Lyra pedaled her bicycle up the mountain, sending waves of pebbles cascading down its face with every inch of ground she gained.
Sweat and tears were rocks, her face like the mountain, with a cold lack of expression that was indeed an expression, painted by eons of tectonics and emotions.
They were coming back to her now, all the shadows she so feared.
The emotions broke through her stony expression like the crest of a wave rising on a violent sea.
"GO AWAY, GO AWAY, GO AWAY!" she screeched.
But the shadows did not listen, because shadows are little pieces of shit. They don't tend to make very good traveling companions (as you can see here), not to mention their passions for bringing up everything bad that has ever happened to you and making you believe that it was all your fault, even though some of it may indeed be your fault.
None of that shit is any fun at all, and this is why shadows are not very popular at parties, and thus they don't get invited to any, which hurts their feelings. Then, with their feelings hurt, they take it out on ponies like poor Lyra here. Then, a pony like Lyra will make sure to spread the word on how much of an asshole those shadows are being, and then you can see how the vicious circles go around, like bicycle wheels. Wow, what a convenient metaphor.
She pedaled faster and faster, and yet they kept so close to her tail, playing with her, each shadow daring the other to be the first to pull her from her place.
But she could not pedal her fear away.
She came to a place that was flat, not yet the top of the mountain, but flat nonetheless, a good place to rest.
She was so high up now, that there was snow!
Beautiful!
She wanted to play in the snow! Oh how badly she wanted it, and how beautiful was the snow! How she longed to play in it, roll in it, to just shove as much of it as she could up her nose.
But she stayed away.
Nothing good can come from snow.
It is fun yes, fun to play in the snow.
But at what cost?
Everything she knew to be true had been reduced to rubble, ashes of what existence used to be.
She could no longer see the shadows who tormented her, but this brought no comfort.
She could see Ponyville, and the land beyond, or what used to be the land beyond.
She saw, all of it.
What happened?
Gone were the cheery, rolling hills.
Gone were the apple orchards.
Ponyville, and portions of the land beyond held unto jagged clumps of land, suspended in a checkered void, like drowning rats clinging to drift wood.
She could see the townsponies, as small as ants, but she could see them.
She could see them, going about their humble lives but no pony was shouting, no pony was screaming.
She was appalled at the chaos.
She was appalled at the discord.
There was more.
Lyra turned away.
"Who did this?" Lyra asked the mountains.
The mountains were silent.
"WHO DID THIS??!!" she screamed at the mountain, beating her hooves against its rocky face.
Lyra crumpled to the ground in tears, her face buried in the dirt, her hooves pounding the earth.
"Who did this to us..." her voice now soft, the mere whimpers of a child.
But the mountains did not answer because they had better things to do than talk to a pony with kaleidoscope eyes. In fact, the mountain were slightly offended. You know, there they were, minding their own business, doing their thing, being mountains, and here come this pony assaulting them with all sorts of philosophical questions, all the while blinding them with her kaleidoscope eyes. You must remember that these particular mountains have a curious case of epilepsy. I'm sure you remember learning all about this in the third grade or so, and I don't feel the need to give you a refresher course on the various medical conditions of the local mountain range. You should have payed attention.
After one final THUMP, her hooves ceased to move.
She whimpered.
Someone had done something terrible to her home, and no pony noticed. Even she had not noticed, at first! All her life, the sky had never changed from its forever changing state. All her life, there had been clouds that rained chocolate. All her life, the roads had been made of soap.
Hadn't they?
Whatever the case, someone had lied to them!
They had LIED to Lyra! They had LIED to her friends! They had LIED to Ponyville!
Her fear pulled back, like the tide.
Slowly, but steadily, something new filled that space. Sometimes one says that their stomach is filled with butterflies. This would not be an appropriate metaphor. What is a good metaphor for righteous anger?
Lyra's stomach contained the screaming souls of the long forgotten, and they screamed for justice long withheld.
Lyra's heart beat upon her rib cage like her hooves once had, on the face of the mountain.
She rose up, and marched to the face of the mountain.
She would have her answers!
She got directly up in that mountains face.
She squared her shoulders, and made her face into a kind of tough, no nonsense expression, before knocking on the bit of rock she assumed was the upper right-hoof portion of its left-hoof eyebrow.
"Mountain!" her voiced boomed with a new found courage.
"I demand answers Mountain! You have sat here through the ages, you have been the witness to this discord and strife! Surely you know what has happened to my home?"
Then there was a thundering CRACK, and the a great slit appeared in the rock.
Upon the surface, two slabs of stone began to slowly part, and the mountain spoke.
Listen now, and listen well, for once I will tell
First, do not have fear, for that makes it hard to hear
Lyra could now see that she had been pounding her hoof on the mountains right eye, as it was opening slowly and dramatically before her.
Remember that this is just a game, though you will walk close to flame
Third---OH MY GOD WOMAN YOUR FUCKING EYES!!!!
The Mountain's great stone eye was open enough to meet Lyra's luminescent gaze. Remember she has kaleidoscope eyes, and those are very flashy and not something to be shined into the eyes of an epileptic mountain.
Lyra did not understand.
She did NOT pay attention attention in third grade health.
CLOSE YOUR EYES
Lyra did, but it was too late.
A flock of birds burst screaming from a bush clinging to the mountainside.
Vibrations began feebly, but turned to violent spasms. They reverberated through her hocks and shook her to her core. Cascades of stone rained down upon her from the peaks that towered far above.
She opened her eyes just in time to see a cavern crack open beneath her hooves. For a heart beat after the rocks fell away, she remained suspended in air, and could only stare into the blackness of the abyss.
Then she fell in.