//------------------------------//
// The Day I Went Crazy 
// Story: The Spectacular Stories of Starspinner 
// by Masterweaver 
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	Let's start off with a little preamble: I was never diagnosed with schizophrenia or any similarly structured mental issues. I may have been an introvert--still am, to be honest--but that was about the extent of it. And just to clarify any other possibilities: I didn't try talk to spirits or summon demons or anything like that, I never ran any really exotic experiments on myself, and I almost certainly have no ancient prophecy about me. (I've looked. Repeatedly.) Basically, my only claim to fame was an eidectic memory, a lot of reading, and sheer raw intelligence.

Now admittedly my skillset landed me in Celestia's school for gifted unicorns at a very, very young age. And I was actually salutatorian--I could have been valedictorian, but at the last moment I decided to answer one test question wrong--my closest competition was also (I had thought) my best friend, and she was just a little bit nuerotic, so I wanted to skip all the drama that having two perfect scores would cause. Of course, she was also Celestia's personal student... which I might have been slightly envious of, if I'm completely honest, but seeing how hard she pushed herself I declined to comment. Maybe I should have earlier--but if I get caught up in maybes, I'm never going to finish this... I don't know what I'm calling this. A journal? A log? I'm writing after the fact.

Actually, maybe I should start at the party. See, it had been a whole year since graduation. Most of my classmates were moving on with their lives, getting jobs and whatnot, but my friend and I were still nose-deep in our books--me, because I was attending a university of higher education, and her because, well, Celestia was her teacher. Still, I thought maybe this one time, I could take a little break like some of my other friends were talking about, and just celebrate our accomplishment together. So I tried to arrange a little anniversary party, just a get-together. And... well, I might have pinned a lot on her showing up.

Yeah. Didn't happen. Celestia sent her off on a quest, and what Celestia says goes.

Now, I was already annoyed, since I'd accidentally stepped on my glasses and had to tape the frame back together, again. Her just zipping off, without even a by-your-leave, really got to me though. I thought she knew she was my best friend and... like I said, I'm an introvert. I don't make connections easily. It... hurt. A lot. I'm over it now, mostly, but at the time I just felt... lifeless and grey. I left the party that I myself had set up and trotted home in a funk, ignoring my other friends who actually did attend--yeah, I was brushing them off. Stupid of me. Maybe they could have helped me out. I don't know. Can't focus on the might-have-beens.

I'd intended to do some binge reading when I got home, take my mind off things. Except, after I locked my door, I... well, I don't know exactly what happened. Trying to remember gets me a big blank space in my head--I can't have forgotten it, I don't forget things, but it was like first I was in my foyer, and then suddenly I was on my couch, waking up with an awful headache. The only other person present tells me she can vaguely recall voices that she says sounded like 'annoyed accountants for an eldritch law corporation.'

And now might be the time to introduce this other person, actually. Because this is when I first met her--waking up with a headache, looking blearily around, and hearing a groan of pain from the ground.

When I looked beside the couch, I saw another pony. Except... well, the pony had a cream coat, just like me. The pony had a red mane with a purple stripe--just like me. Purple eyes, like me, big eyebrows like me--her cutie mark was exactly identical, for crying out loud! I'd heard of cutie mark correlation, of course, but even as a cultural medical phenomena it was supposed to have a minor degree of variation! But no, here was the impossible--a pony who could have walked right out of my bathroom mirror, rubbing her head with a hoof and wincing.

"Okay, what was that?" She pulled her hoof back and stared at it. "And what is this? This is new."

I tried to organize the bundle of thoughts bouncing around my skull into something that could be spoken out loud. When I opened my mouth, though, what came out was a simple "Ahrk?!" of sheer astonishment.

She turned to look at me, and... well. Her expression was first one of confusion, then suddenly recognition, then realization, and finally went back to confusion again. "Just a quick question. Do you have any idea and or theory of how I got here? Cause I sure don't."

"I... No," I replied, managing to shake my head. "But--hold on, I was... Okay. No." I shut my eyes for a moment, adjusting my glasses and flattening my thoughtscape to reasonable levels. "Okay, you look... exactly like me. Which is weird, and probably impossible. That means you've got to be some sort of construct--not that I'm suggesting you're unintelligent," I quickly clarified, "just that you're artificial--why are you laughing?"

"That, hahahaha, that's hilarious!" She giggled into her hoof. "Oh, that is just--funny on so many different levels--or maybe it's only funny because I'm trying not to panic? Either way, ha! You, you think I'm a robot? Hahahah! You?"

"Robot...?" I gave her a look. "What's a robot?"

She looked at me, still giggling. "Oh, wow. Hmm. You said... construct, right? Yeah, that's what I meant."

"...okay, so if you're not a construct," I managed, "then who are you?"

For a moment, it looked like she would answer. And then she got that expression. I had never seen it before, but I would become very familiar with it; the sly way she turned her head and narrowed her eyes, the slant of one eyebrow as one end rose high, and that smirk. That irritatingly amused smirk. With all the experience I've had, I've decided to label it the 'Let's mess with Moondancer for giggles' face.

"That's a fascinating question. Who am I, indeed?"

"...That's what I just asked," I pointed out naively.

"A question with so many facets! Am I the product of my upbringing, or of my instincts? Can I be classified into a specific caste, or should all personality be considered as random as the very nature of life itself? And what makes a who? Am I but a being forgotten by eternity, or am I whom I make myself out to be?"

