Luna sat next to Twilight, fanning her gently with a wing.
“This is too much for her, Reaper!” she said, “We must find another way!”
Reaper shook his head slowly, but firmly: “We can process this information so much faster running through our shared visions this way.”
He looked down at the matted, vomit-smeared coat on Twilight’s chin and chest.
“I know it’s rough on her,” he responded, “hell--it’s rough on you!” He nodded at Luna.
She pursed her lips: “Yes, but I am responsible for this--”
Reaper took a breath to interrupt.
“Yes, yes,” she continued over him, “for much of this, if not all! But the point is, I was there! I know what happened. I tore out that poor unicorn’s entrails and revelled in the blood. It sickens me, too, but not enough to render me insensate!”
A tear ran down her cheek as she looked with deep concern at Twilight’s slack, unconscious face.
Reaper paced back and forth in front of the princesses.
“We’re close, Luna,” he said impatiently. “I know we almost have the key to figuring out this “thing’s” source! The sharing of visions, having Twilight there as an outside observer--this will get us what we need much faster than flipping back and forth between our memories!”
Luna’s expression hardened: “She may not survive another episode like this last one--and there are worse to come!”
She closed her eyes and sighed: “We may have no choice now but to enlist my sister in this cause…”
Reaper shook his head dismissively: “She’d never be able to tolerate my presence long enough to get the job done--she’d be too distracted.”
“I can do it,” croaked Twilight weakly, “please get me something to drink…”
Luna scooped a wing underneath Twilight’s body and helped pull her into an upright position: “Certainly! Reaper--please fetch some water or cider for Twilight!”
Reaper walked to the side table muttering, “Yeah--we could all use a drink!”
Twilight cleared her throat and looked for somewhere to spit. Luna shrugged and magically moved a nearby planter next to Twilight.
Reaper delivered a cup of cider to Twilight, who drank it to the bottom, and unsteadily spoke again: “Reaper’s right--between the three of us we can make out details neither one of you could alone, and that even the two of you might not get right between you both.”
She took a deep breath, followed by a large hiccough; her eyes watered, and she spit in the planter, again.
She continued: “And what about scenes where the pony didn’t appear to die--where Reaper never intervened? Can’t the three of us together pull more information out of those, than just you alone, Luna? Even Reaper isn’t of much use after-the-fact.”
She suddenly wobbled to her feet and tried to stagger off to the right side of the chamber.
Luna stood with her: “Where are you going, Twilight? You should rest!”
Twilight answered over her shoulder, stumbling toward a small, adjoining room: “I have to pee--really badly!”
Reaper and Luna heard a door slam.
Reaper turned to Luna: “You know, she’s absolutely right! There’s no reason we can’t use the same technique to explore one of your dream sequences where a pony is taken by the darkness, without my involvement. It would be another situation like Sea Foam, where you may well have killed, but maybe not: maybe something stepped in at the last instant and denied the victim a real death!”
Before Luna could answer, their attention was taken by the sounds of retching and water running.
Luna furrowed her brow.
“She’ll come through this OK,” asserted Reaper, “though if you can sort through the candidate scenarios and find one a bit less barbaric than this last one, it might help.”
Luna glared at Reaper, but sat down on the couch and composed her face.
Her lips moved wordlessly as her eyes flicked to and fro underneath their closed lids.
Reaper stood silently, watching Luna intently, until he heard the door to the bathroom open. He turned to see Twilight weakly, but accurately, walk across the open floor back to her companions.
“I’m really sorry, Princess Luna,” Twilight began, rubbing her wet mane with a towel, “but you’re going to need to get a bunch of fresh towels in there after it gets cleaned up! I promise to help when…”
Reaper put up a hoof and waved off the rest of Twilight’s apology; he nodded down at Luna.
“She’s finding us a candidate scene where it appears Nightmare Moon may have killed without my intervention at the end,” he explained.
“Like Sea Foam?” Twilight queried.
Reaper nodded: “But hopefully something clearer, not in a cave, not hundreds of years before the pattern really got established.”
He took a swig from his own goblet.
“I’m hoping she comes across something rather recent.”
Luna opened her eyes and looked up: “Then you should not be disappointed with my discovery, though it is rather embarrassing.” She bit her lip and looked away.
“Worse than disemboweling an old unicorn?” Reaper said archly.
Luna tapped the tips of her hooves together: “No, not like that, just more embarrassing…”
A look of comprehension dawned on Reapers face: “Ah--as in Firebrand “embarrassing,” is that it?”
Luna shifted uncomfortably and nodded.
Twilight blushed a little, and Reaper rolled his eyes: “By Cerberus' hairy balls, Luna! You were Nightmare Moon, and it was all bad. This is just a different kind of bad! I somehow don’t think humping is going to be as upsetting to Twilight's delicate sensibilities as watching a pony getting ripped into bloody pieces! Now let’s go see if we can pierce this accursed veil”
Luna sighed and reclined as Twilight and Reaper settled onto their respective cushions.