cloth. Together with Hawa, she mounted the stairs and pushed open the door to what had been Rarity’s bedroom, and now served as a silky boudoir. Orange Dash wept dramatically at the dressing table, covered in a ragged cloak.

“Seriously?” Firefly muttered. “I need to deal with Rainbow’s inner Rarity? This is going to su-uck.”

Orange Dash whipped her face around, her unkempt mane hanging around her mascara-stained face. “Oh, like you don’t have a passionate, hyper-feminine side.”

“If I do, she’s totally not as much of a sissy as you are.”

“Firefly,” Hawa warned tightly. She turned to face Orange Dash. “I know you’re… in a bad state, but we need your help.”

“Yes, yes, you wish to join Firefly’s essence with mine in some mad gambit to restore order to the cosmos,” Orange Dash said in a high, mocking voice. “Well, you can forget about it! Rainbow Dash broke my heart. I have no intention of seeing her ever again.”

Hawa stomped a hoof on Firefly’s as the other started to reach for the frying pan strapped to her back and stepped forward. While Firefly danced with pain, she laid a hoof against Orange Dash’s back and sighed. “I know. Rainbow hurt me, too, but I understand why she did it. Now we need to call her back.”

“Why? Let her flit about Nirvana for all time—or whatever passes for time when you’re a transcendental ideal.” Orange sniffed disdainfully. “Besides, it’s not like it matters. She’s right—the world will die.”

“And in the meantime,” Firefly said, glaring at Hawa as she came up to join them, “things have gotten worse. If there’s a solution to this, one that fits everyone, I mean to find it. Rainbow’s solution can’t be the right one—not if it leaves all of us hanging.”

“The world doesn’t need passion or desire.”

“Doesn’t it?” Firefly shook her head. “Maybe. I don’t pretend to know. I think dumping experience like a discarded toy is a terrible idea, though. How can you have led a complete existence unless you’ve experienced all the highs and all the lows? I think that’s why you’re here—you aren’t satisfied.” Firefly waved a hoof around. “Maybe you can’t be satisfied, maybe it’s a carousel that never ends, but I want to find out.”

Orange Dash looked between the other mares and smiled faintly. “You make a good point—more importantly, you appealed to my vanity, and that is a surefire way to win my affection. Do you need me, Firefly?”

Firefly nodded. “Yes, I do.”

Just as Red Dash had done, Orange Dash shimmered and changed, taking on Firefly’s features. “Then, let it be done.”

Orange lightning shot between them, and Firefly yelped as the color orange imprinted itself onto her mane and tail. When it faded, she shook her head, feeling strangely drunk. When she looked at Hawa, she smiled and slid up to her. “You know, you are really gorgeous. I just love the way your mane—”


* * *


Firefly hovered outside the balloon, crossing her forelegs and pouting. “You didn’t have to hit me so hard.”

Hawa snorted indelicately, refusing to face her. They rose towards Rainbow Dash’s cloud house steadily.

“I would have backed off! Besides, it’s not my fault,” Firefly protested. “I have, like, double the desire I had before.”

“Which is why I will forgive you. Eventually.” Hawa flicked her tail and glanced over her shoulder. “Do you really think I am pretty?”

“Uh.” Firefly held her hooves up defensively. “I should clarify that I don’t feel an overpowering urge to jump your bones again—well, not as much—but, yes, you are rather cute.”

Hawa giggled and hopped out of the balloon. Her hooves rested firmly on the vapor in front of the cloud house. “Let’s go.”

Firefly muttered, “Some mares. Sheesh.”

“What’s that?”

“Coming!” Firefly darted into the house after her.

Smashed furniture and pictures covered the floor and crunched under their hooves. They wandered through the halls until they came across a silent figure with a golden mane curled up on Rainbow Dash’s bed, her tail tucked around her.

Firefly stepped forward. “Excuse me—”

Yellow sprang from her crouched position and flattened Firefly to the floor. The latter yelped and squirmed, but Yellow shushed her loudly and pushed her tear-stained face into hers. “Let’s go.”

“Uh. I haven’t given my pretty speech ye—whoa!” Firefly squeaked as Yellow Dash’s features shifted and vanished in one go, the yellow hue forcing itself on her mane and tail. She shuddered and shook as she righted herself.

