"Let us begin with something simple, shall we?" Calm, collected, but twinged with intrigue, Luna's voice practically strutted through the empty black void, as if daring somepony to challenge its authority. Normally, this spell would begin by producing an image of the target's face in the center of the void, a reflection of their personal identity and current emotions but Luna chalked the deviation up to the 'unique' nature of this particular target.
"What is your name?"
"My name?" A second voice, definitively masculine in nature, cut back through the darkness easily, but this voice was immediately followed by echoed whispers. The clear voice would answer her questions truthfully in a conversational manner, while the whispers declared her target's deeper thoughts aloud, granting Luna further insight into her target's thought processes, intentions and possibly their subconscious as well.
"I can't --"
"--remember."
She was afraid something like this might happen. While her spell drew the truth from its targets, it could do nothing if that truth was hidden from them.
So somepony not only cast some manner of amnesia spell on this poor soul but also went through extreme efforts to teleport them past all the magical wards of the royal palace and into our private quarters. This is starting to feel like an elaborate prank. Perhaps we should have a talk with Discord about inappropriate----
What?
“I know I…”
The target's voice and the echoed whispers began to sound strained and agitated.
"Knives... "
“Everywhere…"
"Why...?”
Luna had heard that victims of amnesia sometimes suffered migraines when they tried to remember their past, but this disturbed her deeply.
An amnesia spell that causes physical pain as the target tries to remember? Even Discord would find such torture to be in poor taste...
“--had one. Actually --”
“--had three, but I--”
“--can't remember. Why can't I--”
“-- remember? No. I have to--”
“-- gotta remember--”
“-- at least --”
"STOP..."
“-- one.”
The target's inner thoughts gradually grew louder and more pained and Luna briefly considered ordering it to stop, to save the poor soul the pain. However, seeing (or hearing, as it were) him fight so valiantly for his own memories against some unknown foe sparked empathy in her heart for such an underdog.
"TOO MUCH..."
“My first name is? No? My middle? No?”
"STOP..."
“Must remember… at least one--”
"ARGH..."
“No… I won’t… lose this.”
"PAIN AHHH..."
"IIIITTT HHHHHHUUUUUURRRRRTS..."
"AAHHAHAHA STOP PLEASE STOP PAIN..."
The inner thoughts reached their peak, sounding through the blackness of Luna's spell so loudly they nearly drowned out the sound of her target's actual voice.
"I WILL remember my name."
“MY… NAME... IS..."
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"
"...............Forget..............."
Suddenly, silence. The dark felt as if it was empty. Fearing that she had accidentally allowed him to exert himself to the point of death, Luna pushed more mana into the spell, in the hopes of finding her target's thoughts, but before she could probe further, his voice finally answered.
"My name… is Wilson."
The declaration was made with confidence, quiet dignity, and, Luna noted with a bit of a smile, no small amount of defiance.
Hmmmmm. Yes, well done. We suppose given your circumstances a little pride isn't unwarranted. We would imagine any pony might --
As if in retort to her thoughts, the void bulged as though it was fabric stretched across a tensing leg muscle and suddenly a stable image of her target's face flashed into existence in its center. For a brief moment, Luna was terrified that perhaps it had stolen her magic from her, much like Tirek, but just as quickly as the sensation came, it was gone again, the spell entirely under her jurisdiction once more.
Luna snorted in annoyance but elected to evaluate the situation logically.
It makes sense, we suppose. Ponies’ names are often intrinsically entwined with their identities. Robbed of its name, it had no identity to project.
However, Luna had reservations about applying pony logic to a face that was most certainly not a pony.
It was too flat and its nose was too small and pointy and its eyes were too small. The entirety of its face was furless apart from a short cropped brown mane atop its head and some stubble around its chin and cheeks. Put simply, it was unlike anything Luna had ever seen before. Indeed, immediately after putting it into a magically induced coma and prior to beginning her spell, Luna had scoured the royal library for any reference to this strange bipedal creature, real or fictitious, and had come up empty hooved.
Admittedly Luna should have probably informed the royal guard of the intrusion first, or perhaps sent a short missive to her sister, or told literally anypony really, but this was such a unique opportunity. A specimen of an entirely new species, alive, perfectly healthy, yet unconscious, dropped right into the hooves of the one pony whose mastery over the realm of the unconscious mind was unparalleled in all of Equus.
Hmph. Fie on anypony who would deny us this moment. If anypony takes issue with our decisions later, they can shout their woes from beyond the gates of Tartarus.
