The Alter Accords

Chapter Fifteen: Love Line and Awakening.

Eventually the day came that they had to come back, and while Star had still not awaken they were going to bring him back to Ponyville so that he could at least be home when he awoken. While this made everyone of the group happy he was coming home, feelings of guilt and betrayal still coursed through them, but at least now they had understanding to temper it.

However before they were to leave there were some very important questions that needed answering and two mares had to know the answers and that is why they first came to their friend to ask. “Twi.” Began the accented pony out of the two. “Ah been meanin’ to ask and so has Dash here.”

“Have not!” The cyan flier exclaimed even as she blushed.

“But…” It was hard for her to say as one part of her wanted to know, however the other part was afraid of what it meant as well. “What is a Love Line?”

The instant she asked AJ knew she didn’t like where it was going already as the student of Celestia started to turn red in the face. “W-well you, you see.” Her head turned left and right quickly before she smiled. “IthinkIhearThePrincesscallingmeaskCadenceokbye!” and with a pop of violet energy she vanished as she teleported.

Dash looked towards her friend then and they both knew what had to be done. “Throne room?”

“Throne room.” Replied the working mare.

It had been bugging both of them for a while now, whatever the Love Line was it had been key to saving the shifting pony and AJ had to know, both why it could save him, and why Dash was connected to it. Both of which the mare in question wanted to know as well.

It took a while to get to the throne room and a bit longer as Cadence was in a meeting with some crystal ponies but eventually she was free. “Princess we need to talk to you in private.”

The Princess of Love opened her mouth as if to say something only to stare at those two for a moment before nodding. “I suppose you both do, follow me.” Getting up off the throne and heading out through a nearby door Cadence told a waiting crystal pony to hold off her meetings for an hour. They eventually found themselves in the Princesses royal chambers as she sat down on a chair and motioned for them to sit as well.

She waited for a few minutes till finally one of them spoke. “Princess…” It was Dash who spoke, the brasher of the two ponies. “What is a Love Line?”

The gaze she leveled at both of them was one that couldn’t be read easily, not even by the living lie detector. “If I tell you this, you have to promise that it will not change anything.”

The farm mare gulped but nodded, she had to know if not for herself then so she can help Velox out somehow if he needed it. “I promise.”

“I promise, I gotta know, why it is connected to me and what it is even.” Dash rubbed at her head where it connected to her before.

Standing up the Princess motioned for both of them to come closer and peer into the mirror on her stand. “You see.” Her horn started to glow and shoot towards the mirror, but instead of reflecting or shattering the mirror, it made it ripple as simple figures appeared on the surface. “There is a thing called Sync between all objects and ponies. A good example of a high Sync Ratio is you girls and your connection to the Elements. However they are just objects and there is only so much that can be attributed between them. However if somepony becomes extremely connected to a object, even a none magical one, they can give it power, sometimes minor power, sometimes not. There are some books in the forbidden archives that are magical because they never left Starswirl’s side and he synced with them.”

The girls watched as a pony was holding objects and their aura went into the object till it started to emit an aura itself. “There is a theory that objects can even gain a soul if there is enough sync and aura to complete it, or even a transfer of the soul if it were to be abused.” Again the girls watched as the mock pony in the mirror pushed something into the orb that was the example and dropped dead before its face appeared on the orb.

“So the Elements might have been made like that?” Dash seemed to follow it though so did AJ and it seem to be what Cadence hinted at.

She shook her head. “Some unicorns thought that but the magic that they are made of seem to be something else.” The figure and object vanished to be replaced by a pink pony and a blue pony. “Now there are syncing with ponies and other living things. Here it is much different and more varied.” The two ponies were shown to nuzzle each other. “When two ponies with strong feelings for each other spend years with each other, a small Love Line will form. Love Lines are also called other things, A Trans Thread and Connection Cord are two other examples.” The ponies now had a thread connecting between them.

The orange work-a-holic couldn’t stop herself from interrupting. “But Dash and Ve-ah mean Novo haven’t really been together for years like that. Does that mean it is somethin’ else?”

