You breathe and you breathe
Musk and dust and
Dust and musk
Something itches
Something crawls
A buzz
A never ending buzz
Like cicadas
Crawling on the ceiling
Then the floor
Sizzling on hot metal grates
Your skull has been on for too long
Open your eyes
The world slides in through narrow slits
A narrow corridor
Urine colored carpets
Fluorescent bulbs
Bright and bright and buzzing
An air of stale gold
Faded
Stiff as hay
A fitting diet, don't you think, Twilight Sparkle?
Move
On stiff legs
You stand
A flick of the tail
And you feel nothing
No wind
No breeze
No coolness or freshness whatsoever
Just the mildew
And the buzzing
Buzzing and bright and buzzing and bright and
Or maybe you found it
You exhale
There's a narrow partition up ahead
Where a yellowed wall meets a yellowed wall
You trot forward
The buzzing comes and goes
A slight flicker to the lights
Or maybe you imagined it
You reach the partition
You turn the corner
And
Musk and dust and
Dust and musk
Something itches
Something crawls
A buzz
It is your head, Twilight Sparkle
After all, you brought it here as well, didn't you?
You rub your temple, leaning against a wall
It's neither warm or cold
But lukewarm
The walls
The walls
Your head or the room?
Both are the same
Would you expect any more?
Would you deserve any more?
Maybe the next room will be different
How did you know there would be another?
Only one way to find out
You move forward
Four hooves tiredly shuffling
Padding
Trotting without echoes
The buzz follows
Take a right
Take a right
Take a right
You stand in place
The buzz is above you
The buzz is behind you
The room splits
A fork in the yellow
In the yellow
In the yellow
There's a right turn up ahead
There's a left turn up ahead
A left turn behind you
You think about turning around
A complete one hundred and eighty degrees
But
The left will look right
Only the buzzing would remain
Only the buzzing would remain true
And then what?
At least it would be something different than what you've been doing
It would be retracing steps
Or have you actually been stepping?
You have been moving in one direction this whole time
Or has the rooms been moving?
And you have just been
Floating
Forward
As the buzz shifts
You close your eyes
You try to think
Past the buzz
Past the dust and musk
And dust and musk
And dust and musk and
You are better than this, Twilight
You are a clever unicorn
You've been through tougher situations
Crazier straits
More chaotic labyrinths
Think about your friends
Imagine that they're stuck here with you
What wouldn't you do for them?
Wouldn't you get them out as well?
Wouldn't you work your hardest?
You really
Really
Shouldn't have closed your eyes
Silly pony
A gasp
Your eyes flash open
Dust and musk
Mildew and yellow
A narrow corridor with mildew and mildew and
There's a fork
A right turn
A left turn
And which is left?
Only the buzz remains
Bright lights
Fluorescent and following
Must keep going
Just make a turn
You do so
With
Your eyes closed
The buzz shifts
And it's just like floating
Stairs
The stairs lead up
But they do not pierce the buzzing
As you ascend
One hoof at a time
The buzz climbs
It carries on
And it carries on
Your ears flick
The buzz carries forward
On fluorescent waves
Or maybe it isn't climbing
It's just a sound
Sound goes in all direction
Then why are there no hoofsteps?
Your eyes widen
A stab of pain
Brightness and brightness
Piercing gravity
And as you look down
And as you look up
You lose track of either
Are these stairs going up?
You pause
You lean against the wall
With your hoof
It's barely even there
The wall
The walls are everywhere, Twilight Sparkle
They're your only friends now
The walls and the ceiling
Six sides, forever receding
Yet forever devouring
And one day they will sink inwards
And swallow you into nothingness
It was always bound to happen
Maybe
Maybe somepony got tired of waiting
And brought you here before your time
Unless
This is the time
The buzz
Lights flicker
The stairs tilt
Back
Forward
Somewhere
Teetering
No
Do not wait for the walls
You are not surrounded
You can't be
The sixth barrier
It
Is always receding
It is an exit
Must
You must find it, Twilight
You must find it and break free
The stairs tilt up
The are stairs in front of you
Climb
You climb
You ascend
Past the buzz
Through the buzz
The buzz follows
There's a hallway up ahead
There's always a hallway up ahead
Keep an even pace
Get on even hoofing
Even now
Even now
Even now
Do you seriously believe her?
A slight shudder
But
You keep moving
You ascend
And
The buzz
You're a clever unicorn, Twilight
Why didn't you think of this before?
You lead it through the empty corridor
Over carpet and tile and mildew stains
The fluorescent lights catch the fibrous track
A golden glow
It is so very simple
The string goes around a wall
And takes a left
You turn left with it
The string will show where you've been
And where you haven't been
That's why you've left it
That's why you've been leaving it
Your pace quickens
The string drapes in a straight line up ahead
Until it doesn't
It goes around a wall
It takes a left
You turn left with it
Such a clever unicorn, Twilight
You would have to be
To fashion a string out of nothing
Was it the carpet?
Did you unravel it?
If so, from where?
You blink
You follow the string
But slowly, now
There's a wall up ahead
The string takes a left
So
You follow it
You
You made the string
You left the string here
Or did the string leave you here?
It leads straight ahead
Until
It doesn't
There is a wall up ahead
Such a clever pony, Twilight Sparkle
So
You turn left
And
There's a string
It goes straight
Until it doesn't
There's a wall up ahead
It turns left
So
So
There's a chair here
You have stopped
There's a chair here
Why is there a chair here?