Hawa laid a hoof on her shoulder. “Are you all right?”

Firefly nodded weakly, her teeth chattering. “Y-yeah. Sh-she w-was just sc-scared… scared and lonely.”

“I guess word is getting around,” Hawa said with a frown down at the detritus under her feet. “How, I have no idea. I wonder if the other colors will be this easy to persuade?”

“Well!” a voice said from the window, held by another simulacrum with a bright green mane over Rainbow Dash’s features. “I, for one, think it entirely reasonable that you want to become me.”

Firefly stepped to the window with a hesitant motion. The imposition of additional fear was not helping her emotional stability anyway, but she swallowed it as best she could. “So… does that mean you’ll help us?”

“I’m not so sure about that,” Green said, squinting at her closely. “You can talk about how relevant you think I am, sure. I’ll enjoy it. The thing is, I don’t know much about your plan. What’s this good for?”

“Taking her place,” Firefly said.

“And? What then? I’m not Red and Orange and stuff.” She shook her head. “How does taking Rainbow Dash’s place change anything?”

“It’s a gamble,” Firefly said quietly, yet firmly. “I’m going to shame her into returning so she can answer to us. She still owes us, and I won’t let her forget that.”

“Well. I guess I, of all ponies, can’t really object to ridiculous ambition. Count me in.” With a rush of green light, the fourth part of Rainbow Dash flooded into Firefly. She bit her lip to keep from crying out and writhed against the tear-soaked bed.

Hawa pulled her back gently. She held Firefly’s head in her forelegs and searched her features with uncertain eyes. “You don’t need to do this. I don’t even know if it will work.”

“Neither do I,” Firefly grunted and pushed her back, though she quirked her lips gratefully. It was a wan smile, but a smile nonetheless. “It doesn’t matter, though. Either I do this or everything I’ve fought for is worth nothing.”

Hawa looked at her for a moment and then nodded. She pulled Firefly into another hug against her squawked protests. “Oh, hush, you bold, beautiful thing. I never got to really tell Rainbow Dash how much I admired her determination, before the end. I… I wish I could be as strong as either one of you.”

Firefly opened her mouth, but closed it thoughtfully. “I probably shouldn’t say much. I’ve just been hit with a double whammy of envy, after all. Still, don’t sell yourself short.” She cuffed Hawa’s shoulder. “You’re here by my side, after all.” She looked out the window at the sky. “Next, Vinyl?”

“Already got you covered.”


* * *


Firefly looked around the desolate landscape. She frowned, feeling a little jarred as she contemplated the jagged rocks and sheer surfaces. “Seems like there should be, I dunno… wind or something.”

“We can’t have everything, dear,” Hawa said as she picked over the stones. “It does seem a little barren for Blue, though. Would she not be compassion and nurturing?”

“Well, we’re about to find out,” Firefly said, pointing ahead at a shape on the rock face above them. While Firefly flapped her way up, Hawa leapt from rock to rock, and together they came to the mouth of a cave high above the ground.

A blue-maned Rainbow Dash sat in front of it patiently, her sad eyes fixed on them. She perked her ears as they approached, and offered a small smile. “Hello, Firefly, Hawa.”

“Hey.” Firefly walked in front of her. “You know why I’m here?”

“Better than you yourself do, I suspect, as I did for Rainbow Dash before you.” She held her hoof out. “I told her something very important, and you are the vehicle in which I shall remind her.”

“If you knew it was going to come to this,” Hawa asked with a frown, “why did you let it happen?”

“Because it needed to happen,” Blue Dash said. “What Rainbow Dash learns in her journey is important, just as it’s important for Firefly to be the one to bring her back.”

Firefly scuffed her hoof and cupped her ears forward. “What do you know? Do you know what we need to do to fix things?”

“I do not,” Blue Dash smiled, “I know only that you will. I have a certain faith in the matter.” Her features slid away, to be replaced by Firefly’s pink face. “Within this cave is the last fragment of what Rainbow Dash left behind. She will be… difficult to move. Are you ready?”

“No.” Firefly shook her head. “But I’ve got to do it anyway.” She took Blue’s outstretched hoof. This time, there was no pain, only a sweet joy that filled her heart and mind. She closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, taking in the acrid scent of the world.

