The Pain of the Past

by milesprower06

Pain

Her hooves clacked against the stone floor of the cavern, echoing against the walls and continued down the passage until they were nothing. It seemed so familiar, a place she thought she visited hundreds of times, and yet, the memory escaped her. Maybe answers would be around the next bend...

Starlight Glimmer looked from left to right, at the droplets of water as they fell from the stalactites above. This place gave her a sense of dread, but she couldn't put a hoof on why. How did she get here? How long had she been wandering in here? Was she lost? Where was this cave?

She noticed that the walls were becoming slowly brighter around the next bend. A dim source of light shined from around the corner. She broke into a gallop, eager to see something other than the same damp walls. But when she rounded the bend and saw what awaited, her eyes went wide and she nearly tripped over her own hooves as she skidded to a halt, nearly colliding with a pedestal in the center of the room. A lump began to form in her throat as she stared at the glowing blue grid against the terminus wall of the cave.

Her Cutie Mark Vault.

"Hello, Starlight." A voice greeted behind her, causing her to nearly jump out of her skin. She whipped around, and heard approaching hoofsteps echo from where she had just come from. The voice sounded completely normal, but something about it was bone-chilling to her. Its source came around the corner, and her breath left her.

It was herself.

The heliotrope unicorn mare's mane was tied back in a long ponytail, and her bangs were split evenly between her glowing horn. Next to her, floating in her horn's magical grasp, was the double-pronged Staff of Sameness.

Starlight backed up towards the vault, fear nearly paralyzing her, her mind unable to challenge the impossibility of the sight.

"I see you've finally decided to join us. Your friends will be so happy." The other Starlight said, motioning with the staff to the vault behind her. Starlight turned to look, and her heart dropped into her stomach when she saw the Cutie Marks.

Celestia. Luna. Cadance. Twilight and her friends. Sunburst. Trixie. Maud.

She turned on her hooves to run, but the other Starlight was waiting. The staff glowed, and out from between the tips of the two prongs, a white beam shot out at her. There was no avoiding it. It hit her and enveloped her. Starlight felt something passing under her coat and reaching inside; down immeasurably deep, where it grabbed hold, and twisted.

She screamed.

"No!!!"

It was an attack on her very soul, worse than any physical pain she had ever felt before in her life. She lost track of how many seconds passed as she slammed her eyes closed and kept screaming as she tried to shut it out.

Then it faded as she collapsed to the floor of the cave. But something didn't feel right. She felt like she had faded along with the pain. She slowly opened her eyes, to see the other Starlight standing over her; a purple and white eight-pointed star in between the prongs of the staff. The mare angled the staff towards the vault, and watched as her Cutie Mark traversed the short distance to the empty grid box next to Sunburst's. She weakly reached for it in vain before it was enclosed behind a panel of plate glass.

"Please... Give it back... This isn't you..." She said, looking back to the other Starlight.

"This is me, this will be everypony in Equestria one day. Free from pain. Free from differences."

Starlight got to her hooves just in time to see the other light her horn up, and she was blinded by a flash of light. When she blinked, the setting was different, yet the familiarity returned to her immediately.

Our Town.

The other Starlight stood several feet in front of her, alongside Twilight, Sunburst, Trixie, Maud, and everypony else whose mark was in the vault. They all had the equals sign on their flanks; their manes kept in a small number of similar styles.

"Alright then. In you go. Until you've seen the light of equality." The other said, as storm clouds began to gather overhead.

Starlight turned and looked behind her; the Equalization Cottage. It hadn't always been the same location; as more ponies arrived and were unmarked, more cottages were built to house them. The Equalization Cottage was always the farthest down on the northwest side; the farthest possible from other residents, and from her central cottage. It served as temporary housing for new arrivals and for villagers who had stepped out of line of her vision. She remembered how she locked ponies in here for days; until they were so overcome from isolation that their mind opened up to the indoctrination that the manifesto on the speaker played out.

"No, please... This isn't who you are. This isn't who any of you are!" She pleaded with her unmarked friends.

"It's alright, everypony. This is, after all, a completely normal part of equalization." The other claimed.

The anger in Starlight rose, a rage desperate to be released. She tried firing off a spell, but her horn did nothing more than fizzle; her power taken by the unmarking. Instead, she found herself grasped in the magic of the other Starlight, and flung backwards into the Equalization Cottage. Before she could even get to her hooves, the door was closed and locked, and the ceiling speakers in the corner began playing.

"In sameness, there is peace."

"No. No!" Starlight raced to the door and began pounding on it.

"Exceptionalism is a lie."

"No! It's not true!!! Let me out!!!" She screamed, tears welling up in her eyes as she continued to slam her hooves on the door. The wood began to splinter, but the door wouldn't give.

"Free yourself from your Cutie Mark."

"Maud!!! Twilight!!!"

"Choose equality as your special talent."

"Sunburst!!! Trixie!!! Please!!!"

Her pounding resulted in little more than getting splinters stuck in her hooves, but that didn't deter her in the slightest. She rammed and scraped at it with her horn.

