Lucidity

by alexmagnet

First published 1st of October, 2013

Rainbow Dash has always wondered what it'd be like to do magic, like a unicorn, but seeing as she's not one, she's never had the chance. Luckily for her, Twilight has the perfect solution. Lucid dreaming.

Lucidity (n.) lu·cid·i·ty
1. the quality of being easily understood, completely intelligible, or comprehensible
2. the ability to see things clearly

Rainbow Dash has always wondered what it would be like to perform magic, but seeing as she's not a unicorn, it's always been a dream that was just out of her reach. Fortunately for Rainbow Dash, Twilight may have the perfect solution: lucid dreaming.

Of course, neither Twilight nor Rainbow expected what would happen once they started experimenting with dreams. It turns out, if you're not careful, the line between dreams and reality may blur beyond recognition.

Stage 1 — Theta

Twilight was snout-deep in a book when Spike entered the room. She was so preoccupied with reading that she didn’t hear when he opened the door, nor when he strode across the room. Not even when Spike slammed down a pile of heavy leather-bound books on her desk did Twilight take notice. It was only when Spike realized he had misjudged the positioning of the books, causing the top one to fall with a loud thud, that Spike finally managed to get Twilight’s attention.

Her eyes shot up from the book and widened in a mixture of surprise and anger. “Spike!” she said loudly. “Be careful with those. Those books are very old and very delicate.”

Spike sighed, bending over to pick up the fallen book. “Yeah, yeah, sorry about that. Total accident, I promise.”

Twilight, satisfied though not really listening, turned to the pile of books. “So, these are all the ones I asked for then, right?”

He nodded. “Yep, every single one. Ya know, it wasn’t easy finding some of these. They were at the bottom of these huge stacks like a thousand books high.”

“Pssh.” Twilight rolled her eyes. “You’re exaggerating.”

“Only a little,” said Spike wiping a stray bead of sweat from his forehead, “that’s the crazy thing.” He watched as Twilight took the top book and cracked it open, letting its pages spill out gracefully. “So, what’d you want these for anyway? It seems like an awful lot of books just for learning how to keep a dream diary, and an awful lot of trouble.”

Twilight, her eyes scanning the pages quickly as she flipped through them, answered, “Well, it’s not really about keeping a dream diary. I mean, that’s what it was at first.”

“At first?”

Twilight flipped past a few dozen more pages, eventually stopping on one for a second only to read the first few paragraphs then move on. “Yeah,” she said, not looking up, “I was reading a book by a famous psychologist who said that your dreams were the gateway to your soul. He says a lot of meaning can be ascribed to them, and you can use them to discover your heart’s inner desires. Of course, it all seemed a little silly, but I thought I’d look into it.” She stopped on another page, shook her head, then continued. “But the more I read about it, the more interesting it became. So, I decided to try using one of my dreams to test this theory on, but I found myself having a really hard time remembering them the next morning.”

Spike nodded in agreement. “I usually remember that I had a dream, but I can never remember what it was.”

Twilight frowned. “Darn, not here either,” she muttered. She glanced up at Spike. “Yes,” she said, “that was the same problem I had.” She went back to her book, skipping a few more pages then heaving a sigh and setting the book aside. Grabbing another book, she said, “Apparently this is a common problem, but it has a relatively easy solution.”

Spike narrowed his eyes. “Nothing’s ever that easy.”

As Twilight flipped open the next book, she said, “This is.” Opening to the table of contents, she quickly skimmed the chapter titles then skipped to the appropriate one. “All you have to do is keep a dream diary. Every time you wake up from a dream, you write down everything you can remember from it. The more you do it, the easier it becomes. It’s simple really.”

Spike scratched his head, cocking it to the side. “If it’s so simple, then why aren’t you doing it? Why all these books on influencing dreams?”

“Because I—” Twilight stopped. Her ears twitched as she caught a sound coming from upstairs. She waited a moment, then heard it again. “Is… is that knocking?”

“Oh, that?” said Spike, lazily jabbing a thumb over his shoulder. “That’s probably Rainbow Dash.”

“Rainbow Dash?”

“Yeah, I saw her through the window when I was carrying these books downstairs for you.”

“And you didn’t open the door for her?”

Spike pointed at the pile of heavy books on the desk. “When I was carrying these books,” he repeated.

Twilight threw her hooves in the air. “Spike! Why didn’t you at least tell me she was waiting at the front door?”

He shrugged. “You seemed busy.”

Twilight groaned loudly. “Well, we better go see what she wants at least.”

“She does tend to get upset at having to wait for anything,” Spike mused quietly.

Carefully setting the book she had been reading aside, and making sure to mark her page with a stray scrap of paper, Twilight quickly made her way up the stairs, followed closely by Spike, and into the foyer. There, her face pressed against the window, a slightly miffed Rainbow Dash was waiting at the door. No sooner had Twilight reached the door and swung it open than Rainbow came crashing through, knocking over Spike in the process.

“Finally!” she cried, letting out a greatly exaggerated sigh. “I was waiting outside, like, forever!” Hovering a few inches in the air, she looked around the room. “So, uhh, where do you keep your adventure stories?”

Twilight watched Rainbow fly around the room, scanning the books lining the walls. “Is that all you came for? Books?”

Rainbow shot a quick look over her shoulder at Twilight, giving her a grin. “Yeah, pretty much.”

“Didn’t you read those other ones I lent you?” she asked. “There was about ten of them, all fairly decent length.”

Rainbow shrugged, her eyes still on the bookshelves. “I read a few of ‘em, but didn’t really get around to the others. Got kinda bored, I guess. Thought I’d swing ‘round to your place and pick up some more instead.”

“Ah… I see.” Twilight’s horn began to glow as she started pulling books from shelves and towards the hovering mare. “Umm, well, there’s this one,” she said, holding up a bright blue book for Rainbow to see. “The Long Way Around. It’s about these two ponies who go on a journey around the world. Or, there’s always, Space Wars,” she said, holding up another book. “It’s a sort of science fiction adventure about…” She trailed off as she realized Rainbow wasn’t paying attention. Her eyes weren’t even focused on the books. Instead, the were fixated on Twilight’s horn, which was still alight with magic.

“Yeah, that one sounds cool,” said Rainbow, her eyes still on Twilight’s horn. Suddenly, she snapped meet Twilight’s eyes. “Hey, I was wondering something.”

Twilight cocked an eyebrow. “You were?”

She nodded. “Yeah. I was wondering, what does it feel like to do magic?”

Twilight’s brow rose higher. “Why are you asking this?”

“I dunno,” she said, shrugging, “just curious, I guess.”

Twilight creased her brow, her lips pursed. “Hmm, I don’t really know how to describe it” she confessed. “It’s not something I really think about. I mean, what does it feel like to fly?”

Rainbow hummed quietly. “Umm, I dunno. Normal… I guess.” She fiddled with her mane for a bit before adding, “Is there any way you can make it so I can do magic?”

Twilight thought for a moment, then shook her head slowly. “No, not really. The best I could do is give you a horn like a unicorn, but it wouldn’t actually do anything. It would just be for aesthetics more than anything. Pegasi simply don’t have the same leylines that unicorns do. It’d be like trying to trying to turn a cow into a dragon. Sure I could make the cow look like a dragon, but that doesn’t mean it is a dragon.”

Rainbow’s ears drooped pathetically as she gave a sad sigh. “Oh, that’s kinda lame. I’ve always wanted to do magic. It’s sorta always been a dream of mine.”

Twilight’s eyes lit up suddenly. She gave Rainbow a wild look, then grabbed her by the shoulders, shaking her. “Dream!” she yelled. “That’s it!”

Rainbow, a little surprised by Twilight’s sudden outburst, pushed her away carefully then said, “Uhh, ya lost me there, Twi.”

A massive grin exploded across Twilight’s face as she grabbed the other mare by the hoof and dragged her downstairs. Before she even knew what was going on, Rainbow Dash found herself standing in front of Twilight’s desk with a huge pile of books looming over her. She opened her mouth to say something, but before a single word could escape her lips, Twilight cut her off.

“Spike,” she said, glancing over at the bewildered dragon who had all but been dragged along with them. “I need a few more books from upstairs. Can you find me, Sleep as Medicine, Sleeping Spells 101, and Case Study’s Lectures on Psychoanalysis?”

Spike eyed her suspiciously. “Yeah, I guess. Why? What’s this for?”

Rainbow’s eyes drifted from the pile of books to Twilight, her expression a mixture of confusion and excitement. “Yeah, what’s this all about?”

Twilight stopped rummaging around in the desk drawer long enough to shoot a Rainbow a knowing smirk. “Rainbow, have you ever heard of something called ‘lucid dreaming’? No? Well,” she said, her smirk growing to a wide grin, “that’s perfect. You’ll have no preconceived notions then.”

Rainbow groaned, massaging her forehead with her hoof. “Just, guh, tell me why you brought me down here. I’m starting to get a little weirded out.”

Twilight paused for a moment, watching Rainbow Dash give her the “Well?” look. She sucked in her breath, then let it all out in one big exhale. “Okay, here goes. I’ve been doing some research lately, looking into the art of lucid dreaming. Lucid dreaming, of course, being a state where you are aware you’re dreaming and are thus able to control you dream through conscious thought. It’s sort of like an advanced state of dreaming where the dreamer has complete control over their actions and the events of the dream. Imagine it like you’re writing a story, only instead of it being in your imagination, you’re actually living it.” Twilight looked at Rainbow expectantly, her eager eyes wide.

Rainbow was silent for a moment, her cheeks tugged into a frown. “So, I wouldn’t actually be able to do magic or whatever, right? No matter what, it’s still just a dream.”

Twilight sighed. “Well, in a sense, yes. You wouldn’t be able to perform magic in real life. However, while you were dreaming, it would still feel real to you. So, you can do whatever you want in your dreams without fear of consequence. It doesn’t even have to be doing magic. You could dream about going on an epic adventure, or flying to the moon. While you’re dreaming, the possibilities are literally endless. And it will all feel as real as you want it to. The reason dreams are so powerful is because we believe they’re real while we are experiencing them, but we usually have little control over them. With lucid dreaming, however, you get the best of both worlds. You believe that it’s real while you’re in the dream, but you also have a say in what happens. This allows you the chance to live out whatever fantasy you want.” Twilight shook her hooves wildly. “Don’t you see what a huge opportunity this is?”

Rainbow Dash didn’t share in Twilight’s enthusiasm. Her face was contorted into a look of wariness. “Couldn’t this be dangerous? I mean, if it feels real, what happens if I get hurt or something?”

Twilight frowned. “You’ve had dreams where something bad happened, right? What happens then? You just wake up, that’s all. There’s nothing physically dangerous about it.”

Rainbow considered this for a moment, then finally nodded, satisfied. “All righty then, fine. Let’s do this. Make me a unicorn!”

Twilight grinned, suppressing a giggle. “Well, it’s not me that’ll be making you a unicorn. All I’ll do is put you into a magic-induced sleep. From there it’s all up to you. You’ll be the one in control of your dreams.”

Rainbow chuckled. “Ah, right, duh. So, uhh, how does it work? I mean, how do I make it so that I can control my dreams? I’ve had plenty of dreams before, and I couldn’t control any of them. It’s not like I can just turn on a switch in my brain, right?”

“It’s true, I admit,” said Twilight, shrugging her shoulders. “It’s not something you’ll be able to do right away, not without practice.”

Rainbow groaned, rolling her head to the side. “You mean I’m gonna have to do this more than once?”

“If you want control over your dreams, then yes. It’s going to take a bit of work.”

Letting out a slow sigh, Rainbow mumbled, “Fine, whatever. I mean, how hard can it be?”

“Not too hard, I imagine,” said Twilight. She looked over to Spike who was still standing beside Rainbow, his eyes moving back and forth between the two mares. “Now go get those books I asked for, Spike. We can’t get started until you bring them to me.”

“Oh, right. Sorry.” He gave a little chuckle, scratching the back of his head, then spun around and hurried up the stairs.

“Now then,” said Twilight, turning back to Rainbow. “We’ll need to go over a few things before we get started. Things you’ll need to do when you wake up and things you’ll need to do while you’re asleep and all that.”

Rainbow nodded happily. “All right, shoot.”

“You’re probably not going to like this first one,” Twilight said, laughing slightly. “In order to keep a log of your progress, I’m going to need you to start keeping a dream diary.”

“A what?”

“A dream diary,” Twilight repeated. “It’s basically just a notebook where you write down what you dreamt about the night before.” Seeing Rainbow’s confused expression, Twilight explained further. “It’s important because the more often you write down your dreams, the easier it’ll be for you to remember them in the future. And from there, it’ll be more and more natural for you to manipulate them.”

Rainbow rolled her eyes. “You mean I have to keep track of all this stuff? Can’t I just, y’know, not do that?”

Twilight shook her head. “No, if you’re not going to keep a dream diary, then there’s no point in doing this. It’ll just be a waste of time.”

“Fine, fine. I’ll keep a stupid dream diary.” Rainbow sighed. “What else?”

“Okay, so what you’ll need to do while you’re dreaming is to do your best to pay attention to your surroundings. Look at something, then look away. When you look back at it, it should be something entirely different. This will tell you that you’re in a dream. Once you know you’re in a dream, that’s when you’ll be able to take control away from your subconscious and start manipulating it however you want.”

