Bonus Chapter: Dreamscape of Heroes
“Where in the name of Equestria am I?” Blueblood looked around the place he had appeared, curiosity outweighing the fear that should normally be crushing his mind. The place he stood was a vast, open field. It seemed like a field outside of Canterlot, but that was where the similarities ended. The grass was purple and the sky was pink, the clouds blobs of red and blue in the oddly colored sky. Blueblood was unsure what time it was, as the sun and moon were eclipsing each other in the sky, the rays they shone silver instead of the usual soft yellow.
“Pretty sure we aren’t in Equestria, anymore,” a voice from behind the Prince said, and Blueblood spun around to face the source. He was surprised to see an elderly, dark brown Earth Pony stallion, his mane and tail silvery white and an open book for a Cutie Mark. The Earth Pony was smiling at Blueblood in the way a Grandfather might, and Blueblood smiled in return.
“Silver Page! I’m glad to see a familiar face in this place! Speaking of, where are we?” The Earth Pony looked around with a sigh.
“It seems we have been drawn into the Heroscape.”
“The what?”
“The Heroscape. It is an alternate dimension of dreams, where hopes and desires come to life.” Silver Page looked around at the scene. He started to walk off in a random direction, and Blueblood followed his old tutor.
For a while the two wandered, Blueblood keeping a pace or two behind and to the side of the 55th Master Librarian of Canterlot’s Royal Library and Archives, watching out for anything out of place. Well, more so than now.
“So why are we here? And what do you mean about hopes and desires?” The elderly librarian paused for a moment to think about his answer.
“First, let me ask you a question; what is up north?” Blueblood blinked in confusion, but Silver Page seemed to want an answer.
“Uh, lots of snow and ice. A few research and mining outposts, but nothing that reaches out more than a mile into the Frozen North. Why?”
The Earth Pony nodded his head in thought.
“I see. Well, let me tell you something. The Dreamscape is not connected to our world in any way you could understand. Here, time flows differently, and so do the chain of events back in Equestria. For example, I myself am from the future, a few months more than you are it seems.” Silver Page began walking again, and Blueblood continued to follow, now curious to understand his mentor.
“How is that possible? How are we talking, then?”
“The Heroscape does not obey our perceptions of time. A pony from 100 years in the past could talk with his grandson and it wouldn’t be considered strange. You see, it exists outside of time, and thus, all time is connected.”
Blueblood mulled that over.
“So… the question you asked about something up north is because in your time period, something has happened. Something that would mean nothing to me, but everything to you.” Silver Page stomped his hooves his approval.
“Very good, Blueblood! Yes, the me you are speaking with is from the future. I am asleep, obviously since I am here, but I am asleep in the future! You are, to me, in the past, yet we can speak as if it is nothing!”
“So you’re here with me… in an alternate dimension where time has no meaning?”
“Yup! Still have a good head on your shoulders, there! You’ve learned a lot since I taught you last!”
“You haven’t taught me since Magic Kindergarten!” Blueblood laughed, and the older pony joined in.
“So, how are Silver Tongue and Gold Dust? Are they doing well in the future?” Blueblood inquired after a few minutes of silent wandering.
“Ah, those two! They’ve been really helpful in my time! And Silver Tongue finally has his eyes on a mare, and a mind to start a relationship!”
“The end times are upon us! First Canterlot’s most eligible playpony has a relationship, next Aunt Celestia stops eating cake! The signs are coming!” Blueblood exclaimed in mock horror, and Silver Page roared with laughter.
“Yes, he might be my grandson, but if he kept on fooling around with the mares, I’d have stopped saving his rump!” The old librarian chuckled, and Blueblood snorted.
“Remember the one time he accidentally walked in on some maids changing in the palace, and they shoved him in the freezer?” Blueblood asked, and Silver Page nodded, reminiscing on the past.
“It took Shining Armor an hour to thaw him out!” Laughing merrily, the pair failed to notice the grass was turning from purple to black.
“Is Gold Dust alright? Her cousin is a fool, but she graduated with honors from Magical Academy!”
“Ah, yes, my granddaughter is well. She’s part of the Spell Research and Study Division at the Royal Society of Magical Sciences,” Silver Page declared proudly, and Blueblood whistled approvingly.
“She’s still not jealous of Twilight, is she?” At this, Silver Page lowers his head in despair.
“Gold Dust is a bright Unicorn, and she is very talented with magic, but she never really got over the fact that I helped Twilight out with magical studies more than with her.” He shook his head.
“It’s not that I don’t love her, or anything, I just don’t want her to get hurt! It was selfish of me, and she still has a bit of a grudge towards Twilight Sparkle because of it.”
“It’s not your fault! You wanted to protect you family! Besides, she must be proud of you! You’re an Earth Pony who’s contributed to the field of Magical Theory more than most Unicorns!” Blueblood praised, and the Earth Pony smiled at the compliment. Unnoticed, the grass continued to blacken, and soon patches of the grass were melting into a tar-like substance.
“When you don’t have it, you think about it in a different way. A new mindset is all it takes, sometimes.”
As they spoke, Silver Page started to sense something was wrong. He froze, and looked around wildly, before his eyes fell to the ground.
“Jump to the side!” He screamed, putting action to his words, and Blueblood obeyed, throwing his body to the left, while Silver Page went right. As they jumped, Blueblood saw what they were escaping from.
