Projected Nightmares

by bearcat

First published 3rd of November, 2011

Mane6 attacked, but only with bad dreams. REALLY bad dreams. Same universe as my 1st 'fic here

The Sergal invasion has been repelled, and life might continue normally, except Twilight and a few of her friends are driven harshly away from sleep by violence and pain as nightmares pursue them wherever they go. Is Celestia trained in dream warfare? Is anyone?

Note: there are some OCs carried over from 'War of Another World's Conquest' as I decided to put this in that particular alternate universe.

Note2: this is my NaNoWriMo project. What that means for you, dear reader, is this is 1st-draft stuff, and it's likely to get much worse as the month drags on. Also I may just drop it when November ends. Or maybe I'll let it ramble with no clear end in sight until Deus Ex Machinma can fix the silly thing.

Enjoy!

Twilight -- Nightmare

Twilight Sparkle readied a puncture spell -- like a push spell but more focused; it would 'push' a hole through the flesh of her attacker.

If he showed himself again.

Her readied spell caused a faint purple glow that barely reached the white bricks. Partly because even in this narrow back-alley of the palace all the bricks were covered in dried blood. Thicker at the bottom, coating everything but still refusing to show the alabaster or concrete or whatever stone these were, until well above Twilight's head. Even then the spatter marks continued until nearly at the ceiling three meters above.

Twilight slipped as she took a step backwards. This time on fresh blood: her own. She hadn't seen the sun, nor her mentor, nor indeed any pony, or even a door, anywhere in days. But there had been some cackling shadow wielding a sickle, and it had managed to cut half her tail off and gouged deep into the meat of the leg itself.

Turning her head, she saw the endless hallway behind her. She had roamed this palace for years in her fillyhood and never had the walls been changed, but this time the servants' entrance had been replaced with a curving, unlit passage a scant 2 meters across.

Twilight didn't even remember why she had come here; all her memories started with the fresh blood dripping down the empty throne.

She tried again to back up, and despite the lack of feeling in her leg was able to hobble without reopening the wound. All the places she expected to find medical supplies of some sort, she found only fresh flames and long forgotten blood; mute testimony to however many years she must have lost looking for this palace.

The crackling flames were the only sound she would hear outside her own breathing. Clearly the shadowy figure was toying with her. Again she heard a distant scraping, as that wicked blade was ground against stone walls. Twilight focused, but could not tell which were echoes, and which the original. There was a very quiet giggle behind her, and Twilight whirled on her good leg to unleash her spell.

As it cracked a brick in half, the thaumaturgical flare showed several things: dried blood, flying away from the now-clean, broken brick which had symbolically traded one form of corruption for another, and also there was an unmistakable view of an empty hallway stretching more then five meters before the light faded.

Sweat was dripping off the mare, but her blood was running cold. Her hoof falls as she straightened sounded like drum beats of an orchestral production to her straining ears. Again, the giggle. Breathless, high pitched and fast, it was the laugh of a witch who saw her vengeance unfolding before her.

Twilight was getting tired, and might almost feel hungry if she weren't so terrified. She concentrated on a brief light spell, but it needed to be extinguished quickly. Every time she had tried it before, in this windowless prison that was once her home, the attacker had homed in within seconds like a teleporting moth.

She stilled her breath, mouth agape so as not to even disturb the velocity of her air. No sound. She flared her horn; three hundred milliseconds at full illumination was all she'd dared.

What it showed, was that accursed sickle curving down fast. Too fast, and it caught in her throat. Her chest was suddenly cold, and as the light faded, she heard one last cackle as the shadowy figure tore her chest open. Then Twilight was no more.

Twilight -- Waking World

Twilight jumped out of bed, gasping for breath, her blanket getting caught in her flailing hooves. She could still feel the broken ribs; expected still to feel her life drain from her. But as she stood, all four legs replied that they were whole, despite her expectations. Warily she flared her horn. Left the light at maximum. The spare bed was freshly made, just there. Her telescope near the window, the curtain pulled tightly shut against the night. Silently she vowed to apologize to Luna; clearly this was not her doing.

She limped anyway, the psychic damage too fresh in her mind as she went to the balcony. Her fancy wall clock said it was a few minutes past one in the morning. Stepping outside she felt the cold air shock her senses into the here and now. It had been a nightmare. From the past week she knew that if she tried to go back to sleep, the shadowy figure would return immediately. The setting and his weapon changed each dream, but they were getting darker and meaner every time.

But if she waited at least two hours, then she could sleep but not past daybreak. If she overslept the figure would give her a vision of he beloved mentor, ruler of all Equestria, burning. Or rotting. Or sometimes insane, killing everypony while her student watched in horror. The nightmare mightcontinue for months within the dream, before finally she gave up, and found a way to die.

That would wake her up.

Which was the real world? She was exhausted enough that it was starting to get difficult to remember. She was afraid someday she'd mistake a badly decorated room for a nightmare, and kill herself for real. She'd finally get the sleep she was losing, of course. But she'd never wake again, either.

Closing and latching the door against the winter chill, Twilight walked as calmly as she could manage to the kitchen, and made warm milk & honey to drink while she waited out her allotted time.

Rainbow Dash -- Waking World

With a sudden snort, the blue mare yanked her eyes open, violet irises taking in the scene. Low cloud, barely above treetop height; predawn darkness showing hints of less-dark patches; and a carnation pink earth pony mare's face staring in consternation at Dash's still unmoving head.

Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash made eye contact for the briefest of moments before Dash zeroed in on the metal platter in Pinkie's mouth. On it, was a single cupcake, with a rainbow of colors in the frosting.

"Hey Dashie" the pink mare said around her cargo. "I brought you a present. I hope you like it." Rainbow Dash still didn't move her head, or even refold her wings that had been shot straight out during her recent dream time. Dash watched as the pink mare sank all the way to the cloud's surface, and set the platter on her forelegs. "I mixed some drugs in this one I'll just be frank, Dashie I'm worried about you but I don't know what's wrong since you won't tell your friend. But there's aspirin and prune juice in this one but don't worry you can't taste it I already ate the other one to make sure it would taste alright and I think you'll like it anyway so eat up, Dash!"

Finally Rainbow breathed deeply, slowly, once. Twice. Folding her wings she carefully pulled her right wing through the hole in the cloud she had punctured in her thrashing. Her eyes never leaving the drugged confection she asked Pinkie Pie "How are you standing on a cloud?"

"Twilight's worried too."

Dash finally lifted her eyes, let herself again look Pinkie in the eye, and said "So she put the cloud walking spell on you and teleported you up here?"

"No Dash just the cloud spell. She's kinda busy so she didn't go looking for you but once I found you, your cloud is tied to the trees so I climbed up the rope. Won't you say what's wrong, Dashie?" The pink mare tipped her head, as if she had to look around the cupcake below her chin.

The blue mare finally sat up, carefully arranged herself on the very small cloud so she could pick up the proffered dose of drugs. "Aspirin, huh Pinkie?" She carefully nibbled at the frosting to expose the paper wrapping before continuing. "Nothing that's going to slow me down? I need to work on weather projects in a couple hours and I need to not oversleep." Finally making it to the bready part of the cupcake, Dash swallowed a tiny bite before adding "Or they'll come looking for me. You know how frustrated some ponies get when they see me napping." Another tiny bite.

Pinkie's ears twitched for a moment after her friend had spoken, then a look of enlightenment crossed her face. "Oooh! Do you want me to get you some sedati"

"NO."

Shocked into silence, Pinkie looked carefully at Rainbow Dash, no further words escaped her lips.

Rainbow's eyes were hot, threatening to spill tears. She wasn't looking at anything as she ate the cupcake. Mostly through it, she stopped and breathed deeply. "I'm sorry Pinkie I didn't mean to snap at you. I had a bad dream and I'm still sort of coming out of that." Dash hurriedly finished her treat, and wished it was her body that ached.

Actually, she thought silently with as little sleep as I've had this week my body is starting to feel the fatigue. Maybe if I slept on really high clouds. It works for a few hours. Sometimes.

Pinkie Pie tried to pick her platter back up, but it tipped over and fell through the water vapors she was sitting on. The pink mare frowned in the meager light. "I better get going, Dashie. That spell only lasts for three days and I've been looking for you for most of those three days, now." Looking up and offering the biggest smile to her friend that she could muster, Pinkie added "You come see one of us if you want our help, OK? I promise on every one else's behalf we won't laugh at what you're running from, OK Dash?"

Rainbow sat up to receive her friend's hug, except they missed each other, as now Pinkie was sinking into the cloud rapidly. Oops. Small cloud, too. Rainbow leapt into the air, and flew down to grab her friend by the belly as she sank through.

Earth ponies weighed just a little more than she was ever expecting. Denser, or maybe just magically pulled to the Earth they were named for. But the pair sank quickly through the trees and Rainbow Dash had to struggle to keep from crashing as branches smacked her wings aside, and her forelegs, still insistent they had been nailed, torn, and electrocuted mere moments ago, weren't willing to hang on to this pony even if she were to right herself, at her cargo's expense.

Least of all this pony, even if this actual pony in her hooves had nothing at all to do with her inability to finish a good night's sleep. But Pinkie thanked her friend for the ride down as if had been planned that way. Dash saluted her now-safe friend, and launched herself into the air. Dawn had arrived, and she dare not try going back to sleep now. Not for a few hours at least. So off to be extra-productive in weather patrol as if she was up as soon as Celestia was.

Twilight -- Awake

Her assistant, Spike, was bringing her black tea. "Aw c'mon Twi Spark Impulse said he'd be by on his way to talk to the sergals. Wanted to talk to you." Twilight saw her assistant set the tea cup and its saucer on the table in front of the couch.

The couch she was reclining on now. "It's ten o’clock and I've had a rough night. Morning chores and stuff and " The mare yawned, already losing her focus. "Just tell him I'm sick or something because maybe I am." Healthy ponies don't forgo sleep for fear of sleeping. If only Redheart's pills would keep the nightmares at bay!

Spike was saying something else, but that was lost to blissful sleep. Sleep fled however when a hoof shook her back awake. A musty smell of rotting leaves faintly exuded from the hoof's owner. Twilight opened her eyes to see an unfocused pale orange mass in front of her couch. "Hey Twi." Came Applejack's Apple drawl. "Ah know you ain't a doctor but the solutions Redheart have don't seem to help the right problem."

Twilight sat up, forced her eyes to focus on her friend. As wrung out as she felt her heart still leapt for joy at seeing a good, and healthy friend. Except as her eyes focused, this orange mare didn't look all that healthy, as her eyes had baggy circles under her eyes, and Applejack's ears drooped, as forgotten as her hair coat that was matted and barely brushed back out in places. "Applejack I haven't seen you look this bad since Big Mac got injured at the start of applebuck season." Sliding her front hooves off the couch and sitting upright she blinked the sleepy dirt away that had accumulated in the 15 seconds her eyes had actually been shut. "Who got hurt this time? What's up?"

Applejack backed up to some pillows a little ways from the study couch and sat down. "And thanks again for helping me even when Ah didn't want help. See that's why Ah thought of you because we just finished applebucking but now Ah'm the one what needs fixing up but as I said, the nurse just wants me to sleep more." The orange mare sighed, and looked away, awkwardly rubbing her eyes with one hoof.

That tension was so unlike her that Twilight immediately spoke up to comment on it. "Now, I can't read ponies as well as Pinkie, but you don't seem at ease with yourself." Neurons were just now starting to leap for the nearest thing as the adrenaline drove her fear induced sleeplessness away. "You're not dying or something are you? You'd tell me if you knew?" Twilight's heart was racing, but she forced her forelegs and neck to be soft, relaxed like she was Fluttershy. As gently as she could manage, she tipped her head, pointed her ears at her distressed friend and awaited the explanation.

"Ah'm sure Ah would but truth is, Ah just cain't sleep." Applejack finally looked Twilight in the the eyes, and those green orbs showed a level of fatigue Twilight had seldom seen in another pony. "Tain't true. I cain sleep but I don't want to no more. Not at night the bad dreams. The." Applejack closed her eyes, and breathed heavily for a moment before continuing. "Ah've died in those dreams countless times and I cain feel every knife cut, every hoof mark, hear the screams of mah attackers but about the time it all goes black I wake up."

There was a slight clatter of pottery as Spike set some tea cups in front of each mare. "Thank you Spike." Twilight said without looking at him. Racking her brain, she eventually levitated her tea cup and found it to be unsweetened raspberry. Not her first choice but Applejack would like it. Sipping her tea Twilight had a thought pass violently through her cranium, and she had to squint hard to catch it before it escaped.

Applejack took that time to continue her tale, tho Twilight didn't spare brain time to estimate if it was because AJ wanted to offer more helpful facts, or if she was concerned the squinting meant Twilight leaving the conversation. It had happened before but regardless she listened with half an ear to the further details.

"Redheart offered some light drugs but they just keep me asleep. Cain't stand it; tried once but Ah had to endure what felt like a year of being whipped by buffulo who was keeping me as slaves fer foulin' up they're land with trees." She sipped at her tea, and sighed contentedly. "Raspberry. Almost calmin' flavor. Too bad I don't want t' sleep no more."

Twilight decided it had to be asked, no matter how ridiculous it seemed. "These bad dreams. They started about" well, here goes nothing she thought to herself "a week ago?"

Applejack yawned, and set her tea down. "Ten days, Ah think. Why? What happened ten days ago? Or a week for that matter."

Twilight blinked in surprise. Really? This is going to pan out? "A week ago I started having bad dreams. There's a pattern to it that I can sort of work around tho. Do yours always wake you at 1AM?" She almost dropped her levitation spell trying to set it down so she could concentrate on her friend's response.

"Hmm. Nah." Applejack's eyes roved invisible projections as she searched for better answers. "Course Ah cain't stand the tick-tick of clocks so there ain't one in mah room but Ah'm pretty sure it's later. Three in the mornin' and for at least another two hours I have to try to keep mah eyes open or the dreams" The orange mare gulped and looked away from her purple friend. "They get more violent the harder I try to sleep through them."

Twilight looked around for Spike but he was off cleaning something. "Hey Spike! Parchment and quill, please! I've gotta take notes in" Abruptly she stopped as she saw spike come from the storage room with several sheets of paper and a quill and inkwell.

Setting them at her hooves her green assistant opined "If there's one thing I can count on Twilight, it's that you need parchment and something to write with." Turning to their honored, if completely disheveled guest, he asked "How's the tea Applejack? Twilight normally drinks black or green tea but you seem the herbal tea kind of pony."

The orange mare put a strong smile on her tired face, and replied "Thanks a million, Spike. You're a great assistant for Twi here." Looking back at her wizardly friend, Applejack said to Twilight "So, one AM? Is that when your nightmares try to kill you?"

Twilight nodded. "And for two hours it's not safe to go back to sleep. But at 3AM my attacker apparently moves on to other ponies."

And now it was Applejack's turn to look excited and upset at the connections being drawn in this conversation. "Attacker? Seriously?"

"I'm not actually sure how such a spell would work." Twilight responded, but another piece suddenly jumped out at her. "But Pinkie says Rainbow Dash has been very under the weather in a nonspecific way for about a week. She asked me to cast the cloud-walking spell and I never heard if she found a way to get herself to whatever cloud Rainbow was on -- it wasn't her home, I heard from Pinkie."

At least three ponies, Twilight thought to herself. This doesn't seem like discord's style … but he is locked in stone right now.

Out loud, she said "Look Applejack, I think whatever it is doesn't like the sunshine, or maybe it's just nocturnal. But if you can manage a mid day nap the dreams are just dreams." Laying back down on her couch she added "I'm the informal librarian so I need to be downstairs I think." She yawned. "But if you want to sleep in the spare bed or mine or whatever, it should really be safe." Twilight snuggled against the soft cushions, her head against the edge in lieu of a pillow. She didn't hear Applejack drearily climb the stairs, nor if Spike responded when she called out "Wake us in three hours, Spike? Or if somebody else comes to find me."

The last syllables were lost to unconsciousness as Twilight slipped into the satisfied slumber of a researcher who had found the lost trail, and knew what questions to ask, now.

Rainbow Dash -- Waking World

The day was done, and Dash could find someplace to run from her fears now. Unfortunately the blue mare always used napping to run, but now it seemed her naps were cursed.

She remembered that when the possessed sergal had magically reattached her wings, he'd needed to find a place away from "the god-king's realms" and it was on the totally off chance this was some elaborate prank from Princess Luna that she was flying straight into the Everfree.

Dropping into the canopy she was whipped by evergreen fronds and deciduous branches well on the way to losing their leaves naturally. She had intended to find Zecora's hut and beg her indulgence but the clearing before held no hut.

Instead there was a flat yard of no vegetation, but evenly spaced, completely round stones that were almost half exposed, and quite evenly disbursed across a semicircle perhaps eleven or twelve meters across. At the flat half, was a cave with a very heavy metal door latched shut.

Jack!

It was 6:30 and this time of the winter it would be getting dark soon. Dash didn't trust herself right now to get home without some kind of mishap. Not least of which is being home right now sounds like a mishap in itself. She knew there were several "tame" sergals that had agreed to live as proper Equestrians rather than risk death during that war.

Looking around, she didn't see any, but when she desperately pounded on the steel door it was a deep blue, very skinny female that answered the door. Feathered legs like a gryphon's back half, she had coarse fur that faded to white along her chest and belly, but her hands, ending in five of the sharpest hooves Dash had ever been on the wrong side of, were the deep blue of Luna's coat of fine hair. Too bad they don't any of them have her personality.

In Rainbow's nervousness she had let her wings sort of stick out akimbo, but these things took offense to wings, she too-painfully remembered. Folding her wings tightly against her side, Dash cleared her throat. "Hey? I'm looking for Prince Jack. Was hoping to talk to him or something is he home?" and what do I do when the butler tells me to get lost?

The sergal turned and barked and coughed loudly. Rainbow wasn't sure how many sergals had stayed but she had yet to meet a natural born gryphon-dog that could speak any English. But at the rumbling barks that came back up from the stairs that dropped down from the steel door, the servant stepped back, her tall frame and long legs high enough that Dash could almost have stepped through between her legs without anypony stretching to make room.

Inside the temperature dropped another 5 degrees and colder still air was coming up from that dark stairwell. The antechamber was only two meters across, with a single kerosene lantern illuminating the only way forward: down those stairs.

The midnight blue biped waved at the descent into deep earth, and Rainbow stepped down the rough cobblestone stairs. The last time she had met Prince Jack, he was burying the opposing army by causing an earthquake with his mind – and "accidentally" elevated himself to royalty. Presumably he had created this cave as his palace since he was Regent of the Rocks Beneath Your Feet. Dash had never been here before and indeed had seen Jack only once or twice in the months since the end of the invasion.

Her wings itched, the memory of having her "offensive" limbs ripped off and hung to dry as a macabre fetish to please the invading chief still too recent despite that it was by all appearance a sergal that put them back on.

And here she had opted to surround herself with these things in order to sleep more peacefully. Brilliant, RD.

Ahead were torches, and as the stone stairs curved, there was a platform of smooth, almost polished granite, and a doorless passage to her right, as the stairwell continued down to her left. From downstairs came a rumbling voice calling "Down this way, Rainbow Dash; I am at the next platform six meters directly below the surface."

Nothing unusual about a pegasus taking a nap six meters under ground. Nope. Dash chided herself. Hey Prince! Can I crash on your couch right now? Great! Thanks buddy!

But she dropped the asked flight of stairs, and as it curved around there was another doorless entry to her right, but to her left were two magically illuminated globes about two thirds of the way to the ceiling and between them was a narrow, tall bench, or perhaps it would be best called a chair though a pony could not set comfortably in something the way the blue feathered and gray furred sergal reclining it in now could.

Dash hadn't seen this form of Jack's very long, but the pale robin's egg legs, and constantly shifting forms of black and white covering his upper half were clearly the same as she remembered.

There was a stone table to his left, with a steaming cup of something on that. The Sergal looked up from his book, and called to Rainbow Dash by her full name using a voice that could best be compared to heavy machinery being torn apart by too-large rocks being poured into the works. Yep; it's Jack.

"Rainbow Dash, welcome to my completed system of caves. I will offer you tea or coffee but I fear foods your are comfortable with are in short supply in this tunnel. How are you today?" His triangle of a face barely moved, the piercing yellow eyes locked onto her own reddish-purple orbs.

There was only the one chair and it wasn't really a big room so she just sat on the floor across from the sergal. "Hey Jack. Long time no see. In fact I thought you wore your pony outfit all the time now? And don't worry about the tea I probably won't stay long I guess." The stone was colder even than the air. And as Dash remembered things Jack was still..."

"As the regent of the rocks? I have partially renounced that title, Rainbow Dash. Even wearing the 'pony suit' as you call it, exhausted my supply of imported magic with which I operate this body. And it made the princesses concerned that there might be a civil war with a prince who was not pony-born gathering subjects. So I have fewer than a dozen subjects now." He levitated the coffee cup into the air, where he deftly grabbed it with his many-fingered right hand, so he could sip daintily.

Rainbow was impressed he had learned to drink without spilling; that pointy face and small lips didn't seem built for drinking daintily. Rainbow sighed. Hafta say something soon, don't I? But it's an ice-box down here! Out loud she said "Glad you're trying to get along with the princesses. I can't say really if I find your current form more or less intimidating than when you looked like an alicorn that needed a bath." She looked away, down the mostly dark corridor to her right. There was a clattering of somebody manipulating dishes down that way. "Hay can I ask something weird? I sorta want a really different place" but I hate sounding weak. Like, really a lot. Making herself look directly at those yellow eyes she noticed they were so bright it was like looking into a fire. "Different place to sleep. I've been having nightmares of Pinkie cutting me up into pieces and I can't stand drugging myself to sleep through them and without drugs I miss out on half my sleep every night." There. Rainbow lowered her head subconsciously, and looked pleadingly to the meat eating monster that had saved her from hell.

Jack looked briefly at her, then at his coffee cup. She saw his claws glow a pale off-white this time, as the coffee cup floated back to the table. "Yes, Rainbow Dash, an odd request. Why, do you believe, are you dreaming of being dismembered? And by a friend. By this friend? There are more monstrous friends you have, that would do the job if you thought yourself worthy of dismemberment. Is it not so?"

Just then, from down the corridor came striding a sergal with white limbs and chest, carrying a plate in one hand and a sandwich dripping blood onto the plate, in the other hand. Ketchup. Just a lot of Rainbow Dash looked back at the way she came, feeling sick.

Jack called out to the red-backed newcomer in their incomprehensible language, and she called back, pointing with her sandwich at the doorless corridor just next to the stairwell, and saying a number of words. She seemed to be snickering as she replied to Jack. The no-longer-prince waved the newcomer on, and called now to Dash.

Still using her full name with careful diction. Nearly as annoying as some of Luna's old-timey speech patterns but tarnation close.

"Rainbow Dash. You may sleep here, there will be a bed down that hall in a moment. But I want to hear why your are plagued with such bad dreams as to drive you to the people who made an earth pony of you."

At this he stood, his long feet putting his ankles nearly as high as her back. But he didn't look like he was ducking under what for a biped was a low ceiling. Waving his left hand for Rainbow to follow, he barked out in his tongue quite loudly. Mumbled responses came back, and as they reached the corridor's entrance a pair of sergal, looking sheepish if RD had any ability to read their expressions, came rushing out. The shorter was a female with back and lower limbs a bright red, while the taller male had the clay red fur of miss bloody-sandwich. The female ducked her head low and tried to sneak past Jack and Rainbow, while the male ran upstairs.

Into the corridor, again lit with kerosene lamps, and the first door on the left was a small alcove, circular and just under three meters across. It was poorly lit by a bit-sized circle of magical light in the ceiling and light spilling in from the hallway outside. There was a fur blanket sitting on top of something soft underneath it, on one side and a table and a small bookshelf to Rainbow's left.

Jack motioned to the blanket, and spoke. "Their parents don't approve of the developing relationship, but there are few neighbors to choose from of course. They know better than to fornicate so perhaps that is not why they chose to hide in here, but they did not bring a light as you see. So the bed is likely warm but if it needs cleaning, tell me now and I shall attend to the matter of their indiscretion."

At this Jack walked to the curving wall next to the bookshelf and touched one corner, which began to glow brightly enough to recognize all the titles were written in a script she couldn't have read.

Fortunately the bed was not only dry, but unwrinkled. Slightly warm but Dash didn't think she was really laying on anypony's snuggle cooties of any sort. But what to tell Jack? "Thanks a heap prince. Or whatever you are now. I don't know anything about dreams, alright? I can make clouds out of wet air but this might maybe be Twilight's area." She pulled the fur over her hair coat, and tried not to think about why this animal had parted with his hide. Natural death. They eat carrion as happily as I eat plain hay so … yeah. Natural death.

Jack leaned against the cold stone, and leveled his yellow gaze on her again. "Truly? Do you feel your life is crumbling? Has the pink pony wounded your self esteem? Any reason at all?"

Too late Rainbow realized she didn't have anything resembling a pillow. Trying to find an especially soft spot on the still-warm bedding she replied as well as she could. "No, Jack. I like Pinkie and I hate these dreams. She would never do those things but I'm wounding her by running like this. Every time I see her now I remember things she never did." Suddenly she yanked her head up to meet his concerned gaze of eye-fire. "I remember the pain as clearly as I remember when your adopted people ripped my wings off, but they used blunt force, and my nightmare uses sharp implements. A different feel but I know what it feels like precisely to have a splitting maul remove my wings."

Dash closed her eyes tightly against the memory, tears dribbling over her face as she laid her head back down. As she let her fatigue claim her, she spoke her thanks. "Jack, if this doesn't work I'm sorry I bothered you. But if it works you probably won't see the end of me. It means a lot that you let me just drop in un" She yawned, and lost her train of thought.

Jack's rumbling reply only partially registered. "You are a friend of Twilight, and a warrior mare worthy of my respect as well. I will make what accommodations I must."

For ten long, wonderful minutes, Rainbow Dash drifted at the lower edge of dreams. Normal, safe dreams that ended as she dropped lower, below REM sleep. Dreams that made no sense, but had no violence either. Just dreams.

Outside, Jack watched as Rainbow Dash's limbs, all six of them, began to twitch in short, sharp motions, one limb at a time.

Rainbow Dash -- Nightmare

Drifting to Dash's memory was a cold wind, a windowless cave, and more sharp objects than she had seen since the civil war. She couldn't see anything yet but the war part seemed to have caught up since she was chained down to a wooden plank.

Except that wasn't a civil war it was … something else.

Her mind too fuzzy to make sense of her circumstances, she concentrated on breathing but everything tasted like some chemical that seemed familiar and alien at the same time. A hot, fetid wind blew over her as a clank of a heavy door opening sounded in front of her somewhere. A pink blob carried a painfully bright light source in to the room which looked sort of like a war torn version of Redheart's surgery room. Blood, forgotten bits of flesh, and lots of rust covering everything that wa not one of the surgical implements.

Rainbow, who was laying on her left side, squinted into the light to find Pinkie Pie walking towards her, a giant grin on her face. "Dashie!" the pink blob said, still a little fuzzy looking. A white blob slithered from behind Pinkie to rush up to Rainbow, and begin carefully unhooking her chains. Dash saw a wide eyed hunger in the white nurse that didn't seem right, but while she was getting upset, she wasn't sure what to be scared of. Yet.

Pinkie's voice interrupted Dash's worries about Redheart with worries about Pinkie. "You ran so far, Dashie I thought I'd never find you! I thought I would have to fast forever. I had to promise something to Redheart here just to use her fun room."

Her front legs free but still numb from the chain's weight, Dash was not ready for the sudden upheaval as Redheart slammed Rainbow Dash against the wall, desperately shoving the now struggling forelegs into locks that held her hooves well above her head. Too late she remembered ... something that she had forgotten again. About Pinkie, and this room. Doesn't matter anyway I just need to get out. Any way I can.

Dash bit down on Redheart's shoulder as hard as she could, and felt the muscle soften beneath her fear powered teeth ... and in return felt the nurse bite back with equal fury at the base of Dash's neck. As Dash's mouth finally gave out, Redheart let go, brushing her lips along Dash's long neck, breathing hotly across her face, and drew back to give that wild eyed, licentious look again to Rainbow Dash.

There was blood on the nurse's lips, which she slowly licked clean. Redheart's hooves now held Dash's head, and Dash saw the white ears prick to rock hardness and point straight at Dash's left eye. Again, the tongue went slowly, lasciviously across those white lips.

"Now Reddy." Pinkie's effervescent voice interrupted. "She's not ready yet. You know we'll have to soften the meat a little bit." Redheart glared angrily at the restrained blue mare, and drew back. Making eye contact with Pinkie, who had picked up a scalpel and was wearing the most serene expression, the white earth pony slithered back out as quickly and silently as she had come in.

The wall mounted cuffs were just barely low enough that Dash could touch the floor, but it was a stretch, and she was not suited to stand bipedally for long. But she could still feel her front hooves up there. They hurt.

"How about we start, then, Dashie?" Pinkie's expression slowly shifted as she walked towards Rainbow Dash, from the serene look of a pony enjoying a beautiful sunset, through the appetence of a drunken colt watching an under dressed all-mare broadway musical, to the ravenous look of a starving pony who thought her source had left and gone forever.

Dash could almost remember what this was going to feel like, Like she'd died before. Been under the knife before. But she didn't have any scars, did she? Even knowing what was coming, Dash screamed as the scalpel roughly, carelessly carved the flesh off her left haunch.