Hawa stepped forward to her side, wordlessly solicitous, but Firefly waved her off with a small smile. “It’s all right. Come on.”

Entering the cave, they found it as barren as the outside, but for the presence of a statue. She sat in the middle of the cavern, her violet hair as immobile as the stone that surrounded her.

“Sheesh,” Firefly muttered. “When she said ‘difficult to move’ I didn’t take her literally.”

Hawa gave her a sour look. “You know, your flippant comments are a little off-putting when the fate of the universe is on the line.”

“Sorry, sorry.” Firefly grinned sheepishly. “I can’t help it. It’s the only way I stay sane through all of this metaphysical garbage.”

“Garbage,” Hawa snorted and tossed her mane. “This is deep and meaningful.”

“As the sum totality of all existence, you are no more or less silly than it is.” Firefly walked up to the immobile fragment and placed her hooves on it. “And, you know what? Reality is pretty ridiculous. Trust me, I’ve been from one end of it to the other by now.”

Lowering herself so that she could look into Violet’s staring eyes, Firefly evened her breathing and prepared her thoughts. “I know what you are. You’re Rainbow Dash’s identity. I have a pretty good idea of why you’re not moving, either.”

Violet Dash did not respond. Naturally.

“She denied you. She taught you that you were irrelevant.” Firefly rubbed a hoof against the impenetrably stiff ear. “You pretty much are, too. Your only relevance is providing identity, and for someone who doesn’t need an identity, what good are you?”

Silence.

“In all that vast… nothingness, whatever, what good are any of us? Rainbow Dash doesn’t need us anymore. In a way, we don’t even need her. She’s gone and we’re going on—the Wheel keeps on turning, for now, and all of us turn with it. One spoke missing, not enough to compromise it.” Firefly sat in front of Violet and held her hooves up. “So… that’s where my plan comes in.”

Hawa leaned forward intently. Vinyl appeared out of the air and watched, tilting her glasses up as she looked at Firefly.

“I’m going to show Rainbow Dash the thing she’s running so hard from,” Firefly said. “I’m going to take her place, and when I do, I’m not going to leave the world or perpetuate it. I’m going to end it. I’m going to break the Wheel.”

Vinyl stared, while Hawa’s gasp filled the cavern. “Uh, Firefly?” Vinyl asked. “Just what are you saying?”

“The only way to win is not to play,” Firefly said, not taking her eyes off the frozen Violet Dash. “Rainbow Dash avoided responsibility for the cycle. I’m going to take consequences to their logical extreme and dare her to come back and find a way to fix them.”

“Holding the universe hostage isn’t a solution, Firefly!” Hawa said sharply. She strode forward. “I trusted you!”

“I have a few objections, myself—” Vinyl started.

Firefly leapt to her feet, her eyes ablaze. “No!” She looked between the two rainbow-maned mares. “You’re right. You are absolutely right. It isn’t a solution. It’s not a solution because there is no solution for any of us here.” She pointed up at the ceiling and it parted, revealing the void. “The only way out of our problem is to look in the one place we can’t—the place Rainbow Dash has gone to!” She spun around, her tail lashing. “And the only way to get her back is to force her hoof. She wanted to avoid this fate so badly? Well, okay. Let’s give it to her and see how she takes it.” She fixed Vinyl with her gaze. “We’re damned either way. Might as well take it on our own terms.”

Vinyl shook her head. “I… really don’t know if I agree with you.”

Firefly turned to Hawa. The alien unicorn’s face was torn, her eyes flicking this way and that. “I… Firefly… we all spent eons trying not to let this happen. We’ve had more cycles of mares changing place than there are years in a cycle.” She stepped forward the rest of the way and looked into her eyes. “We’ve asked the question of what we should do before, and never took this seriously as an option. Why should we do it now? What’s changed?”

“I have,” Firefly said, “and so has Rainbow Dash. You said it yourself… I’m a unique creation, and so is she.” She rested her hoof against Hawa’s face. “I’m sorry. I loved living in your world—even after I got kicked out, I still thought it was beautiful. I think there could be many more beautiful worlds to come. We won’t survive long, though, if we aren’t complete. We either take a stand now, or we whimper out of existence.”

