There it was. My life’s greatest failure and I couldn’t even remember exactly what I had done. I could only count my blessings that I had simply roughed up a few ponies that gotten between myself and the changelings I had been hunting. Not to mention the fact that my primal subconsciousness had pushed itself so far that I had nearly perished myself. Perhaps I had been subconsciously seeking my own demise seeing how this was the second incident in a relatively short time span. If anything though this time was quite the wake-up call. I had gotten so close to squandering everything good that had happened to me ever since I decided to actually start living my life again. But the first to slap some sense into me was not the individual I had expected.

It started slowly, a strange yet slightly familiar spreading through my limbs. Not much unlike the feeling of a leg that had fallen asleep except the fact that I felt it all over. With a groan I cracked open my eyes, blinking a few times in an attempt to clear the darkness that I saw before me. But when the darkness didn’t dissipate confusion started to set in and I turned my head to try and see where I was. However as I continued to turn my head all I could see was more of this unending void I currently found myself in. Sure I saw my own body when I looked down so that proved that I wasn’t blind or at least under a similar effect. I raised a hand to scratch my head as I couldn’t for the life of me remember how I had come to find myself in this situation.

Confused I tried to move forward but the more I tried it became clear that it was impossible to discern if I actually did move in any direction. Unsure of what to do in this situation I resigned myself to floating in this unknown void until something changed.

Minutes passed and ultimately those minutes turned to hours, although I cannot tell you exactly how many as this place I found myself made the telling of time quite difficult. It was around this time that I first spotted it. Far off in the distance I saw an anomaly I hadn’t seen earlier. As another hour passed one thing became clear, I was drifting towards whatever the in the distance was. With nothing else to do I simply waited as the thing in the distance slowly took the shape of some sort of tear. A tear in what seemed to be in the very fabric of reality. Within the next hour the tear had doubled in size and roughly half that time it had doubled in size again. Whatever that tear was I was getting pulled towards it with increasing speed.

Just as I started to wonder what exactly might lie on the other side I felt myself come to a sudden stop as someone grabbed a hold of my shoulder. Bewildered I turned my head only to come face to face with one of the two major villains I’d seen in the show before my first adventure in Equestria. There behind, with his lion paw on my shoulder stood the lord of chaos himself.

I felt myself tense as my body prepared to attack on instinct but before I had time to make any sort of movement my mind registered something different about the draconequus. The tired yet strangely calm expression was not the same as he held in my faded memories of his first appearance in the show. I tilted my head ponderously as I studied the chimeric god in front of me and as I watched he was the first to speak.

“I wondered when I would finally meet you for real Stormcloud, or do you go by a different name these days? Not that it matters, what does matter though is that you almost crossed over the veil of worlds again. Do you know how much trouble I went through to bring you back to Equestria in the first place?” He said, his voice mirroring the tired look he bore.

My eyes widened at the implications of the words spoken. What Discord had said set my thoughts racing to the extent that I almost missed that he had continued speaking.

“And you Immy, I’m disappointed in you. I thought you protected your wielders better than this?” He asked, a question directed at me but at the same time not. Before I had a chance to ask who he was talking to he spoke again. “Now don’t take that tone with me missy, I might not be your older brother by much but I’m still older. Well as long as this doesn’t happen again I won’t have to scold you,” The draconequus said adopting a smug look.

I blinked a few times in a half hearted attempt to clear my confusion before I decided that asking was the most reasonable choice available to me. “I’m sorry but where am I and who were you talking to?” I questioned.

Discord tapped his chin with his clawed hand. “Hmm, both good questions but I’m afraid now is not the time to answer them. In fact you really shouldn’t be this close to the rift longer than you have to,” and with those words he snapped the fingers of his claw hand and the strange void vanished in a flash along with the draconequus and the tear in space.

When opened my eyes, that I had involuntarily closed, again I instead found myself in a strange star scape with thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, gently twinkling stars. My confusion gave way for awe as I looked out over the vista of stars. Soon confusion came creeping back in like an itch not properly scratched as I observed the stars moving gently across the midnight blue tapestry of what I had originally believed to be the sky. Scratching my head again I observed the slow gentle dance of these particles of light that behaved nothing like the stars I had first believed them to be and when one of them drifted close enough for me to touch I couldn’t resist reaching out towards it. As my hand touched it several things happened seemingly at the same time. I briefly experienced a gentle warmth from touching the small drifting light and the very next second I experienced a blinding flash of light before something came crashing into my midsection followed by a very loud shout.