Pulling back now, Pinkie squealed with delight like a school filly, holding a flap of bloody meat and hide in her hooves. "Your cutie mark, Dash! I've always wanted your cutie mark Dashie oh isn't this wonderful?"

Through the tears, Dash saw a look of an innocent filly reach Pinkie's face. Dash suddenly thought this was an opportunity, though she couldn't have explained why for the life of her. Which would be drained shortly, she know deep inside but she asked anyway. "Pinkie. Where's the battery? Aren't you going to electrocute me?"

The pink blob danced in a quick circle, and setting the hunk of pony flesh on a nearby rusty table, added "And the adrenaline isn't here so if you pass out I need to wake you right away because you'll never sleep again. Stay right there, Dashie! I love you!" And out she ran, leaving the light hanging, rocking disconcertingly as her passage disturbed it.

Then several things happened in quick succession. First was a foreleg, ending in bony tentacles each with a sharpened hoof, erupting from the wall she was bolted to, and wrapping around her muzzle, holding her mouth shut tightly. Then there was a voice like the buzzing of bees, again coming from a place that she was sure couldn't have the room to house a speaker.

"Rainbow Dash, I must ask an uncomfortable thing of you. Please hurry and do this thing." Then the hoof -- she would eventually realize it was a hand, just like, say, Spike had -- slid down to the base of her jaw.

Where had she heard that line before? Dash replied "Uncomfortable is having a pony you thought was your best friend steal your cutie mark with a scalpel. What do you want, monster?"

The hand slid farther, warmly gripping her throat. "Look right. What do you see?" She glanced, and saw something that chilled her blood, then froze it in place. Gilda, her schoolmate from so many years ago, here. Also, dead. Feathers pulled out from her right wing, left foreleg burnt to a blackened stump. Again, the bees buzzed. "Look left. What do you see?"

This time she saw a blue pegasus, standing on just her rear legs, her forelegs high in the air. Bolted in place, just like hers she thought, but then realized her head was somehow lower than this whole mare's body. The strange mare was looking to her left, at the lantern, and the still empty doorway. Her mane was in shadow, but she thought she made out several colors ... and her own cutie mark!

It was her! She was ... bolted to the wall to her own left? She tried to move, but the new Rainbow Dash whipped her head to what she now assumed was the body of dead Gilda, and hissed at her. "No don't you'll give us away too soon"

But at that the door whipped open, and in ran Pinkie with a cart, filled with many rattling "goodies" that from this lower angle, Dash couldn't identify and didn't really want too.

The blue mare looked coolly at the pink mare, who was hefting a bone saw. "Dashie I just want to say I won't miss you when you're gone. Because you're not going anywhere! Do you see your old schoolmate over there? She's going to be your roomate again once I stuff you both isn't it just the best thing you've ever heard of? Except the tiny bottle of liquid helium in here but really what's cooler than that?"

The party pony had reached the false Rainbow Dash, who hefted herself on the cuffs to lift her hind-legs and lay them against Pinkie's sides. "Silly party pony" Dash heard herself say. Does my voice sound like that, though? It doesn't from inside my head. "What makes you think" At this, the blue pegasus closed her hind-legs in a scissor motion which quickly drew the pink mare against the blue belly, and there was locked in place, face against chest. "Think I would want to leave this? Hmm?"

Dash sort of wanted to be sick, but as her current body was a corpse, she wasn't sure if that would even work. If Spike can explode twice, I should be able to puke once. But she held her peace, gratuitous violence and bad acting notwithstanding.

Meanwhile the pony of torture parties tried to pull free, but found those hind-legs too sure in their grip. Even poking a hoof into the still bleeding wound where a cutie mark was moments ago, elicited no reaction from the still cool, detached pegasus. "Dashie!" Called Pinkie, "What's going on, Dash? Why won't you let me go?"

The blue mare examined her catch carefully, before proclaiming "You're right, poppet. I don't want you here after all." And with a brisk contraction of un-pony strength, Pinkie's back snapped, and she collapsed to the floor. "Silence!" she called, but the real Dash noticed that her body was making eye contact with herself, and anyway Pinkie hadn't said anything, although she was starting to whimper now.

Dropping to the ground, over the top of Pinkie as if it had all been consensual, the blue mare shook her wings free, then into place at her side. She cast her gaze about the small room, and found nothing for a moment, until a white glow snaked into the room, stopping five meters from the false Dash.

It was vaguely pony shaped but was not Redheart. It was just a shadow, albeit one made of glowy bits. After the two standing equines stared each other down for a few seconds, the false Dash said "I see." And stepped on Pinkie's shoulder, eliciting a loud shriek from the pink mare as her fore half twisted and crunched independently of her back half.

The terror that the shadowy figure elicited in Rainbow Dash was indescribable. But momentarily it was followed by pain, as the light it was giving off exploded around her, burning her borrowed corpse body to ash.

Rainbow Dash -- Return

Rainbow Dash bolted awake only to find the disembodied, bony hoof tentacles were sitting on her face in this dream too! But her blanket was too heavy and her mind too fuzzy from the transition out of sleep to escape.

But the claws withdrew, and a rumbling voice called softly. "Dash. Rainbow Dash. You are awake, Rainbow Dash. Awake, Dash. You are awake."

Somewhere in there she realized that it was Jack, calling her name. It was his hand (just his hand, nothing more sinister) that had been across the only part of her that was not covered by the fur blanket. Trying to get her breathing under control, she asked hastily "What in tarnation's hay was that pile of sugar?"

Her swearing probably didn't make sense, but she could see Jack's quiet smile, and between a friend's face -- if not the friendliest she'd seen at least she knew him somewhat -- and the warmth of her bedding she found her heart rate descending to safer levels.

"There was a third, in your head, Rainbow Dash." The sergal was laying on his chest, to reach across the bedding so as to touch her without laying too close. Now he was raising his chest, and bringing his feathered rump closer. Again, his rumbling voice. "You are in desperate need of sleep, and I can offer some protection against that interloper. If my touch does not offend you, I will lay a hand to your neck, and you may sleep again."

Rainbow wasn't thrilled about the shift in circumstances but she hadn't had more than half a night's sleep and she had heard ponies went crazy if they couldn't sleep. So she grunted a reply, pulled the blanket down so some of her neck was bare too, and put sleeping here down to sleep deprived insanity.

It took ten minutes or more for her heart to let her think about slowing to slumber mode, but she didn't wake again for any reason she could remember over the next nine hours.

Celestia -- Waking world

The ruler of Equestria had heard this pony in her court before. He wanted to use tax money to build a railroad in the sky, held aloft with pylons every forty meters. Never any good reason other she could discern beyond that as an earth pony, he felt "left out"

"I appreciate the ingenuity, Colton, but the projected speed boost of not having to stop in a town doesn't seem, at this time, to be a worthwhile goal. Not to mention the cost of the stations, supporting that much weight so high up." No, Celestia decided, this needed a different tack, to get this pale brown engineer to concentrate on ways to benefit society. "Tell me this, Colton. If your grandmother wanted to ride the train to Trottingham, would you want to have her climb all those steps?" She looked out a window, and saw the sunshine, and thought for a moment about the distance between here and Trottingham. "Too, it might be raining when she gets there. So she'd be traipsing carefully down slick stairs that would be hard pressed not to accentuate their height. In short any pony with a fear of heights would soon shun your railway."

The earth pony carefully put his charts and white papers back into his saddlebags. "So, it sounds like I'm stuck finding private venture capitol, your highness?"

Well, she thought to herself, That provides a neat way of saying no. "Yes I think so. But at least you will have better margins, if you can make it work, with so little governmental interference at the early stages."

But the ponies parted civilly, regardless of what each thought of the other. But as the ponysuit left she heard a fast shuffle behind her. Turning she met with the gaze of a concerned Shadow Orange, one of her fedaykin and the only one currently trained to fire-write. He had a parchment in his mouth.

Celestia held up a hoof to keep the door guards from calling in the next pony, and turned back to Shadow. "If it please your highness" As a soldier of incredible somberness Shadow could be off-putting, and Celestia wasn't worried yet. The pale orange unicorn levitated his parchment from his mouth, and explained it was a letter from her student, Twilight Sparkle. "This was the most recent. The first was this morning from the dragon Spike," and a letter levitated from his pouch to sit midair just behind the first. "And mid day, there was a message badly scrawled from the biped prince who of late has stepped down from his throne." The humor of a regent of the rocks beneath your feet, stepping down from a throne, was going to be entirely beyond this somber fellow, reflected the princess. "and minutes ago Twilight herself wrote saying much the same as the first two.

Celestia arranged them first in chronological order:

Spike:

Dear Princess(es),

Thank you for reading the letter of your student's assistant, and please

remember that I almost never use this privilege but Twilight has been sleeping

poorly of late, and won't let anypony help but won't tell me what's wrong. This

morning when she set to what is her new schedule of a late morning nap,

Applejack arrived and Twilight convinced her that Applejack's sleep troubles

are due to an external "attacker"

They're both asleep right now, and since no one is really going insane

from lack of sleep (yet) maybe this letter means nothing. But I feel I'm

obligated to keep you informed since Twilight won't until she understands it,

which might never happen until whatever it is, is too late.

Then former-prince Jack, the possessed sergal caster:

Celestia, ruler of Equestrians and strong alicorn:

I write in case no one else needs to. The pegasus Rainbow Dash, who

fought alongside us those many months ago, is asleep with an assistant who

will retrieve me, so forgive me if this letter becomes fragmented.

Bluntly, there is an enemy to your state, who can invade sleeping

minds. I have not found the entity but have been inside R.D. 's dreaming

and helped her drive off the attacker. Said attacker was not expecting this

so it was a short battle but there will be more.

I ask you, Princess Celestia, are you, or your staff, anypony trained

in the art of dream warfare? I suggest also you query those other brave

warriors who fought alongside us in case this is related to those battles, or

more likely to their relationship to you. In any event I shall offer my claws to

bring this miscreant to justice, or to a better adherence to state boundaries, as needed.

And finally, her protege, Twilight who according to Spike would have just gotten up from her "new schedule" of sleeping 10-1 every morning.

Dear Princess Celestia,

This is not precisely a progress report, but my friend Applejack has

reported sleep disturbances that, when taken in light of my own newly formed

disturbances, and in light of Rainbow Dash's disappearance at about the same

time as this all started for me, a week ago, I believe somepony is entering

the dreams of the elements of harmony, and forcing us to view the most damaging

and disturbing images we could endure in an effort to break us.

Having no idea who or how, nor truly why. I ask for your guidance in however

to proceed, and if you know the origin of these invasions. Thank you always

dearest teacher and say hello to Luna as well,

Your Student, Twilight Sparkle.

Well thought Celestia, I guess court can wait a day. Celestia handed the parchments back to Shadow Orange, and told him "Please write a letter to Jack, directing him to bring both himself and Rainbow Dash to the Ponyville library." She called out to the guard on scribe duty. "Sorry something has come up. No more meetings today, thank you." And walked from the throne room to wake Luna.

It was not, of course, needed that an alicorn regent would sleep. But as she passed the guard, and entered the bedchamber of the princess of the moon she recalled how Luna had always wanted to be closer to the ponies, and used sleep to remind herself of their needs. Although few ponies could afford such plush blankets as she was wrapped in now.

Gently shaking her with a hoof, Celestia called to her sister. "Luna. It's the middle of the day, Luna and I need to look into something that might be a threat to the state."

There was a snort, and the blue alicorn's eyes were open. "State? Hmm, sister?" Luna shifted under her heavy blanket and looked into Celestia's eyes to gauge the level of threat. "Does the sergal interloper threaten thee sister?"

Gently Celestia shook her head. "No Luna. He told me of a threat. Someone is making the elements have dreams so bad they dare not sleep. Tell me, do you know anything of dream warfare?" It was a long shot, but it was more Luna's realm than her own. She watched her sister's midnight blue eyes drift shut.

Still shut, the younger alicorn spoke. "I shall look into it this evening at the royal library." She opened her eyes again and looked around the room, to see the door was shut and no other ponies were in the room. "May I open the forbidden library if my studies direct me that way?" She gave the elder alicorn a pleading look.

She's so sweet when she's tired. Celestia didn't verbalize her thought, instead saying "I trust you with that knowledge Luna, of course. But observe the normal precautions." Stepping back from the bed she added "I'll be in Ponyville by a small entourage. Two fedaykin and I'll ask the guards pulling the chariot to unhook themselves. I doubt anything will happen there or here, but keep ponies you trust within shouting distance, sister."

The midnight blue alicorn turned her head to look out at the brilliant sunshine, and breathed deeply and slowly as she sank back down under her blanket. "Of course Celestia." and with that, she released herself again to slumber.

Celestia -- inquiry

As Spark Impulse and Sprintpoint set her royal chariot onto the road at the outskirts of Ponyville, Celestia reflected on her sadness that ponies everywhere fled as if she was going to banish any roadhogs to the moon. She was due the right of way but there shouldn't be any fear in yielding it. Shadow Orange jumped off as soon as the craft was on solid ground, and Celestia could taste the shield spell he held just in check. It would protect her, she noticed. If circumstances warranted that spell, Shadow would sacrifice his life to save her. For some reason, this natural order of things also saddened her today.

The sergal caster had written back, saying for Rainbow Dash's health he would not hurry his trip, but expected to arrive at about dusk. Twilight Sparkle on the other had had asked for a few extra hours to dust the shelves so as not to embarrass the ruler of Equestria.

Since this was attack was in the mind, she left as soon as she could, not worrying about physical protections. Barely two hours since Twilight wrote her first letter, Celestia arrived, doing so with only three guards total. Stepping regally off her craft, she instructed the pegasi to disconnect and drop the flight straps; again her choice was for speed. "I don't really expect anything even resembling trouble but the threat level is higher than I'm comfortable with regardless."

They both stiffened and nodded their approval. As she turned to enter the library she heard the clanking and ringing of tack being disconnected behind her. This early in November there was no snow scheduled but her sunshine was not really warming the ground, either. She had subtly shifted her mane and wings from protecting against the winds of the chariot to the still, cold air of the ground.

It was Twilight who answered the door, not Spike. And her eyes seemed to have been replaced with saucer plates. "Princess!! You're here!" Turning she shouted behind her "Spike she's here just move stuff. Move it now!" Piles of things dropping somewhere deep in the library created a muted cacophany that came to Celestia's ears. "Your highness, please enter my humble home and the humble town's library." Bowing deeply she levitated the door wide enough to admit the tall white alicorn.

She started to walk in, then stopped. Turning over her own shoulder she called out to her own somewhat hapless assistants, not entirely unlike her student. "You three. Please give me … oh, fifteen minutes. Then follow me in but try not to make a ruckus this is my friend's house not just a call of state." Making eye contact with each of them in turn, she finished by asking "Alright?"

When she saw they all agreed, she proceeded into the library and seated herself in the middle of the main room, where a coffee table had been brought out. There was neither coffee nor tea which wasn't really a big concern except to her student who was still beside herself over feeling unprepared. Celestia knew she would calm down in a few moments.

Walking briskly towards the kitchen area Twilight turned to her teacher and said "I'll be right back with some tea, and my notes, and you can decide what kind of crazy I am." She glanced around the room for a moment. Deciding not to react to anything in this room, Twilight went toward the kitchen

A scant two minutes after that, Twilight came back with a silver platter of some quality, with two small cups and a flower-motif teapot as well as some slightly wrinkled sheaves of paper with writing too small for Celestia to read it from here. She noticed Twilight was carrying it in her mouth rather than levitating it. Must be too worried about protocol. Or maybe it's something else entirely. Celestia dismissed it as the purple mare set the tray on the table, then gave a sweet, concerned look to the alicorn. Celestia almost had time to ask herself What are you expecting me to say, dear filly? You called this meeting. but the smaller mare lowered her head in supplication, and smiled carefully.

"Princess, I'd like to begin with an experiment. Would you agree to participate?" Twilight looked at that moment sort of like a frightened puppy dog.

Unable to guess where this was going, Celestia quickly looked for the signs of a sudden lack of control as they'd been explained by Spike. Frazzled mane and tail, bloodshot eyes. Neither were present, so after a few seconds Celestia replied "I think so, Twilight. What would this experiment entail?"

Twilight breathed deep, her confidence quickly returning. Almost nonchalant now, she looked around at the library, her expression no longer acknowledging the alicorn in the middle of the room. Again after a few seconds, Celestia heard "Oh, it doesn't matter princess. The experiment is over now."

As Twilight turned too look Celestia in the eyes, Celestia thought to herself my own student is dismissing me! Aloud she asked "And, did I pass the exam, student of mine?"

As a licentious grin spread across what was moments ago a sweet young mare's face, the unicorn shook her head. "Nope."

Spike's voice from the kitchen could be heard. He was screaming but it didn't last long, drowned in the gurgling of his own blood by the sound of it. Twilight didn't react. "Twilight tell me what's going on."

The purple hair across her student's back separated, as she became a small alicorn as simple as opening her eyes would have been. "Teacher, it's simple. I'm going to kill everyone you love now, and you've been instrumental in showing me how to finish the job." There was a tiny flash of purple light from the newly formed alicorn, and Celestia was thrown backwards hard enough to break her right wing against the wooden wall.

All the ruler of Equestria could do magically was a feeble shield spell. "Guards! Guards!" she shouted but there was no reply. She was even magically augmenting her voice but her breath was being squeezed out by the spell that continued to attempt to crush her ribcage.

Twilight walked towards the elder alicorn, and the coffee table flew out of the way fast enough to break a bookshelf. But at the mention of the royal guard outside, Twilight looked with condescension towards the door. "Those little things?" The spell was dropped, and Celestia teleported herself to a safe distance above her chariot, but forgot about the broken wing.

Landing rather painfully, her hooves stinging nearly as much as her right wing's throbbing, she frantically searched the empty streets, and found only ... three dead ponies, their spines nowhere to be seen, their bodies still bleeding rapidly but all quite thoroughly dead.

As the door opened, and the young alicorn stepped out, Celestia remembered why she was here. Dream warfare. "You're not Twilight Sparkle."

The purple mare shrugged. "Really? Does it matter now, teacher? The pain is real, even if I'm not." And with that, there was a purple streak as the thing that was not Twilight flew at Celestia, short swords somehow strapped to each fore hoof, her form hazy and indistinct from a thick shield spell.

Their shields clashed, multicolored sparks flew everywhere. "What kind of a monster are you?"

Sparks were added to the pyrotechnic display as she short-swords flashed and flew against Celestia's rapidly depleting shield energy. "The kind that eats ponies!" shouted the small alicorn, her teeth bared in what seemed equal parts anger and dismassal.

Celestia tried magically attacking but this realm didn't acknowledge her power; her spells fizzled with little to no effect. She even called down a solar flare, the sun acting as her own personal orbital laser cannon, but no one watching would have guessed a spell had been tried.

Then the skies darkened, and the young alicorn stopped, and stared in amazement as out of the sky, descended night. Or more precisely a midnight blue alicorn flying fast. This alicorn's magic worked as expected, and Twilight, or whoever it was, was flung backwards, body on fire.

But the fire went out, and the purple mare teleported away. "Sister! Thou sleepest now?" Luna wasn't even looking at Celestia as she spoke, but at the deserted town around the pair. Seeing no threats still, she softened a little, and added "Thy magic works not the same, in dream. I shall teach thee sister but why art thou" Here she shook her head, and breathing one careful breath, corrected herself. "Why are you sleeping just as you arrive to Ponyville?"

Still shaken but as of yet uninjured beyond that one crushing blow, Celestia straightened and replied "Neigh sister. I know I sleep but remember only wakefulness. I have no idea where in the waking realm my body lay." In the distance, several Ponyville buildings exploded into fire, the sky darkening into a menacing dusk.

"Truly?" Now there was a lamp post next to the library, next to Luna, that had not been there a moment before. "I can wake you, but it will hurt." Luna looked askance at the library. "You are sure you were not drugged?" The lamp post slid out of the ground, and levitated next to Luna who paid it no mind.

Celestia wasn't really sure, of course. "I don't believe so. I arrived at the library. At least I think I did. And tea was brought out but that was definitely in the dream. I'm pretty sure. Why?" Celestia was tripping over her words as she watched the pole floated higher, well above the alicorns now.

Luna looked too embarrassed to explain, but said "Since this is dream, you can wake by dying. Except if you were drugged, you will simply remain a helpless corpse or something similar. I would drive you out of your dream but this isn't happening in your head. Somehow the interloper has drawn you into his head." A stern look crossed Luna's face as she reasserted eye contact. "This is his dream, and you and I just happen to be here. In your case by his whim I assume. Entering your dream was enough to find myself here by your side. But your guards will be frantic I'm sure."

Finally Luna looked up, nervously, at the floating lamp post. "Celly, until your mind agrees that your body has failed, you will feel this. And driving you out that way will leave small mental scars, but will also leave this dream in utmost clarity even for a pony of the day such as yourself." Again with the embarrassed look. "Celestia you know more about these things than I. Where do I put this so you will wake quickly?"

Celestia wanted to cry. Her sister shouldn't have a vision of killing the ruler of Equestria, no matter that it wasn't 'real' in any permanent sense. But she laid her belly to the ground, her head out straight. "Right behind the skull, Lunadeer." She closed her eyes and tried not to think about what she was about to feel. "If you're quick I might not even notice anyt"

Pain shot throughout her body, but mostly centered around her head, causing Celestia to launch herself into the air, briefly lodging her horn into the library's ceiling. Yanking her head free she floated down to the floor amidst the scene of her guards, Twilight Sparkle, and Spike, all of whom held with looks of terror on their faces. There were overturned and shattered bookshelves, and several large scorch marks still flowing with ice cold mist showing how recently Shadow Orange had hit the fires with an ice spell.

Shadow Orange was shouting "My liege!" and Twilight was shouting "Princess you can stop!" but Spike and the pegasi just looked like they were watching her to know which way to dodge. The only thing that remotely looked like it was normal was the silver platter, with the tea cups and pot that the evil Twilight had brought, was sitting mostly on the coffee table. No tea had been poured.

Seeing her point of focus, Twilight began babbling about the reason the tea was there. "I brought the best tray with some expensive tea out but you had passed out your head was on one edge of the table and it looked like an odd angle I thought you had broken your neck princess are you OK the dreams should quit while you're awake so there's nothing to battle you can calm down princess please."

Celestia looked around the room, at the scorch marks, the broken shelves. She tried to remember the strikes she had thrown, the direction they had been relative to her own body. "I caused this?"

Her fedaykin, watching her closely with blood orange eyes wide as saucers but with his normal somber seriousness replied only with one word. "Yes" before adding "my liege." a breath later.

It was young, innocent Spike, who spoke next. "You were having a real nightmare. But instead of just twitching you were throwing spells something serious."

Celestia unfolded her wings, flapped her right wing several times. It was whole, unblemished. But as Luna had said, she remembered the feeling of that injury. The snapping of bone. Even the jolt as she woke by dying, was crystal clear. Even, neigh especially the pattern and colors on that teapot.

Which her protege was carefully pouring from now. Luna's questions about drugs returned to her, and she stared at the cups, unsure of what to do. Seeing her dilemma Twilight quickly crumbled a little of everything into one cup -- a cookie, a cracker, some sugar, some honey -- everything that was on the tray, and gulped it down, swallowing hastily. By the grimace she gave it must have been far too hot to drink but Twilight immediately dropped into a deep bow, and waited.

They all waited.

Celestia didn't really think the cup itself was drugged but she decided to play it safe, and when she levitated a cup for herself, it was the one that Twilight had drained. Seating herself as regally as she could manage with her heart still beating as if she was mid-battle she said "Please, everypony, I'm clearly awake now and so long as it remains so we should all be safe."

Twilight finally stood up, and seeing the cup that was left had tea still in it, she levitated it, and stepped away before seating herself, and tried to sip at the tea.

From the stairwell came an apple drawl. "Is it safe to come down yet?"

Nopony spoke.

So Celestia had to invite the element of honesty. "Applejack, yes, I'm sorry about whatever you all just saw. Please, come join us for tea. And battle planning." When she heard the clip-clop of hooves on stairs, she explained to the assembled ponies what she had experienced.

Her bodyguard, the death commando (so named because he would die for his liege), explained what those still awake had experienced. "We waited outside as you asked, my liege. But two or three minutes after the door closed I felt you call out, although there was no sound. I sent my spell to you, and commanded that we should rush in.

"Running inside we found you asleep. Peaceful looking except for posture. It looked as if you were struck by a fit of narcolepsy, and then you started throwing offensive spells. Fire, force. 'Twas all I could do avoid injury to those present. I swear to you, my liege, there was nopony else in this room but us."

Spike belched green fire, and an especially small parchment formed from the smoke. Spike examined it, and proclaimed "That's Luna's seal." Looking to the princess he asked "Your highness?"

Celestia nodded, and Twilight moved to sit next to the small dragon as he unfurled the note. She spoke up to read it aloud. "She asks if you've recovered from your eventful awakening, and asks that we reply with the means of your return for her confidence in your contents." Then looked somewhat confusedly at the princess.

That would be so she knows it's me, not the interloper stealing my body. Celestia hadn't told the part about being stabbed by the regent of the moon. Out loud she said only "A lamp post. Write, a lamp post, and that the damage to the library will need to be seen to. No more; the rest we can speak of later but she wants a fast reply."

Twilight levitated a quill and pen from a pile of rubble, and Spike scribbled the requested notes, then coughed on it. The green smoke floated purposefully out through a crack above the door.

There was a knock at the door, and then it opened to admit a pink blob. "Twilight?" Only Pinkie's head was sticking through the door, and Applejack was whispering something about this not being a good time.

Twilight perked up, but did nothing more than look hopefully at the party pony, then at Celestia. Taking the hint, she called out for the element of laughter to enter, whereupon said pony launched into a tale of searching. Following her descriptions was challenging but it did help clarify some details.

"And I finally found Rainbow Dash but she was still not talking to me but she gave me a hug but that was yesterday and then she flew off and I saw her go over the Everfree Forest but she didn't come back. Oh! Princess Celestia did you know your chariot thing is in two pieces and sorta on fire?"

Celestia remembered she had called down a solar flare. Since her spells seem to have happened here instead of inside the dreaming … "Yes Pinkie thank you. No one was hurt in that incident." But on the matter of Rainbow Dash she should fill in her friends. "But Rainbow Dash ended up staying the night at prince Jack's cave, and I asked him to come here, with her, and he expected to be here about dusk. I appear to be the unlucky first pony to be struck with narcolepsy by this new threat to Equestria."

"Nah I'm here now. Hey. Hey to you too Sparky, Sprinty."

This last, was from a blue pegasus mare who was just entering, followed closely by the elements of kindness and generosity. Towering behind them and closing the door was a gray and blue sergal of piercing yellow eyes.

"Greetings Princess Celestia. Are you aware your transportation has been burnt to cinders by a means reminiscent of your orbital flare spells?" Celestia told Jack as how, yes, she had been informed of the recent property damage to her mode of arrival.

As the shorter ponies whispered amongst themselves to explain the state of the library's interior, Jack asked if Celestia would telepathically "send" to the other princess a question. "Since I am no longer at a regent's power level, she would not hear my moving of magic. Let her know we all are here, and I have an idea how an attacker might cast a dream forcibly."

There wasn't actually a form of telepathy, but a fake spell formed and thrown away would be "felt" by other regents. Meaning, the two princesses could send simple words to each other and the message would be received much, much faster than even fire-writing. So while the once-prince was talking she thought about how to send such a message, and formed the image 'big crowd' closely followed by 'assembled' followed by the idea of a professor prattling endlessly, then the word 'prince' with the final image of a new package -- modified slightly to imply it was the professor's package.

We're all here, and the big guy has a new idea he wants to present to us all.

Almost as soon as she made an end of not-spells, came the reply. A sleep spell designed to gently encourage a large crowd to feel very tired, then an illumination spell that would draw a line toward canterlot castle, and the sending of a scroll by fire.

if you fall asleep, I'll meet you in the shared dream and tell you what I've learned.

So it was that not but two breaths after the sergal caster spoke, Celestia replied "Princess Luna says if we make a shared dream, she will assist us further there."

She was about to ask if that was within the caster's abilities now, but his triumphant "Excellent!" cut her short. "I shall gather what supplies I must. Twilight Sparkle may I use flour or some other white powdery component?"

Soon everypony but the pegasi guards were laying somewhere on a circle made of sifted flour, and as Jack cast a spell to keep their subconscious linked, Celestia cast a spell to bring them to REM state.

As the spell hit her, Celestia was no more, leaving her quite disoriented until she woke up, and for several seconds afterwords too.

Twilight -- Dream

Twilight "awoke" to find she was in a desert, not unlike the outskirts of Appleloosa. In fact there was a train engine turnstile some ways in front of them all, with six tracks leading into the distances … all of which were, she noticed, nondescript to the point that wasn't sure the tracks weren't some sort of illusion.

But it didn't have the oppressive feel of her nightmares. Just, an odd sort of disconnect. A part of her mind said this isn't real but all of her senses registered normally. There was not much to smell, but even that sense, she could detect blown dust, and the working of giant steel machines.

She saw her friends all in a line, facing the turnstile. Also, there was the elite guard who had insisted on following the princess into dream, next to an especially radiant princess Celestia. Twilight heard the guard say "But where is the other princess, my liege?"

