Civil Distinction

by SpitFlame

Chapter 7: Contradictions

"So... how far off is the train again?" inquired Pinkie Pie, almost beside herself with weariness.

"The same distance as our walk from there to here, Pinkie Pie," said Luna. "Around fifteen minutes, give or take." And then she added in an expansive voice, deliberately aimed with the utmost sincerity: "I trust you all must be wreathed with fear. No need to worry, my friends. We'll make it back safely. As long as I'm here..."

The golden blast of a teleportation flashed before them in an instant; standing there was Princess Celestia, her eyes cold and uncomfortable. She quickly closed the gap between them.

"My, were we really walking that fast, Tia?" said Luna in surprise.

"Corvo is gone," announced Celestia with apprehensive ardency. "Discord too. They must have taken off back in the shelter."

Exclamations arose all round.

"What do you mean they're gone?" asked Luna, not quite willing to catch the drift of her sister's exclamations. A nervous shadow swept over her face.

"What!" Twilight enunciated, jumping forth between the sisters, her eyes flashing with a terrible agitation. "No, no, no! Corvo left? As in: he's disappeared? Completely gone, like—poof?—just like that?"

"I'm afraid so," said Celestia, quieter than before. There appeared to be a lack of focus in her eyes.

"Whoa, whoa, hit the breaks for a second!" interjected Rainbow Dash indignantly. "If both Corvo and Discord are gone, where could they have headed off to?"

"And why Discord of all ponies?" said Applejack. "Beg yer pardon, but none of this seems right."

"Serath!" Luna nearly shouted with a new stage of indignation, throwing out a piercing glare at Serath, who was badly startled and looked at all the ponies confusingly.

"Yes?" he muttered out.

"You know Corvo best," Luna went on, taking long strides towards him. "Where would he have gone to? Why exactly? To what extent is his motive? If he is no longer in the house, he must have convinced Discord to teleport them out. Surely you must have an idea. Out with it!"

"I don't know anything," said Serath, inclining his head low.

"Nothing neither me nor my sister could think up?"

"Yes, precisely that," he replied softly.

Celestia bore a pained look, one which hinted at an overwhelming perplexity, as though her heart were bleeding spitefully. Right now some new and practically tormenting recollection of her knowledge on Corvo made an immediate impression on her; and she did not like what she concluded.

"There's two possibilities, all things considering," she said rather irritably. "Either he ventured out to gather more help, or—and this is the worse of the two—he went after King Sombra, believing that he has a chance against him."

"That could explain why Discord would tag along," said Fluttershy with drooping ears. "Ever since the Tirek incident he's been really eager to help out in whatever way he can."

"Why would he wish to contact other ponies without informing us?" said Serath. "Corvo is very pragmatic; leaving us in the dark at such a moment will prove to be a hinderance."

"Neither of us knows what goes on in his head," said Celestia. "He might have his reasons, but putting aside basic scrutiny, I seriously can't imagine what might possess him to go after King Sombra on his own. Even with Discord's assistance they'll be outmatched."

"Oh my, this is how we are now?" said Rarity meekly, as though she scarcely believed them.

"We better not cease our gait," said Serath quickly. "More efficient to discuss these woes while on the fly—double time, or however they say it."

The ponies all realized he had a point and hastily resumed their walking, noticeably faster than before.

"How did those two simply vanish under our noses?" exclaimed Luna gravely. "Ah, what were they thinking? We need answers!"

"We all do," said Celestia firmly.

Their chatter during their trip to the train station turned out to be surprisingly redundant. Everypony was either confused, shaken with fear, or readily angry at what had transpired. Serath did not say much, preferring to listen to all he could catch onto, but with each passing minute an aching conviction blustered up in his mind. He was absolutely certain Corvo held his own reasons for disappearing on such short notice, was even almost, much to his annoyance at himself, relieved to witness such a spastic willingness on Corvo's end. It at least alluded to a decrease in his anxiety problems.

Very little could be said for Luna. She was evidently displeased, even horrified, to hear such news, but her strangely ominous exterior remained present.

Celestia was in a state of trepidation, both in the echelons of indefinability and the planning process, as it were. A vague premonition kept growing in Celestia's mind that an inevitable, dreary catastrophe was about to occur. What this catastrophe could turn out to be, to what order of magnitude, Celestia could not define. If Corvo wants to put himself in harm's way, so be it, swept through her mind. Just don't make it anymore difficult for us. We must get the Crystal Heart back to the Crystal Empire. It's now or never.

* * *

"Are you certain you took us to the correct location?" asked Corvo insistently.

"Yes, yes," said Discord with nonchalance on his face, seemingly chasing away something else of greater concern.

They stood surrounded by long trees, most of which were old and gnarled, and bent low. It was still extremely dark; the forest proved to be more of a distraction for movement than what they had hoped for. Corvo navigated the area using his Dark Vision, but Discord remained bumping into trees or spiked rocks every minute or so. At last he grew terribly vexed, and with a loud groan he summoned a ball of white light. Immediately every part of their environment within a range or fifty meters was descriptively visible.

"Good call," said Corvo, lowering his Mark.

"Nevermind that," huffed Discord, and at once cast forth a most curious glance at Corvo. "How does this work again? Wait, wait, was it that we combine our powers and track down Sombra based on the reaction we get with his dark magic? Do I remember right?"

"Think of it like a chain. I use my Mark to arouse the illustrations on these papers (Black Light and White Light magic, eh?)—then, as it were, you sense magical imbalances, that being dark magic, and from here on it is a game of 'warmer or colder.' This will work."

"So much potential falling squarely on your shoulders," Discord smiled caustically. "All that's left is for us to save Equestria, defeat King Sombra, and win our medals—and by 'us,' I definitely mean you. Your idea and all."

"Let it stand that way. Now then, before we fizzle out, ah, here..." He took out the two mildly crumbled papers from his pocket and held them forth, as though they were meant to magnify something. His Mark struck a turquoise glow, and the papers themselves wavered back and forth on their own, a gleam swiping through the letters every once in a while; it was as if he held these documents underwater.

"I caught something already!" exclaimed Discord. His whole body slithered and shook up and down, a metallic wobbling noise escaped him; he immediately snapped a claw and the two were zapped away.

When Corvo found his footing he witnessed long streaks of sand at his sides, ahead was a large glittering river, in the middle of it a distorted elliptical reflection of the white moon. They teleported to a lone beach. The ball of light previously conjured had disappeared.

"Lovely view," mused Corvo, and suddenly a slow, half-hearted grin spread over his face. "Tell me, Discord, are we closer to the source of magic you sensed? Are we?"

"Eh, likely closer," drawled Discord, his yellow eyes glowing strangely. But then a change flashed on those eyes, one of evident trepidation. "I've never felt my head get so fogged up before... hmm... Corvo, you're positively certain you want to chase Sombra down the alley?"

"No turning back now," retorted Corvo imperiously, and paused. "We abandoned the ponies outright," he said again firmly. "Surely they are looking for us now, or Celestia might even feel wrathful. Who knows what at this point."

"I admit, Corvo, I'm the nosy type, but I only agreed to this on the basis that you know what you're doing." He stuck out his neck and gave Corvo a sour frown. "And do you?"

"Yes, I do. Come on then, again!" He lit his Mark, effectively agitating a magical response from the papers.

Discord tightened his jaws and, with a scrunched face, snapped his claw powerfully; but only a handful of sparks flew out. "Well, would you look at that?" he said, his whole countenance deflating wearily. "This isn't a good spot, I'm afraid. The frequency isn't right. I can sense the dark magic, but only its afterimage; let's go..." he licked his pale lips, which hinted at a pretentious smile, and narrowed his sight far ahead. "There, down the beach. Hopefully I'll pick something up."

The two walked hastily alongside the river's lips, where it met the wet sand, side-by-side.

Corvo's gait was somehow almost lackluster, mechanical even, as though he only knew how to walk straight; his eyes were sedately glassy, and a gloominess swept over his pale face. At last his head began to buzz, but he scarcely took heed of it, and with the exception of his moving legs, the whole of his composure was as immutable as stone.

"You look very out of it," Discord threw in, for the absolute sake of it.

"Must be the silence," said Corvo with a forced smile. "Ah, devil take it! Not even a cricket within earshot."

"'Devil' take it?" echoed Discord curiously, his ears perking.

"The unsavory atmosphere of this whole night, is all," laughed Corvo almost inaudibly, yet his face betrayed extraordinary excitement. "Hmm, however, as you inquired, a 'devil'—there must be a little devil in my heart, and I cannot decide on which line to cross."

"The line with Sombra, you mean? My, your persistent grumpiness is truly fascinating, really! But which line, precisely which line do you refer to?"

"How I ought to act, is what I refer to, Discord. From what I have observed Sombra almost reveres me, as it were. If I take hold of the opportunity to converse with him once more, and possibly for the last time, it shall be the end," he spoke out with a malignant grimace. A weak chuckle escaped his lips. "Ha, ha, your expression is that of confusion, I can tell. When we confront Sombra, he will be bewildered, is what I'm getting at."

"As it were?" added Discord with the utmost inclination for mockery.

"Ha, ha!—as it were, as it were." Corvo exhaled quickly and closed his eyes for a short moment. "Would you agree with me in saying that Celestia is the most fastidious among our small circle?"

"Maybe. What brings it up?"

"Well, you see, it is not in my intention to distort the significance of the word, not to an absurd degree, anyway, but perhaps she has some sort of connection with White Light magic."

"Who am I to make sense of White Light magic?" replied Discord with a shrug, but nevertheless he paid careful attention. "And what's the meaning behind 'Black Light' magic? How can light possibly become black?"

Corvo looked closely at the papers in his hand, especially the second one with the wide circle. He went on sharply: "This must be White Light, the good magic, you can say. After all, 'white' is the colour of good. And the other one," he flipped to the paper with the crooked and dark letters, "Black Light, I presume. Black—darkness—darkness is bad. Dark magic? And Equestrian magic, the sort you witness out of the conduct of love and friendship—Twilight and Cadence... hmm..."

"You make some awfully blunt analogies," said Discord with a strained voice, but right there cautious optimism flashed in his eyes. "I think you may be on to something, however. Corvo, Sombra's dark magic took from your unrecognized Mark two years ago. It's the reason he's back."

"I know that already."

"Well!" Discord suddenly tossed out. The strain on his face suggested a repressed laugh, and an all-new stage of extraordinary, even naive, curiosity. "Come to think of it, Dark and Light don't have much of a reaction to each other. They're the first of its kind, after all. Must be used to the other by now."

"My magic is somehow linked with that of Sombra's, and as such I suspect White Light will lead us to him."

"This is all needlessly convoluted," said Discord in a low voice, reaching the limits of his patience. "We'll probably need a graph and diagram to make sense of this all. It's almost like your explanations don't explain anything at all!"