Her peripheral vision told her that Rainbow had also nodded to that. “Normally yes you would be right, however I learned a lot about the activities that Bright Star has been up to from Luna as she needed to tell me them so I could help her when she was looking through his memories. I still think he will be mad about that.” Getting back to her example she looked one more time to the girls. “Are you sure you want to know, the next parts start getting to the parts where ponies can’t un-hear these things.” When they nodded she sighed and said she had warned them.

The mirror started moving again as the two ponies started to kiss and touch foreheads. “Now normal ponies even ones who become special someponies, they don’t don’t always have high sync rates, in fact most sync rates for special someponies are lower then what you would think.” A number came up for the normal pair in the mirror. “For ‘normal’ pairs, the sync ratio is just barely above fifty percent, and usually never goes higher then seventy. Though not to say those numbers can’t be improved and are not to say only those with high sync rates with each other can be special someponies, it is just when it is that high they are drawn together eventually. So far are you with me you two?”

“Yeah, so far so good Princess.” AJ told her silently wondering what her own sync rate with a certain Pegasus would be.

Nodding as well Dash smiled. “I kinda learned abit about that from my training.”

“I suppose you did.” Cadence gave a knowing smile that made the brash pony blush fiercely. This time the figures changed being replaced with a cyan colored figure and a green one. “Now in the case of a couple with a rare high sync rate the time which a bond can form is much much less. There are also ways to speed it up further in the case of unicorns which does produce interesting results when preformed.”

AJ looked over as she heard a noise to her friend with her wings fully extended and her face as well as her neck and parts of her body were turning red. “D-do you need to cover w-what unicorns do?”

With a nod from Cadence, Dash covered her head with her hooves. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of Rainbow Dash, it’s considered a very personal thing.”

“J-just get on with it.” She said slowly uncovering her head to continue watching.

“Alright.” With that they all watched the figures in the mirror touch foreheads again this time their cheeks growing red as their auras were made visible. “The way unicorns do this-” Both figures in the mirror grew a horn now. “Is that they go through a process in which the unicorn sends some of their own mana, something that is unique to each pony, into the willing pony. This is called Mana Merging or Mana Melding. However most of the time this only happens with two unicorns as they can deal with an overflow of mana by either a random expelling of magic through their horns, something often seen as sparks, or by casting a spell.” The figure on the mirror started to send sparks from its horn.

“Oh is that why he-.” Dash cut herself off with that by stuffing her own mouth with a hoof.

Cadence couldn’t help but smile and for some reason that made AJ frown. “However when a unicorn is sending their mana into a none-unicorn well they have no way of getting rid of it, and it can often hurt a pony or even stretch their mana channels out, even rupturing them if not careful. This can cause some serious side effects like the loss of that tribes unique traits, in a case of a Pegasus flight, weather manipulation and more, with earth ponies it could be their connection to the ground and nature itself or even their physical attributes.” The figure that was cyan lost their horn and then collapsed seeming to shrink and go gray.

“I-I didn’t know that.” AJ was getting tired of being out of the loop as Dash said another statement that made no sense without context.

The mirror refreshed and there was the green unicorn and the cyan pony again. “Now, in the case of bad natural sync rates, a unicorn doing this with another pony it can cause all kind of side effects, from minor discomfort to the feeling of a pony forcing themselves on them. At which point they should stop as it can mentally scar the pony or ponies involved.” The flier said nothing and only just nodded this time. Cadence just raised her eyebrow at this but continued. “This can be made to feel worse if one pony comes from a melding with a higher sync rate to a lower one.”

Gulping Dash barely was heard as she said. “Yeah it does.”

“We will have to talk about that later Rainbow Dash but for now-” Turning back to the mirror. “Now the feeling that is instilled in ponies with moderate to high sync ratios are rather…nice, the higher the rate the better it feels. Some unicorns have adopted this practice to include in the bed room to enhance the mutual pleasure.” The blush on Dash went from the really red on her face and neck to full body at this and AJ was starting to understand what was happening. “None unicorns can even learn to push their mana into their partner with practice and the act of any two ponies doing this creates a loop of in and out mana if they both choose to accept their partner’s energy. It is called Circuiting and this of course creates a sort of out of control reaction between the two ponies that is really hard to make them stop if they start it.”

