//------------------------------// // Chapter 1: Arrival // Story: Into the Myst // by flyingweaselman //------------------------------// Family. What word could better describe everything that an individual has ever loved or ever hoped to achieve? What better word can accurately place that individual’s wishes and dreams? Everyone has one, and I hope that everyone will yearn to have one. For me, my family is the inspiration for all my greatest accomplishments, and my greatest regrets. -- Atrus “Arrgh! Not again!” A mare’s voice groaned. “Twilight, you are beating yourself up over nothing. Can’t we take a break?” A smaller voice responded. This one belonged to a small baby dragon with green spikes going from the top center of his head down the whole length of his body. They were also his namesake. Spike was Twilight’s assistant and was very near a migraine. They had been searching the libraries for hours now and Twilight had run out of patience. Her wings were unfurled and her horn glowed with magic as she pulled books from off the shelves left and right. “We can’t take a break now Spike!” Twilight said as she ran to the other end of the library. “I have very important research I need to do if I’m to fulfill my role as the Princess of Friendship and the last book didn’t help!” Spike raised an eyebrow. “And you think that these books will have what you need?” Twilight stopped in the middle of a run and put a hoof to her mouth. “Yes... Um, no... I mean... Maybe?” Her wings drooped to the floor as she gave a sheepish grin. Spike walked over to the slumping purple alicorn and put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “It’s okay Twilight. I’m sure that you’ll do great in your new position.” Twilight had been appointed the Princess of Friendship after saving Equestria from the demon Tirek. He was a demon that stole everypony’s magic and Twilight had been entrusted by the other princesses to thwart his plans. Up until then, she had no clue what she was to do as a newly coronated princess. It had weighed heavily on her mind for some time and then, finally, after defeating Tirek she knew what role she was to play. Despite that, she felt very insecure when it came to breaking new ground. Twilight let herself fall to the ground. “I’ve always had someone else’s experience to learn from or some other pony to help me learn. Even with all the lessons I’ve learned about friendship, they were learned with the help of my friends.” “You can do it Twi, you always have,” Spike said. Twilight gave a grateful look towards Spike and sat up. She levitated a few books in front of her as she slowly walked. “I know, Spike. Finally knowing my purpose as a Princess has helped me a great deal. However, not knowing exactly what a Princess of Friendship does makes me nervous.” Spike turned and started searching through some of the books Twilight had discarded. “I don’t think that there is anything that we can read that can help this time.” Twilight stopped, turned to Spike, and said, “Why not? It’s always helped in the past.” “But a princess of friendship hasn’t ever been done before. Right?” Twilight sighed, “I don’t know, that’s why I’m hoping that all these books can answer that.” The library inside the castle had been stocked full with books. That was strange, considering that it hadn’t been here before. It was located near Ponyville, where Twilight and Spike had been living. Ponyville was a small town located in the country a short train ride away from Canterlot, Equestria’s seat of government. There had never been so much as a trace of a crystal castle like this one to ever exist here. It had only appeared recently. Because the castle was filled with several library’s worth of books, it was an anomaly that Twilight was hoping to investigate in the future. The crystal castle had risen after the defeat of Tirek when Twilight and her friends used the Tree of Harmony to banish him back to where he came. All of them had used special keys relating to what made them a good friend to unlock a chest that contained the power to restore Equestria’s inhabitants their magic. Tirek had stolen it all and Twilight sacrificed much to allow their victory. Twilight felt a need now more than ever to help everypony with her new role. However, she only had an idea of what she wanted to do and not what she was supposed to do. Spike couldn’t rule out the possibility that a princess of friendship had existed in the past. All that he’d ever known were the two main princesses, Celestia and Luna. One ruled the day, and the other ruled the night, respectively. Their reign has lasted centuries. Luna had, for a time, been imprisoned by her sister for a millenium in the moon when she tried to seize all power for herself. When Twilight and her friends wielded the Elements of Harmony, powerful magic that righted Equestria’s wrongs, they brought her back from evil. Cadence was another princess that ruled, but she was responsible for the Crystal Empire located near the northern borders of Equestria and her rule was fairly recent. If there was any mentionings of another princess of friendship in the past it was unknown to both Twilight and Spike. Spike casually glanced at other books in the other room, not really paying attention to what they contained. Even with his desire to help Twilight as her junior assistant, his patience