Chapter 9: Dealing with Mephistopheles
Days of confinement were wearing deeply into Rainbow Dash’s patience. Twilight was trapped by some alien freak halfway across the universe – for all she knew about interstellar distances – and she was stuck on some kind of enforced medical leave until she either died or they found a way to cure her, which she was certain would probably not happen first. Nopony had even come to visit her! Her friends, she assumed, were either still too embarrassed by her rampage or hadn’t been told she was dying – in theory – by the Princess.
She’d taken to pacing in the middle of her living room, to burn off nervous energy. If the cloud floor hadn’t been hardened into something approaching cloudstone’s density and impermeability by the guards, she’d have probably worn through it by now. All her furniture was packed against the walls, especially against the front door; if Princess Luna wanted to come back and interrogate her some more, her dramatic entrance would likely be forestalled satisfyingly by that petty bit of resistance.
“I need powdered phoenix beak,” she mumbled, half to herself. “How can I get that stuff when I’m stuck in here?”
“Logically, one would conclude you would have to leave first,” Ghealach answered pointedly. Dash gave her a flat look.
“Thanks, Ghealach.” She shook her head and continued pacing. “That helped. That helped a lot.”
“There is little I can actually do to help, in that regard,” she pointed out. “You must find a way out on your own.”
“Buck it, you stupid moon-pony, this isn’t some kind of self-discovery quest or something!” she snapped, rounding on the Dust Sentinel’s impassive avatar . “Twilight’s life is in – “
“I have heard it all before,” she interrupted impatiently. “And it is not a matter of – “
“Then why won’t you help me?” she demanded. “I’m trapped in my own home by a dozen guards! I thought you had some kind of plan for me, too! Is this part of it?”
“It is not,” she replied. “Emphatically not. But my hooves are bound by distance – I am several light-years away. Our mental link is the only reason I can send strength to you with any efficiency, and I must put double what I would have to otherwise into that just to make an impression. Direct physical manipulation of your environment would be impractically energy-intensive, even for me; I would need to maintain a space-folding spell to reduce the distance, and those are nigh-impossible to maintain efficiently for any length of time, and then while performing that impossible feat I would have to manipulate objects I cannot personally observe.”
“So?”
“You are not a unicorn,” she explained simply. “You lack a magic sense defined enough to be useful for this. The most you could detect with would be a particularly strong sense of foreboding in high-magic areas.”
Frustrated, Dash whirled back to her pacing. “So, I’m attached to a moon, and even with all that power I still can’t escape and save Twilight.”
“My power is finite,” she responded defensively. “And it must maintain your life functions at the same time as I would have to cast the spell. Phoenix beak powder demands energy to absorb, and I must satiate that demand to the point that it forgets to draw from you altogether. At this moment in time, I effectively lack the ability to replenish my own magic reserves.”
“Great. Awesome.” She sat down abruptly. “This is useless. I’m just going to have to fight my way out somehow and go underground. Black markets have stuff like this, right?” At the very least, they always seemed to be where the villains in the books got their ancient and powerful relics – and who knew where Trixie had found that amulet? “Maybe I’ll find Trixie and see if she can tell me where one is.”
“You idiot,” Ghealach sniffed. “They would have you surrounded and subdued before you got four feet from your front door.”
“Well, I don’t hear you coming up with anything better!”
“I have dealt with the magical portion of this plan,” she said. “It is your task to perform the more physical duties. You have experience.” She shrugged. “This form is little more than a marionette. I am a moon. Fine physical manipulation is beyond my knowledge, difficult as that may be to believe.”
Dash started pacing again. “Okay. I’m in charge.” She grinned. “I’m in charge again. I can do this.”
“I’m glad you have such faith in your abilities,” Ghealach said, her voice devoid of anything approaching gladness.
“So, I need to find some kind of phoenix beak powder stock, and I need to do it fast,” she thought aloud. “The only pony I know who has some is Discord, and I’m not asking him for help ever again.”
“Your pride will make things difficult for us.”
“It’s not my pride!” she protested irritably. “He doesn’t want Twilight back. He’s perfectly happy just letting Beta do whatever she wants to her! The last time he helped basically killed me, and when he helped Luna he purposefully sabotaged it! Asking Discord for help finding her is like asking an earth pony for flying lessons.”
“Then how do you intend to get it?” she asked skeptically.
“I know where the stuff is. How can we store it without getting any more of it on me?”