And then she materialized. In here she was as tall as her elder sister, and her mane nearly as large. She was walking towards Celestia, which meant most ponies present saw her walking to their right. "Celly I have some leads but I want to speak privately." When the elder nodded assent to the junior, Luna turned to the elements, and also Jack, who was, Twilight just realized, in alicorn shape. Luna was augmenting her voice now, although it probably wouldn't have been needed. "Friends, this place at the meeting of tracks is inside my own dream, and I promise I shall maintain it though I be awake, for as princess of the night, dream is also familiar to me.

"Each track here, leads to the dream of an element of harmony. Yourself. I know not what you must find, or how your own mind shall accept you, but you must travel to the most sacred place of your own country, and take the tool, or weapon you find there.

"Natural time is slowed; the rate will vary but an hour here will take roughly ten minutes
in the waking world. You may eat here but you will not need anything. This counts as sleep so you do not need to sleep more while you travel. As you learn to operate the dreaming you will find you can shift reality and this shall be your greatest defense.

"But in the waking world you will need to eat so I will instruct Jack how to anchor your minds to a particular point in the dream world, and every two to three days, you must leave, and awake, and live your lives before returning here.

"I have learned that the interloper must be magically following you, and as only one pony may only follow a single point, or a single dream. I do not believe there are more than one interloper but he or she is strong, and a very fast learner of new attacks.

"Good luck to you all, but I must speak with prince Jack, then I believe we princesses shall leave you to your quest."

Jack had accidentally become a regent by drawing so much magic that no "unicorn" could safely channel it. As his first deliberate spell after he became royalty he made himself an alicorn with obsidian hooves, and the hair starting as black but fading into a shifting, grizzled slate gray, with mane & tail the color of beach sand and wings that nearly glowed they were so white. It made his voice easier to interpret, for which she was grateful and likely not the only pony present who felt that way.

There was a clip-clop of perhaps aluminum shoes as Jack wandered past the assembled ponies to the huddle of alicorns. Since Luna had said she wanted to speak privately Twilight walked the other way to gather her friends. A huddle of mere mares here, demigods there. Twilight giggled slightly.

"And what's so funny, huh?" Applejack was quite tense, but as Twilight recalled AJ's nightmare settings had often been in deserts like this. Twilight tried to ease her fears.

"Just that we look like competing sports teams. Gonna be a short competition if so." Twilight waved her horn at the double sized ponies gathered some distance away. "Anyway I guess we can expect resistance from the interloper as well as ourselves if Luna's announcement was right." She looked at the train, and hoped it either weighed incredibly little, or in the dreaming could pull itself. Applejack was the only source of muscle here and she'd resent pulling everypony everywhere all the time.

Pinkie Pie, naturally, was excited. "Whose dream are we going to first? Twilight do you want to find the dream form of the element of magic? I wonder if it's a big crown thingie or if in here we all get crowns and you have to wear a giant necklace to set you apart? This is kinda cool " Barely pausing for breath, she turned to Rainbow Dash, who was eying Pinkie with more scorn than Twilight thought was normal for the pair. "Dash is this what your dreams were like all dry and wind blown what was scary about that can you tell us Dash" here she started pogo hopping around the huddle. "I think we should go to your country first so we can help you sleep so I don't have to find your cloud and climb up to give you drugs hidden in a cupcake because I hate hiding things from you in fact Dash I didn't I told you I was drugging"

Here Rainbow Dash grabbed Pinkie's muzzle as she bounced past, and rather abruptly twisted the jump so the pink party pony would land on her side. "Pinkie." Dash took a deep breath, eyes closed, now open again. "My nightmares involved you torturing me to death repeatedly. We're friends, alright, but every time I see you in here I'm afraid you're going to start hacking my wings off with a bone saw. So pardon me if I don't share your enthusiasm."

There was a collective gasp as Pinkie got back up, now near to tears but afraid to reach out to Rainbow. Dash was stoically staring straight ahead, head lowered and ears looking quite sad; even pathetic.

Twilight spoke into the shocked silence, hoping her own experience would help Dash get through this coming quest. "Dash I know what that's like. Some of my bad dreams, well not all of them but some were of princess Celestia going power mad and killing ponies wholesale. I had to watch, powerless, as she reduced Ponyville to ash, melting or crushing or simply dismembering everypony I know." Twilight looked over her shoulder at her teacher, who was talking just now, primarily it looked like to her sister Luna. "But Celestia not only wouldn't do that, she didn't." Eye contact now with those reddish purple irises. "Neither did Pinkie. We're here to fix that, alright?" Looking quickly at every one of the ponies assembled she continued. "Somehow a thing has found a way to drive us apart but we're not going to let it. I don't know what this will look like, but we need to keep faith that we're all the ponies we love and know outside, in the waking world."

Heads nodding assent, and Dash managed to pull herself out of her deep funk far enough to playfully poke Pinkie in the shoulder, although he face didn't look like she was ready to be this close to the party pony yet.

Pinkie's thoughts on that whole affair left a different taste in her mouth obviously, because she launched herself at Dash and hugged the pegasus' neck tightly as she spoke promises to defend her bestest friend against any and all fake not-party ponies that might dare to wear the color pink.

Applejack -- quest, part 1

As the only other pony present that had been mentally invaded, it was Applejack who said "Ahlright so lets get this show on the road. Might as well go to my 'country' first if nopony else is going to offer."

She looked to the assembled demigods, who seemed to have finished their huddle. The ponies walked towards one another, and Applejack bowed deeply, as did the others. She noticed Jack step off to the side, so it didn't look like anypony was bowing to him. Well, suit himself I guess

Celestia dropped to her belly, and tried to make eye contact with each of her fighting force. Having achieved that, she spoke, her voice as regal and gentle as ever. "Ponies I must return to Canterlot now, but I trust Equestria is in good hooves. In case this interloper changes tactics entirely my sister and I must devise spells for the waking world to stop this horrible invasion." Here she looked specifically at her advanced magics student, the purple bookworm unicorn to Applejack's right. "Twilight thank you for letting me know about this and I'm really sorry about your home. I'll have someone from the treasury make sure a good contractor is hired soon."

Standing back up now, she flared her wings, then looked confused. Turning her head over her right shoulder she asked Luna "How do I wake up again?"

Applejack could just hear Luna mumble "Some body part. Your hooves. Feel your waking hooves, and twitch them. As soon as you've established connection with your waking body, just ... well, Celly, then you wake up."

Applejack saw the princess look down, as if searching for a thought, then suddenly she disappeared. Not even a flash, like she'd teleported, just one moment she was there, then next she wasn't.

The guard didn't have the difficulties that "his liege" had; as soon as she flickered out, so did he. Princess Luna walked up to the space where Celestia had been a moment before, and added "We thank you also, and we wish you good luck. Prince Jack will remain as your guardian and instructor. As well, he knows how to contact us from within this dreaming place. We must take "

Here the princess faltered, and Applejack guessed she must have started listening to herself. loosen up, lighten up, princess! she tried to say to her but didn't verbalize anything.

"I must take my leave. Friends." The princess dropped the royal 'we' to bid them farewell, then flared her majestic midnight blue wings, and as she refolded them, she too flickered away.

Jack spoke to the crowd, his voice smooth and silken now, and about three octaves higher than the road grading equipment range that was his natural voice. "Have we decided on a mind to minister to first?"

Applejack stood stiffly, still worried about the army of buffalo that would greet them. "Yeah sugarcube. Drinks are on me. Do any y'all know how this Luna train is operated?" She was walking slowly so as not to seem impatient but she had already turned straight towards the foreign contraption.

Dash and Fluttershy were floating as they so often did, but not moving any faster. Jack, Prince Jack now, with that pony shape like that, offered to figure out the controls, and flew quickly ahead. Pinkie took off running and Rarity, fearing for a moment she had been left behind ran after the earth mare. Applejack upped her gait to a trot and sighed internally.

The train engine was huge, having two decks and the most elaborate control console she had ever heard of. But for all of that, it had a lever in the center, clearly the largest single control, and on the left of it were the names of the ponies boarding the train, and just to the right were the matching cutie marks.

Applejack looked behind her, and seeing everyone climb in, she shouted "All aboard!" and couldn't help but smile just a little. "Applejack's train of insanity! Come for the apples stay for the inanity! All aboard!" And she moved the lever from the 'N' in the middle to the her cutie mark, just below Twilight's star.

The train shifted, rotating to what to the Earth pony was a random track. Aligning itself, it stopped. what in tarnation? was all the farther she thought, before Jack prince Jack. Guess I gotta call him prince Jack in here. walked next to her, and grabbed a lever nearly as big as the alignment lever. It had some hatch marks next to one side but no marks beside the 'h' at the bottom, where it was now, to an 'f' at the top. Jack eased it a quarter of the way from h to f, and the engine lurched.

Dash started grumbling about not having room to fly, and how she could probably have just followed from the air and at least kept her wings in motion, and Applejack heard Twilight lecture the blue pegasus about magic and how this was the dream world so the train would be symbolic so not being in the train might mean you would never get to where the train was going.

"You're afraid we're going into a nightmare, aren't you?" That soft voice was Fluttershy's, and Applejack saw she had sidled up next to her at the giant console near the front window. "But it won't be unless this meanie finds us. Just a dream, right?"

Applejack tried to smile but couldn't. She didn't want to think about it, but prince Jack was nodding. "Nothing there but yourself. You do not seem the type to be mean to yourself so it may be as simple a trip as your lifestyle is simple."

Applejack shrugged, and looked out the front window. There was a brief flurry of snow, and as it cleared the train was in desert again. But there was a train station looking mighty similar to the one in Appleloosa, up ahead.

She turned around to tell her friends the stop was nearing, but stopped mid sentence when she saw Pinkie was wearing her ill-fated show tunes outfit. "Uh. Sugarcube? Where'd yah get that outfit? I'm not sayin' I thought yur singin' was as bad as th' buffalo folk thought but I don't rightly remember any o' us packin nothin'."

Pinkie looked her outfit over with gleeful astonishment, and finally settled on answering the farmer's query with a simple shrug. "Seemed like what you should wear, you know?" Applejack looked to her other friends, but no one else had suddenly acquired new duds.

Mentally shrugging she started again. "I see a place like Appleloosa up ahead. Don't rightly know what's there but I guess we get off. Is that right prince?"

The dusty looking alicorn looked her in the eye, and smiled very slightly. "That depends on you, orchard farmer. Earth pony. Is the distant land of your more adventuresome cousins the best place to stop and begin searching for your most hidden truth? Your closest held power? We arrive by constructed means to the Equestria between your ears. Is the first stop the best one?"

The train whistle sounded, and the engine began decelerating rapidly. Applejack looked over hear shoulder, out the front window at the approaching station, before turning back to the sometimes sergal. "Since Ah don't rightly know what you're really talking about, Ah'm just gonna say lets get off and start looking here."

The train stopped, and wooden steps climbed up to meet the metal ones dropping down. The engine seemed to have gotten even larger during the trip, Applejack thought but then dismissed it to examine the town itself. There was an even mix of buffalo and ponies, but the cultural differences were immediately apparent.

The ponies wore suits like what you'd find in the city. Even when Applejack could make out dirt stains marking them as workers of the earth -- the same reason she never wore clothes herself, these ponies wore clothing with "bling" gems at odd corners, lots of easily broken buttons all maintained at the highest levels of repair.

But the buffalo wore only the occasional feather, or a shiny rock, tied to their fur with tiny strips of leather. Their walk was stoic, their speech was a little bit old fashioned and always carefully enunciated.

As the questing ponies made their way through town, Twilight commented on the possible cultural rift in such a town. "Every buffalo I overhear is talking about how it has always been thus and so. But the ponies, even the old ones, are talking about needing to tear down the old things, to make room for new forms."

"Well" Applejack opined, "that should make it clearer where we need to go. Lookit' up there." She pointed to the distance where an evenly formed mountain climbed from desert into forest, and at the very top was a giant structure. Shaped like a barn it would be many square miles if her eyes were to be believed in this place. Faded paint marked it as her old barn but the shape itself was clearly the newer barn she'd just built a couple of years ago.

Applejack stopped at a pair who were discussing something amiably in the middle of the street. The blue pony with musical notes as his cutie mark to her right, and an especially large buffalo of an especially dark hue of brown, to her left. "Hay uh, 'scuze me but can you tell me how a pony gets up there?" She pointed with a single hoof to the mile-high barn in the distance.

The buffalo spoke first. "It is an arduous journey of self discovery and disappointment. You must search within for the best path."

Followed closely by the blue pony whose tone would have been at home in a stand up comedy routine. "Well seein' as yer already within, meanin' within th' town here, yah just start walkin'. See that train y'all came in on?" The assembled ponies looked hopefully behind them. "Ya cain't take that up thar. Ain't no tracks."

And the Buffalo again, with "There is an ancient tradition you must adhere to. If you take the wrong path, it shall not lead you to your destination."

Applejack was pondering this for a moment but Rainbow Dash blurted out "So, what's the tradition? How do we find the right path?"

The blue pony smiled like a used wagon dealer and replied "He means ya gotta make a new path each time. If'n ya take some other pony's way, why the stronghold moves. Does that, just ups and moves away from yer hooves."

Rarity groaned melodramatically and said "Ugh; that's a lot of walking for these poor old hooves." But Applejack had heard enough. Thanking the pair for their input, she strode purposefully toward the mountain, the pair already back to discussing ad nauseum the benefits of the new, versus the old.

At the edge of town however there was a three buffalo deep line easily a hundred wide. Fluttershy floated up a little ways, and dropped back down to state the somewhat obvious "At least three hundred buffalo facing us and they don't look very happy."

Pinkie rushed ahead totally ignoring Applejack's cry of warning. She heard the pink pony ask the first buffalo she met "Why are you standing here? Can we get around you please?" which did not receive an immediate answer.

But when Rainbow Dash flew up to that buffalo and tried to start in with "Yeah we're friends with a drag Ahhhh!!!" she was blown rather harshly into her friends by what seemed to be a simple exhalation of just one buffalo to the speaker's right.

Addressing no one in particular, the one Pinkie had asked, said "We are the ancient tribe of Will Not Budge. We have always stood her, and we always shall."

A smaller specimen to the pony's right several places, added "We're here to keep your hooves on the ground. Only then might you understand our place in this society."

Pinkie turned to her friends, but couldn't say anything because she was too astonished. "Guys! Where's the town?" she pointed behind them, where an expanse of unadorned desert stretched for several hundred feet before the edge of town could be seen.

Prince Jack coughed delicately, and said "Ah, yes. I believe that may be my fault." Looking over his shoulder he gave full attention to the edge of town, now back to the edge of the buffalo. "Yes. I tried to teleport past them. Each time I found myself in the same spot relative to you, and they. But I see now I am as far from the town's edge as my teleport spell should have taken me."

That settled a lot of questions in Applejack's mind. Walking up to a random buffalo in front of them, she asked "So, can we jus' walk through y'all if our hooves stay on th' ground?"

Both this one, and the first that spoke after blowing Dash to the ground, spoke now in unison. "We have never moved, and we never shall."

Turning to her friends, she tried to guess which were the lightest. "Twi? You and Fluttershy stay in the middle so's we don't lose you. We jus' need to walk between their legs or somesuch." Of course prince Jack would have a heck of time given his size but that was going to have to be his problem.

They formed two rows, three ponies deep. She followed Fluttershy who was hanging on to Rainbow Dash's tail. Every few steps a buffalo near one of them would exhale that hurricane breath on them and the whole row would be forced to drop to their bellies. Rarity was followed by Twilight Sparkle then Pinkie, who of course kept giggling when the hurricane would dislodge her accessorized outfit but otherwise seemed none the worse for wear.

True to their word, the tribe of Will Not Budge didn't so much as raise a two toed hoof and after what seemed like forever the two columns forced their way through. Panting, sweat dripping off her belly, Applejack looked behind her to find prince Jack. She couldn't see him but through all those buffalo standing so close that might not mean anything. "Hey, uh .. Jack? Prince Jack?"

The soft tones chimed behind her. "It is as we guessed, friend Applejack" which caused the orange mare to about jump out of her skin since that put the oversized flying goober on this side of the line of buffalo without having walked past them. "When you exited the barricade, I could teleport to your location. You are the deciding factor in this leg of the journey."

Well. Don't that beat all. Applejack wasn't sure whether to be elated that she was somehow more influential than this world shaking magic caster, or annoyed that he didn't have to put up with the hurricane breath. Aloud she said to him "Sure thing boss. Can we get to gettin'?" To which his only reply was a sardonic smile before he raised himself airborne, along with Dash and Fluttershy.

They walked on, towards the great green mountain in the distance. Vegetation quickly sprang up, rustling beneath their hooves. Here there was a small creek, steep sided with clear water flowing at a measured pace past them. Applejack thought it looked much like a irrigation canal, and probably functioned as one since they had moved from bare desert to fertile grasslands.

The prince landed to walk beside it, studying the clear fluid as if it were a great mystery. "Your feelings run deep, Applejack." Looking up at her, he explained "Water is emotion, in this place. This emotion is clear, and strong. The creek tells me you are healthy, friend Applejack."

Not sure how to take what sounded like a compliment, she stopped and drank from the creek. It was crisp; cold even as if there was a glacier of some renown in that old barn, melting the way glaciers do, feeding ice water to the plains below. All she could think to add was "Glad you think so boss. I've a feeling we're gonna be losing some health points up ahead."

Applejack went back to walking, and so only peripherally saw Jack sigh, but she saw Fluttershy drop to the ground and look nervously about her. Maybe the water gave her clarity, or maybe she was just guessing, but she felt an epiphany dawn on her; there would be nothing to watch for in this open plain.

Rising to a brisk trot, she called to her friends. "Tain't nothing here gonna get us, Fluttershy. Just everypony keep moving and will find someplace that needs our worries." She didn't wait for her friends to pick up the pace, knowing that if she didn't slow down they would keep up.

Applejack -- quest, part 2

Rising to a brisk trot, she called to her friends. "Tain't nothing here gonna get us, Fluttershy. Just everypony keep moving and will find someplace that needs our worries." She didn't wait for her friends to pick up the pace, knowing that if she didn't slow down they would keep up.

So time passed as uneventfully as she thought. They arrived in what felt like late afternoon at the edge of the mountain, which was also the edge of the forest. Small scrub trees housed clicking insects but not at this point were there any chirping birds.

There was a path right in front of them, but it was marked by spears that towered above everyone. Worse, was the recently decapitated head on the one spear that warned everypony from this particular path.

Pinkie just wrinkled her nose expressively, Fluttershy resolutely looked away while Rarity moaned about how disgusted she was. But as Applejack tried to take in the meaning of this sight, it was Twilight who asked the already obvious. "That's Granny Smith, isn't it? Why would your subconscious exhume her?"

Applejack just shook her head, finally snapping out of her trance. "Don't know, Twilight. Maybe just because I know she died violently, maybe because I know she died a while ago." Looking up at their alicorn 'guide' she asked for guidance. "What do you think? You're our guide, the princess said."

Jack only said solemnly "I know only that it means this is not the path we take. What did you hear those -arguing folks in town say about such matters?"

Applejack randomly picked a direction and turned to her right, walking along the scrub brush to find a likely looking non-path. "Jus' that ya cain't trot another's path. Hopefully we can all follow me but Ah wouldn't swear that's what it means."

Hoping she was far enough from that macabre warning she just walked into the forest. It was harder going than she was expecting, but there was no chance of getting lost as the mountain was completely dome shaped. Just force your way uphill and a pony would find herself at the top.

She was concentrating on what felt like it was supposed to be a spiritual journey, so was very grateful when she heard her traveling companions enter the brush behind her without a lot of talking, although she heard Rarity whine or sometimes moan when she would slip, or get a hoof wound up in a vine. Fluttershy too was ill at ease.

"It's just a forest, Fluttershy. We've been in scary forests before and it all worked out fine right?" That was Pinkie's voice.

Applejack felt she was being drawn forward; she didn't even look behind her when she heard the pegasi close behind her talking about the forest of Applejack's mind. This was about pressing forward, her subconscious told her. About learning what you already knew.

Fluttershy said "I remember that night in the Everfree forest, yes. But it was just the one grove that hated us. This whole forest seems, I don't know … angry." A rustling implied she was detangling herself from some low branches. "Like we're not supposed to be here."

Rainbow Dash replied "Just a forest. Nopony here attacking us or anything. The trees are getting taller too so our low flight should start getting easier. Oh Twilight how's it on the ground?"

Not wanting to seem uncaring, after she heard Twilight mumble a response of some form Applejack tried to explain what she felt. "Ya just gotta press on. You know because this is like a learning experience, a field trip when you were in school. Somehow the harder your journey gets the sweeter the rewards will be." Looking behind her finally she saw Rarity closest, and Twilight to their right a meter or two.

Rarity wasn't impressed with this dream hill. "I always hated field trips, to be honest, Applejack." She held up a forehoof and shook the debris and slime off.

Applejack just smiled but to avoid offending turned back uphill and walked on.

About dusk the underbrush almost completely disappeared but the loose, well dampened soil made going almost as slow now that the hillside was steepening. Jack commented on the trees themselves, saying "These are old, strong trees. Their roots go deep Applejack. You are getting close to the weightier matters of your heart, and the path you trod leads you to the wisdom your history has granted you."

Maybe she was just too much of a simple farm girl but all his philosophizing wasn't really helping her mood or understanding. But the creek that had clarified everything wasn't here. Had faded into some rocks and disappeared before the hill started actually.

So she concentrated on her footing, which was getting tricky as, between the forest canopy and the setting sun it was getting dark. But then both Rarity and Twilight caused their horns to glow, giving her enough light to see where she was going.

But she still almost bumped into the steel plate, none the less.

It was Rainbow who verbalized it first. "Ugh! Finally. So, how do we get in?"

It was easily ten meters on a side, and sticking out ever so slightly from the stone behind it. There were no marks in either steel or stone, and pulling on the edges yielded no result. Their resident alicorn wasn't much help either.

"This is a mystery of your mind, Applejack. The door is a question to you. What, Applejack, is the answer?"

Dash is right she thought to herself. It's annoying the way he uses a pony's name too often.

But the journey, the creek, the arguing in town. This was the culmination, Applejack felt certain, of that thinking. She still wasn't sure what Granny Smith was doing on a pole down below but she didn't think she needed to dwell on that right now. But as she stared at the blank, unmoving metal amongst the old-growth forest of her mind, she thought she had the idea, and might even the poetry to satisfy the prince.

"Somethings never change" Applejack started, speaking as much to the edge of steel in front of her as to her friends. "Others are in constant flux, moving like water in a stream. But water stays where it is in the stream and just the details of which piece of water changes. Friendship is like that too; the game of give and take. Some days you take, and sometimes you give, but the balance never changes. Sometimes your friends change, but almost never why they're still your friends. Things change because they stay the same, and likewise things stay the same through all their changes."

From above, "Like those hinges. I could'a sworn they weren't there a second ago." Applejack looked up to see the silhouette of Rainbow Dash as she was flying at the top of the steel plate, now pulling at it with all her strength.

Applejack started pulling too and this time the plate swung out, leaving a dimly illuminated tunnel big enough for three ponies abreast to walk in. Applejack was front and center, but Twilight was to her right, and Rainbow Dash had dropped from the sky to be at her left. Applejack's shadow showed that Rarity was right behind her, and Pinkie's near constant giggling interspersed with 'ooh's and 'aaah's came from behind Rainbow Dash. Applejack snuck a quick peek to make sure Fluttershy hadn't chickened out, but there she was, flying just at Jack's ear level.

At the end of the tunnel was a small room just big enough for everypony to enter. At the front of the room was a wood cutting depicting the stand they had found in the old castle, and the elements of harmony still as stone globes. Below that, on the ground, was a wooden bucket, but the light made it hard to make sense of what she was seeing.

Rainbow Dash however thought that's what it looked like too. "That's a really small bucket, or our eyes are playing tricks on us all."

Pinkie stood up on Rainbow's rump to get a clearer view and proclaimed "Nope! Those apples look just about right and I bet that long rope is to hang on a pony's neck."

Twilight walked up to it first, and Applejack was more certain her eyes weren't playing tricks on her now that there was something nearby to put the image in perspective. Two apples balanced and almost overflowing the wooden barrel, which instead of a metal handle had a very long cotton rope with an extra length hanging off the middle of one half of the handle, with a clasp at the end of that.

Since she figured it was supposed to be for her, she walked up to Twilight, who said "I think you're supposed to wear it around your neck. Like Pinkie said." And with that she lifted the cotton rope over Applejack's head, and then clasped the middle rope under her neck, just at her chest.

Applejack picked one of the apples up by it's stem. The balance was so superb, so even, she couldn't help herself. She tossed it well into the air, and behind her. When it was down, she bucked high, kicking the apple into the ceiling just at the entrance to the tunnel they had come in through.

Whereupon it exploded. The room shook from the deep reverberations, and Applejack was sure she saw bits of stone fall free with the gooey slime the apple left.

Prince Jack seemed to understand. "Applejack, you now wield the apples of truth. And as every school pony knows, the truth hurts." He looked over the otherwise bare chamber and said "I think that's all we need from this place. When you're ready, Applejack" and walked back the way they'd come.

Her bucket still had two apples.

Again, she found herself at the lead as the others were more interested with what their train trip would show of their mind, and what weapon they would give themselves. Pinkie wanted a giant lollipop great-hammer that would turn enemies into sweet friends. Rainbow was talking about wing extensions that would let her cut enemies down just by flying through them.

At the entrance to the tunnel, the moon had come out making eerie shadows of every tree limb, and Jack was standing half in, half out of the tunnel looking quite concerned. As the party caught up behind them, he said quietly, over his shoulder, "We have company."

And the Applejack saw the white dots. Always in pairs, often shifting. Eyes. More than a dozen. Assuming the heads were all about the same size they ranged in distance from three or four meters to probably twenty five.

Now Applejack understood the warning that had been Granny Smith's head. "Are they from me, Jack? Or is this him again?"

Jack replied "The interloper. He takes the form of the invaders but not all are him. Any of his shadows could send you to the waking world with a headache and the shakes." Louder this time, to the whole small army of ponies behind him, but still not turning his head from the moving dots. "We must drive them off to retain what we've gained here. You've done this before; I'll keep the playing field as level as I can but that does not make this battlefield less slippery."

Whatever that meant, Jack rushed off into the dark woods, and some seconds later generic scuffling sounds could be heard. Meanwhile the invaders were close enough to consider their attack. It was steep but they all had double ended swords.

Applejack barely considered her actions, simply twirling around and flinging apples to her back hooves. They each struck an oncoming sergal, and each exploded into mist, the apples of truth having revealed their false nature.

Rainbow Dash likewise had a personal vendetta against these creatures, muttering through gritted teeth, "You're not taking my wings again, you misborns." and with that flew straight at the nearest biped, striking with front hooves and all her momentum.

Twilight and Rarity weren't skilled battle mages but all those nightmares where she had honed her puncture spell seemed useful here. Standing on flat, solid ground she would discharge her focused push spell which seemed lethal to twenty meters, and she could manage some amount of accuracy at nearly half that. She tried to teach Rarity but under such conditions Rarity could only manage to tear open a leg once or twice as a crowd of attackers rushed too quickly to be killed at distance.

It was enough; Pinkie would kick them in the head as they fell, at which point they'd tumble away and slowly fade into mist, or if Applejack's half of the tunnel was at a lull, she'd launch a fruity projectile at the too-close mongrel, and there would be a dull 'thud' as the whole beast turned to nothing.

There was a delay in the refill for the apples of truth bucket, but fortunately for Applejack's limited repertoire of fighting techniques it seemed to be just over a third of a second, nearly to half a second, per apple. "Four hundred milliseconds" Twilight would later report, when she took the time during peaceful moments to convince her farmer friend to experiment with the weapon.

Fluttershy was crouched against the smooth, cold stone wall some distance into the tunnel, nearly in tears. "Are these walking piranha respawning as fast as you kill them? How do we stop this nonsense? Applejack make them go away!"

"Cain't, sugarcube! Imported nuisance species and we're desp. "Here she carefully launched another apple, needing to lob the projectile high to account for the sudden drop of the ground, while her legs were built to launch upward. Missile on its way, she resumed with "We're desperately trying to eradicate them but it's mighty" Another lob, and one shot straight at a downswinging sword aiming for Rarity. "stubborn. Any suggestions dear heart?"

Fluttershy said to the orange mare, her voice cracking in hysteria as she tried to finish, "You're a farmer; you have to pull the whole root out." before devolving into tears a Rarity tore open a belly, blood spraying everywhere as Twilight put a hole in his chest, knocking him back. The bits of flesh evaporated eventually but the fluids seemed content to harden into long-dried stains in that amount of time.

Ah only have a double barreled shooter, dear heart. But Fluttershy's words rang true. "Girls!" Applejack didn't know if her friends could spare any mental time to hear her but she had to try. "She's right. We need to wade in and help Jack finish off the real sergal."

From somewhere in the shadows, about halfway up the tree trunks average height, Rainbow's voice came somewhat muffled. "On it." to be followed by her rainbow contrail disappearing into the deep of night.

No sooner had she disappeared though then there was a mighty explosion, and flying straight into the side of the stone building was what Applejack first took for an upside down Jack. But when he bounced off the building Mountain, more like. Just shaped, like mount Rush Mare and landed on his feet, she realized it must be an imposter. Gray feathered legs supported an robin's egg blue furred chest.

