What Remains II: After the Fall

by Bateman66

Immortal Truth

Twilight Sparkle glided solemnly over the rooftops of her former beloved hometown, Ponyville. The sun hung at half mast as she fluttered over the yellow thatch roofs of the multi-colored wooden shops and homes, casting an orange light that baked the ground in a comfortably warm glow.

It was amazing that just days ago, she’d been happily enjoying a visit to this very location with her closest friends, completely unaware of the crisis unfolding right under her snout. The disappearance of her friend Alistair had been one thing, but the complete lack of anything to go off of made the search seem even more desperate than it already was.

But that wasn’t completely true, she still had one base to go from, but the dark feeling she sensed inside Alistair’s apartment didn’t particularly help triangulate where he’d been or where the darkness had come from in the first place. Needless to say, her one last hope was living somewhere in Ponyville and hopefully he could set her on the right path.

Spotting the address she was looking for, she evened herself into a descending glide until her hooves skidding against the dirt road, just outside the house she was looking for. Dusting herself off, she approached the front door and knocked gently against it with her hoof.

A few moments later, the door swung open to reveal a heavyset, electric blue earth pony colt with a spiky dark blue mane. A set of glasses were perched atop his snout as he looked Twilight over with widened eyes of surprise.

“P-Princess…” he began, awe struck that one of the Equestrian royalty had just shown up right up at his doorstep. “What are…?”

“Hello, Commodore Blip,” greeted Twilight with a small smile, “or would you prefer that I call you just Commodore? I’m Twilight Sparkle.” She held out her hoof cheerfully.

Staring at the hoof unsurely, he slowly shook it in return, nodding his head in agreement. “Just Commodore is fine.”

“Good, would you like to step outside then? I wish to talk.”

Wincing in shook, the colt nodded quickly. “Uh, sure. W-Why not? What do you want to talk about?”

Gesturing for him to follow, Twilight took a few steps toward the road. “I’ll tell you as we go.”
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Commodore stared forward as he and Twilight moved down the winding pathway, the sprawling countryside of outer Ponyville spanning before them.

“Are you afraid of me, Commodore?” Twilight spoke suddenly.

The colt nervously swallowed and promptly shook his head. “I’m not afraid, just…surprised. You’re a Princess and all, and with you showing up at my door…”

“Even though I used to live in Ponyville for quite some time, even after I became a Princess for awhile?” she replied.

“But that was before you destroyed Lord Tirek and got your own kingdom. I mean, sure, you were a Princess before, but what more proof do ponies need to know that you’re the real deal? I know I don’t.”

Twilight grimaced at what Commodore had just spoken of. Of course she’d fretted over what he had just spoken of, the separation, the entitlement, the metaphoric raising of her superiority of all those around her. And yet she’d almost completely been able to convince herself that all such notions were ridiculous and simple anxiousness in accordance to her recent ascendency to royalty. The key word being that she almost had been convinced.

“Commodore,” she stated evenly, “you know of the disappearance of Alistair, correct?”

Commodore gravely nodded. “I almost couldn’t believe it when I saw it in the newspaper. I know he’s out doing that big job of his, but he’s still a kid and all, you don’t imagine that happening to somepony.”

There it was again, Commodore bringing to light more factors Twilight wished to not consider. Yes, Alistair was still a kid, but a human kid. No pony would bat an eye at him being in position suited for somepony much older than him. To most ponies, even Twilight sometimes, a human was a human, with not much variation in between.

“Is that why you came?” asked Commodore with pleading eyes that didn’t quite suit his age. “You want information on him, to find out where he might have gone?”

Twilight exhaled deeply. “Not exactly. I don’t have an exact trail to lead me directly to him, but I think I may have a clue I can go off of, if you’re willing to help.”

“What do you mean?”

She pursued her lip. “While searching through his residence back in Canterlot just the other day, I sensed something unusual rippling outwards from his room. I couldn’t pin down precisely what it was but…”

Commodore gestured for her to continue. “But…what?”

“It was darkness,” whispered Twilight, the unspoken word from her mind finally being said. “It was hatred, cold and raw. Gaping forth from and projecting itself all throughout the entire room. I shuddered as I felt it sweep past me, like an icy invisible force grazing over my skin, the evil within it almost tangible. It was darkness.”

Commodore looked alarmingly toward Twilight. “Is something wrong, Princess?”

“No,” she said with a shaky wave of her hoof, “nothing is wrong. I was, uh, I was just wondering if you knew anything about the…the, uh, the thing I mentioned.”

The blue colt rubbed the edge of his chin in thought. “Well…I can remember talking with Alistair a pretty while back, about a month before he left for Canterlot and all.”

“What did he say?”

“He was feeling pretty down, hopeless even. Said he didn’t seem to have any other choice of what to do with himself. He didn’t seem himself, moving from irate to almost on the verge of tears just like that.” He snapped his hoof in emphasis.

“Did he explain why he felt this way?” Twilight asked with as much forced composition she could muster.

Commodore’s face suddenly wrinkled uneasily. “Well…he felt all stirred up over…you.”

“Me?” she asked numbly, praying that this was all some sort of joke. “How can that be?”

The colt sighed. “You’re not making this easy for me, Princess. But I said I’d help, and I will.”

Commodore briefly recounted the entire pained conversation he had with Alistair from what felt like an eternity ago. He spoke of Alistair’s desperations, his frustrations, and overall mourning of Twilight’s elevation to the status of Princess, with the wound only being worsened by her acquisition of her very own kingdom within Equestria.

He glazed over what Alistair had both shouted in rage and rasped through tears. Perfection was mentioned very quite frequently, with Alistair believing that flagrant similarities between Twilight and Princess Celestia emerged day after day since the Royal tiara had been placed atop her head.

Ending the recollection with another sigh, Commodore shook his head somberly. “That’s everything he said, Princess. Every last bit of it.”

Twilight stood solidly in place, her head cocked slightly down towards the dirt road, a shadow seeming to cast over her features. Feeling a chilly breeze push past her, Twilight responded with question. “Do you think I’m perfect, Commodore?”

Commodore winced. “To be quite honest, Princess, I would think so. You’re an Alicorn after all.”

Nodding darkly, Twilight turned away from the young blue colt and began back down the road. “Thank you, Commodore,” she called behind her. “I appreciate the talk.”