"I, uh, have been told that before," mumbled Corvo uneasily.

"I'm not surprised," deadpanned Discord breathlessly.

"You must understand. If Sombra's magic is Black Light, then I should aim my magic at White Light to narrow the focus. Doing the same with Black Light here shall put your 'magical imbalances' all over the map." He stuffed the ripped paper with the cruel writings into his pocket and stretched out the sketched circle.

Suddenly, as though remembering something of capital importance, Discord stopped short and pondered: "I believe that my interaction with Black Light could explain this foggy migraine I'm getting. Oh, fine by me! We'll exclusively rely on the opposite!"

"Opposites attract, like the magnetic poles," said Corvo, grinning. He ignited his Mark.

An intense exclamation seized Discord when he himself activated his chaos magic. He looked round wildly, as though he did not understand what was going on, and at last involuntarily rested his gaze on Corvo, as though he were being forced to look. His expression acutely resembled that of ominous uncertainty, he struggled to find the right magic, but in the end he retracted from this so-called 'ominous' power as a new wave of pain hit his head. It appeared that the paper did not respond accordingly.

"Eh, this is a bit hard to describe!" exclaimed Discord feverishly; he was caught up in the heat of the spell. "It's almost like this magic hates you, Corvo, like it's attacking you; White Light magic is everywhere and nowhere, if that makes any sense."

"Hmm, this should have worked," said Corvo regretfully. He intently examined the paper in his hands. "I, ah—I believe it must be reacting to Sombra's smoke all over Equestria."

"Funny you say that, because if so, how did we manage to teleport onto this beach?"

"We were caught in an erroneous current, is all." Corvo hummed to himself, deep in thought. "What did you feel with the White Light magic?"

"Oh dear, how do I go about laying this out for you," sighed Discord pensively, swiveling his wrist as if it were an awaiting gesture. "Your very presence was the only thing that, er, existed!"

Something of surprise transformed on Corvo's face, but he simply nodded.

"The thing is, Corvo, this White Light nonsense was shooting out from everywhere, but whenever I looked it vanished, except you: all the magic was pouring into your very center, right down to your chest; but the unfortunate part is that it turned out to be short-lived: I couldn't sense anything beyond a kilometer or so."

A ting of doubt struck Corvo without warning. Almost impetuously he stuffed the current paper in his hand back into his pocket and drew out the other one.

"Here," he demanded hastily, his Mark glowing once more. "Try your luck on this one!"

What followed was immediate: no build-up was necessary to Discord's searching for a magical imbalance, or lack thereof. He thundered a snap and the two teleported in a blitz.

They reappeared in a massively expansive wheat field. The horizon was flat, but to their right, way off in the distance stood walls of spiky mountains. There was not much in terms of pony civilization in this area.

"Where are we now?" asked Corvo quickly.

"Closer to the south, I think," said Discord; he circled all his fingers round his eyes, promptly turning them into binoculars. There was nothing special to see. "Seems like that other paper worked, which wasn't the one you expected, huh?"

"So Black Light—Sombra's dark magic—is bringing us closer to him, and only him? I don't understand..." he drifted off and nearly sat down, but thought better of him and continued walking. Dubiety, the sort of feeling so unexpected as to be perceived as spiteful, burned in Corvo's mind, which annoyed him to no end. "For all intents and purposes it should be occurring the other way round: my Mark resurrected Sombra's magic, so it should stand that Dark Light would be attracted by my Mark. But the White instead, it... damn!" He lightly slapped his forehead. "Am I missing something crucial? I have in fact spent much time near the princesses."

"That's nothing but redundant information," huffed Discord irritably, crossing his arms, only now deciding to follow closely behind Corvo. "Sombra's dark magic is clearly more sensitive to your own, Corvo, and I personally regard Princess Celestia's magic to be a non-factor. We're all wrong sometimes, after all. No need to feel down and out about it."

At last Corvo ceased his gait, his eyes lit up with anticipation; he completely recovered his self-complacency, and most traces of his former agitation and indignation were gone.

"I am not wrong," said Corvo somehow sadly. He looked sorrowfully to his left palm; he closed it, turned his wrist, and stared hard at his Mark. "Damn it. Come on, Discord, again, again!" He drew out the paper with the plain circle and chains of elegant words. His Mark burned with magic once more.

Discord heaved a dumbfounded sigh but nevertheless decided this was for the best. He concentrated his chaos magic and, as before, began to shake. The same result occurred: everything round him, everything save for Corvo, darkened in his point of view.

"Nothing worth noting," groaned Discord after a second, furrowing his brow.

Their following attempts were largely in vain. An hour of empty trial and error left both Corvo and Discord in states of frustration. They constantly moved round the field, back and forth, picking specific locations to test out these imminent "imbalances," and while the supposed White Light magic continued to fail hopelessly, the Black Light source outweighed their initial plans. Corvo couldn't locate the problem, and whenever he assumed he had it figured out, and went on for another try but with a different set-up, it still didn't work. There seemed to be no predictability to this ancient magic.

At the end Corvo was quite beside himself, and reflections of skepticism flashed in his mind with each passing minute. There could be no way, he went on to contemplate, that Sombra wasn't using a variation of Black Light (all forms of Equestrian magic originated from these two), and Sombra was definitely from Equestria, there was no denying that. Something was indeed missing from the picture. Discord was just as clueless and, despite several suggestions he threw in to explain this impossible contradiction, it was to no avail.

Eventually Corvo found a rose beyond the edge of the wheat field; he stared longly at it, but did nothing else. When he stared at the rose he saw its beautiful red pedals at first, but then its charm subsumed with the darkness about, and the rose wilted. This moment nearly put him off his feet. What an off-putting rose. Why was it here, and why did it surprise him? A seemingly beautiful piece of nature turned to death without meaning to; but that's ridiculous. Flowers aren't sentient, they don't mean to do anything. One moment there was the red rose, and the next a grey and withered rose. He stared at it for an entire minute.

At last a seemingly absurd epiphany struck him.

He wandered back into the field, to Discord, who had by now given up on testing his magic with the papers.

"This is how it is, huh?" remarked Corvo, his face unusually pale. "White Light ignores all save myself, even if my Mark should be accustomed to Celestia's magic. And Black Light... is..." His eyes widened, and he felt a sort of shudder rise within him. "Corvo, you blind fool! How did you not even consider this possibility?"

"What is it?" inquired Discord with terrible anticipation; he started to become exasperated with the insignificance of his considerations and angrily wanted to leave. "Well? Don't leave this poor Lord of Chaos hanging!"

"Discord, why is 'White' Light any good, White Light in particular? Dark or darkness is synonymous with Black Light (sounds familiar with Sombra's powers, doesn't it?), but why would we jump to the conclusion? We are conditioned to expect that the glowing purity at the end of the tunnel is good, 'white' is the lack of evil, symbolically speaking. And yet this all contradicts. What if Sombra is the one who uses White Light? What if Equestrian magic is Black Light? One must know the light to know the darkness, but which is worse? Which one should we fear?"

Discord blinked rapidly. He tugged at his beard and looked skywards. "Now that you mention it," his voice suddenly became far more serious than before, "there's no moral side to magic. It's a lot like mathematics, really, depends on how you utilize its potential. But why bring that up, Corvo?" A sly grin spread on his lips. "None of us are confused about our morals, or I would hope so. Whatever do you mean by which one should we fear?"

"Take forever to explain." Corvo stared almost stupidly at the paper in front of him, like he could not believe his own eyes, he did not even want to entertain the overwhelming complexity of something he himself knew little about. "The line, Discord, the line in everyone's hearts. The line separates order from chaos."

"Chaos?" Discord smirked triumphantly and menacingly.

"Not magic," continued Corvo, not taking notice of Discord for a moment. He was anxiously tapping his foot, and was even gnawing at his nail. "Chaos might kill you, and order," he inhaled uneasily, as though he were running out of oxygen, "order might strip you of free will, your freedom, that is. Within the realm of magic, in that particular vacuum of pre-magical existence, you can conclude that only the dark was known, but when light arrived, I think it started all sorts of differences and actions, concrete and abstract, good and evil. Before only darkness—order—and then when light arrived it disrupted the order and brought forth chaos. If White Light is chaos and Black Light is order, then the line is inverted. It is not merely my intuition, Discord, only I most adamantly infer that the latter is of Equestrian emergence."

"I suppose that'd explain why White Light attracts so unambiguously to King Sombra," said Discord dubiously; he was still wavering on the issue.

"White Light is, in essence, that which destroys, and Black Light is that which builds. Now I see: Celestia is the upholder of true dark magic, but 'dark' magic brings hope; Sombra has the light to destroy. After thousands of years of written knowledge, thousands of years of editing and interpretations, the pony historians must have misplaced the two."

"Oh, ho, ho!" laughed Discord amusingly, clearly at the end of his own peculiar suspense, and had finally taken to condescending hand-waving. "I can't tell you which side of the line I'm on, Corvo, or if I'm right on the line, or if I'm anywhere near the spectrum in the first place. Are you seriously telling me that the alicorns have been using the real dark magic all this time, all because of mistranslations? But within all bets I'd be willing to strike myself down if you manage to find King Sombra by these means of magical imbalances. In practice I concur, but only because that would prove what you said to be true, and if that happens, the very foundation of Equestrian magic will crumble. Ah, I've never seen such wicked irony before. It's incomprehensible!"

"Crumble, you say?" said Corvo mechanically, almost as if he were unaware of his exact wording. "Once we manage to defeat Sombra, what in hell do I care what happens to Equestria?"

* * *

The closest train station available was further away than Celestia had anticipated—they had followed the rusted tracks, but miscalculated the distant. But at last they arrived in one piece. The station itself was two large wooden platforms on both sides of the track, holding up wobbly ceilings with dry planks. One of these platforms was actually a small room, accessible through an iron door in the back. As expected the door didn't budge, and Luna blew it down without further idling.

The room itself was small and apparently weather-worn, but no pony had taken a step in for years, judging by the outdated tools inside. There was a counter, on it a cloth with random pink patterns; there were shelves, but all were empty. This shop—if it was a 'shop' to begin with—had been closed and run down before, since the windows were boarded up.

Behind the counter they found a trap door, revealing a ladder heading underground for nearly a roughly fifty meters. This, of course, was the complex tunnel system which ran through all of Equestria. When the ponies and Serath reached the bottom they looked both ways: the tunnel was dry and dirty, and stretched onward into the dark. They went off north. Celestia took the lead, Luna stayed behind as the last one: both had their horns illuminating.

"Princess Celestia?" said Serath, after a minute had passed.

"Hmm?" she cast a brief glance at him, then resumed facing forward.

"I wonder why nobody has brought this up before, but—"

"No, we're not going to walk the whole way. That'd take weeks, and we're low on supplies as it is," assured Celestia with a calm air. "Eventually we'll reach a fork splitting off in four separate directions. Once there I can properly teleport us through the correct one."