Hawa sighed. She tilted her head forward and gently nuzzled Firefly’s cheek. “All right.”

Vinyl’s shoulders slumped. “Well. Guess we did have a good run.”

“So…” Firefly turned towards the violet-maned figure. “What say you? One last blaze of glory?”

She found herself looking into her own eyes, reflecting back at her with fierce determination. Iron-shod hooves gripped her shoulders. “Now you are speaking my language.”

Firefly howled as she united with the last shard of Rainbow Dash. Awareness flooded into her, the certain knowledge and perception of generations of souls filtered through every form of consciousness imaginable. The earth, such as it was, shook and cracked under her, then vanished entirely in a burst of multicolored flame. Firefly flashed to the mountainside, then up its slopes, hardly seeming to breathe between stops as she crossed distance without bothering with the intervening points. She passed through the ring of stones and stood before Vinyl Scratch.

Reaching down, she grabbed the sleeping mare and chucked her bodily off the mound into the pond beside it, where Vinyl spluttered and splashed. She pulled herself out and glared at Firefly with subdued annoyance. “I was getting up.”

“Sorry! Time waits for no mare.” Firefly settled herself down on the mound. “Call it Dash’s impatience combined with mine.”

Hawa stepped up from the garden and smiled. “More like your mutual rudeness.” She tossed her mane and looked down at Firefly as the newly minted dreamer put her head between her legs. “Firefly?”

“Yeah?”

“If this doesn’t work out… well, I’m sorry for casting you out. I wish I’d been able to help you.” She smoothed Firefly’s new striped mane back. “If it does… I’d like to get to know you better, if I can.”

“Deal.” Firefly smiled, and closed her eyes. Slumber took her.

As for the world she crafted, she kept it very simple. No chance at all to mess it up. It would endure for eternity, with no loss of energy or purpose. Light and darkness, spirit and matter, all of it mixed together until there was only one thing left: a monument. A tomb, even, or perhaps a grave marker. There would never again be a need for the Wheel to turn.

On it was written one thing, in the language of the Book. Space and time writ into a condemnation against the black. It read, and would read for all time:


Rainbow Dash, the Destroyer of Worlds








Well, Rainbow Dash thought, isn’t that just peachy.







The sign reading “THIS IS A DREAM” flickered fitfully in the cloud bank. The sun, too, shuddered and trembled before settling down on the horizon. It could have been rising or setting; no one could say.

“We’ve come a long way since meeting here for the first time, haven’t we?” Firefly called. “It only seemed like a few weeks, but it’s been so much longer than that. So many eons since it was just you and me, planning on how to fix our lives and stop the meddling Them.”

“Past the point that time’s meaningful, Firefly.” Rainbow Dash flexed her legs and wings experimentally. “Nice hair.”

Firefly rolled her eyes up to look at a rainbow lock and grinned. “Looks wrong on me, honestly.” She regarded Rainbow Dash. “And you look exactly the same as you did before. Isn’t that essentially impossible?”

“I don’t really have limits like that, Firefly.” She shook her head. “Well, you’ve done it. You’ve given final death to the entire world soul, all to send a message to me.” Rainbow sat down and folded her forelegs. “Here I am.”

“I have questions, and I think you owe me answers,” Firefly said. She twirled her frying pan and frowned down at it. “I can’t really smack you around with this anymore, can I?”

“Not in any meaningful fashion, no. I’m here because I choose to be.” Rainbow ran a hoof through her mane. “Ask away.”

Firefly sat across from her. “I’m going out on a limb and saying it wasn’t pride that brought you back. I can’t imagine you feel shame at what the other Travelers think of you.” She huffed a sigh. “Nor about anything else, for that matter.”

“That’s not a question.” Rainbow Dash smiled. “I suppose it’s several, actually. Am I devoid of emotion? No—I can choose to have emotions if I like. Did I come because of some sense of pride or shame?” She regarded Firefly quietly for a moment. “No. I did what I believed to be the right thing and it would be inconsistent of me to insist otherwise.”

“Why’d you come, then?”

“Because I left for a reason, and now you’ve rendered that meaningless.”

Firefly tilted her head. “I wouldn’t think a perfect being would care about such a thing.”

Rainbow Dash snorted. “Liar. If you believed that, you wouldn’t have rolled the dice.”