No longer having to adjust for a sudden elevation change, the farmer let loose with a single apple at full velocity, straight for the false Jack's head. Her friends, having come to the same conclusion, were also responding. At a shout from Twilight, Rarity had helped grab onto an arm with telekinesis while Pinkie tried biting him in the rump, legs wrapped around his large waist and having no luck in tackling him.

The apple hit the left side of the interloper's head, and exploded much like it had in the room inside the tunnel. Applesauce and blood mixed freely, running down his fine blue fur. He snarled, and gestured at the orange menace with his free arm. A magical bolt knocked Applejack into the air and she hit her back flat against the tunnel wall hard enough to have the wind knocked out of her. The landing flat on her head didn't help her cognitive abilities any.

Grunting in frustration and anger, Fluttershy took to the air, hair and feathers briefly suspended in Applejack's vision while the yellow pacifist slammed hooves-first into the source of all their problems. The sergal again tried a spell, this time a fireball appeared behind Fluttershy, scorching her back legs and setting her tail on fire.

Mighty pretty color of pink it used to be. Sorry, sugarcube. was all Applejack could manage to think as her body finally slid off the wall, and her right side landed partly on the edge of the tunnel's concrete, and mostly onto the rocky, muddy slope below it. Before passing out, she saw Fluttershy's quick thinking as she turned mid-air, not only kicking the attacker for all she was worth but wrapping her flame engulfed hair around his face.

He tried a third spell, but while his claws glowed there was no effect. The real Jack was walking now, into the light of the unicorns who had maintained their lights. His hands were held high and tiny lightning bolts were jumping noisily across all his claws.

There was a stare-down between blue fur, and blue feathers. Face wreathed in flames, right hand still struggling against two weakening unicorns, and an annoying pink thing trying to hump his leg, he cast one last spell. Pointing at a nearby dropped double sword, it flew to him -- and through his chest, narrowly missing Fluttershy.

As the interloper fell, Applejack didn't notice the unicorn's lights getting dimmer. She did notice it didn't seem like she was breathing, and thought that peculiar. But it didn't hurt. In fact she couldn't feel her hooves at all, which somehow seemed fine with her right now. Even when Rainbow Dash flew out of seemingly nowhere, screaming her name, Applejack couldn't care. It was getting to dark and cold to care, anyway.

And then there was light. Her sides hurt like she'd been pummeled mercilessly and her orange coat was drenched in sweat. Eyes finally focusing she raised her head to see it was three oil lamps providing light, and she was back in the library. Shoot. Did I die again? Least it didn't hurt so dang much this time.

Standing slowly she looked around and saw her five friends, and the blue and gray sergal, asleep in contrived positions so as to be in contact with the line of sifted flour circling around the room. Celestia had long since left, and looking out the front door she saw they had somehow taken the charred remains of her chariot, although the ground still bore the scars of that first ill-fated meeting between ruler and interloper.

Her sides didn't hurt so much now; it seemed she had been clenching her rib muscles long enough to make them sore but once she finished waking up she could convince her back it hadn't been cracked in two like a soup cracker, nor had her head, although it insisted it still hurt. Maybe Ah can find some aspirin in Twi's medicine cabinet

She sort of hated rooting around through her friend's things, but she was afraid to wake anypony up over having been kicked out of the game by a simple push spell, and she wasn't sure she could just fall asleep again, nor for that matter if she would naturally fall into the shared dream, let along into the place in the dream where her friends were.

Feeling surprisingly rested she decided honey toast and tea was called for. So she made herself a little breakfast as quietly as she could but still heard the clatter of Spike's clawed feet as he entered the kitchen. "Hey, uh Applejack are you alright?"

She hastily put away the jar of honey but still had the offending knife to stash somewhere. "Hey Spike hope Ah didn't wake ya. Sorta woke up and didn't want to get nopony in trouble. Might dangerous in that shared dream, ya know?" Sliding her toast onto a plate she decided if she was going to invite herself into the kitchen she might as well ask for what she couldn't find. "If'n ya don't mind, Ah was hoping to have more of that raspberry tea but couldn't find it. Am Ah outta luck?"

Spike had a roll of parchment in his left hand, but motioned with his right to a cupboard. "Lower left in that one. Help yourself. You know" He hefted the parchment in front of him like it was poison, and stared gravely at the words on it. "I just got a letter from Princess Celestia, saying that Luna says that Jack told her that you got killed in battle." He looked up at the orange mare, who was calmly adding loose tea to a steel teabag, the water nearly boiling from the first time Applejack went looking for where the tea was kept.

Applejack tried to put on her most reassuring smile. "Ah've gotten killed in there before, but this time didn't hurt so dang much. Plus I've already forgotten most of the pain anyway." pouring water into her cup, she looked into Spike's eyes and added "Ah already said as how dangerous that dreaming thing is. But Ah woke up knowing that all was right with the world, and that made this dream death a lot easier than what Ah was asked to go through by that right monstrous shadowy figure afore mah friends stepped in to help."

"So I should write back to say you're OK? Celestia sort of implied she wanted to know how you felt about the battle." Looking down at the poison letter again, he added, "Or if you woke up, really."

"Yah hayseed. Tell her th' magic of friendship is making inroads into the dark realm o' dreams. That's what Ah think about dyin' in battle." Taking a meaningful bite of her toast, she looked at her plate and decided that some applesauce of truth would go down mighty well about now. "Ah don't suppose you have applesauce, do ya?"

But Spike had already left to look for blank paper to write his reply, so Applejack just took her breakfast outside, tiptoeing quietly past the slumbering warrior mares. She accidentally stepped on Jack's tail which was twitching like a cat's but she managed to jump off without losing anything on her plate, and Jack didn't even snort or breathe funny.

Outside in the crisp late autumn air she walked to the east edge of the library and waited for the sunrise. Finishing her tea, she tried to remember the weather schedule. It would start raining at noon and the weather patrol thought that unrelenting moisture would call for two full days of light to medium rain to ease the pressure, before going back to clear skies for a while. Big Mac would want help with some barn repairs before that rain hit but she wanted to wait for her friends to wake up.

Taking her dishes back in, she decided she needed to give her friends priority. She offered to help Spike reduce the rubble volume, and with two of them carrying the longer pieces the managed to carry much of the charred shelving outside past the slumbering ponies without waking any of them.

Thus about two hours after Applejack had been so unceremoniously ejected from the shared adventure the ring of remainders collectively gasped. Jack was the last to open his eyes, but the first to stretch. Just like a cat, actually.

She was standing outside the circle, near the stairs which put her behind Twilight Sparkle, who sat upright and began searching the room for something. Seeing as she had looked at the scuff marks in the flour where she had slept first, Applejack spoke up to say gently "Ah'm right behind ya, sugarcube. If'n yer lookin' fer me."

Which she was, as her response was to whip around, her face showing concern; her lips pursed in angst but the slope of her ears said confusion. The student quickly closed the stride and a half distance between herself and the farmer, and hugged her friend tightly.

Stepping back she looked deep into Applejack's eyes, asking only "How long have you been awake?"

She was about to respond when she was pile-driven to the ground by a pink pony, followed by a blue pegasus. "I knew you were just awake // Wow your apples were awesome // Told them to keep their chin up // Thought I'd never see you // But can you fall asleep? // Jack said to leave your body but I thought // He even set the forest on fire so Luna might see it. // Oh yeah your forest. Hopefully your mind can make another." The words of the overflowing joy mixed with recent grief made Pinkie's words blend in with Dash's and Applejack could barely keep track of what was going on.

Rarity came over with the biggest smile the orange pony had seen in a long while on that anxious shop keeper's face. "Jack said we needed to get out of your dream land before it crumbled without you. So we beat feet to leave and you should have seen the mess you left. That creek was flowing with more blood than water it was awful really." At this, she paused to look for the wall clock.

During which break Fluttershy exclaimed meekly "The townsfolk had all turned into rotting zombies. Didn't try to eat us but they smelled bad."

"Nine AM! Ladies I have a client showing up in half an hour and I've done nothing to prepare but sleep on my hair funny." Turning to the now upright sergal, who still looked quite asleep despite his open eyes, Rarity asked "Same time tonight, then, am I right?"

The sergal nodded and Rarity excused herself, with an extra wave goodbye the "dead" pony, and a hug to the yellow pony who was having troubles shrugging it all off.

Jack stood, ran a clawed hand across his triangular head, and stretched again. "We are camped again in the mind of Luna. We should try for more sleep tonight but I leave it to the will of the group." Grinning with a mouth full of teeth that Applejack knew routinely ripped poor defenseless bunnies apart, the biped added "Consider me your dungeon master, if you will. Except that was all out doors, just there."

"Right. Dungeon, doors, whatever. I can get back by early evening, but now that we're all awake and not dead, I need to help Big Mac with chores." Twilight moved out of the way but Pinkie and Rainbow Dash stayed wrapped around her neck. "Uh, hint hint?"

Reluctantly they let her go, and she again promised to return for the next battle. Outside, several pegasi had begun placing rainclouds together overhead.

Rainbow -- Silent Dream

This time the princess wasn't there, so Twilight offered to knock everyone out while the biped collected their minds into his own dream, and thence to Luna. As a pegasus Rainbow Dash didn't know much about magic but she trusted that Twilight's spells wouldn't cause too much damage, and to date the possessed sergal had done alright by her.

Laying her head against a pillow that she knew to bring this time, she folded her wings carefully under her side, and thought about the three days she'd been an earth pony. Even the princesses didn't think they could reattach her wings properly. But the big guy had come through; and what kind of pony would the daring Rainbow Dash be without wings, anyway?

This time the cute librarian's spell went off without a hitch, and she felt a little dizzy even though she was already laying down, then there was a gap, then she felt like she woke up, only her inner ear was screaming "Dream!"

As a flier, and a good one, it took excellent perception to not get turned around while doing high speed high G force maneuvers and for whatever reason RD's inner ear from the waking world always followed her into her dreams. That made dream flights mighty hard but normally she never had nightmares because there was no question she was asleep, and would just wake up after a while.

Sometimes a long while.

Again everypony was in a line, this time Applejack was here in line even though they had left what looked like her lifeless body in the forest in her dream. And Jack was that alicorn here which really did creep her out. As the crew drew together into a huddle they tried to discuss whose dream to go to next.

Jack was holding a parchment that was not in the waking world. "I have a letter from the princess Luna" he said after levitating it from his mouth. Opening it, he read "We have learned the pathway spell but can not yet block it. The origin is outside of Equestria so an army action is not viable. Interloper is likely to focus on Rainbow Dash early as that has been the habit for this time of night. Beyond that I can only offer well wishes."

Putting the letter back into his saddlebag, he looked so hopefully at all of them that it made her chuckle. "What Jack you looking forward to meeting this clown again?"

Pinkie started hopping in place and suggested "Let's go to Dashie's land so she'll get a special weapon for attacking fake pink not-ponies!"

Rainbow could only shrug. "Sure thing, Pinkie." And assuming it was decided, she floated up, looked at everypony, and flew lickety split to the large train engine, climbing in through a window on the 2nd floor. While looking for the stairwell down, as she hadn't come up here last night, she heard Pinkie's infectious giggle. "Hey how do you do that, anyway?"

It wasn't the first time Pinkie had pogo bounced herself way ahead of the fastest flier of Cloudsdale but it wasn't common. There wasn't a response, and in fact there were no other noises. Just as she found the stairwell she heard a faint "oh, Dashie!" from the other end of this floor.

But just as Rainbow jerked her head up to look, she heard the door below her open. Twilight was chatting with Rarity and it sounded like magical discussions again. Pinkie's giggle come from behind Rarity. On the ramp, just getting in.

OK, let's step away from creepyville.

Downstairs no one said anything unusual, although Pinkie saw her frown and harrumphed over it. Applejack again found the levers, and set the destination to Rainbow Dash. The engine rotated to a random track that looked the same as the others and stopped. And then when the speed was set, she felt the false acceleration that didn't reach her ears.

What was different this time was five minutes into the trip they entered a tunnel.

"Hey where are the lights!" Dash thought that sounded like Rarity but could have been either Pinkie or Twilight. Too nervous to pay attention Dash just floated up to the ceiling and tried to not bump her wings on anything. Pinkie's gigglesnort that came from immediately to her left wasn't helping any.

Then they were out of the tunnel and everything was bright again. Pinkie really was to her left, floating senselessly. But before Dash could scream she saw Rarity looking like she was about to lose her dream lunch, and a confused Fluttershy just in front of her a ways.

Carefully Dash slowed, then stopped her wings, and folded them. Floating upwards, hooves-first, was a very amused Applejack, who stopped to stand on the roof. "Mighty nice dream you have yourself, Dash. We can all fly I reckon?"

She quickly looked around to find everyone else, and watched for a moment. Everyone was staying where they were unless they kicked off a wall. To Applejack she replied "Not without wings. You can float but that would be the same as if" and her stomach dropped without outside force. "As if we were in free fall. Jack! We're falling or something!"

She and Jack flew to a window to look out. Clear blue skies, mostly below them. Above it was a pale white that might be reflecting the sky below or perhaps there was more blue sky above. In either case, there was no track despite the engine noise having not changed tone or speed.

The alicorn cautiously stuck his head out the window, and when he had drawn it back in, declared "There is no wind, Rainbow Dash. I do not believe this is unexpected."

With no in-world inner ear she couldn't tell if they were falling to their doom, but refused to get worried if the big guy was calm. Besides she could just fly out the window with Fluttershy, and everyone else would just wake up, like Applejack. Of course, that would leave herself and fluttershy to figure out whatever crazy town they came to.

From the floor Dash looked up, to say something encouraging. But everypony had become Pinkie Pie. Two of them had a sour expression and straight mane and listless tail hairs, but the other three were looking at her with joy and enthusiasm.

"Dashie? Are you alright Dashie?" Her voice came from the window, where Jack was supposed to be. Her head whipped to see how close she was and Dash's wings had already unfurled.

Prince Jack looked with quiet concern. Jack's voice, this time. "...Rain...bow? What did you see up there?"

"There was" and that was as far as she got. Her head was back upright, and now all she saw was one Pinkie. She was where one of the depressed Pinkaminas had been. While she looked worried, it was just normal pinkie worry. Applejack was still standing on the ceiling.

Was this one of the forms an attack could take? Was she just losing it? She never got the chance to pursue that line of unreasoning as the train began to decelerate, returning normal gravity with it. Fluttershy 'meep!'d but caught Rarity, Jack flew for Twilight and that left the two earth ponies, except now Rainbow couldn't find Pinkie so she caught Applejack and set her down as quickly as she could in case the orange earth pony turned pink during the descent.

The train nearly to its stop, and Jack was carefully looking over the small crowd inside the control room. "Pinkie has teleported. That is likely a big development in this leg of your journey."

And this time instead of all pinkie pies there were none. But with everyone else looking it seemed it wasn't her overactive imagination. Twilight Sparkle helpfully pointed out "But she's not a unicorn. She shouldn't be able to use external magic like that."

Jack sighed softly, and said "This is a dream. A pony can teleport if they learn how." And he looked over to the hallway leading to the stairwell to the 2nd floor, and saw a pink pony trotting towards the group.

"Wow that was weird and cool I wonder if it will happen hey Applejack you're rightside up! happen again when the gravity got turned on I fell upwards instead of down so I was in the upper floor hi Twilight and had to look for the way back down because I tried pounding on the floor we've stopped but it was just a floor so I had to find a way down speaking of down we should get off the train and see what Rainbow's mind looks like I bet it's cool but in a different way than Applejack's mind come on everypony!"

so, apparently teleporting comes with a free sugar rush.

Oddities aside the team made it to the now unlocking main door, and everypony stepped outside, on to clouds. Rainbow Dash hardly noticed as her whole house was made from cloud but everypony that wasn't equipped with wings hesitated at the transition from grated steel to fluffy white stuff.

"Do I need to cast a cloud walking spell? I don't know that one by heart." That was Twilight, focusing closely on the cloud. Fluttershy carefully passed them and turned around to look hopefully at the magic users of the group.

Still over energized by falling through the roof Pinkie Pie said "Aww Twilight you barely glanced at that book when you cast it on me. Do you really need that dusty old tome?" Then her ears flickered, and she leapt high into the air. Her trajectory was shallow, but would place her front hooves well onto the cloud surface. Rainbow Dash prepared to save her overly optimistic candied up friend.

But the front hooves stuck their landing, and Pinkie walked down a step to turn and stand next to Fluttershy. Giving her friends the biggest I told you so smile, she stood and waited for the other non fliers to walk onto thin air and solidified vapor.

Jack spoke a thought, as the group descended. "This may look like cloud, but since Rainbow Dash can walk on it as easily as stone, it actually is like stone in this dream. Although I would recommend against digging holes for fence posts while we're here."

This town seemed deserted, at least this part of it, but there was a single pinkish colored pony at the bottom of the stairs. With a start, Rainbow Dash realized it was an earth pony who was waiting for them. She started sweating and backing into Fluttershy when that pink earth pony, magenta mane looking like it had been hit by lightning began running up to meet them.

"Hey!" the mare said, having almost reached the group of dreamers. "Why are there seven of you!" Definitely Pinkie's voice. She ran up the stairs, and at this point Rainbow Dash was in front, and feeling really creeped out. There was a pink pony to either side of her now, and this time everyone else could see it.

The Pinkies flattened their ears, and tried to stare each other down. The Pinkie that had climbed the stairwell said "I'm the one you can trust Dash. By the way." But the one to Dash's right, that had been in the train with the group, immediately replied "No Dash she wants you to let your guard down; don't!"

Rainbow wasn't about to trust anything she saw, now. Not after all those other times. She floated up a few feet and tried to decide how to help. As near as she remembered the dismembering pony of sweet street was an identical copy to her friend so she wasn't even sure she could rely on fighting style or skill differences.

Twilight was voicing similar opinions. "We had completely lost sight of Pinkie for multiple minutes. I'm afraid right now, Pinkie, whichever one you are, I don't trust you." but she trusted she could walk out onto the cloud, at the stairway's edge halfway between the Pinkies and cast between them looking for a clue.

Rainbow Dash wanted to scream at her to run away. She was about to get sick, thinking about what would happen if they let the black hearted Pinkie Pie live, let alone walk freely among them. Unconsciously she floated higher, and away from the stairs.

The one that had been waiting at the station continued to stare at the group's Pinkie, who looked away, to Twilight. Pausing a moment, she looked behind her at the group. Dash couldn't spare a glance to see their reaction. She could see however this Pinkie squinting her eyes in frustration, and now she was smirking at Twilight for a moment before waving with a forehoof.

Then she sank slowly into the cloud surface, and was gone.

"That was disturbing." Said the quasi alicorn. "I looked as deep as I could in this land, and could not discern which was more real." Looking at the still hovering blue mare, he tried to explain to Dash "In your sole dream, it was fairly clear." But he shook his head and said "No it was clear there was a third in your head, as I told you then. But Pinkie is a third also, and that interloper is a fourth and that is all I can see until she, or he adjusts the dream to suit the plan of ... whatever her goal truly is."

Rainbow Dash felt she had seen the arrogant hunger in the face of the Pinkie that dropped away. But she still didn't trust her senses. Not here; not anymore. And it might be the real Pinkie. Judging by the tears in her eyes it probably was.

The Pinkie Pie that was left sighed, and with the biggest, roundest eyes told Rainbow Dash "I'm sorry Dashie. I'm your friend and I won't hurt you. Honest, Pinkie Pie swear." But she didn't say more to the pegasus. No questions, no requests. Taking a deep breath, she turned to the other friends, and said "Come on guys lets go look for Dash's weapon so we can get out of here." And with that, she turned and walked away, not looking back. Rainbow Dash landed at the back of the group, just behind alicorn Jack.

Who tried to reassure her, but Dash was having none of it. "I can tell you the avatars you saw were operated by separate individuals." Jack told the still shaking pegasus. "So I can feel confident the one with us now is your friend, whom you trust in the waking world."

Rainbow Dash replied "I want to believe you Jack but the black hearted pony that has been chasing my dreams is all about treachery. About betrayal at what seems the strongest moment." She shook her head, and looked around.

It wasn't like Cloudsdale, actually. More like Manehatten made of clouds. This was the industrial end of things, which would explain the train station, although not how the giant two story engine was floating in air with no physical tracks to hold it.

Rarity slowed a bit, to walk beside Rainbow Dash. "So, I'm going to make a guess about this dream of yours. Applejack's destination resembled bits of her home, and her prize seemed related to the element she is connected to. But not closely enough to say that should make it clear on how the rest of us proceed."

Applejack, in the middle of the group, called back "Ah think it'll be in the very heart of this here city."

But Dash, trying to shake off her jitters, replied "No, because for instance your bucket was way the heck outside of town. And not in a proper orchard, and not really any kind of place you" Dash stopped. Her ears twitched in thought, then she started again. "Applejack were you sort of expecting your thing to be down a tunnel at the top of a hill?"

Applejack walked sideways a few steps, trying to maintain forward momentum and also eye contact. "Well hon, if'n I were building a whole world, and wanted to put the biggest, most expensive thing where the wrong types would never try to take it, yeah. Ah think Ah would."

Rainbow Dash raised her head, and said with confidence, "Then we need to go to the biggest Pegasus related museum this town has." Except she'd never been to Manehatten. "Uh, you tried living in a town sorta like this. It's Manehatten mashed up with Cloudsdale. Sort of. Do you have any suggestions?"

Rarity perked up, and said "In the Clydesdale building on floor eight, I think, there's a bunch of Wonderbolts related stuff. Like, maybe not a whole museum but close."

Applejack nodded. "Ah know where the Clydesdale building is, fer sure. Oh I remember floor eight is like a waiting room fer some of th' businesses above 'em. Decked out in Wonderbolts imagery to help pass the time while the big money folks ignore yer precious time."

Dash impatiently flew into the air, to hover above Applejack but a healthy distance above the probably-safe pink party pony. "Well, Wonderbolts ahoy. Lead on Applejack I want to know what joke my mind will play on me when we get to the big display case."

Fluttershy flew along beside Rainbow Dash, which wasn't such a feat since Applejack, who had lived in the town this dream represented, was leading the way at a comfortable trot. Ground eating for an earth pony but as the yellow pegasus was not an athlete by any stretch of the imagination she found it easier to fly beside Dash. "These empty streets are kind of creepy, actually." Well, and that was an OK reason too, thought Dash.

Aloud she responded to her timid friend by saying "Yeah Fluttershy it is. Applejack's mind got fake people. I wonder why I don't, huh?" But just as she finished, a loud sound came that at first Dash thought was the creaking of a building falling like dying timber, but it slowly morphed through the sound of howling wind, and finally into a cacophony of moans. "Scratch that. Empty is cool too." Rainbow Dash felt her skin crawl as the howl died away.

Behind the pair, an awkward flapping interrupted Dash's gloomy mood. She turned her head to see Jack, awkwardly trying to float with the pair. "Rainbow Dash," he said, still well distracted by the attempts to fly. "I believe the interloper has learned not to challenge us directly. The result is this sense of fearfulness, that may cause your mind to populate the city with monsters not of it's creating but yours. Guard your mind, young Rainbow Dash."

"Yeah I'll be sure to do that." Turning to her pegasus friend Dash asked casually "Hey Fluttershy did you bring any tin foil?" The yellow pony timidly shook her head quickly without a word. "Heh. Oh well. Bosspony says I gotta have a hat for this run."

From below, Pinkie still in front of Applejack despite not precisely knowing where the other earth pony was headed, Applejack called up "Hey, fer what it's worth we're more'n halfway there."

From the middle of the ground group came Twilight's voice. "And I sure don't see anything on the ground. So that noise was probably just the wind or something harmless like that." The report left a smile on the blue mare's face. Not because she believed she was any safer, but Rainbow thought Twilight Sparkle was cute when she was a little nervous. downright scary when she's frightened, but there's a short stage of cute that she's sitting in right now.

The next major hurdle showed itself when they arrived at the Clydesdale building. There was only one door in, and it was a revolving door. Big, curved segments that would admit one pony, or two if they were friendly. Rotating counter clockwise, the doors slowly turned, utterly obscuring the interior.

Rarity looked the building over from afar, now at the back of the group, and lamented "They're supposed to be built of glass, how do we know there isn't a trap inside?"

Rainbow Dash tried to dismiss the wall by kicking it, but unlike a true cloud, it resisted, clanging like steel. The clang echoed through the empty city and came back to them several times over the next few minutes. Pinkie Pie, who had been staring intently at the place where the curved cloud door disappeared into the mechanism unexpectedly said to the group "I'll volunteer to be last." Looking away from the door now, to her friends, she explained "That way, if you seem me just on the other side of the door, you can kick the pretender into the next dream without stopping to ask who it really is."

Remembering the train, when there had been six Pinkies during the zero-G time, Rainbow Dash added "Well, unless it's a hallucination like when I thought you all had turned into Pinkie."

The party pony screwed her face up in frustration. "Oh, yeah."

Standing in the midst of the group, the quasi alicorn had said nothing. To his right, Twilight Sparkle suggested "I'm the only other serious caster her, so I'm going to suggest I go first, and if nothing starts trying to eat you ponies out here, then Jack go second. Rainbow Dash third since this is her dream and we don't want to get stuck like at the line of buffalo that no one could get ahead of Applejack. Fourth,"

But there was a sudden CLANG as an explosive apple impacted the cloud wall to the left of the rotating door, applesauce and smoke flying away from the group but adding greatly to the reverberations that were still rolling past them. "These things aren't quite as strong as Ah hoped they'd be." said an only slightly chagrined Applejack.

"Gah! Fine enough talk we're going! Going now!" said Twilight and hair still standing straight up everywhere she rushed into the door, disappearing without a sound. Jack waited two empty doorways before grinning with a ferocity halfway between his sergal cousins slaughtering their next meal, and Pinkie being asked to arrange a big party.

Not wanting to be alone in this place, but thinking that Jack's segment was awfully crowded, Rainbow Dash jumped into the next open doorway. For some reason an old drinking song she'd heard once came to her, and as she disappeared she shouted to her friends "Meet me for a brew, after we finish what we came to do." And then she couldn't see her friends anymore. Couldn't hear more than a slight swish of air, and while there was nonspecific light in the doorway she couldn't seem much.

She started humming, before thinking it was talking way too long. don't get nervous you'll just make it worse. It's some kind of trick door, that's all.

Finally the light changed; a darkness gaped at the curved wall. The crack widened oh-so-slowly for Dash's comfort, and finally she could see the badly light foyer where her friends should be waiting.

She saw only Pinkie Pie. "Helllooooo, nurse!" her erstwhile friend said, and leaned as if to approach the pegasus.

Dash twirled and kicked for all she was worth. No time to even vaguely aim but kicking was a major part of her job. She hit solidly, but that wasn't pony flesh beneath her hooves. It felt like she'd hit a steel podium, and as it fell noisily over, there was the sound of shattered glass all around her, and the floor gave way. She tried to fly but falling debris cut into her wings making her catch her breath first, and then she hit ground.

She landed flat on her belly, splayed out like a badly cooked egg. Standing carefully she listened for cries of concern from her friends but heard nothing at all now. The doorway mechanism was tilted badly and sitting so as to block the passage above her, and there were superficial cuts all over her back and wings. The only source of light was the doorway above her.

In the direction she had come from but at her new height below the street, came a deep chittering, and a giant insect face filling the small tunnel approached her, mandibles working tirelessly.

Mind blank with terror, she flew away, down the small hallway below the building's entrance into the dark, bleeding cuts forgotten and screaming nothing in particular. After she hit a wall face first at some speed she stopped and considered her current approach to this new development. Looking back, the insect had moved about halfway into the shaft of light, but was apparently too big to follow any farther. Calling her friends' names echoed about the tunnel, which informed her by its echoes that her tunnel had made a left turn. But there was no response from her friends.

Heart still pounding in her throat Rainbow Dash called down the dark tunnel that went away from the monstrous insect. No echo for a little ways. Cautiously she started trotting and soon lost all sight around her. Thus it was that she tripped, and split open her lip an a sharp edge that was about chest high. Stairs up. Promising, but ouch!

Feeling each step carefully she climbed nine steps, and hit a curving outer wall and the stairway became a spiral staircase winding counter clockwise. Still no light, and now she couldn't hear the awful chittering anymore either. Shouting upwards didn't reveal much she hadn't already put together. Nine more steps, ten, eleven, and there was a landing. Shouting again she guessed the staircase continued but there might be a closed door. Carefully, moving one hoof at a time and never bringing it up completely off the floor lest she fall to her doom, she found a flat wall that might be a door.

After searching the flat wall for what felt like hours but was more likely thirty seconds, she found a likely protuberance and tried jiggling it with her mouth. She heard a 'click' and the panel moved away from her. Beyond the door was light, now painful to her darkness adjusted eyes. She heard a squeaking from the new passage, probably to her right. Yanking the door back shut she left her lips on the doorknob, and waited.

The squeaking passed her door, and continued, and after a time stopped. Cautiously, heart in her throat again, Dash opened the door, giving her eyes a chance to adjust before moving further. Starting close this time, the squeaking returned, and grew louder.

if they're looking for me they'd have seen the door slam shut. Something mechanical then, but what? Rainbow Dash decided to wait for the squeaking to pass her line of sight so she would know what manner of problem she would be dodging when she left her deathly-quiet tunnel.

Past the door, rolled an empty wheelchair, not unlike that thing Twilight Sparkle had been stuck in while trying to research Pinkie's pinkie sense. It stopped for a count of five by Dash's somewhat rushed counting, and rolled back into view, and beyond to stop slightly to her left. And again it squeaked to the right.