"Teleportation is a linear process, Serath," put in Twilight, catching up to walk by Serath's side. "To do it successfully you gotta keep a mental image of a direct, physical path, and in between the spell cast you'll follow said path."

"So you cannot teleport through a wall?"

"You can," jumped in Luna. "The theoretical path you conjure up must, in some good sense, go around it. Any opening will do, naturally."

"That must be the reason why Twilight couldn't teleport out of the dreadful cave she was thrown in by Queen Chrysalis," said Rarity thoughtfully.

"Heh, right, that..." mumbled Twilight uneasily. "But, er, anyway, you've gotta be vaguely familiar with your surroundings," she once again addressed Serath.

"That's not all," said Celestia. "You must also maintain a mental image of the place you want to end up at, so it's impossible to teleport to a place you've never laid eyes on."

"I see," said Serath with faint confusion on his face, as though he were still trying to figure something out.

Celestia noticed this and went on, apparently even glad to explain it: "There have been placed many crystal checkpoints throughout these tunnels. These crystals work like magical screens. They serve the purpose of maintaining the images of every stop in the underground, as well as certain posts above ground, assuring a quick way to teleport out, or rapidly across the tunnels, in the case of an emergency."

"I never could have believed it two days ago," said Serath, strangely animated. He gave Celestia an avid glance and pondered for several seconds. "So we travel in between the joints of these tunnels. A safe plan, I trust?"

"Readily assured as far as we know," said Luna.

"I do have to wonder about those books Corvo found in that basement." Serath tapped his chin in a strange sort of rhythm, looking all ahead of him as if he were expecting an answer.

"The last I saw of him he snuck down in the basement," said Celestia, as it were, to herself. "But which one caught his attention?"

"But what was meant to be down there, princess?" asked Twilight suddenly, with a glint to her eyes.

"Notes on ancient magic, practically useless to us in modern times," replied Celestia in a conclusive voice, as if she were experiencing boundless certainty. But neither one seemed to be expressing what they were really thinking.

"I... I have to wonder what will be the first thing to come out of Corvo's mouth when we meet up again," said Serath almost breathlessly, excitement lingering in each word. "So ventures off the 'brave knight' to slay the dragon amid the narrowest of hopes. But I am familiar with Corvo's antics; he knows what he is doing."

"Does one of his antics include needlessly abandoning his comrades to walk blind in the conflict?" said Luna heatedly, turning to look hard at Serath. "After all, we have all got a hoof in the grave now thanks to him."

"I wouldn't be so sure," said Celestia in a completely calm fashion, quite ready to show her optimistic side. Something about Serath's trust in his friend had made an extraordinary impression on her. "Corvo wouldn't leave you here, Serath, not at all. He's also thrown us in the dark, as a means to make sure we don't know his location; so he's still in Equestria, and he must have a goal in mind so dangerous as to not want to risk our lives. Discord went along by his own choice, I could only conclude, and the only scenario I see in which Discord takes off without a goodbye would be to face the villain himself: King Sombra. Why else, all thing considering?"

"How about to create a distraction?" jumped in Twilight thoughtfully.

"Whatever it is, he must have gotten his inspiration from those books," said Luna through clenched teeth, although she did her best to hide this fact.

Luna had been containing quite the bewildered contempt within herself, ever since she learned of Corvo's leave. She had swayed into a more personal pattern of behaviour, frequently speaking in undertones and always had perplexed contemplation flashing in her dark eyes. I won't go into the details of Luna's current state, which was very unexpected to begin with, but more importantly because I don't understand it myself. It was as though she held a cruel hatred for Serath, unbeknownst to everypony, not because she hated Serath, but particularly because he reminded her of Corvo's abrupt, almost insulting get-away. She was having marked difficulty understanding the current predicament, as well as Sombra's position now. Anyway, we shall get to that later on.

The conversation soon died down, and the company remained walking forward for nearly five minutes in silence.

"Hey, Serath," said Twilight. She was walking so close to him the two were almost touching.

He exchanged looks with her and smiled. "Yes?"

"You don't have to answer this, but I'm curious: how did you and your wife meet, and why did you marry her?"

"Did you two meet at a party?" inquired Pinkie Pie greedily.

"Let him talk, Pinkie," said Applejack, paying close attention.

A ridiculous twist of excitement and comical joy was the effect produced on Serath's face. He smiled widely and strangely shook his head in approval. "Oh, glad you asked!" he laughed. "This is so funny, it really is funny!"

"Ah, love, such a wonderful emotion!" added Rarity joyfully, swiping her hair from her face.

"Ha, ha, it is! Now then, I'll inform you of one of the earliest memories of my wife, it tells you what she is like, and maybe why we even became engaged. She lived across the street from me in this little town in the south; I met her when I was nine years old. And I think I fell in love with her the moment I saw her, although I doubt the feeling was necessarily mutual. It was round that time when I got glasses," his voice suddenly jumped, and he smiled even more, "a-and I was very, very proud of these glasses. They were a sort of wood-rimmed style and superbly cut, and, you know, I was really proud of them. At one point she came up to me, and I asked her: 'What do you think of these?' and she responded: 'I think you look really funny and silly in those!' she pointed to me and ran back into her house. And it was only twenty years later when she finally told me she always wanted to have glasses and was merely jealous of me. I suppose my wife decided to give me a good poke about it. Our relationship built up over time and, eh, you know, as it goes..."

"Gah!" gasped Pinkie Pie, wildly grabbing at her throat. "Too cute! I can't take it!"

The others exploded with giggles and laughter. Serath chuckled nervously, his face red as a lobster. Even Luna was mildly amused.

"And what about Corvo?" said Fluttershy with brighter eyes than before. "Does he have a family?"

"As in, a wife and children? No," said Serath. "Corvo is married to his work, if anything. Still, he is satisfied with life; in regards to the interpersonal facets, he chooses quality over quantity," Serath spoke this while lightly striking his chest.

"Good to know," said Celestia, reflecting a small smile. "Judging by your character, I think you've made some fine decisions in life. I do, by the way, wish you luck on your path of medical expertise."

"What inspired you to become a doctor?" asked Twilight. Her friends' ears immediately perked at this mention. He somehow managed to captivate these ponies with his laborious studies, which surprised even him.

"Well, I suppose it fits my position rather well," said Serath in a slow, meticulous voice; his eyes dropped and his smile waned, not because the question saddened him, but due to the sorting out of an appropriate answer. It had been a long time he had received such a curious question.

"Well, I—oof, this is challenging," he went on, humming slowly and considerately to himself. "My father was the source of encouragement roughly twenty-some years ago. The old fellow worked as a caretaker in a nearby inn, of the dated fashion which no longer exists. On a cold winter evening he came home with blood on his hands, already dried up; I asked him about it, since I had never seen blood on his hands before. He looked at little me intently, smiled, and said: 'A passer-by tripped over the hooked part of his carriage, injured his chest very badly. I was there to lend a hand. It's what our people ought to do, boy.' In return for my father's quick hand at patching the passer-by offered him a single item from his carriage, whatever he wanted, at no price whatsoever. He insisted, as I later found out, which explained the basket of mushrooms my father had carried back. Mushrooms are my most favorite food, always has been that way, and so my father picked the basket filled with roasted White Buttons, thinking of me. I—heh—thought nothing of it, either that or I forgot entirely. About half a year passed by. At this point my father was away on a business trip, something concerning a woodlot with a foreign official, but I digress. I was taught to say 'May fortune smile upon thee' in another language, back in school, one which I shall not take up now. On my way home I found a man on the side of the road, sitting next to his horses and carriage; he was writing a letter, and repeated the words he wrote down out loud to himself. 'Lucky me,' I thought, 'he seems to be speaking that other language, the one taught to me at school' (fine, I will reveal to you the language: Serkonish, tongue of the far north), 'so why not?' I wandered over to the man and said, in that same language: 'May fortune smile upon thee.' I happened to have pronounced a word or two wrong, the man laughed and was quick to correct me. He asked for my name, I told him—'Serath Hemsworth, sir'—and something of joy lit up his eyes at the moment, I took notice and all. This man with whom I had given my name was the passer-by from six months prior, as he said, almost in a lisp: 'You are Hemsworth's boy, aye?' I nodded, and immediately he revealed the scar across his chest. He laughed once more. I then inquired about the paper he wrote on. It turned out his mother had passed away—something of a fatal brain fever. He grasped by small hand with both of his big ones, and told me: 'I was cut down on the side of the road, folk walked by me nervously, and your father reached his arm down to me, propped me onto his back, and took me to a bed and took great care of me. The bleeding had stopped, and I was off the next day. If it was not for him I would never have laid eyes upon my mother a final time.' She was already off the deep end back then, and this passer-by nearly missed the final days of his mother's life. He thanked me once more, and what for, I went on to reflect. He gave me a mushroom, a White Button, and I resumed my gait. I eagerly took a bite, and then it came to me: my father was always there for me when I least expected, when I could not do my homework, when I wept needlessly, when the thunder outside was too loud, when I was a little boy in the backyard, with no shoes, and he would embrace me. And the mushrooms! He remembered! Just... I mean, so ungrateful. I was so ungrateful. What was I thinking? 'It's what our people ought to do.' To help those in need is my calling, if that makes sense. I apologize!" he spoke suddenly with a flustered face. "I did not do the story justice, most of what I prattled on about must have come out quite incoherently."

"Don't apologize," said Celestia in a soft voice, a half-hearted grin now spread across her face. "We all need fortune, don't we, Serath? You could help us reach it."

"And did you tell that story to Corvo?" asked Luna.

"Yes, of course. We talk and share a number of stories, some quite humorous, too."

"Talk, huh? Yeah, I realized that by now: you and Corvo like to talk a lot, about all manner of topics," mused Twilight, but something of intense concentration shone on her expression. "There's nothing more enjoyable than a good conversation, but you two went on for who knows how long discussing ideas that could make a pony's head spin. Why do you value just talking with Corvo so much, about anything?"

"Whatever are you getting at, Twilight?" asked Rarity, her ears perking.

"Let's just say you inspired me," said Twilight, setting her gleaming gaze on Serath. "Where did you learn to say all those things? We can all learn from one another, and you really hit the nail on the head about how important speech is. Feels like I've been missing out, even after having read all twenty-six volumes of Star Swirl the Bearded."