"If you're not going to tell me your name," I grumbled, "you might as well get out of my house. I've got a really bad headache and... look, I've just had a bad day, okay?"

"Yeah, about that. Not going to lie: This is my first day as a pony, and I don't know if I know how to walk or anything."

"Aha!" I cried triumphantly. "So you are a construct!"

"My body, probably," she agreed. "My self? Not so much." She stretched her hooves in front of her. "So, fair warning, I'm going to try standing now. This could result in a lot of hilarious incidents and or serious damage, but here I go!"

"Wait--!" I shouted, not at all realizing she'd said that pretty much just to get me to shout in a panic since I wasn't familiar with her yet.

And then she pushed herself up. Into the air. Where she hovered.

"...ahrk?"

"Yeah, this is new to me too."

I got off the couch, walking over to the pony suspended in midair. I mean, how could I not? Here she was, without wings, without the glow of magic around her, and she wasn't falling. That just didn't happen. That was a violation of all known laws of physics, magic, and reality. And yet, here she was, my clone, somehow floating in front of me. Absolutely nothing about this situation made any sense. Logically, this called for science.

I poked her leg. It was enough to start her slowly spinning head over tail.

"...How are you doing that?"

"Flying," she stated in a serious tone, "is the art of aiming for the ground and missing."

I gave her a flat look as she started to 'swim' through the air cautiously. "No. Seriously. How?"

"Don't have a clue. But hey, this solves the walking problem!"

"Look," I explained as she started some slow laps around the room, "you can't just accept something that comes out of nowhere. If you don't try to explain it, not only can't you replicate it but you run the risk of something going wrong while you're using it. What if you're flying over the edge of Canterlot and it suddenly fails? Or the process of flying eats up your mass and leaves you a withered husk? Or you're emitting magical radiation that causes mutations in the local insect populace, resulting in a breed of super-ant that wishes to conquer all of Equestria?"

The look she gave me was another one I would, eventually, become very familiar with. Everything about it was flat: flat eyes, flat brows, flat lips. It's the 'you're overthinking things' look, and it's just as dangerous as the 'let's mess with Moondancer' look. Why? Because when she gives me that look, it's a clear sign she's literally picking up her train of thought and putting it on another track, which can have disasterous consequences.

"Well I, for one, would welcome our new insect overlords." She reached her forelegs out and angled her body down before giving a large kick, probably intending to push off the floor again.

And then her forehooves just passed through the floor.

"...AHRK?!?!"

"WHOA okay, that's not!" She kicked back, pulling herself out of the carpet. "Whoa! Whoa, okay. Yeah, that... that was freaky."

"What--how?!" I looked from her, to the floor, to my own hooves. "I was able to come into contact with you, you can't just..."

My mind was moving at a hundred trots a minute, trying to wrap itself around all the strange details. She looked exactly like me. She was capable of flight. She could interact with me, but not, apparently, the rest of the world...

And then, suddenly, it made sense. "You're a hallucination."

She looked at me. "Sorry, what?"

"You're a hallucination," I repeated. "My hallucination, specifically. I can see you and touch you, but that doesn't mean you exist in reality. In fact, as you seem totally divorced from reality's laws, it would be safer to assume you do not exist. Furthermore, your physical form is an exact replica of mine--except that you aren't wearing glasses, and that doesn't really count. So, as only I can interact with you meaningfully, that means you must have a unique connection to me. The most logical conclusion is that you're a hallucination, quite possibly brought on by my distress at Twilight choosing not to attend my party earlier today. This would furthermore explain my missing chunk of memory and the headache I woke up with."

She continued to stare at me.

I stared right back at her.

Eventually, she shrugged. "You know what, sure. Let's go with that. I'll figure out how to disprove it later."

"Right." I rolled my eyes, walking back over to the couch. "Anyway, I guess you can float around or whatever while you exist. I'll look into a therapist later, right now I just want to rest."

"Hold on." She kicked herself in front of me, floating upside down as she examined my face. "You said Twilight didn't come to your party today."

"...right," I grumbled. "Since you're generated by my own feelings, you probably have something to say about that."

"She's Celestia's student, right?"

"Yeah."

"She'd do anything Celestia said?"

"...probably."

"Including anything that would force her away from your party?"

I narrowed my eyes. "I don't like what you're implying."

"Well," she pointed out, "there's a lot of pressure on that position. If Twilight ever defied Celestia, well, the results would not be pretty."

Her argument sunk into my mind slowly, wrapping itself around my resentment and redirecting it. I didn't really dislike Twilight, after all; it was easier to paint her as a manipulated victim than as deliberately cruel or even absently callous. And, I had to admit, imagining the great and pure-hearted ruler of a nation as, perhaps, a dark manipulator was entertaining in its own perverse way. In fact, given how long Celestia had been on the throne, I couldn't rule out the possibility that it might have been true.

I began to scowl. "Well, even if she did do something like that, what could I do?"

And then my new companion got that face again. "Well... if Celestia is out of her palace, you could poke around her private chambers. If you were careful, and knew the right ponies."

We shared a long look.

"...You know, I really shouldn't be listening to the voices in my head. But if I'm going crazy, might as well go all the way." I stepped off the couch, completely oblivious to how much I'd been had.