Once the automaton chair was past her door, she flew out, and ran to her left not knowing what direction would be best anymore. At a gallop but not flying for fear of the low ceiling she shouted at the top of her lungs not caring what else might hear. "Twilight! Jack! Anypony I'm here where the hay are you?!?" but didn't stop to listen for a reply.

Too fast to stop and examine her surroundings she raced past a hallway that crossed hers at a right angle, looking remarkably similar. Ahead of her the hallway she was in, ended with a porcelain sink attached to the blank, fluffy looking white wall.

Skidding to a stop a door flew shut behind her, smacking her tail and heels as it clicked shut. Everything was still illuminated, if badly, but when she jiggled the doorknob it refused her ministrations. Looking quickly around she found she had slid into a public restroom, and her ears told her the whole of the room was likely empty. In the muffled distance she could hear the wheelchair continue its squeaky patrol of the now deserted hallway. With my luck this is the stallions room, too..

Hoping there was a second door, she walked past the sink, and found to her left a row of three sinks, with a giant shared mirror behind them. There were four stalls to Dash's right as she faced the mirror, and with the fourth sink now immediately at her flank she guessed this was probably the mare's room after all.

Finding no second door, and the first door still firmly locked, she confirmed the ceiling and floor to be real ceiling and floor not a false set of tiles like she heard once the big buildings in the cities had sometimes. Having nothing better to do she went to a sink and got a drink of water. Boy I must be nervous. The mare in the mirror has the stupidest grin.

On a lark, Rainbow Dash poked at the mirror with a hoof. Solid, flat, cold, and her reflection comfortingly followed suit. But I'm frowning. I'm pretty sure. Aren't I? The reflection's grin slowly grew as Dash began to hear her blood pounding in her ears.

Rainbow Dash saw her rainbow'd mane split as her reflection pricked her ears at herself. "I'm not doing that, doggonit! Quit!" But her motions were no longer reflected in the mirror. Instead, the blue mare was mouthing something. A word. Several times, before she could force herself to acknowledge she knew what her misbehaving reflection was saying.

"Dashie!"

At this point Rainbow Dash was in too much shock to run. She was backing away slowly, still watching herself. Her reflection nodded smartly to the real Dash, and then drew a knife from her pack. Running it down her own front leg Dash watched as what should have been her began to bleed profusely into the sink.

The sink turned itself on. Only it was running blood, not water.

Screaming in terror she bashed herself repeatedly into the door she had come into but it wouldn't budge. From around the corner there was a tapping, as of hoof touched to glass. The sound repeated, and Rainbow Dash found herself peeking around the wall to see.

Her reflection, now missing her right ear and left eye, had smeared in blood across the top of the mirror, backwards since her reflection apparently didn't know mirrors reversed things, the word "Dashie!" with a heart below that. Meanwhile her reflection was now biting vehemently at the glass that separated them. Having no success she instead grabbed a wingtip, pulling it forward tautly and hacking with the knife again, trying to remove her own wing.

The other two sinks turned themselves on, dark blood streaming out, loosing enough steam to mercifully begin to obscure the terror on the other side for a moment before the reflection started writing in the steam. 'love U' was written twice, with 'dashie stay plz' and finally 'play w me' were written by an inaccurate hoof in the blood's steam.

Dash could almost see the reflection lifting her head in a silent scream of rage, before launching herself into the mirror. The reflection's wing was hanging oddly, and while a large amount of steam was wiped away with the whole pony's side, as the reflection fell a reflected sink fell away.

That sink on this side fell loudly off the wall, spilling its contents over the fluffy white floor. From the hole came a muffled mare's voice. "You have to come over here, Dash. Come here I love you Dash." But it was when the hole in the wall started overflowing with gooey, chunky gore that Dash completely lost her sanity.

Kicking at the door with all her might a dozen times, two dozen she was exhausting herself but couldn't slow down. The blood was starting to seep into this half of the room now and although Rainbow knew she had sprained both her rear fetlocks she didn't slow down.

She landed on her belly, when the door wasn't there to stop her. Dash rolled onto her back and brought her hooves in for a strike, barely seeing the gray pony standing over her. He spread his brilliant white wings, and called her name. "Rainbow Dash. You are asleep, Rainbow Dash. Just a dream no true harm can befall you here."

Her mind managed to register that it was Applejack who rushed past her, into the restroom whereupon the orange mare shrieked. Lifting both her apples into the air she whirled and kicked the apples into the mirror. don't crack the mirror she'll come over here Dash thought to herself, but was utterly unable to verbalize it.

Not waiting to see the results of the explosion Rainbow Dash rolled and jumped to her feet, and ran past Jack just to bump into Pinkie Pie's nose. Dash vaguely realized her legs were unreasonably hot, and her hooves had gone numb.

"Hey. Rainbow Dash." Pinkie kept her voice as flat as she could manage, and somewhere in Dash's mind it registered that this Pinkie didn't want to upset her. "Glad you're OK Dash. Really. Twilight is to my right, and I think Rarity is to my left so you've got lots of company. We're all here, OK?" Dash had taken a half a step back, and was now hyperventilating.

Daring to look away from the murderous face, she saw her friends. Every one except Applejack. WHERE IS APPLEJACK? What did you do to her? her mind screamed but again, nothing came out.

Behind her, the briefly forgotten earth pony spoke up. "That was a right mess. Mirrors shouldn't have a mind of their own. Shouldn't at all." Dash turned to see her missing friend.

"Heyyy." Dash managed to say. "Scary. So, you're here." She straightened her neck to look at Twilight now, "Can I pass out now or does dream work thaaaa" The heat in her legs had crawled up to suffuse her head, and with no air left in the Clydesdale building she passed out.

Rainbow -- Silent Dream, now with screaming

Rainbow Dash's head hurt. She could hear several voices, all a little muted but at least one stallion and as her mind slowly returned to her, she thought she recognized some of the mares around her. She was under a light blanket, and thought probably sleeping on a cloud. But just cloud flooring, it hadn't been fluffed into bedlike softness.

Applejack her mind said, with no further explanations. Pulling open an eye she saw giant magical lights along a ceiling that seemed impossibly far above her. Try as she might, Dash could not remember ever seeing that ceiling, let alone when she went to bed.

When had she gone to bed, anyway? A weeklong instinct to not be caught asleep when the horrible dream returned, caused Dash to snap upright. She was inside a large building made of cloud, and her friends were around her, most seated on the ground with their back to her. Fluttershy and Pinkie pie were facing inward.

Pinkie's mouth opened as she grinned and gasped at once. Fluttershy was looking around trying to silently get somepony's attention but everyone was too busy staring at the empty atrium. The building still didn't look familiar but Rainbow Dash felt certain she'd failed. Addressing Jack's gray ears, she asked "So, we all got kicked out then? Like AJ but too soon for it to be useful?"

It was fluttershy who responded first. "No, dash you're still alive. Well, in the dream I mean. You just went into shock or something."

Jack's voice echoed off cloudy displays in front of him. "I believe that was a simulated heart attack, or possibly stroke. Fear induced not damage as shock would be." But Dash noted the disbelieving look that the veterinarian pony gave the alicorn who was still not looking at them.

Seeing him as an alicorn finally brought it back. "Still asleep!" But the sudden burst of noise made Dash uncharacteristically nervous and she didn't finish the thought out loud, glaring askance at the corners and crannies of the large room. Haven't failed them yet, I can still find my ... thing.

Twilight looked over her shoulder, deep worry folding her ears down. "I totally get why you passed out in that restroom but where did you go? Everypony went through the doors and you never came out. After about ten minutes of proving you weren't on either side and weren't in any of the segments we just went on hoping we could find you."

Forgetting her prior nervousness, Rainbow Dash practically shouted at resident wizard. "The door?!? You just walked through the broken and shattered door and didn't hear a peep from me shouting in the tunnel below it before the giant pony eating caterpillar chased me into utter blackness where I almost broke both my front legs? How in the HAY did you walk through the door after me?"

Twilight Sparkle was gritting her teeth, and Pinkie was almost crying. It was Pinkie's voice Dash heard, even though the normally bright party pony was darkly mumbling at her hooves. "The door was still there, Dashie. I walked in last to make sure I wouldn't have to look you in the eye in case that started bothering you again but the door,"

Here Pinkie Pie did look up at Rainbow Dash, and Dash couldn't second guess her pain. "OK. Sorry, OK Pinkie? That's just not what I saw." Her frustration turning to anger, she leapt into the air and looked around for her prize. She didn't see anything like the elements of harmony stand anywhere, but all the display cases were made of opaque cloud rather than clear glass.

Dash didn't see the frantic waving from Fluttershy, but she did see a shadowy gryphon materialize and swoop at her, talons extended. As Dash was frantically losing altitude she glanced at her attackers face but could only see a steel plate that didn't seem to have any eyeholes.

She felt the air shift as the gryphon overshot her by inches, saw her light blocked by its passing, but when she landed she saw no sign of it. Of her friends, Fluttershy and Jack were looking up, but her wingless friends were either looking out, or in the case of Pinkie and Twilight, looking only at her.

"You totally saw that, right? Big scary armored gryphon?" Dash was not going to be accused of hallucination again. Of course RD, the thought to herself all of this dream is technically a hallucination.

Jack answered first, as he stood up. "No, Dash. We here on the ground did not. That is why we must use the stairs."

Fluttershy explained as the group warily began to move towards the staircase. "It only appears to those in the air. It might be this floor, Jack thought maybe it was guarding something here. He tried attacking it directly but it was so strong it started to drive him out of the shared dream and so he dropped back down and crouched until it went away." the yellow pegasus nervously looked at the impossibly high ceiling before speaking again. "That's what he said he thought, anyway. Do you know what it might be guarding?"

Pinkie ran over to lay a hoof on Rainbow Dash's right shoulder, and with her other leg pointed out across Dash's snout to a point three quarters of the way to the ceiling. "I think it's that shelf up there!" But then remembered her promise to not make Dash frightened of her, and stepped away to point again. "Sorry Dashie. But there's a ledge or a shelf or something."

As Rainbow Dash looked, seeing a small balcony perhaps three meters by one, with a box of some sort taking half the space and a door left slightly ajar demarcating the other half, Rainbow heard Jack's reply as he calmly lead the group. "There are other ledges too, Pinkie."

As Dash examined the column of cloud that made up this single room, she considered where she would hide, or protect her most valuable trinket. Aerial maneuvers would be needed. Even with that guard. Especially with that guard. Gotta be quick, or you're just not me.

Rainbow Dash looked again, and saw a square box protruding from the very highest point of the ceiling, highly obscured by the bright lights that surrounded it. "There." Dash pointed.

Everyone looked up. Fluttershy promptly fainted.

"Are you sure darling? Or do you mean there's a trap door just above it?" Rarity was straining her eyesight to see through the glare as she spoke.

"No trap door." Dash replied. Now she knew what Applejack had felt when she saw the giant worn out barn in the middle of the desert. It all made sense, now. She was sure of it. "See if I were to plan around there being an I Hate Fliers guard, I'd make sure you had to fly to get there. So there's probably triple plated steel inside the roof of that tiny room. The way in," She glanced around at the ledges. Probably the highest, but maybe just for fun it would be the one below, on that wall over there. "The way in is you climb onto the ledge, hooves still on the ground, and face the doorknob. If you're not facing the doorknob you're not really on the right ledge. Then you dash in. 'Cuz that's me, Dash." She paused for a winning smirk. "And open the door and then slam it shut behind you. Your hooves are again on solid ground so the guard goes away. Problem solved you just have to zoom back extra fast."

Rainbow Dash's confidence evaporated as the group crowded near a door. No pony was opening it. They all looked nervous. Dash followed suit and crouched down in case something rushed them.

It was Rarity who explained their apprehension. "When we were dragging you to the eighth floor we found closed doors to be, well, rather untrustworthy."

"She means monsters will often wait on the other side." Twilight elaborated. Suddenly her form was colorless and indistinct. If this was a spell, Rainbow hadn't seen one like it. But Jack turned from the door, hoof on lever, and saw Twilight's determined look, and her odd gray aura.

His reaction was to grunt and duplicate the spell on himself. "Shield spells in place, everyone? Opening now." And so saying, he opened the door.

There was a landing on the other side, not unlike the unlit landing Dash had let herself out of to be chased by an empty wheelchair. Everypony gave the empty landing a thirty second long look to be sure, then the shield spells were dropped and everypony filed onto, and up the stairs.

"New Spell, huh? Haven't seen you use that one before." Rainbow said, having run to the second spot just in front of Twilight.

Their hooves echoed in the column of cloud. Over the top of that noise Twilight tried to speak up saying "Yes Jack taught me not long ago. Much better than the one I knew during the invasion, this one dissipates thaumaturgical energy as well as slowing to nearly a stop any physical attack."

Dash thought that's what the old one did too, but didn't comment for fear of sparking an all night long discussion about the nature of thamaturgical discharges and their slowings.

The group repeated their bunching up, waiting, stepping out technique when they got to another landing. This looked like a large hallway, but a cursory glance showed no other rooms. The group went around the circle, and found some walled off sections with things like typewriters in them, but no doors to other rooms. "Cubicles" Applejack explained. "So they can shove the office workers into tighter spaces and get more ponies into their leased floorspace."

Rainbow Dash shuddered but that was the thought of working every day inside, away from the wide open sky. Rarity took one glance into the next cubicle they passed, and declared it "Simply dreadful." To which Applejack nodded solemnly.

Up another flight, and this time on the far side, across hundreds of workstalls, or cubicle as Applejack said the Manehatten ponies called them, was a door. Not waiting for the old ninnies to bunch up and yank the door open she rushed out onto the ledge and tried to stare into the light, looking for her suspended safe room.

What she found in her impetuousness was the ledge she was standing on, was made of a delicate, forgotten cloud. Not the dream cloud that the earth ponies were safely walking on, but water vapor that dissipated under the pressure from her hooves. As she fell, the cloud railing that had been at the edges of the now missing ledge clattered together like steel, and fell with her, making her evasive maneuvers very difficult as the angry faceless gryphon materialized to come for her blood.

But bashing the gryphon's face aside with a railing bought her enough time to brake and land at less then bone crushing speeds. Crouched as flat as she could make herself she looked up. The room was empty again. From three floors above, Applejack's strong voice carried down to her. "You alright sugarcube?"

Nothing a long hot bath couldn't fix. And a massage from Soarin while we're dreaming. Which, oh wait, we are. Standing slowly she found her legs and wings to be intact. She called up as loud as she could "Still here guys. Sorry about that, I got carried away. Does any pony see a door up near the lights?"

Pinkie's voice didn't carry as well, being an octave higher than Applejack. "No Dashie no door. Be careful I'll wait at the staircase landing for you." Dash wanted to call back for not to be alone, but hopefully Jack would think of that. Buddy system and all that.

The staircase didn't seem to match the one she came up with the group. The flights met at obtuse rather than right angles, and she had already trotted up five flights, more than enough to be above where she had come out before. Dream physics not real ones. But just as she was beginning to despair of ever seeing a doorway, she arrived at one. Twilight Sparkle was sitting so as to hold the door open with her rump.

She looked bored to tears. "Hello Rainbow." the light purple mare said flatly. Standing to let Dash through, she said "There's ... been a problem with Pinkie. But I don't think you'll have to worry about her now."

Rainbow's skin was crawling at the flat way her friend was speaking. "What? Like she got killed and is awake now?" Rainbow was letting her nervousness move her hooves faster, and was ahead of Twilight now. But the unicorn was plodding along like whatever she had seen made the whole endeavor a useless and wasteful ritual that she had no desire to complete.

Twilight didn't respond with more than depressed looks at her hooves when pressed for details. But both mares stopped suddenly when around the corner came Pinkie's bounding form. The earth pony stopped and stared incredulously at the unicorn. "Twilight! I thought you were a floor above!"

For a long moment, the unicorn said nothing. Rainbow Dash risked a look back, and saw the same flat expression but her eyes were clearly pinned to the party pony's face. Finally Twilight said "No I'm here. Are you sure you're OK though?"

Remembering the licentious look she typically got from her nightmares, Dash looked quickly between the two mares. In Pinkie's eyes was pain. In Twilight's eyes was that disconnect. Like she's been hurt so bad she won't let anything else in because it would hurt too much. what did she see? was the thoughts running through Rainbow's head.

Trying to back away from the slowly closing pair of ponies, Dash exclaimed "No. You're not making me do this."

"Do what, Dashie?" Pinkie asked, but never looked away from the unicorn approaching her.

"Make me choose between one of you. I know one of you isn't real but I'm not going to make guesses here about which one. You. Pinkie. Are you Pinkie Pie?" As she spoke, her rump hit the inner wall. There were tables to either side of her now, making a leap to one side difficult. She'd have to know, before she acted.

Pinkie turned her nose to face Rainbow Dash but her eyes were locked with the disassociated unicorn in front of her. "I'm real, Dash! She must not be real. Are you real, Twilight?"

Twilight raised her right hoof, a shiny steel band clasped just above the coronet band. "Oh, I'm quite real." There was a snick of steel as a blade rotated out, to extend her hoof's reach by half a meter. Plunging the blade into Pinkie's chest, the unicorn said "I'm just not Twilight Sparkle."

And as Pinkie stood there, choking as her dream life faded, Twilight turned, and now held the look of ravenous hunger as she smiled at Dash.

Applebuck the fake gryphon thought Dash as she flew away fast enough to leave a rainbow contrail. In this tight a space it was hard to not bump into the wall or those cubicles or anything else, but around the next corner she saw a broad, open staircase that lead up. The Gryphon was in the center, already flying fast for the narrow space Dash was cutting through. Up the half spiral stairs and nearly bumped into her friends, Twilight first. They can't see it, so, Dash folded her wings, and plowed into the crowd trying not to break any bones.

She was hyperventilating again. On the ground, albeit five or six stories up, the gryphon disappeared into a wall above Rainbow Dash. Giving a report is as short of sentences as she could, she explained that Pinkie would be awake. Hearing there was a false Twilight possible following up the stairs, the real Twilight and Jack cast their shield spells again.

Dash could see the door. It had a simple lever for a doorknob. The room would be big enough for a small mare like herself to turn around, but probably not fully stand up. It would have to do. "You guys hold that thing off. I'm getting my prize and will just jump straight down."

With a running start, Rainbow leapt into the air, and flew for all she was worth. She could see a streak coming from her left, and Dash knew it would be tight. Foreleg out, slamming down the lever and the door swung a little bit. Still with a lot of forward momentum she smacked the door open with her other foreleg and barely made it in. In fact as she stood she realized her tail was about half it's previous length. Just hair. But those were the pretty hairs, doggonit. I like green.

At the far end, Nearly at her nose, was a poster. Faded, dog eared, like her favorite Wonderbolts poster, but this was of the six lobed Elements stand. On a hook just below that, was a pair of goggles. "So, like. The goggles stick to you? How does this represent my Dream element?" Inside her head she said to herself I guess it doesn't matter. Just so long as it makes the fake ponies go away.

Putting tho goggles on, she shouted to her friends. "Got 'em go! Go!" And with that made utmost haste for the way down. This time the gryphon ripped her left wing off, but she was low and slow enough that the sudden fall didn't break her legs. Yep. Blunt instrument. Different than sharp. Wish I didn't know that.

Waiting on the floor for what felt like an eternity, the group all rushed up to her. She lowered her goggles, mostly to show them, but now she could see through the glass to the Wonderbolts paraphernalia inside, and the 'cloud' walls looked like steel and concrete.

And through those goggles Dash saw a sergal, running four legged rather awkwardly, approach her and look sternly at her bleeding wing stump. Raising her goggles she saw the slate gray alicorn. Up or down she saw Fluttershy crying profusely. "Look we just need to get back to Luna's mind, OK? My legs work I can get through this just for crying out loud everyone lets go."

One mad dash later, the group emerged onto the city street. Still running everyone tried to remember the way back. As when they entered there was a deep keening that blew through the city streets. And through her goggles she saw the concrete in front of her being replaced by clouds. Realizing there were only seconds before the wave approaching them met their galloping hooves Dash shouted "Jack Fluttershy the earth ponies they're replacing the cloud with real clouds." And skidding to a halt told the nearest unwinged friend to climb onto her bleeding back.

It was Rarity, who was wincing at the thought of laying on all that blood. Applejack had already obligingly climbed up Jack's back, Twilight was precariously balanced on a straining Fluttershy, and Rarity had a hoof over Rainbow's back. "Eew. Are you sure darling the streets all loo" at which point the wave reached the group and she fell.

Halfway into the cloud below Rarity was struggling to keep that hoof over Rainbow's blood soaked back. "No rush, hon' wouldn't want you to stain something" Dash said through gritted teeth. But one of the stronger casters levitated her onto Dash's back. And with that done, they walked. Carefully.

Finally they reached the train engine, and on solid steel again the passengers climbed down. At the helm of the metal beast Jack pushed levers and the train began to flow backwards, still with no visible track but no time of zero G weightlessness either. Then he drew an imaginary X on the floor, and said "I have anchored us to this train. We will return here when next we travel together." Lifting his head from the floor, he examined the exhausted mares. "We should wake for breakfast now. So."

Pinkie was in Twilight's dining room eating cookies and toast with Spike. Dash thought she looked none the worse for wear, but did have a great big smile when Rainbow ran up and threw her hooves around the party pony's neck.

"So, did you get it Dash? Did you run off the fake Twilight oh hi Twilight did you know there was a fake you in that dream? I can see Dash why you don't like having those kinds of dreams that really hurt even after I woke up at least for a little while but Spike fixed some tea and toast and I found these cookies I hope it's OK I ate them Twilight if not I'll get you some more at work today smile Rarity I'm not a ghost you look like you've seen a ghost or something." Pinkie swallowed the last of her tea, and deliberately laughed at nothing in particular. "See? Not a ghost because ghosts if you remember disappear when you laugh at them."

Everypony laughed at that idea, and at the party pony's antics. After a leisurely breakfast they all went their separate ways, having gotten most of a night's worth of good sleep.

Shadowy Missteps

That evening Twilight received a letter from her teacher, the very ruler of Equestria. In it she thanked the elements for their perseverance, and apologized for the physical pain they were enduring but had confirmed several bureaucrats had been similarly attacked and forced into taking sick leave to avoid utter nervous breakdowns.

"But, she says." Read Twilight, letter hovering in the air in front of her. "That most of this one pony's efforts have been spent trying to waylay us and the princesses feel confident they will triangulate his position in Equestria within a few more days." Setting the letter down she triumphantly turned to her friends. "That means we may not even need to fight him we just need to keep him busy."

"Because playing the role of bait is so rewarding." That sarcastic remark came from Rarity, as Applejack and the Jack who wasn't a pony laid another thin circle of flour. Setting her glass of eggnog down and laying a hoof across her forehead she proclaimed "Riding on Dash's back while my beautiful coat became permanently blood stained. Simply dreadful." Now waving her hoof in frustration she declared again, "Dreadful!"

Dash nearly did a spit take of her black tea before promising "I'll finish bleeding Rarity, before I offer to carry you through the sky again. By the way does your dream body weigh as much as your physical one? In which case you might consider cutting back from the holiday cheer." Dash used her tea cup to point to the glass in Rarity's hand again. Rarity rolled her eyes.

Twilight's enthusiasm could not be suppressed. "Girls we've done fine so far. It's been harrowing but I can say for sure it's been less painful than what we had before." Laying her body carefully on the line of flour and levitating a blanket over her back, she turned to the rainbow mane'd mare still finishing her tea. "Dash don't you agree? You lost a wing but you were free the whole time would you rather have an insane reflection performing self mutilation while you watched or whatever your normal nightmare was like?"

Twilight saw several sets of ears rotate to the pegasus, to catch her nuances of feeling in that answer. As the weather patrol mare set her tea cup down, she nodded as she looked first at Pinkie Pie, then back to Twilight. "Two thoughts, really. One was that every time I noticed my heart was in my throat, I meant it metaphorically instead of several times when" On this note Dash noticed the loss of color in a few of the softer mares as Fluttershy and Rarity blanched in silent, subtle horror. "Right guess I don't need to elaborate but the other is that those times were just a part of the whole trip. The rest was just a trip like any other dream."

Circle complete, Jack said "We are driving the enemy back. But we started late this evening; the moon is already up." Settling into his place at the head of the circle he looked at each of his friends. probably assessing their readiness to be knocked out Twilight thought, and readied her half of the spell. "Perhaps we will meet the princess Luna. Let us begin." Jack took a deep breath, and laid back, his tail crossing the white line, now swishing it to touch it to either side of his legs. Exhaling he said "Twilight, when you are ready. We shall meet again in dream."

Twilight released the sleep spell, which she had refined over the day and within seconds everypony and Jack were dreaming. She was affected last, and thought she saw some shadow move in the corners of her eyes but then she noseplanted and knew no more of her library.

---

A hot wind blew across her face, static charge building across the hair on her back. Twilight was some distance from the train now, and nearly standing on one of the tracks that disappeared behind her into a pony's dreaming. To her left were all her friends.

To her right was Snips. Looking lost and confused, he glanced every which way but did not move his legs. "Uh." was eventually heard escaping his mouth.

More confused than upset, Twilight couldn't guess if this barren desert had generated a Snips of normal dream, or if somehow Snips had been sucked in. Trying to calm the colt she said to him "Don't break anything for a minute, OK Snips?"

Applejack spoke first among her friends. "What in tarnation are you doing here. Are you even here Snips?" Twilight noticed the colt didn't look Applejack in the eye. In fact he barely responded to her question.

Again looking like an alicorn, Jack walked up and tried to get the colt to look him in the eyes. "Kid. You're an awake pony dragged into dream. I can see that." Still the colt would not respond, and now he was backing away from the train as if frightened of it more than the brightly colored alicorn.

Trying to understand his fear, Twilight looked again at the double decker train, and saw Luna walking towards them. "Princess Luna! Thank you for visiting!" Too late she remembered this was actually Luna's mind that her friends were visiting, but continued regardless. "Can you help us figure out why Snips got pulled in?"

The colt had stopped backing, looking angrily at the regent of the moon. Luna quickly flew up to the group, landing just beside Twilight to look at Snips. This time, Snips met the pony's gaze, and Twilight saw Luna's expression darken into fury. "This is not the pony Snips that you see before you."

Rainbow Dash lowered her goggles and promptly squeaked. Lightning bolts were arcing between Luna's wingtips as they sat folded over her back. Jack flared his wings and mumbled something. Snips, in response, looked at Jack. Jack's response to the eye contact was to inhale sharply, then comment "You're outnumbered here, you know."

"Numbers don't always win wars." Snips voice, but a confidence and even arrogance that was so unlike the young colt's normal speaking voice.

Again Jack's response was minimal; a raised eyebrow, followed by "They help."

Amidst Twilight's confusion was Snips' defiant defense. "Look it was a mistake. I didn't really mean to be here, OK?" the colt said.

Not looking away from the yellow-brown colt, Jack asked the princess "Chase him off or hold him for questions milady?" Twilight inwardly cringed at the incorrect honorary term, the more so since Luna still considered herself from a time when there were more layers of semi-royalty to intervene between herself and the peasants.

But the true alicorn was too busy being angry at Snips to waste energy on the false alicorn. "Twas already tried Jack. This thing is not even in Equestria holding it still is of limited value." Twilight saw the lightning stop arcing as the princess' expression faltered. "Jack, that spell I saw you use. Once, a long time ago." She looked over to him, almost afraid to speak it seemed. "I know 'tis not his body, nor yours. But would it work?"

Snips was growling now, squirming under whatever compulsion was being applied to him. Jack spread his brilliant white wings parallel to the ground, the leading edge pointed as far down as they could rotate, before speaking. Without looking away from his quarry, "You hold him down milady and I can but try the spell. Worst case I'll be a prince and he'll be both ticked off and not in your mind."

Twilight felt thoroughly lost but as Luna's horn began to glow, Twilight heard her mumble "Then win soon, king under the mountain." which hearkened back to the sergal invasion when Jack, using a sergal magic user's recently dead body had sucked so much power he had created a new regent, and called himself what Luna just did: King Under the Mountain. The spell she spoke of now must have been the one that closed their door and ended the invasion.

Twilight tried to follow Jack's spell as she felt it build, but it was complex as well as strong. True this was Luna's dream, but Twilight's perception was almost identical to when she was awake. She could discern there was a spell of searching, and now she knew those rough edges were what Jack called "hooks" that interacted with his imported magic that came from wherever the thing inside the once dead sergal actually lived right now. Still dead, technically. Otherwise it would wake up like Sweetie Belle back when she was his host.

Snips was howling now, but his hooves were bound tightly to the dusty ground beneath the unicorn colt. He squirmed and bellowed but was unsuccessful in any of his endeavors. Jack shouted a few words in a foreign language that sounded like it had too many vowels and not enough coughing to be the sergal language, and his spell discharged. Watching the finished product lash out at what the alicorns seemed sure was not really the young colt Snips, Twilight felt dumbfounded that Luna would ask for such a thing. That looks like it would rip apart his very soul looking for a specific piece of his soul!

Snips' dream body was freed for a moment, as he raised a hoof to point menacingly at the once-prince. "You're next small fry!" but as he spoke, his back half began blowing away in an invisible hurricane. Not like, he had been converted into dust, and the dust was blowing away, but flesh and blood and bone was pulverized and the brown and red gritty gore was blown away.

The ground where Snips had been standing was black now, the charcoal lightening in a fan shape on the far side of where Jack stood, a mute testament to the power Jack poured into his spell.

