Matryoshka

by FlanChan

One, Two, Three, Four!

Grey.

That’s the color of what the sky was: grey.

Pinkie Pie didn’t like it when the sky was grey. She liked it when it was warm and blue and she felt happy just looking at it. When it was grey she just wanted to sit inside and do nothing all day. It was really depressing. In fact, that’s what Pinkie wanted to do right then. She wanted to go back inside and fall asleep or read or write some poems or something. But she had to be out of bed today, even though she didn’t want to be. She told herself she had to be up.

Spike had said that Twilight Sparkle went through this every once and awhile, and that it wasn’t anything to worry about. He said she was just going through one of her “episodes”, and it wasn’t too big of a deal. He was the only one that knew of these incidents because this was the first time Twilight had had one in Ponyville, even though they had lived there so long. He seemed used to dealing with it all at this point. Twilight would be fine.

But Spike wasn’t around this time. He had left for some sort of important business in Trottingham. Or Canterlot. Or Manehattan. Pinkie couldn’t remember. She wasn’t even sure if the business was important. But what was important was that Twilight was left to fend for herself, and from what Pinkie could see it wasn’t going well.

He had left a week or so ago, and none of the ponies had seen much of Twilight since then. Not that it was very happy when someone did see her. She was a lot grumpier than usual, and her hair was frazzled. She liked slamming doors in peoples’ faces now, too. Her cheeks were always hot and her steps shaky and her breathing short and ragged.

It would make sense if it was just a fever, but Fluttershy already said that a fever wasn’t exactly an illness that you would call an “episode” when a pony got one. Besides, the word episode is usually used for mental freak outs or something. Fluttershy told that to Pinkie when the pink pony went to go get the pegasus to bring her to Twilight’s house. She wanted to try and make Twilight feel better. Fluttershy didn’t really want to go, but Pinkie made her come along anyway.

And now there they were, standing side by side a good twenty feet away from Golden Oaks Library. It was a foggy and dull day. The sky was grey. Pinkie Pie didn’t like anything about it. Fluttershy was more terrified of the ominous fog than upset about what color it was.

“Are you sure about this?” Fluttershy asked, her eyes filled with more worry than usual, which was saying something.

“C’mon Fluttershy, it’s just Twilight. What kind of thing could be wrong with her that would be scary?” Pinkie reasoned, her mind always on the bright side of things. She smiled as she said it, although she wasn’t really in the mood to smile. The grey atmosphere dulled the ponies’ colorful coats. She continued forward towards the library door, and after a moment’s hesitation Fluttershy followed.

The two ponies quickly arrived with no trouble. Pinkie knocked on the door once. Then twice. Then three times. Then four.

“Do you think she’s not home?” Fluttershy asked. “Because if she doesn’t answer, we can always head back.”

“Of course she’s home, silly! And she hasn’t come out for days, which is why we’re here in the first place!” Pinkie turned back to the dull wooden door to knock again, but decided instead to use the more aggressive approach of inviting herself in. The door put up little resistance to being pushed open, save for a sickeningly loud creaking noise as the out of practice hinges were put back to use.

Sunlight streamed into the darkened rooms, illuminating a dusty, unorganized living space. It hardly even looked like anyone lived there. It closer resembled an abandoned house like in scary stories than the comforting library everyone was used to. Gone was the warm welcoming glow the two ponies would have given anything to see.

“T-Twilight?” Pinkie called out, her voice uncertain, after she remembered why she had come in the first place. Fluttershy ducked behind the door frame, although the outside of the house wasn’t any more welcoming than the inside.

“I really don’t think she’s home. Let’s go,” Fluttershy asserted, although her shakiness showed that she wasn’t nearly as confident as she was trying to be.

“Twilight!” Pinkie called out again, choosing to ignore the quiet pleas behind her. She was met with more silence, save for the sound of Fluttershy’s worried trembling. Pinkie advanced forward into the dank library, and after a split second Fluttershy squeaked and followed after her, not wanting to be separated.

The two mares treaded lightly, investigating every room they could see, but Twilight was nowhere to be found. Pinkie double checked the kitchen, just to be sure, and stole a cookie or two for good luck.

“Do you think she’s upstairs?” the pegasus asked after a minute or two of more fruitless searching. The two ponies’ heads turned upward to see the staircase that they had simply overlooked before.