Refocusing on the task at hand, Luna was now taken aback to discover tears flowing from her target's eyes. Inwardly, the princess winced. She had chosen this particular spell because it didn't use pain to extract the information she required from its target.
Clearly whatever magic is clouding its memory causes far more pain than we had thought.
However, the face in the void didn't seem to hold her mistake against her. Indeed, it was smiling from ear to ear in an expression that Luna could only describe as “jubilant relief”.
Ah, we should correct ourselves before we form a bad habit. Not “it”. He, and his name is Wilson.
"Ahem. Wilson, what is the colloquial term for your species?” While there might have been more pertinent questions to ask, Luna’s curiosity got the better of her.
“Human,” he answered cheerfully, clearly still riding the upswing in his mood from triumphing over his amnesia.
Scientific name: Homo Sapiens Sapiens.
Interesting that his first thought in relation to his species is of its scientific name. Perhaps we have been lucky enough to be gifted with a scholar of his species.
In short order, a new image appeared in the void behind him, half of a large tome, opened to a page with an illustration of another human, but with more arms and legs. Clearly this was the image that came to Wilson’s mind when he thought of the word “human”.
At least that part of the spell is working properly.
Luna analyzed the drawing closely.
Another scholarly thought, I see. Hmmmmm, unless his kind are typically born with awkwardly placed vestigial appendages and Wilson has lost his, or is the result of some manner of mutation, this must depict their range of motion.
Suddenly realizing that she had allowed her mind to wander, the princess shook her head and pressed onward to more important issues.
“How did you get here?” she asked.
“I… don't know,” he said, shrugging his shoulders and bending his neck to the side.
“Don't even know where I am.”
Luna hummed aloud at that.
A different tact, then.
“What is the last thing you can remember?”
“Well… I was… ah…” Wilson tried to reply but began to grimace and clutch his sides.
”The knives again? How? Why?”
Luna frowned in annoyance. As much as she wanted the information, Luna didn't believe she had it in her to actually watch Wilson go through the pain of remembering, “Stop. You don't have to answer that question.”
Wilson's features softened back into a neutral expression.
Personal information is lost to him, but memorized facts are not. If one disregarded the cutting sensations on his skin, one might think this were just a typical case of amnesia. Hmmmm, memorized facts...
“Where do you hail from?” she asked.
“Kalispell,”
Wilson's subconscious helpfully provided three maps behind him in rapid succession. First, what Luna had to assume was a city map, then a country map, and finally a continental one, all of which were being represented on different pages of large tomes in the same way the diagram of the human was.
Unfortunately, upon closer inspection, the maps proved to be worse than useless. Even taking into account the many countries that had been discovered while she had been banished to the moon, the maps she now saw matched nothing on Equus. Luna's eyes widened with a sudden realization.
“What is the name of the planet you live on?” she asked.
“Earth,”
“The third planet from the sun…”
The map that his subconscious provided next confirmed her suspicions, in that it did not match Equus’s home system at all.
We knew it! Wilson is from another planet. Another solar system even! Add in his predisposition toward scholarly thought and Wilson must be some manner of interstellar explorer! How exciting! Oh, we must tell Twilight immediately! Sister too, of course, but I'm sure Twilight will be much more excited. Just wait until she hears --
“Um… excuse me, but I have a quick question."
The spell Luna used shouldn't have allowed its targets to speak unbidden so she was understandably shocked into silence to hear Wilson say anything out of turn. Wilson, for his part, continued, apparently not noticing Luna's shocked silence.
“Who is Twilight Sparkle?"
Princess Luna couldn't help but chuckle nervously, "Our apologies. We didn't mean to say that out loud."
"You didn't say anything."
"What is she talking about?"
“This is a strange conversation.”
"Why is she avoiding my question?”
“Was already strange but I mean…”
"-- after I answered all of her questions.”
The princess felt one of her eyes twitch but she did her best not to have an outburst at the presumptuous tone of that last thought, “Wilson, does your kind possess some manner of passive telepathy?” she asked carefully.
“Not that I know of,” he answered without hesitation.
”That's another weird question to ask out of the blue.
Her anger at the possibility that he had been playing her for a fool quickly evaporated and was replaced with confusion, “Then, how do you know the name, Twilight Sparkle?”
“Well, I only asked because that picture appeared,” he said, raising his hand and making a gesture with it that Luna guessed was pointing.