Jack turned his head to face the very concerned looking regent of the moon, but all he managed to say was "my laaaa" before collapsing.

"At least I don't have to put up with this clumsy oaf occupying alicorn magic space again, thank Celly." Luna looked a little nonplussed but not angry or surprised, thought Twilight. Her horn glowed and the still-quasi alicorn was levitated into the air. "Alright everypony if you please. I'll load this smelly piece of cargo and he should recover not too far into the trip. Have you all decided where you're going tonight?"

Rainbow Dash seemed the least shaken by the show of raw power and fury they all had witnessed seconds ago. It was her that spoke up, raising her goggles to look at the princess. "Yes ma'am. Twilight's dream. So, say. What on earth was that thing? It was ugly like I can't describe."

The group all started walking towards Luna's double decker train and Luna tried to answer. "I don't know, young warrior. I have never heard of anything shaped like that but we were seeing a dream projection and there may be other factors too. I have seen what I thought Jack's true form to be several times, but each one was different from the next, as well as all being no pony. Even here he looks like a sergal but I doubt he truly is."

Fluttershy hovered over to the unconscious pony, and glanced quickly at his still breathing form. "Princess, I don't think the train has medical supplies or anything so will we need anything or can you summon some dream thing for us to help him if he, you know" she tried to fly backwards to stay next to Jack but look Luna in the eyes. "wakes up with a headache or something."

Luna chuckled gently, and replied. "Oh softest of my dream warriors, no. You can summon what medical supplies you feel you need, but they will only heal as much as the recipient will believe you, and they, can provide for." Rotating her ears for emphasis, she continued, "Likewise you can regenerate as fast as you think a dream body can, if you believe you are dreaming, and should feel better now." A broad, mischievous grin stole across her face. "And if you're right of course. About being asleep."

Pinkie giggled. Rarity asked if they still needed go through with this. And Rainbow Dash, goggles still up Twilight noticed, if the spell had worked. "And do you know why it chose to look like Snips of things?"

Luna shook her head sadly. "I won't know until much later tonight if that shadowy figure can still return, so you must assume there will be another attack on your party tonight." Hooves clattering on steel, Luna boarded her own mind and set the still unconscious slate gray lump gently against a wall where no one would have to trip over him to board or operate the train. Walking back down the boarding platform she finished with "And that blasted interloper has made a mess of our guards during the day. Several will be needing therapy for some time to come before they can be allowed back into service. I dare not shirk my duties in the waking world, my sister would have my tail docked if I went with you tonight, as much as I dearly would love to see another's dreaming tonight." Flying straight up, the wind from her powerful wingbeats started a small dust storm around the mares on the ground. "Fare thee well element holders, and good luck!"

On the next downbeat, her wingtips touched below her hooves, and there was a flash as she teleported away. Twilight hesitated, looking at the place where Luna had just been. "I don't really want to be attacked by that thing in my deepest desires." she mumbled to herself.

"T'aint much we can do about it sugarcube." Came the equally quiet murmur of the farmer, proudly wearing her hard won implement of destruction as she put a hoof to the first step.

Dash, still floating above them all, apparently had heard her too but didn't feel a need to be all that quiet. "Hey look at the bright side, you're fine the next day." Dash pointed at her wing that had been missing yesterday. Twilight just nodded; she had never intended to back down, she just wanted to whine a little.

Seemingly reading her thoughts, Rarity said "That's not whining. No, dear THIS IS WHINING" but had not only used her 'I hate you make it stop' voice, but magically augmented its volume like the princesses sometimes did.

As Twilight boarded, smile returned to her face, Pinkie giggle snorted somewhere in the background.

Twilight -- Dream quest pt1

The train ride was uneventful. No zero-G, tunnels, or even rolling landscapes. One minute they were still in the desert, hills in the distance but not close enough to be 'growing' very fast. The next the engine was slowing to a rapid stop in what appeared to be the center of Ponyville.

"Gollleeeee. Willya lookit that?" Said Applejack as she departed first, looking almost straight up. As everyone climbed down Twilight finally saw what they were all looking at.

Where the library was supposed to be, the castle from Canterlot sat, albeit about half sized. There wasn't any guard ponies around it but the rest of town had at least earth ponies walking to and fro as if this were all normal. Even the giant train that was as tall as some of the houses seemed not to be gathering notice. Twilight tried to pick out some faces and didn't find anyone she knew from town, nor even ponies she remembered from her early school years.

Thinking it probably didn't matter, Twilight just made a beeline for the front door of either her dream home, or her childhood home. "I should warn you gals" Twilight said, "that castle is quite likely to be booby trapped in some way. Even if Jack's spell didn't work actually."

The named alicorn forcefully hauled himself into the air, hovering only with some concentration. "It is good to guard the gates of your mind. I have faith you will pass your own tests, Twilight Sparkle."

But the miniature drawbridge was sealed shut with a spell lock very similar to where Celestia kept her most precious implements of power. Twilight stared with eyebrow raised at the six blank circles connected by gold filigree to a hole in the center.

Fluttershy laid a hoof gently on Twilight's left shoulder, and said "The hole is the right height for your horn. That vault in the waking Canterlot is too high for you to reach. I bet we're still supposed to go this way." But at that she lost her confidence and dropped to a sitting position and tucked her head as far under her beautiful pink mane as she could.

Well, staring isn't answering my questions thought Twilight as she lowered her head and began pacing in front of the drawbridge. "Yes Fluttershy but we know this is supposed to be my entrance but I don't know any unlock spells. I'm stuck at the start and it's making me feel stupid."

Applejack said "A puzzle piece, huh? They can be fun. And frustratin' as all git out too."

Rarity's contribution: "Do the six spheres still represent the six elements of harmony? They're not marked with anything."

Twilight stopped and harrumphed at the door. Then sighed, stared a time and went back to pacing. "I'm not sure what each circle represents. But I feel certain the lock spell is a six-parter, that's a good guess. Except I don't know any complex lock spells. In fact" she stopped to glare angrily at her companions. "I don't have any clue how a spelled lock mechanism works. I know that the elite wizards such as the fedaykin devise their own so no other wizard can steal their inner secrets."

At this Jack, who was barely even watching her, spoke up with his dusty head still facing the rest of Ponyville. "It will be the simplest six part spell you already know." Turning his head now towards Twilight, he explained "Look out there. Nothing unusual. Strangers to them approach what they must surely believe is their capitol city, seeking entrance, and not one has challenged us nor even taken note." Looking back over the town, he returned his examination of the ponyfolk.

Twilight was staring at the four legged enigma with scrunched eyebrows, but it didn't reduce her confusion any. Rarity again spoke up with "What about that, uh, memory spell, dear?" Twilight unconsciously redirected her confusion cannon at her fellow unicorn. "When the avatar of Chaos was loose you cast a spell so that we would remember what it was like to be your friend. Was it the same spell over and over again or did you revise it for each recipient?"

Twilight shook her head, her deep purple mane drumming against her neck as she did. "Those were separate spells. I tweaked each a tiny bit to emphasis which friend I was remembering but" Then Twilight had a sort of epiphany. She could just shove them all together, make a big five part spell and even add herself. Hoping there wasn't a steep penalty for guessing wrong, she said "Look girls I can try but I'm not sure about this."

She quickly made her memory spell into an impersonal, six part thaumaturgical energy blast, and inserted her horn into the hole until the tip of touched the edges, just as the drawbridge's surface started compressing her forehead hairs.

With her eyes that close she couldn't see the glowing gold surround her horn hole, which flew down each filigree wire as green light, making each circle grow brightly. Each cutie mark was vaguely visible in the light before all that energy faded, and a loud series of clicks could be heard inside the door.

What was supposed to be a drawbridge simply slid away, into the sides of the castle doorway. "Tom saved th' day! Thank ya to Rarity for remembering Tom!" came from an over energetic Applejack. Rainbow Dash snickered loudly but tried to hide it as a sniffle when Rarity glared at her. Just barely loud enough for Twilight to hear, Fluttershy said "Woo hoo. Go Tom." and Twilight was warmed by the brilliant sparkle that didn't make it any farther than the pegasus' eyes.

Rarity tried to be a good sport but mumbled through gritted teeth "I really thought we'd agreed ..." While Jack, now taking up the rear position, after staring in confusion a time finally agreed with himself to level his eyebrows and hum a merry tune instead.

Which was the only sound adding to the clip-clop of the band's hooves on the cobblestone floors. When he finally noticed how eerily silent it was, he looked around at the tapestries flapping in silent breezes, the empty corridors and the room that had furniture (still half sized, Twilight noted.) and remarked "I have gone in search of myself. If I should return before I arrive, kindly detain myself until I get back."

Pinkie's reaction was to giggle long and loud, then to convert to her pogo hop with a silly grin on her face. Twilight Sparkle just rolled her eyes but Rainbow Dash said "Yeah sure thing kingy. What does your other self look like?" But Jack didn't deign to respond with more than a lopsided smirk.

She wasn't sure where her item would actually be, but the throne room seemed a fair guess. All the rooms and hallways and corridors were exactly half the size of the life size, waking world castle in Canterlot. Fortunately even the narrower sections were wide enough to walk two ponies abreast, and Jack never once had to duck under a doorway.

Finally they arrived at the throne room. Still not a single pony, and there was nothing standing out to imply it was the end of their endeavors. There were two pony thrones at the head of the dais, although the larger one was a brightly colored wire mesh that might not accept the weight of any pony. Applejack was fascinated by it, declaring "That there is aluminum! And Here's copper and I think that must be gold. Don't know about this shiny wire here. All braided like, and I don't think there's any iron in it." Turning back to her unicorn friend she asked "Aw Twi don't ya know what it means at all?"

The other throne was well padded and a brilliant red suede covered the seat. It was larger than a pony would actually need but didn't look big enough for Celestia to recline on and neither was proportioned like the upright thrones that Celestia actually used. More like the chaise lounge that Rarity hauled to picnics only nicer. Much nicer.

"No Rarity I'm afraid I don't." Turning to the quasi alicorn who was sitting on the cobblestone at the foot of the stone dais, she asked "You're supposed to be our guide, what do you know about it?"

Jack looked first from the bottom of the stairs, then flew to the top. "First, friend Applejack, that wire" he pointed to an especially shiny section. "Is polished titanium. And that wire and it's like" he indicated another less shiny, but still vaguely silver colored part "is platinum. Lastly the feet and outer wires all appear to be silver with gold accents." Stepping back to look at it from a meter away, he turned now to Twilight and finished his interpretations. "This throne is ceremonial. It means you give honor to a leader who is not here in your mind. That this throne is bigger than the pony who sits in control of all you remember and know, it says you feel deeply that that one's reign is more important than your own place in your heart and mind."

There was a sudden clatter of hooves as a pony ran up the hallway into the throne room. In full royal guard golden armor, it was Spark Impulse, the pegasus who had helped Jack and Celestia keep in touch about the reeducation of the surviving sergals. Now he was galloping nervously towards Jack. And not flying. Odd. I wonder if he's inside our minds or if this is a dream pony?

The pegasus guard reached the alicorn and bowed deeply. Out of the corner of her eye, Twilight saw Rainbow Dash put her goggles on and lower them to look at Spark. Snorting in dismissal she pulled the goggles back up.

Twilight thought the massive stallion was about as uncomfortable with honorifics as she would have been, but heard his voice stumble through some sort of formal hello. "I Am jack, once-prince called King Under the Mountain and was then Regent of the Rocks beneath your Feet, now not quite so immortal god king among ponies." Still no response until he added hesitantly. "You seemed to be looking for me?"

Spark Impulse leapt up and said "My Lord Jack, Princess Luna sends her regards and also grave tidings." He fished around in his saddle bag for a moment before handing a scroll to the alicorn, who levitated it and unfurled the letter.

While Jack was examining the letter the royal guard bowed again, and nervously ran back out. When he was gone, Rainbow Dash said "So Twi, was that your dream stallion? Cuz he wasn't real."

While Twilight blushed deeply, Jack lowered the letter a little and said "No. Luna's, more likely. Her letter offers well wishing of hope and success. Also warns"

There was a deep moan, followed by several more, coming from somewhere outside the throne room.

"Warning that the shadowy figure has already returned and she's certain he's trying to obstruct your passage here." Five rotting corpses dressed in what once might have been servants garments shambled into the throne room. Not looking worried yet, Jack asked "Twilight do you know the way to Celestia's bed chambers?"

Feeling quite distracted by the moaning, shambling undead menaces that were being joined from a couple of hallways now, Twilight stammered "Yes. Yes I know but normal ponies can't get in there that's utterly private only the princess"

Jack interrupted her. "That is the waking Canterlot. Here you are the princess. This is your castle. For lack of better suggestions I say we exam your most private room." Then, glaring in consternation at the thickest group of zombies, he said "Excuse me friend Twilight." and then a ceiling brick, perhaps hundreds of tons of rock at a dozen meters on each flat edge, fell from sky and crushed the undead into a greasy paste that was oozing out from under the tile.

Twilight -- Dream quest, Pt 2

Author's note: Published part one, didn't I? Well, I guess this quest will become a three-parter then! (or something)

The not pony, currently no more magical than a strong unicorn when awake, turned to his companions, all of whom were staring with open mouths. Twilight eventually shook off her awe long enough to stammer "Won't Celestia ... I mean, won't I? Uh. The palace. Ponyville. The palace in Ponyville won't. I uh"

Twilight saw the quasi alicorn roll his bright yellow eyes, his voice a rumble albeit nowhere near his sergal voice. "The damage is far from permanent or in this case even symbolic of anything since I did it." Stretching his neck to emphasize his next point he asked "May we please proceed, friend Twilight?"

Trying not to look at the dark ooze coming out from the giant stone that she was also trying not to look at, Twilight managed to shake herself loose and call "OK girls. And Jack. Follow me!" Fortunately for the group she knew this palace inside and out. She'd even snuck into the bedchambers just so she would know what she was missing although that had been a lot of years ago.

And whatever the interloper was doing, he hadn't changed the layout of the castle yet. hafta avoid the servants' passages though. They'll be undead now. But even so, the larger rooms were filled with moans of somepony's nightmare.

They passed the entrance to the kitchen complex used for formal dinners such as the gala. A pale pink pegasus stallion with no skin on his left fore, and his right wing hanging loosely by some tendons was accompanied by a deep blue earth pony mare. Their manes both looked reddish brown but she wouldn't trust that just now. From behind her came a clattering of hooves as the group stopped, and Twilight heard Rainbow call "Phantoms. Applejack?"

Twilight looked over her shoulder to make sure the farmer had a clear shot as Applejack tossed her two apple bombs high before spinning to catch them with her hooves. One, two shots that smacked wetly into the zombies. But instead of dust that disappeared, as in the forest, these phantoms' dust fell as a small amount of red mud that smelled of decay.

Panting, Twilight cautiously walked past the doorway, and while there was a urine stained yellow pony of unidentifiable race at the far end, it had a lot of counters to weave around. Speed had not been their strong point; Twilight began cantering towards the spiral staircase.

Now they were one of the few semi dangerous ledges in the castle. Beyond the railing to the group's right was a dozen or more shambling forms, the stench coming from them nearly made Twilight gag. The zombies all stopped their ragged breathing and looked up. They began moaning almost in unison as they chose a direction to walk in. Three staircases equally near them, none very near. We've got time. But Twilight reconsidered her opinion as she was yanked forcefully into the air, the sound of sharpened steel whooshing past her.

Looking up she saw Rainbow Dash had grabbed her and was holding her three meters in the air, her goggles lowered and looking very concerned at something below her, which turned out to be a very long spear. "Can't lose ya now Twi! And that's not a mere phantom either."

Stepping out from the hallway was something like a diamond dog but his overalls were covered in bloody body parts from all different types of animals. Also, his wrists ended with two hands each, one facing in and another facing out. That's a moray eel's head, isn't it? No sickle Twilight had the presence of mind to notice thinking it was nice this wasn't the killer that usually chased her through her fillyhood home.

The moray monster picked his spear up slowly, and as he came out into the pathway her friends were in, Applejack loosed two apples. Both exploded, leaving small holes in the monster's overalls that oozed slowly, but the monster gave no indication he felt the attack at all.

Rainbow set her down at the back of the group, but Twilight set a hoof to her side. "Stay here we're not armed." she said to her friend as she cast an extended shield spell, covering her blue friend. Twilight saw Dash stare wide eyed at the blurry haze an inch in front of her eyes, and nose, and ... but other than catching her breath in surprise, did nothing else.

The monster dropped his spear as fast as lightening, Twilight's friend scattering as the stones they stood on shook with the impact. Another apple of truth exploded harmlessly on the monster's right outer hand, the inner hand holding the spear with confidence still.

And then there was a crackling combined with the loud scream of a certain blue pegasus mare. The spear was driven straight, like its first attack but this time it impacted Twilight's shield over Rainbow's chest. The force drove her back some distance but Twilight concentrated on maintaining the shield over that distance.

Too focused on her one friend, she didn't parse what Jack shouted but she saw Fluttershy and Rarity run to the monster's side, kicking with all their might at his hip, and his ribcage. In his current position his body was parallel to the floor, and he did move this time, tripping over Jack's prone body.

Jack had thrown himself to the ground to roll into the eel's knees, and now was kicking out to catapult the thing over the railing. A loud crunch was heard a second later, which was followed by a blood curdling scream.

Rolling upright to look over the railing, Jack said "Still there." Turning back to Twilight he first addressed the group with "So I assume no one wants to make cottage cheese of out their own blood?" For emphasis another blood curdling scream was heard, followed this time by the scrabbling of the thing trying to stand back up. "So, friend Twilight? Onward if you please."

Shield dropped, Twilight nodded breathlessly before taking a brief second to look over her shoulder at the utterly stunned Rainbow Dash. Her violet eyes were as large as dinner plates but her skin was unpunctured. Twilight pointed towards their destination with her horn, once. Dash nodded but still didn't look like she trusted herself to breathe.

So to give everyone a chance for their heart rate to lower a little she stepped out at a brisk trot instead of her hurried canter. Just three doors down and to the left for what, ten meters? But the closed doors they passed all had zombies pouring out of them. Pushing for time she just used broad push spells trying to keep the path clear. "Almost there just keep the path clear guys!"

The left turn was clear and Twilight broke into a full gallop. But she misguessed the conversion for the shrinking castle and on the smooth stone she slipped and fell trying to brake for the turn into the closed door. Climbing back up she saw her friends had safely avoided her mistake, but the zombies were closing fast. Well, as fast as zombies close. But still I shouldn't dally here long. Twilight thought to herself as she hesitated at the opulent gold filigree inlays displaying curlicues and hearts and geometric shapes.

"Twi?" Came from the back, where Applejack had just loosed two apples and was waiting for the refill. In this narrower hallway she would be limited and soon overcome. Twi grimaced as she thought about bursting forth into the princess' private quarters.

"Remember friend Twilight, this castle is your mind. You have the right to enter your own heart's door." And with those encouraging words from the group's guide Twilight pushed down the lever, and swung open the door.

It wasn't half sized, when the group went in. Brilliant red and blue tapestries hung between the paintings of Ponyville, and her friends standing valiantly against the forces of darkness and chaos, their element necklaces glowing even through the pigments on canvas. The largest bed Twilight had ever seen stood near one window, a thick quilt covering it. If it's like what I remember, it's filled with gryphon down donated by their army when a peace treaty was negotiated four hundred years ago, and ... is that gold filigree woven into the alpaca felt?!?

Twilight's stomach turned to lead. There, in a duplicate couch like the throne outside, was an alicorn, her lavender coat long and fluffy, covering her soft, well fed sides. not fat, exactly. Just comfortable. Has been for a long time, too.. The alicorn set down the quill and paper she had been levitating, and raised her regal head to examine the newcomers.

Her mane was a deeper lavender, almost purple with a red streak next to a deep pink streak, about a third of the way down her neck. On her wings she had matching purple and pink feathers a third of their length from her body; on the bottom for her right wing, and the top for the left wing. Her eyes were a near match for her mane; pale purple.

Twilight -- Dream quest Pt 3

As the lavender alicorn raised her padded body from her padded chair they were filled with hate. Flaring her wings she rushed up to the group but Twilight thought she hadn't even seen her visitors yet. She said, and Twilight thought it was to her friends but wasn't sure as her eyes were pointed to the hallway, was "Excuse us a moment." Then she began augmenting her voice, shouting "Begone foul intruders! Thy hooves be cursed each step thou take! Begone!"

The doorway, still open, began to fill with lightening so thick it completely obscured the zombies outside, who were catching fire and stumbling away. Presently the door swung shut and Twilight did a quick head count as she heard the latch click into place, locking them in with this unidentifiable member of the royal family.

"Hey Twilight she's got your cutie mark is this your dream self?" blurted Pinkie Pie. Twilight looked to confirm this alicorn, as tall as Celestia, had the same cutie mark she herself wore.

The unnamed alicorn looked at Twilight, and raised an eyebrow. "Truly? Art thou Twilight Sparkle? Lie not to us or it will go poorly with thee."

Feeling awkward beyond words Twilight could only bow, and stammer out "Yes, your highness." Behind her came Jack's voice, sounding suspiciously like it was coming from the floor, as if he was bowing too. He never bows to the princesses. Why me?

"It is an honor and a pleasure to meet you, Twilight's heart." His voice now coming from halfway up the room, he was obviously done with formalities. "Might we know by what name to call your highness?"

The alicorn sighed, and carefully set her wings to her side. "We are Princess Eos, by the grace of Celestia we are ruler of the kingdom of Twilight." Her head turned to Twilight as she finished. "Of Twilight Sparkle. Rise, young unicorn." Twilight stood up. Out of the side of her eyes she saw her friends had all been too worried about getting away from the zombies to show proper respect to an alicorn.

But now that things were slowing down, Rainbow, goggles still down, was expending great effort to suppress a giggling fit as she decided to raise them off her eyes.

Walking to the blue mare, the alicorn said "And to what pleasure, or horror, do we owe the honor of thy visit? Wherefore dost the holders of the elements spoken of old intrude upon my most inner sanctum?" Rainbow Dash was trying very, very hard to look serious.

Twilight, hooves still rooted in place turned her head to say "We've been pursued by the things that made those zombies. Princess Luna thinks we can defeat him permanently if find some tool inside our dreams."

Again the alicorn sighed, and turned back to her table. "We shall consider your request. We have screwdrivers and hammers, but we think these are not the tools thou searchest for." Scrolls began floating out of her bookcase and unfurling before Eos, before curling again and floating back.

Dash made her way next to Twilight, and put her goggles on Twilight's head. "Ya gotta see this, girlfriend." Dash whispered.

Still unbelieving Twilight humored her friend. Probably a prank. Y'know Dash now's not the best time. she thought to herself but looked anyway. There, floating book after book in front of her bespectacled eyes was an aged version of Twilight. No wings, small horn, and extra large saddle bags filled to overflowing with books, scrolls, ink and quills. Her lavender coat had faded to light gray around the coronet bands, and her muzzle was white.

Presently, she had turned her head and was peering over glasses to make eye contact with Twilight. "Dost thou find us amusing, then?" And the utter mismatch of regalia and frumpy elicited a short snort of laughter.

Twilight pulled the goggles off quickly and said to the alicorn "No, your highness." and tried to fumble with the goggles to give them back, but princess Eos grabbed them by levitation and, once she held them above her head, summoned a mirror.

Trying to look at herself through the goggles left a look of deep confusion on the princess' face, until she tipped the mirror down to what should have been her chest. Now, she turned her head from side to side, and a small smile could be seen at the corners of Eos' face. "Truly?" was all she said before dismissing her mirror and floating the goggles back to Rainbow Dash. "These devices of vision art thine, are they not?"

Dash plucked them from the air and set them over her ears. "Yes, ma'am."

Rarity's voice joined with Pinkie's in a surprise scream as the tip of a spear erupted from the door to the hallway. Princess Eos flared her wings and shouted with full augmented royal canterlot voice. "Dost intrude here? Thou shalt retreat by my command! None who are unfriendly to my kingdom shall dare such approach!" The spear retreated only to smack again against the door, although this time no second hole formed. Eos' ears twirled and twisted as she considered the news of this attack.

Turning to Twilight she said "What thou needest, young mare, is not to be an old filly. Thou art a warrior now, a wizard of Celestia's army. Confidence in thyself is lacking; thou art indeed, something special" her horn glowed, and a long, gently curving sword appeared in front of her. The handle was wrapped in strips of red silk, folded so as to present a checkerboard of dark and bright red colors. The scabbard was a deep red mahogany. Tied to the scabbard were enough straps of vulcanized cotton to hang the sword at a pony's side.

Princess Eos handed the blade to Twilight, who levitated the straps so it would hang at her left side. It was long enough that the tip of the scabbard was across her flank, and the tip of the handle was a little ways in front of her chest.

Another clang at the door, again the blade did not puncture again. Eos paid it no mind, so Twilight tried to keep her focus on the princess. Herself. Whatever.

Princess Eos explained "That tachi is called by the name xìnxīn. It reminds thee to believe what thou already knowest." Twilight tried to reproduce the pair of sounds she heard the princess say, silently to herself but was having a heard time. Seeing her distress, Eos grinned and said "Shin, sheen. As thou wert to polish up thy hock 'til doth shine. Shin-sheen."

"Shin-sheen" Twilight repeated. "Is that pretty close?" but by the princess' friendly grimace Twilight guessed she had mangled the name.

Eos shrugged, and said "It is close enough, young mare. Thou shouldst research the old forms, and the ways of the gryphon. Thou must have once, ere we could know the name of thy blade." Right. Twilight thought to herself. That's me up there. So I know everything she knows.

Turning to her friends, she found the maneuver a little awkward with the unfamiliar and unyielding steel strapped to her side. "Alright girls?" but Twilight looked up and saw Jack, slightly glassy eyed as he followed the alicorn back to her inside throne. "Jack?" An ear twitch, little more. "She's not real. You do know that, right?"

Finally the dusty equine shape turned to regard the wizard mare. "Even so, even so. You're quite the looker as an alicorn, you know." He winked at her before looking at the rest of the party. "We out? All copacetic?" and with a few nods from around the group, Jack said "On your lead then, oh shiny of shin." and he stepped aside to let Twilight Sparkle have clear access to the door.

As Twilight drew her tachi xìnxīn, blade of the heart, a spearhead erupted from the door. Thank you so much for this honor, Jack. And Eos. But her sarcasm remained unspoken. Instead she took several breaths to steel her nerves, before levitating the door wide.

The action was fast enough that the spear was yanked out of the hand of the moray eel-dog. Twilight burst into a full gallop and slashed at the double hands that reached for her, some part of her mind noticing the small wounds from the apple bombs were still oozing wetly. On the far side of the narrow hallway she called to Applejack "More bombs!" before engaging the grasping arms in melee. Too close! Long sword plus long arms mean neither has a good advantage but he's used to his body!

Twilight skittered to the side trying to give herself some slashing room as four explosions, one close after another, detonated on the eel-dog's shoulder blades. It caused him to miss a swipe at xìnxīn but otherwise had no visible effect. On the far side of Eel-dog came the moans of approaching zombies. I've trapped myself by skittering this way! was all Twilight could think.

Her friends poured out of the royal bedchambers and forgot about Eel-dog, instead focusing on clearing the approaching undead horde. As Twilight backed up she tried to think where this hallway went. Dead end. Literally this time. Phooey. Worse still was that every step she took gave her opponent the same measure of increase in strength of strike as she herself gained.

From down the hall, at the edge of the railing came Rarity's voice. "Teleport Twilight! No zombies right now." But her moments of struggle let her see the shift in weight of her opponent. He would turn and run at her, the moment her spell discharged. Two more explosions against his back, with no more effect than the first four.

Eel-dog's right inner hand went across her chest, and the outer hand grasped for her left leg. Rearing out of that reach she struck at the fishy face, but the other hand came straight up, this time grasping the blade firmly. There was a loud clatter as one of the equines in the hallway galloped full bore towards the fighting pair. Twilight's jaw ached as she held onto her sword but Eel-dog was steadily driving the handle towards the floor.

And then he let go, as his own spear poked out from the base of his neck. Peeking around Eel-dog's broad shoulders, Jack's head appeared to say "Now canst teleport?" Twilight spared a handful of milliseconds to glare disbelieving at their guide. "Canst" ? Sorry, big guy, can't help you. Then she gathered her magic and formed a teleport spell that would put her near the railing. no room to run so I'll have to use the static form Not that Twilight actually thought those words, but the image of the lower energy doorway as compared to the teleport-in-place spells appeared before her, and she chose the one that would be safest to use.

Having never wielded a sword before, Twilight was surprised she had done as well as she had, but now that she was trying to sheath it, she was running into real problems. Applejack leaned over to offer some assistance. "Blade down to the ground so it matches the scabbard, hon. Never mind the handle just point the tip, there. Like that just, yeah." the tang snapped into place, holding it firmly in the scabbard.

Jack was flying backwards, wings brushing firmly against the masonry with every stroke. He nearly ran over Pinkie and Dash doing it, and did trip himself knocking down poor Fluttershy who had just ducked instead of running aside. "Make like a tree and leaf, ponies!" the three winged party members took to the air. Twilight saw Fluttershy make eye contact with Jack once they were airborne and had to hope that was enough friendship patching for now.