was waning. “Can’t we just talk to Celestia about this?” Spike asked, almost pleading. Twilight didn’t even look up from the book she was looking at. “She might be my teacher, but all I can see her doing is having me struggle to find the answers. Despite her experience, I’m certain that even she doesn’t know fully what a princess of friendship’s responsibilities would be. She trusts me.” “It wouldn’t hurt to just ask,” Spike said under his breath. Twilight heard him. “Complaining won’t get us anywhere Spike.” Spike stammered, “Well, it wouldn’t. You said yourself that she’d probably just have you struggle for an answer. Isn’t that what we’re doing now?” “I don’t want to bother her with this.” Spike folded his arms and insisted, “It won’t hurt a bit.” “Really, Spike?” Twilight said. “I don’t want to concern her with this. I already feel like I’d be imposing on her if I did. I really want to show that I can handle this.” Spike relaxed, realizing that he couldn’t persuade her otherwise. “You remember what’s happened before when you’ve tried to do something big on your own. It never seems to work out. What would the others think?” he replied. Twilight had made some good friends since she arrived in Ponyville. They were as close to her as family. All of them had helped her learn the lessons she knew now about friendship. It had become her most valuable possession until it literally became her life because of her title. They had been through so much together and she knew that she couldn’t live without them. Because her new castle had a throne room with six thrones positioned in a circle, it was clear that her friends were key to helping her fulfill her role. As Princess Celestia had said, “What is a princess of friendship without her friends?” The Tree of Harmony, the Elements’ source of power, was responsible for creating Twilight’s castle and since each of her friends, including herself, embodied an element it made sense that they would be included in this venture as well. Twilight’s train of thought was broken when Spike spoke again. “All of them are included in this as well Twilight.” She pursed her lips as she knew that he was right. They were a part of this, and undeniably so. Twilight scratched a foreleg and replied sheepishly, “You’re right Spike. I just wish that I could gain some sort of clue on how we can work together. I want to be the kind of princess that they can look up to.” Spike smiled gently and said, “You already are Twi.” That brought on a smile from Twilight as she relaxed. Spike might be a baby dragon and immature at times, but he knew some ways that helped her with stress. Twilight looked around at the mess that they had made and they were nowhere closer to finding a book that could help her. As she thought about it some more she had to settle that she might not be able to learn anything from these books. It made her uncomfortable, very uncomfortable. There were many thoughts of failure flowing through her head. She wasn’t sure how to do her job right. It was almost as bad as not knowing what her purpose as a princess was. She turned back to Spike and let out a short breath before saying, “Alright Spike, let’s clean up.” Spike sprang into action almost immediately. “Yes ma’am,” he said with a salute. Twilight chuckled as he left and she started using her magic to help clean up the place. Books had been strewn everywhere and it looked almost as if more books were on the floor than on the shelves. Spike began with gathering a large stack in his arms and precariously moving around to the shelves and placing books on them. Twilight had a system for organizing books alphabetically by subject then alphabetically by name. It made it easier for her to find books relating to what she wanted. However, her castle’s library hadn’t been arranged that way which was the main reason she was so set that she could find the book that she needed. In her old library, Twilight knew almost every book and where she stored them. With the constant studying that she did every day to learn more and more it was easy to see why she had that kind of knowledge. The castle had made it difficult because nothing was organized the way she preferred. She felt that with time she could get it to her liking. At first, when she had discovered the vast array of knowledge that her castle had she was ecstatic to say the least-- practically drooling when she first came in the doors. It may have been too much of a good thing. One by one, Twilight picked up her books and carefully placed them on the shelves. Spike, knowing her system, was doing the same and occasionally asked her for advice on where she’d like a particular book. This library was one of many rooms and they hadn’t searched as thoroughly through some of the others yet. So cleaning up in the other rooms wouldn’t be too difficult. The library was divided into seven parts with one main room to act as the hub for all the rest. The hub room was hexagonal in shape, consistent with the number six as a motif, with doors leading out from the main room in the middle of each of the walls. The room was three stories high as well with balconies allowing access to higher shelves. On the main floor there were numerous bookshelves organized into rows that swiftly became a labyrinth. “You go ahead and clean up this section. I’ll head over to the next