"Glad to inspire you," returned Serath with a heartfelt smile. He danced his sight round from pony to pony, and saw Luna paying close attention; he shrugged involuntarily and continued: "Take the most true facet of each pony, say, what represents the most truth, from ten different ponies, and combine them—that gives you a literary hero. Now do the same with a million literary heroes, extract from them what is most true and heroic, and"— he kept closing and opening his hand in front of his eyes, as though he wished to grasp something of immeasurable incomprehensibility —"what you hold on to, rather—what you have is genuine truth, the truths of a meta-hero. And what better way to seek the truth than to share a dialogue every once in a while with a close friend? Look at this discussion we are having, to the degree that it's working: we both are trying to articulate our preconceived notions of reality, and I do that, you listen, then you do the same, I listen, and maybe you and I have some comments, but together we are both building something different than what we had when we first started this conversation. In a sense, we are participating in a process of articulating each other's characters, and I mean that most technically. Part of your character is an amalgam of the information you have encountered, and a lot of that is articulated wisdom, and so its sole construction, if you are having a good conversation (and that is also a conversation that is meaningful, and you can tell that when you have the conversation), it is that you are, as it were, decomposing parts of yourself, your false presuppositions, you let them die, and you let something new reemerge as an alternative. You participate in this process of metaphorical death and revival constantly when you have a meaningful conversation. You shall discover your intellectual errors, you will let them go, and a new part of you shall emerge. And then another part dies, and another part emerges. That is the ultimate exercise of death and rebirth... it is the general mythology of redemption, that which makes up the rationale of talking."

"Very well put," said Luna with feeling, at last allowing herself to crack a smile, which surprised her greatly.

Celestia decided to not respond, and instead remained gazing forth as if it were the only thing that mattered.

And the other ponies did not even know where to began. Most of their mouths were agape in the most awe-struck sense. The words Serath had just articulated carried ideas they never even thought about before. They agreed with him, of course, but could never figure out why until this very moment.

"And those are your most treasured values?" asked Twilight quickly, as though she would not get another chance.

"We are products of our environments," said Serath. "It really is incredible how the latter half of our lives is entirely made up of the habits we acquired in the first half. We are all born puppets, influenced by strings, and I wish to be a genuine individual, free from those strings." Suddenly his eyes took on a sad, weary look. "I want that more than anything."

"We're here," Celestia suddenly broke in. The others all threw their undivided attention ahead.

The tunnel split off into four directions, all of which connected to a small circular space, and in the center stuck out a long post, slightly bent; it held four sharp crystals on its sides, each pointing to a single opening.

"There we are," said Luna, hurrying to the magical post, as did the others, huddling round the crystals. Upon closer inspection there appeared holographic images on their smooth surfaces, constructing highlighted regions throughout the tunnel system. It was nothing too spectacular: they saw images of other rooms with similar-looking posts, some were wider than others, or darker.

"How do you know which one to pick?" asked Serath, unsure of which crystal to study.

"Easy," said Celestia as she lit her horn. "I can read the positions of the crystals based on their magical notations."

"Their... what?"

"I'm familiar with magical senses, traces, imbalances—that sort of work. I can follow the track back to the Crystal Empire."

"It's difficult to explain to a non-unicorn," said Twilight.

"Just roll with it," said Rainbow Dash dissuasively, evidently uninterested in the explanation. "When it comes to magic you gotta live and let live, don't think about it too much, y'know?"

"I was taught to ask questions, not ignore the unknown in the scientific field."

"I'll lend you some books on it later if we've the time," said Celestia in a low voice, by now focusing intently on the crystals, her horn glowing brighter than before. "Ah, there, I got the path. It'll take a number of teleportations before we're underneath the Crystal Empire. If you're wondering where exactly, there's an underground entrance right beside the castle."

"I trust you have a plan, correct?" said Serath, listening with great attention. "That is to say, the Crystal Empire is by now draped in that black smoke. If it really is as fatal as we believe it to be, how are we to slot in the Crystal Heart?"

"I have a way," said Celestia. The words broke involuntarily from her. She smiled for comfort, but a second later a shadow formed over her face, and she groaned to herself. "I know a spell, but—now's not the time to be playing fifty questions. We need to hurry!"

She at once surrounded all of them in her golden glow, and in unison both the fellowship disappeared and the center-left crystal flashed for a brief moment.

* * *

Corvo's new method indeed proved to be useful. They finally succeeded in leaping from the wheat field, and found themselves in a dry tundra. The horizon ran off flat for what seemed like an eternity, but they now stood on a decaying road leading straight ahead. To their right could be viewed the lateral edges of an orange canyon, which indicated a southern region. Soon afterwards a chill and sharp wind picked up. The moon was starting to wane as well.

"Down this path, you say?" said Corvo, squinting his eyes to look ahead, but he couldn't see a thing; the lack of light meant they could barely make out the details a couple hundred meters in front of them. They had already been walking for some time.

"Yes, I sense the magic growing stronger up the path," said Discord.

"I wonder if we will last long enough to see the sun again," Corvo got out bitterly, as though his tongue were impossibly heavy.

"You want to see the sun again?" Discord looked at him in solemn surprise.

"Not because I miss a natural light source, it hasn't even been a full day after all. But we are surrounded by the dark, and we can only navigate this road through the moon's light."

"You weren't complaining before."

"But Sombra's all-encompassing smoke is the darkest shade of black I have ever seen before, sort of like if it absorbed all light and reflected none. What if his smoke is right there, in the distance, a mere kilometer or two away? It hardly produces a sound, and this wind keeps ringing in my ears. For all intents and purposes we might be minutes away from death, and never know about it. What do you make of that?"

"If that were true, I'd meet my end cursing," said Discord with a grin. But his lips twitched and froze, as if he gave a start; something of exasperated dead seriousness inclined on his long face. "Pfft! I bet I could scour through the history of pony-kind and not find anyone half as evil as Sombra."

"And what of Celestia's evacuation plan? I mean, she ordered a mass evacuation on the whole country, right?" An ironic, lifeless laugh escaped him. "I have no idea how many ponies have died thus far, but none made it out safe from Canterlot. How many bodies right there? One-hundred thousand? Two-hundred?"

"Enough to mourn for a long time," replied Discord, dropping his eyes.

For one moment the thought struck Corvo that Discord would never smile again. Perhaps the dead night sky was getting to him.

"I think Luna is helping Sombra achieve his goal," came out of Corvo with no warning.

Discord cast a hard stare at Corvo, quite taken aback, scanning him as if he were mad. But Corvo was hardly shaking (we don't count the cold wind), but instead everything about his composure and countenance showcased consistency, an adamant conviction like no other. Discord slumped down a bit and hummed, deep in thought.

"Mind repeating that?" he said almost caustically, twisting a finger into his left ear. "You think Princess Luna is under King Sombra's direct control?"

"Right."

Discord shot up his back and kept blinking to himself for several seconds. "Really?"

"Call it what you will, but I have my doubts."

"Corvo, first thing's first: what magnificent piece of evidence do you hold to defend such an allegation?"

"Nothing concrete yet."

"Then why are you so worried?" Discord was getting strangely excited now. "How did King Sombra ever manage something as complex as mind control, and when? But even if what you're saying is true—absolutely no pony has caught on, not even the highly vigilant Princess Celestia herself? Magic of that caliber isn't entirely inconspicuous, you know. Why did you come to that conclusion?"

"Call it a... a..." He paused, searching for the right words. "Call it a 'fit of passion,' if nothing else."

A fit of passion? Is he yanking my tail? thought Discord; but he said nothing yet, and seemed purposely to refrain from speaking.

"Come now, Discord, how am I to compose myself in times like these?" Corvo all but threw his arms up, firmly tightening his fists, accompanied by a weak smile. "I do not even know where to begin on explaining my reasoning for suspecting such an ordeal from Luna, and yet I do. Funny, is it not, the nonsensical nature of the mind? I often assume that all of our struggles in life can be predicated on the fact that we seek contradictory things simultaneously. We truly are 'walking contradictions,' but—enough of that! I have been thinking about this for quite some time now. Sombra released his gaseous weapon two days ago, I believe. What kind of foresight would lead to the destruction of the Crystal Empire the moment we arrived there? The Crystal Heart was never meant to be discovered, but from what Serath told me he was the only one capable of unlocking an obscure, magic-absorbing lock. Even if I came to the rescue (as I have done) without Serath in the picture, we would depart immediately, for time is of the essence now. But Sombra knew—all of it."

"King Sombra knew Princess Celestia would be the one to go after him, and you'd be hunting for him no matter the objections," said Discord curiously, at last catching the drift of what Corvo was latching on to, all the while he'd been looking at Corvo from time to time with wide eyes.

"It was almost like he knew we were going to split up," continued Corvo with a glassy look, he had even forgotten that he was walking. "We know what trouble he aroused in that crazed village, but does that explain everything else we just covered? You see, I kept running all these notions through my head, and—hmm, I noticed Luna enjoys her alone time, like back in the Crystal Empire—and I was completely scrambled. Without even thinking next I said to myself: 'Luna is working with Sombra, she is under his control, something is off.' For an extraordinarily brief moment, less than the blink of an eye, rage burned within me; and back in the train, I looked Luna square in her face, and rage was burning in me, and without understanding it myself, I thought: 'Luna is undoubtably against us, she is the enemy.' I wanted nothing more in the world than to expose her right then and there, frenzied fear was in me then and there. Eh, why are you giving me that look? Not seemly, is that it? Not suitable in my position?"

"Frenzied fear?" repeated Discord in a low, searching voice. "Is that the so-called 'fit of passion' you were taking about?" And suddenly, even inappropriately, he erupted into a crooked laughter. "Ha, ha, ha—no, stop, please stop! I can't take it! First the bit about dark magic, and now this?"

Corvo's eyes remained following the road. His face read indifference, and at once he sighed.

"Why should I fool myself?" he said, not exactly puzzled, but perhaps with disappointment. "What reason do you have to believe anything I say? Of course you would doubt my convictions. Very well, I hardly need your opinion as it stands, only your magic."

"Hey, hey, hey!" rapped out Discord with a strange air, smirking almost pitifully. "Absurd as what you say sounds, it's practically my obligation to believe you. I've followed you this far, haven't I? Haven't I place my absolute trust in this plan of yours? We're both staring the abyss deep in its ugly mug, any further and that'd be considered the leap downwards. We've journeyed through all this distance, Corvo; I'm aware that there's no turning back, I've known that since the beginning. May as well go along with what you're saying. In fact, it makes a decent bit of sense. If Princess Luna truly is under the binding influence of King Sombra, and placing the Crystal Heart in its rightful place would theoretically eliminate him, then doing so must relieve her of his control, correct?"

"My thoughts exactly. But there is a minor hole in my hypothesis," he added, with a dubious expression on his pale face. "Not enough to omit Luna's back-stabbery, but it is still of some concern. Luna must be contacting Sombra in some manner, so in that case, what manner?"

"There's no way he could have predicted all of ours moves and instructed Princess Luna accordingly. Unless you want me to believe that, too."