“A simple unenchanted satchel should be enough to safely store it. Waterproofed would be best, to minimize the chance of it being pulled through the fabric by your magic,” she answered cautiously. “What do you have in mind?”
“Awesome! My saddlebags are waterproofed, that will work…” She frowned. “I still have to get out of here and back in without being detected, though. That might be harder, actually.”
Ghealach’s eyes widened as she caught Dash’s train of thought. “Bonding you was a mistake. You are beyond rationality.”
“What? I’m not asking him for help again,” she said. “This is the only way we can get it!”
“You would seriously consider stealing from the physical embodiment of a primal force?” Ghealach asked disbelievingly.
“Yep. And you aren’t any better,” she replied, grinning. “You want to take over an entire planet from a sun, with only me and the voices in my head for help.”
“That is far more reasonable than what you suggest.” Ghealach frowned. “And as yet I have not heard how you plan to escape.”
Dash’s eyes widened suddenly with a realization. “That doctor!”
Ghealach gave her an even more skeptical look than what she’d already been wearing. “Yes? Do you suggest we use him as a disguise? As a Trojan Horse, perhaps?”
“No, no – the magic-sphere-thing he did!” she clarified. “He said that if unicorn magic was dominant or something, enough of it would make me be able to do unicorn things. If more of whatever was causing the contamination was in my aura, maybe I could get a better magic sense.”
“And?”
“You could use your own magic to make part of the wall normal again, so I can get through it,” she finished triumphantly. “It’s perfect!”
“Did anything I said about the cost of magic over this distance get through to you?” Ghealach sighed. “It would be too costly.”
“Use me as a channel for it or whatever,” Dash suggested dismissively. “I’ll be part unicorn. It’ll be easier, won’t it?”
“Marginally,” she answered. “If I had a better idea, I’d reject this plan, but…” She shrugged. “How do you intend to increase the prevalence of that contaminant?”
“I think I know what’s causing it. This should be easy!” she answered. She dove into a cloudy couch along the wall; her eyes were closed before she hit the cushion. “I can do it in my sleep.”
------
It was chaos as Twilight and Beta prepared to make their entrance into Uisceban. Dozens of kelpies milled around, pursuing their tasks with all the intensity of hunting dogs who’d scented their prey. Twilight was mildly impressed by their ways of handling objects – clipboards were glued firmly to forelegs by the adhesive properties of their coats, small microphones were affixed near their mouths similarly to allow communication between disparate individuals across the town. Seaweed-like manes were tied up and tied back or tied down or done in a dozen different styles, and smooth stones of varied earth tones were carefully arranged on their flanks and necks like jewelry. Even though the kelpie color palette was far more restricted than the normal range of pony coat colors, it was still easy to distinguish them – maybe even more so than for ponies, as these creatures seemed to go out of their way just to make themselves stand out.
In the center of the madness, the two stars sat – Beta, comfortably and at ease; Twilight, nervously and on edge. She’d never made any sort of public appearance as a political figure before – hay, the last time she’d been in front of a large crowd as the center of attention had been when she’d given a speech as valedictorian of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns. She was certain that would be nothing at all like what was about to happen. There were books about it that she could consult to ease her mind, true…but of course, she didn’t have any of them, and she hadn’t had any time to peruse the library Beta claimed she had.
“Calm down a bit, Alpha!” Beta advised. “Today’s going to be simple. Just a quick jaunt down the main boulevard and a feast in Lord Measured Speech’s castle.”
“What if I do something to ruin everything?” she asked worriedly. “I’ve never done this before! What if I trip, or say something I shouldn’t say and cause an international incident, or insult an ambassador by accident – I don’t know any of the cultural norms here, I don’t know what’s acceptable or not – oh, stars, what if I use the wrong fork for my salad?”
“Was that really an issue on Equus?” she snorted. “Really?”
“Yes, it was an issue!” she snapped. “Proper table etiquette is important when dealing with the nobility! There’s a fork for salads, a fork for the main course, a dessert fork – no, was that a dessert spoon?” She racked her brain, trying to remember – was it a dessert fork or a dessert knife or a dessert spoon? Were sporks acceptable to use when dining with ponies of the upper class? How many different knives were there?