one,” Twilight said. “Okay, don’t get lost,” Spike said in jest. Twilight chuckled, “I’ll try not to.” She walked away from Spike and through the bookshelves into the main plaza of the library. Tables were set up so that anypony could easily read what they had selected. It was near heavenly for Twilight to have this almost exclusively for herself. She wasn’t going to keep it that way, however. The old library she had lived at had been destroyed during her battle with Tirek. So now her castle’s library would serve as Ponyville’s library. Twilight took in more of the sights as she walked further away from where Spike was cleaning and into more of the maze of shelves opposite her. She cleaned up with her telekinesis, placing books one at a time into the shelves after looking at it to determine its subject. The process was actually kind of enjoyable to her. It was methodical and it involved organizing. It helped her ease off of earlier stress. She picked up another book in her telekinesis labeled “The Science of Griffon Flight” and with no thoughts at all placed it on a shelf with some books already stacked on it. She released her spell and immediately turned away. Upon doing so the unexpected thud of a book falling to the ground caused her ears to perk up. Twilight turned around to see what the problem was and was surprised to see no problem at all. No book on the floor. No sign of any disturbance. She cocked an eyebrow before walking slowly over to the shelf and immediately her inquisitive mind was searching for possibilities. She had definitely heard a sound and she knew that she wasn’t going crazy. Or was she? She had been nearly manic half an hour ago when she wasn’t finding any helpful advice on how to be a princess of friendship. After a brief mental inventory, Twilight deducted that possibility. She put a hoof to her mouth before looking around some more. “Hmmmm…,” she said in thought. If there wasn’t a book on the ground or on the shelf that was upturned then maybe it was up. Twilight craned her neck, looking high in the air at the upper shelves in case the castle was pulling some weird spell on her. After a few seconds of looking up she couldn’t see anything out of place, even on the higher shelves. “Well that’s weird…,” Twilight said as she scratched her mane and leaned to rest on the shelves. As she did so the unexpected sensation of falling through nothing came to meet her. She yelped out loud before landing flat on her face. She looked forward with a deadpan expression. “...and that was embarrassing,” she finished. After that, she spat out some dust in her mouth before getting on her hooves. She blinked in confusion at what she saw. There was a path of stone steps leading downward. Torches were lit further down as their glow flickered on the clean stone walls. Twilight took it in for a moment. This definitely didn’t fit the theme of the architecture. The castle was made completely out of crystal. Some of it was even roughly surfaced to have a matte appearance so the eyes didn’t tire of the shine. She also wasn’t aware of there being a lower level than the ground level. There weren’t any stairs that lead to any cellars other than the larders. When the castle had first appeared Twilight and her friends had taken the opportunity to explore as much of the place as they could. So this was completely new for her. Twilight nearly squeaked in anticipation. A mystery level in the castle that she could explore was thrilling. Forgetting the mess that needed to be cleaned in the library, she walked along the stairs to discover this new secret passage. He hooves echoed in the solid corridor making the air feel heavy. The torches along the wall kept the path well lit. Twilight was curious as to why the torches were lit, either somepony had been here very recently or they were made using magic. Upon closer examination, the torches weren’t glowing a usual yellow light, but were instead giving a faint yellow-green light. They also burned very evenly despite the light flickering as a natural flame would. They were ever-burning torches, obviously magical, so that ruled out the possibility that there was another pony here. The stairway descended further down until levelling off. The entrance wasn’t visible any more. Twilight freaked out inwardly for a moment because she hadn’t inspected the entryway to the stairwell. She determined that she’d look at it when she came back out. For now, adventure awaited! Everything about this place felt like it was out of one of her Daring Do books. The secret entrance, the undiscovered passageway of stone, much of this was similar to her favorite adventure novels. Her eyes widened at a thought. “Ooh! Maybe there’s some ancient treasure down here? Or maybe an ancient artifact lost to time! Haha! This is exciting!” She was nearly giggling like a school-filly. The path in front of her lead on a straight course away from her. The ever-burning torches lined both walls now and the walls became slightly more ornate with engravings. The corners where the walls met the ceiling had the largest concentration of designs etched into them with elaborate patterns that swirled and flowed along them. Twilight was taking this all in with the anticipation of a fangirl. She was beyond feeling like this was real and was starting to be convinced she was in a Daring Do novel