Three Words
Bloodshot eyes fixated on the words before her, Twilight Sparkle was going about her usual beloved hobby of reading through the various books at her disposal. She had propped herself into a reasonably comfortable position on the polished wood floor and read peacefully, letting her thoughts drift to the silence of the night and the words on the pages. The book was illuminated by the flickering candlelight nearby as well as the magenta glow of her horn.
This time, she wasn't reading the escapades of Daring Do, Sherclop Pones, or any of those other adventurous explorers and detectives. Rather, her focus this night was a bit closer to reality, but still, in a sense, centered around a creation of the mind. In fact, it was all about the riddles of existence and perception, something that the physical-inclined unicorn wasn't used to investigating.
She flipped to another page to read the next chapter, strained eyes scanning over the wordy text of Branching Out: the Pathways of Equine Philosophy. Twilight read on, even as her wearied eyes began to glaze over the words and her head threatened to droop down and crinkle the book's pages in an exhausted stupor.
Twilight herself had to admit it was an unusual subject, and upon trying to explain the concept to her dragon assistant, Spike, he had met her gaze with a look of incomprehension which seemed to suggest that anypony who tried to understand what Twilight was talking about would have their brain turned into spaghetti.
Still, Twilight scoured the text of the chapter, trying to absorb as much knowledge as she could about these psychological profiles and viewpoints. No matter how ludicrous the ideas seemed, they were quite thought-provoking. Many resolute unicorns had created spells and disciplines of magic through their research on the workings of thought and soul, and as such, Twilight figured it couldn't hurt to follow in their hoofsteps. Even if pondering some of these concepts did stretch her scientific beliefs a bit.
Despite her fascination, another, smaller part found the thought utterly terrifying. Continuing to read, she would occasionally glance over at an aspect of her library—a bookshelf, the various tomes upon it, her desk, parchment and quills... she held her gaze on the lone flame of the candle, the fire dancing as much as her thoughts. Questioning… pondering.
The words of the chapter danced around in her mind as she processed them. 'Consciousness', 'lucid dreaming', and many others. She comprehended the terms, of course, but the context in which they were used baffled her. Was she just imagining their existence, or were they real manifestations which she herself had brought into being as her readings had implied? The possibility made Twilight's head spin.
As this chapter concludes, really ponder it — can you be certain that everything around you is in fact as real as you are?
The words seemed to stay with Twilight, as if she was inclined to obey the book's words. Even the candle flame's movements appeared to slow as the finality of the thought resonated in her mind. Time itself seemed to slow to a crawl as Twilight's mind moved at a pace all its own. The images around her library began to distort into blurred shapes. Her eyelids drifted shut.
What a notion... everyone and everything I know being fake? It's too crazy to even consider seriously...
Just when her mind was beginning to drift into the unconsciousness of sleep, a burst of a white light encompassed the room. Its beams illuminated the books on their shelves as rays shone from the center. Twilight opened her eyes in curiosity at the sudden light. She felt a hazy sensation of both surprise and unease come over her, seeing the sphere as luminescent as the sun itself. There was only one being who was powerful enough to cast so much illumination—her mentor, Princess Celestia. But the Princess, visiting her now at such a late hour?
The bright orb of light grew in the center of the room with an ever-increasing brightness, prompting Twilight to shield her eyes. Just when it reached its apex, a familiar figure walked forth and the glaring light dimmed away. Twilight rose to her hooves.
Princess Celestia stood before her in the library's main room, her mane and tail flowing with magic. However, her face was not the warm expression she usually showed her faithful student. Her expression, much to Twilight's confusion, was dulled and ashen, as if a large amount of life and energy had been drained from her. It was like the aging that the alicorn had resisted for so long was catching up to her within a span of minutes.
Is that what's going on? An age spell gone awry? With the Princess's sudden appearance in the dead of night, and her empty expression, Twilight's chest grew tight with unease. It was usually Celestia's sister Luna who would be the one to observe the night. Yet here Celestia was, and as dreamlike as the situation seemed, Twilight felt certain that she was indeed wide awake. Whatever the reason for the Princess paying her a visit, Twilight knew it couldn't be just to say hello. But despite her concern over why Celestia was there, one question stood out above the rest: Why did Celestia appear so grave?
"P-Princess? Wh-What are you doing here?" Twilight stuttered, unable to keep the surprise out of her voice at Celestia's unexpected arrival and her worn-out appearance.