Rainbow hummed quietly, nodding her head. “Yeah, I think I can do that. Sounds easy enough.”

Twilight laughed, eliciting another confused look from the mare opposite her. “Sounds easy enough, yeah. But it’s a lot harder than you’d think. See, until you’ve done it a few times, it’s hard to remember to check for things like that while you’re dreaming. Because remember, in a dream, it will just feel like real life. You won’t notice if something changes when you look away from it. It’ll just feel normal. I mean, if you already knew it was a dream, then why would you be checking to see if it was real in the first place?”

“Yeah, that’s a good point. So, how am I supposed to remember to check, then?”

Moving a few books aside, and clearing a space on her desk, Twilight answered, “You need to make it almost second-nature to do so.” She pulled a piece of parchment and quill out and started scribbling down some notes. “Even while you’re awake, start double-checking things to make sure they don’t change. Do ‘reality checks’ every couple of hours. If you come across a sign, or books, or magazines, or any kind of written word, try to focus on it and see if you can actually read it. In a dream, your brain will know what it says even without you reading it, but if you try to read it, it’ll just look like a garbled mess of letters with no discernible meaning.”

Rainbow whistled slowly. “Whoa… that’s kinda cool. So, uhh, what happens if I don’t realize it’s a dream?”

“You just dream like normal then,” said Twilight, scratching her quill across the parchment with a flourish. “That’s probably all it’ll be at first anyway. Just regular dreaming. But if we keep this up, you’ll be able to control your dreams in the future.”

“So, how long do you figure we’ll have to do this for? I mean, I’ve got, like, weather duty and stuff. Can’t really be doing this all day, y’know?”

Twilight giggled softly, covering her mouth quickly to stifle the sound. “Oh, this isn’t something that’s going to be one day.”

“Oh good, because I—”

“This will be week, potentially months, of experimentation. We’ll start with some easy stuff, like seeing if you can simply recognize your dreaming and then we’ll go from there. I expect we won’t see much in the way of results for a week or so at least, more likely a month.”

“—have stuff to do…” Rainbow finished half-heartedly, her cheeks sagging. “Geez, Twi. I didn’t think this was going to, y’know, be so much work. I’m not sure I really wanna do this anymore. Maybe you should find somepony else to—Twilight?” Rainbow stopped when she saw Twilight’s expression. Her eyes were wide in a pleading look, and her lips were curled into a pout, and her chin trembled slightly. Rainbow sighed. “Fine.”

Twilight clapped her hooves, smiling. “Good! We’ll get started right away. Well, as soon as Spike gets back anyway.” She looked over to the staircase, then frowned. “What’s taking him so long anyway?” She cupped a hoof over her mouth and shouted, “Spike!” There was a muffled thud followed by the sound of little feet running across the wooden floor.

“Yeah?” came the voice from upstairs.

“What was that sound? Actually, nevermind. Just hurry up and bring those books, okay?”

“Right, yeah. Be there in a sec!”

Twilight looked back to Rainbow and smiled. “Well, as soon as he brings those books for me, I’ll be ready to put you under.”

Her eyebrows rising, Rainbow asked, “Put me under what?”

Twilight shook her head. “No, it’s a medical—Nevermind that. The point is I’ll be using magic to induce sleep in you so we can get the study underway immediately.”

“Ah… So, how come you need those books to do that?”

Having finished writing on the parchment, Twilight set her quill aside and pushed the paper to Rainbow. “To be quite honest, I’ve never done it before, so I need to look over some spells again to do with suppressing the central nervous system to bring about a state of deep relaxation and eventually sleep, or something like that. Anyway, shouldn’t be too hard to do. Worst case scenario is you end up in a permanent and irreversible sleep, sort of like a coma, but that’s really unlikely. Probably only a twenty or thirty percent chance at best.”

“Umm…”

Twilight waved her hoof. “I’m just kidding, Rainbow, gosh. There’s no way that would happen… I don’t think. Anyway, there’s nothing to worry about. You’ll just be taking a little nap is all.”

“Riiiiiiiight.” Rainbow Dash heaved a sigh, then looked down at the paper in front of her. A bullet-pointed list ran down the center in Twilight’s distinctive scrawl.

Twilight took notice of Rainbow reading the list and used her hoof to point to the first item on the list: Dreams are not real life; keep the two separate.

“That’s the most important thing to remember,” she said. “No matter what events may occur in your dreams, they are not part of your waking life. No matter how real it may feel, none of it is.”

“But didn’t you say earlier that it was good if the dreams feel real?”

“Yes, but you have to be able to tell the difference between the two. If you aren’t careful,you may end up in a state where you don’t know if you’re dreaming or not, and you’ll end up doing something you can’t just wake up from.” Twilight’s expression was somber as she looked at Rainbow, her eyes flitting back and forth as she searched the mare’s face. “Being in control of your dreams can be fun, but you have to remember to wake up when you’re done. That’s the other side of doing reality checks. There may be times when you don’t know if you’re asleep or awake, and you’ll need these tests to check.” Suddenly her disposition shifted to a more carefree one. “But enough of all this doom and gloom stuff. What does the second item on the list say?”

“Uhh,” Rainbow moved her hoof down so it was below the second bullet point. “Have fun.”

Twilight smiled kindly. “Exactly,” she said. “This is your chance to do whatever you want, so do it. You want to know what it feels like to do magic? This is your opportunity to find out. The only limit on what you can do is how far you’ll let your imagination take you.”

Rainbow snorted, trying to hide a laugh. “That may be the cheesiest thing you have ever said, Twi.”

“But it’s true! Your imagination—”

“Yeah, yeah, imagination shcmimagination. Blah blah blah.” She waved her hoof dismissively. “It’s the power of dreams or whatever. Anyway, when are we going to start?”

Twilight’s lips pulled into a frown. “As soon as Spike brings me those books, like I said earlier. He should be here any—Oh! And there he is now!” Twilight’s horn burst to life as she saw Spike awkwardly making his way down the stairs. She scooped the books out of his grip and deposited them next to the other substantially larger stack. She pulled the first one from the top of the pile and placed it in front of herself. “Ah, good, Sleeping Spells 101. This is a good place to start.” She carefully peeled back the cover of the book, opening to the first chapter. Within seconds she had already found the page she was looking for and was happily skimming through it. Once she had finished, Twilight gave Rainbow a confident grin. “All right, seems easy enough to do.” Her horn, brimming with magic, Twilight floated a rather dour-looking sofa from the other side of the room. “Just lie down on this and make yourself comfortable, Rainbow.”

The other mare complied and stretched herself out on the graying sofa. As she placed her head against an old pillow, she nodded to Twilight. “Okay, I think I’m good to go now.”

Twilight nodded in return and walked over to Rainbow. She placed a hoof on her forehead and said, “You sure you’re ready?”

Another nod.

“All right, let’s get started then.”

Twilight’s hoof started to grow warmer as she forced magic into it and Rainbow’s forehead. It wasn’t too hot, but rather pleasantly warm, a perfectly calming temperature. Both Twilight and Rainbow relished the feeling. There was a calm silence for a few seconds before Twilight broke it, speaking softly into Rainbow’s ear.

“As you start to feel tired,” she said, “try to focus on something, anything really. Just pick one thing and put all your attention into it. When you start to drift into sleep, if you’re lucky, that thing you focused on will be in your dream. This will provide a good jumping off point for the future as you’ll need something familiar to concentrate on before sleeping, and the better you get at this part, the easier it’ll become to reach lucidity.”

Rainbow opened her mouth to speak, but Twilight placed a hoof over it, shushing her quickly. Her other hoof grew just the tiniest amount warmer as Twilight pumped more of her magic into it. She was focusing as hard as she could on Rainbow’s brow, where her hoof was pressing down gently. But just as Rainbow started to slip away, her eyes fluttering as he bobbed in and out of consciousness, Twilight’s eyes drifted to Rainbow’s. The two ponies locked gazes as the mare on the sofa became more and more drowsy. Moments before Rainbow’s eyes closed completely though, Twilight could’ve sworn she saw a flicker of a smile cross Rainbow’s face… then she was out.

Stage 2 — Spindles

As soon as Rainbow’s eyes closed, and her muscles relaxed, Twilight removed her hoof and brushed aside a stray lock of multi-colored hair. Carefully and quickly, she stood up and walked back to her desk where she removed a blank piece of paper from a drawer and began taking notes. The room was silent save the scratching of Twilight’s quill against the paper and Rainbow’s gentle breather. Spike followed the rise and fall of her chest with his eyes a few times before saying, “So, how long is she gonna be asleep for?”

Twilight, without looking up from her notes, responded, “Likely a few hours at most. I tried to make sure to only use just enough magic. Didn’t want her to sleep through the whole day.’

“As if that wasn’t what she already did,” Spike mumbled under his breath. “Well, what’re we supposed to do until she wakes up? Just sit around and watch her?”

Twilight shrugged, setting her quill down and looking up. “More or less. I need to monitor her during each of the five stages of sleep, so I can’t really leave.”

“So, you’re just going to sit there watching her sleep for the next however many hours? Man, that sounds really boring.” He crossed his arms and leaned against the desk, his eyes on Rainbow.

Twilight, too, was watching the sleeping mare when she said, “You don’t have to stay, you know? I can do this by myself just fine.”

Spike craned his neck backwards to look at Twilight. “Nah,” he said, “I think I’ll stick around. Maybe something interesting will happen.”

Twilight gave a shrug before returning to her notes. “Suit yourself.”

For the next ten minutes or so, Twilight and Spike watched in silence as Rainbow peacefully slept the afternoon away. Twilight couldn’t help but notice how calm she looked lying on the couch. Her head would loll from side to side occasionally, and every now and again a hoof would twitch every so slightly. It was only when Twilight glanced over at the clock hanging on the wall that she finally spoke.

“She should be in stage one by now,” Twilight observed. “Her brain will have started producing theta waves within the last couple of minutes. Any minute now she’ll start experiencing sleep spindles.”

Spike flicked his tongue idly. “I don’t think I really wanna know what all that means.” He sighed. “Is there any way to tell if she’s started dreaming yet?”

Twilight nodded. “Yes, actually. Although, that being said, she won’t have started yet. Dreams don’t normally occur until stage five.”

“Stage five?” Spike pursed his lips. “Isn’t that the last stage? Won’t she wake up right after?”

Shaking her head, Twilight said, “Nope. Sleep may occur in stages, but they don’t really happen in order, at least not after the first cycle. See, she’ll reach stage five, which is when we’ll start to see rapid-eye movement, and that will only last for a few minutes or so. Then she’ll jump back to stage three, then two, then four, and finally back to five which will last longer and longer after each cycle.”

“Huh…” said Spike, rubbing his chin. “That’s kinda weird. So, what’s ‘rapid-eye movement’, then?”

Twilight took a deep breath. “Well,” she began.

Spike held up his hand, cutting her off. “Try to keep it short, please.”

“Right, right.” Twilight cleared her throat. “Rapid-eye movement, or REM, is the phenomena that occurs during dreaming sleep. While your eyelids are closed, your eyes dart back and forth quickly due to increased brain activity during dreaming. It’s even visible to an outside observer, so we’ll know for sure when she starts dreaming.”

Spike nodded slowly. “I see. Well,” he said, pushing himself away from the desk, “I’m bored now. Do you want some tea? I think I’m going to go make some tea.”

Twilight chuckled quietly. “I’d love some tea, thank you.”

“Milk, sugar?”

“Both, please.”

Spike nodded again. “Cool, I’ll be right back then.” Spinning on his heels, Spike turned around and made his way up the stairs.

Twilight watched him leave, then turned her attention back to the parchment in front of her. “All right,” she whispered. “It’s note-taking time.” Dipping the quill into a pot of ink, she set pen to paper and didn’t stop until Spike had returned, only looking up occasionally to observe Rainbow and write down a few extra notes.

By the time Spike had returned, Twilight had already filled six pages with notes and was working on her seventh. A nearly-empty pot of ink sat at the top corner of a fresh piece of parchment. Spike made his way across the room as silently as a ghost, setting the tea tray down gently on the edge of the desk.

“What’d I miss?” he asked.

Twilight glanced up from the paper to see a tray with tea and cookies on it. Like a ravenous, yet dainty, beast, she tore into the cookies with monstrous ferocity. Pouring herself a cup of tea, she swallowed the last bite of cookie and gave a wide-eyed Spike an apologetic smile.

“Sorry, I just realized that I haven’t eaten all day,” she explained. “Guess I was a bit hungrier than I thought.”

“Uh huh…”

Twilight blushed, turning her face so Spike wouldn’t see. “Anyway, you came at the perfect time, Spike. Rainbow Dash is about to enter stage five for the first time.”

Spike poured his own cup of tea and swirled it around, eyeing Rainbow. “How can you tell?” he asked.

“Well, to be honest, I don’t know that she’s about to enter stage five, but from everything I’ve read, this should be about the time REM first occurs. So,” she said, dragging out the word for too long, “if I’m right, it should start happening any—Oh!” Twilight quickly stood up and pointed at Rainbow. “Look! She’s dreaming!”

Inexplicably, Spike found himself unable to look away, following Twilight’s hoof to Rainbow’s eyes, where, subtle though it was, he could see movement beneath her eyelids, darting to and fro like an errant fly. He absent-mindedly set his tea on the desk and moved towards Rainbow. Twilight followed him, her eager face lit up with excitement. The pair approached the sleeping pony, both breathless as they neared her.