now. She half-expected to see the heroine pegasus running down the hallway pursued by some ancient horrors. Twilight allowed her imagination die as she stopped for a moment to examine the designs on the walls. They were in regular patterns and varied in length. Soon Twilight realized they were organized into rows. Twilight’s eyes widened with glee at her discovery. This was writing! Much of the designs on the walls was writing in the same patterns. She couldn’t wait to break out a copy of her favorite linguistics novel to decode the script. After her breakthrough, Twilight wanted to see what was at the end of the hallway. The corridor ended with a stone portal leading into another room with a single pedestal in the middle of it. A pillar of light shown through an unknown source in the ceiling centered on the raised platform. It was angled towards the door for the person who approached it to see plainly what was on it. Twilight approached it and saw with some disappointment that it was currently empty. With a small groan she decided to look around at the room she was in. There was definitely some purpose to this room. Otherwise there wouldn’t be such emphasis on the pedestal. “What could be hidden here?” Twilight thought as she walked around in the room. There were four pillars that were half as tall as the room with unlit torches on the top of them. Twilight wondered why they were unlit while the rest of the torches in the room were clearly on fire. Looking around for a moment she saw that each of the unlit torches had thin lines etched from the top of their pillars down the length and on the ground leading to the central pedestal. “Maybe I should try to light them,” Twilight said under her breath, thinking out loud. She looked up at the nearest torch and grabbed it with her telekinesis. Upon lifting it from its place on the wall it immediately snuffed itself out. “Darn it!” Twilight cursed. She put the torch back into its holder on the wall and it lit up again. Twilight rolled her eyes at the irony. Whoever designed this room wanted to get a laugh from the frustrations of others. This only made Twilight more determined to solve this puzzle. If somepony had gone through such lengths to have a device built with no obvious solution meant they had something to hide, and it was probably valuable. Twilight sat down and put a hoof to her mouth in thought. The torches, when removed from the wall, will snuff out. The four torches in the quadrants of the room obviously had to be lit. She looked up and her horn glowed purple with energy. A spark of flame spontaneously combusted on top of one of the pillars but to no avail. The flame that Twilight had summoned disappeared just as quickly as it had come. Twilight looked up and groaned, “Why does this have to be so difficult?” After a bit of a tantrum she began thinking out loud again. “There has to be a solution to this. Think Twilight,” she said as she put her hooves to her temples, “the solution is often the most simple one.” Twilight looked around at the room again, making sure to take in as many of the sights as she could. Anything that could possibly be out of place was sure to be noted in her head. She wasn’t going to let this room beat her. She would be the one laughing in the end. She was biting her lip when she finally discovered it. “Yes!” she said with excitement. Near corner to the left of the door there appeared to be an irregularity in the wall. Some of the stone was jutting out slightly and Twilight figured that it was a button of some kind. She walked over to it quickly and gave it a press. The stone slid with surprisingly little effort. When it was in almost two inches she heard a click. Several wooden sounding clacks sounded through the room before a short stony grating noise sounded from the floor. Up came three levers to about eye level for Twilight. At each corner of the room a pedestal arose slowly from nowhere. On top of each of them a magnifying crystal was placed at random angles. One pedestal at the corner opposite to Twilight rose higher than the other three. Twilight’s head reeled back slightly at what she thought was a design flaw. Shouldn’t they have all reached the same level? She looked over at the levers. “Oh, they must control the pedestals’ height.” She bit on one of the levers and pulled. The highest one in the corner lowered down. Twilight sighed in satisfaction as it did so but groaned as two pedestals rose up making the scene even more unorganized. Her eye twitched as she observed the situation in front of her. This was going to be a long day, wasn’t it? She pulled another one of the levers to see what it would do. The middle lever made the two pedestals closest to her rise while one of the others at the far end of the room rise. Twilight’s lips pursed in concentration as she fought her way through this puzzle. She experimented with the levers and with much frustration found herself where she felt that three of them were in the correct position while one -- and only one -- pedestal was out of place. She yelled in frustration when she was so close to finally uncovering the solution. “I don’t know what kind of dastardly person could come up with a puzzle so evil, but I’m gonna win!” She exclaimed as she pulled more levers. “You’re just lucky that I love puzzles. Oho, you’ve never thought somepony like