Iridescence
The sun reclines in the sky like a ladle left carelessly on a kitchen counter, uplifting and pressing down on the world below. Somewhere, the clock strikes twice. And caught between the city and the sky, I let myself drift down onto a balcony in Canterlot Castle, alighting like a bird on the seat laid out for me.
Twilight sits in the seat opposite, poring over pages and pages of documents. Unlike Spitfire, she enjoys documents. I think. She looked up almost immediately after I sit down, but it's still hard not to feel a little guilty about interrupting her.
“Oh! Hello…Rainbow Dash!” Twilight says, good humor dipping into slightly-less-good humor. Strange that she forgot my name for a little bit. Then again, Twilight always Twilights a little, so perhaps her brain’s too addled with pages of words to remember her friends.
“Hey, Twilight!” I put on my best smile for her. “Sorry about interrupting your paperwork. You can finish that up if—”
“Nonono, trust me! It’ll take hours to finish everything, and at that point I’d basically have to serve you dessert and make sure you fly home safely.” Twilight chuckles. “Don’t want you to bump your head in the dark or anything.”
It’s projection. Twilight never was a good flier, and I doubt that her growth spurt made her any better. She’s easily as tall as Princess Celestia now, maybe even a little taller. And her mane definitely outclasses both Princess Celestia and her sister. I could get lost in it, honestly.
But no matter how different she looks, Twilight is still Twilight, and always will be.
“Don’t worry, Twilight. I’ll just use the light of the stars to guide me. It’s kind of nice, actually.” I take a seat the normal way, sort of—opting for a drooping hind-legged affair instead of curling up like a cat—and yawn. “It’s peaceful. You should try it sometime, unless you’re worried about bumping your head.”
“I’m a princess!” Twilight feigns a pout. “We do not bump heads. We simply neglect to correct the askew elements of our surroundings so we don’t disrupt anypony else, that’s all.”
“And that makes you bump your head.”
“You’re just being technical.” Twilight’s voice is childishly annoyed, but her grin is incandescently impish. “You don’t need to make me look dumb.”
“What can I say? I’m the flier in all of Equestria least likely to bump their head on anything.” I throw in a shrug to emphasize casualness. “So that basically makes me an expert, except in the exact opposite way of having a lot of experience.”
Twilight snorts in an unprincesslike manner. “Of course. All hail Rainbow Dash, the know-nothing know-it-all.”
“How did I know you were going to say that?” I reply, pointing a hoof at her.
The snort turns to laughter. It’s so nice to hear Twilight laugh. It’s like the tinkle of the tiny bells hung around shop doors near Hearth’s Warming by businessponies affecting an extra bit of cheer, mixed with a half-dozen young fillies trying to harmonize while singing a rousing rendition of “Hearth’s Warming Eve Is Here Once Again.” It’s such a nice laugh that I even forget to be bored, which is something I’m positive I might have done before.
I wish she could laugh forever.
Eventually, though, she stops laughing and takes a brief moment to catch her breath before beginning again. “Anyways, lunch is ready. The chefs promised to prepare something ahead of time and keep it cooled, so it’ll still be fresh by the time you’re here. Be right back!”
Then, in a brief flare of magic, Twilight Sparkle poofs out of existence. Fortunately, she poofs back a moment later, setting down on the table a plate full of little…
“Cucumber sandwiches!” Oh boy oh boy oh boy, these are great. I remember that I didn’t used to like them, but I suppose the difference is in having them prepared by professionals instead of Rarity’s hoofwork. That, or I’ve allowed my horizons to expand. But in any case, I can’t help but lunge forward, snatch one off of the plate and chomp down eagerly.
Twilight’s horn glows as she takes one and bites into it with much more decorum. I guess restraint is necessary if you’re a princess, and I guess I can’t blame her for doing what’s proper, but it still feels a bit sad. Holding herself back like that means that she isn’t filling her mouth with the frosty blue tang of dill and white sauce and can’t fully appreciate how the softness of the sandwich bread feels like a midsummer cello chord. But if she chose to keep being a princess and doing princess things, then she must enjoy the restraint, too, and I can respect that.