The lunar princess turned her head only to discover, floating behind her, a portrait of said alicorn smiling innocently, with the words ‘Twilight Sparkle’ written in a fine gold script on the box at the bottom of its frame. As she laid her eyes upon it, Luna couldn't help but wilt visibly at the sight.
“Oh, buck.”
Luna ended her self-dubbed ‘Dream-Interrogation’ spell, the blackness quickly giving way to the light of the her bedroom where she sat next to Wilson's prone form. Looking down at him, she found that the tears he had shed in the dream had counterparts in the waking world.
How splendid, a reminder of yet another of our failures today.
Sighing, the princess reached down with a hoof and gently wiped the tears away.
“I'm sorry, Wilson, but you might have to endure more of that pain in the future, for both our sakes.”
Resolutely, Luna turned and walked to her desk. In hindsight, using barely tested magic was already fraught with dangers and gambles, even without the additional variables that using it on an entirely new species entailed.
Truly, we should be grateful that this was all that went wrong.
Luna stopped dead in her tracks on the way to her destination.
And that he spoke fluent Equestrian.
She couldn't resist smacking her forehead with a hoof.
Gadzooks! With the number of things we overlooked it was absolutely miraculous that anything went right at all.
Fortunately, Luna still had options, not the least of which was her original dream-walking spell. However, the unexpected result of her interrogation immediately brought a different possibility to mind in particular.
Evening is not for a several hours yet, but it would be best not to doddle.
Reaching her desk, Luna extracted a quill and two pieces of parchment from its drawers and set about writing a letter while drawing up a magical formula at the same time.
Dear Princess Twilight,
I have been working on a somewhat experimental application of magic and I am interested to hear your input on the subject. What I'm speaking of combines the Zone of Truth spell invented by Circumspect Silver in the year 747 A.D. as well as my personal talent for dream-walking.
While it does seem to produce the desired results for the most part, meaning the subject speaks truthfully in the dream, it fails to restrict the subject from conversing unsolicited. Another notable issue is that it opens the caster’s subconscious to the subject by way of producing mental images to the same effect as it does with the intended target.
I am curious to see if perhaps you might be able to think of some solution for these issues. I have included in the scrolls I've sent you the details of Silver’s original spell’s casting and formula as well as a summary of the combination’s intended effects.
Ever thankful, Princess Luna.
Gathering the two scrolls together and wrapping them in her letter, Luna sealed the scroll with her wax insignia and sent the whole lot off with a quick spell.
That task complete, Luna set about completing some paperwork her scribes had brought for her approval, but not before double checking to be sure that the sleeping spell she had cast upon Wilson would last well into the night, when she would have ample time and mana to cast it again.
She had only finished three documents before a thought occurred to her, causing her to levitate his body and move him to the floor next to her bed so that the bed concealed him from the room's entrance. With a nod of approval at her own cleverness, she set herself back to work.
It only took the completion of three more documents for another doubt to come to her. This time, she stood from her desk and trotted to her door. Opening it, she poked her head out and addressed one of her guards, “Tell the maids and kitchen staff that we require the utmost privacy today. They will skip any cleaning and leave my meals out here in the hall until we have ordered otherwise. Are we clear?”
The guardpony said nothing, simply saluting in confirmation.
“Very good. Carry on.”
Retreating back into her quarters, Luna shut and locked the doors. With another nod of approval at her own thoughtfulness, she trotted back to her desk and set herself back to work once more.
She had barely made it through three more documents when she was interrupted by the appearance of a scroll above her desk. It appeared at just the right place to knock into her quill as she was signing the latest page, butchering her signature.
“Sun and stars!” Luna said in exasperation as she lifted the scroll to her eyes, “Who dares to--?”
She stopped short when she saw Twilight’s royal seal holding the scroll shut.
“Oh.”
Looking at her clock, Luna realized it had only been ten minutes since she’d sent off her letter.
That was quick. If she has already discovered a solution, she is even more of a genius than we had thought.
Quickly undoing the purple wax, Luna opened the letter and read it.
We need to talk.
Luna blinked once, twice, turned the scroll over to see if anything was written on the back, turned it back around, blinked a third time, and then snorted in confusion.
Curious. What could she wish to discuss that could not be done by letter? Is she worried it might be intercepted? Or perhaps it is another matter altogether?
After scanning the page for more information one final time in vain, she set it down on her desk, and prepared a teleportation spell.
Whatever the case maybe, it would still be best to get through it quickly.
With a small pop she was gone.