Now they were galloping, the sound of steel impacting stone became routine sound behind their hooves. Eel-dog had pulled his spear free and was chasing whoever seemed slowest, his weapon's reach enough to threaten even the pegasi who had to avoid the low ceiling, or drop to a gallop while ducking through arched doorways. Rarity and Twilight ran in front, using push spells to knock aside the rotting trash that used to be dream ponies.

The front drawbridge was still open, and with no sign of another crowd of zombies the group poured on the speed, gaining nearly a meter gap between Eel-dog and themselves before crowding through the gate. Behind them, Jack dropped to the ground to face their attacker but was unable to bring up a shield spell before a third of a meter of sharpened steel buried itself in his chest.

Fluttershy's wings folded in utter fear, and Twilight gasped but waved her friends onto the train. Jack turned his head, blood already staining his lower lip. "Run. Get the engine going." he said with what strength he could muster, then turned to Eel-dog to cast something. Twilight could see the energy on his horn but didn't see an effect and didn't take time to interpret the flow of energy.

Applejack ran to the controls, and shouted "All aboard?" after hearing several mumbled assents, she slammed the two levers to send them back to the station in Luna's mind. Twilight was knocked to the ground as the engine jerked itself into motion.

"What about Jack?" Said Pinkie, who stuck her head out a window to see him still struggling with Eel-dog, and clearly losing.

Twilight, standing now, replied "He said he'd anchored us and we should concentrate on getting back to Luna's." Sort of. Hope that lie doesn't catch up with me too badly. He'd clearly intended for the group to leave him.

As Jack fell to the ground, Twilight noticed her dream wasn't in color anymore. And the sound, as Rainbow Dash asked what was going wrong, sounded distant. Twilight couldn't feel her hooves, or the steel grating she was standing on. She could feel a warm weight across her hips, however. And her neck was starting to hurt.

Opening her eyes, she realized what had happened. When Jack had died, their anchor to each other had failed. She was awake now, in the library, and a wall clock showed her it was two in the morning. Her friends were blinking their eyes, lifting their heads.

Except Jack, who was breathing was fast and shallow, his limbs twitching slightly. After a few minutes of this, Twilight went to wake Spike. She'd need to write a letter to the princesses that Jack needed saving.

Twilight -- descent into madness

Luna teleported into Ponyville, and quickly flew to the library. It had been nearly an hour, and Jack still couldn't be woken up. Twilight let Luna in, and explained developments since her letter. "We've tried shaking him, or holding his twitches still, no response. I tried casting the sleep spell on Fluttershy and a little later on Rarity and Dash. They fell asleep and were in a dream but they were separate dreams and Jack wasn't there and Dash said she didn't have her goggles. Can you help us?"

Luna strode to the circle of flour and watched the sergal's short, rapid breathing. Her normal stern look of formality softened a little, and she brushed her hoof awkwardly across the floor. "Whoever is doing this is pouring a lot of magic into holding Jack still. We've been tracking it since about a minute before your letter arrived." The princess of the night looked around at the sleepy eyed ponies, and waved them closer. "I can't bring you all into a single dream the way Jack can, but I can enter your dreams and bring you with me." The shushing and swooshing of hair against cloth as everyone went back to their sleeping spots around the flour circle, and at a signal from Luna, Twilight cast her sleep spell again.

The next morning, sun peeking in her window, Twilight's first thought was "how did I miss that?" But considering how high the sun was to reach her window it would be time to go back to her daily routines. Pulling the blanket aside she rolled out of bed, only to find her movements severely hampered by a red bar that appeared to be forcibly strapped to her side. That's xìnxīn! I'm asleep!

Twilight raced down the stairs to the central room in the library. Spike was putting away some books, and there were several forgotten tea cups on various surfaces. "Morning Twilight. Rarity should be bringing Sweetie Belle over to pick up a science book or two but there isn't anything else planned. Have some breakfast I guess." The young dragon absentmindedly pointed in the direction of the kitchen. "I made oatmeal and you're welcome to finish it off."

Twilight walked carefully around her home. Nothing seemed amiss. The furniture was back in the middle of the room, and there was no sign of flour. Or her friends, and Spike wasn't supposed to be included. "Spike!" The poor dragon dropped the book he was trying to leverage into the tight space on the bottom shelf. "Are you awake?"

Spike dutifully turned and looked at her. "Yes." He was standing at attention. This can't be the waking spike. My dream Spike then? But there were no details missing from his appearance. He was even fidgeting like the real Spike would.

"No you're not." She said with authority.

Spike blinked. "Oooohkaaay." He went back to cramming the book into the shelf. From this distance Twilight could just make out the title. Anthropomorphized Compendium of Spells Cast by Nonponies (with emphasis on spells requiring physical components)

Twilight thought for a moment, and decided That's not a title I have. Or have heard of. But maybe her dream Spike knew things her conscious mind didn't, like Eos had. "Where is prince Jack?"

Book put away, Spike again turned to look at his employer and roommate. "In his cave, in the Everfree Forest about twenty minutes walk from Zecora's hut. At least, that's where he lives." Spike looked pleadingly at Twilight.

Who queried "Should we go to his cave, then?" That could be it thought Twilight. His cave here, represents the door to his dreaming.

Spike raised an eyebrow. "Are you looking for Jack?"

Twilight rebutted quickly with "No I'm looking for princess Luna."

Spike sighed. "Twilight I don't think they've shacked up together. The cave isn't where you'll find Luna." He started to walk in the direction of the kitchen. "You know, I think it's you who's not awake. I'll make some extra strong black tea, OK?"

After a quick look around for signs of the princess who had not materialized in her dream, Twilight motioned for her assistant Spike, shouting "Wait! Uh." Looking around again she tried to remember why she was so sure this was a dream. "This red thing." Twilight drew her tachi a tiny ways out of the scabbard. "How long have I been sleeping with it?"

Spike snorted in derision. "A while now. Honestly Twilight I don't remember when you started but you never take the thing off." A look of self defending concern crossed his face, and he hesitantly added. "It ... looks good on you?"

But just then the door flew open, and in strode princess Luna. Spike yelped and once his feet were in contact with the ground again, ran into the kitchen. Luna zeroed in on Twilight, and strode confidently toward her. "This will be a little more complicated than I feared. Follow me from your own dream into mine. What, what is?" Her eyes now focused on the tiny guard separating hilt from blade, where two hieroglyphs were imprinted into the metal.

From the kitchen, Spike's voice came defiantly, saying "I told you it was you who was asleep!"

Angrily Twilight called back "So are you, Spike! This is MY dream after all." Twilight turned back to the princess who was closely examining the marks.

She looked up curiously at her subject, without moving her head. "You're arguing with yourself?"

Twilight smiled awkwardly and tried to cover her blush with a nervous giggle. "Your highness I spend most of my waking time arguing with myself, it shouldn't surprise anypony I argue with my dream people too."

Looking one last time at Twilight's blade of her heart, Luna said "xìnxīn." And while Twilight couldn't reproduce the sound she knew that was how Eos had said it. Luna stepped back, and took in the sight of the whole sword, and was overtaken by laughter. She quickly covered her mouth with her right fetlock joint, unable to control her mirth.

Seeing Twilight's blank stare, Luna explained. "That sword is a tachi; a cavalry sword. The army was just starting to make them way back when. Before the nightmare moon incident. OK?" Twilight nodded. She hadn't know hardened steel to have been in common production for over a millenia but of course the government would end up getting anything nice, first. Putting her hoof back on the floor, Luna continued. "That marking though, in written in ancient Gryphon. Which is fine, except I've read of a big war between our peoples. And by the time the war was over military practices had shifted so we favor short swords now for maneuverability."

Twilight looked at her dream weapon and considered her words. "So our blacksmiths would never make a tachi and give it a gryphon name, and the gryphons would never have made a sword that would be used to kill their own people in wartime." Luna nodded.

Twilight sighed. "I like it anyway. So, what have you learned? Where is Jack?"

Princess Luna turned to the doorway. "Follow me." And with that, strode out. Twilight hurried to keep up.

As they left the library, which was just her tree in this dream, Twilight watched as every few steps more buildings faded, and the grass rapidly died until she was trotting on coarse tan colored sand. They were paralleling a train track now, and in the distance she could see the boarding platform, although the train engine itself was nowhere to be seen.

Now her friends faded into view, gathered around a small table filled with various baked goods. Luna looked them over, levitated a bright pink cupcake, and commented nonchalantly "I didn't put this here. Whose table is this?" And as Luna bit into the imaginary confection, Pinkie jumped up and waved her hooves excitedly in the air.

"Me Princess! I thought cupcakes would sound good and there was a bunch of cupcakes and I thought we shouldn't be eating of the sand even if the sand is imaginary so I said I wanted a table but nothing happened so I tried to think about what a table looked like but that didn't work either so I just picked up one of the cupcakes and when I set it down I expected a table to be there and look Princess! There was!"

Luna grinned at the ADHD party pony's long winded explanation and replied "Your awareness of what makes a good confection is well appreciated." But presently she lowered her head to stare intently at the table, and it faded from view. Most of Twilight's friend stood up and put a serious face on, with the exception of Pinkie Pie whose smile dropped when her table went away. Luna continued, "Now that we're all here, as you see the engine is symbolically attached to Jack who is not here.

"Since Celestia is not skilled in dreams I will need to remain awake in case this is a ruse to reach Celestia." Luna walked to the boarding platform, then around to approach the ground beneath the steps. There was a steel cable emerging from a stone set in the ground. Luna squared up her posture, braced herself as she gritted her teeth, and lifted the stone. Yikes! thought Twilight. if that were a real stone it would weight more than ten times what I do.

Luna set the stone down, and beneath it was revealed a poorly lit staircase. "Down there my warriors. This path has been attached to Jack's mind. At the bottom you will find yourself in his dreaming world." Stepping back from the entrance Luna looked the group over, and briefly bowed to them, then quickly stood up looking embarrassed. "I bid you the best luck my well wishes can offer you, and good night to you all.

With that, she leapt into the air, and turned into a bolt of lightening that illuminated the sky for a moment before fading, and leaving them alone. Pinkie giggled. Rarity said "That was quite an exit, princess." while Applejack chose to bow deeply to the last spot the princess had been standing in her dream.

Twilight started to descend, then said "This sword is too long for passages like this one. Who wants to take point? Dash?" But in response to her offer, Rainbow Dash just raised an eyebrow and waited for another pony to respond.

Pinkie pogo hopped into the tunnel. "OK!" she said still pogo hopping down the steep stairs. Rainbow, to her credit, lowered her goggles and declared she'd take second, and followed the pink menace of the pogo stance.

Rarity took fourth just behind Applejack, and Fluttershy preferred the last place behind Twilight, but she made her yellow and pink friend promise to keep up. She only nodded meekly, not even 'meep'ing but Twilight trusted she wouldn't abandon the group now.

It was a long descent. Sometimes the air was stale, wet, and smelling of rotting vegetation at the bottom of a swamp. Other times for minutes long there would be a cold dry wind blowing down the stairs, and up their tails. Twilight couldn't see what was illuminating the passageway but her lighted horn was not strictly speaking necessary, although it made her feel better. Rarity must have agreed since she had created a light too.

Periodically they'd hear noises. Quiet ones, just loud enough to make the group stop. But the stones remained unchanged, and the chittering or moaning or scraping sounds would only be heard in that section. A dozen steps more and the group couldn't hear it anymore.

After enough monotony that Twilight couldn't tell how long they'd gone or what time it was supposed to be, Pinkie called "The steps are different!" But that was a slow change. The stone darkened, the steps were deeper and shallower, and finally Twilight could see a light source. Every twenty fifth block was inexplicably glowing.

Pinkie called out there was a dead end, but Dash followed that with "I see a door." The group filed off the stairs onto a round room with no light, and stood on slick polished stone. At a nod of readiness from everypony Dash opened an invisible door, and the smells of an old growth forest, just after the rain came rushing in. It might have been day outside but only if the forest canopy was quite thick. "I can hear all kinds of critters but none too near." Came Dash's proclamation of the safety of the door.

Twilight suggested proceeding with a slow caution. "And lets try not to get separated. But if nothing is attacking us right now Applejack and I can spread out since our weapons need space." That was when Twilight noticed Pinkie was fascinated with the doorway itself. "Pinkie did you hear me?" Those pink ears didn't stray from the upper right corner of the doorway one iota. "Pinkie?"

Pinkie's eyes went wide, and she exclaimed "That's so cool but where do I get one?" Pinkie reared up, and pinned her ears and promptly galloped off, disappearing into the doorway. Not through the doorway, but into the wall itself.

Pinkie was gone. "Nuts and shoes." Somepony said.

Pinkie Pie -- Dream Quest Pt 1

Pinkie Pie had been distracted by the glowing squares. Tiny ones, just hovering behind the stone and steel but she could still see them. All sorts of pastel colors and they hummed. Some of the humming sounded like Jack's alicorn voice, and some sounded like rocks being scraped together as if sand paper was an instrument now.

But the real distraction was when she looked real, real hard at one of them. It was cerulean, paler and brighter than Dashie's coat. When she caught it with her eyes it stopped moving, and inside the square she could see a forest.

When she saw the forest she could hear the ocean and as soon as she identified that sound she could feel the sunshine and smell the breeze blowing from the cool forest across the beach sands.

Pinkie deliberately blinked, and found a deep pink one, almost the color of the red patch in Twi's mane. This time she heard the clatter of hooves, and from there it became the smell of hot, sweaty ponies and then she was there was a giant crowd pulling a big statue across a cobblestone street. "That's so cool!" Several milliseconds passed before she realized this might just be her dream thing. Or one of them, anyway. "But where do I get one?"

They were behind the wall, sort of. But if she could see them, she should be able to touch them, right? She screwed up her face with determination and focused as hard and as precisely as her sometimes addled brain could manage on a square that started the pink color of her coat. As she reared to reach for it she saw it expand, and now the top was a dark pink like a sunset almost over, and the bottom was off-white. Like my throw rug in my apartment! Although if pressed she would never have been able to explain why that was the particular image that came to her.

But when she reached a hoof out, the square expanded to engulf her. She was now in her apartment, and Twilight and Dashie and the others were nowhere to be found. "Phooey. Twi's gonna be mad, isn't she?" She spent several moments looking for more squares, but couldn't find anything like that her in her room. "I'm still asleep aren't I?" But pinching herself hurt the way it was supposed to.

Pinkie's smile faded. "Dashie was hurt a lot in her dreams. A lot more than a pinch." Her smile returned. "But then she woke up." Then her thought went to the time when the thing she thought was Twilight said she wasn't Twilight Sparkle at all. That had really hurt but it had turned out OK because Rainbow Dash was able to see who was a pony and who wasn't.

She hadn't been able to help Dashie very much but maybe now that she was here she could find a way to help all her friends. Help them sleep at night. That's what I'm going to do. Out loud, she said to her walls that still didn't have opaque lighted squares "I'm sorry Twilight, but I'll find my way back. Just you see!" And as evening descended she raced downstairs with no ideas beyond helping her friends.

Her employers didn't have any ideas either, but Pinkie figured the fact they were using her voice meant something. "Now dear, there's no door to leave by." Mrs. Cake said. She sounded just like Pinkie's voice sounded from inside her head. "We had to do some repairs after your last party and we saved money by not reinstalling the door."

Mr. Cake poked his head out from the kitchen. His voice sounded like the one time she had heard a recording made of her voice. Not at all like she thought she sounded like but everyone said her voice was like Mr Cake's right now. "And we need your help keeping the stove lit. They burn cupcakes now so we need to keep feeding what we bake into the the ovens as fuel."

Pinkie ran around the public area of the store, and found there weren't even any windows. "OK Mrs. Cake but how are the customers going to get in?" she said while making a second circuit. is a door what I'm looking for? But that won't hang around my neck very well.

Mrs. Cake gave Pinkie one of her big smiles as she shrugged. "I guess it hardly matters since we can't keep anything we bake now that we've got bigger ovens."

The Cake's logic was making her head feel all fuzzy but Pinkie tried a different tack. "But how will you get out? You'll have to go shopping for other stuff, won't you?" Speaking as she trotted around her workplace she stepped into the kitchen but felt certain her special tool was not a skillet, as much as she wanted to smack the fake Twilight with one. And that spear wielding eel was creepy but maybe it would look better simmering in a skillet.

Mr. Cake, shoveling a mountain of unfrosted cupcakes into a boiler said nonchalantly "Oh we never really leave the kitchen anymore Pinkie. You should know that by now."

Pinkie felt confident she had seen enough. The store didn't have a basement that you could get to from inside, and it was just sort of a crawl space that was icky with spiderwebs that you could get to from outside anyway. I hope my mental forms of my employers can forgive me. I'm gonna hafta just break the wall down and MAKE a door.

And so without further explanation Pinkie built up to a full gallop, from behind the counter at the edge of the kitchen at the farthest wall so she could have the best velocity. At the last second she planted her left fore and spun, uncoiling her whole bulk and all her rump muscle's power into the wall, which shattered with a sound that Pinkie thought was a cross between a thousand matchsticks being snapped and small pile of dynamite being set off. Breaking matches around dynamite can have that effect, I suppose..

Pinkie's problems became immediately apparent as she trotted away. Sugarcube Corner was the only building in this dreamscape. To her left was a farm that looked like it was growing carrots to judge by the low greenery, and to right was another farm with a few orange trees interspersed with lots of blueberry bushes.

In front of her, granted more than a minute's trot away, was a giant wooden wall. It went all the way up to the ceiling, where a huge magical light source that was nowhere near as blinding as the sun, was beaming down on everypony.

Namely her, Carrot Top, and Applejack. Just them. Is Applejack in here now? Or is she like the Cakes in that she's not in here but it looks like it Will she sound like me or like Applejack I guess there's only one way to find out especially if I want to know about a door to whatever is outside Except if this is like Sugarcube Corner she won't know about a door and I'll have to kick the wall down again but now my hooves are sore Maybe I can talk Applejack into breaking the wall even if she wants to stay so she can feed blueberries to her orange trees or something HI APPLEJACK! Having trot between the rows of tended bushes to where Applejack was tending an orange tree, Pinkie said out loud "Hi are you Applejack?"

Applejack put her clippers down and turned, an easy going smile on her face. "Yes ma'am. Applejack. And who are you? Don't know that Ah've seen you in Ponyville afore now."

"I work for the Cakes. I've been here at least since this morning." Pinkie thought that was a fair answer since the Ponyville she'd lived for so many years wasn't this dream which obviously hadn't seen here before. Her dream Applejack said so.

Applejack nodded. "We used to have parties for newcomers but Sugarcube Corner sort of adjusted their business model and we don't see them out here much. But I betcha Golden Harvent an' Ah can put together a mean soup to share this evenin'"

Pinkie looked around again. "You mean the carrot farmer?" Applejack nodded. "Isn't she named Carrot Top?" A confused look crossed Applejack's face.

"Nah hon. Ah know her as Golden Harvest." Giving her tree one last look, Applejack began walking towards the other end of this Ponyville. "Let's go meet her, huh? Sure she'll want to meet'cha."

Pinkie followed Applejack, who seemed not to notice the broken lumber or the hole it was piled in front of as they passed Pinkie's home and place of employ. Carrot Top looked up from her work and set her tools down to meet the approaching pair at the edge of her farm.

This mare was made of stronger stuff that the Carrot Top Pinkie knew from the waking land. Her walk was confident, her glance knowing and charismatic. I bet Mayor Mare looked like this twenty some years ago.

But her greeting surprised both the approaching mares. "Pinkie. This is not where you need to be. You'll have to find your way outside." And so saying, she strode up to the party pony and shook her hoof. "You can call me Golden Harvest." Setting her hoof back down, she continued. "Or not. And I daresay you know why."

Finally she deigned to acknowledge her neighbor, looking over just long enough to say "Applejack." in a flat voice.

The orange farmer of oranges held a bemused smile and one cocked ear as she replied quickly "Golden Harvest."

Pinkie spun around once, then gave Carrot Top a hopeful look. "Do you know what I'm looking for, then? And why aren't you Carrot Top I know a mare named Carrot Top who looks just like you and is neighbor to an orange mare named Applejack but she grows Apples And that's pretty much it." Pinkie felt her ears twitch with the sheer volume of anticipation.

But this yellow mare's mouth barely cracked even a small smile. Pinkie admired how impressive she looked since she was just standing there, and was shorter then either of the other two ponies in front of her. But this dream form of Carrot Top held Pinkie's attention when she spoke. "I know, Pinkie Pie, that you will not find it here, and that I cannot tell you what you seek for or where it is." Now the deep orange mop of a mane dropped a little as Carrot Top gained a motherly smile. "A part of what you need to find, is how to find it, and what to find. So I can't just hand it to you or you won't have it at all." Her head came back up, her face beaming hopefulness towards that party pony. "Do you understand, Pinkie?"

She didn't really, but she did get that further questions of her misnamed dream form of Carrot Top wouldn't get any farther. "Sure, Carrot ... I mean Golden Harvest. But, can you tell me how to get out of here, if that's where I'm supposed to go?"

Applejack looked around at would have been the horizon if this room had one. "Ain't rightly seen a door in all mah years." Applejack cocked her head at the carrot farmer and asked "There ain't a door, is there? Ain't nopony come or gone that I heard tell of."

Carrot Top nodded her head once, and said to Pinkie "There is no door. Your way further will have to involve more focused searching than a doorway would provide." and with that, turned back towards where she set her tools. "Good luck to you, Pinkie. Remember to stay focused; you're distracted too easily sometimes."

Pinkie felt her cheeks redden. That sounds like something my unfunny mother would say. "stay focused on the rocks young filly they won't farm themselves." but rocks aren't any fun and neither is farming Although I like eating and I guess I like roads both of which require farming Although I'd hate to walk on carrots to a plateful of gravel That wouldn't be tasty or fun Although it might be a little bit funny Like how Carrot Top changed her name That's funny too But Applejack and Carrot Top both sound like they do when I'm awake Is Jack awake yet Will I wake up when he does or do I have to stay and search Or maybe they're not even related Like how I'm not related to Applejack Except I'm related to this Applejack standing next to me In fact I think she IS me in here But that's not really related either Dreams sure are funny things.

Turning to herself Pinkie visualized a pink Pinkie talking to an orange Pinkie to say "I think I need to get going then, however I find a way to do that."

And Pinkie heard in her mind an orange Pinkie speak with an Apple drawl to the pink Pinkie "Ah shore enjoyed your company then, miss. Don't know how yah'll leave but Ah don't know how you came here so Ah'll just wish you well on your journey." The orange Pinkie Pie looked behind her, and said politely to the pink Pinkie "Ah've got to get back to mah farmin' sugarcube. Take care."

And as the farmer walked away Pinkie visualized a blue stallion Pinkie named Care and the pink pony would take him, take Care, to Sugarcube Corner for coffee and cupcakes. But then the pink party pony looked around, and realized she couldn't see a blue Pinkie so she sighed, and walked away from the farms to inspect the wooden wall marking the edge of her personal Ponyville.

Pinkie Pie galloped around the whole of Ponyville and found it to be really small. Less than half the size of the waking Ponyville and just like the two farmers had said, no doors. So she decided she just have to break out, like out of Sugarcube Corner.

She kicked a few times, but the wood didn't respond. Focus! Kick exactly one spot, girl. Like a kung-fu play right? Pinkie concentrated on one spot, just about hock height, just big enough for two hooves to fill it. Taking a deep breath, she kicked with all her might, just there.

And the wall shattered, leaving a perfect arched doorway. Beyond was a cobblestone courtyard and stone buildings were visible all around. As Pinkie stepped through she could see a familiar castle not very far in the distance. I'm in Canterlot! Pinkie's breath was taken away by the beautiful oranges and pinks and yellows in the distance but realized it was also much darker than inside Ponyville. The sun was setting which augmented the banners and paints and masonry but also meant it was getting dark.

Pinkie Pie -- Dream Quest, Pt2

Running to greet her was a small, white alicorn with light pink mane and tail flowing freely and the biggest grin on her face. Grateful for the attention Pinkie ran to greet the young royal pony, stopping only when they bumped noses into each other.

The alicorn, shorter even than Pinkie, looked embarrassed and took two steps back. "You're ... Pinkie, aren't you?" The white pony bent all her legs evenly for a perfect in place curtsy, and said "I'm just about to have a dinner party and there's no ponies in Canterlot to share it with. Would you like to join me?"

Pinkie looked suspiciously at the mane that was even lighter and pinker than her own coat of pink. "Uh, miss, I'm asleep. So that means I don't have to eat."

A mischievous look of delight crossed the alicorn's eyes, not quite making it to the mouth which was busy giggling politely. "I'm an alicorn so that means I don't have to sleep. Would you like to join me?"

With unflappable logic like that, Pinkie's defenses were overwhelmed. "Sure." So it was that Pinkie pogo hopped beside a young alicorn who was giggling like a schoolfilly as she skittered in a gait halfway between a proper trot and a reckless scamper.

Inside the castle was a large room with the largest table filled with foods she had ever seen. Even her time when she was first invited to the Grand Galloping Gala she wasn't sure they used a single table for all the food, like they had done here.

And the food was delicious like she'd never tasted before! And with no other ponies to complain she would go from side to side sometimes by jumping and sometimes by scooting under the table just to get to the next dish that happened to be on the other side.
The royal filly meanwhile was doing much the same but would gracefully fly from side to side.

Pinkie told jokes and sang songs, and the alicorn talked about the ponies that came to see her or that worked just outside the castle. It never got dark because there were so many lamps and lanterns and even torches but it did sort of get chilly but Pinkie found where the hot chocolate was and tea and mulled wine and several other hot drinks she didn't recognize so as she ate she could come back to the section with the hot beverages and just carried a cup of something with her as she sang.

Pinkie would occasionally remember that she was doing something important, but then the pink and white alicorn would start singing another verse, usually off key just a little bit, and they both would start laughing and then it would be driven out of her head again. But then one of the impromptu verses that Pinkie sang out reminded her.

"What were you looking for, Pinkie? Coming from Ponyville, I mean." The white alicorn was laying down on a blanket now, a little ways from the table. A glass of mulled wine was hovering near her head.

Pinkie slapped together a poem on the spot and tried to sing it as her response.

Twilight's light was bright
she lit the cave of night
we found a bucket of the mind
in the dream of an orange mare

Walking tall were giant feathered wolves
slay'd the mare who doesn't normally wear clothes
too late for her and the truth she'd find
too late for them and we left her there

slaughtered the pack from her castle
never were nightmares such a hassle
town was zombies not flesh eating kind
Jack rode back said okay did we fare

woke from dream to greet orange friend
slumber party of warrior mares again'd
shadowy false pony will be in a bind
sleep to wake and fight in his lair

Pinkie stopped silent, and looked around. Suddenly she remembered this wasn't Canterlot. Wasn't Ponyville. Probably wasn't even her own mind. Sparing just a moment to wonder whose brain she was using to dream about a cute filly alicorn with nothing better to do that laugh with her, Pinkie turned to her dinner companion, the smile faded from her face.

"Oh?" asked the alicorn. "I didn't think the rhyme was that bad." She levitated the ladle from a nearby punchbowl. "Maybe punch will help the timing?"

Pinkie shook her head. "No princess. Uh, miss." the earth pony laid beside the alicorn, their front knees almost touching. "I never actually asked your name."

The alicorn's voice put Pinkie in mind of a gently babbling creek, so soft and gentle was it. "I'm sort of like Celestia."

Pinkie tipped her head in confusion, feeling the silly unfocusing thoughts trying to return. "But you're not?"

The alicorn dipped her head, and shook it to say 'no', then looked up demurely through her forelock. "I'm just here as one of your distractions, Pinkie." Very quickly Not-Celestia kissed Pinkie lightly, just on the tip of the nose. "And that means you're welcome to stay as long as you'd like." The alicorn's face lit up with her soft smile.

"Until I wake, you mean?" Pinkie asked, to which the alicorn nodded, her pink mane bobbing gracefully off her shoulder as she did so. Pinkie drew the friendly dream projection of what filly Celestia might have looked like into a hug, forelegs wrapped around neck, then Pinkie stood up again. "I'm sorry Not-Celestia. But I have to find something, and then I have to go." But she took a sip straight from the punchbowl, and wiped her lips on her shin. As Not-Celestia giggled, Pinkie said "But I would like to see you in another dream." Looking over her shoulder she gave her projection an playful smile. "Someday."

The alicorn stood now, and nodded her head. "I'd like that." Turning her head towards the entrance, she warned "But for tonight I should tell you that your mind is a big place, and in here you can even leave your mind." Turning now to Pinkie the filly had the most sisterly look Pinkie had ever seen. "So be careful of where you go from here, but do hurry. I can hear your friend Jack screaming in pain and as much as I don't want your conscious mind to know what your subconscious already knows, if you're set on your task, you can save him." Doubt now caused the white fuzzy ears to twist and churn. "I think."

Did I ever give one of my sisters a look anything like that? I think I just scowled at them for borrowing my things. I wish I had a sister like Celestia. But of course, that would make me Luna, wouldn't it? I don't think I'd like being banished to the moon, even if it was because I was evil. I should write a letter to my sisters to say I'm not evil. Or I guess that would be that they're not evil. Even if they melted my crayons. I should write them a letter with crayons and send them the crayons too because I think my baby sister has fillies now. Or a colt I don't remember because we don't talk much. Oh no, maybe we ARE evil! I have to write a letter right away when I wake up to find out who needs to be forgiven worse!

With renewed focus, Pinkie said her farewells and trotted away. There wasn't another pony anywhere in Canterlot, and she had a sneaking suspicion this layout was physically larger than the real Canterlot.

