//------------------------------// // 5. Prologue, Part Five: Failure Is Just A Step Closer To Success // Story: Tartarus Forged // by SvenFoxx //------------------------------// Equestria One year and six months after Twilight vanished… Moondancer looked up when she heard the chair across from her get pulled out. She watched as a white stallion with a blue two-toned mane and light blue eyes sat down in front of her. “I’m not interested,” she growled, despite feeling like she should know this stallion. She reached for the bottle in front of her. “I have to wonder what Twilight would think if she saw you like this,” he said, using his magic to pull the bottle away from the mare’s reach. Moondancer’s expression darkened as she finally recognized the stallion. “If you came here to yell at me some more, save your breath. I’ve been getting shit over my part in Twilight’s disappearance for a year and a half. Whatever you have to say doesn’t hurt any more than it did the first time,” she said, trying to use her magic to take the bottle back. It fizzled out, her inebriated state shooting her concentration straight to Tartarus. Shining Armor flinched. “I… There’s nothing I can say to excuse the things I said to you. They were wrong, and the only excuse I have is that I was looking for anypony to blame. That doesn’t change the fact that you didn’t deserve it.” Moondancer snorted. “It wasn’t what you said that hurt, Armor. It was how absolutely spot on you were,” Her bitter expression softened, becoming sad. “I messed up and made a mistake. The rune array just wasn't ready, but I never once thought it would backfire on her. I never once thought that there was a spell in existence she couldn’t make bow to her whims." She shook her head. “One bucked up way to have your beliefs shattered.” “Tell me about the rune array,” Shining requested. Moondancer’s eyes grew unfocused as she drudged up memories she both cherished and hated. “It was brilliant. Signature corruption is a major problem when it comes to rituals and high-level spells. A pony’s magical signature carries a part of them in it, a part of their soul, and it can affect ambient magic it intermingles with. It can influence it, even shape it with enough power and will. But that’s bad when you’re dealing with incredibly precise spells that have little-to-no-room for error. A small drop in your focus, one slip of the control on your magic, and it corrupts the spell matrix.” She spread her hooves. “Boom. You’re instantly at the center of Maroshima.” “The spell was supposed to fix that somehow?” Shining asked. Moondancer shook her head. “No. The spell itself was more a proof of concept than the solution. The real treasure was the rune array she was using to cast the spell. We had developed a series of runes and sigils that would filter the signature of the caster from magic run through them, making it neutral magic and therefore safe for use in powerful precision spells. If we could have made it work, it would have made using those spells so much easier, as the caster can place their focus squarely on shaping the spell.” “It would have revolutionized thaumaturgy,” Shining Armor admitted. Moondancer slammed her hoof on the table in a sudden rage, making the Royal Guard jump. “It would have put Twilight’s name in the history books right next to Starswirl’s!” she shouted. “I was so happy to have helped her develop something like this! She valued my input! She wanted my opinion!” The mare suddenly seemed to lose her anger, deflating and slumping. “And in my ecstasy over her noticing me, I got sloppy. I messed up the failsafe rune matrix that took into account her Surges. Instead of feeding it through a loop as the filters slowly dispersed it as neutral magic, she brute-forced her way through every rune, shredding them… and causing a feedback loop that I’m still having trouble understanding. The resulting Surge was so strong that it tore at reality itself.” Moondancer sighed, and this time successfully managed to get the bottle from Shining Armor’s grasp. She took a hard slug of it. “So no, I don’t want your apology. I don’t deserve it. You were right in everything you said. It was my fault this happened. It was my fault Twilight vanished…” Her eyes glassed over slightly. “Nothing anypony says or does to me hurts more than that fact.” Shining took a moment to examine the mare in front of him. Her fur was dirty and unkempt, her mane was an absolute mess, her clothes were filthy and heavily stained, and he could smell her from where he sat. It was easy to see she had been living on the streets for a while now. Ever since it got out that Moondancer was partially to blame for Twilight’s disappearance… Ponies could be cruel creatures sometimes. No one would associate with her. The nobility was outright calling her a traitor and demanding she be hanged, she was fired from her job at the Canterlot Center of Thaumaturgical Research, and no pony would hire her anywhere in Equestria. And the worst part was that it was his fault. The moment Celestia had