There was a heavy silence in the air, as if time in the world had completely stopped, before the alicorn gently replied. "I've come to deliver a message to you."
Twilight paused, half-expecting a scroll to appear in the air, surrounded by the golden glow of Celestia's magic. Perhaps it was a message that for one reason or another, needed to be written rather than said? Maybe a spell that was dangerous if spoken, and there had to be a certainty that nopony would see it but Twilight herself? If that were the case, why couldn't the Princess have sent the scroll from Canterlot like usual?
"I don't mean a scroll," the Princess said with a weighted tone, seeming to have read Twilight's thoughts. "This was a message I had to come and deliver to you myself. Privately, with no interruptions from anypony else. Not even my sister or your friend Spike could be here."
"Why?"
The Princess sighed. "I figured that interaction between anyone who we were incredibly close to would risk corrupting the connection and not allowing you to wake up properly."
Twilight's face twisted into an expression of utter confusion. "What do you mean?"
"There would be too much of a potential for disruption and something might go wrong," Celestia went on. "You've been immersed for a very long time so any interruptions could be risky."
As Twilight looked on, Celestia grew as still as a statue in the Canterlot Gardens. Her eyes appeared glassy as if holding back remnants of tears, expression revealing to Twilight in an instant a turmoil that Celestia was going through but reluctant to say aloud. With an unusual tone in her voice, an inflection of regret that Twilight didn't understand, the Princess looked grave before uttering three words.
"Wake up, Asteria."
"Huh?"
Twilight blinked as those words were uttered from the being she had practically worshipped since her awareness of the world and the heavenly bodies. This had to be some sort of prank, a joke. Just the Princess pulling her leg.... right? Maybe the Princess has somehow fallen ill and she's delusional?
Twilight let out a nervous laugh, attempting to ignore Celestia's completely serious expression that chilled her nerves. "Um, Princess? My name's not Asteria. It's Twilight, remember?"
There was a pause that felt like it lasted forever to Twilight before Celestia responded, her face looking even darker. "I thought the trigger phrase would work," she murmured quietly, her head tilting downward as if she were about to admit an unwanted truth. "It was supposed to bring you back without any trouble."
"Trigger?" Twilight eyed Celestia's face carefully, searching for any sign that her mentor was not fully herself. She was hesitant to take a step closer to her mentor, unnerving thoughts beginning to slowly surface in her mind. "And what do you mean 'bring me back'? Back to what?"
"Your true life."
"True life?" It was moments before a second possible option arose in Twilight's mind aside from sleep overtaking her, and she forced out a shaky laugh. "Alright, you got me, Discord," she deadpanned, looking into the carnation-hued eyes she was familiar with for any sign of the gaze of the yellow-eyed draconequuus. "Stop pretending with your little mind games. They're not funny!"
The tense seconds passed. There was no chortle of a trickster, no shifting tone of voice, no sign of a transformation to signify that the form of the sun princess was anything other than what she appeared to be. Celestia shook her head sadly, her face just as bleak as before. "I'm not joking around this time... this is serious." The alicorn let out a low sigh, her expression even. "Your time here in this world is up." Her gaze was turned briefly to the floor. "I think we let you stay too long. We were afraid that you'd become too immersed in this one."
Twilight felt as if she was hearing the words from far away. The rhythm of her own heartbeat sounded erratic in her ears as she listened to Celestia's words.
"Your true name was the code that you wanted for yourself after you came into being and started doing the experiments for philosophical analysis." The princess's tone was heavy. "Something to shock you into really waking up in case we thought you were too far into the Trial Life."
'Philosophic analysis'? 'Came into being'? 'Trial Life'? What in the world did Celestia mean? Twilight stepped backward, knocking into her desk and causing a gold-plated ink bottle to spill in her haste. She took no notice of the ink staining the polished wood floor as she looked at the Princess in complete disbelief. The weight of the statement finally impacted her as she came to terms with the fact that the Princess was being entirely serious, meaning every word she said.
But she couldn't be... the Princess's words didn’t make sense...
"My name is not Asteria," Twilight said. "It's Twilight Sparkle!" She stepped forward, directly meeting the Princess's eyes. "You remember who I am, don't you?" She wasn't normally one to question the Princess so harshly, but the severity of the alicorn's expression and words weren't having a positive effect on Twilight's nerves. What if Celestia was suffering from some mysterious form of amnesia that was suddenly causing her to confuse her pupil for somepony else? "Do I look different to you?"