“Dice implies I could have lost.” Firefly crossed her forelegs. “I don’t care how immortal and transcendent you are; you came from somewhere, and that had to mean something to you.”

“Heh.” Rainbow Dash leaned back. “Yeah. I suppose it does. So, yes, I care. I care about everypony left behind.”

“Great!” Firefly grinned. “Now fix it.”

“Oh, that’s cute. You break it, so I’m obliged to fix it?”

Tapping her hoof on the cloud, Firefly pretended to think it over for a moment and then nodded. “Yup.”

With a groan, Rainbow Dash rubbed her face. “How I ever let you talk me into anything, I don’t know…”

“To be frank, we were both pretty much idiots at the start of this,” Firefly pointed out. She smiled. “I still look fondly on that time, though.”

“Yeah.” Rainbow chuckled. “Maybe I was terrified out of my mind most of the time, but I felt really alive. I had a purpose, then, I had ponies who loved me. I had you, my special friend in the twilight. The weight of the universe had only just begun to settle, and I was kind of stupid so I didn’t really get the full consequences anyway. Blah blah, ignorance is bliss, fond memories of our infancy.”

Laughing, Firefly reached forward and punched Rainbow’s leg. “Yet, here we are again. Just the two of us.” She smirked. “Shows how far we’ve come, huh?”

“Yeah. I guess.” Rainbow Dash looked at her thoughtfully. “Did you ever wonder how you got to be there in the first place? To know Their Plan and all.”

“I’m guessing neither my charming good looks nor my winning personality did it?”

“Hah.” Rainbow rolled her eyes. “No. It’s because you’re the part of us who couldn’t stand to give up. You’re the spark that never dies.” She rubbed her leg. “You’re me, telling me how wrong I am, how the world isn’t fair and that the only person who has the responsibility to change it is me.”

“Am I?” Firefly smiled. “Well. I certainly agree. You are wrong, and you do have a responsibility to change that.”

“What is there left to do, though? I asked everyone who ever lived or would live. I asked the Traveler.” She spread her forelegs. “Now it’s over. If you changed the dream and started it, Vinyl or another rainbow-maned mare would just finish it.”

“I’m sorry, Rainbow Dash, but the only one who can answer that now is you. I spent everything getting you here.” Firefly reached out and took her hooves. “We carried you on our backs to the mountain, and now we’re asking you to carry us on yours. We’re empty and lost. Please… find some way to guide us.”

They sat like that for a long time, such as time can be reckoned.

“It all starts with ignorance, doesn’t it?” Rainbow asked. Firefly jumped, startled by the sudden sound after so deep a silence. “I mean… every time the dreamer goes to sleep, the world soul awakens and busies itself. It starts from the beginning, worms its way through possibilities uncounted, and eventually shuts down.”

“Uh.”

“Sorry.” Rainbow Dash shakes her head. “I got a little carried away. What is the one thing that They always tried to prevent?”

“People finding out that They exist,” Firefly answered at once. “Because once people knew about Them, Their ability to do anything about them was limited.”

“Right.” Rainbow Dash nodded. “So what if everyone knew They existed? What then? We couldn’t tell everyone about it because They could just cut us out of the picture, before… but They can’t do that, now. They can’t affect me, and They are you so They certainly can’t do that.”

“Isn’t that how Hawa’s first world worked? Firefly asked skeptically. “I don’t remember that ending well.”

“All Hawa did was teach people how to ask her for things, and she performed it through the Entelecheia. Always, she acted as the intermediary. I’m not proposing giving people power over the Entelecheia, just… telling people the truth and letting them decide for themselves what they want to do.”

“That… will pretty much destabilize the world at once, won’t it?” Firefly asked.

“It will,” Rainbow said with a nod, “but does it matter? It’s the only way to be equitable.”

“I guess that’s really the end of… well, everything, though, isn’t it?” Firefly shook her head. “What’s the point of the dreamers if people are just going to know everything? There’s no need to keep them in ignorance.”

“No need at all.” Rainbow sucked in her breath. “Which is why I’m going to teach them how to leave.” She nodded firmly. “I’m going to accept the end. We’re going to accept the end. We’re going to end ignorance, then we’ll end desire, and we’ll all leave together to be free.”

