Empty Horizons: The Lost Student

by Psyonicg

Chapter I: An Island of Two

The sound of roaring waves. The dying light of the setting sun. The wet rock beneath her hooves. The horizon stretching out all around her.

Twilight was tired, impossibly so. She was dirty and injured and would have loved for nothing more than to collapse onto the rock beneath her and give in to the delightful temptation of sleep. But she wouldn’t. She couldn’t.

Even now, she could feel the after-effects of her spell pounding inside her head like a drum. The pain had not relented once she had fallen from the sky - a moment that seemed so long ago, back when her head was filled with the furious anger of the Other that she shared her small sanctuary with.

But it couldn’t hurt her anymore. She had made certain of that. How, she wasn’t quite sure, but the spell had somehow broken the link that it had with her magic, had cast it out from her body and into the air around her. It had granted her a reprieve from the struggle of trying to retain control of her own body, but with it, a new problem had arisen.

The Other had screamed at her when she had crawled onto the middle of the debris, legs trembling with the effort to keep herself moving even when both magical and physical exhaustion demanded she stop. It had demanded to know what she had done.

It had shouted at her with fury in its voice when she had climbed from the wreckage onto a chunk of stone, still floating with some of the power left over from the island’s magic. It had reiterated that her actions were meaningless, and only further proved she had lost her mind.

But she knew that, deep down, that was the furthest thing from the truth. Even now, her friends’ strength was with her, and as long as they were by her side – in spirit, if not in person – she would stay strong.

And so, as Applejack had, she kept her gaze locked onto the waves; steady, resolute, firm. Even as the Other continued its tirade of hatred. Eventually, though, it got tired. And when the sound of its anger finally died away, Twilight replied calmly.

“I won't let you control me.”

And then the Other had paused. It had stopped its ranting for a moment as if to consider those words, assessing them, weighing them.

A different kind of anger sprung forth then, one not of mindless hatred but one borne of frustration and disbelief. The dark magic had rushed through her limbs, pulling at them hard enough to send waves of agony coursing through her as the thing yelled about mistakes and delusions.

It was sometime around that point that the constant heat began to get to her. Visions of her friends, of her past, and of the last few days swam in and out of her eyesight as if to mock her and remind her of the mistakes she made. But among them, darker sights lingered; twisted memories and hateful words squirmed between her thoughts as if she was looking at a strange reflection of her own life.

But even as she felt the strength start to ebb from her body she hadn’t wavered; she had kept her hooves steady and her eyes locked onto that distant horizon as the early sun had baked the moisture from her coat and then relentlessly beat against her back her until her eyes were blurry with sweat and her flank burned in pain.

The Other began to slow down, its words heavy with exhaustion rather than anger. A small part of Twilight considered the relationship between her own weakness and its apparent fatigue but was quickly brushed aside. There was only one thing that mattered.

“We had no choice. We were trying to help you! Stop this! You’re going to kill us!”

Twilight didn’t reply audibly, but the Other could sense her response all the same. With a snarl, the hallucinations that had plagued her vanished; they were replaced by a floating vision of herself. But this wasn’t her. This was the Other, an almost impossibly identical look-alike, only given away by her sharp fangs and blood stained cheeks.

And when it next spoke, the desperation in its voice was clear despite the venom that laced every word. “We did what we had to! And your little stunt is only hurting yourself! Is that what you want? For your friends to never see you again because you were too cowardly to let me help you?”

“...”

The Other collapsed to the floor, its form flickering and fading in the slowly fading light. Twilight could feel her magic reserves running dangerously low, but still, she refused to give in. “Not even our magic can change the past! What do you expect me to do? Are you really willing to let us die on this miserable rock over a mistake? You have to see sense, little flower! We can only fix this if we survive!”

At this, Twilight finally responded. Her ears flicked up as she shifted her gaze to give the Thing a piercing stare. “What did you just say?”

The Other’s eyes widened hopefully at the response, her words coming quickly despite how tired they sounded. “That we can only fix this if we survive!”

“No, not that,” Twilight replied, shaking her head. “The bit before that.

“Are… you really willing to let us die on this miserable rock over a mistake?”

Twilight held her hoof up as the Other finished. “So you admit that it was a mistake?”

“What? Yes! Yes, of course, why would I ever intentionally hurt our friends?”

“If it was a mistake, then you know what I want,” Twilight replied, giving the Other a firm stare for a few more moments before looking away.

A scoff, indignant and arrogant. “Apologise? That’s what you want? Some meaningless phrase and you’ll end this silly tirade? You cannot truly be that naive. Actions speak louder than words, little flower, and all I’ve ever done is help you!”

Twilight didn’t reply, and the Other’s arrogant glare faded away once more to be replaced by a fearful look, its ears pinned back and its hooves scratching at the ground. “You’re not joking. You...” It stepped back, shaking its head and looking to Twilight with a frown. “Fine. I’m sorry. Good enough?”

Twilight refused to even justify the attempt with a response, causing the Other to whine, anger warring with fear as it paced back and forth, occasionally glancing at Twilight for some hint that she’d give in.

But Twilight paid it no attention, staring up at the sky as the sun finally dipped below the horizon and the stars began to shine, bathing their small rock in a brilliant Twilight. Fitting, it seemed that she would finally join her family beneath the stars.

“Fine! I… I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t intend to hurt her, I only wanted what you wanted. To protect us, to keep them all safe. Please, I don’t want to die.”

Twilight’s chest began to ache, her breath growing laboured as she looked back down at the flickering vision of the Other, of herself, staring back at her with wide eyes as it slowly started to fade away.

And at that moment, Twilight was forced to admit that the terror and fear in those eyes resonated in her own.

She didn’t want to die.

She could do it, would do it, if it meant saving her friends. But something in those words struck a chord deep within her. If Nightmare Moon could be defeated… Maybe The Other could, too. Maybe there was another option.

She had a duty to try, didn’t she? She had been tasked as the leader of the Elements of Harmony. She had to uphold the virtues of Equestria. She had to be better.

“You won’t try to control me without my permission again.”

The Other gasped, nodding quickly. “Of course!”

“And you will never ever hurt my friends. Ever again.”

“I promise!”

Twilight sighed, a thing barely audible above the waves, but deafening in its meaning. She knew that the promise was hollow, but it was the best she was going to get, and slowly, she sunk down to her barrel. And as her resolve crumbled, the magic she had been repressing flowed back, just like that. It was enough to let the Other flicker back into full existence, a slightly translucent version of herself. “Thank you.”

Twilight opened her mouth to reply but found she couldn’t muster the energy. She couldn’t muster the energy to do anything anymore. Everything was getting blurry, and as sleep forcibly dragged her down into darkness, the last thing she heard was the shimmering of her own horn as the ground rose up to meet her.