"What? No, of course not. Sombra may be dangerously cunning, but he cannot observe future events before they occur. Ah, I need to know!" He started biting his nail. "Serath's arrival had to have been an accident, and yet nothing makes logical sense unless that lunatic is privy of Serath. Sombra used the mirror to connect our worlds, as a means for him to cross over, but I think he overlooked a detail."

"King Sombra made a mistake?" said Discord, raising an eyebrow.

"Yesterday morning Serath and I were conversing about the mirror. At a certain point, although I cannot pinpoint the exact time of wording, there was an aggregation of the ideas we had been tossing up in relation to variations in magic-based reactions. To spell it out plainly, dark magic might react violently with regular unicorn magic, but not at all with chaos magic, but my Mark could either de-power or propagate either one."

"Oh, I think I get it. It's just like chemistry!" chuckled Discord.

"Well, inorganic chemistry. I believe the only way Sombra could have linked our worlds would be by finding the right magical equation and, as it were, mapping it out through a catalyst: the mirror. I have no notion of what he did wrong—perhaps the balance was off, or the predicted timings, whatever—but I felt a significant reaction between my Mark and the mirror. I met up with Serath, and the whole thing just collapsed, sucking us back into Equestria, more or less when Serath showed up, as though the magic had to hold on to a non-magical entity."

Discord crossed his arms, forgetting the weight of the nearby magical imbalance momentarily. "Two years ago, your second visit, and four months before then, your initial one—he had all that time to plan ahead, to slip into your place and craft the black smoke. My, how poetic should it be that you released King Sombra when you were really just trying to protect your poor city."

"Poetic and inconvenient," huffed Corvo. Besides, either I went to Equestria and revived Sombra or a war would erupt.

Myriad little jingling noises arose right in the direction they were heading. They hadn't even taken into consideration that anything else could be out there with them. Corvo immediately put his hand to his sword's folded handle, and both he and Discord halted uneasily.

Corvo could vaguely descry a large, swaying mass approaching, but specifically what remained hidden in the dark. A second later and there could be heard a strange whistling.

"Is it a pony?" asked Discord with nonchalance.

At last what emerged before their eyes was indeed a pony. An aging stallion, with a narrow face and hollowed cheeks, which contrasted peculiarly with his small eyes and shabby mane. He pulled from behind him a tiny wooden cart, decorated on both sides with pairs of bronze bells. He halted before them, as though he were unfazed to see a human and draconequus standing next to each other in the middle of nowhere.

"Dawn's still a way's off," said the stallion stiffly. "You two fellas out in the open at a time like this?"

"And who, my good pony, might you be?" inquired Discord curiously. He quickly swept his serpent body round the cart, and abruptly appeared again from behind Corvo.

"I don't think that matters, I'm afraid," huffed the stallion, bouncing his eyes back and forth between the two strangers with ominous cogitation.

"Better question: why are you out here?" asked Corvo, relaxing his shoulders.

"My mates received news of death taking hold of Equestria, sir. Our princess ordered her subjects to leave as soon as possible. I'm making my way to the western border, sir."

"The evacuation was sent out two days ago," said Corvo, and for some reason he looked behind him, then back. "How many ponies are still in Equestria, would you estimate?"

The old stallion looked falteringly at Corvo, as though he did not understand the question, and his small, green eyes blinked involuntarily. "I don't know, sir," he said at length.

"Fine then. But like I said, two days ago you should have been notified of the 'death.' Why are you still in Equestria?"

"Got to be certain my family heads out safe first, then comes the exchanges. I'm one of the last ponies from my area to be taking off."

"Then we ought not to waste each other's time. Go, head for the borders."

"What about you two?" he asked suddenly as Corvo began walking forth again. "Shouldn't you both be running with me?"

"Us?" said Discord with an inappropriate grin. "We're heading to the very heart of all this madness, to save Equestria. You can thank us later."

"Maybe," sighed Corvo. "I should avoid black smoke if I were you, just to say. Farewell."

They then departed, but Corvo was left feeling cold, like he did not get to express everything he wanted to. He and Discord resumed their gait in silence for nearly a minute.

"He was very odd if you ask me," remarked Discord, breaking the silence.

"I wonder what was in that cart."

"Oh?" Discord was ready to add a second remark, but his entire body began to vibrate, his eyes burned with animation, which went unnoticed by Corvo.

"Eh, leave it be. Now I know how the Outsider could not sense Sombra's arrival with his own magic, and when everything over two years ago was put into place. I was thinking about how Luna and Sombra are contacting each other, and I remembered that—"

"New signal!" cried Discord in a state of fervour, which readily made Corvo drop whatever was on his mind at that moment. "It's the strongest one so far."

"Excellent!" Corvo took out the paper with the 'Dark Light' writings and ignited his Mark. Discord hastily took hold of the now visible trace and focused his own magic, slowly orientating his body to match what he sensed.

"There we are," said Discord breathlessly. But he did nothing, and only stared at Corvo with a strange, fixed look. His face suddenly captured an air of desperate resolution.

"What is it now?" inquired Corvo with tremendous haste, watching his words carefully. "Why did y—ah, why do you look all twisted? Did we miss something critical?"

"I can feel it," Discord breathed out with decision. He even began to shudder. "Oh, I can feel it alright. We're close, Corvo. We're very, very close. My powers are begging me to run away, to get as far away from him as fast as possible. All my nerves are screaming danger. The presence of King Sombra is right around the corner. This may be out last stop, but who knows..." And a little twisted line came into his caustic smile. "Any final words of departure before we go? Anything you want to say, to get off your chest? You got any redemption left in you?"

"Nothing worth noting," replied Corvo with a cruel smile, even with a sort of menace in his voice. "And what about you?"

"Me? Well..." Discord inhaled longly. "I... I was... I'm glad that I know how to live a meaningful life. In spite of my abhorrent past self, I was taught how to carry the burden; I was taught how to come to terms with my mistakes; I—was taught how to stand solidly by the ponies who can rely on me."

"Hmm, really now? And who 'taught' you those virtues?"

"A friend," said Discord resolutely, and at once snapping his claws. The two were gone in a blinding blast of magic.

* * *

The drab environments of the tunnel stood out this time, somewhat fuzzy for a moment as a temporary visual effect of long-distant teleportation. Most of the ponies instinctively shook their heads, and soon huddled together again, right next to Celestia and Luna.

"Not much has changed," said Serath familiarly, blinking hard. "Phew, now that is a tad dizzying!"

"I thought up of some last-second short cuts," said Celestia, right off the bat surveying the next set of crystals, but these ones were a different colour. "We travelled, just now, something like four hundred kilometers. That's my guess, anyway."

"Gee, I didn't even know about this underground system till today," remarked Spike gleefully. "This is awesome! We'll be setting that bad boy"— he pointed to Celestia's saddlebag, in allusion to the Crystal Heart —"into its rightful place in the Crystal Empire before Sombra knows what hit 'em."

"I wouldn't celebrate just yet," said Twilight, although the opportunistic glitter in her eyes betrayed any sense of worriment she carried. "Er, I mean, we have to be certain everything'll play out smoothly and in our favour."

"Ha, nothing can get in our way now!" exclaimed Rainbow Dash.

"Gotta agree with you, RD," said Applejack, inclining her hat.

However, while the ponies swayed into a small chatter, Serath's attention somehow fell on Luna, who stood the furthest from the group by roughly a foot. Although he was acquainted with her by sight—at least—he only now truly began to study the remarkably unknown change in the whole of her physiognomy: her very face, ever so inclined to expansive gazes and cold smirks, now only weighed with an air of ominous detachment. Serath might have been wrong in his assessment, but to his mind she looked as though she did not want to be there (not in the way that every single pony clearly wished to be sitting comfortably at home right now, without having to worry about King Sombra, but more along the lines of actually holding a gloomy disdain for the fellowship). It was almost like a nervous impatience, masked by characteristic quietness, had partly dominated Luna.

But on that later. Serath was just ready to ask Luna if there was anything on her mind she wished to share, or if not, then at least reflect an assuring smile in her direction; but then Celestia declared admission of their next teleportation, and just like that they took off with another golden flash.

The next room they appeared in was larger than the previous two, about twice as wide even. Rusted pipes ran in bent pairs along the circular walls, and continued on to meet several more pipes throughout the tunnels. They were covered in dark moss, blatantly showing its worn-out age. Some of these pipes were even shuddering, and noises of what was believed to be hot steam spewed, echoed all along the tunnel system.

"Are you positive this is a good idea, Tia?" began Luna mysteriously and importantly, speaking in a rapid whisper. A dreadful reluctance could be felt by her composure alone. "I don't want to suggest anything, I don't want to lift the veil, but, I mean, what if something happens?"

"Worrying this late in the game will do us no good, sister," replied Celestia imposingly but with dedicated compassion. She forced a smile. "We've got to pull ourselves together. Complaining about our suffering will only make it worse."

Luna is displaying some early symptoms of a serious fever, thought Serath, who had been listening. And... Corvo told me about his suspicions. He thinks Luna is hiding her true colours. But I know practically nothing of her relationship with Celestia, so who am I to judge? Now that I think on it, Corvo is wrong. What he says is implausible. If that Sombra king were to possess any of us with his dark magic, it would be Celestia: the leader of this group.

"Ready again," announced Celestia, her horn glowing for the third time. "Serath, step a bit closer. It's easier for my magic to latch on to you when we're together."

"Uh, right!" said Serath as he took a step forth.

"Answer me this, Serath," said Luna, looking hard at him as though he did something wrong. "When you meet up with Corvo once again, what'll you tell him?"

"It depends on the outcome, really. Whatever happens I will probably question his actions, and his reasoning for them. It is only natural to want to know."

"It sure is," she said, as it were, to herself. "How else are we to counter the unknown?"

"The unknown?"

"Nevermind. It's nothing."

Celestia teleported them straight through the correct tunnel again. But upon reappearance they immediately took heed of a disturbance: the pipes were still there, but now they held severe dents all across them, and were shaking like mad, as if something were trying to break free. It was noticeably more noisy here than five seconds ago. It stuck out like a sore thumb in the dark.

"Whoa, this doesn't look too good," commented Spike, even afraid to go near the wild pipes.

"How long has it been since these pipes were last treated?" inquired Twilight readily.

"I'm not familiar with the exact schedule, but this isn't right," said Celestia, biting her lower lip, completely distracted by the unnaturally unstable pipes. "These tubes are the ones that transport water to cities such as Canterlot, and further down is the Crystal Empire's system."

"So we are under Canterlot," assented Luna in a subdued voice. "I suppose I'm correct in saying so. But that means—" an intense trepidation overlapped her face. "Sister, the center of King Sombra's smoke is here, in Canterlot Castle, where it all began. Do you know what that spells for us?"

Trepidation of greater proportions flashed in Celestia's burning eyes, which reflected in her actions. She hurriedly found the appropriate crystal and started to concentrate her magic.