“Alpha, take a deep breath and calm down,” Beta ordered. Twilight nodded and tried to get her anxiety under control. “Everything will go perfectly. Measured Speech is a personal friend of mine. The food will be excellent, as it always is, and the people will love us as they always do. There will not be any assassination attempts, there will not be any foreign ambassadors to embarrass, if you commit a faux pas I’ll cover for you, and for the love of Caelum stop worrying about dessert forks. Or spoons. Or knives. I don’t know what kind of elaborate dining scheme Equestrian aristocrats have, but we don’t have it here.”
“Wonderful,” she muttered. “I have to figure out a new dining scheme in the presence of nobility.”
“Just remember that you’re at the top of the heap now, Alpha,” Beta said. “Judgment is the least of your worries. You’re one of the two kelpies on this planet who makes sure the crops grow and the livestock have enough to eat, and whose light keeps the bugganes in their holes half the day.”
“Bugganes?”
Beta grimaced. “There are some things I’m almost glad you can’t remember.” A pair of younger kelpies pushed a cart up to them, on which lay two piles of metal regalia. Beta thanked them and said to Twilight, “Almost showtime! Time to get the adornments of office on.”
Twilight lifted a necklace with her magic – it seemed to be made of smooth lapis lazuli stones linked by a delicate tracery of gold threads. On the front of it was a plate embossed with a trio of four-pointed stars – the same design she’d seen on Beta’s torc when she crashed into the hill. “What does that symbolize?” she asked curiously, trying to distract herself from her impending reveal.
“You, me, Proxi,” Beta answered, pointing first to the largest of the three stars, next to a smaller star above and to the left of the large star, and last to an even smaller star below and to the right of the big one. “We came up with it when we first started to rule our subjects more directly. The symbol of the weird old priesthood had…some bad connotations. Especially after – you know.”
“No, I don’t,” she reminded Beta. “Two thousand years? Several – apparently – reincarnations?”
Beta turned stoically away. “We – Proxima and I – used the old triskelion symbol when we tried to dethrone you,” she managed to respond, after a few seconds. “During the War of Nightmares.”
Twilight didn’t press further. She floated the necklace around her neck and let it settle around it, tugging at it and determining that it had adhered to her coat. The hoof coverings were similar to what Celestia and Luna wore in public, and rather simple; they were gold, and devoid of further detail. She slipped them on without incident, taking pains to make sure they were facing forward and in a comfortable position so she wouldn’t have to summon a stormcloud to get them to come off.
The flurry of activity was starting to die down now. They were in a mid-sized room in a public building at the end of the main road of Uisceban, a wide cobblestone boulevard lined with oak trees older than their reign, from what she’d seen from above when they’d flown in. Sunslight flowed in through a wide pair of frosted glass doors that led out onto a small porch with wide staircases sweeping around toward the ground. Kelpies of the City Guard now took their positions to either side of the doors and prepared to open them; Twilight and Beta stood up.
“Walk forward next to me,” Beta instructed her quickly. “They have to see that we’re equals. Don’t stray behind or rush ahead. Calm, measured pace. Don’t let them see any fear or nervousness – put on a mask. Smile some, if you want. You’re a Queen of Domhan, Alpha” – she smiled – “remember that.” Twilight nodded.
“Starting in five!” Silver Tongue, Beta’s personal aid, declared. She stood against the right-hoof wall, clipboard stuck firmly to her foreleg. She gave them an encouraging smile. “Four…”
"Three..."
Twilight swallowed nervously as they stood before the door. No turning back now…
“Two…”
“One…”
The doors swung open, and the room was flooded with the roar of a city.
It took all of Twilight’s willpower to force herself to take that first step onto the porch next to Beta, but as soon as she did, a wave of calm overcame her. She knew exactly what she had to do and how she had to do it. She grinned, and the crowd’s voice surged louder. Rolling thunder filled the air as thunderbirds perched on rooftops rattled their wings; howling mixed in with the kelpies’ voices as wolves joined in. She matched her pace with Beta’s as they descended their separate staircases and met an honor guard composed of soldiers from both the Royal and City Guard, who fanned out and added a second layer of security to the pickets already stationed at regular intervals on the edge of the onlookers. Camera flashes went off as journalists snapped pictures for what would almost surely be front page news - she could already see the headlines. "Ancient Queen Returns!" they would proclaim. "Alpha Centauri Regina Reclaims Vacant Throne!"
“You seem to have gotten over your fear,” Beta commented happily, about halfway down the boulevard. Their pace had remained even for almost twenty minutes; it would be another twenty to the coral-stone castle at the far end of the street.