mewould come along.” She spoke as if talking to the puzzle would intimidate it into place. It may as well should have because soon after she said that all of the pedestals were in place. She knew it was correct when a shaft of light appeared with an abrupt noise. It nearly gave Twilight a start as her heart leapt in her chest. The light shown through the crystal nearest her and two other beams of light shot out in random directions. When she looked over near the base of the pedestals each of them had two wheels for adjusting the directions of the beams. Twilight looked at them with dismay because it was another puzzle for her to solve. With stubborn resignation she began turning the wheels to adjust the crystal. The two lights turned in response to the adjustments. One wheel controlled the vertical axis of the light and the other the horizontal axis. Twilight was pleased that it was easier than the other puzzle had been as well as it being a practical design. The question now was where to point the lights. The two beams were at an angle from each other. From her experimenting she couldn’t have the lights be pointed at two of the torches at the same time. Instead she tried to direct the light to another crystal while placing the other beam on a torch. It couldn’t shine on the next consecutive crystal and a torch at the same time, so she decided that the placement of the beams had to be irregular. With some finagling, she finally had the beams shining on a torch and crystal at the same time. A similar effect happened with the other light crystal. Two beams shone out from it in reaction to the beam entering in. Twilight walked over to the new pedestal and experimented with different placements of the light. Soon, she was on the last crystal. It also had two beams of light shining from it. She paused and looked around for where the two streams could be placed. Twilight decided to go with her first thought. One beam of light on a torch and the other beam placed back onto the source. When the light neared the last crystal, all the crystals gradually shined brightly, giving more light to the room than the torches had. The beams intensified before the torches erupted into life. A thin line of sparks trailed down along the recesses in the torches’ pillars towards the ground then out of sight. Twilight cocked an eyebrow as nothing immediately happened. “Whoah!” Her eyes widened as a loud rumble engulfed the room. Dust was disturbed as the ground opened up. Stone doors opened upward from the ground to reveal a spherical metal cage rising from the ground. When the cage cleared the floor the stone doors closed beneath it. The sphere turned several times before a hatch with two doors from its hemispheres opened up to reveal a book. It’s shelf lifted at an angle and the book slid onto the stone pedestal in the middle. Twilight was in awe of the show of machinery before her. To her this was the best thing ever. A challenging puzzle rewarding her with a book when solved. Her eyes gleamed as she watched her prize slide into place. With a short squee she hopped over to the book. It was leather bound with a couple small emeralds embedded near the corners. Parts of the book were trimmed with gold, particularly near the binding. One word was stamped in silver print for the title, “Tomahna.” With excitement, Twilight opened the book. To her surprise a single note written on parchment was between the cover and the first page. It had one simple phrase: This will help. “What?” Twilight said. She tried to speculate who the author of the note was. As far as she was concerned, she didn’t think that it was addressed to her but the timing of it was too perfect. She felt that she needed help and that through the new books here she could gain some advice. Twilight was feeling an odd connection with the book in front of her. It pulled on her mind again and again because of the note. After reviewing the note for any more clues she peered down at the first page. What she saw amazed her. In a rectangular frame on the page a moving panoramic view of another location could be seen. The view in the book flew through the air of a desert-like environment. Large red rock formations flew past the viewframe as it travelled across the landscape at astonishing speed before it finally stopped at the edge of a cliff looking down over a rushing river. A small gazebo was the focus of its attention as it began circling it endlessly. “What could this be?” With wide eyes, Twilight, without thinking, placed her hoof on top of the page over the panel. To her confusion, she felt a pulling sensation towards the book. Her vision blurred for a moment before she found herself soaring through the air in the exact manner that the panel on the book depicted. Twilight screamed as she was unwillingly pulled through this scene towards the gazebo. For a moment she tried to open her wings and fly, but to her bewilderment felt no wind rush through them, not even through her mane. All she could do now was scream. She felt like she was going to be thrown over the edge of the cliff as she was zoomed in to the gazebo. Her vision blurred once more before she found herself standing in the middle of the small building that she had seen in the panel. “What? Where am I?” she panted. Twilight looked around, trying to get her bearings. The air was hot where