“Whoa…” Spike breathed, “that’s kinda cool.”

Twilight let a small smile spread across her face. “Yeah,” she said quietly, “it is, isn’t it?”

“What do you think she’s dreaming about?” Spike asked, looking over to Twilight.

Her eyes on Rainbow, Twilight shook her head slowly. “I really don’t know,” she said, “It could be almost anything. I’m sure she’ll tell us when she wakes up… if she remembers it.” Twilight leaned a little closer, putting her face right next to Rainbow’s. She could hear her steady, rhythmic breathing, soft and quiet like the trickle of stream. “You know,” said Twilight, still staring into Rainbow’s sleeping eyes, “I’ve spent so much time reading about REM, but this is the first time I’ve ever seen it in person. It’s oddly… beautiful.”

“How long will it last?” asked Spike, cocking his head to the side.

“There’s no real way of telling. It could be anywhere from a few seconds to a few minutes,” she explained. Twilight moved away from Rainbow and slowly made her way back to her desk. “We’ll just have to wait and find out. What was the time when REM first occurred?”

“Umm,” said Spike, glancing over to the clock on the wall. “About 2:13, give or take a minute.”

Twilight nodded, then scribbled down something on her paper. “Mm, okay. Keep an eye on her. As soon as you see her eyelids stop moving, check the time. I want to keep track of the length of each stage.”

Spike mock-saluted. “No problem, Twilight. Can do.”

Watching Rainbow sleep, Twilight let out a sigh. “Now we just need to wait for her to wake up so she can tell us what she was dreaming about.”

As it turns out, they didn’t have to wait long. Only an hour and half, and two cycles, later, Rainbow Dash began to stir, slowly at first, then more quickly as her eyes opened and she stretched out her limbs and sat up. Letting out a lion-like yawn, Rainbow smacked her lips together and looked over at Twilight, a content expression on her face.

“Man, that was a pretty good nap,” she remarked with a grin.

Not wasting any time, Twilight asked, “Well, what did you dream about?”

Rainbow let out another yawn, scratching the back of her head. “Umm, I don’t really remember. Heh, sorry.” She shrugged. “You did say I probably wouldn’t have much luck the first time, right?”

Her ears drooping, Twilight let out a sigh. “Yeah, I guess so. Still though, I was hoping for something… anything.”

“Well, if it helps,” Rainbow began, “I do remember some things. Like, bits and pieces mostly.”

Twilight’s eyes lit up. “What were they?”

Rainbow rubbed her chin, looking up at the ceiling. “Uhh, well, I remember flying through a cloudless sky for one.”

“Do you remember where it was that you were flying?” Twilight asked, her quill poised to take more notes.

Rainbow shrugged apologetically. “Sorry, Twi. It was kinda just, y’know, nowhere in particular. Just… ‘the sky’, like, in general. Oh! But I do remember seeing some mountains if that helps.”

Twilight sighed. “Well, it’s better than nothing.” She quickly wrote something down, then said, “Mountains, hmm? Okay, what else?”

Rainbow tapped the side of her head, leaning slightly to the left. “Well, after the mountain, I was flying over the ocean. At least, I think it was the ocean.”

Twilight’s eyes narrowed. “The ocean?” she repeated. “Was it calm?”

“I mean, it wasn’t not calm… I guess.” Rainbow shrugged. “I don’t know, it was a little choppy, I suppose. But it didn’t look too bad, not like a storm or anything.”

Twilight nodded sagely, then wrote down something else. Tapping the quill against the parchment, she said, “Is that all you remember?”

“Like I said, there was some other stuff, but I don’t really remember it very clearly. It’s, like, just on the edge, if that makes sense. I can almost remember it, but the harder I try, the more difficult it becomes.”

“Yes, that’s a common occurrence upon waking,” Twilight said. “It’s to be expected. However, the fact that you were able to remember anything is a good sign. Just make sure you write down what you told me in your dream diary, and the next time you dream, do the same. Over time, you’ll remember things more and more clearly, until eventually you’ll be able to recall entire dreams with little to no difficulty.” Twilight smiled. “I’m proud of you, Rainbow. You did well for your first time.”

Rainbow blushed slightly, though not enough for Twilight to notice. “Heh, what can I say? I’m just that awesome.”

Twilight chuckled, rolling her eyes. “Yes, apparently you are. Anyway, if you want to stick around for awhile, I’d like to ask you some more questions. Plus,” she added, nodding towards the tea tray, “there’s tea and cookies if you want some.”

“Oh, uhh,” Rainbow mumbled, looking away. “That’s really tempting, really, but I gotta get going. Cloudchaser is expecting me later this afternoon. We’ve got cloud duty together.” She got up from the couch and walked over to the desk. Swiping a couple of cookies, she stuffed one in her mouth and said, “Sorry, Twi. Maybe next time?”

Twilight smiled sadly. “Yeah, next time.”

Rainbow swallowed the cookie and then bit her lip. “Umm, what time is next time?”

“Oh,” said Twilight suddenly. She glanced over to the other side of the room where a calender hung on the wall. Scanning it quickly, she said, “How about the same time next week?”

Rainbow nodded. “Sure, I can do that.” She stuffed another cookie in her mouth and then turned to walk away. As she started to make her way up the stairs, she glanced over her shoulder and said, “See ya next week, Twi.” She grinned, a bit of cookie crumb encrusting her mouth.

Twilight let out a giggle, then smiled and said, “Next week, then. Goodbye, Rainbow.”

Turning back to the stairs, Rainbow began to make her way up them, waving a hoof back at Twilight as she did. A few seconds later, Twilight heard the familiar click of the door opening and then closing. As soon as she was sure Rainbow was gone, she turned to Spike. Spike raised an eyebrow.

“Spike, I need to ask one more favor of you, okay?”

His eyebrow rose higher. “And that is?”

“There’s a book on dream symbolism not too far from where you found the other books earlier, can you bring me it?”

Spike nodded. “No problem, I’m sure I can find it. Why though?”

“Just more research is all,” Twilight said assuredly. “Nothing sinister, I promise.” She chuckled.

Spike couldn’t help but smile and chuckle too. “Yeah, all right. I’ll be right back.” With that, he spun around and hurried up the stairs, leaving Twilight all to herself.

Her eyes falling back to the parchment in front of her, Twilight read over her notes. She had made a note of the timings for all the stages, and the number of times they occurred. She had even kept track of the number of times Rainbow’s eyes moved around during REM, but the thing that she was interested most in now was the last page. The page she had just been writing on contained what she felt was the most intriguing information: the contents of Rainbow’s dream.

“Mountains, and the ocean,” Twilight said quietly, looking over her notes. “What do they mean? Do they even mean anything at all?” She frowned. “Dreams are the gateway to one’s soul,” she recited. “Of course this has to mean something, but what?”

Sighing, Twilight re-inked the quill and set it against the parchment. She paused for a moment, unsure of what to write down. After a few more seconds of simply sitting there staring at an empty piece of parchment, she finally wrote down two words, then nodded, satisfied. She set the quill aside and waited for Spike to return with the book she had requested, her eyes drifting back to the two words she had written more than once. She frowned, looking at the words. Grabbing her quill again, she dipped it in the ink and scratched out one of the words, then wrote a new one below it. She stared at it for a few seconds, then smiled. She set her quill down again and looked to the stairs.

It was only a few minutes later when Spike returned carrying a single book under his armpit. He quickly plodded down the steps and hurried across the room to Twilight’s desk. Placing the book down, he said, “Found it,” then grinned.

The book was soon engulfed in magenta light as Twilight picked it up and moved it in front of herself. “Thanks, Spike,” she said. “That’s all I needed.” She looked over the top of the book at Spike. “I’m just going to finish writing up these notes real quick. You can wait upstairs for me.”

“Are we still running those errands today?”

She nodded. “Soon as I’m done with this we’ll go, okay?”

Spike smiled. “Awesome. I’ll go wait upstairs then.”

By the time he was gone, Twilight had already found the entries she was looking for in the dream symbolism book. She placed her hoof below the first word: mountains, and read aloud from the entry.

“Mountains: To see mountains in your dream signify many major obstacles and challenges that you have to overcome. Alternatively, mountains denote a higher realm of consciousness, knowledge, and spiritual truth. To dream that you are climbing a mountain signifies your determination and ambition. To dream that you fall off a mountain refers to your rush to succeed without thoroughly thinking about your path to success. Falling off a mountain also means that you have a tendency to give up too easily or escape from demanding situations.”

She paused, humming to herself. “Well, if nothing else, Rainbow is certainly ambitious, and she does have a tendency to rush things. But I wonder what flying past a mountain signifies? Is she bypassing, or ignoring, some obstacle in her life?” Twilight mused. “Hmm, I suppose I’ll just have to see how things go in the future. Now then, how about the ocean?” Twilight flipped to the other page she had previously marked and scanned the page until she found the correct entry.

“Oceans: To see an ocean in your dream represents the state of your emotions and feelings. Alternatively, the dream means that you are feeling empowered and unhindered. You have a positive outlook in life and are not limited by anything. If the ocean is rough, then the dream represents some emotional turmoil. If it is calm, then it implies contentedness in your situation.”

Twilight pursed her lips. “I see, then it’s as I thought. Hmm…” She trailed off, lost in thought. Finally, with a sigh, she closed the book and slipped the notes she had taken all day into an empty drawer. Placing her quill back in the inkwell, Twilight stood up and pushed away the chair. Her gaze, along with her thoughts, drifted back to the drawer she had placed her notes in. She found herself thinking about those two words she had written again. Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, Twilight tried her best to not think about it and instead quickly hurried up the stairs and into the foyer where she found Spike huddled in a corner reading a book.

“You ready, Spike?” she asked.

He brought the book down and nodded. “Yup, I’m ready whenever you are.”

“Well, let’s go then.”

Over the next few weeks, Twilight and Rainbow Dash continued their sessions without fail. Every week, just before noon, Rainbow Dash would show up at Twilight’s front door, wide-eyed and eager to continue the experiment. Twilight found her excitement somewhat odd, given her initial reaction to being asked to participate, but decided not to dwell on it. She instead focused her energies on keeping tabs on Rainbow’s sleep cycles and subsequent dreams. According to Rainbow, she had been dreaming nearly every night, and had been keeping a record of what she remembered in her dream diary, as Twilight had requested, but for some reason didn’t seem to be making much progress with regards to dream recalling.

After every session, Rainbow would wake up, stretch, yawn, and tell Twilight she could remember almost nothing. It was uncanny. Every time Twilight pressed her for details, she would at most get a few vague locations, and one occasion, a more specific one, but nothing more than that. And always, always, Rainbow would be alone in her dreams. Never once did she mention the presence of another pony, a phenomena which Twilight considered to be quite odd, but never said anything about. The really odd thing though was that the locations of her dreams shifted about quite frequently, from the mountains of the first dream to caves and fields later on, but would inevitably end up back at the ocean. She would always say that she remembered flying over the ocean, an ocean which was growing increasingly tumultuous with each passing dream, a prospect which worried Twilight.

Even more worrying than that though was the issue with lucid dreaming. Despite having been doing dream recalls for weeks, Rainbow seemed to be making no forward progress towards being able to control her dreams. When Twilight asked her about this, she would merely wave her hoof and say, “Don’t worry about it. I’m sure it’ll come later,” which of course did nothing to assuage Twilight’s worries. Not to mention the fact that Rainbow refused to show Twilight her dream diary, claiming that it was in fact a diary and therefore none of Twilight’s business, which Twilight begrudgingly had to admit was true.

Despite all this lack of forward progress however, Twilight still found herself oddly confident about the whole thing. That’s why when Rainbow showed up on her doorstep earlier today, she was all smiles.

“Come in, come in!” she said, waving Rainbow through the threshold. “Spike’s already brewing some tea for me, but we can go ahead and get started whenever you’re ready.”

As Rainbow entered the foyer, she accidentally bumped into Twilight. “Oh, sorry about that, Twi. It’s these bags,” she said, indicating the saddle bags hanging over her sides. “I’m not used to wearing them.”

Twilight waved her hoof dismissively. “Oh, don’t worry about it. It’s no big deal. But, if I may ask, why do you have them?”

Rainbow shrugged. “It’s nothing really. Rarity asked me to bring some stuff from Cloudsdale for her, so I figured after we’re done here, I’d stop by her place and drop it off.”

“What did she want from Cloudsdale?” Twilight asked, cocking her head to the side.

Rainbow rolled her eyes in an exaggerated fashion. “Some stupid cloud pearls for a dress she’s making. They’re basically raindrops that this dude crystallizes and turns into jewelry that he sells at his shop,” she explained. “I think they’re kinda lame, but Rare really seems to love them, so I’m bringing her a few.”

“Well that’s nice of you,” Twilight said, smiling.

“Not that nice,” Rainbow huffed. “She’s using some to make something for me, so I had to bring her some anyway.”

“She’s making you something? What is it? What for?”

Rainbow took a step back, holding her hooves up. “Whoa, Twi. What is this, twenty questions? Sheesh, it’s some a necklace if you must know. I’m giving it to my mother as a present.”

“Aww, that’s so sweet of you,” said Twilight. “I’m sure she’ll love it.”

“Yeah,” said Rainbow, looking away, “well, we’ll see, won’t we? Anyway, can we go ahead and get started? I’m supposed to meet Rarity at three.”