"Difference is frustration."

She screamed and cried hysterically, the wood splinters in her hooves digging deeper under her coat every time she clawed and pounded on the locked door.

"To excel is to fail."

"Let me out!!! Please let me out of here!!!" She begged.

Her hooves began to bleed, and still, she persisted.

"Be your best by never being your best."

Her logic failed her. Her screams did nothing to dampen the speaker. The marks of blood she left on the door did nothing to deter her.

"Conformity will set you free."

The bloody marks smeared down as she collapsed against the door in exhaustion. Shivering, she curled up, slammed her tear-filled eyes shut, and pressed her blood-and-splinter-covered hooves to her ears in an effort to block out the voice.

She laid there in the silent blackness, for how long, she couldn't be sure. But then, she felt a hoof on her shoulder. She opened her eyes, and saw through her wet vision, the Princess of the Night.

"P-P-Princess Luna... You're... You're..."

"It is alright, Starlight. You're dreaming." Luna reassured her. Starlight looked over at her flank, and indeed saw the crescent moon cutie mark.

Starlight let out a quivering breath as fresh tears spilled from her eyes as she crawled forward and threw her legs around Luna's torso. The Princess merely sat and embraced her, using her magic to heal her self-inflicted wounds as she cried in relief. After a few moments, Starlight sniffled and looked up at Luna.

"Can I wake up now? I don't want to be here..."

"I can wake you if you wish, but I am afraid that my aid here is limited, because this is no ordinary nightmare, Starlight." Luna informed the distraught unicorn.

"What are you talking about?"

Princess Luna's horn lit up, and she softly touched a hoof to Starlight's barrel. It began to glow, then a wiggling, sparkling mass emerged, which Luna immediately surrounded with a magical force field.

"What in Equestria...?" The shocked unicorn asked.

The purple, glowing, smokey amorphous mass didn't seem to have any defining shape. It writhed within the confines of Luna's shield as it tried to break through to return to the unicorn.

"This..." Luna began. "...Is a Tantabus. It is a magical parasitic creature of the dream realm. Very few of them become powerful enough to be noticed. Simply put, it is severe guilt made manifest. The guilt of what you did here." Luna explained, using a hoof to motion to the surroundings of the Equalization Cottage.

"It made this nightmare? Can you destroy it?" Starlight asked, fearfully eyeing the creature.

"No. It is a part of you, so this task falls to you. It is something I once had to carry out, and I was unable to do it alone."

"What do I have to do?"

"Forgive yourself for what you did here. Talk to whomever and do whatever you must to relieve yourself of your guilt, and make peace with your past. Until you do, your Tantabus will become more powerful, and the nightmares will only increase in frequency and severity, to the point where I will be powerless to stop them."

Luna's magic flickered, and the Tantabus broke free, rushing back into Starlight, and she closed her eyes as her breath left her.

She drew in a sharp breath and her eyes shot open, and her surroundings were different. She shot up in bed, looked around, and found herself in her bedroom in Twilight's castle. She took in a few deep breaths, looking over at the clock on her nightstand, and saw that it was barely midnight. Feeling wetness on her cheeks, she surmised that she had done a fair bit of crying in her sleep.

There was a gentle knock on her door. She walked over, opened it, and there stood Twilight, magically holding a small lantern.

"Are you okay, Starlight? I heard you from two doors down." Twilight asked, concern filling her voice.

Starlight's emotions began bubbling to the surface as she looked into the eyes of the Princess of Friendship, finding only concern and worry. This was the Princess who had come to her village, revealed her true cutie mark, started a revolt against her, and fought back through multiple alternate timelines to beg her to see the light.

This was the pony who had saved her from herself.

Starlight began crying again as she came forward and hugged Twilight, burying her face in her mane.

"Starlight...?" Twilight asked worriedly as she returned the hug.

"Just..." Starlight began, her shoulders heaving. "Th... Th... Thank y-you. For... For everything. For absolutely everything." Starlight whispered as she wept. Twilight rubbed Starlight's back as she shuddered in her hooves for a few moments. To her knowledge, Starlight didn't have a lot of nightmares, at least none that she heard from down the hall, but this one had clearly shaken her to her core. When she got herself under control, they released each other, and Starlight sniffled.

"Do you think you'll be able to get back to sleep? Would you like some tea?" Twilight asked.

"No," Starlight began, wiping her eyes. "Thank you, Twilight, but I have somewhere I need to go."

Comments

[SuperPinkBrony12]

Ooh, Starlight creating her own tantibus? Interesting, do go on.

[quade]

This is definitely a very interesting start... I really hope that there will be more attached to this.

[milesprower06]

8512752
There will be. It was originally going be a oneshot, but I've essentially split the story in half. I've been writing multiple stories for two weeks now, and I need to update my ageplayer Starlight story first.

[Emperor]

Well, that's an interesting start.

And hark, do I see what I think I do with those character tags? I'm always keen for GlimGlam and Double Diamond fics considering how starved we are for them.