“It’s not that unheard of to be in your room when you’re sick, right?” Pinkie offered. She moved towards the wooden staircase and lifted her hoof to begin her ascent. She hesitated for a moment or two, then uncertainly stepped onto the first step. She tested its weight, and when she was confident enough of it, she climbed up the rest of the stairs.

“Are you sure we shouldn’t go home? I don’t want to disturb her if she’s sleeping.” Pinkie turned to look at Fluttershy. It was weird how the colors were so muted everywhere. It was like everything was gray scale.

She answered by gently pushing the bedroom door open, prepared for the worst. Fluttershy squeaked and hid behind Pinkie before she could see. She hadn’t seen anything yet, but she was terrified at what could be. What if Twilight turned into some sort of monster or something? What if Twilight got mutated?

When she finally gathered enough courage to lift her head from Pinkie’s dull coat, she was attacked. Not by a monster or a mutant, but by something else. Her eyes were being absolutely battered by the bright neon yellow colors inside the bedroom contrasting against the dusty grey color of everything else she was used to.

"Twilight?" Pinkie whispered with the same uneasy tone as if she was investigating a pitch black room, even though the bedroom was the most vibrant place she had been in for a long while. She took an unsteady step into the room. She wasn't sure why she was so scared. Twilight probably was resting in bed and decided to magically color the room neon yellow at one point to brighten her mood. There was simply no other explanation.

After taking a short moment for their eyes to adjust, the two ponies saw their friend huddled on the ground across the room. She was shuddering visibly and was right in the middle of what looked like a whirlwind of paper and books, ink spilled everywhere and staining most of whatever she had written. Twilight didn’t seem to notice that the other two entered.

“Oh, thank goodness. She’s just been studying,” Fluttershy whispered, not wanting to interrupt. She heaved a sigh of relief and took a step forward. The moment her hoof connected with the floor, the unicorn’s head whipped around to face the two mares in her doorway, who were instantly taken aback by her appearance. Her mane was frazzled, and her coat was matted and uneven. In some places her fur clumped together from lack of care, and in other places it looked like she had ripped out chunks of hair completely.

The most disturbing thing, though, was her face. There were dark circles under her eyes that were so bad the two could easily see her veins through her skin. Under the dark circles were solid black dot markings, along with some lines along the ridge of her muzzle. It wasn’t clear whether they were self-induced, though there was a high likelihood of that being the case considering how neatly they were shaped. Her eyes were wide and manic, twitching rapidly. Her pinhead sized pupils were trained rabidly on the butter and pink ponies that intruded. Fluttershy ducked behind Pinkie again.

“T-Twilight?” Pinkie asked, inching towards her with as much caution as approaching a rabid animal. “Are you alright?” She reached out a hoof, but Twilight fearfully swatted it away. After a moment of blank staring, the unicorn slowly brought her hooves to her temples

“M-my head hurts…” she mumbled. She almost resembled a disgruntled foal. She fearfully glanced at the clock on her wall, then darted them away just as fast. She continued stealing quick looks at the ticking clock. “Time is passing, but the clock is stuck at four. Aah, five two four…”

Pinkie threw a glance back at Fluttershy, who was slowly emerging from her hiding space out of curiosity.

“Oh, Twilight, you must have been studying for so long! Maybe you should go get some slee--” Pinkie was abruptly cut off when Twilight forcefully shoved her against the wall, shaking her shoulders wildly a few times.

“I gotta tell you something, alright? Promise you won’t tell anyone, okay?!” Twilight’s expression was as wild and serious like when she forgot to send her friendship letter to Princess Celestia way back when. Pinkie nodded, a bit uncertain.

Twilight leaned in close to her ear. “Don’t tell anyone, but the world is gonna turn upside down.”

Pinkie Pie was taken aback, chancing another look at the mare at the doorway, silently pleading for help. Fluttershy wasn’t able to decipher the meanings of Twilight’s words any more than Pinkie could, unfortunately.

“H-hey, Twilight,” Pinkie started with uncertainty, forcing a smile, “What were you up studying? Was it like ancient rituals or something? Those marks on your face are pretty cool!”

Twilight stared back at her like a little foal who was being treated like an idiot and wasn’t too happy about it. Her cheeks turned red with anger and she backed off a bit.