Firefly stared. “What? But… how? I mean, I thought only you could do that. You had this whole thing where you ripped your colors out one by one and denied them.”

“I know.” Rainbow nodded and smiled. “But that’s the thing. I think I know why I came back. I mean, the proximate cause is that you called me back, but ultimately, why did I come back?” She spread her hooves out. “Because it’s incomplete. The work isn’t done. I left pieces of myself behind, unsatisfied pieces that demanded I come back. I left you. I left Hawa and Vinyl. I left nine-hundred ninety-seven other rainbow-maned mares and everypony back in Ponyville and beyond.”

“You mean… taking all of us with you?” Firefly stared at her. “I mean… what’s that even like? You seem so different, Rainbow Dash, but you’re so much the same. Honestly, I was expecting you to be this stiff… other.”

Rainbow Dash got to her feet. “What I’ve seen, beyond the veil…” She shook her head. “I can’t really describe it to you, Firefly, though I’ll try. It’s not just nothingness—it’s freedom.” She lifted her face and closed her eyes. “I could go anywhere, do anything, imagine anything. It was like being the Dreamer, but without all of the pain and suffering. No expectations, no anxiety… all but for the one little snag that you all were stuck here.”

“All together as one,” Firefly murmured. “It does sound nice. Could we end it if it wasn’t too our liking?”

“Liberty means freedom to choose. What you do then… well, I don’t know, but I’m going to try and find out.” Rainbow took a deep breath. “I’m almost wondering if this is a mistake. We’re just ending the Wheel again, in a different way.”

“Maybe.” Firefly rose. “I pulled for a third option, though, a way out of the impossible choice. If this is it, well… I’m willing to find out, too.”

Rainbow reached her hoof out to Firefly. “I will make an oath, then, and bind myself to you. So long as one soul is unenlightened, I will never leave. I commit myself to descend to earth and remain there, to be the last one out the door.”

Firefly grinned and clapped her hoof against Rainbow’s.  “And I’ll be right there beside you.” The sound resounded throughout the dreamscape, a ringing note of finality.

They pulled one another into an embrace, and Rainbow felt tears touch her face. She’d become a part of the world again, letting it touch her. It didn’t matter, though. One long task had been put behind her, that of reclaiming the seat of the dreamer, and now another lay ahead of her. To enlighten the world, and free them of their burdens forever. Boy, do I take the easy jobs or what?

“Firefly?” she asked. “One request.”

“Yeah?”

“I’d like it if everypony incarnated back as they were in Ponyville when we left.” Rainbow said. “We can bring back the lost unicorns, and Crimson Charger, and the Lost… we’ll find room for them. I think everyone deserves their chance.” Rainbow laughed softly. “There’s something they should be present for, anyway.”

“Done, and done.” Firefly blinked at her. “And what’s that?”


* * *


Morning in Ponyville shimmered. From the rustling branches of the Everfree Forest to the misty blue mountains to the canyons to the rivers, it glowed in the light of the sun. Today, of all days, it was packed to capacity and beyond, a hundred times over, filled with guests that, once upon a time, would have looked strange. Unicorns never seen living mingled with those long thought dead and buried and the residents of the little town. They talked over coffee, they ate pie, they danced and sang, they wondered and they wept for the simple joy of sensation.

At Sweet Apple Acres, in the field in front of the barn, pegasi strung streamers from tree to tree, while unicorns erected poles and decorated a great tent and earth ponies raised a stage and chairs. Applejack belted orders at the top of her lungs, while the former Queen of the Lost issued countermands and conflicting orders, her face fresh with youth and her mane done up under her crown. Twilight Sparkle laughed and chatted with the three other Princesses, who all made room for the blue-maned Oracle as she sat between her daughters.

In the farmhouse kitchen, Rainbow Dash scrunched her face as she watched the preparations taking place outside, a strange feeling settling in her gut. In a way, this is all pretty ridiculous. Everypony here knows it’s ridiculous. What does it matter anymore? We all know the truth. We all know this world is just an illusion.

Rarity tugged on her tail. “Rainbow, darling, we aren’t finished yet. Get over here and stand still.”

She sighed and allowed herself to be roped back to the stool Rarity setup for her, holding a leg out so the unicorn could take additional measurements. “I thought you already knew my dress size.”