“Yes, of course,” said Twilight realizing that she was blocking Rainbow’s path downstairs. “After you.” She held out her hoof, waving Rainbow into the basement. With a nod, Rainbow cantered down the steps, followed closely by Twilight.

Once they had reached the bottom, Twilight took her usual place beside the head of the couch and waited for Rainbow to lie down. Rainbow quickly shrugged off her saddlebags and tossed them haphazardly onto the desk, loosening one of the buckles. She then spun around and threw herself onto the couch, causing it to release a puff of dust like a wheezy old stallion. As she rested her head against the pillow, she waited for Twilight to place her hooves on her forehead and made herself comfortable, scooching a little further into the couch.

Over time, Twilight had gotten quite adept at performing the sleep spell. She was now able to put Rainbow to sleep within seconds with minimum effort on her part. Twilight hovered her hooves over Rainbow’s forehead, and said, “Okay, Rainbow. Are you ready?”

Rainbow nodded. “Just like always. Hit me.” She closed her eyes and waited for Twilight to begin.

Quick to oblige, Twilight softly placed her hooves against Rainbow’s already warm forehead and began to force magic into the rainbow-maned mare’s brain. It normally only took about four to five seconds to knock her out, and this time was no exception. But just before she fell asleep, Rainbow opened her eyes just a little. And just as she had during their first session, she looked Twilight in the eye and a flicker of a smile crossed her lips. Not a half a second later she slipped into restfulness.

Twilight let out a sigh. It wasn’t as difficult as it had been the first time, but it still took a bit out of her to force someone to sleep like that. She slowly made her way to her desk and reached into the same drawer she had been using for weeks. Carefully removing her stack of notes, she opened a separate drawer and produced a fresh piece of parchment. Lifting the quill with magic, she dipped it into the inkwell and pressed it against the paper. She marked down the time and began to take notes and make observations as usual. For a few minutes she carried on like normal, but something kept drawing her eye: Rainbow’s bag.

It was lying there, at the edge of the desk, one side nearly open, and for some inexplicable reason, Twilight couldn’t help but feel curious. She tried to push the thought of snooping in Rainbow’s belongings out of her head, but she kept being drawn back in. A few more minutes later and she couldn’t stop herself. She picked up the bag with her magic and went to close the latch, hoping that doing so would put it out of her mind. However, as if by serendipity, something slipped out of the bag, landing with a thud on the desk.

It was a small, leather-bound notebook, smaller than a normal piece of paper, but it was the title that caught Twilight’s attention.

In sloppily written hoofwriting, the words “Dream Diary” were scrawled across the top.

Twilight’s eyes went wide. Her hoof, completely of its own accord, was slowly gliding across the desk towards the notebook. She tried to stop herself, but curiosity got the better of her. Before she knew it, the notebook was lying in front of her, one hoof poised to open it.

“Well, it’s only for research,” Twilight reasoned to herself. “Rainbow won’t tell me much about her dreams herself, but maybe there’s something more written in here.”

Suddenly, Twilight was struck with a thought, an image more like. She looked over to the stack on notes she had compiled over the last couple of weeks and remembered something she had written after their first session. Unconsciously, she found herself digging through the pile until she found that single piece of paper. There, near the bottom, were those two words she had written all those weeks ago.

“Mountains, and the ocean,” she repeated quietly. “What did they represent again?”

She read those two words to herself and then looked back at the notebook. With one final glance at the words, she made up her mind. Taking a deep breath, Twilight pried open Rainbow’s dream diary and began reading. Her mind flickered back to the words she had written as she read the first entry.

emotional turmoil

confusion

Stage 3 — Delta

So, I guess I just write stuff down in here? Am I supposed to be writing everything I’m thinking? Why am I asking myself these questions and writing them down? Okay, I’m going to stop writing everything down…

Umm, so this entry is about the dream I had when Twilight did that sleep spell thing on me. Is this how I’m supposed to do it? Whatever, close enough.

It started with me, like, flapping my wings. That’s the first thing I remember clearly. After that, I was just, y’know, doin’ my usual thing and just flyin’ through the air and whatnot. Like I told Twi, I don’t remember where I was flying, or if I was even flying anywhere at all. I was just… flying. I do remember the sky being, like, really super clear though. It was just blue, and that was it. I couldn’t even see the ground, the sun, mountains, anything. I mean, it felt like it was just empty, y’know? But, I knew it was the sky, and not just, like, a blue vacuum or anything. I don’t really know how to explain it. Anyway, that part of the dream went on for a little while, then, as I was flying, I started to notice that things were changing. It was, like, just wisps and stuff at first, but I started to see clouds come in, and the further I got, the more there were. Then I saw the ground for the first time. It was weird, because it felt like I shouldn’t have been able to see it, like, it looked weird or something. I don’t know. Anyway, I was flying through some clouds or whatever, and then, totally out of nowhere, Twilight shows up. She just, like, flew right through the clouds and started flying next to me. She had wings now, but her horn was gone. I mean, thinking about it now, it sounds really weird, but it made sense in the dream, like, it just felt… right. I don’t know if that makes any sense. Well anyways, she didn’t say anything, at least I don’t remember her saying anything to me, she just kinda smiled at me and then just kept flying. So we flew. We flew for what seemed like hours until we came to this freakin’ huge mountain. I stopped because I couldn’t even see the top, but Twilight just smiled again and started flying up towards the top, waving for me to follow her. The rest of it gets kinda fuzzy here, like, I don’t remember how we got there, but I just remember suddenly being over the ocean. It’s like, I remember starting to follow Twilight, then the clouds just disappeared and suddenly I was being sprayed with ocean mist. I remember the smell. Is that weird to remember? Anyway, like I said, ocean, flying over it, y’know how it goes. Twilight asked me if the ocean was calm, which seemed weird to me. It’s almost like she knew it would be, or at least she knew that it wasn’t rough. I don’t know, maybe she read about it in her books or something. I guess it doesn’t matter. Like I told Twilight though, the ocean was calm… ish. It wasn’t, like, totally still or anything, but it sure wasn’t hurricane season or anything. I don’t really know what that means, if anything, but Twilight wasn’t talking if she knew. Oh well, she’s not the only one keeping secrets.

I’m not sure why I lied to Twilight about my dream… but, it just felt like the right thing to do. I mean, my first time trying to lucid dream, and I dream about flying with Twilight? Am I wrong, or is that weird? I don’t know, but do I know that I didn’t want to tell Twilight. Maybe eventually I’ll tell her, but I don’t think it’ll matter. I’m sure the next time I’ll have a normal dream without Twilight being there and then I’ll tell her everything I remember about that one. Anyway… I think I’m done with this entry. Hopefully I don’t dream tonight. Writing in this thing is such a pain…

Twilight blinked, looking up from the diary. Her eyes drifted to the sleeping mare. Just as usual, she looked so peaceful, a calm smile upon her face as her chest gently rose and fell in time with her breathing, completely oblivious to Twilight’s snooping.

“Why would she lie to me?” Twilight whispered. She bit her lip. “Why was she even dreaming about me in the first place? Is it because it was me who performed the sleep spell? If Rarity had done it instead, would Rarity be the one Rainbow dreamt of? No… that doesn’t seem right.”

Twilight frowned, her ears drooping. With her eyebrows furrowed, she followed the rhythmic cadence of Rainbow’s chest, her mind racing dozens of thoughts and conflicting emotions. Suddenly, her ears perked up as she heard a sound come from upstairs. The clatter of silverware against porcelain plates reverberated down the steps. Twilight snapped out of her stupor and quickly popped open Rainbow’s bag and stuffed her diary back inside just as Spike came into view. Quill in hoof, Twilight looked up as Spike entered.

“Oh, the tea is ready?” she asked, using her quill to point at the tray.

Spike nodded. “Yup, just finished brewing it. It’ll need to steep a bit in, but that won’t take too long.” He set the tray on the desk, grabbed a cookie and took a bite from it. Using the half-eaten cookie, Spike motioned to Rainbow. “So, how’s she doing?”

“Oh, uhh, she’s doing good… she’s doing good,” Twilight said awkwardly.

Spike raised an eyebrow. “I kind of meant, what stage is she in?”

“Oh! Oh, right!”Twilight looked down at her notes, then realized she hadn’t taken any yet. “Umm…” she glanced over at the clock, then at Rainbow. “She’s in staaaaaaaaage, uhh, three!” She nodded. “Yep, stage three.”

Spike nodded slowly. “Uh huh. So, no REM yet?”

Twilight shook her head. “Nope, not yet.”

Spike took another bite out of the cookie, then leaned back, sighing. “Man, this always takes so long.” He shoved the rest of the cookie in his mouth then, after licking his fingers, poured himself a cup of tea. “How long do you think until she hits REM this time?” he asked, looking up at Twilight while hot tea poured out of the kettle.

Twilight looked out of the corner of her eye to make sure that Rainbow’s bag was securely closed, then said, “I don’t really know for sure. Maybe forty-five or fifty minutes? You know,” she said, fiddling with her quill, “You can always go do something else. You don’t have sit here the whole time.”

Spike eyed Twilight. “I know that,” he said. “I kinda like hanging out here though. It’s, well, a lot more interesting than I thought it’d be,” he chuckled. “I always love seeing Rainbow when she wakes up.”

Twilight laughed awkwardly along with Spike. “Yeah, she does look pretty funny when she wakes up.” She bit her lip. “Okay, well, umm, if you get bored, feel free to go.”

Spike’s eyes narrowed. “You’re acting a little weird, Twilight,” he noted. “Something up?”

Twilight quickly shook her head. “No, why would there be?”

He crossed his arms, sighing. “I don’t know, just the way you’re acting is weird is all. I guess it’s not that different from normal.”

Twilight bit her lip, looking over to Rainbow’s bag. She sighed under her breath. Grabbing her quill, Twilight quickly started to scribble down some notes. Periodically, she would look up to see if Spike was still there. He was. Every time. The rest of the afternoon followed this pattern. Twilight would take notes, look up at Rainbow, look over at Spike, then go back to her notes. When Rainbow first entered REM, Twilight didn’t meet it with her usual excitement, instead she felt an odd pit in her stomach, like she was falling. But at the same time, she couldn’t help but feel a strange sense of euphoria. They were some of the most bizarre butterflies Twilight had ever experienced, simultaneously falling and soaring.

When Rainbow finally did wake up, her description of the dream she had experienced was much the same as it had been since the beginning. Rainbow said she had been flying through a tunnel, alone of course, and that she was trying to reach a light at the end, but it was just out of reach.

“So you weren’t able to recognize that you were dreaming, then?” Twilight asked pointedly.

Rainbow shrugged. “Nope, guess not. Maybe it’ll just take longer for me than you were hoping,” she said, laughing. Rainbow sat up, did her usual stretch, then grabbed her bag and headed up the stairs. “Anyway,” she said, turning around at the foot of the staircase, “I’ll catch ya later, Twi. I gotta run. Rare’s waitin’ for me!” She bounded up a few more steps, then said, “Same time next week!”

Twilight watched her go, her heart suddenly sinking. “Yeah, same time…”

Spike’s brow furrowed as he looked at Twilight. “Something up?” he asked. “You look kinda… bleh.”

Noticing Spike staring at her, Twilight quickly adopted a smile and said, “No, of course not. I’m just a little tired is all.” She gave him a reassuring grin. “So, what else was on the agenda for today?”

Spike shrugged. “If you say so. Let’s see,” she said, tapping his chin, “you promised Pinkie Pie that you’d help her with some new recipe she’s working on, and then after that you agreed to give Mayor Mare a hand with the preparations for Nightmare Night.”

“Is it really that time again?”

He nodded. “Only a few weeks away now. I should probably start working on my costume,” he said quietly, his mind drifting off.

“Well,” said Twilight, looking at Spike. “I guess we better get going then, huh?”

He grinned widely. “You know it. Say, what do you think I should go as this year?”

“Why don’t you go as Balerion the Dread?” Twilight suggested.

“A dragon again? Nah,” Spike said, waving his hand. “I already did that last year. I’m thinking snakes this time.”

“How about Jormungand?”

“...no one’s even going to get that.” He sighed. “Oh well, I’m sure I’ll think of something.”

Twilight chuckled. “I’m sure you will, too.” Her chuckle turned somber when her mind drifted back to Rainbow’s diary however. Then, she thought again about those two words she had written in her notes about that first session. “Was I writing that about Rainbow Dash… or myself?” Twilight mused quietly.

“What was that?” Spike asked, cocking his head to the side.

“Oh, it was nothing.” Twilight smiled. “Just thinking out loud. Anyway, I’m sure Pinkie is waiting for us. Let’s not keep her waiting.”

By the time they had returned from all the errands, it was well into the night. Sluggishly making their way upstairs, Twilight and Spike headed to their respective beds and, after bidding each other goodnight, laid down for a good night’s sleep. Twilight, despite how tired she was, found herself strangely unable to sleep at first. Her mind kept leading her back to the diary and back to Rainbow’s sleeping form.

She stared at the ceiling, willing herself to fall asleep, trying her best to ignore the confusing thoughts floating around her head. Minutes crawled by on hands and knees as she stared at that wooden ceiling, unable to clear her mind enough to allow sleep. Finally, with a sigh, Twilight placed a hoof against her own forehead.