"No more than you're supposed to here," Celestia admitted with a sigh. "I know it's hard, but you have to believe what I'm saying..."
Twilight's mind raced, frantically, trying to think of some way to prove that the Princess's insistence was a cruel joke, or that she was dreaming. Granted, Celestia liked to have a little fun, but not like this. This kind of joke that made Twilight feel cold from with and without. Her eyes darted as she tried to think of something. "Just ask me something only I would know!"
Celestia arched her brow, appearing hesitant and uncertain. "You really want me to ask something only you would know?"
Twilight nodded firmly, attempting to stop her hooves from trembling.
"The true you?"
"Yes." In her mind, she ran over the possible questions that her mentor could ask her, hoping and praying that it would be something that she could answer, that this was her true life and this supposed alternate lifestyle was simply that of a dream. She just had to hold on to the firm conviction that she was exactly who she believed she was. What spells are found in the Star Swirl the Bearded Wing of the Canterlot Archives? What category of books are placed on the third shelf closest to the right of the library's door? What caused Discord to be reformed? In what year did—
"What is the slogan by which Capsule lives by in line of philosophical standings?"
"Huh?" Twilight's mind was thrown into confusion. What kind of question was that? She had no idea who or what 'Capsule' was. Is it the name of a pony? A business production? An organization?
The way of which Celestia spoke of it seemed to suggest that her third assumption was the closest, but Twilight still had no idea what it was no matter how much she tried to rack her brain to think of it. "I'm sorry, I, I don't understand, I can't remember anything about that..." Her face clearly expressed distress at the thought of not knowing something which the Princess seemed to insist she should know. Twilight's chest tightened as her horn instantly lit up, books levitating off the shelves at a frantic pace almost of their own accord as she attempted to find any mention of this "Capsule" which Celestia spoke of.
Celestia recognized the look of incomprehension written on her student's face. "It seems trying to jog your memory of the place you came from didn't work either..." The white alicorn began to pace back and forth, looking visibly distressed, as if she were about to do something that she knew she would regret. "I hoped that the transition would be easier than this..."
"What do you mean?"
Celestia's gaze bore into Twilight's as she replied. "Our slogan is, We transcend identity, for it is malleable..."she said. "It was also what you said to us in one of the earlier days of your true life, before we even told you our slogan."
As her mentor spoke, Twilight felt her muscles tense up as a memory seemed to spark in her mind. Or, rather, the fragment of a memory. Like a dream she once had years ago that was only just now beginning to return in her subconscious. The confusion seemed to be visible in Twilight's eyes as Celestia gently placed a hoof on her left shoulder. "Nopony exists here but you... and you are but a thought,"
A cold dread advanced within the unicorn's chest, clenching at her heart and threatening to freeze it to ice. The words resonated within the deepest parts of her memory, like a long-forgotten sealed door that she had only opened once. "I..." she forced herself to take a deep breath. "I don't understand..."
Celestia's gaze was solemn, her voice distant as she stepped back. "You really don't remember who and what you actually are..."
"I don't know what you're talking about!" Twilight protested, trying to keep any sense of alarm out of her tone even as A cold sweat broke out on her skin and her muscles seemed to turn to jelly. "I know who I am! I'm Twilight—"
"You only think you are..." Celestia's eyes narrowed slightly, causing Twilight to feel even smaller under her gaze. The alicorn's expression, however, was not filled with anger, but sadness. "Soon you're going to wake up in a world you will not recognize, Asteria." The voice was so sudden and so close, it almost sounded as if it was inside Twilight's own head, despite it having been the Princess's own voice that the sentence was projected in.
Before Twilight could ask what Celestia meant, the world began to shift and distort around her. The sphere of light appeared once more as Celestia vanished without a word. As the light of Celestia's departure faded, the library's interior blurred together and caused everything to look like a muddled watercolor painting.
"W-Wait!" Twilight said, her own voice sounding to her as if it were being heard from underwater, distant and not fully belonging to her body. But that was only the most minor indication that something was amiss. The world around her began to lose color and form, changing rapidly like an old monochromatic painting before the very shapes each object was made of began to morph into an unfamiliar disarray. "Princess Celestia!"
