"You can still call me Cherry Blossom, if you want," the filly said, "but I think a new name is more fitting. 'Nightmare Core'. It's a bit ironic, I know." She looked around meaningfully at the beautiful waves of grass under the picturesque sky that was the shared dream she wove for us. Most of us didn't dream anymore, concerned Luna would stumble in and make everything hopelessly complicated. I certainly avoided it like the plague, afraid my own old roleplaying character would somehow come to life and take control of me. It was a valid fear: it had happened in another timeline, and I had the awkward position of remembering it. So we shared this fiction amongst ourselves instead of dreaming. 'Elysium', a sort of heaven. And a haven, for the mind at least.
I chuckled. "Nightmare Core. I like it... in your own way, you're the core of the kingdom, enough bandwidth and computational power to keep us all in touch and coordinated, and enough to spare to grant us pleasant dreams, but you certainly look like something out of a nightmare. Hmm... I guess you can't dream anymore, can you?"
"I can... and I do," she replied, surprising me. "You know, my brain never rotted that much, I was able to restore it completely, bring it back to life. I... I'm pretty sure the soul has long since fled. I don't know how we would measure such a thing, or if I even want the confirmation, but I'm able to dream again. I do, every night."
"Why?" I asked, intrigued.
"Why? Why wouldn't I? I know your reasons, your fears, but I don't share them. And the digital part of me can still function when my pony brain is asleep." It was a bit amazing to me how thoroughly the two parts seemed to share a sense of self. I always thought of Deus as an alien thing within me, the closest ally imaginable, but still not myself. null was, of course, the opposite, with no living brain to have a sense of self, merely dead flesh wrapped over a robotic interior, a sort of false undead. I had thought Cherry to be much the same aside from using the dead filly's memories and personality to guide her thoughts and actions, but it seemed she'd taken it one step further. "Besides, dreaming was a big part of my destiny, and cutie mark."
"Weren't you a blank flank when you died?" I asked.
"Was," she confirmed, turning to show off her new logo, a pair of crescent moons, somewhat overlapped. "It's connected to dreams, I'm sure of that much. I've been having... kind of awkward dreams lately."
"Awkward how?" I questioned. "I can't imagine that ponies get the 'show up to class naked' one."
She shook her head. "No, not that one. I see my self, like my naive, innocent pony self, walking near Citrus Hills, heading unwittingly toward where I was ambushed and foalnapped. I reach out to her, to try to talk to her, warn her, anything, and she runs in terror. No surprise... you know what I really look like now, that's what I look like in the dream. It's... it's the same every night, but different. Like dream me remembers. She's ever more wary, but I have to reach out to her. It's my destiny, I know it."
"That's... kind of weird. Prophetic, maybe? I know that's a thing here. Celestia has them, right?"
"I don't think it's... it's not prophecy, exactly. I don't know. I'll find out, though," she said, before changing the subject. "It's nice here, but wouldn't you like something a bit more fun? Adventurous? I can generate any kind of dreamscape you like."
"I'm living enough adventure for now... how about another kind of fun... hmm... I have an idea."
It felt weird being a blocky shape falling through space, but even weirder being an 's' block than it had being a square or a line or even a 't'. Appropriate, since I was such an awkward piece to work with. I couldn't see the spot I needed to be in from here, because of the overhang, but I nudged myself sidewise a few meters, to pass under it, before sidling back and rotating myself.
Even if it didn't hurt, it was still really bizarre feeling when half of my body glowed and vanished, letting the rest of me, along with that damned overhang, drop down a meter. A small success, but it was nonetheless.
Oh, yeah! The sudden shift of perspective came with the slick, lean feeling of being a line. And perfect timing, with that blockage cleared, I could get down to the side there and... TETRIS!
"You have a frankly inexplicable sense of fun," Cherry Blossom's teasing voice came from everywhere and nowhere.