she now was, very similar to how it felt in Appleloosa. The landscape was similar as well, so she figured that she was somewhere near there. However, she didn’t remember seeing a large slot canyon with a river there before. There was the river that lead into the Ghastly Gorge, perhaps that had a slot canyon before it. On a small pedestal in the middle of the building was a book similar to the one in the chamber she had left in her castle except this one was labelled “Equestria.” Twilight opened the book and found the same type of panel that was in the other book. She guessed that it was her way back to the castle because the panel showed the book chamber she had solved the puzzles in. She moved away from the pedestal and observed that the gazebo was built over the edge of the cliffs on an edge that stretched out over nothing to get a good view of the river below. Three sides ended with a sheer drop. Twilight grimaced at the noticeable lack of a railing. She walked over as close to the edge as she dared and looked down. The movement made her woozy and she stepped back to a safe distance before sitting down to catch her breath. “Okay, Twilight. You can figure this out.” She worked up her courage and walked over to the other edge of the gazebo. One railing remained on this edge and she was better able to look over the edge. A catwalk began at another edge of cliff near the gazebo and lead downward to the river below where a trail followed it out of sight. The river was full of rapids that showed signs of the speed of its current. She wondered where the path next to it could lead her and leaned out as far as she could to see if she could see at least a bit around the corner the path. The railing creaked and jerked suddenly away from the gazebo. Twilight let out a frightened yell, briefly forgetting that she could fly, as she reflexively tried to make herself fall onto the floor and not the ground hundreds of feet below her. Her arms flailed in an attempt to keep her safe as she painfully slow fell backwards. As she fell flat on her back her head hit the pedestal that Equestria’s book was on. It toppled over in slow motion to Twilight, looking up from where she lay. “No!” She sprang up as quickly as she could to try and stop it from falling but in vain. The pedestal fell onto its side, flinging Equestria’s book through the air and over the edge of the gazebo. “No no no no nonononono!” Twilight was screaming as she opened her wings and flew over the edge. She raced as fast as she could to catch the book, but she wasn’t fast enough. Being new at flying, she couldn’t dive faster than she could fall and the book had a two second head start on her. She watched helplessly as the book fell into the rushing rapids of the river. With frantic desperation she tried to see where it could have been. The water was murky from all the sediment in it and the current splashing over the rocks made seeing anything under the water impossible. She flew erratically around trying to see where it went. “It has to show up soon!” Twilight said, trying to deceive herself. “This can’t be happening! I’m not stuck here right?” She looked around for any sort of confirmation that this was true. “I can get out!” She flew up above the cliff tops and tried to mimic the flight pattern that the book had shown. It was no use as all she could see for hundreds of miles around was desert. Nothing but desert. Tears began streaking her eyes at the thought of never being able to go back home. She did everything she could to think of any solution. Her horn glowed intensely as she summoned up the strongest teleportation spell that she could use. She imagined her home back in Ponyville as the destination, and when she felt she had a sufficient image in her mind she released the magic. A large lavender burst of energy exploded in the sky as the spell had no effect. It couldn’t release Twilight to where she wanted to go. It knocked the wind out of her as she plummeted from the sky. Her emotions were getting the better of her now as she began cursing herself for her curiosity in her library. Moments before she hit the ground she came to her senses and opened up her wings again, catching the air and flying safely away. Twilight retraced her flight and found the gazebo with the catwalk nearby. When she landed she was sobbing. Inside, she felt betrayed. The note she found promised that she could receive the help that she wanted. It had given her hope which was now dashed to pieces. Getting back to Ponyville was now impossible. “Some help this turned out to be!” She yelled in defiance to the heavens through her tears. What could she do now that would get her back? The desert provided an imposing obstacle as Twilight thought of flying away. If she left, there was no way to tell if she was going in the right direction. She looked over to the toppled pedestal and gave it an angry kick with a forehoof. It rolled off the edge of the gazebo without resistance. A moment later a loud metal clank sounded in her ears. She stopped sobbing and wiped her tears from her eyes to look over the edge again. The pedestal had hit the catwalk that lead below. Twilight sniffled and came to her senses. She looked along the path to where the trail lead out of sight. If anything, she could follow it and get some answers. To her, it was to be her ticket home.