There was no answer. Twilight found herself completely alone. She caught movement out of the corner of her eye and watched out her window. Her mouth dropped open as she watched the formerly deep blue sky breaking up into a disjointed checkered pattern, then into lines as it broke apart. The entire world took the form of a coloring book devoid of color, only lines and the opposing shades making up the world as she had known it. The lines crisscrossed the former sky as an inky blackness remained, the degeneration steadily occurring in the rest of the landscape as the blanched ground became indistinguishable from the forms atop its surface. The black lines that outlined their forms like a sketchbook appearing to vanish before the ground cracked to send the white shards tumbling into the endless dark expanse below.
Twilight's stomach twisted into a cold knot, as if she had accidentally swallowed a quick-acting poison, her mind in a haze. Everything was breaking apart, dissolving, fading into oblivion. Town Hall, ponies' houses, the Ponyville residents... all gone, all vanishing. Nothing was remaining but the dissolving assemblage of monochromatic blocks and the empty grid surrounding them.
Twilight managed to finally tear her gaze from the horrifying landscape as her eyes met the interior of her home once again, the stairs in her library melted like fresh tar. Her heart suddenly jolted as a warning bell rang in her mind.
Spike!
Her mind a whirl of panic, Twilight teleported upstairs, rushing to Spike's bed in an attempt to rouse him. Her assistant was one of the few things around her which still retained his complete form, a constant within the broken and shattering world.
"Spike!" Twilight cried out, lifting the young dragon from his bed with her magic. "Spike, wake up!"
Spike blinked his eyes open at her words, barely registering the sensation of his friend hoisting him onto her back as the world swam into focus. "Tw-Twilight, what's going on?" he asked as he rubbed his eyes.
"I don't know!" Twilight exclaimed, charging out of her room and down the stairs. Spike became instantly alert to the pencil-sketch environment. "I was just talking to the Princess and then everything started getting like this!"
The pair reached the library's door, which had nearly vanished. They were met with a sight that nearly caused them to tumble off the island which the library now stood on.
Everything had either vanished into the endless expanse of black abyss with luminescent gridlines stretching on forever, or fell away from them, already growing smaller and smaller in their view. Twilight's ears pricked up as she thought she heard the screams of several ponies before they were silenced.
"T-Twilight!"
Twilight had become so frozen in shock that she almost didn't hear the cry from her companion. She turned and saw Spike beginning to dissolve before her. Her eyes shot wide open, her pupils shrinking to pinpricks as the dragon gripped her leg.
"T-Twilight! Help!"
Spike's color beginning to drain away from his body as the monochrome-drawing appearance took over him.
"NO! S-SPIKE!" Twilight screamed. She held on to Spike with her hooves and magic, clinging tightly to him to save him from disappearing as well. But it was to no avail as Spike’s body became as drawing-like as the rest before vanishing into thin wisps of smoke.
"No!" Twilight's eyes filled with tears as her only remaining friend was snatched away from her, the rest of the world vanishing just as rapidly. All she was aware of was a whirlwind of pencil-sketch shapes and a grid-like void, feeling distanced from her own body as her breath came out in choked gasps. Her tears simply fell through what little ground remained.
And then, every part of the library began to crumble to dust like grains of sand being blown away, joining the vanishing blank void of the outside world. In her whirlwind of horror, Twilight realized that at this point, even she too was fading, though at a far slower pace. She was stable enough that she was capable of movement, as if the force of gravity which held the fabric of space and time together was concentrated on her alone.
As her physical form began to erode and fade just like everything else, all the memories that Twilight had accumulated in her lifetime became buried within the recesses of her mind. Like rocks tumbling down a canyon, the world and her memories as she knew them dissolved into disjointed fragments.
And then, there was nothing. No sight, no sound, no perception of having physical form.
There was only a flash of memory of who and where the being had once been before everything vanished completely.
"Wake her up."
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So yeah, I decided to go for a bit of a more surrealist story this time.
And for those who don't know what Mark Twain's "The Mysterious Stranger" is, it's a story, but also an animated segment from the film "The Adventures of Mark Twain", and that was what partially inspired this.
I'm confused.
And now you can go into the mindwarp where she is Asteria wondering if she is actually Twilight Sparkle imagining herself to be Asteria... you evil author you.
There's a lot of room for emotional manipulation in this story.
4662039 After seeing that, I want to go home too.
This is a vary good story so far.
Hope to read more soon.