“Well, yes, but this is a very special dress. We can’t have even the slightest error.”

Fluttershy sewed away merrily in the corner, giggling. “It’s okay, Rarity. I think we’ve got it.”

“Got it?” Rarity fumed. “This is to be the first celebration of its kind, ever! We can’t let it slide! It would be a crime of unthinkable proportions!”

“Thanks for reminding me that I have my work cut out for me in freeing you of your desires and needs, thanks,” Rainbow Dash muttered. “And we’ve had… weddings before.”

Rarity pricked Rainbow with a pin, and pouted when it failed to elicit a reaction. “Yes, but never one like this. How many young stallions and mares dropped their commitments after you and Firefly told us the truth?”

“I made a promise. One I failed to keep. I don’t plan on doing that again,” Rainbow Dash said quietly. “And I want to live the life I never could have had, before it’s time to go.”

The door burst open and the Cutie Mark Crusaders burst in. Each of them wore a flower girl’s dress and flowers in her mane. They were followed by the blonde unicorn filly in her own gown. All four lit up grins and grabbed Rainbow Dash. “Come with us, sis!” Scootaloo announced. “Firefly wants a word with you!”

“Girls—!”

“No, it’s okay,” Rainbow Dash laughed and waved off the crowd of fillies. “All right, let’s go.” She trotted out with them, looking around as she went. She saw Crimson Charger helping lift Vinyl Scratch’s heavy equipment toward the stage, the crimson-maned musician’s tail flicking excitedly.

“Just a little lower! And don’t crush Mosh Pit!”

“I thought death was irrelevant now, or something?” Mosh Pit asked uncertainly, turning a little more green than usual as he eased an enormous speaker into location.

“Yeah, but it’s messy and inconvenient.” Vinyl grinned. “Come on, you wuss. You have nothing to fear now. Take a chance!”

Rainbow snickered. I think there might be another wedding in a few short days, Rarity. She hurried on, passing a gaggle of other rainbow-maned mares as they marveled over a table stuffed to overflowing with Pinkie Pie and the Cakes’ catering. Some had found Applejack’s supply of stuffed apple pies and were happily gorging themselves.

Soon the Crusaders led her to the barn, and she frowned. “What’s Firefly doing over here?” she asked as she paused in the doorframe. As she turned to look at the girls, though, she saw them fleeing in all directions, just in time for a massive hoof to hook her around the neck and draw her into a deep, powerful kiss.

For all her enlightened power, Rainbow Dash felt her strength sapped away. She melted gleefully into the limbs of Big Macintosh, molding herself against his great red bulk. “Mm,” she murmured as they pulled away for air later, “I’m pretty sure there’s a tradition against the groom seeing the bride right before the ceremonies.”

“If there’s one thing you taught me, Rainbow,” Big Macintosh said into her ear, “it’s that traditions don’t mean a thing.” He then proceeded to nibble at that ear, which sent a new wave of squirmy heat down Rainbow Dash’s spine. She giggled and pushed at him futilely, not protesting terribly hard as her neck and mane were aggressively nuzzled.

“I just wanted to say…” Big Macintosh said slowly as they cuddled one another in the shade of the barn, “I know you’ve been through a lot. You’ve changed a lot, yourself and all of us combined. It’s never gonna be the same sorta marriage it mighta been, I know.”

Rainbow shook her head. “No. But…”

“But it don’t make it meaningless,” he finished for her with a broad smile. “I don’t care what you’ve become, Rainbow. To me, for the next while, you’re my beautiful wife, who I fought to heaven and back for. After that, well… we can talk about you bein’ the great teacher or whatever. I just want to have a few good years with you. Like nothin’d ever changed.”

Rainbow Dash nuzzled up under his chin and rested her head there. “Yeah… me too. I… heh. You know, I bet Orange is crowing right now.”

“Who?”

“Long story, tell you later.” She smiled. “That’s the thing about desires, though, don’t you see?”

He tilted his head curiously.

“The problem with desire is that you fear losing the things you want so bad that you blind yourself to the truth. You don’t see how it’s tearing your life apart to fight and struggle against something that will end.” She looked up at him. “That’s the ultimate lesson. There’s nothing wrong with desire all by itself, so long as you’re willing to let go when it comes time.”