As her horn began to glow softly, she felt a familiar warmth flow through her. “So this is what it feels like on this end?” Twilight wondered quietly to herself. “It feels nice.” Only a few seconds later, and her horn started to dim as Twilight’s eyelids fluttered. A few more seconds and she had drifted into sleep, her hoof sliding off her forehead and landing gently on the pillow next to her.

When she opened her eyes again, Twilight found herself reclining in a lounge chair on the beach. The sun was warm and inviting, not too hot as she lay on her back, only shielded slightly by the umbrella planted in the sand next to her. With her hooves crossed behind her head, she stared up into the unbelievably blue sky, completely free of clouds or any disturbances. She really couldn’t have asked for a more perfect day at the beach. Although, something kept nagging at the back of her mind telling her that it wasn’t quite perfect. Close perhaps, but something was missing.

Twilight sat up, her mane falling back over her shoulders as she surveyed her surroundings with a furrowed brow. Stretching as far as she could see to either side, the beach, its white sands as clear and empty as the sky, was only stopped by the lapping of the ocean waves. Behind her was nothing. The beach rose into dunes, but beyond that, she couldn’t see anything. She slunk back into the seat, frowning.

“Where is everypony?” she wondered aloud.

“What do you mean?” came a voice from beside her.

Twilight nearly fell out of her lounge chair from shock. She looked to her right and saw a familiar face. Where before there had been beach, Rainbow Dash now sat beneath an identical umbrella with a pair of dark sunglasses obscuring her face. She wasn’t looking at Twilight, her eyes instead staring up into the cerulean sky.

“Rainbow Dash?” Twilight asked, squinting her eyes.

Rainbow pulled her sunglasses off and gave Twilight a smirk. “Expecting somepony else?”

“I wasn’t expecting anypony, to be honest,” Twilight confessed. “I thought I was alone on this beach. Where… where did you come from?”

Rainbow chuckled, swinging her hind legs around to face Twilight. “I’ve been here the whole time, Twi. If that was your idea of a joke, it was terrible.”

Twilight shrugged. “I must’ve missed you.” She smiled. “Well, what do you want to do?”

“Do?” Rainbow raised an eyebrow. “We’re at the beach, Twi. You don’t do anything. Ya just sit around and lounge in the sun. That’s what makes the beach so awesome! It’s nap time all the time.”

Giggling, Twilight nodded. “All right, lounging it is then.” She leaned back against the chair, a smile upon her face. Just as her head hit the little pillow however, she suddenly felt water splash her face. Jerking upwards, she looked around. She was in the middle of a stormy ocean, floating only because of the lounge chair. Rainbow Dash was nowhere to be found.

Twilight looked around frantically, but the only thing she saw were the swells rocking her chair relentlessly. The sky was filled with black clouds, and lighting lanced down at regular intervals, piercing the sky with a harsh bolt. Thunder rocked the sky, shaking Twilight as she tried her best to hold onto the only thing saving her life. Half her body had slipped off the chair and now hung in the ocean. It was cold, freezing cold, and the salt water kept washing into her mouth making her gag.

Twilight started to panic, kicking her hind legs as hard as she could, paddling towards where she was sure the beach must be, but she wasn’t making any progress. She could feel herself being pulled out further and further into the ocean, and it was only when she looked behind her that she realized why. A massive wave, at least thirty or forty feet tall towered over her, sucking her in as it rose higher. Her eyes went wide just before the wave crashed into her. She tried to shield herself, but the wave never hit.

Twilight blinked, bringing down the hoof she had been covering her face with. Rainbow Dash gave her a questioning look, one eyebrow raised.

“Ya okay there, Twi? You were, uhh, kinda freaking out a bit.”

Twilight looked around, her eyes scanning a familiar room. She was in her bed again, and it was dark. It must’ve been the middle of the night. Rainbow was in the bed next to her. Twilight mumbled something unintelligible, then looked at Rainbow.

“What was that, Twi?” said Rainbow cupping a hoof over her ear. “I didn’t catch that.”

Twilight sighed. “I said, this is a dream. You aren’t real.”

“I’m not?” said Rainbow. “That’s pretty lame.”

“You’re not, at least not here.” Twilight frowned. “I just can’t figure out why you’re here though.”

Rainbow shrugged. “I’unno. Must be something to do with your subconscious, or whatever, right?”

“Well, that is how dreams work, but still…”

“But you still don’t know why I’m here, right?”

“Right.”

Rainbow hummed, bringing a hoof to her chin. “Hmm, it’s an interesting question, isn’t it? I mean, why me and not Rarity, or Fluttershy, or even Applejack?”

“I don’t know,” Twilight confessed. She shook her head. “I really don’t know. It doesn’t make sense.”

Chuckling, Rainbow said, “You mean, it doesn’t make logical sense, right? This makes perfect dream sense, I’ll tell you that much.”

Twilight laughed mirthlessly. “Maybe that’s true.”

Rainbow grinned. “So, I keep showing up in your dream. I’m in your bed right now, and you don’t know why. Twilight, do you… like me?”

Twilight blushed fiercely, though she didn’t really know why. She didn’t have any reason to be embarrassed by that, or did she? “I… I don’t know,” she admitted. “Is that what’s going on here? Do I… like you?”

Rainbow shrugged. “You tell me. I’m not the one having the dream here, remember?”

Twilight massaged her temple, squeezing her eyes shut. “I mean, I’ve always sort of admired you. You’re fast, strong, brave, loyal to a fault, and you’ve never let me down when I needed you. But admiration isn’t the same thing as love, is it? What is love? How would you even define it? Is it something that can be defined?”

“Whoa, Twi. You’re getting a bit too heavy for me,” said Rainbow with a chuckle. “Who said anything about love? I was just asking if you liked me.”

“Of course I like you, Rainbow,” said Twilight. “I like all my friends. But when does that like become something else? When does liking somepony becoming loving them?”

“I think those are questions you better ask yourself, Twilight. You won’t find the answers in any book. It’s just something you gotta figure out.”

Twilight frowned. “Do you like me, Rainbow?” she said, looking over to the mare sitting in bed next to her. “Do you… love me?”

She held up her hooves. “I think those are questions you should ask Rainbow Dash, not me.”

“But you are Rainbow Dash!”

Rainbow tilted her head towards Twilight, giving her an accusatory look. “You know what I mean.”

Twilight sighed. “Maybe you’re right.”

“Of course I am. I’m Rainbow Dash!”

Twilight giggled, giving Rainbow a smile. “All right, I think I know what I need to do now.” She leaned over and gave Rainbow a hug. “Thanks for your help.”

Chuckling, Rainbow said, “Look, I won’t say no to hugs, but I didn’t do anything. I’m just a piece of your subconscious, remember? All I did is tell you what you would’ve told yourself.” Suddenly, she looked up as if she had heard a sound. “Oh, look at that. What perfect timing.”

Twilight cocked an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

“It’s time for you to wake up now.”

Twilight opened her eyes. The wooden ceiling she had seen while falling asleep loomed over her, and stray beams of light poured through the curtains into her room, segmenting her bed with their lines. She slowly sat up and looked to her right. Rainbow Dash was gone, and the room was empty. She glanced over at the calendar hanging next to her bed.

“Only six more days,” she muttered.

The rest of the week passed without incident. Though, Twilight noted, she had three more dreams involving Rainbow Dash, though she had not achieved lucidity in any of the others. Despite being occasionally busy with helping her friends, or Mayor Mare in one case, Twilight still found herself thinking about what Rainbow Dash had told her during that dream. She found herself anxiously awaiting the week’s end with an uncanny amount of anticipation.

When Rainbow finally showed up again, Twilight did her best to hide her eagerness, welcoming her in the same fashion she always did.

“Come in, come in!” she said, waving her hoof, motioning for Rainbow to step inside.

The long-awaited mare casually strode inside and immediately headed for the basement steps without waiting for Twilight. “We’ll have to make this one kind of quick,” said Rainbow. “I have to meet Rarity again, but this time to pick up that necklace. I was a little late last week, and even though she didn’t show it, I could tell she was a little mad. So, I guess it’ll have to a be a short dream this week.” She strode down the steps, closely followed by Twilight, until she reached the bottom where she made herself comfortable on the sofa she had become so accustomed to.

Twilight, careful to not bump into Rainbow, scooted around her and took her usual place beside the mare. “Umm, before we start, Rainbow. I was wondering about something.”

Frowning, Rainbow bit her lip. “Can it wait until after, Twi. I really can’t be late to Rarity’s again.”

Twilight’s heart raced. It felt like it was trying to beat its way out of her chest. “Uhh, yeah… yeah, it can wait.” Her hooves shaking, she placed them over Rainbow’s forehead. “So, should we go ahead and get started then?”

Rainbow nodded. “Yeah, now would be great.” She closed her eyes and waited for Twilight to begin.

Not wasting any time, Twilight’s horn flared to life and magic began to seep down through her limbs and into Rainbow’s head. Almost instantly, the mare became sleepy, her breathing softened, and slowed down to a steady pace. Within a few more seconds, she was fast asleep, well into stage one.

Twilight, her heart still fighting its way out of her chest, calmed only slightly when she removed her hooves from Rainbow’s forehead. She cursed under her breath.

“Shoot, now I have to wait to talk to her. Although,” she mused quietly, “perhaps it’s better this way. I don’t really know what I would’ve said.”

Twilight sighed, calming herself down a bit, then walked over to her desk and sat down. She went through her usual routine and pulled out a quill and paper to take notes, but she found herself unable to write anything. She kept staring at Rainbow’s face, watching her mouth move slightly as she breathed.

“I wish there was some way I could see your dreams,” Twilight muttered softly. “Maybe that would clear some things up.” She sighed, grabbing her quill again. She set it against the parchment, in a vain attempt to start writing something, then stopped suddenly. Her eyes shot wide open and she dropped the quill. She looked over at Rainbow, then got up and hurried towards the stairs. As soon as she had cleared the last flight, she ran right into Spike who was carrying his usual tray of tea and cookies. Rather than drop them though, the dextrous little dragon managed to keep them firmly within his grasp. He let out a sigh of relief, then gave Twilight a confused look.

“Jeez, Twilight, where’s the fire? Why are you in such a hurry?”

Twilight backed up, careful to avoid knocking over the tray. “Oh, I’m so sorry, Spike. I was coming up here to look for a book, and I didn’t see you there.”

He raised an eyebrow. “A book? What for? Isn’t Rainbow here already?”

“Yes, she’s asleep downstairs, but I need a new book for… something.”

He went to set the tray on a nearby nightstand, saying, “What book? I’ll help you look for it.”

Twilight quickly held up a hoof. “No! I mean… I’ll get this one myself. It’s no problem. In fact, I need you to get something else for me.”

“Okay, what is it?”

Twilight wracked her brain to think of something that would send him far away, distract him for a couple of hours. “Umm, I need you to go to Sweet Apple Acres and see if Applejack has any of that Zap Apple jam left. It’s for an, uhh, experiment I’m doing.”

He gave her a suspicious look. “An experiment, huh? Why didn’t you tell me about it before?”

“Well, I just started working on it,” Twilight explained. “I’m trying to see if Zap Apples can be used in concert to create an alternating current with their innate electrical properties.” She grinned awkwardly. “It’s kind of a side project type thing.”

Spike shrugged. “Whatever you say, Twilight. Sure, I’ll go get you some Zap Apple jam, but only if you give me enough extra money to buy myself a pie too.”

“That’s fine,” said Twilight hurriedly. “You know where to find the money, right?”

He nodded. “Yup, in your dresser. Same as always.”

“Good,” said Twilight. “Then off you go. Take your time, no rush.”

He laughed. “Sometimes you are so weird, Twilight. All right, well, I’ll be back in a bit. See ya!”

Twilight waited until he had gone into her room, collected enough money to buy what he needed, and left the house before returning to her search. She made her way to the library room and began searching through the thousands of books there. As she tore through shelf after shelf, digging further and further towards the back, she began talking to herself.

“I know I saw it somewhere around here,” she said, biting her lip. “If I remember right, it should be right behind this—Aha! Here it is!”

Extricating herself from the pile of books she had created, Twilight held her prize aloft. With a massive grin on her face, she quickly made her way back downstairs and to the desk. With a quick glance at the clock to confirm the time, she calculated that she had about an hour and a half to two hours before Rainbow woke up. Taking a deep breath, Twilight placed the book she had so recently unearthed in front of herself. The title spilled across the book in large black print. It read: The Dreamscape: Entering and Leaving Dreams Through the Use of Magic.

Stage 4 — Delta (II)

Having quickly found the spell she needed, Twilight positioned herself beside Rainbow Dash in a small armchair and lay her hoof over Rainbow’s.

“Okay,” she said quietly to herself, “physical contact complete. Next I need to close my eyes and begin the incantation.” Doing just that, Twilight let darkness engulf her as she closed her eyes and started to mouth the words of the spell. Within a second, she could feel the beginnings of the dream connecting spell take hold. She felt herself becoming more and more drowsy, and she could see flashes of images pass through her mind, images that she knew were not her own. If anyone had been watching they would’ve seen her eyes darting back and forth beneath her eyelids, entering the first stages of REM. With this spell, Twilight would skip over the beginnings of sleep and move right into the final stage. Finally, with one last word, Twilight finished the spell.