accidentally let slip that Moondancer was helping Twilight with the spell that failed and swallowed her, he had chased her down and, very loudly and in a very public place, tore her apart verbally. He probably would have attacked her too if it wasn’t for somepony calling the Royal Guard. Celestia had been… well, outraged wasn’t the word he would use, but it was damn close. She took him off the search for Twilight, as it was becoming increasingly obvious he could not control himself with it. His only source of information now was Cadence, and the information had slowed since they came to Techstoria in search of the cult that had robbed The Vault. Imagine his surprise when he found Moondancer in Cybertail getting drunk in one of the seedier bars. He supposed he shouldn’t be surprised Moondancer had left Equestria, it had become a place impossible for her to live in. Shining looked at Moondancer again. His eyes widened though when he no longer saw the yellow Unicorn with the taped glasses. No, now he was looking at himself. His uniform was torn and filthy, his eyes were distant, and his fur and mane was a mess. And then he was looking at Moondancer again. His expression firmed up as he made a decision. Moondancer looked up when she felt the table shudder alongside the unmistakable sound of a bag of bits clinking. She found said bag in front of her nose. She looked at Shining Armor in confusion. “Magic has hit a dead end in regards to finding Twilight,” Shining Armor said, standing up and straightening his cloak. “So let’s try a different avenue. Get yourself cleaned up and sober, and then start researching the technology of this kingdom and whether or not it can help find Twilight. I’ll be in this city for a while, so if you need more funds, let me know.” Moondancer stared at Shining Armor as he left, and then at the bag of coins on the table when he was gone. She sat there for an hour, just staring at the bag, trying to decide if she could actually bring herself to do what he told her to do. She had failed Twilight once… who was to say it wouldn’t happen again? “I have to wonder what Twilight would think if she saw you like this.” Shining Armor’s words suddenly sprang up in her mind, and her eyes focused, narrowing. Twilight was her friend. What would Twilight say if she saw her now? Moondancer snorted, knowing exactly what she would say. “Come on, ‘dancer! You can’t give up now! Every time you fail, that’s just you getting closer to success!” They were words Twilight had said to her multiple times when Moondancer would get dejected over the failures they encountered over the course of their research. The mare looked down at herself, and grimaced at the state her body was in. “Come on, ‘dancer,” she mumbled, forcing herself to stand despite wobbly drunken legs. She looked at the bag of bits. “You can’t give up now…” She grabbed it, leaving a few as payment for her drinks. A light entered Moondancer’s eyes as a familiar feeling overcame her, causing her to grin. She thought she never would have felt this feeling again… this passion. Unknown to her, her Cutie-Mark was glowing as she once again felt determination course through her veins. Determination to learn about the unknown. “Every time you fail… that’s just you getting closer to success.” --- “You finally forgave her,” Cadence mused as she and Shining Armor walked away from the bar. Shining glanced at his fiancé, before turning his attention to the road they walked along. He had known Cadence was watching him as he talked with Moondancer, ready to leap in and pull him away in case he attacked the mare again. “I saw myself in there, Cady,” he whispered. “I saw myself just as drunk as her, just as filthy, and just as close to the edge.” He shook his head. “I realized with a startling clarity that Moondancer is far more like me than I ever thought… but she’s suffering more over Twilight’s disappearance than I am.” “Oh?” Cadence asked with a raised eyebrow. “One would argue that’s impossible, considering you’re Twilight’s brother.” “I’m upset and hurt over the fact that Twilight’s gone… but I ultimately didn’t have a hoof in it. Moondancer… she blames herself to the point that I could see exactly what she was considering in her eyes. If I hadn’t given her something to focus on and latch onto… she would have been dead within the week.” “I see. Do you think technology really can find Twilight?” Cadence asked. Shining Armor shrugged. “We’ll find out soon enough.” --- Tartarus… Fifteen years after arrival… Twilight’s eye widened and she stood up, staring down at the page of the book she was reading. “No way…” she whispered, and then started to grin. “Finally! I finally found it!” That was when she realized that the spell in question had a list of items required to make it work. She grimaced as she read the list. “This… this will take some time to prepare.” she muttered to herself, using a memory spell to make sure she memorized every single aspect of the spell and the list of items. “Finally… after all this time, I’m so close to getting home.”