“I’ve always liked our subjects,” Alpha responded. “I hope whatever nobility has grown under you is half as pleasant.”
“I've always liked Measured Speech,” Beta said. “I’m sure this will be a feast to remember. Tomorrow we’ll be visiting Caisleanard – the ruling family there is one you’re familiar with, don’t worry! They never gave up hope I’d find you, either.”
The rest of the walk to the Castle passed uneventfully, if accompaniment by thousands of cheering kelpies and wolves and thunderbirds could be considered “uneventful”. The crowd thinned out near the end of the boulevard, where Measured Speech’s Guard had established a security cordon. A tapering semicircular staircase, wide at the base and narrow at the top, lead up to an open double door in a gatehouse that seemed almost purely ornamental; the lord himself was waiting at the top when they arrived.
“Welcome, esteemed guests,” the kelpie stallion rumbled, bowing low. His coat was silver, and studded with dozens of opals – grey as well, though they iridesced in the sunslight. He had a short, pointed beard, devoid of seaweed – Twilight noted with scientific interest how that seemed to be limited to manes on kelpies – and his mane was tied back in a queue. “I trust your journey has left you both with an insatiable appetite, my Queens?”
“I am hungry, at least,” Beta laughed. “I hope it’s up to your usual standards. Visiting your castle has always been an honor for my stomach!”
He laughed good-naturedly. “The cooking staff assure me it will be delicious, my friend, and the honor is all mine.” He turned his eyes toward Twilight. “And here we have your sister – the long-lost leader of our people, Alpha Centauri, Alpha Incorruptible, the ancient Queen. I’m sure you have some interesting stories to share of your long exile.”
“Maybe,” she replied, smiling. “Two thousand years is enough to forget a few, at least.”
He laughed again. “Certainly, it’s time enough to forget more than what we mere mortals can learn in a lifetime! Perhaps we’ll learn a bit of what you’ve forgotten over the course of our meal, hm?”
“Perhaps,” she agreed.
“I suppose that’s all I can hope for right now. Always in motion, after all, the future is.” He stepped aside and swept a foreleg towards the open door. “After you, please, my Queens.”
Confidently, Twilight stepped through the door – Beta following almost immediately after.
------
The dream where Rainbow Dash met Cloud Ferry again was different from the last time. Instead of a pleasant garden, she found herself in a dark room, seated in a plush red velvet chair. She wore a different ridiculous dress than last time, though she lacked a hat thankfully. Past a few rows of seats in front of her, she couldn’t see anything. She had the sense that she was in some kind of huge theatre.
With an echoing clack, a single spotlight snapped on, its brilliant shaft of white light shining down on Cloud Ferry herself, bedecked solely in a modest feathered cap and laying lazily across the front of the stage. As seats went, Rainbow Dash had a fairly good one – of course, when one is the only patron to show up, any seat is a good one. She was about to say something, to start to make her case, but Cloud Ferry pre-empted her and began to recite what Dash assumed was her line from the play.
“O for a muse of fire, that would ascend the brightest heaven of invention!” she exclaimed. “A queendom for a stage, Princesses to act, and time-worn stars to behold the swelling scene - then should the selfish Rainbow Dash, like herself, assume the port of Ghealach; and at her heels, leash’d in like hounds, should rashness, idiocy, and ill judgment crouch for employment.” Lazily she rolled off the stage and landed on her hooves, facing away from her guest. “Fair denizens of her mind, I give you the tyrant fool herself! What mad schemes doth she have to share with us, her constituency?”
“Cloud Ferry!” Dash shouted, before she could continue monologuing. “I need your help.”
“Why, my dear, should I help you?” she hissed, turning to face the pegasus. Her eyes burned with barely checked violence. “Your supernatural aid has imprisoned me here on a stage unseen by mortal eyes already. What incentive, what rationalization, might remain to me to justify lending my hoof in aid? Piecing together a mind again, while choking in the detritus of yours, is nothing if not energy-intensive.”
“I need to get Twilight back. She’s my friend! I can’t just leave her with the creature that kidnapped her!” she insisted. Cloud Ferry snorted.
“And you would deliver a world into the tender hooves of Ghealach to get her back?” She barked a laugh. “Single-minded madness, Rainbow Dash! Is she really worth it?”