“Begone foul deamon before I… Cloud? Is that you?”

I released a pained groan from my now prone position as I looked up at the nightly alicorn that had just assaulted me. “First of ow, what the hell Luna? Secondly, what the hell Luna?” I managed to say before said alicorn dove down to hug me.

“Oh Cloud we’ve been so worried since you wouldn’t wake up and since you haven’t dreamt I haven’t been able to reach you either” She blurted out as she worked on squeezing whatever breath I held in my lungs out of me.

“Lu-Luna I ca-can’t breathe,” I forced out, causing the alicorn to loosen her death grip on me.

Luna offered me a sheepish smile as she spoke once more. “Sorry Cloud, it’s just that my sister and I have been terribly worried since it’s been three days already and all that. Not to mention the worry shown by young Twilight, Loyalty and my personal guard,”

Given the sudden, albeit short, meeting with Discord and the weird places I had found myself in since waking I wasn’t ashamed to say that I wasn’t as receptive to information as I might’ve been otherwise. However one thing Luna said stuck with and I couldn’t for the life of me make sense of it.

“What do you mean three days Luna?” I asked, tilting my head much like a confused dog.

I saw Luna’s eyes widen in surprise before she recovered. “Nothing, nothing you need to worry about. What matters is that you’re here safe and sound,” she quickly spoke trying to change the subject, or at least downplay what she had just said.

The damage was already done though, and as she had pressured me to tell the truth months earlier it was now my time to turn the tables around. I stood up from prone position. “Luna,” I said a bit more sharply than I had intended but it had the desired effect nonetheless as the blue alicorn’s focus snapped back to me in full.

“Luna,” I said again. “Please tell me what happened? I need to know,”

Luna released a deep sigh as her gaze wandered down to the floor. For a moment I thought that I’d have to prompt her again but she suddenly raised her head once again, her eyes holding a strange sense of resolve mixed with pain and pity. “What is the last thing you remember before coming here Cloud?” She asked.

I opened my mouth to answer as my mind immediately jumped to my meeting with Discord but as my mouth started to form the first syllables something else came crashing into my mind. Dark images of blood and a pink coat flashed in my mind, causing me to stagger. Pain seared its way through my head as a veritable flood of images poured into my mind. Soon the pain became so unbearable that both my hands were more or less glued to the sides of my head as I screamed. Before I knew the cause of my pain the world around me and Luna warped and I once again found myself in a familiar cave. And once more I was forced to watch as my best friend in this world get murdered before my very eyes. Not long after I felt my legs give out from underneath me and fresh tears blurred my eyes as the image of Pinkie’s broken form tormented my mind.

For a while I was unresponsive to the outside world but when I recovered enough to register what was happening around me again I found myself in Luna’s embrace as she whispered soothingly in my ear. “It’s okay Cloud, it’s okay just let it all out. You been shown a terrible lie and have been forced to endure so much as a direct result of it,”.

I forced ragged breath to calm down and lifted a hand to wipe my tears. With my vision more or less reclaimed I looked over Luna´s shoulder to find we were once again back in the odd star scape I had first encountered Luna. “Wha- How?” I wondered out loud.

“A memory Cloud, I’m terribly sorry it partly my fault that you had to relive that. I should’ve realized that something like that would happen if I prompted you to remember in this place,” She told me.

“So that was real then? Pinkie is… I did…” I babbled as tears once again began to sting in my eyes.

“No!” Luna cried out before continuing more softly. “No Cloud, your friend is alive and well what you saw was something induced by changeling mind magic most foul,”

I breathed a sigh of relief as I finally returned the hug Luna had been giving me. My eyes met hers and for the first time since waking up a smile found its way onto my face. “Thank you Luna,”

“You are most welcome my friend,” She said, returning my smile. “Here let me help you up,” she continued, offering me a hoof.

With Luna’s help I once more stood up but in the process in doing so I got very close to her muzzle making another memory quickly flash in my mind. Namely the one where Chrysalis had taken on Luna’s form to kiss me. This time though the scenery didn’t change but that didn’t help the fact that I still flinched slightly as a strange feeling settled in my chest. My reaction didn’t go unnoticed by Luna though and she was quick to ask.