Still, I have my fill of sandwiches, after Twilight Sparkle takes exactly two. Four and two is roughly an equal balance, and I allow myself the luxury of a relaxed sigh as I brush the sandwich crumbs off of my hoof. “That was delicious!”
“I’m glad you liked it.” Twilight’s smile could melt butter. “To be honest, I wasn’t sure if you’d like something like this. I was considering asking for a hayburger and fries for both of us, but I didn’t want to get ketchup or oil stains on the royal paperwork.”
“Eh. Maybe next time!” I lean forward onto the table. “I mean, if you’re offering, I honestly wouldn’t mind eating lunch here with you every day!”
“I’ll pass along the compliments to the chef.” Twilight’s smile widens. “And I’d like that. I doubt the Wonderbolts would appreciate you taking off every day to have lunch with the princess, though.”
“Actually, Soarin seemed totally fine with it!”
“He did?”
“Yeah! He encouraged me to take a break, actually.” I look up to meet Twilight’s eyes. “He reminded me that I was supposed to meet you here, actually. I totally forgot until he pointed it out. Isn’t that silly?”
Twilight’s smile freezes. It doesn’t abate, not entirely, but it does fade a little, as if she’s trying to gradually control its groundward descent. “He did, did he?”
“Yeah! I guess he thought I was distracting the rookies. One of them wanted to figure out how to be creative, so I helped her out!”
“I…see.” Twilight’s smile continues to gently fade. “And how did you do that?”
“I took a good look inside of her. I knew that if I could see exactly what was quintessentially her, I could help her figure out how to see her own inner beauty, and the beauty in everything else, too!”
Twilight remained silent, smile gone.
“I think it might be like looking into the sun. You know…how most ponies think they shouldn’t do it because it’ll hurt their eyes, right? Which is so silly.” I can’t suppress a chuckle. “Because I don’t know how you’re supposed to really see the light if you don’t do that. And if you can’t see the light, you can’t see all the wonders of the sunrises and the sunsets. You can’t let the blue skies stroke your coat or the sunlight kiss your cheek. You can’t fill yourself with rainbows.”
I try to look her in the eyes. Twilight looks back, but just like with Soarin there’s something in the way. It’s subtler—almost intangible—but I know she’s still keeping her distance from me. Scared of filling herself with the rainbows, too.
“Rainbow Dash…” Twilight takes a slow breath, but doesn’t close her eyes or rub her face. “What was she like after you showed her the…beauty that you’ve talked about?”
“She seemed overwhelmed, just like most ponies do. It’s okay. I know she’ll get her thoughts back together eventually.” I shake my head a little. “But Soarin and Spitfire made it seem like it was a big deal. They won’t let me really look at them, though, so I don’t know why. Maybe you could ask them?”
Twilight’s face remains impassive. “Actually…I was hoping I could ask you something else, instead.”
“You sure are full of questions, Twilight! But I guess you were always curious, weren’t you?” I shrug. “Okay! What’s your question?”
“Do you…” Twilight’s ear flicks. “Do you remember the last time The Elements of Harmony came together? You, me, our friends…?”
“...No.” I shake my head. “Were we having a party?”
“You don’t remember that we came together to investigate the Pebble in the Sky?”
“Is that what we were doing?” This is…starting to get annoying. I think she’s leading me on. I don’t think I like that.
“So you don’t remember how it hatched into the Prism-Eyed Serpent? Or the big, long quest we went on to figure out how to defeat it before it hatched, after we figured out that it would destroy everything? How it was almost too late?”
She’s up to something. I try to get a better look at her, and she’s not having any of it. I think she’s toying with me, and I know I don’t like that.