"We need to move ahead!" she said through clenched teeth in a tone suddenly charged. "We're right under the beast. It'll be too late if—"

A pipe a dozen or so meters from behind them burst violently: its metals arms flew outward and shrapnel tinkled out. But in that instance, much to their horror, the deathly black smoke poured into the tunnel at an alarming rate. It was spreading quickly, too quickly for anyone to get a word out.

It would take less than a second for it to cross them.

Terror struck all of them instantly. Luna looked at the smoke with a contorted face, far too shocked to react properly.

Serath fell over in his vain attempt to run away. The ponies, all with darkened expressions, screamed and grabbed on to one another.

Celestia wildly grabbed hold of each and every one of them with her magic, and using all her might teleported them right away.

For the next short moment none of them knew what was going on, it was as if their entire surroundings became alien to them. The ponies tossed their heads round frantically, seeking the black smoke, but discovered a separate room entirely. The pipes were still present, behaving normally this time, echoing the noises of rushing water.

Serath rose from the ground, striking his forehead lightly and coming to his senses. They had indeed made it out alive, and now stood, he assumed, a few hundred kilometers away from that initial accident. But then a new apprehension for the uncertain took hold of his heart: his eyes aimlessly gazed among the ponies, with no clear point to focus on, but a thing or an idea seemed to be standing out somewhere, just as something will sometimes obtrude itself upon the eye. These thoughts all flashed before him within the first second or two of reappearing in a different room. It was his instinct, either learned from his Medical Academy experience or by mere nature, to question everything when something unexpected happened and vanished just as fast as it had happened.

Finally having restored his clear head, what was "obtruding" came to him: Twilight was on the ground, the only one not standing up, and while the ponies were still recovering from the shock of the imminent danger, Celestia and Luna ran to her at once.

"What's the matter with her?" he heard Luna ask in tones of disbelief.

Celestia was there, kindly nudging her with a hoof, while her friends surrounded her; but an ear-piercing scream rushed out of Twilight. Nearly everypony was taken aback, shook with horror. Twilight was shaking uncontrollably, her screeches wavering in volume. Tears began swelling in her eyes.

"Twilight!" cried Celestia sorrowfully, followed by calls from her friends.

"Somepony do something!" cried Spike feverishly, clutching Twilight's shoulder. But it was as if she hardly recognized them: she kept on gasping and squeaking wildly, shuddering rapidly like she were possessed.

Serath rushed to her, parting the crowd and bending low, all with a strict expression.

"She is in a great deal of pain," he said mechanically, leaning closer to her.

"We can see that!" seethed Celestia, trying desperately to figure out what had happened to Twilight.

"Not just that," went on Serath in a crystal clear voice. "Intensive pains plus the seizures—possible disturbance in her nervous system." He hovered over Twilight, staring straight down into her face: she showed no signs of perceiving that anyone else was in the room with her, or even hints of receptiveness. Her eyes were somehow vibrating, like they had no control over themselves.

At last Twilight delved into a state of pitiful wheezing and crying, but still loud enough to be passed off as deranged shrieks.

"Can't you do something to help our Twilight?" asked Rarity imploringly, as she herself verged on tears.

"She must be experiencing double vision," said Serath in a low voice, intentionally ignoring the ponies. "Must not be her nerves then. Did any of you see what happened to her right before the teleportation? Did she trip, or—"

"The smoke must have gotten to her," said Luna abruptly, her entire composure stiff, unmoving, as though she were afraid to touch anything. In fact, her face in general was overcome with a certain gloominess.

"Right before we took off?" said Pinkie Pie in grim surprise.

"I noticed it, right in the corner of my eye. The smoke teleported with us, and Twilight was the furthest behind."

A sharp cry escaped Twilight's now-bloodless lips once again, drawing their attention back to her instantly.

"Given the directness of her pupils, Twilight here is hardly conscious," said Serath. "Let me think: blurred vision, neurological deficiencies, pulsing levels of physical pain, seizures, impaired cognitive awareness—"

"Get to the point!" interposed Celestia, quite beside herself now at her inability to do anything.

"These symptoms," continued Serath calmly, "this all suggests increased intracranial pressure, but... ah, damn it!" He finally allowed anger to flash in his eyes. "I have dealt with these problems before, but only in infants, and to a far lesser degree."

"Wait, wait!" interjected Rainbow Dash in haste. "What the hay did you say before?—increased something pressure? What is that?"

"A rise in pressure in the fluid that surrounds the brain and spinal cord," said Serath, dragging a finger along the back of his head for a visualization. He sighed deeply, rising a little on his knee, now having learned of Twilight's condition. "So that is what that smoke is capable of? It hardly scratched her back side and this is put on the table? It must have boiled up her spinal column or something."

"Serath, listen," said Celestia pleadingly, turning to him with an imploring face. "None of us here are qualified for this, but you are. Maybe we can help in some way. Can't you, at the very least, relieve Twilight of the pain?"

Serath seized the moment to survey the long looks the ponies were throwing in his direction, all equally transparent in undeserved emotional pain. Twilight gave a shrill cry once more, and the ponies, at first, nudged closer to her, but found themselves in the awkward position of having absolutely no idea what to do.

But Serath swept a palm over the cold sweat on his forehead, and proceeded to remove his overcoat. He tossed out to the side the tracheostomy tube from earlier, a pack of medial cloth, a pen, his wallet, and several papers stapled together of unimportance.

He strode over to the tormented Twilight and, having folded his coat, carefully slid it under her neck.

"But what are we supposed to do!" exclaimed Rainbow Dash hotly.

"Not much," said Serath in a low voice.

"You can't expect us to jus' idle on," reproached Applejack.

Yet another bout of convulsions shook Twilight to no end, an she began to groan quietly.

"Do something!" exclaimed Pinkie Pie, trying to lean closer.

"I am trying."

"You gotta try harder. This is Twilight we're talking about!" said Spike.

"I am aware of that."

"I don't know how much more of this I can take," said Fluttershy breathlessly, weeping indignantly.

"Hurry!" cried Rainbow Dash again.

"How about you all shut the hell up," retorted Serath, firmly and imperiously, never taking his sight off Twilight. The five ponies, as well as Spike, almost fell on their rumps in bewilderment. Celestia and Luna were standing aside, watching the whole scene with hopeless anticipation.

Serath sighed and continued in that same tone: "This situation is to be treated with the utmost respect, and nothing less. Shouting can only worsen her condition, so I demand complete silence. Twilight has certainly gone off of it: never in my career have I encountered such a severe state of hydrocephalus, if such a diagnosis can hold up under a hospital's examination. I snuck my coat under her neck for breathing support, it can help with stability. But that is all there is. I truly do apologize for saying this: there is genuinely nothing else I can do."

A grave shadow swept over Celestia's face. The ponies were still trying to process this information, some were even crying now.

"Nothing you can do?" asked Luna solemnly.

"Even if we were back in my house, or better yet, the university where I do my research, we have nothing at the ready to treat her condition. Our nineteenth century science hardly understands the causes of encephalitis to begin with, let alone the mess that is hydrocephalus. The most we have are alcoholic remedies to numb the physical agitations, maybe for the day. But this?" He fell off his knees, pressing his back to the wall, and looking keenly at the ponies' frenzied faces, and especially Spike, who stood there paralyzed, beyond words, totally helpless to save his best friend. "Believe me, if I could rid her of this horror, I'd do so in a heart beat."

"But she'll pull through... right?" said Celestia intensely, with weak notes ringing in her voice.

"I suppose I should not hold back on informing you of any possible complications. Best case scenario: permanent neurological problems, most likely paralysis if you want my personal opinion." He was quiet for a moment.

"And the worst case scenario?" asked Luna as though the answer to this question was the only thing that mattered.

"Worst case: Twilight will be gone. Let us hope it does not come to that."

"W-wait, wait," said Spike, the corners of his mouth quivering. "If y-you're a doc—a doctor, you do this all t-the time, right? How often do your patients... you know, go away?"

"That is impossible to assess correctly," said Serath. "Previous encounters of mine with increased pressure in the spinal column were with infants, roughly two-to-six years of age, and they never expressed so much pain as Twilight does. Out of those I knew..." He paused sharply, as though something bitter stung in his mouth. "Listen, we should not dwell on these pointless anecdotes. What remains of capital importance, right here and now, is doing whatever we may to prevent her death—any death, actually. I will not have it. Please, none of you take offence: there is absolutely nothing any of you can do, nothing I can do outside of professional speculation."

"Actually, there may very well be a way to save her," said Celestia suddenly.

Everypony's eyes lit up, and were on the verge of loudly responding in surprise, but Serath hushed them, and set his gaze on Celestia with terrible curiosity.

"There's a chance placing the Crystal Heart in its rightful location will heal Twilight," continued Celestia with a weak, desperate look plastered on her face.

"How would that work?" inquired Serath, his voice quieter than what was expected from the animation on his face.

"If the smoke was the cause of this problem," replied Celestia, but she paused hesitantly, as though she were unsure of what to add, "well—and we know the Crystal Heart can destroy every last trace of it, wouldn't it serve this purpose?"

"Are you saying that fragments of Sombra's smoke is inside Twilight, and by effect causes her this pain?" contemplated Luna.

"That... might just be the problem," said Celestia with a new gravity to her voice. Twilight's friends were all eyeing the princesses almost hysterically, hoping for any fraction of hope, and at last looked to Serath, as though for confirmation.

I can tell Celestia is grasping at straws here, thought Serath, ambiguity inclined on his analyzing face. I can in no good effort judge the properties of the smoke's 'magic,' but basic biology does not concur with such a conclusion. Even if the smoke were to be cleared, I do not see how it will reverse the neurological effects. Come now, Serath, I best not crush them. "Hmm, yes, seems rather plausible. Fine, now we have even more reason to save the Crystal Empire."

"So there is a way to save Twilight," said Spike with new-found hope.

"And when will we be off to the next post, Tia?" asked Luna, although she was looking nowhere in particular, and seemed to ask as a reference for her own reflection.

"I can't decide what effects teleportation may have on Twilight just yet," said Celestia. "Serath, do you think she'll get temporarily better, like how a strong headache will subside at times?"

"That is only natural. Look, she has gone quiet now."

Twilight's body went limp. Her eye-lids dropped heavily into a senseless expression.

"How long till we get to the Crystal Empire?" asked Rainbow Dash impatiently.

"A few more jumps, Rainbow," said Celestia with decision. "I promise you all Twilight won't meet her end, not like this. I've lived far too long, unlike her. She deserves to see all the wonders life has to offer, much like you, her friends."

That last line immediately inspired a sense of passion in each of their hearts, evident by the hot gleam which struck their eyes in that moment. It was all they could think about.