“All this is gonna end.” He nodded. “But, yeah, it don’t mean we have to let it slide by and not enjoy it while we can.” He flicked an ear and grinned down at her. “Hey, maybe there’s somethin’ to this great spiritual teacher thing.”

Laughing, Rainbow Dash smacked him in the ribs. “Oh, don’t you start cracking jokes. I’ll make you pay for it.”

“Well, I plan to make you the mother of my foals, so I’m sure I’ll have plenty to pay for.” He smirked and nibbled at her ear again.

Rainbow Dash’s face turned bright red. She giggled and kissed him again. “You will pay for that. I’ll see to it. Now, contain yourself until after the ceremony. Imagine if somepony came in and found us.”

“Yeah?” Big Macintosh closed his legs around her. “I’d like to see ’em dare and object.”

“Tsk tsk,” Rainbow Dash said, abruptly standing in the door a few feet away. “Nope, I’m afraid your punishment begins now. Lesson two: never think you can contain somepony who transcends space and time!”

“Oh? Well.” He leaned back and crossed his lower legs. “We’ll see who contains who tonight, then.”

Rainbow blushed again. Then she stuck her tongue out at her husband-to-be and ran out giggling.

Almost immediately, she ran into Hawa and Firefly, who were trotting along their way to visit Twilight and the Princesses from their course, who were even now being joined by a laughing Discord. The two rainbow-maned mares exchanged glances and grinned at one another. “Having a little prenuptial conjugation, Dashie?” Hawa asked gleefully.

Rainbow Dash brushed her mane back. “I don’t know what you two are giggling about. I’m a completely awesome and dignified mare who would never do anything like that where dozens of ponies might accidentally see. They’d be blinded by how much cooler I am than they.”

“Mmhmm.” Firefly rolled her eyes. “More like they’d all get to see how you like it when a stallion really takes charge of you.”

“You take that back.”

“Make me!” Firefly grinned.

Hawa laughed and stepped between them as the two pegasi spread their wings and planted their noses together in mock aggressive. “Ladies, ladies! Let’s not fight. Let’s not ever fight again, in fact.”

“Ever?” Firefly rolled that around in her mouth. “I dunno. I like a little tussle with a cute mare now and then.”

Rainbow laughed uproariously as Hawa spluttered and covered her mouth in shock. “I think I’ll leave you two alone.” She chortled still as she wandered off, hopping onto a low-hanging cloud and drifting south a ways, towards the Everfree Forest, so she could get a better view of the preparations.

She smiled down at the little ponies as they busied themselves. In just a few short years, the world will fall apart and be replaced with a new one. Or, perhaps, the same one over again—after all, we don’t have to worry about trying new combinations anymore. Maybe we’ll change it up, just for the heck of it, but I get the feeling we’re going to be sticking with Ponyville and Equestria for a long time.

Each new iteration will have fewer and fewer ponies. More of them will go on, and where they go no pony really knows. They’ll be free, though, wherever they are. Free to be whoever or whatever they want, with no one telling them what they should like or hate or love. No one holding them down, no one tearing their lives apart.

Then, one day, it’ll be just me and Firefly. We’ll sit together on the clouds by the silly neon sign and we’ll tell each other old stories. We’ll hug one last time, and then we’ll walk out together. The door will close on one era, and open on the next.

She puffed the cloud up and rested her head on it, murmuring softly. “That era won’t be just another cycle, though. Not just another little change. It’ll be a time when everypony is her own person, well and truly, now and forever.”

Her shadow stretched out, forming thin copies of herself. The Entelecheia rose up from the cloud and regarded her with Their silent gaze.

“I have one last task for you,” Rainbow told Them. “Go. Return to the Book. Burn it. Break the mountain down to powder, roll up the entire superluminal world, and seal the gate of the moon. The Wheel is broken, and we will all be freed from it. We don’t need Them anymore—we have each other.”

And, so, one by one, They left, never to return.

Rainbow Dash rose from her cloud and glided back over the celebration. She opened her mind and saw the world beneath her, turning under the watchful gaze of sun, moon, and stars.

Then she smiled, closed her mind, tilted her wings, and fell back to earth. She had a wedding to attend.

The world could wait.


* * * * * * *



THE END