A sudden sense of vertigo overcame her as she felt herself falling down. The shock was almost enough to wake her up, but she held on. As she plummeted through total blackness, she could hear Rainbow’s voice echoing in her head. She couldn’t make it out, but it sounded like she was speaking to someone. A loud sound filled Twilight’s ears, almost like being at the bottom of the ocean. A second later, she found herself standing in the middle of a large field of flowers.

She looked around. Aside from miles and miles of flowers of all different colors, she saw nothing. Then she heard Rainbow’s voice again, clearer this time and coming from right behind her.

“Uhh… hello? Equestria to Twilight. You there?”

Twilight spun around. Rainbow was standing there with a confused look on her face, and her head cocked to the side. She tapped Twilight’s head with her hoof.

“Anybody home?”

Twilight blinked, then shook her head, throwing off Rainbow’s hoof.

“Rainbow Dash,” she said breathlessly. “Oh, sorry about that. I was just, uhh, thinking about something.”

Rainbow raised an eyebrow. “That’s not like you. Well, I mean, that is like you, but not like dream you. You were acting normal until a few seconds ago, then you just spaced out and I couldn’t get your attention at all. Is something up?” Rainbow held a hoof to her chin, then said, “Wait, what am I asking you for? It’s not like you’d know. You’re not even real.” She laughed and placed a hoof on Twilight’s shoulder. “Man, this dream stuff really messes with your head sometimes. I actually forgot if I was dreaming or not for a second there, heh.”

Twilight looked at Rainbow, her brow furrowed. “You know that you’re in a dream?”

Rainbow slowly took her hoof off Twilight’s shoulder. “Uhh, yes? Why wouldn’t I? I’ve been doing this for, like, two months. I got pretty good at it. Why are you asking me that? You’re definitely acting kind of weird.”

Twilight fumbled for an answer. “Uhh… umm… well—”

“You know what?” said Rainbow suddenly. “It’s probably nothing.” She waved her hoof dismissively. “Either way, I don’t really care. Let’s just go back to what we were doing before.”

“Right, of course,” said Twilight, putting on an unassuming smile. “Let’s do that.”

For a full minute the two ponies stood a few feet from each other, completely silently. Twilight let her eyes wander, taking in the surroundings fully now. It was amazing how complete the dream was. The sky was that perfectly beautiful shade of blue that Twilight loved so much, and the stray clouds that drifted by seemed to do so lazily, propelled only by the soft breeze that blew through the field. That breeze, in a similar fashion, also caused the flowers in the field to wave back and forth, welcoming almost in their own sort of fashion. Off in the distance, Twilight could make out a what looked like the edge of a forest, and perhaps the rim of a pond or maybe a lake. If she didn’t know any better, Twilight would’ve guessed she was just outside of Ponyville. Everything looked so oddly familiar, and yet so distant. It was an odd juxtaposition, one that she didn’t have time to think about because Rainbow was about to interrupt her thoughts.

Rainbow Dash stared at Twilight, her eyebrows raised. “Uhh, so any time now would be great.” She tapped her hoof impatiently.

Twilight’s eyes shot back and forth as she shuffled her hooves nervously. “Can you remind me what it is we were doing again? I forgot.” She chuckled awkwardly.

Rainbow sighed. “The same thing we always do, Twi. You were about to make me into a unicorn so I can do magic and stuff. That’s why this whole thing started in the first place, or don’t you remember?”

Twilight cocked her head to the side. “But… isn’t this your dream? Can’t you just do it yourself?”

“There you go asking weird questions again,” Rainbow laughed. “Of course I can do it myself. Like you said, it’s my dream. But that’s not how I want to do it. It’s too…” she made small circles with her hoof while her face contorted into into a look of concentration. “Easy,” she finished. “It’s too easy that way. It’s my dream, so I want you to do it, y’know, like you always do.”

Twilight felt her heart racing. She wasn’t sure why, but she suddenly felt excited. It was difficult to speak over the lump in her throat, but she managed to force out a couple of words. “So, uhh, how is that I normally do it?”

Rainbow shook her head, her mane bouncing lightly as she did. “Man, what is with you today, Twilight? Spacing out, forgetting things. It’s not like you. Well, since you’re just part of my mind, it’s more like it’s not like me, but still. It’s weird.” She rubbed her chin thoughtfully. “Maybe I wanged my head or something and forgot about it?” She shrugged. “Well, whatever, I’ll just chalk this up to dream weirdness. Anyway, normally what you do is put your forehead against mine and then do you magic whatever, then BAM! Unicorn.” She rubbed her hooves together like she was wiping something off of them. “Easy as that. There’s nothing to it.”

Twilight nodded. “Ah, I see. Sounds simple enough. I think I can do this.”

Rainbow grinned. “Ready when you are.”

Twilight took a few steps closer to Rainbow until she was face-to-face with her. The other mare’s grin split into a smile as Twilight got even closer to Rainbow. Her heart was pounding so loudly she was sure Rainbow could hear it. Each beat became more and more painful than the last as she edged closer. A soft gust of wind blew past, cutting right in between Rainbow and Twilight, playing with their manes. Only inches from her now, Twilight wondered why she felt so nervous. It’s not like she had never been this close to Rainbow before. She wasn’t ever this close to begin with since this was all a dream and Rainbow wasn’t real. Still though, she felt overcome with anxiety she couldn’t explain. She couldn’t even remember why she had entered Rainbow’s dream in the first place.

With a deep breath, Twilight placed her forehead against Rainbow’s. At first she tried to keep her eyes closed, but it was no use. She couldn’t help herself. She opened her eyes and found herself staring directly into Rainbow’s beautifully brilliant amethyst pools. She felt like she could drown in them they were so deep. Twilight’s eyes drifted downwards until she came upon Rainbow’s soft lips. It was then that she realized how close her own lips were to the other mare’s. She felt a sudden urge to have those soft lips pressed against her own, but she resisted, as much as she could anyway.

Her horn, rather than burst with life, slowly took on a muted glow. Magic flowed seamlessly from Twilight’s body into Rainbow’s. Like a river that had been recently freed from a dam, magic pouring into Rainbow with Twilight acting as the conduit. For what felt like a millenia, Twilight kept her head pressed against Rainbow’s, refusing to let go.

Once the spell had finally run its course, Twilight stepped back to admire Rainbow’s new form. With her wings gone now, Rainbow’s sides looked oddly bare, almost naked, but on her forehead a new appendage drew her attention. A thick blue horn jutted out from her head. Spirals ran along its length to the top where it ended in a dull point. Rainbow Dash grinned widely.

“Nailed it, Twi. This horn looks amazing!” Rainbow spun around, admiring her new horn. “Y’know, we may do this every week, but it’s always awesome. Like, I dunno, but something about this just feels… right, y’know? Oh, don’t get me wrong, I like my wings. Love them, in fact. But it’s nice to feel different every now and again. You look awesome too, by the way,” she added, motioning to Twilight.

Twilight gave Rainbow a puzzled expression, which Rainbow responded to by roller her shoulder blades. Twilight’s eyes went wide. She brought a hoof to her forehead and felt nothing but silky mane. Almost not believing it, she looked over her shoulder at her brand new pair of purple wings. She unfurled them, her eyes growing wider.

“But… how?” she asked, looking over to Rainbow.

Rainbow shrugged. “I’unno. You explained it way back the first time. Something about it being easier to just switch certain parts of our bodies than to make new ones. It made sense at the time.”

“Of course it did,” Twilight mumbled to herself. “It was all part of the dream, and dreams always make sense while you’re having them.”

“What was that, Twi? Couldn’t quite hear ya.”

Twilight smiled. “Oh, nothing. I was just saying how much I love my wings and your horn.”

Rainbow grinned. “Right? Aren’t they awesome? Hey!” she said suddenly, “check this out. I can totally change the color of all these flowers.” She licked her lips and stared intently at a patch of flowers a few feet away. Her eyes narrowed and she dug her teeth further into her lip in concentration.

Twilight watched her, but nothing happened. “Uhh…”

“What the heck?” Rainbow’s expression went from one of concentration to one of confusion. “Why can’t I feel anything? Normally the magic stuff starts to move into my horn whenever I concentrate on something, but nothing’s happening this time. What’s going on here?” She glanced over to Twilight who looked down at her hooves. “First, you space out for like a five minutes and I can’t get your attention. Then you start acting weird and asking questions you already know the answer to. Now this? What in the name of Celestia is going on in this dream?”

Twilight stared at her hooves, doing her best to come up with a satisfactory answer to Rainbow’s question. “Well, you see—”

“It’s gotta be something I did, right? I mean, this is my dream, isn’t it?”

“Well…”

“Well? Well, what?” Rainbow flung her hooves in the air. “Are you saying this isn’t my dream?”

“I’m not saying that.”

“Then what are you saying?”

“I… umm…”

Before Twilight could finish her sentence, the ground started to shake like an earthquake had just hit. Only, it felt like more than just the ground was shaking. The whole world was shaking. While Twilight was doing her best to keep her balance, she saw Rainbow standing opposite her completely unfazed, as if she didn’t even notice the whole world crumbling around her. The only emotion she showed was confusion, tinged with a bit of anger, or maybe pain. Twilight tried to say something to her, anything, but before she could even get one word out, Rainbow started to fade away. Her body became ethereal, misty almost, and she just started to disappear into nothingness.

Twilight, forgetting for a moment that everything was falling apart, and massive cracks were appearing in the sky and below their hooves, sprinted over to Rainbow, trying her best to grab her before she was gone. But she arrived too late. By the time Twilight’s hoof was reaching for Rainbow, the only thing she grasped was the air where the other mare used to be. A small “no” escaped Twilight’s lips. She looked around frantically, hoping Rainbow had only disappeared to another part of the dream, but all she saw was a crumbling world. Bits of the sky were falling down around her and a crevice had opened below her. She tried to jump out of the way, but she slipped on a piece of rubble and tumbled into the darkness.

Just like when she first entered the dream, she felt overwhelmed by vertigo, spinning around in circles, feeling nauseous as she fell further and further into the abyss. Again, just like before, she started to hear a voice calling out to her, but this time it wasn’t that soft, gentle voice she was expecting. The voice was loud and angry, and it echoed harshly in her ears. Another second passed and the darkness began to be replaced by light. Slowly, the world around her came into focus as she woke from the dream and opened her eyes to see a furious Rainbow Dash standing over her.

She felt something heavy hit her lap, and she pulled herself up to look at it. It was the book, the one she had used to help her enter Rainbow’s dream. Twilight picked up the book and looked at it. She could feel tears welling in her eyes. Tossing it aside, she looked up at Rainbow and said, “I can explain, Rainbow. Please, just let me explain!”

Rainbow shook her head fiercely. “No, I think I understand just fine.” She clicked her tongue. “I can’t believe I fell for your stupid tricks. I mean, how twisted do you have to be? Screwing with people’s dreams like that.”

“Rainbow, I wasn’t—”

“You weren’t what? Manipulating my dreams? Right, that’s why you have a book on how to do exactly that sitting on your desk open to the page about entering other people’s dreams. Because that’s exactly what you weren’t doing.” Rainbow laughed mirthlessly. “You’re unbelievable.”

Twilight, her eyes wet with tears, tried to stand up, to get closer to Rainbow, but the look on the other mare’s face kept her in place. “I’m sorry, Rainbow. I know it was wrong, but I—”

“Save it. I don’t want to hear your lies anymore.”

“Anymore? But I haven’t been lying to you.”

“Oh really? So how do you explain all the dreams I’ve been having over the past couple of months?” She held out a hoof, bobbing it up and down. “It’s always you, Twilight. Always. Every dream I have, you’re in it. It’s like I can’t get you off my mind.” Her eyes narrowed. “But now I know why. It was you all along. You’ve been manipulating my dreams since the beginning.”

“No, I promise. I wasn’t doing anything.”

“And I’m just supposed to believe that?” She shook her head, laughing. “I seriously can’t believe you, Twilight. First, you lie right to my face, then you turn right around and expect me to believe you? How stupid do you think I am? I mean, I know you think I’m not the smartest pony around, but even I can see that you’re full of it.”

Twilight wiped away fresh tears, saying, “Don’t say that, Rainbow. I would never lie to you. I wasn’t doing anything, I promise. You can ask Spike. He was with me the whole time.”

Rainbow looked around, then nodded. “Mhmm, and so that’s why he’s here right now, right? Is he hiding somewhere? Behind a bookshelf, maybe under your desk. Oh! Is he in the closet?”

“Well, he’s not here right now, but when he gets back he can tell you the truth,” Twilight said desperately. “Please, you have to believe me.”

Rainbow shook her head slowly. “No, I don’t have to do anything, Twilight. And I’m not gonna wait around for Spike to show up so he can lie to me too. Nothing against the little guy, but he is your assistant after all. If I can’t believe you, how am I supposed to believe him?”

Twilight’s eyes lit up. “Wait! I can show you all the notes I took during our sessions. That’ll prove I wasn’t doing anything!” She stood up and quickly moved to her desk. Before she could open the drawer however, Rainbow stopped her by slamming her hoof down on the desk.

“Don’t bother, Twi. I don’t want to see your notes. Besides, how do I even know you took them while I was sleeping? I don’t. You can’t prove that either.” She put her hoof back on the ground. “Y’know… I thought I liked you, Twilight. Like liked you. But I can see now that was all part of your plan. I don’t know what you were after, and I don’t care, but what I do know is that I don’t want to see you again.”