Is she my enemy? I don’t want her to be my enemy. She’s beautiful, and she gets other ponies to make the most delicious cucumber sandwiches. But I don’t want her to treat me like this, and I don’t think I’m going to let her keep treating me like this.
“Twilight…”
“I just…” Twilight takes a deep breath. “Don’t you remember almost dying?”
That’s…
Wait…
“I do remember!” Oh boy oh boy oh boy, I know this. “There was this beautiful thing, with shimmering scales, and it plucked me out of the air like I was the sweetest peach and carried me to the ground. Into the ground. Through the earth! We went spelunking together! And that was…” I can’t suppress my grin. “You would have loved it, Twilight. I felt like I could see everything forever! I felt like I think…I think there was something more than just seeing things, but…it’s not coming to me.”
I wish it could. I bet it was a beautiful memory.
“Dash, it…” Twilight’s eyes are starting to water. Maybe she should stop looking back at me like she needs to keep her distance. Maybe she should let me in. “It impaled you on its fang. It went right through your heart. Don’t you remember that?”
I think…
Maybe…
“Yeah.” I sigh in contentment. “I think I really felt alive, then. Like all the pieces slid into place.”
“No, that’s not how…Dash, you weren’t moving by the time we pulled you out of the hole. I know we disin…defeated it after—”
“About that. That’s…” The taste of cucumber sandwiches sours slightly in my mouth. “I hope you didn’t hurt it, Twilight. It was such a friendly creature. It helped me out so much.”
“We…” Twilight’s eyes water a little more. I think there was something about them that was starting to crack. “Maybe we should talk about this some other day. I’m feeling a little…”
“No! No, it’s okay! We can keep talking about this!” I find myself sitting up a little. “So you pulled me out, and…”
Twilight takes a deeper breath. “Fixed the hole in your heart. As best I could. It was still…”
“Still what?”
Twilight stays silent.
“...It was beautiful, wasn’t it?”
“Your heart shimmered. Like it…like it was iridescent, even after I finished mending the hole. I thought it was just...I don’t know what I thought, but…”
“That…” Wait, I think I remember this last bit. “That was when I started seeing how beautiful life was, I think.”
“Your eyes. They’ve been the same most days, but some days, they…why am I even telling you this?” Twilight suddenly snaps. “You’re just going to forget it all again. You always forget this! No matter how I coax you, no matter what I try or how much we talk, it never ends, does it?”
“Twilight…” Her eyes are starting to get ugly. Her mane…I don’t think I like her mane right now. I don’t know why.
“It just keeps happening more and more! I thought it would just be one day, maybe two, but every week it feels like it’s happening more often than not, and I swear one of these days it’s just…just going to be that. And that’s going to be Rainbow Dash. Not my…not my friend.”
Twin tears trickle down her cheeks. It’s…entrancing. Entrancing enough to make me forget her ugly eyes and dull mane. The way it catches the light, the shimmering trail it leaves as it descends, that bead of liquid so evanescent and so worthy of committing to memory. I wish she could see herself. She’s so beautiful when she’s sad.
“Twilight…of course we’re friends. We always have been. We always will be.”
Twilight’s breathing is shaky. Shuddering. She needs more reassurance.
“And I know that someday, when you’ll let me into your heart just the way you fixed mine, that I’ll help you see the world like I do. And you’ll be the happiest pony in the whole world, I think. Maybe even happier than me. And I can’t wait to see all that we’ll be able to see together.”
It doesn’t make her smile, but it does seem to steady her. At least she doesn't keep crying, which is a shame. She does dab her eyes, though, and look back at me, once again not letting me really look at her at all.
“Rainbow Dash, or…I don’t even know what I should call you, at this point—”
“Rainbow Dash is fine! It’s my name, isn’t it?”
“If I find out exactly what’s happened to you, and if I find out how to cure this…this disease, I will. But if there’s nothing else I can do about it, and I have to make a choice…”
I know what she’s not saying. I know she wants to shutter the light, snuff my senses, extinguish the rainbows. And if she can’t…
She’ll make me disappear. All of me.