Interesting conspect. Should be fun to see where this goes.
A mere thought experiment invovling possible higher authorities with a test gone horribly wrong?
Mmm, cue the Inception, because we must go deeper.
Favorited and upvoted. Well done. Well done, indeed.
At first I thought of something like this:
fc09.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/224/2/5/comic__the_twilight_show_by_sophiecabra-d5avc4x.png
But it seems that we need to go deeper...
Well this is interesting.... I'm very interested to see how this goes from here, both to see what Twilight/Asteria's 'true life' is like, and how she deals with the change. Definitely looking forward to seeing more of this!
I'm immensely happy to see a philosophical piece on this site, as there are far too few. You're a fan of metaphysics and Kant's theories of reality, I see.
It will be interesting to see which theory you use to explain this story, and how "Asteria" reacts to it. Your writing is pretty solid too, which makes this even better. Some of your sentences are a little wishy-washy, but that's fixed with experience. Got a like and fave by me.
Coincidentally, have you seen the movie Waking Life? If not, it may give you a little nugget of inspiration for this fic. Look into it if you haven't seen it!
Keep it up. I like this.
My brain has exploded after reading this.
Bloody hell
MOAR
!!!
4663552 DINKLEBERG!
4670865 Yes I am Dinkelberg and I am cosplaying Rainbow Dash and you can't stop me, muahaha!
4670954 you ruined DINKLEBERG says howdy neighbour after times dad says his name
4670957 That's because I'm actually Queen Crysalis but don't tell anypony
Problem with Solipsism is there can be no surprises. You can pretend to be surprised but you can't ont-AH GAD DAM A RAT
*smashing noises*
This is my kind of story.
Finally, we have creativity at work!
4672781
Indeed it does. You have my thanks for drawing my attention to it.
Woah, that. That right there, was a good story. It made me think really deeply.
4672653
Shush, you are just looking for someone to replace Derek.
Geez, how long has this been in the backburner? Quite the old story ID number there.
Anyway, I'll have to give this a look.
4677021 *looks at username*
*starts singing the Dr. Who theme*
Dum dum dum Dum dum dum Dum dum dum DUM dum dum Dum dum dum Dum dum dum Dum dum dum DUM dum dum
Bew weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww
4670963
*GASP* 
4735390 Dum dum dum!
And then Twilight was the Emergency Medical Hologram.
4662039
Well, no sleep for me tonight!
You have my interest. Go on.
Well... this is something.
Count me hooked.
...You know, even though both Twilight's narration and the tags seem to refute it, this still feels like it could be merely a horrible nightmare brought on by all of that pondering weak and weary upon a midnight dreary.
4879280 I totally caught that reference to The Raven there!
This was... Wow... I have to admit, the concept and execution totally caught me by surprise.
Then it refused to release me until I fan's and upvoted. Just... amazing work. Looking forward to (hopefully) seeing more!
MORE, soon, right???
4877421 The irony in using the "ST:V" reference there is that the Doctor was quite content being a sentient computer program.
Twi needs to stop being angsty and just take over the Matrix.
4667308 She has no true life. Everything is an illusion.
She is actually just a story being told on the Internet...
(I mean, why not? We're already into the sheer madness that is modern philosophy.)
4877464 Totally fits your profile picture too!
But other than that, author you have intrigued me. Please, continue on...
...
I mean it. If this dies like so many other wonderful fics, I will die with it.
4889326 Glad someone got it.
4889331 You went full-meta. Never go full-meta.
4890830 Once you start introducing doubt, there's kinda nowhere left to go but all the way down the rabbit hole.
And end up in Newark, NJ...
4892345 And that's why you never go full-meta.
4897188 Full Meta Jacket?
Full Meta Alchemist?
I could have fun with that...
We're going to see more of this awesome story soon right?
4883155 Thanks!
4884745 Soon, yes!
4889326 Nice thing is you're going to be seeing more of Twilight's "Asteria persona" soon... she'll have a few shocks to deal with...
4890211 I don't plan for it to die... just plan it out carefully...
5040303 Yup!
Considering how next chapter we'll see more of who Asteria is, I want to make sure I got it perfect.
5063600
Awesomesauce! I'm eager to see what you come up with.
5063610 Let's just say... remember that "Mysterious Stranger" video above? There'll be stuff like that...
5095642
*evil grins* That'll be interesting to see.