“A message I’ve thought much too much about. Maybe it’ll reach somebody, who can say?” she answered in a surprisingly normal fashion. “Certainly, I’ve always been this way: a patched up, crazy matryoshka.”

“Aw, don’t be so hard on yourself! What kind of message do you mean, anyway? I mean, you always over think stuff, so what’s the big deal about it?” Pinkie replied, choosing her words less carefully than she should have. Twilight turned back to her, her eyelid twitching. There was a pause.

“Snowball trees and raspberries! Great parades and marades and scarring!” Twilight shouted out after a few moments of silence, back to her insane self. She walked back to her corner of papers and books, laughing like a maniac that had just told the funniest joke ever. She bobbed her head back and forth to the beat of some inaudible tune, though her neck always twitched a little too far every time she nodded to the left. Pinkie watched for a moment, then hesitantly regrouped with Fluttershy a few feet away.

“What do we do now?” Pinkie asked in a hushed tone. “I have no idea what’s wrong with her, so I have no idea how to fix it! You’re the nature expert, don’t you know anything about illnesses like this?” Fluttershy bit her lip and looked to the floor. She winced as Twilight’s distant laughter cut into the conversation.

“Mental conditions are hardly my forte…” she mumbled, her tail swishing anxiously. “And, u-uh, I think we should go. There’s nothing we can do here.” The pegasus turned and slowly moved towards the exit before being stopped abruptly by Pinkie yanking her back.

“We can’t just leave Twilight here! We have to help her in any way we can! Even if we can’t get her… functioning like normal, we still gotta make her somewhat normal!” Pinkie reasoned, squeezing Fluttershy’s cheeks with her hooves to maintain her attention. There was a pause, in which the only sounds were Twilight’s muffled mutterings in the background.

“Well, what do you suppose we do? She seems to be pretty… far gone…” Fluttershy muttered, her eyes glued to the floor.

“If you can’t beat ‘em, join them!” Pinkie responded, her tone much too happy for the situation. She giggled a few times. “Okay, that doesn’t really work in this situation, but I don’t have much else.”

“Actually…” Fluttershy mumbled, her eyes growing wide in realization. “That’s it! We just have to pretend like we agree with whatever she’s doing, and then maybe she’ll trust us enough to open up!”

“Huh?”

“It’s like working with a frightened little baby bunny,” Fluttershy explained. “It’s frightened, so it doesn’t want to listen to you or associate with you in any way. But if you just show it that you’re a friend, it’ll warm up to you and let you help.” Her kind smile faltered a little. “But remember, you gotta be veeery cautious with what you say. You don’t want to set her off at all.”

“Okey dokey!” Pinkie smiled. Everything seemed bright at that moment, but then they turned back to the unicorn across the room. It looked like she had started drawing pictures of buildings and cities and taping them on the wall at the edges of her shadow, muttering to herself the whole time. Her ear twitched at their approach, but she didn’t let it distract her from her work.

“H-hey Twilight!” Pinkie started, her voice nervous yet oozing with false friendliness. “Whatcha doin?” Twilight frowned more, taping the drawings in a more aggressive manner. She twitched her tail a little, squeezing her eyes shut when the two ponies didn’t leave.

Pinkie and Fluttershy exchanged worried glances for a few moments. Hopefully they hadn’t messed up whatever chance they had.

“We can help you with that, if you want,” Fluttershy offered. Twilight’s movements stopped immediately. After a moment of being completely frozen, she slowly turned her head around to face the pegasus. Fluttershy was finally able to get a good view of how unkempt Twilight’s face was, and she had to desperately fight the urge to turn away. She gulped, sweat forming from the awkward pause, though she still kept up her smile.

“You and me, rendezvous?” the unicorn finally spoke, her eyes full of amazement as if Fluttershy was the first living thing to offer her kindness. “Rendezvous? Rendezvous?”

“Y-yeah! Rendezvous!” The pegasus nodded awkwardly. Pinkie stood to the side, observing the conversation with interest.

“Oh, or out on a hopping adventure?” Twilight’s eyes widened, the smile of a wonderstruck filly dancing on her lips. She was practically jumping from excitement. She shakily got to her hooves, then did a half-skip for a few feet. “With a crooked gait, one-two, one-two!”