“Of course she’s worth it!” Dash answered. “She’s my friend, and I’m the Bearer of Loyalty! It’s part of who I am! And the freak who has her messed with my head and made you and a dozen other phantoms appear!”
“You’re straying dangerously close to admitting this is also partially about revenge,” Ferry said, giving her trademark smirk. “Not so high above the crowd now, are you? What’s it like from the perspective of us groundlings, O incomparable Rainbow Dash?”
“I never thought I was better than anypony!” Dash snapped. “Look, I just need you to somehow contaminate my aura with unicorn magic.”
“Is that jealousy I detect in your motives?” she asked, cocking an eyebrow.
“Ghealach needs somepony with a unicorn magic sense so she can help me escape my house,” Dash explained, forcing her temper back under control. “Princess Luna decided I was nuts and trapped me in my own home.”
“Oh, you poor dear, I can’t possibly imagine what that’s like,” Ferry groaned with mock sympathy, leaning forward into a chair and casually sweeping a foreleg out to encompass the darkened theatre. “All the world a stage, and to be confined to a bit part in some shadowy backwater unsuitable even for burlesque.”
Dash sighed. “What do I have to do for your help?”
“Make her let me go,” she replied instantly, focusing with an almost frightening intensity on Rainbow Dash. “Let me out, and I’ll do my best to help.”
“No way!” she shouted. “Why, so you can keep messing with my head all the time?”
“Maybe, maybe not.” She shrugged innocently. “Those are my terms. Nonnegotiable. Be glad I’m not asking for more.”
“Like what?”
“Total control of your body,” she answered. She grinned ferally at Dash’s sudden silence. “Count your blessings, Rainbow Dash. I’d give a quick answer, too, if I were you – I could change my mind at any time…”
She gritted her teeth frustratedly. “That’s ridiculous. Isn’t there anything else you want?”
“Take it or leave it,” she said. “And here I was, thinking you wanted your friend back.”
“I do!” she exclaimed. With an even more frustrated sigh, she yielded. “Okay, fine. You want to be free again? You can be free again. After you help me out.”
“I don’t know – the deal seems a bit one-sided…” Ferry murmured thoughtfully.
“That’s all you’re going to get,” Dash declared with a smile. “Take it or leave it.”
“How do you expect me to help, anyways?” she asked with a shrug. “Have you thought that part out?”
“I don’t know. Do whatever you were doing before.” She shrugged. “I kind of assumed you were doing it on purpose.”
Cloud Ferry nodded and smiled – a genuine smile, not a smirk, though Dash had the sneaking suspicion it was an act. “I might have an idea, then. Very well; I agree to your terms, unfair as they may be. I’ll start as soon as you leave my pitiful show-room.”
“Thanks.” In the waking world, she stirred; the dream began to break down. It was almost a sensation like flying – the gentle, unguided ascent that came from catching a strong thermal over an open field. She rose out of the dream, into the off-white space between dream and reality – and that was when Cloud Ferry struck.
The void around her strobed with magical light as the phantom’s presence crashed against her. For an instant, the struggle transcribed itself into physical feelings – Ferry’s body slammed into her midsection, folding Dash’s wings around her body protectively and sending them plummeting back down into the twilight of unreality they’d escaped from; for an instant, she couldn’t feel her real body jerking on the couch. Something snapped; something was mauling her. In a confusing impression of feathers and blood, Rainbow Dash screamed and redoubled her efforts to wake up.
With a herculean effort of will, Dash yanked herself free from Cloud Ferry, and the void was filled with the sound of her screaming now – raw, agonized, shocked emotion, like she’d just stabbed the phantom through the heart. In her house, Rainbow Dash tumbled off her couch and landed on a burning wing.
“I take it your visit went well?” Ghealach asked, a faint smile on her lips, as Dash staggered to her hooves. Her eyes were darting around frantically, jumping from shadow to shadow, corner to corner – she had to have another attack planned! She was trying to kill her! Her own mind was trying to kill her!
After a few minutes, it became apparent that whatever Cloud Ferry had been planning, it was over now. She forced her tensed muscles to relax again, and swallowed her fear before speaking. “Uh, well – I thought it was going good. Then she attacked me!”
“I assume this was the cause for the sudden bout of spasming?
“…Yeah.” She shook her head and tugged her hooves out of the cloud floor. They immediately began to sink through again. “Uh – something’s wrong.”