Luna, on the other hand, looked to be more in her own bubble. She expressed a vague determination, but it was all somehow superficial; in actuality there was little to no vigour in her countenance, and if anything, she seemed even sad. Of course, as far as I can tell, this is to be expected given their situation, and perhaps it was a characteristic response to be doubtful or cynical, and like I have described, it seemed to be exclusive to her.

"Give me five minutes," said Serath, staring searchingly into Twilight's deathly pale face. "I want to wait for a bit, just to study her condition more calmly. That is all I ask, then we will go." But he was breathless. Perhaps he intended to express his idea with more art and naturalness, but his speech was too hurried and debatable.

But Celestia would rather not have objected then. She was completely and horrifically worried for Twilight, and adding her genuine trust of Serath's intuition, the alicorn decided to go along with it. Twilight's friends took up one corner of the room, likely to start up some quick, albeit glum, chatter, while Celestia and Luna were by the crystal post.

That left Serath next to Twilight, who for the next five minutes had been going over what he memorized in several books. I won't write down exactly what he was thinking, but it should be mentioned that this entire time, starting with Twilight's physical illness, Serath had been mapping out his own experience as a doctor, that's to say, he was comporting himself exactly as what would be expected of him back in the hospital. But, at last, he let himself survey Twilight as a regular person, not only the mechanical amalgamations of a learned doctor; and Serath was suddenly hit by a great surge of sympathy. He felt an unpleasantness darken over him. He slowly reached into the outer pocket of his shirt and pulled out the picture of him and his family. And then Twilight sluggishly opened her eyes, which were almost bloodshot.

"This is me," he said in a barely audible whisper, and without even thinking he lowered the photo right before her. "My wife, my son, and his baby sister. Once this is all over you can keep this." He placed it back in his shirt with a trembling hand, and he said again in a low, ragged voice: "I... I'll keep this safe. Just, you know..." he suddenly stood up and suppressed what felt like a shudder.

"You look all but happy to stay here," remarked Celestia, catching the attention of everypony in the room. "I got hold of the next spell. We're going."

Serath nodded to show his understanding and agreement.

"About time," said Luna to herself in a sarcastic tone.

And once again they were off, ever closer to the Crystal Empire.

* * *

"What is this place?" said Corvo, looking all round him.

They stood before a dirt pasture, approximately several acres, surrounded by sickly looking trees and low hills. What was most unusual was the plethora of stones, varying in size, scattered across the land. There were even a few large boulders jutting out of the ground. A little ahead was a fenced ring, although the planks that made up the fence were largely old and broken down. It was as if no one had lived here for a long time.

Within the fencing was a little cobblestone house, apparently sturdy in its construction, with small windows. Next to it a windmill of commendable height, and right after that a long, matte grain bin with a wide, wooden door for the entrance.

The night sky had brightened up somewhat by now, the silver moon was resting deep in the west.

"Now isn't this quaint!" remarked Discord, walking ahead of Corvo. "Who would've thought we'd end up in Pinkie Pie's rock farm."

"A rock farm?" said Corvo dubiously. He found himself thoroughly unimpressed with the ugly scenery, and subsided into a dignified silence, watching out carefully for anything out of place, as it were.

Discord, however, acted much more lively. He paced about, surveying the countless rocks on the dirt, and strode right up to the fence.

"My, the choice of wood here is particularly drab," he said in a provocative voice, somehow even pleased with himself by mere virtue of his own presence.

"What on earth is a rock farm?" inquired Corvo, even more confused than before. "How does one farm rocks?"

"Oh, you know, a little of this, a little of that."

"No, I don't know." He set his attention squarely on the old-fashioned house, and began making his way there. "But why am I questioning 'rock farming' of all things? You all capitalize on unexplainable sorcery, but at the same time put modern technology to decent use, like oil lanterns. Equestria is seriously the most contradictory country I have ever visited, and believe me, I have visited some truly antithetical autocracies."

"You should see where I live," Discord smiled caustically.

"I... you said we were close," said Corvo. "Do you sense any imbalances, or is Sombra nearby?"

A dulled blade from the windmill suddenly broke off, flapped about and eventually towards the fence, and swept to the ground. It impacted against the ground a number of times before it came to a halt; and its weak echoes made Corvo realize just how quiet the outdoors had been.

"Everything is dead," said Discord. His smile had quickly vanished, he even lowered his shoulders and let his arms go limp without a trace of magic on his part.

"What do you mean: dead?" said Corvo, turning in his general direction. "No one is here but us."

Corvo was meaning to leave once again, but something about this farm bothered him. Discord was watching the cobblestone house steadily, although for seemingly no reason. There was not a hint of jesting on him now.

"I don't mean other ponies," said Discord again, as though utter quietness was the last thing he expected. "There's nothing here. Well—how do I put this? No magic, no 'imbalances,' certainly no other pony. It's almost like this farm doesn't exist: its physical appearance is there, we'll give it that, but I take nothing away from it, I don't sense a thing."

What the hell is he going on about? thought Corvo, but nevertheless his face became gloomy with unease. If Discord cannot sense anything, is this farm the end of the journey? Have we made it? But... I do not see anything. "Discord, do you at the very minimum have any idea of Sombra's location? If not then this whole abandonment of ours was a vain attempt."

"Oh, this truly is a disaster!" declared Discord with a strange sincerity. He heaved a sigh, and his lower lip drooped out like a pancake. "Eh, is it too late to reminiscent about the good ol' days when I was a statue, frozen like a stump, or are you too serious for that?"

"No," said Corvo firmly. "Pinpointing Sombra is the priority. It's not a habit of mine to leave work unfinished, and seeing it to the end could potentially save Equestria and reveal whatever Luna is hiding. Listen—perhaps we could scout out the area, look in that house for a half-decent start. And besides, whatever is there to show might often—"

Discord suddenly gasped loudly, as though something inexplicably grabbed hold of his throat. His eyes glowed a sick yellow, much to his shock, highlighting horror on his contorting face unlike nothing else.

"What the hell!" cried Corvo in extreme perplexity, and ran to help, but in an instance lashes of black smoke spewed from the ground, immediately covering the air round Discord, effectively hugging him.

Corvo instinctively teleported away from the danger, but was taken off guard upon noticing that the smoke, completely identical to what had engulfed the Crystal Empire, didn't want anything to do with him. It obsessively drowned Discord, and in a moment his screams were void. The smoke then vaporized and the result was a deathly pale Discord spread across the ground, entirely still like a dead thing.

Corvo couldn't speak. He couldn't even think cohesively. And before a single conclusion was made, something of an apprehensive placement dominated the corner of his eye. He rapidly turned left and, as though nothing else carried much weight, Sombra was standing there, smiling menacingly. His hard expression was not so much good-natured as accommodating and ready to assume amiability if the occasion should arise.

Traces of magic just evaporated from the tip of his curved horn the moment Corvo looked at him.

"Alright, you found me," he said, feeling a strong need to start the conversation. "What did you have in store? Oh, I see, Princess Celestia isn't with you. I was anticipating you, but not accompanied by him..." He cast a brief side-glance at Discord's lifeless body. "It's consequential how you all assumed my smoke is only spreading from Canterlot. I can still produce it on my own, anywhere I'd like, at any other time. And look at what it's done: sucked the magic right out of him," his voice suddenly rang with notes of sorrow, which contrasted sardonically with his unapologetic smile. "Ah, Corvo, I think this may very well be the last time we meet. And believe me, oh, definitely believe these next few words—my eyes will be looking down on you in the next hour."

"I expect that you are ready to forgive yourself, because I promise you that today is the worst day of your life," said Corvo with an intense severity that burned in his grey eyes. All I need is to stall for time—hopefully. Damn it all!

"Don't bolster me up just yet," returned Sombra, turning round to the house and beckoning for Corvo. All at once his face expressed a sudden solicitude. "Let's go inside, if you know what's good for you. It's pretty cold out in the open." When Corvo obliged (albeit with terrible and anxious reluctance) and followed him closely, Sombra added: "It's a good sign that you treat me so familiarly."

Corvo was in a state of panic and excitement, the specific kind of nervous excitement where one opens up a rare and finite opportunity with only that very moment to act upon it, or else the opportunity shall never reveal itself again. His throat felt tangled, he couldn't even decide on how to start, and before that, he realized that Sombra was taking him inside the house. But he blocked any and all mental doubts and remembered the 'expected deduction,' and convinced himself that everything would play out in his favour.

A true shame, Discord, he thought. You should not have died like you did, but it happened, so now you will lay there, cold on the ground. Farewell, my friend.

The air was impressively clean in the house, and had a strange gravity to it. The kitchen was adjacent to the living room, displaying wooden cupboards, shelves, and a stone furnace, but the entire place was completely gutted, not a single item was left that wasn't nailed to something. The living room was also fairly empty and drab, only boasting a long oak table, with two chairs pressed opposite to each other at the very end, and in the space between the chairs was a chess board with a full set of organized pieces at the ready.

Right above the table there was a spot on the ceiling that looked to be paler than the rest of the visible paint round it, also with several holes ripped out. Corvo thought a chandelier used to hang there, but he could not know for certain.

As if seemingly agreeing without words both Sombra and Corvo sat down on the chairs, facing each other and the chess board—the latter of whom took a moment to glance out the window to his right: it was dark, but he could still make out the low hills and bent trees far away.

"You're white," said Sombra, smiling amicably. "Looks like you go first."

"Why are we playing chess to begin w—" Corvo began as he looked down, but was struck by the absence of his king. He glared disdainfully at Sombra. "What is this supposed to be?"

"I really should have organized my speaking points better," sighed Sombra with a thoughtful look on his face, as if he were contemplating defeat. "Let me tell you how this'll work. We're sitting in the southern region of Equestria, down the middle map-line or whatnot. At this point my smoke is forming an upward parabola, and its moving down on us quick," said Sombra with a sort of concern. "You do know what an upward parabola is, do you?"

"Yes, I understand something as basic as a parabola. Keep talking."

"Oh, good, just... you know," he coughed and retained a sharp focus in his speech. "I could estimate if you really insist, throw up a time—how long it'll take for the smoke to cover us. Maybe thirty minutes. It's only one or two dozen kilometers off from here. But adding in foliage could buy you some extra time."

"What the hell are you up to?" said Corvo with fury. Suddenly his eyes gleamed, he leaned back on his chair, and a crooked smirk appeared on his lips. "Ah—maybe I understand after all. I believe you about the smoke, you obviously want to get rid of me as soon as possible. But why not now? I cannot harm you, but you can kill me. What are you holding back, Sombra? If I had to guess you probably want to learn something from me. You're keeping me here, occupied with this bungled chess game, just to clear up your own scheme."