The grass was blackened, as if by fire, and small patches had become thick, viscous puddles of some kinds of dark liquid. As he watched in fascination and horror, the black goo writhed and stabbed upwards where the two ponies had been standing and talking mere seconds ago.
“What is that?!” Blueblood screamed, and Silver Page growled in annoyance.
“The Heroscape is separated from time, and operates on a different set of rules than Equestria! Here, emotions, sub-conscious thoughts, dreams, and even fragments of events, past and future, can appear here!”
“So what does that mean?!” Blueblood was shaking, and he could only watch as the tar began to move and budge, some sort of shape starting to appear in it. At once, something burst from the tar and landed in front of the quivering prince.
It was a griffin, or at least, it looked like one. It was all black and its eyes were burning orbs of fire, and as it opened its mouth, only gibberish spewed forth. It raised a talon to strike.
Blueblood screamed like a filly.
“Take this!” With a blow that would shatter stone, a hoof was sent smashing into the shadow-griffin’s head, and sent it flying. Silver Page had leapt at the creature and slammed into it, knocking it away from Blueblood.
“The Heroscape draws in the minds of people who are, in a sense, heroes. People who have great courage, strength of mind, magic, body, or destiny. It does this for a very important reason, one that I shall explain in a moment.” Silver Page continued his lecture, giving Blueblood a look that was a mix of amusement and pity.
“The beings its summons, be they pony, griffin, dragon, or any other race, are brought forth fully, in body and mind. Only heroes can enter this place.”
“Then what is that?!” Blueblood demanded, pointing a shaking hoof at the shadow-griffin. It had stood, its smashed head reforming as if it had taken no damage at all.
“While only heroes enter in full, monsters, villains, and things of ill-purpose will appear in this place as Shadows; not really here, but real enough to become a problem.” The shadow-griffin lunged at Silver Page, but the Earth Pony smacked it aside.
“If something is loved enough, an echo, for lack of a better term, appears here, in the Heroscape. Cities, monuments, artifacts and living things such as pets. They are not real, but they were cared for so much that the sub-conscious minds of dozen, even hundreds, of beings gave it form in here. But the same is true to the opposite. Something, or someone, so feared and hated could be reborn in this place, to wreak havoc in this realm, as the minds that created it only gave it the will to destroy.”
“Why does that matter?” Blueblood asked, less fearful now that his mentor was teaching the shadow-griffin why you never mess with a retired adventurer, even one who was now an elderly librarian.
“Because even though it has no effect on time, the Heroscape still reflects the state of existence in Equestria and Equis as a whole. If Equestria is happy and safe, then this place is safe, and only the weaker, most pitiful fears are given life.” Silver Page punctuated this fact by punching his hoof straight through its chest, but the shadow-griffin rallied, trying to bite of the pony’s head. It didn’t work, as Silver Page gave it a strong head butt. He recoiled in pain as soon as he was free though.
“Nopony wins with a head butt,” he muttered to himself in a daze, but he quickly recovered.
“Anyways, if something damages the Heroscape, then whatever caused it will be manifested upon Equis! If this Shadow, born from some kind of domestic violence, if I’d have to guess, were to run rampant, then we’d have increased cases of domestic violence all over Equestria, as ponies would react to the evil in the Heroscape being reflected into them. Most ponies, or any being, in truth, never fully enters this place, but all are connected. The Heroscape is a higher level of the Dreaming World which Princess Luna patrols and protects, though here, heroes like you or I are drawn in to act as defenders.”
“This place thinks I am a hero?!” Blueblood was incredulous, and looked at the shadow-griffin. “I could never fight something like that!”
“And you might not have to. Like I said, things of negative reputation appear here as well. Once, I had to destroy a muffin. Apparently, it was so horrid, it sent dozens of ponies into a comatose state of sickness after they ate it.” Silver Page pounced onto the monster, and pummeled it into submission. It tried to reform, but after a brief struggle, it collapsed, and the darkness it was made of disintegrated to mist and smoke. Silver Page wiped his brow free of a bead of sweat.
“Once you find and destroy the evil you were brought here to vanquish, the Heroscape expels you, returning you to the waking world. You’ll have no recollection of any of this upon waking up, but the next time you return, you’ll remember it all.” As he spoke, Blueblood felt everything fade and shift around him. His eyesight went blurry, and he saw Silver Page mouthing something to him, but no sounds reached his ears.
With a yawn, Blueblood opened his eyes, then stretched as he felt the early morning sunlight on his face.
“Sleep well?” Shining Armor asked at breakfast later, and the prince nodded.
“I think I had some kind of dream though, but I can’t really recall it… something about Silver Tongue and maids, and me laughing…” Blueblood mentioned, and lapsed into silence. The ponies in the room roll their eyes in amusement at the mention of the flirtatious grandson of the Master Librarian. Unnoticed by him, and the rest of the table, Princess Luna shot him a glance, a knowing smile on her lips.
‘Looks like somepony is about to have some interesting dreams,’ Luna chuckled to herself in her thoughts. She turned back to her stack and waffles, and let her family regale her of tales about the misadventures of Silver Tongue.
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Nice bonus chapter. I can't wait for the next one to come out.
If heroes are brought to the Heroscape to defeat an evil, what was Blueblood's purpose there? Silver Page did all the work. BTW,
I see what you did there.
: Why did you have to remind me? I still have nightmares about those from time to time.
3810941 lol baked bads