And I think, for the first time, I can feel myself start to get angry. I don’t like this. I don’t like what she’s saying, I don’t think I like her anymore, there’s something sick and ugly and filthy green in my guts and I want to pour it out all over her, watch her scream, pour out this ugliness over the entire world and tear all their ugly stuffiness to pieces and watch it all disappear and break and crumble and leave behind nothing but light and—
“Excuse me, Princess? Madame?”
There’s somepony behind the ugly princess. Wearing a suit and with an uninteresting coat or mane and carrying—
“Cucumber sandwiches!”
“Since Princess Twilight Sparkle suggested that you may have been fond of these, I took the liberty of crafting more for you two, should you so wish.” The besuited stallion sets down another small platter of cucumber sandwiches, then whisks away the empty one. “I trust they were sufficient for your meal?”
“They were marvelous.” I can’t stop my tail from swishing. They really were marvelous, after all. “Thank you for making more! I’m so going to carbo-load on these. Or veggie-load, I guess.”
The stallion chuckles. “As you say, madame.” Without another word, he’s off and away, back toward whatever part of Canterlot Castle he came from. With a sigh of contentment, I pick up another sandwich and toss a glance at Twilight.
She looks shocked. Why does she look shocked? Did she see something just now? Ohh, if she saw the light like I did, even if only for a second…that would be beautiful.
“Twilight? Is everything okay?”
Twilight’s body jerks a little, then she nods her head. “Yeah! Everything’s fine! Just fine! All…wonderful, am I right?”
“It is a really beautiful day.” I take a generous bite of a sandwich and just barely remember to avoid talking with my mouth full. “You gonna have any more of these sandwiches? They taste awesome. Though if you’re gonna leave them all for me, I’m not complaining.”
“It’s…have as many as you like!” Twilight chuckles nervously. “Actually, I just remembered, there’s even more work that I need to do than I thought. I…I should probably get started on that."
“Aw.” I can feel my ears droop. “But I was having fun!”
“Maybe we can do it some other time, okay? Just…just I need to focus on this for a bit.” Twilight replies with a sad little smile. “But maybe if you wanted to help out…maybe you could paint something for me? Maybe that would help me see things the way you do, so you wouldn’t have to try and talk to me about what it’s like.”
This is why Twilight’s my best friend in the whole world.
“Yeah!” I reply, standing up. “I’m…actually, I’m gonna take a page out of today’s workbook! I’ll make you some cloud sculptures, Twilight! The biggest and the best you’ll ever see, and I’ll put them all above Canterlot, and I’ll really wow everypony with how awesome the castle will look after I’m done!”
“Yeah, that’s…that’s great” Twilight says, nodding her head. “Well, maybe you can do that, and…well, if you’re hungry and you’re feeling clearheaded, maybe you can stop by tomorrow? For lunch?”
“Totally!” I spread my wings. “That’d be the coolest thing ever!”
And then I once again take off into the sky, spiralling upward until there’s nothing I can see but the clouds and the blue.
It isn’t until later, while I’m feeding Tank, that I realize I forgot the sandwiches.
But that’s okay. I’m sure Twilight enjoyed them without me. I forgot to move all the grand, ornate cloud statues down and around Canterlot Castle, too, but that can wait until tomorrow. I know I’ll have time to do everything tomorrow. On days like these, there’s so much wonder and splendour to everything that time feels like it lasts forever, at least until the sun starts setting.
Which, of course, it has. Daylight pours through my window, like a phoenix breathing its last, waiting to be reborn again. The light sinks in bounds and waves, like a falling tide disrupted by the hooves of fillies being called back for dinner. Colors coalesce, performing their final dance as they gradually await gentle night to take their place again.