Ghealach’s eyes flared with power as she cast an aura visualizer spell – a promising sign in and of itself. The sphere appeared in the air between them, and this time it was immediately obvious there was a very serious problem – the sphere was split in half down the center, divided against itself into a white hemisphere and a blue hemisphere, both streaked heavily with silver. The Dust Sentinel nodded approvingly.
“Your plan has worked,” she declared. “You shall have as much of my power as can be spared. We should move to secure Discord’s supply of powder – “
Dash’s hoof broke through the bottom of her cloud floor and found open sky.
An upwelling of primal fear burst into her mind, and before she could get a lid on it she was bolting through the hallway to the kitchen, through the kitchen to the back hall, through the back hall to Tank’s room, and skidding across the solid cloudstone floor that room had, breathing heavily. There was solid ground beneath her again – she was safe. I’m safe.
Tank poked his head out of his shell and blinked at her as she shuddered, before pulling back in again, deciding against intervening. Dash sat down and relished the feeling of solidity again, hovering on the verge of swearing off flying forever just to avoid putting empty sky between her and the ground ever again.
Okay. Fear of falling, she thought. That’s a natural pegasus thing, right? That’s not me being crazy, right?
Cloud Ferry smirked at her from the cloudy wall. It could be, she sang silently. Dash blinked and she vanished.
“If you are finished galloping, Rainbow Dash, perhaps we could begin our journey to the Everfree Forest,” Ghealach suggested from the doorway of the room. Dash smiled sheepishly.
“Yeah. Yeah, I guess we should do that.” She stood up before a thought crossed her mind. “Buck. How are we going to get down?”
Ghealach smiled. “You have access to lunar magic now. We get down how I would get down.”
“And that way is…?”
Her navigational sense told her she was moving in every direction at once, including several which didn’t exist. Her stomach turned and bucked against the control of her brain. Finally, with a gut-wrenching, perception-scrambling ripping, she was pulled out of the real world and into the instantaneous folding of a teleport. Where she and Ghealach had been, wisps of cloud flowed in to plug the vacuum nature so abhors. Determinedly unconcerned, Tank didn’t even poke his head back out of his shell.
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Geez, did it occur to Dash that she's basically running the risk of sacrificing her flight to save Twilight?
I kinda want to see more of Twilight, or Alpha... Or whatever her name is most of the time XD
3431160
Nothing is too great a sacrifice for friendship!
Admittedly, revenge is also partially a motivator by now, too, but that alone wouldn't be enough to cause her to risk her flight. My view is that as Element of Loyalty, she has to be extraordinarily loyal - more so than the average friend, in order to be the Bearer and best example of the Element - and so she'll sacrifice anything to get Twilight back...especially since, in her mind, Twilight is held hostage by a powerful alien being who has no qualms about mucking about in other ponies' minds.
3431230
Don't worry, she'll have a few chapters mainly to herself once I accomplish my short-term plot goal for RD next chapter (I hope I finish it next chapter, but it may take one-and-a-half to get her off Equestria again fully). I have plans for her coming up...soon.
3431248
Glad to hear it. I look forward to reading more :3
3431248 now think for a moment and Replace "friendship" with Obsessive Relationship and you might find what I'm seeing about Rainbow Dash Right now.
3432173
Except Rainbow Dash genuinely believes Twilight is in real danger from a creature that has proven herself to be hostile (in Dash's eyes), and has absolutely no reason to think otherwise. The more powerful beings whose job it is to take care of this sort of thing have proven themselves completely inept at doing it, or actively detrimental to rescuing Twilight in Discord's case, and she is allied with a different powerful being who is reinforcing her determination to get back into space and do it herself in addition to the being's mere presence reassuring her that she can do it. It's less obsession than it is a certainty that she and she alone can rescue her friend and bring her safely home, and that Twilight does actually need that.
That being said, a few of her assumptions are untrue or distorted by the mental damage she's been taking from Cloud Ferry's meddling and Beta's original - quite traumatic - scan of her deep memory. Some irrationality mixed in with her motivations is to be expected.
3433427 So basically she's broken and Cloud Ferry made it worse?
Yea Rainbow really is going to be in trouble after this story is over.
3435716
I'll take it under advisement. I prefer the closer-together style of printed books, but what's good for print isn't always best for internet I suppose. If anyone else chimes in for bigger spaces I'll start using that, but until then - if it ain't broke, don't fix it
3438974
Thanks! And puns are nothing to be sorry for