"And do you know what my scheme is?" reproached Sombra with an almost hysterical curiosity. A bitter chuckle escaped his mouth. "Heh, heh—I was about to reveal my scheme. I'd advise to not put yourself on a pedestal just yet, after all, you haven't scored any points in this battle. You wanna learn something from me too, eh? Is that so? We're both extractors. Sounds poetic! Heh, heh—but we'll only proceed with this conversation once you've retrieved your king. That's the only way you have to take me apart, to crush me like a cockroach. It's through the sheer will of a board game, the means to amplify determination—that is, the determination to kill me, both literally and metaphorically—that I see you walking out of here alive. But like I said, that's not going to happen. And so I... heh... I'll tell you where the king is!" His entire countenance suddenly resembled something of a hysterical fit, as though something snapped peevishly in him, precisely as he said those last few words, like he just couldn't stand the wait. "Upstairs, second room to the left! It's on the bed, right there on the bed, just waiting to be taken. Go on! Don't believe me? Time is slipping by, you know! Go grab that miserable piece, slam it down on its rightful square, a—"

Corvo stopped time right away, effectively freezing everything in place. He hurried himself, teleported up to the second floor and into the suggested room in a smooth instance.

* * *

Celestia, Serath, and the rest resumed their travel without much interruption. For the sake of brevity I won't give an account of each stop, what they said in what rooms, and the whole. Celestia teleported them five or six more times, and each jump seemed to get darker than the last—literally, as if Celestia's horn was getting weaker. But this wasn't the case exactly. It turned out that the underground, as it drew nearer to the Crystal Empire, really did resist magic. Nothing damaging, but nonetheless worrying.

But again, we don't need the details. Twilight's condition dominated her entire being from start to finish, and with the exception of certain spikes in pain, she kept quiet for the most part. The sight was particularly hard on Spike, for reasons that should be obvious. Serath told them of the fables he had learned as a boy, the typical hero mythology, where the knight would venture far from his village, slay the dragon, claim the gold, and so on. But Serath couldn't even come to terms with why—on what grounds, that's to say—was he relaying these old stories. For comfort, no doubt, but that hardly had a visible effect on the ponies. It didn't change the reality.

Unbeknownst to him, though, Luna took a great interest in these fables. But was it really 'interest,' the sort created by sheer boredom? This might be hard to explain, but it has always been my belief that the motivations which drive our actions are inconceivably more complex than our subsequent explanations for them; and so even the most mundane actions—such as taking interest in off-the-cuff fables—are simple at first, only to reveal that they were the product of a whole string of thoughts and ideas nested in a potential agenda. But we all have our own agendas, now don't we? You can't not have an agenda.

I apologize for the digression. We better get back to the story, notably, when they arrived at their destination.

At this point both Celestia and Luna were conjuring powerful lights from their horns: up close it was almost blinding, but upon taking a step or two away one's vision would be abruptly subsumed by darkness.

Once they had reached the last room—that is, the last room they intended—they started walking down the tunnel this time, on the lookout for a door. Applejack and Rainbow Dash both hoisted Twilight on their backs, with some moderate difficulty, but were soon off, and Serath was right next to Celestia.

"Shame that Corvo couldn't be here with us," said Celestia. "He can see in the dark, could have scouted ahead, if you catch my drift."

"He must be in a worse situation if he has confronted Sombra," said Serath with conviction. "That is his preliminary goal from what we can guess."

"That's most definitely his goal," threw in Luna, who had been averting her eyes from the sable walls. "Maybe this entire journey we have undertaken will become its own story, told through the generations of ponies to come."

"King Sombra really outdid himself this time," said Celestia. "In all my times of raising the sun I've never seen such an attempt to destroy Equestria before."

"Villains must be stepping up their game," remarked Pinkie Pie suddenly.

"He's definitely the worst of 'em," said Rainbow, frowning.

"I quite agree," put in Rarity. "Tirek, Queen Chrysalis, the Everfree Forest itself, even Discord at his lowest traits—none come to the levels of monstrousness that is King Sombra."

"You all speak about a hierarchy of villains?" asked Serath with great curiosity. "Fascinating. I myself believe that the capacity for evil exists within a number of stages. The more evil it is, the further at the bottom you are. I read that in a ballad."

"King Sombra must be stationed at rock-bottom then," said Luna.

"I look at it in a different light," said Serath in a low voice, as though he were confessing something.

Luna's ears perked, she looked at him like a complete stranger, turning her full attention to him. "You disagree?" she said slowly.

"The worst act of evil, in my mind, is intentional betrayal."

Luna looked to be entirely taken aback by the honesty in Serath's tone, which was lacking even a trace of sarcasm. She didn't want him to continue—it brought back memories of her Nightmare Moon days—and was unsure of how to word that. But before she could get a word out Serath continued:

"If we base evil on a hierarchy, I believe betrayal sits at the dark bottom. I do not mean that you misbehave by someone else's standards. I mean this: when you know that, by your own standards, you are doing something that is devious or malevolent or underhanded, and you know it, and you still do it—that is your own judgement you bear on yourself. If you look at why you do that, the longer you look at it the deeper a hole you dig. And believe me, people can recover from almost anything: injury, bullies, loss of property; but no one can recover from the betrayal of a loved one. When someone you have known all your life as a dear friend or a partner tosses you a foot in the grave, that seriously destroys the person. Sombra is the enemy who threatens your world, and so be wary of the snakes."

"Well struck," said Luna with a tense satisfaction. "Would Corvo agree with you?"

"He is mostly on the same page with me, about our capacity for doing wrong, but he takes very little interest in debating the topic, that is, about the aspects we do not see eye-to-eye on, much to my surprise."

Celestia halted, as did everyone else in her lead. They had suddenly reached the doorway.

"We're here," she said.

It led to yet another room, but this one in particular was narrower and more squared out, somewhat like a rectangular prism. While before the walls were made of flat stone, this room had been constructed out of crystal bricks, and although they did not glow, the change in aesthetic was pleasing. At the very end of the room stood a ladder, leading up to an entrance wedged into the ground.

Celestia at once recognized this location and announced that they were directly under the Crystal Empire, and more specifically, next to the Crystal Castle, about ten or so paces off.

"We made it!" cried Pinkie Pie, beaming.

"We're really here, huh?" said Applejack almost breathlessly. "Darn, maybe mah glass was half empty, but Ah was seriously startin' to have mah doubts if we ever could make it."

"Everypony, listen up," said Celestia importantly. She drew out the Crystal Heart from her saddlebag and held it up for all to see. "Our mission right now is to place the Crystal Heart directly under the castle. Once there it should activate its magic. The fate of Equestria hinges on this."

"I can't see a thing, sister," said Luna, who had used a scanning spell to see through the ceiling above them. "Nothing but black."

Twilight began groaning again, completely taking Rainbow and Applejack off guard. They carefully laid her down, but to their growing fear her groans grew louder, and at last she was shrieking in pain, covering all the ponies' faces with grim animation.

"We gotta act fast!" cried Spike in despair.

"Celestia, what was that spell you mentioned earlier?" inquired Serath anxiously, striding over to Twilight's side. "You claimed to have had something in store. I cannot tell how much more she can take."

A degree of extraordinary sadness seemed to resemble on his Celestia's face. She retracted the Crystal Heart, holding it close to her chest, wandered over to the ladder in spite of the pleas for help, like she couldn't hear a thing.

"There is no spell," she drawled out in a faint and exhausted voice. "You all should stay here."

"What?" said Luna instantly. "Sister, what are you talking about?"

"Yeah, what are you talking about, princess?" said Spike in surprise, stamping with both feet

"I never had a plan to dispel King Sombra's smoke," said Celestia, trying her hardest to go on. Her eyes were glittering and she breathed with difficulty. "To speak plainly, I'm the one who will charge through and place the Crystal Heart. I can hold it off for maybe a moment, but I can't promise anything else."

Everypony was stirred, looks of protest highlighting their features.

"Why would you bring us along if you wished to protect us!" reproached Luna hotly. "We could have gone off west, beyond the border."

"Pardon mah sayin', but Princess Luna's got a point," said Applejack supportively. "You don't need to do this by yerself."

"Truth is, I was afflicted by an internal debate all this time," said Celestia pitifully, her ears drooping. "Maybe I didn't think far enough, must have gone off the deep end, but I truly believed we'd all make it together. You could've stayed in the train, or ventured off to safety with Princess Luna's guidance. But"— notes of conviction rang in her voice —"I'm afraid we can't pull this off in one piece. I'm the only one who's powerful enough. I realize that now."

Serath, at last, got up, pale from fright; an imploring smile lighted up his face.

"I admire you, Celestia," he said. "You truly care about your ponies, you care sincerely, and... what else am I to add? I have no right to tell you what to do, but I implore you to have plans for tomorrow."

"I have no way of knowing how this'll turn out," said Celestia in a soft and, as it were, controlled voice. She frowned painfully as Twilight's shrieks grew louder, which immediately brought tears to her friends' eyes. "There's nothing any of you can do. If I push my magic to its limits I'll buy a second or two of protection form the smoke, and that's that." The glow of her horn intensified. "I'm going to teleport up there."

"I should have known," said Serath, leaning stiffly against the wall. "What could we do against Sombra's smoke? Perhaps we all went off the deep end together believing that."

"This wasn't part of the plan!" cried Luna, nearly spluttering at every syllable.

As Celestia prepared to take off the ponies broke out into desperate pleas. Serath merely bowed his head, with a look of defeat overlapping him.

An extraordinary and, you can say, contradictory change washed over Luna's precise position and posture. The reflection on her eyes were entirely unnatural, no way to tell how she really felt; her horn was not glowing, she didn't move an inch, the strains on her face resembling anguish: she had no idea what to do, as if she both hated her sister for pulling off such a stunt and completely accepted it asa necessary sacrifice.

If only Corvo hadn't left, swept by her mind in a sort of fury.

Suddenly Celestia summoned up a powerful surge of magic and, to everypony's shock, she teleported them all outside the room, far off down the hall, away from her. She heard multiple distant voices from them, shouting and weeping at the realization of what had happened.

Now that that was out of the way, Celestia looked up and spread her wings. She forced herself to breathe slowly, as to combat the shuddering in her shoulders. She was about to go out there, a mere second away, it was coming. It all boiled down to this moment, after all, which, for some reason, completely baffled her. Three-quarters of a second. Half. She was about to do it.

And right before that the intense gloominess on her face vanished, which resembled something of an unusual change. She kept staring at the ceiling, and her face brightened, as though she had nothing to fear. The trembles were gone, and she was in control of her emotions.

Celestia began laughing long but quietly to herself. She mused how ridiculous it all turned out to be, how ridiculous it was of her to have believed they could all fend off the black smoke; she went on laughing, pondering, and, getting the last chuckle out, blasted right out of there.

What she felt next, amid her waning magic, was seemingly the full force of a freight train; and she wondered if her eyes were closed, because everything was just as dark as when she had them open.

Author's Note:

So, chapter 8 was initially going to be a part of this chapter, but due to pacing issues I decided to split them.