With a second pop she reappeared at the foot of the front staircase of the foyer of Twilight’s castle. Upon closer inspection, it seemed that Twilight had apparently taken to converting it into a proper throne room, complete with a crystalline throne at the top of the staircase and lo and behold, there sat the Princess of Friendship herself. She was draped over her throne's left arm, reading a book, accompanied by a large stack of more books on the floor at it’s side.
So engrossed was Twilight with the tome before her, she had not even noticed Luna's entrance. Even so, her nonchalant attitude did little to alleviate the feeling of smallness that overcame Luna at the sight before her.
Methinks Tia's knack for intimidation has rubbed off on Twilight a tad too well.
Luna cleared her throat loudly to draw Twilight’s attention.
Looking up from her book and down at Luna Twilight’s expression immediately soured, “Luna.”
The sour look and curt greeting only served to increase the heavy atmosphere in the room, but Luna did her best to ignore it and greeted her fellow princess as cordially as she could, “Ahem. Hail, Twilight! How are you this afternoon? We hope all is well.”
Twilight, for her part, seemed willing enough to play along.
“Oh, yes. Everything is going great!” she answered with faux cheerfulness, “Today Spike woke up extra early to surprise me and Starlight with a pancake breakfast, Starlight’s friendship studies are going even better than I'd hoped, and I even got to start reading the newest Daring Do novel today.”
Luna gulped nervously. Feeling that the other horseshoe was bound to drop shortly but not knowing exactly when, she had no choice but to continue, “T-truly? We are happy to hear that.”
“Yes, I was having a wonderful day,” Twilight nodded happily, before her tone took a complete turnaround. “Right up until somepony sent me a letter detailing an extremely unethical magic spell.”
“W-wha? Un-unethical?” Luna sputtered indignantly.
“What would you call it, Luna?”
Luna opened her mouth to retort, but quickly stopped herself. In truth, she had spent almost no time considering the moral implications and now that she did, she was having difficulty mounting a sufficient argument in her defense. To be fair, when Luna first had the idea, time for a lively debate on its morality had been a luxury she and Celestia could not afford.
They had captured one of King Sombra’s generals acting as his spy inside Equestria’s borders. The pegasus in question was a mare as twisted and evil as Sombra himself and was also deeply infatuated with him, making it impossible to pry information from her willingly. To make matters worse, Sombra had blessed her with a spell that made her impervious to all physical pain, which made her into both the perfect spy and the worst prisoner at the same time.
Equestria desperately needed to know if Sombra was planning an invasion without him learning what they knew, so her ‘dream-interrogation’ had been a godsend. Luna was able to get the mare to admit that Sombra was indeed planning an invasion (and quite soon, in fact) and together with her sister, she immediately flew to the Crystal Empire to launch the preemptive assault that ultimately culminated in Sombra’s thousand year banishment. Had it not been for the spell, the general would have likely taken the knowledge with her all the way to the grave and thousands of ponies would have lost their lives in the defense of Equestria.
Of course, that information will do little to save me from Twilight’s wrath today.
“Surreptitious?” she answered weakly.
“Very cute,” Twilight replied, rolling her eyes.
“Please accept our apologies, Twilight, but we’ve been gone for a thousand years, ponies ideas of right and wrong have shifted a great deal, in many ways that we are still ignorant of. Perhaps you could enlighten us as to the ethical issues that this magic creates?”
“Where do I even start?” Twilight huffed, rubbing the base of her horn. “Firstly, without even going into this situation specifically, your dream-walking ability is already rife with its own issues. Dreams are where ponies’ conscious and subconscious minds intermingle after all, so they’re extremely personal and should be private.”
“Scootaloo and Applebloom did not seem to mind our presence.”
“Scootaloo and Applebloom are just fillies, Luna. Their dreams are probably occupied with the tamest of personal issues. Imagine if you stepped into a more adult-themed dream. Imagine accidentally walking in on mine while I'm dreaming about Ra --” Twilight stopped talking and shoved a hoof in her mouth.
Seeing a possible way out of her scolding, Luna jumped on the opportunity, “Hmmmm? Dreaming about who now? And what sort of adult-themed dreams are we talking about, specifically?”
“None of your beeswax and you know what I’m talking about,” she snapped pointing an accusatory hoof at Luna, but she quickly steered the conversation back on course, “And even disregarding those issues, there's also the fact that this new spell’s victims don’t even realize that they’ve been interrogated. They wake up thinking they had a dream about a weird one-sided conversation with you or worse just forget it entirely.”
To be fair, that was the intended effect.