“What’s wrong Cloud?” She said, the concern in her voice being mirrored on her face.

I opened my mouth to explain, thinking that she would surely understand when something else dawned upon me. Something glaring that I had somehow managed to not think about until now. I looked at Luna a slight frown forming on my face. “Luna, what happened after the cave?”

Luna’s expression fell as the last syllables left my mouth. “It will be faster just to show you, just keep in mind that what I do show is only my memories Cloud. There are consequences to what transpired after the cave but we’ll get to that,” she said before lighting her horn and again the world seemed to melt away around us.

When the world once more stabilized I found myself riding passenger to someone’s point of view, someone who was staring at a wall of changeling drones. It quickly became abundantly clear that I was looking through Luna’s eyes as she fought the swarming horde side by side with the ponies that made up the royal guard.

“Drive them back and show them no quarter!” Luna’s voice reverberated over the battlefield that I was slowly beginning to recognize as Canterlot castle.

The guards responded around her by fighting with increased fervor and yet the changelings held fast. I was beginning to wonder what it was Luna wanted me to see with this battle when a flash of lightning tore through the changeling ranks and smashed through one of the castle windows. A sense of dread descended upon me as I saw myself through Luna’s eyes, or rather a weird caricature of me before the hole in the changeling ranks closed up.

What was that? Why can’t I remember this happening? What have I done? And similar thoughts assaulted my mind as I rode along Luna’s memory, catching more and more glimpses of myself fighting the changeling queen. By the time that I watched Luna dive in after me my hairs were already standing on end and I barely noticed when the memory froze soon after. For within me another memory of my own had surfaced, me staring at my hand covered in blood before my entire world went dark.

“..oud! Cloud! Cloud!”

My eyes snapped open and I drew a surprised breath as I sat up. I once more had returned to the star scape and Luna was standing in front of me, observing me worriedly.

“What was that Luna? How did I-” I started to babble before Luna cut me off.

“I’ll be honest with you Cloud, I simply don’t know. It could be a reaction of severe grief and anger, a momentary lapse in consciousness or even just the severity of the snow storm that night,” she theorized. “However, what has happened has happened and we cannot change the past no matter how hard we wish for it to be so. What you need to understand and be prepared for are the consequences that I mentioned earlier. You were seen by quite a few ponies in that state and fair amount of them now regard you with fear. Around one tenth of the nightmares I’ve had to deal with these past few days haven’t been induced from a fear of changelings,” she went on as I felt my posture sagging.

I wiped my face with a hand before raising my gaze, that had been staring at my feet, to look Luna in the eyes again. “That… That’s some heavy stuff you just laid on me Luna. So what do I do now? What will happen to me?” I asked her the reality of the situation having been laid bare before me.

“I understand your worries Cloud, more so than you might realize right now. Remember that I too once bore the mantle of fear and nightmares,” Luna told me sternly before continuing in the same tone. “It is what you do afterwards that will truly define you. Will you ever regain the trust of all ponies? Of course not, but it wasn’t as if you had it to begin with. You will live long Cloud and you’ll have plenty of time to do better not to mention make other mistakes. It is all a part of life after all.”

A small sense of determination started to grow inside me at Luna’s last few sentences. She was right of course and the wisdom behind her words truly showed that there was a way to make it through this. I was about to reply to her to say that I would try my hardest to make what she just described a reality when Luna spoke once again.

“It isn’t as if all ponies that saw you that night regards you with fear either. I can safely say that Longshot’s squad regards you with the highest amount of respect I’ve seen for quite some time. Not to mention the other assorted guards that were present during the siege of the castle,” she added in a softer tone, surprising me that there were some positive news.

“I don’t know what to say Luna, there’s just so much to take in. I guess what I’m trying to say is thank you for being honest with me. I’m glad that you are my friend,” I told her a small smile slowly forming on my face. I raised a hand to offer her a fist bump only to find it slightly transparent. “Luna?” I asked worriedly.

The lunar alicorn only offered me a smile though. “Worry not young Cloud, you are simply waking up. My sister and I will be there shortly there are still a few more things that we need to go over but that can wait until after my sister and you have had some time to talk,” she said as the world slowly started to get brighter and brighter until I finally had to close my eyes to not get blinded by the light.

Author's Notes:

Meh, took a long time. No real excuse but I will attempt to put some more focus on this.

Working title for the next chapter is: A journey for the weary.