And yet the iridescence lingers. I stare into the sun, and the sun stares back, and once again the rainbows fill my house and paint my body and fill my soul to bursting. Gossamer soap-bubble strands tickle my body as it stands in aureole, and I know that this fully touched life is the best life that I could ever hope to have.
I can’t wait until tomorrow.
I can feel, deep in my heart, that it will be the most beautiful day ever.
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Though that probability is still greater than zero.
Fascinating bit of horror. The loss of self in overwhelming, sanity-rending beauty is a rarely explored concept, and you execute it incredibly well here. Thank you for it.
Well, this second part was definitely worth the wait, so to speak, since I was definitely curious to know what would happen when Rainbow met with Twilight... not often you see a story from the perspective of someone slowly becoming corrupted into a monster, after all.
Nicely done, Petri. 
Well that was a fascinating critter and no mistake, very eldritch. And for once in a clear gemstone-geometry sort of way instead of gribbly with tentacles all over.
Complete??? Oh no! It was so fascinating!
Do these ideas come from folklore from somewhere, or did you come up with it yourself?
11355437
These days? Stuff tends to come more from whatever I'm listening to than anything else in particular, and that's in more of a vibes-based sense than in a literal-translation-based sense. These days, I've been listening to Drum & Bass / Drumstep more than anything else in particular, hence things being a bit eclectic.
I should peruse folklore more often, though! I know it's not exactly the same thing, but I read a story recently that was modeled on a 19th-century ballad (which itself was modeled on 7th-century ballads and sans metatext was about a 13th-century event), and the whole thing had a feel to it that was simultaneously grounded and fantastical. Riveting stuff. I could learn something from it, I think.
In any case, sorry it wasn't longer! I hadn't intended for this to be a big, sweeping mystery-thing; just something that was meaty enough that it needed to be broken up into a couple of chunks for clarity's sake. Glad you (and all the other commenters here, for the record) liked it, though!
11355477
So the idea was original with you? Wow! I could never come up with such a plot or such a creature/character.
Honestly this chapter felt more like a tearjerker than horror. Though I guess that tragedy tag must be there for a reason... oh no...
I thought we were just getting started :(
I read this and really liked it. I didn't really understand the fact that Rainbow was hurt and got magic sparkle vision from being healed.
I think everyday her memory resets for some reason, too, but it isn't implied.
Great work!
God this is still one of the most amazing stories I've read in a long, long, LONG time. Good job!
Oh god, Sheogorath has corrupted Rainbow! Soon she'll be asking for cheese!
Holy crap, that was one amazing read, short as it is.
It feels like I'm reading an epilogue to some Lovecraftian horror story. There's something wrong for sure, but Rainbow doesn't even know it, and I don't even know for sure how to approach it, and it doesn't seem like it's fixable, regressing more and more until there's nothing left of Rainbow but pure, distilled rainbow.
That was a fantastic little story. The ending line also reminded me of Somewhere Only We Know, which is kind of funny
Wow! This was such a great read. Has such a ripe amount of chill and mystery and intrigue. And perfectly encapsulated why disguised horror is my favorite kind of horror.
Loved it! Imma follow you.
Wow! This was so fascinating to read. I liked the mystery to it and that slowly developing sense of wrongness about Dash and how she was viewing the world was done so wonderfully. Felt so bad for Twilight during this chapter, but also terrified of the thoughts Dash kept having about her. Love how the foreboding ending clashed so well with her sunny/enthusiastic thoughts about her situation. Your word choices and sentence structure throughout the story also added so much to the overall vibe of the fic. Very awesome story! :)
Despite the plenty of sunlight and rainbows, the atmosphere of this story is really dark.
On the one hand there is a desire to read the sequel to see if Twilight could find a solution... But on the other hand the story works as it is.
poring
splendour
It feels like this sort of cut off, even slightly earlier then a cliffhanger should of. No real context on what Dash is really doing.
No real idea what what Twilight was surprised by or planning.
This really good story feels more like a concept piece then a open ended story, unless I missed some subtle details.