“Ever?”

Rainbow didn’t answer. She just turned away and started to walk up the stairs. A few steps up, she said, without turning around, “Oh, and by the way. Thanks for this.” She jabbed a hoof at her head.

Twilight followed her hoof. There, where there should’ve been nothing, was a horn. Just like in the dream. Twilight immediately looked at her side and saw that same pair of wings she had had in the dream. She looked back up just in time to see Rainbow pass out of her vision.

“Rainbow, wait! We have to fix this!”

“I am going to fix this. But it’s not going to be with your help,” came Rainbow’s voice from upstairs. A few seconds later, Twilight heard the door open, then slam shut.

Twilight waited for a few minutes in silence, hoping against hope that Rainbow would come back through that door and hear her out. But in her heart Twilight knew that wasn’t going to happen. She slumped into her chair and lay her head against the desk, crying into her hooves.

“How could I be so stupid!” she said, rapping her head against the desk. “I shouldn’t have done that. Not for any reason. She said she liked me, and now she’s gone. Why couldn’t I just ask her myself?” Twilight threw her hooves out, her left one knocking into something. She took her forehead off the desk and looked up. Rainbow’s bag was there. Just sitting on the edge of the desk looking as innocuous as can be. “Her bag?” Twilight mumbled. “She must’ve forgot it she was so angry.”

Without really thinking about why she was doing it, Twilight reached for Rainbow’s bag and pulled it over to her. Instinctively, she tried to use magic to open it, but realized quickly that she had forgotten a crucial detail. Rainbow Dash currently had the the horn that was supposed to be on her head. Shaking that thought out, Twilight used her hooves to clumsily open the bag and pull out Rainbow’s dream diary. She flipped past the pages she had already read, skimmed a few more, then stopped when she reached yesterday’s entry.

I had another dream about Twilight last night. You know, same as usual, nothing outta the ordinary there. I won’t go into detail since it’s pretty much the same as the last fifty dreams I’ve had, but anyway. I’ve been thinking a lot lately, a lot about these dreams I’ve been having. I mean, why always the same? Why always Twilight? I think I know the answer, but I’m not sure. When I see Twilight tomorrow, after our session, I'll ask her. I don’t know how she’ll respond, which I guess is the point of asking her in the first place, but something tells me that I’ll be okay. I don’t know. It’s just a feeling I guess, but it’s a good feeling. Like, I feel like things will work out in the end, even if Twilight doesn’t return my feelings. Well anyway, we’ll see, won’t we?

Oh yeah, remember last week when I told Twilight I was bringing those cloud pearls to Rarity? I don’t know why, but I lied to her. They weren’t really for my mother, or whatever I said. They’re for her. It’s weird. I don’t know why I did it, but I had the urge to do something for Twilight. You know, get something nice for her. I’m planning on giving it to her after I talk to her, regardless of the outcome. It’ll be a nice present even if she doesn’t feel the same way about me. I hope Rarity’s done making that necklace by now. She said it’d only take a week, but I wonder if managed it okay. Guess I’ll find out tomorrow, huh? Heh, kind of a lot of “finding out tomorrow” going on, isn’t there? Apparently tomorrow’s gonna be a big day for me. I suppose I should get ready for work now. Cloudchaser’s gonna be waiting for me down by the river. Well, I know this was a short entry, but that’s okay. I’m feeling too excited to write anything else down. I’ll let you know how everything goes tomorrow. Until then, see ya!

Twilight closed the diary and sighed. “How did everything go so wrong?” she asked herself out loud. “Oh, that’s right. You decided to be an idiot.” She rapped her hoof against her forehead. “Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!” With another sigh, she placed her cheek against the diary and stared into some empty corner of the room. With her ear pressed against the book, she hoped that it would somehow gain sentience and tell her what to do. She briefly entertained the idea of writing Celestia for advice, but then realized that the ruler of Equestria probably had better things to do than deal with Twilight’s relationship problems.

Twilight turned to the other cheek and stared at the other side of the room. Only, instead of the walls she was expecting, she saw the green eyes and purple scales of a familiar dragon boy.

“Uhh, you okay there, Twilight?” Spike produced a bottle of Zap Apple jam and placed it on the desk. “I got what you were looking for.” Spike’s eyes narrowed. “Hang on a second… something’s different.” His eyes shot open. “Twilight! Where’s your horn, and why do you have wings?”

Twilight quickly sat up and pushed the diary aside. “Spike! You’re back! Maybe you can help me.”

“Sure, I can help you. Umm, but what is it I’m helping with again?”

Twilight bit her lip, unsure of how to explain everything. In the end, she just went with a breathless shotgun approach. “I read Rainbow Dash’s diary, found out she was dreaming about me, started having dreams about her myself, then decided that I needed to see her dreams for myself so I used a spell to enter her dream and when we woke, Rainbow found out I had been in her dream, thought I had been doing it all along and ran off furious with me for manipulating her dreams.”

Spike opened his mouth to answer, then shut it, holding up a finger. His mouth opened and closed a few more times before he finally said, “What?”

Twilight sighed. “Rainbow Dash thinks I’ve been manipulating her dreams to make it so that she likes me, so she ran off to who-knows-where and also she has my horn.”

“She has your horn?”

“Right, and I have her wings.”

“Umm… can I ask why?”

“It’s a long story.”

Spike nodded slowly. “I don’t think I wanna know anyway. So, what is it I’m helping you do?”

Twilight pushed herself away from the desk, stood up, and put on the bravest smile she could. “Win Rainbow Dash back, of course!”

Spike cracked open the bottle of Zap Apple jam, stuck his finger in and pulled out a big scoop. After stuffing it in his mouth, he said, “Well okay then. Let’s do this.”

Stage 5 — REM

The sky was shaded by the handful of clouds that drifted in front of the sun as Twilight and Spike trudged through Ponyville in search of Rainbow Dash. Twilight kept glancing around, hoping that maybe the angry mare would appear from behind a bush or around a corner, but she was having no luck whatsoever. Starting to worry that she might not find her for the rest of the day, Twilight turned to Spike.

“Where do you think she could be?”

Spike shrugged, shaking his head. “Beats me. She doesn’t have her wings, right? So she’s probably not up in the clouds right now. That would’ve been my first guess.”

Twilight let out a soft whimper. “I should never have started this whole thing. I pushed Rainbow into it, and then I went and read her journal behind her back.” She stomped her hoof. “I’m so stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid.” Slumping to the ground, Twilight hung her head. “I just wish everything could go back to how it was before.”

Spike frowned, kneeled down and placed a hoof on Twilight’s shoulder. He let out a quiet sigh. “So maybe you screwed up a bit.”

“A bit?”

“Okay, a lot, but so what?” Spike looked up at the sky. More clouds were gathering, and blocking out the sun, but he smiled anyway. “You think you’re the first pony to mess this kind of thing up?”

Twilight lifted her head. “Well, no, of course not, but—”

Spike smiled at her. “But nothing, Twilight. Do you think that if you were the one that stormed off, that Rainbow Dash would be sitting on the ground moping?” He raised an eyebrow. “Think Rainbow Dash would let a little bump like this slow her down?”

“Well—”

Spike stood up, puffed out his chest and pointed a claw up to the sky. “Heck no, she wouldn’t. Rainbow Dash’d be flying all over Ponyville trying to find you, looking under every rock, and behind every door. She wouldn’t stop until she’d found you and made things right.” He spun around and held out his claw for Twilight. His smile was bold, but soft, and, as Twilight moved her hoof toward his claw, he added, “So, what are you gonna do, Twilight?”

Twilight put her hoof in Spike’s claw and felt herself being lifted up. It was like being pulled through a waterfall, and when she emerged on the other side, it was like she was seeing the world in a completely new light. She smiled at Spike. “I’m gonna find Rainbow Dash.” Closing her eyes, Twilight sucked in her breath and let it out slowly. When she opened her eyes again, Spike was gone. “Spike?”

She barely had time to look around for him before she a flash of something blue out of the corner of her eye. Hoping, but still cautious, she quickly followed after the object, deciding that she would look for Spike later. He would understand.

As Twilight rounded the corner of a row of houses, she came face to face with another pony. Unfortunately, this pony was not Rainbow Dash. He had a dour look, and seemed not to notice Twilight until she cleared her throat loudly.

“Excuse me,” she asked rather hurriedly, “did you see a blue pega—unicorn pass by just a second ago?”

He looked at her with dead eyes and a thin mouth. “No,” he said flatly. “I didn’t see Rainbow Dash.”

“I didn’t say Rainbow—”

“I said no, all right?” he said angrily, turning away from her. “Just leave me alone.”

As the stallion walked away, Twilight furrowed her brow, then let out a disappointed sigh. “Where could she be?” Twilight wondered aloud. “Applejack’s place, maybe?” She thought about this for a moment, then nodded. “I suppose if I needed somepony to talk to, it’d probably be Applejack.” Satisfied with her new direction, Twilight quickly did a u-turn and started heading towards Sweet Apple Acres.

As she trotted through the town, which was unusually quiet for this time of day, she happened to pass by The Carousel Boutique, and Rarity who was just locking up, about to head home. Twilight quickly walked up to her and said, “Rarity, have you seen Rainbow Dash at all today?”

Rarity was busy fumbling with the key and didn’t respond to Twilight. After she finally got the key into the hole and turned the lock, she turned around to give Twilight a pointed gaze. “No, I haven’t, and even if I had, I wouldn’t tell you where she was.”

Twilight felt like she’d been hit in the chest. She fumbled for words while Rarity watched with pursed lips. “Rarity, I—”

“Save it, Twilight,” said Rarity, holding up a hoof. “Any friend who’d go snooping around in somepony else’s dreams is no friend of mine. That you could take something as personal as her diary, a dream diary no less, and read it without her permission, I just can’t believe you’d do something so lowly.” With a delicate ‘hmph’, she tossed her mane over her shoulder and walked away, leaving Twilight stunned.

“Rarity…” Twilight held out her hoof feebly, but Rarity didn’t stop. She didn’t even so much as look back. Her heart sinking a little more, Twilight mumbled under her breath, “I have to fix this.” She glanced up at the sky and saw clouds were gathering in greater numbers now, and a darkness was pervading the relative calm. She bit her lip.

Twilight pressed on, hurrying through the streets, only occasionally stopping to ask random passersby, “Excuse me, have you seen a unicorn with a rainbow mane recently?” The answers she received varied greatly, but not because they actually knew where Rainbow Dash was.

“Rainbow mane? You mean the pony you betrayed?”

“How can you possibly be looking for her after what you did?”

“Do you think she even wants to talk to you?”

“How dare you even ask me where she is.”

“Rainbow Dash hates you.”

“Rainbow Dash never loved you.”

“Rainbow Dash doesn’t want to see you ever again.”

Twilight fell to her knees in the middle of the street, her fur getting soaked from the puddle she’d stepped in. All around her ponies were yelling at her, cursing her, angry looks on their faces. She tried to hold up her hooves to push them away, but they just came closer and closer, suffocating her. It was all she could do to look up in the sky and see lightning strike down in jagged arcs. One bolt even managed to hit the library.

Her eyes went wide as she pushed through the crowd of angry ponies only to watch her library catch fire, burning a bright and furious red. As she galloped towards the library, hoping that she could do something, anything, to stop it from burning down, she felt rain start to come down in heavy waves.

Another bolt of lightning struck, cracking one of the branches on the large treehouse and causing Twilight to have to roll out of the way. Her mouth was agape as she watched in horror. Rain lashed at her sides, the streets quickly becoming small rivers as more and more water poured from the sky.

Suddenly, a thought occurred to her. Panicking now, she braved the now blazing fire that was quickly consuming her treehouse and threw open the front door. The ceiling was on fire. The walls were on fire. Even the floor had the cracked red look of burning embers, but Twilight didn’t care. She started looking around frantically.

“Spike! Spike, are you in here?” she called, yelling upstairs and downstairs. But even after a few more shouts, she heard no response, and she wasn’t sure if that made her more, or less worried. Eventually Twilight was forced to abandon the library as a beam holding up the second floor collapsed in on itself and almost crushed her.

Twilight stumbled backwards, tripping over the door frame and landing on her flank. She closed her eyes and turned away, afraid to watch anymore as huge flames engulfed her treehouse, devouring it in a fiendish display. Her lips trembled, and tears started to stream down her face, mixing with the rain that was pouring down even harder now and making it impossible to distinguish the difference between the two.

“I wish I had my horn,” she said in a shaky voice, her mane plastered over her face. “I wish Rainbow Dash were here. I wish—” Before she could say her final wish, Twilight noticed that the rain was coming down in torrents now, and she could feel the water under her hooves start to rise rapidly. Twilight stood up, looked around.

Looking to her left and right, she saw that the water was quickly getting higher and higher, and that all the ponies had escaped into their homes, leaving Twilight frightened and alone. She stood there, not knowing what to do, as the water rose up to her knees, and then to her haunches.

“I have to do something,” she said to herself. Glancing up to the sky, Twilight was struck by a sudden idea. “That’s right! I still have Rainbow Dash’s wings!” She unfurled her delicate wings and fought against the heavy rain to lift herself into the air. Before she got very high, only a few feet off the ground, she was forced to hold her hoof up to her face to block the wind and the rain.