While still a bit unsettled, Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy were a little happy at the progress they had made.

"So, rahn-de-voo...?" Pinkie asked, hoping she was in the position to start poking and prodding at Twilight's sickened mind. She also genuinely had no idea what rendezvous meant. Fluttershy giggled a little to herself. Twilight turned back to face them.

"Everything, all's to be laughed at. Hurry, dance, with all your foolishness." Twilight's horn started to glow as she finished her sentence, and in a flash of light a music player was conjured out of nothing. Even when her head wasn't screwed on all the way, she was still quite impressive when it came to doing magic on the fly.

After a few moments, music started to play, though calling it music was an overstatement. It was just the same piano note playing over and over at different intervals. Still, the two mares played along, swaying with the "tune" until they were sure they were going to go crazy just like Twilight from it.

Tink, tink tink. Tink tink tink-tink tink. Tink, tink tink...

The manic dance went on for a minute or two before Fluttershy stepped onto one of the books that littered the room, throwing off her balance. She stumbled for a moment, and as she looked down to investigate what she had stepped on, the book cover caught her attention. She flipped through a few pages to decipher the subject matter. Psychoanalysis...?

“Psst, Pinkie,” she whispered, calling her over cautiously so Twilight would remain unaware. Pinkie waltzed over in curiosity.

“Did you find anything?” Pinkie asked quietly, though Twilight was so absorbed in what she was doing they didn’t need to be so vigilant. Fluttershy gave a small shrug as they flipped the book open to the first passage. They tried to make sense of the text, but it was filled to the brim with fancy science terms that the two ponies couldn't make heads or tails of. However, they were still able to gather that there was something that wasn't right about the whole thing.

“Freud? Keloid? Just hit the key!” Twilight shouted, slamming the book shut on their hooves and yanking it away in a cloud of magic. It was weird, because it seemed like just a moment ago she was across the room lost in her deranged thoughts, then the next moment she was right in front of them. She zapped the book away to some unknown location.

“Hey, I thought you liked it when ponies came in your library and read! Why are you so upset that you had to take the book away? You didn’t have to do that,” Pinkie whined. Fluttershy bit her bottom lip, trying to read Twilight's unreadable emotions. From what Pinkie had just said she was sure she was about to get upset. Twilight's expression remained even, her brow still furrowed from when she caught them reading her book, but after a few moments she sat down and slumped over with a sigh. She was in visible discomfort, and her back legs twitched a few times.

“Ah, I feel broken apart. Throw out all your memories, too. Ah, how I want to know, to the deep down…” Twilight mumbled, her ears flattening. Fluttershy was taken aback, and Pinkie seemed a bit hung up about what she had heard.

“How can you be so calm when you tell me to just throw out my memories? What does that even mean?” Pinkie shot back. Fluttershy stepped away, scared of the scene unfolding before her. “You must have a really big ego to say something like that. Like, a super-ego!”

“Kyahaha! Super-ego, huh? Super-ego?!” Twilight shouted suddenly. Then she calmed down just as quickly as she exploded, sitting back down and neatly tucking her tail in. “I’m quite the opposite in fact.” She frowned and sighed. For some reason her statement depressed her, and she buried her face in her hooves. It was strange, in this state she almost seemed normal. “What should I do about such feelings? Can't you tell me? Just a little?” After a moment she raised her head back up to face the other two, who were looking back with sympathetic expressions. Tears flickered on the edge of her eyes, a few running out, and she looked… hurt. It was weird; it was almost like they could understand her somehow.

Suddenly her expression turned from depressed to grave in a matter of moments. She turned towards the wall, apparently finding the two off-putting again. Still, she continued, the music still clicking away in the background, though eerily growing louder. “Clap your hooves, not entirely childish, and watch, to this purposefully-crazed tune.” Fluttershy tilted her ears downward to try and block out the now deafening noise. “Certainly, I don't care either way. The warmth of the world is melting away.”

The pegasus’ eyes flicked open just in time to watch with Pinkie as everything in the room started distorting. It looked like everything was just painted onto the neon yellow, and now the paint was running until all that was left was a stain of black and brown smeared along the bottom. Pinkie whipped her head back to the door, only to see that it too was gone. Everything was just a big yellow space with no definite start or end.