It's an empty room
With the lights
And the buzz
And
A chair
And you remember
Or was it ten hundred rooms ago?
There were two chairs
Facing a wall
Facing each other
Facing nothing
Just like this one
It faces the wall
And the corner
But neither
It breaks up the symmetry
It is empty
As this room is empty
But why is it here?
Why were the other ones there?
Who is it for?
You're the only pony here
You're the only pony anywhere
The rest of the chamber is empty
Full of nothing
But fluorescent lights
And buzzing
Pointless
Purposeless
Crooked
It had to have been placed here
Twilight
Twilight, you have to keep moving
Turn around and pick a direction
Any direction
But what if you find more empty chairs?
Just go
Move
What if you chose to sit in one?
Move, Twilight
You turn
You trot down the corridor
If you waited long enough
Would someone come sit beside you?
Move
Or would it take you somewhere deeper
Further
Someplace more broken than here
Than you?
Move
Move
Move
Ascending
Descending
Tug and push
Gravity
Deflating
The walls are the floor are the ceiling are the walls
You know why you're here, Twilight Sparkle
Don't listen
You know what brought you to this broken place
Don't listen to her
Just
Move
Ascending
Hoofsteps
Without echoes
Without
Without
Think about it, Twilight Sparkle
Nature doesn't have tests
Nature has nothing to prove
Nature just is
Don't listen
Don't listen
Just
Trotting
Step by step
Up through the buzz
The lights
A flicker
Nothing about this is natural
Nothing about this is right
The geometry
The decay
It's trying to implode upon itself
It yearns for collapse
The six walls shrink
Hungry
Devouring
But
You
You have to keep moving
You're the only thing keeping it from dissolving into infinitesimal nothingness
Hoofsteps
Ascending
Descending
Past the buzz
It floats
It
A rock in the stomach
A pit
A center of gravity
Upon which all things spin
All things here
That shouldn't be here
That shouldn't be anywhere
Think, Twilight
Think about it, Twilight Sparkle
Think about your friends
Think about how wrong this place is
Think about how they're missing you
Think about how wrong you are
The sixth wall recedes
It will lead you out
It will lead you to them
You are here because of a test
A test that you are failing
Just keep moving
And tests don't exist in nature
Buzzing
Because nothing in nature is bound to fail
Buzzing
Stepping
Hooves
Don't
Don't listen
Keep moving
Just keep moving
No
No
It's
No
No
It's
Starting to make sense
Now
You stare at them
Feathers
Lavender feathers
That's
It's not
Scattered
Across
The carpet
Lavender against yellow
A cold contrast
Left in a hurry
A flurry
There
There must be
A pegasus
Somewhere
With your coat color
Lost here with you
They don't leave a trail
They're just
Scattered
Like leaves
Lavender leaves
Soft and freshly-plucked
No
Yes, we all know why they're here
No
Just
We all know why you're here
Just keep
Just keep moving
You limp forward
Hooves over feathers
Hooves over carpet
Don't
Just
Please
You quicken your pace
The buzz follows
More feathers
After all, Twilight Sparkle
Unless it needs to be fixed
Branches
There are branches here
But
But how
But where
When
Twilight
All across the room
Scattered across the corridors
Teetering off the stairs
Charred and burnt
Beneath
The fluorescent lights
Twilight
Don't
You trot forward
You see fragments of books
Tattered lengths of bedsheets
The broken remnants of a telescope
And
A wooden horsehead
Cracked down the center
Don't
Isn't it starting to make sense
Twilight Sparkle
Don't
You shake
Your heart
Your heart
Branches
And splinters
Scattered
Blasted
Leave
And that's why
You were brought here
Leave this place
You backtrot from the branches
But you only bump into more
Because you are a failure
They scratch and they claw
You must leave this place
Twilight
Twilight
Leave
You hobble over the chunks of wood
So broken that
You couldn't even be fixed
No
Twilight
The world blurs
The fluorescent lights sting
The buzz
Encompassing
Twilight
Don't cry
Don't cry
Just move
They replaced you
Twilight Sparkle
Just move
You
You will find them
You will find them
You must find them
Collapsing
Crying
Musk and dust
The buzz
Get back up
And go
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Walls and walls
Halls and halls
Fluorescent bulbs
And
Buzz
And
Buzz
Don't stop
The same way forward
The same way backward
There has to be an exit
There is always an exit
There is
No
Don't
They replaced you
Twilight Sparkle
Keep moving
Twilight
Twilight
Just
Imagine if you could fly out of here
Gallop
Keep
Keep
Can you?
Down the corridor
Until
A scrap
What?
In the center of the floor
A scrap
It lies there
What
You stumble to a stop
Limping
Panting
And you look at it
No
Leathery
Translucent
Dragonskin
Oh no
Molted dragonskin
In the shape
Please no
Please Celestia no
They replaced him too
You cry
Nothing but buzz
So you run
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
They replaced him too
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Go right
Leave a string
Just follow a string
Have you tried using a string
Leave a string
Just follow a string
Have you tried using a string
Leave a string
Just follow a string
Have you tried using a string
Leave a string
Just follow a string
Have you tried using a string
Leave a string
Just follow a string
Have you tried using a string
Leave a string
Just follow a string
Have you tried using a string
Leave a string
Just follow a string
Have you tried using a string
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Just keep moving
Like a room
It is nothing
Without a space
To give
To forget
Sometimes right
Sometimes up
Forward and backwards
We tried
We cried
And in the end
We can always start
With you
The form
But always
A backup
To pick from
With