Forcing herself higher, Twilight rose up above the town, looking down on it to see that a massive flood was surging through the streets, washing away benches and market stalls, and anything else that wasn’t secured. “Where is the weather team?” said Twilight, looking around, expecting to see a group of pegasi taking to the sky to combat the storm. But, try as she might, she couldn’t see anything like that happening. They sky was filled with black clouds and white lightning, but not a single pegasus besides herself was anywhere to be seen.

A crack of thunder heralded a lightning bolt that Twilight just barely had time to dodge out of the way over. Between the hurricane-like winds and the thick sheets of rain, it was almost impossible for Twilight to fly straight. It was all she could do to keep herself in the air, but she knew that she must, at all costs, stay in the air. Even if the chances were seeming slimmer and slimmer, she was still hoping to catch a flash of blue fur or a purple scale. Anything to let her know her friends were still alive.

It was then that Twilight caught, out of the corner of her eye, the sight of a pony struggling to stay holding on to the door of Sugarcube Corner. Twilight’s heart stopped as she noticed the pony was the same blue as Rainbow Dash, and she was a unicorn too.

Tucking her wings in, Twilight dove down towards the pony, realizing as she got closer that it was, in fact, Rainbow Dash who was clutching onto the door for dear life. She looked up just as Twilight was coming out of her descent.

“Twilight!” she called, waving a hoof at her and almost losing her hold at the same time.

It was difficult to hear her over the sounds of wind and thunder, but Twilight’s heart soared at the sound of Rainbow calling her name. She swooped in low and wrapped her hoof around Rainbow Dash’s, saying to her, “Hold on tight!”

Twilight’s wings strained against the weight of two ponies, and the combined difficulty of a severe thunderstorm throwing her off balance. After a few powerful strokes of her wings, however, she was able to lift herself, and Rainbow Dash, into the air.

“Twilight!” Rainbow Dash called up to her. “You have to get up there and break this storm up!”

Twilight looked down at Rainbow Dash, her hooves wrapped around the other mare’s. Her grip tightened. “I don’t know how,” she called back. “I’m not a pegasus like you.”

“Well, you are now!”

“Ah!” Twilight shrieked as a bolt of lightning arced past her, almost striking her wings as she struggled to keep aloft in the tumult. She knew she had to find a place to land, but everywhere she looked, all she saw was water now. Any semblance of Ponyville was gone, replaced by a vast, raging ocean of endless depth that stretched as far as she could see. “Rainbow,” said Twilight, looking down at the pony in her hooves. “I’m sorry! About this, about everything!”

Her mane whipping around in the wind, and soaked with rain, Rainbow Dash grit her teeth. “Yeah, you should be! This is all your fault!”

“I know,” said Twilight softly, barely audible over the howling wind. “I messed up. I messed everything up.” Tears streamed down her face, falling imperceptibly into the ocean below. “I’m sorry that I read your diary behind your back, and I’m sorry that I invaded your dreams, and I’m sorry that I ever asked you to be part of this experiment in the first place.”

Rainbow Dash’s lip trembled. “No…” she whispered. “I’m glad you asked me, even if things ended up this way.”

“But, I—”

“It made me realize that you—that I… cared about you,” said Rainbow Dash, looking up at Twilight. “I’m sorry I said this was all your fault. If I had been in your situation, I’m sure I would’ve done the same thing.” She gave a little laugh. “Actually, I probably would’ve read the dream diary sooner.”

Looking down at Rainbow Dash, Twilight smiled weakly. “Rainbow Dash, I should’ve said this a long time ago, but… I think I—”

The look in Rainbow’s eyes made Twilight stop. Smiling, the other mare said, “I know. Trust me, I know, but right now kinda isn’t the time.” There was a loud crack as lightning shot forth from the black clouds.

“Maybe you’re right,” said Twilight, laughing nervously. “But I don’t know what to do. I’m not a pegasus like you. Even if I have the wings I can’t—” She stopped, her eyes lighting up suddenly. “Rainbow!” she said suddenly. “I’ve got a plan.”

Rainbow, who was still hanging from Twilight’s front hooves over a roiling ocean said, “Well, don’t keep it to yourself.”

“You’re going to have to use your horn,” said Twilight, nodding towards Rainbow’s forehead.

“I don’t know how to use this thing!” Rainbow shouted. “If you can’t control the weather, what makes you think I can use my horn?”

“It’s easy,” said Twilight, more to reassure herself than Rainbow Dash. “You’re just going to switch back my horn and your wings. Piece of cake… heh.”

“How am I supposed to do that!?”

Twilight bit her lip. “Umm, well, just try to imagine switching them back in your head. Think about it as hard as you can. You have to really concentrate.”

Rainbow shook her head. “I don’t know if I can, Twi. I’ve never done anything like this before.”

“Neither have I,” replied Twilight, “but we’re just going to have to make it work.” She took a deep breath. Her strength was quickly fading, and it was getting more and more difficult to hold Rainbow Dash up, but she wasn’t about to tell her that. “On the count of three, I want you to think about switching back harder than anything you’ve thought about in your entire life.” She looked down at Rainbow expectantly.

Rainbow looked back up at her, grit her teeth, nodded, and said, “Let’s hope this works!”

“Okay. One! Two! Th—Ah!” Right as Twilight was about to finish, a bolt of lightning zapped right next to her, making her flinch instinctively and drop Rainbow Dash as a consequence. She watched in slow motion as the other mare plummeted towards the frothing ocean, her eyes wide with fright. Twilight didn’t even have enough time to recover and start diving after Rainbow Dash before she saw her horn start gathering light at the tip. When she was only a few yards above the water, there was a bright flash of light, and suddenly it was Twilight’s turn to fall.

With her wings gone in that flash of light, Twilight had her horn back, but the only things keeping her in the air were nowhere to be seen. She felt an immediate sense of vertigo as the sky dropped out from under her and she fell towards the ocean. However, almost as immediately as the sensation started, it stopped and reversed. She felt hooves wrap around her body and looked up to see Rainbow Dash, her eyes hard and focused straight up, beating her wings, carrying the two of them higher and higher.

Twilight, who was in Rainbow’s two forehooves and hugged close to the mare’s chest, reached out and wrapped her hooves around her savior’s neck, squeezing her tightly. “Rainbow, you did it!” she cried.

Rainbow Dash smirked. “Like you said. Piece of cake.” Her smirk disappeared a second later though as she rolled out of the way of a stray lightning bolt. “But we’re not out of this yet,” she added, her faced returning to a look of pure concentration. “I’ve got to find somewhere to land. I can’t fly forever.”

For what felt like hours, Rainbow battled her way through raging storm clouds and malevolent lightning bolts, all while keeping the pair of ponies above the sea beneath them. Her wing strokes, much more powerful than Twilight’s had been, were the only thing keeping them aloft now. Twilight, for her part, was using her horn to give what little light she could in the darkness, and also did her best to fend off the lightning by keeping up a protective shield around them.

Eventually, Rainbow’s strength started to give way, and Twilight felt her grip loosen, and each beat of her wings was less forceful than the last. “I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up, Twi,” she said. “I don’t see land anywhere. Where even are we?”

Twilight shook her head, wiping the rain from her eyes. “I have no idea. For all I know we could’ve left Ponyville awhile ago.” Her eyes went wide. “Oh my gosh! What about everypony else. Do you think they’re okay?”

“I’m sure they’re fine,” said Rainbow Dash. “I bet AJ rounded everyone up and got them to higher ground when the flood started. She’d know what to do.”

“Rainbow Dash,” said Twilight sheepishly, “I’m sorry about all this.”

“What, you’re apologizing again?” said Rainbow, smirking, though her eyes still looked just as worried as before. “Wasn’t once enough?”

Twilight’s face was serious as she looked into Rainbow’s eyes. “No. I can’t apologize enough for violating your trust.”

“Look, we all make mistakes, Twi.”

Twilight shook her head vigorously. “No! You can’t just let me off that easy. This is bigger than that. I… I understand if you don’t… feel the same way you might have before—”

“Twilight.”

“—A-and, I understand if you just want to be friends—”

“Twilight…”

“—But, no matter what happens, I don’t want to lose you as a friend, so please—” she looked pleadingly into Rainbow’s eyes “—don’t hate me.”

“Twilight!” Rainbow Dash shook her head. “I don’t hate you. I could never hate you.” She laughed. “You don’t get it, do you?” Smiling, Rainbow Dash brought her face closer to Twilight’s. “I was mad because I thought you were manipulating me, and I ran away because I was scared you weren’t. It may have taken almost drowning and flying through a storm for me to really realize it, but…” A soft smile tugged at her lips. “I love you, Twilight.”

Words escaped her. Twilight tried to respond, but her mouth just opened and closed fruitlessly. She eventually settled for a smile like Rainbow’s, and another hug. As Twilight held Rainbow close to her chest, she whispered into her ear, “I love you too.”

Once the two separated, both of them were sporting a delicate blush that neither decided to comment on. Of course, it could’ve also been due to the cold that was permeating their bodies from the harsh rain they were still enduring, but it didn’t matter. For the first time in a long time, Twilight felt like she was exactly where she wanted to be.

“So…” said Rainbow, breaking the somewhat awkward silence that had followed their confessions. “Now what?”

“I guess we try to get out of this storm?”

“I don’t have much strength left,” said Rainbow with a strained look on her face. “Maybe another minute or so.”

Twilight tried to smile reassuringly. “Don’t worry. If you fall, I’ll catch you.”

Rainbow chuckled weakly. “It’s a nice sentiment, but who’s going to catch you?”

“Hopefully somepony.”

Rainbow Dash’s wing beats were now barely keeping them in the air. She was faltering more and more with every inch they flew. After about a minute or so, like she had guessed, her wings started to give out completely, and it was all she could do to keep them open so she could glide, which was difficult considering the wind was still rocking them left and right while the rain pounded down on them from above.

“I’m sorry, Twilight,” said Rainbow, her eyes fluttering as she strained to keep her wings unfurled. “I can’t go any farther.”

“Don’t worry,” Twilight said softly, “I’ve got you.”

And then, rolling over on to her back so Twilight was facing the sky, Rainbow dropped altitude dramatically and started diving towards the ocean. Wind howled in their ears, even louder than before, and the rain lashed their faces as the water’s surface drew nearer. Finally, they were mere inches above it, and then there was a loud splash as they crashed into the water.

Twilight shook her head, flinging water from her mane all over the place. Her eyes shot open, and she moved her mane out of her face. The darkness was quickly replaced by a familiar face standing over her. “Spike?” she said incredulously.

Spike was standing there, an empty bucket in one hand, and another full of water by his feet. He smiled, tossing the bucket aside. “Man, I thought you two’d never wake up.” He shook his head, chuckling. “I tried everything.”

“Ugh, why am I all wet?” asked Rainbow Dash, who was awoken at the same time as Twilight. She flicked her hooves and shook her head, clearing the water out. “Spike, what the heck?”

He shrugged. “I told you. I had to do something to wake you guys up. It’s been hours already.”

“Hours?” Twilight cocked an eyebrow. “What time is it now?”

Spike pointed his thumb over his shoulder at the clock on the wall. “It’s already 8 o’clock at night. I was worried you guys were, like, in a coma or something.”

Twilight sighed. “I guess it was all just a dream then.” She turned to Rainbow Dash. “Do you… remember anything?”

Rainbow, who was busy squeezing the water from her mane, said, “That depends, did you have the same dream as me?”

“Was there a flood?”

“Yep.”

“And did you have a horn?”

“Uh huh.”

“And I had wings”

“That’s the one.”

“Did you switch them back?”

Rainbow held up her hoof. “I’m pretty sure we’ve established that we were having the same dream.”

Twilight brought a hoof to her chin, tapping it softly. “I wonder how that’s possible though? Weren’t we in your dream, Rainbow Dash?”

“I remember I was having my own dream, and then you showed up in it,” said Rainbow, shrugging. “After that, things kinda went dark and then suddenly we were back here, but I felt like I was awake.”

“I think that we may have moved from your dream, to my dream,” suggested Twilight.

“Is that even possible?” asked Spike, his arms crossed as he followed Twilight’s lead and tapped his chin.

Rainbow Dash tilted her head to the side and hit a hoof against her ear in an attempt to get the water out of the other ear. “I guess so,” she said. “Looks like that’s what happened.”

“Wait,” said Twilight, her face suddenly turning red as she looked over at Rainbow Dash, “if we were in the same dream, then you remember what we said to each other?”

Rainbow lifted her head up, her mane still soaked and stuck to her face, a sly smile coming over her. “Maybe this will help you decide.” She leaned forward, causing Twilight to suck in her breath and make her face grow even redder.

“Rainbow—” Twilight was stopped mid sentence as Rainbow Dash’s mouth came into contact with hers. The other mare’s lips felt unbelievably soft, and the fact that they were both soaked with water still meant that the kiss was wetter than Twilight was anticipating. Twilight knew it would be cliche to admit it, but it felt like their kiss lasted for an eternity, or at least a few minutes, but when Rainbow Dash pulled away, it had only been a few seconds.

The other mare grinned, licked her lips, and then said, “How’s that for an answer?”

Spike looked back and forth between the two mares. He arched a brow, saying, “What kind of dream did you two have, exactly?”

Twilight, still blushing like a filly on prom night, said, “I’ll tell you about it some other time.” She then moved towards Rainbow, rubbed her muzzled against the other mare’s, and kissed her again while Spike stood there, shaking his head.