While they were preoccupied with trying to figure out what kind of illusion was taking place, Twilight had turned back to her pile of papers, which for some reason stayed intact. She was murmuring something, but was too quiet for either of the mares to decipher what she was saying. Fluttershy timidly approached her, but the unicorn refused to turn around even if she had heard her coming. Now that she was closer, the pegasus could see that Twilight was rewriting “rendezvous” all over the sheets of paper, muttering it with more enthusiasm each time. Her cheeks were red and her leg twitched uncomfortably a little. Fluttershy tried not to notice.

“Twilight, what did--”

“Loud and clear, five two four. There’s no 13 in it, after all!” Twilight Sparkle shouted, whipping her head around expectantly. Fluttershy was at a sudden loss for words, trying to process whatever it was she had just heard. Twilight studied her for a few moments, then groaned dramatically when she still refused to say anything.

“Ah, I'm ready to burst out; catch every part of me. Ah, with both your hooves, catch me for me.” Fluttershy blinked a few times, taking a moment to regain her composure, then opened her mouth to reply.

“Um, well…” she began, but it was obvious that Twilight was too peeved to listen now.

“Listen a little - it's something important!” Pinkie shouted, getting a little miffed herself. Twilight eyed her angrily, and Fluttershy could feel the animosity brewing between the two.

“Kalinka? Malinka? Just pinch my cheek,” the unicorn replied in a tone that seemed sarcastic, even though neither had no idea what her words meant. Her angry expression faltered a few moments afterward, and she broke eye contact. “It's just that I can't control myself. Should we do more fantastic things?” Before she could think, Twilight felt a sudden impact on the side of her face.

“I want to do fantastic things with you! You’re my friend, but for some stupid reason you’ve snapped and you’re taking the great things we’ve done before for granted! What’s the matter with you?!” Pinkie yelled, her hand throbbing a little from slapping her friend so hard in a fit of anger. Tears brewed at the corners of her eyes.

Though it seems now she’s not the only one that’s snapped, Fluttershy thought, biting her lip in worry.

Twilight Sparkle sat dazed for a few moments as she was battered with Pinkie’s words.
Ever so slowly, she brought a hoof to her face, feeling the stinging skin. “Pain, hurt, but no, don't cry,” she said lifelessly. “Parade? Marade? Just clap some more. Wait, you say, wait, wait, before we drop to just one…”

“W-what’s...going on...with us?” Fluttershy whimpered. “Why is this happening…?” Twilight turned to her, an annoyed expression on her face, but she said nothing. “I mean, just because she’s sick doesn’t mean we have to get upset, too…!” As soon as the word ‘sick’ escaped her mouth, Twilight perked up, a mixture of disbelief, hurt, and anger showing on her face. She got up aggressively, then fixated her gaze on the pegasus.

Fluttershy squeaked as Twilight advanced towards her, pinning her against the wall with a deranged smile plastered on her face that was so wide it looked like her skin was going to tear. She watched helplessly as the unicorn’s horn flared up with energy, then felt a burning sensation on her cheek, searing her flesh and sending knives of pain into her skull. An intense feeling shot up her nerves and she yelped and struggled to run away, but Twilight’s hold was too strong.

“Down with a sickness?” Twilight asked, her eyes wide. She finished marking one cheek and moved onto the other, but had to clear away the streaks of tears first.

“T-twilight--”

“Show me your song!” Fluttershy's constant sobbing only made the pain worse, but she couldn’t stop. The salty tears burned into her tender raw skin. Twilight made a few ridges along the pegasus' muzzle for good measure.

“See how today…”

“Twilight, please--!”

“I’m still a patched up, crazy matryoshka!”

~~~~~~~~

I feel like I'm being stripped down to my core.

I just gotta cover it up, that's all.

Haven't I always been like this?

My mind is spinning, I feel like I'm falling.

Can I trust you to catch me?

Go away and stay by my side.

Stop trying to get close to me.

I want to know you as deeply as I can.

Let me grow stronger, though time won't let me.

My vision is spotty.

Everything is red and green.

I've thought too much about this.

Kissing, kissing, la lu la.

Isn't everything so corrupted and tainted?

Isn't everything so beautiful and amazing?

It's terrible! It's wonderful!

Why am I crying?

Maybe I should close my mouth, since nothing matters anyway.

Why am I crying so much then?

Nothing is grey anymore!