But after what felt like forever, she got to a giant stone wall where the gate to the town of Canterlot should be. In some bushes nearby was an earth pony, old, bald of mane and toothless of mouth, he was dragging a rake across the ground.

Pinkie turned to him and nearly shouted "HEY! How do I open the gate?" The gardener stopped raking, and set the handle against his shoulder so he could stare mutely at the party pony. "I need to get out. To the next layer or whatever. How do I get through?"

The earth pony finally deigned to look at the wall where no gate was. "Tain't never been a gate, young filly." Slowly, slowly the gray stallion made eye contact with Pinkie who was starting to feel a bit manic from all the sugary treats she'd been eating the last few hours.

"So where is the gate, mister? How to I go on?"

The stallion blinked his deep gray eyes and smiled condescendingly before replying. "Oh, that's where a gate would go, little girl. But there isn't one, and since the bricks are at least two feet thick, I don't think you can break through them." He grabbed his rake again went back to his work, speaking around the wooden handle "Good luck to you, just the same missy."

Pinkie growled, and stared at the rock wall. What had Not Celestia Spoken? Pinkie tried to remember her parting words. Something about setting myself to my task. With that she backed up to the wall, and thought about the brief moment of pain when the thing that wasn't Twilight had stabbed her in the chest. She tried to picture that pain in her back hooves, and determined she would kick until her feet didn't work anymore. Kick right there.

And on her first strike, the stone shattered. Huge boulders became dust, and the dust blew away. well, that wasn't so hard after all. She turned to tell the gardener there was a gate now, but he was nowhere to be seen.

Pinkie shrugged and turned to trot through the hole, only to see a layer of bright red bricks laid just behind the stone wall marking the edge of the town. Pinkie reared up and screamed in frustration.

"Why!?! Why is there a fourth wall?!? I've kicked through my own house and the fort around Ponyville and even broken the castle down and still there's another layer?" Snorting and already sweating Pinkie ran at the new wall with all her might, again planting her left fore at the last moment to unfurl her weight and muscles against the offending barricade.

This left her hooves quite sore, but beyond the brick wall Pinkie could see a face. No hair, and the nose was completely separated from the upper lip. Glasses sat balanced on round ears attached to the side of the mostly round head.

"Oh. Ah, high there. Reader." Pinkie says to you. "It was that kind of a fourth wall. I'm sorry if I scratched your monitor." You notice Pinkie looking down, at the pile of bricks around her hooves. "Hey, you know what? I found my thing! My dream thing I'm looking for." She picks up one of the bricks, and holds it up for your inspection. A red brick, representative of the fourth wall.

"You see this saddle bag?" She's standing sideways to the hole in reality now, where pink suede saddlebags seem to have magically appeared strapped to her side. "It wasn't there a few seconds ago. But since I'm dreaming I can do THIS.

You watch as Pinkie puts the brick into her suede saddle bag.

"OK." She points at you with her right front leg. "You keep reading the story, alright? I want to know it turns out alright. You should too. For my sake, you know?" She's doing one of those impossible Cheshire cat grins right now. Please reader just nod knowingly we don't want to upset a manic Pinkie on a quest.

"Oooh!!! Questing!" Pinkie says as she reads the paragraph above. "Now that I have my dream thing I guess that's right." She's turning now, trotting away but you can still hear her through the hole in the story as she says "So long I love you buhbye!" Her voice is getting a little distant as she finishes "I'll come back later and fix that hole, alright? I promise I will but I have to save Celestia since that was her and not Jack that my subconscious heard screaming."

Twilight -- Dream, Jack's forest

Rainbow Dash had said after a couple minutes that Pinkie probably wasn't coming back the way she went. Fluttershy was hard to convince and Twilight wasn't making it any easier for the group but AJ wanted to find Jack and Rarity pointed out that the group was going to have to wade into the unknown to look for him anyway. "So we can just add Pinkie Pie to our laundry list of scavenger hunt items."

They stepped out and found the ground was covered with wet moss deep enough to leave everypony's fetlocks dripping. The sea green moss covered everything, hanging from the trees and obscuring individual tree limbs.

Dash was making faces as she hovered above them. "Eew the air is heavy with water. It's like trying to swim in a soup mix."

Fluttershy tentatively floated up a few feet, nervously looking every which way. After a dozen wingbeats of not being struck down by horrible nasties she took a deep breath, and looked back to her remaining companions. "Do you know which way, Twilight?"

Twilight shook her head, then looked around. She thought that the door would probably face the correct direction but dreams didn't seem to work the way she had heretofore expected they would. None of them were wilderness enthusiasts so looking for deer tracks and following those wasn't likely to help. The sunlight filtering through the canopy looked like late evening but there was no guarantee the sun even moved here. She called out to the braver of the two pegasi. "Dash would you mind flying straight up, see if you can get above the trees? If there's a town or something I bet that's the direction we need to go."

Dash grunted her disapproval before accelerating straight up. Shortly after, Rarity grunted too, lifting a dripping hoof away from the ubiquitous moss. Suddenly it was raining, the raindrops coming from the air without benefit of clouds. Leaves fell from where Dash had just been, and now a branch came crashing down with a slightly muffled warning of "Oops sorry. Falling branch everypony."

While waiting, Twilight listened for sounds of larger mammals. Or lizards, as they could be troublesome too. But all she heard were a few small insects, and the occasional burst of raindrops somewhere as an incredibly slight breeze would cause the moisture in the air to surpass the muggy atmosphere's ability to hold it any longer.

The trees themselves didn't even provide any clues, as they were widely and evenly spaced. Not as precisely as if it was an orchard, but far more orderly then anything she'd seen in the Everfree Forest.

Presently there was a crackling as three large branches came crashing down from impossible heights, their arrival preceded by another localized rain shower and followed by a blue pegasus.

Rainbow Dash stopped to hover as soon as she was lower than most of the branches, but she was used to shouting across open sky so Twilight didn't have difficulty hearing her. "Can't see any buildings but you guys would not believe how tall these trees are! Two hundred meters for some of them! Anyway." She pointed in what to Twilight looked like a random direction. It would be about forty five degrees to the right of their heading if the group had gone straight after crossing the door from Luna's dream station in the desert. "There's a column of smoke that way, but it's a long ways off. That's the only thing at all I can see."

It was slow going because of the deep moss that held every drop of moisture from the frequent rain showers but over the next few hours the group never got fatigued, nor hungry. Nor, Twilight noticed, did the level of illumination ever change.

Conversation drifted among the ponies at various times. Without Pinkie, of whom there still was no sign, the party wasn't as upbeat or talkative as it could have been. Rarity pointed it out once, saying "This just isn't as much fun, slogging through mud and muggy raining moss, as it would be if Pinkie was here to make fun of the cloudless rains."

From above, Dash harrumphed. "You look good with your hair falling straight like that. But to be honest she just looks kinda creepy that way." Rainbow Dash did a mid-air shimmy shake that got Rarity and Applejack even wetter, so they both stopped to shake the worst of the water off. "Oh? Oops, sorry. I'd offer to rainblow you dry but in here I think it would just make you wetter."

While that didn't get a laugh, or even a proper chuckle, it did create a smile on Twilight's face, and Rarity looked up from the moss to grin at Twilight, probably remembering the first time she'd met Twilight who had just been rainblown dry and indeed her mane had looked a mess.

Twilight asked Rainbow to go up again to double check their heading, and later when she thought they should have arrived by Dash's explanation but hadn't she asked Fluttershy. Not because Dash would lead them astray but she seemed to be getting angry with the low hanging branches. Fluttershy took a lot longer but her methodical flight left her not much wetter coming back then she'd been when she left.

Pointing in exactly the direction they'd been going, Fluttershy said "Uhm, the smoke column is over that way." Although Twilight couldn't actually make out anything past 'smoke' she could follow the hoof.

Twilight levitated her tachi in front of her, but left it close enough she could grab it with her teeth in case something tried wrestling it from her magical grip. Within minutes of travel there was sounds of a fight ahead.

Specifically grunting and flesh slapping against flesh. Of metal weapons there seemed to be none. It was the same two voices, which sounded like twilight like sergal voices but of course with no words she couldn't be sure of much beyond that it was a lower register than any pony she knew.

There was a line of bushes acting as a wall, and using xìnxīn she parted a viewport through them. Two sergals, clearly exhausted, fought tooth and nail in front of a thatched roof hut in a clearing. Think smoke drifted lazily from the hut's chimney.

Neither sergal looked like Jack, being both white of limbs as well as chest, with one having a deep red fur across his back, and red feathers across the haunches, with the other one having dark gray in the same place.

It was actually fascinating and a little bit creepy to the quadrupedal mare to watch a veritable martial arts exhibition between two strong, well trained bipeds with five fingered, clawed hands trying to grip, rip, and kick each other for minutes at a time. Rainbow Dash stood next to Twilight and lowered her goggles, but did not immediately comment.

After a quarter minute she said quietly "That red one might be Jack? Not real sure about it but I can tell the gray one is our problem boy. Looks like a squid with the head where the waist should be." Lifting her goggles she turned to Twilight who was still watching the proceedings with trepidation. "Another thing they're both shades, or puppets or something. Not the real puppet master and not just a simple phantom."

Applejack crowded up behind the pair to whisper "So do we go in hooves flashing or what? If'n one of them is Jack he needs our help."

At that point the gray one, that Dash thought was the interloper, stopped, and turned to look into the bushes, straight at Twilight. His maw split in an unhealthy grin, the tongue lolling out far enough to reach his chest, so it seemed. His hands were at his sides, and the red sergal stopped to assess his opponent's reaction.

But rather than look for the watching ponies, he simply leapt, arms outstretched to grab the gray sergal. Contact was made, the gray sergal began to fall backwards, his eyes never leaving Twilight's, but the tackle was ineffective.

The gray sergal wasn't there anymore. The red one, sweat dripping from around the transition between fur and feather, saliva running out of his panting mouth, laid on the empty ground, holding his chest up by his elbows but otherwise looking quite defeated. He turned to the group of ponies, and spoke. "Your rescue mission is perhaps unfortunate but I will not pretend I had him anywhere I wanted him. Jack will be inside the hut but be properly warned." His breath slowed a little, deepened a little, and he drew his knees under his belly to support his weight as he continued. "When you leave the forest you leave his mind, and enter the realm of the shadowy figure." Now the red sergal rolled onto his right side and curled into a fetal position. Looking Twilight right in the eyes he finished with "I know not his plans else would I play better than raw strength and brute fighting 'til we both tired." Eyes closed now, the sergal drew several ragged breaths, and said "You will find Jack chained and unconscious. Farewell and good luck pony friends."

When the red and white sergal, apparently a direct puppet of Jack's, drew one last breath, exhaled, then faded from view. The ponies were alone again.

Rainbow Dash was almost shaking. "What happens when you walk into someone else's dream? Twi I don't want to get dismembered again!" She had grabbed onto Twilight's shoulder and was shaking her.

Clearly her nightmares were more violent and more personal than mine. This is so unlike her.. Without moving her body, she levitated xìnxīn toward the pegasus. Dash's eyes followed the proffered handle but she did not otherwise respond. Aloud, Twilight explained "Its name means confidence."

Dash took a deep breath, and dropping to all fours she buried her face into Twilight's side just behind the shoulder blades. "If the insane Pinkie shows up and starts cutting me into pieces, you have to take my place so I don't have to wake like that." She rotated her head a little so she could make eye contact with Twilight. "Okay?"

"Okay." Twilight knew that it likely would never come to that. Either they would drive the impostor back, and nopony would be dismembered, or by treachery or brute force Rainbow Dash would endure what could not be stopped. But right now the too often injured pony needed a friend to stand beside her.

Twilight levitated her blade into its scabbard, and Rainbow Dash wiped her tears and made an end of her sniffles to stride beside Twilight. The others followed, and they entered the realm of Dementia.

Twilight -- Demented Dreamland Pt 1

so they entered the realm of Dementia.

Although actually there wasn't any distinct change as the left the jungle proper, except that once they were in the clearing, the humidity went way down. Rarity moaned a bit about her mane, fearing that a static charge would completely disrupt her fashion sense. Dash offered her professional assistance by saying "I can discharge the field by shaking you until a cloud forms, then strike it until the lightning is spent. Of course you'll get rained on again and lightning is loud that close but we just repeat the process until the clouds are all shaken out of you."

Rarity didn't even look over her shoulder to see Rainbow's sarcastic smile. "Sounds ever so pleasant. Remind me to hire you when I need to send my customers to the competition and never see them again."

The inside of the hut was dark, so without getting much closer Twilight wouldn't know what to expect inside. Presuming it was small, she did not draw her sword, but instead mentally prepared a shield spell without drawing power. The screaming startled her into engaging the spell, however.

But it was actually quite muted, and as the distant scream of pain died away, Twilight had time to question how large the inside of the hut actually was. Fluttershy crawled out from behind Applejack and asked if it was over.

Applejack said "That sounded more like a pony, than ol' Jack in either o' his forms." She didn't look scared, Twilight decided. But she didn't look too confident either. And how did Twilight look, she wondered. No mirror and none of her friends were looking at their erstwhile leader.

Rainbow Dash lowered her goggles, and after glancing around them briefly, nodded to Twilight. "After you." Gee, thanks girlfriend. But this time she prepared an older style of shield spell, that would form a giant bubble around the whole group. And with that she stepped through the hut's door.

And found she was standing on a concrete landing, which was at the base of a stairwell that ascended up into a gently climbing tunnel. There were strips just below the ceiling on both sides of the tunnel that were glowing brightly except they flickered as if the spell was in the process of failing.

"That don't look foreboding, none." Was Applejack's comment, the first of the group as they gathered inside the "hut."

Twilight still felt dumbfounded and it might have shown through, she realized, as she spoke her thoughts. "How in the hay does it go up from inside a hut? I know we're sort of asleep except dreams are supposed to make sense, aren't they?" She turned to her best friends for answers.

It was Fluttershy who, after about three tries, managed to express a reasonable opinion on this. "But the hut isn't supposed to be seen as a dwelling. It's sort of a wall between rooms. The room that Jack built is a depressing forest of ancient and forgotten trees, and the shadowy figure built a room with, well. Hmm." She looked at the badly lit ascent shook her head in dismay. "That place up there. So the concrete, and the hut, and the dry clearing are the layers of a good wall as go from one room to another. Dreams are supposed to be all about the symbology."

Rainbow Dash looked back and forth a few times between the tunnel and her fellow pegasus, and asked "So, does the tunnel go up because he thinks he's better than us, or because it's true that he's stronger than us?" She lifted her goggles and watched Fluttershy for any further clues.

Fluttershy only shook her head. Rarity took up the slack, saying "It hardly matters Dash, does it? We're pretty sure we need to go up there to free Jack or at least get away from the awful rain." And with that, began climbing the stairs, calling behind her "Twilight can you spare a shield spell if I scream for mercy? I can't put that thing up without a lot of thought about how they're constructed."

Twilight ditched her previous prepared spell and re-thought her shielding so the first thing she'd do, was cast full protection on Rarity. Hopefully one of these spells will actually get used or I'm going to feel like a fifth wheel pretty soon.

Twilight walked close behind Rarity, and while the tunnel was a little to narrow to comfortably fit two ponies they could stagger themselves so Rainbow Dash's head was next to Twilight's ribcage, and likewise Applejack's nose, just a few inches from Twilight's own tail, was next to Dash's ribs. Fluttershy seemed to prefer walking straight down the center but Twilight was glad that it hadn't yet taken a lot of coaxing to get her to keep up.

After less than a hundred steps, the tunnel flattened, and it a dozen strides more tripled in width. With no light strips on the ceiling it seemed a little darker but Twilight didn't worry until the wall to their right lit up with an image of a centipede larger than any of them crawling quickly across it.

Dash slapped her goggles down, and as Twilight drew power carefully, Fluttershy behind them all called out "There's nothing there. It's just a painting. A moving painting but it's completely flat." Dash nodded and raised her goggles to watch the centipede appear to walk into the ceiling and disappear.

"Nope. Not foreboding at all." was Applejack's comment, aimed at the edge between flickering light strip and gray blank concrete wall. All the mares gasped but didn't move when the same centipede "crawled" down the other wall. "Ah think we should just mosey along, girls."

Twilight had never used many destructive spells, but was desperately constructing a fireball spell in her head for whenever they found the mad pony responsible for such 'decorations'. Thus it was that she nearly fried the hair off Rarity, still in the lead, when a giggle echoed from behind them.

As the three meter diameter fireball exhausted its extremely limited summoned fuel, Rarity got back up off the floor and whirled around, possibly to scold Twilight for not being more careful. But Twilight couldn't see it, didn't hear what her friend might have said.

Breathless, high pitched and fast, it had been the laugh of a witch, who expected to see her vengeance unfold before her. Twilight was hyperventilating. She almost blasted Rainbow Dash when the blue pegasus started shaking Twilight.

"Hey! Twi! Listen Twilight we're all still standing. Rarity has a light spell prepared and Applejack is here with her hoof grenades and it's all cool. What happened to your shiny sheen huh?" All the while Dash was gently shaking the wizard mare by the shoulder, as if to wake from a deep slumber.

Twilight might still have never heard, but a tiny part of her mind insisted there had been no scraping. No sudden pain, no sickle cutting limbs off. Twilight eventually decided it had just been a recording, not unlike the centipede. Meant to disrupt and dismay.

As color slowly returned to her conscious mind, Twilight turned sheepishly to her occasionally terrorized friend. "I'm sorry if I seemed unfeeling, Dash. These nightmares are horrible but it's so easy to forget what it's like when you've managed to forget what terror is like."

Rainbow Dash nodded vigorously. "Yeah, I know. I know but you're not in it, yet. Not yet and this time you won't be alone, alright?" Dash looked around to make eye contact with the other four. "So we'll keep going together. You going to be OK?" Dash looked Rarity over, and finding no burn marks asked "Is Rarity going to be OK? Wicked cool fireball by the way. I'm impressed."

Rarity grinned a little nervously and said "Dear if you want to forget about shielding me I can probably do OK on my own." She quickly brushed he coat into place, as if it had fallen out or otherwise taken direct damage, but Twilight didn't doubt the fashionista could still feel the heat disparity. "Not even any soot. I wonder, can you cast ice?"

As the group started walking, Twilight nodded, and waxed eloquent about destruction. She might never had noticed the glazed looks around her as the mere act of explaining something she was skilled and experienced with was quite calming. But the pathway widened again, only the new part of the path was a black, bottomless pit on either side. Fortunately there was a sturdy looking rail on either side.

What seemed more foreboding was that the path itself was now made out of deeply textured rubber, and was moving at a fair clip. "A conveyer belt?" That was Applejack's outburst.

But Rainbow Dash thought it was almost reasonable. "So long as it supports ponies it would get you where you're going, faster." She started to step onto the belt, then turned back to Twilight. "Err, hey why don't you hover your blade so it'll already be drawn in case something nasty floats up around the railing." Turning fully around, she addressed herself to Fluttershy now. "And get ready to grab a pony. That way with Pinkie still missing we'll only have to lose one more if this thing is rigged to kill us all."

Rarity flung her mane dramatically, indignantly responding to Dash with "That's so comforting, darling! So glad I can be such a burden to your careful plans!"

Girls, thought Twilight but she didn't say anything, rather she drew her sword and levitated it above her head, straight up. It meant shielding spells would be quite complicated to cast on a moment's notice but maybe, she thought, a good offense will prove to be the best defense.

Dash wasn't phased by the unicorn's tone, telling Rarity "Hay I'm just saying the only way forward is across an untested bridge and only two of us have wings, alright?"

Behind them, Applejack growled "Suits me just fine. I can pert near leap that chasm anyhow." Turning an angry eye towards Fluttershy, she nearly shouted at the meek pegasus "If'n we fall, you catch Rarity and keep outta my way, right?"

Twilight saw the yellow pony was at the verge of tears and had already dropped to the ground while nodding quickly. Girls, be careful she thought again.

But she didn't have to say anything out loud. From everywhere and nowhere came that giggle again, and a very distant scraping as of a blade grinding against stone. And then, song. It was off key and almost tuneless but the words were easy to follow.

"Imagining that you are here with me // I'm always falling down // and coming for you now. // Lost my mind, are you calling me?"

Everyone looked at the bridge. Twilight and Fluttershy looked behind them. From in front of them, came a groan of misery that was interrupted by a yelp of pain. Then, finally the tunnel was plunged again into silence. No one could decide what do to, but from behind them came a series of clanking noises, many seconds apart but jumping vast distances each time. The lights, as inadequate as they were, were noisily shutting off until the only illumination came from the bridge and sections beyond it.

Rarity cast a light spell. Twilight almost shouted out to extinguish it, but she held her breath and realized that again, old rules weren't being applied here. Rarity was fine.

They all were fine. If you discounted racing hearts and saucer plate eyes.

Again, the singing. "So, how can it be? The color of the world turning dark on me." The cackle came afterwords this time.

Voice trembling, heart in her throat, Twilight said "OK girls I think we just need to move forward with this." Various strategies danced in her head, but she thought about the constant change to her shield prep strategy and dropped the notion beyond suggesting "A pegasus on either end so Dash you first Fluttershy you last." She couldn't bring herself to look behind her to see if that's at all how they lined up.

Single file for no clear reason, they stepped onto the conveyer belt and were whisked away. Once they were all standing on it, the ponies in the rear walked up stand in a close line again. To their right the wall was replaced with a mirror. After a minute or whatever (thought Twilight, who could barely pay attention to holding her sword upright let alone guessing how fast they were going on how much time was passing) the mirror stopped and it was plain stone again.

Now there was a mirror to their left, but they didn't show up in it. Their saddlebags, Dash's goggles and Twilight's sword were visible but the ponies themselves were not. The writing was quite visible however.

Written in a red, dripping substance that might well have been blood, it said "Losing my reflection" The next set of mirrors showed the ponies but they all looked like piles of lint. The message on this mirror was "...and my clarity."

"Right welcoming." Was Applejack's only response. Twilight fought the urge to blast the accursed pseudo mirrors just to see them crack open and stop showing such foul mockeries. Applejack finished her thought by saying "Ah said it afore, I'll say it again. Tain't natural for a mirror to have a mind of it's own."

Then the whole group was dumped unceremoniously on their noses as the conveyer belt disappeared under the concrete that was not moving. None of them were expecting this and Twilight almost forgot about her levitation spell. Fortunately no one was speared with her supposed confidence despite the pigpile of ponies.

When everypony was standing again, Twilight found they had reached a poorly lit landing with a solid wall in front of them and identical passages going both directions. Also, the conveyer belt had just stopped and was now rolling back towards their point of origin.

The wall in front of them was far from blank. It had illuminated silhouettes, basically the opposite of shadows. Five of them, all identical, depicting something bipedal, perhaps a conventional diamond dog, slowly, mechanically raising and lowering an arm holding something pointy that pointed downwards. The shape was lost as it overlapped with an upside down pony.

Twilight tried to shake off the creepy vibes crawling up her spine by analyzing the imagery. "You know, since all we see is an incomplete outline and only a single moveable joint, this might not be saying what I think I'm seeing. Or something."

Rainbow Dash watched the arm disappear into the chest of the pony shape. "Given the interior decorations to date I think it's safe to say that's an advertisement for pony sacrificing services.

Rarity managed to find a moment of humor by suggesting the company's slogan. "We help your cruel demigod be less angry with you starting at only ninety bits per pony."

"Hacksaws not provided" was Dash's somewhat inscrutable finale.

Twilight -- Demented Dreamland, Pt2

Rarity managed to find a moment of humor, suggesting a company slogan. "We help your cruel demigod be less angry with you starting at only ninety bits per pony."

Twilight was already facing to their left, but Fluttershy seemed to be favoring the right passage. Their direction was made somewhat clearer when the creepy billboard started rattling as it rolled up like a newsstand's doorway.

Behind it was a cage, poorly but evenly illuminated. Thick iron bars covered with slimy moss and sticky rust held a beaten and bleeding alicorn, who was lying flat. Attending to his wounds with a bucket of water and fresh, white washcloths, was an uncharacteristically clean pink coated earth pony mare. The shifting air brought scents of stale mildew, and hints of Pinkie's cotton candy shampoo. She didn't even look up from her task, saying firmly over her shoulder "I'm sorry about getting distracted, back there."

But then she stood, and turned to her friends. Jack groaned, a little. Rainbow had already lowered her goggles but Twilight was busy examining the cage for a door. As much, she admitted to herself, to know if this pink question mark could reach her, as whether any of them could get in to help her. There was no door that she could see.

Pinkie looked hopefully at her friends, none of whom had spoken to her yet. She frowned, and said at no particular pony, "That thing could emulate any one of you, too, you know." Then backed up a few steps, and looked her cage over. Each bar was centimeters thick and seemingly formed from a single sheet of billet iron. "Dash, can you see where the hinge is?"

Reluctantly, the pegasus raised a hoof, and indicated a particular joint. Jack tried to sit up, but his neck hit a chain, which Twilight had just a split second to see that each link was barbed. Keeping her eye on the joint that Dash had pointed to, Pinkie scootched back and began brushing insects off of the alicorn's shoulder and neck. Twilight understood the situation a little better, now. With the creepy crawlies providing the urge to thrash about, the chains bit deeper into his flesh each time.

Wave of beetles begone'd, Pinkie spoke again. "Applejack, can you blast that piece of metal with an explosive apple?"

Once everyone was cleared a little distance from it, Applejack launched a hoof grenade at it, splattering applesauce everywhere and leaving the supposedly unbroken line of iron, clanging on just one hinge. Applejack hit that one too, now that she could see it.

And a giant section of cage, came crashing down, bouncing a few times before catching one corner on the conveyor belt, which twisted and spun the metal, launching a spinning grate that probably weighed more than any one pony present, Jack excluded probably, into the abyss below the conveyor bridge. It clattered against the walls several times, echoing up through the chamber periodically throughout the rest of the conversation.

Standing now against the far side of the cage, which left her too far away even to touch Jack's prone form, Pinkie called to her now. "Twilight? Your sword of confidence. It can cut his chains and he needs to be loose to wake us up safely."

Twilight lowered xìnxīn until it was levitated parallel to the floor, and held it in front of her as she stepped into the cage, just far enough to see the chains. Their links were just the size that she could fit her tachi into them, and if she put the point against the floor behind Jack's back, and lifted the handle harshly ...

SNAP

The first of eight chains that cris-crossed over the worn out stallion snapped, and were carefully followed with more snapping chain. Once he felt them all fall away, he tried again to sit up, but had been stuck for too long and could not make his injured form obey him. Again, Pinkie attended to him, lifting his shoulder blades until he could prop himself on his left elbow. Wearily he looked around and counted heads. "Pardon me for calling this night in, early, but I believe I need to reset my dream form." Jack sighed deeply, a thousand yard stare pointed at none of them. Focusing his eyes again, he looked at each of them. "I can mark our progress so we shall return here. This is inside the interloper's own mind and we should not easily lose our progress."

So saying, he stomped his right front hoof, aluminum shoe clanging louder than should have been heard. Laying back down, he sighed again, and closing his eyes, Jack breathed no more.

A moment later Rarity piped up to say "I was expecting that speech to wake us up, too." Twilight didn't bother nodding but saw Fluttershy give assent. Pinkie wiped a tear as she stood over the deceased alicorn guide.

But just then light started pouring in from the ceiling. Birds could be heard chirping just down the hall to the left, and from the hallway to the right came Spike's voice. "You guys are waking up a little early this time, huh?"

Twilight opened her eyes, and raised her head from the pillow to look around and find Spike's voice.

He had moved his sleeping basket downstairs, and was still under his covers, sounding drowsy. Outside the windows of the library, came the chirping of birds that were up before the dawn, although it was already lighter than inside that dream hut. Sitting up carefully was the sergal, Jack, grunting and groaning as he stretched his limbs. "I feel like I've spent three days chained to the top of an anthill."

Pinkie yawned, and explained "Technically it was a scorpion burrow." While Twilight, stifling a yawn herself, sat upright and said quietly "The feeling wears off in a few minutes."

Dash almost leaped up, and leaned over to give Pinkie a noogie, rubbing hoof deep into fluffy mane. "YOU are a complete nuisance." before stepping closer to engulf the earth pony in a big hug. Muffled by Pinkie Pie's mane Twilight could just barely make out Rainbow Dash saying "Thanks for coming back for us, goofball."

Giggling, Pinkie apologized again. "I don't suppose you want to know I had a really pleasant trial? Lots of cake and fresh oranges and tea to distract me. I'll have to see if I can talk Jack over there into taking us back for a vacation once this is over."

Fluttershy, having already shaken the ceremonial flour out of her hair, asked demurely if Pinkie had her weapon, then? Rainbow Dash stepped back to gaze expectantly at the party pony, and Even Twilight felt a little anxious to hear. From what she remembered of those few moments, Pinkie Pie didn't look to have any new equipment.

Pinkie nodded enthusiastically, and said "I did it was a piece of" And then she stopped. Twilight could see the gears grinding in her friend's head. Pinkie was devising an alternate explanation for some reason. Twilight decided that the everypony - can - follow form was probably better for her addled brain, this being early in the morning even for her. "A piece of brick. From a big wall."

Twilight felt her brows furrow. "So you can ... remind yourself of the benefits of the Earth Pony way?" Twilight asked hesitantly.

Pinkie giggle snorted. "No silly. You just hit ponies over the head with it."