Apparently finishing her rant, Twilight began rubbing the base of her horn again and said, “Look, just please tell me you haven't used this spell on anypony yet.”
“Nooooo… Nay, we have not. Not once.”
“Luna!” Twilight slammed the hoof she been using to rub her head into the seat of her throne to look indignantly at her.
“Well, I’m sorry, Twilight, but we weren't blessed with thine treasured guidance a millennia ago as thee had not been polite enough to be born yet.”
The half-truth seemed to soften Twilight’s mood, “Okay, okay, but at least tell me you haven't used it since you came back from the moon.”
That question caused Luna to hesitate. On the one hoof, she could say no, and that would be the end of her scolding, but she would be no closer to solving the problem with the spell, which would likely mean a swift end to her interrogations with Wilson. On the other, however, the whole truth would probably also lead to a quick halt of them as well, especially if Twilight felt the need to inform Celestia of her machinations, though Luna was now having difficulty rationalizing why she was still keeping Wilson’s existence a secret.
“Luna?”
Gods, she sounds just like Mother.
“We have used it on one pony who volunteered to help test it,” she said quickly, thinking on her hooves. “...For purely academic purposes, we assure you.”
Raising an eyebrow, Twilight regarded her slightly for several moments, seemingly weighing the truth of Luna’s words. Eventually, she relented with a sigh, “Alright. I suppose I of all ponies can't blame you for experimenting with new forms of magic.”
“So you'll help us work on the spell?” Luna asked hopefully.
“As long as you only use it on volunteers and publish a scientific paper on your findings,” Twilight’s smile became a smirk, “And credit me as a co-author.”
“Errrr… Done.”
I suppose I’ll have to start recording what I’m doing, to satisfy her if such a paper can be published later.
“Great!” Twilight said, using a levitation field to produce what Luna had to assume were the scrolls she had sent earlier from behind her throne, “Now the main technical issue with the actual magic that I can see is the use of this ‘Zone of Truth’ spell. Honestly, it's not really the best spell suited to the task.”
“Oh?” Luna asked, glad to be moving the conversation onto actually solving her dilemma.
“Yeah. The thing is, Circumspect Silver invented it for the expressed purpose of casting it in his parlor to stop guests from lying to him. He didn't really care much about extracting information, just preventing deception. So really your version was more of a 'Dream Honest Conversation' spell."
He was always a bit paranoid.
"Not to mention the fact that the spell also affects everypony within its range, including the caster, which may partially explain why the caster's subconscious becomes exposed as well," Twilight continued, having fully engaged her 'science mode', “Actually, several much better truth spells were invented while you were away on the moon. Most of them during times of war, of course. In fact, I know Celestia used one of them herself about 300 years after your banishment, though the details of the event are somewhat hard to pin down due to conflicting accounts. Why don't we ask her what she thinks?”
“No!” Luna said, perhaps a bit too quickly.
Twilight tilted her head in confusion.
“She… my sister is a mare of very rigid morals and she would likely not see the scientific value of this avenue of research,” Luna said hastily. “I’m sure she would stop us on the ethical grounds alone, even if we pursued a perfectly moral method of experimentation. We should keep her in the dark about this for now. Once we have some notable findings, it will be easier to convince her to let us continue unabated.”
Not to mention she would want to oversee the whole affair.
“I don't know…” she seemed to hesitate.
“Listen to me well, Twilight Sparkle. It is easier to ask for forgiveness than it is to ask for permission.”
Twilight’s eyes narrowed, “That sounds like something a pony who gets into a lot of trouble would say.”
“Many did characterize me as a ‘problem foal' in my youth,” Luna chuckled.
“Alright fine. I’ll keep this from Celestia for now,” she said with a roll of her eyes as a quill and notebook teleported to her side and she began to make notes, “It’s going to take me a while to come up with a suitable replacement for the ‘Zone of Truth’ spell anyway, since most of the ones I know off the top of my head require the subject to be awake.”
“Thank you. Is there anything you want us to do to help?”
“No, no. This will probably just take a few hours of research. I'll send a letter if and when I find something,” she answered, not bothering to look up from her notebook.
“In that case, we bid thee farewell,” Luna said, charging a teleportation spell but paused when a wicked thought occurred to her.
“Oh, and Twilight?” Luna said with a suitable grin.
“Hmmm?” she asked, looking up.
“We believe Rainbow Dash would make a fine wife for you.”
Luna was gone before Twilight could begin to sputter out a response but not before her face turned a lovely shade of red.