AJ turned quickly to her friend whose wings were practically vibrating as they couldn’t spread any wider. “Rainbow Dash.”

Dash turned to look at her friend with eyes that were remembering things she had experienced and was looking back at her with the answer written all over her face. “If the sync ratios are very high it can be the same intensity as being intimate with your special somepony without even physically touching one another except at the foreheads…isn’t that right Dash.”

“RD ya didn’t.” AJ couldn’t believe this she had to wonder when this happened, it couldn’t have been on Braeburn’s ranch so did that make her the other mare in this.

Dash broke down and covered her head while she lay down on the crystal floor. “Yes, yes I Mana Merged with Novo, at first it was cause my mana channels were too small to do the current so we started doing that, then I found out what it was doing to me and fought it every time but, I didn’t want to fight it either, its…its…”

The mirror had stopped with the images for now as Cadence asked bluntly. “Did you Circuit with Novo at any point?”

The Prismatic mare was still hiding under her hooves as she nodded. “A few times. The first time was when I followed him to Cascade’s grave. He was so lost and sad and crying, I don’t know why by I pressed my forehead to him and sent a tiny bit of my mana into him and he did the same. It was so nice and comforting and it felt…right, it was only for comfort then.”

Cadence raised her eyebrow at that. “This may seem…weird but I need you to describe what it felt like the next few dozen times you circuited with him.”

“Few dozen!” AJ exclaimed at this looking at Dash suddenly in a new light.

“No, we haven’t even done it that many times; at most I think we did it five times maybe up to seven.” Dash exclaimed waving her hooves at both of them.

Cadence’s eyes however went wide at what she said “What, you are saying you have only done it about six times give or take?”

“Ya, once at the grave for comfort, then again on the train for comfort. Then when I got part of the current right we comforted each other…” Dash started trailing off again and started to tap her hooves together suspiciously.

“Dash this is important.” Cadence told her with a look said that she had to tell her.

Gulping Dash had no more cyan left in her face and most of her upper body as the red of embarrassment took over. “Then that last time, he just…he kinda sent more than normal into me. It felt…felt just great and I…pushed back harder into him.” For a moment they watched the Pegasus wrap her hooves around herself and close her eyes. When they opened she had a look of a mare no longer there. “It was beyond words, it felt…perfect. There was even one point at the end when our streams came together as one that-”

“WHAT?!” The Princess of Love exclaimed interrupting what apparently was a flashback to the athlete as her hooves went to her forehead as if to hide arousal that might have spontaneously sprang from there. “Dash, tell me, truthfully, you felt your mana and his merge into one source, not two?”

For some reason Dash started giggling as her eyes went far away. “Yeah, it was great, happened quicker the second time and we both had to get out the spring to finish up or we would have gone boneless, though that happened anyways.”

“Rainbow Dash I need you to stay still for a moment while remembering that feeling.” The multi-hued mane of the pony for a moment took an almost ethereal look as her eyes glowed as she looked towards the chromatic Pegasus. No sooner had she done that then it faded and she looked at the pony with a look of profound respect. “Wow.”

Blinking at the words, though Dash was still out of it, it became AJ’s job to break her own silence to ask. “Somethin’ wrong Princess?”

“You are lucky Rainbow Dash.” The mare in question gave a ‘huh’ as she finally came around to the world. “No Applejack, nothing is wrong. I am just surprised; usually it takes years for a pair of unicorns to achieve a Total Unity like Dash has experience.” When both of none Alicorn ponies in the room tilted their heads Cadence explained. “Total Unity is a special type of Circuiting that only those with years with a partner or an insanely high sync ratio, which I just check that Rainbow Dash has with Novo almost a perfect ratio actually, it’s where both streams of magic form one stream that is almost a new entity of magic in of itself but more rather a perfect merging of mana that is rarely seen and is a dream of many unicorns around Equestria.”

AJ swallowed hard not wanting to say the next part as she knew what it would mean for herself. “Does…does that mean that Dash and Star were meant for each other?”

There was a moment when everypony in the room held their breath except the princess herself. “Chances are, even without them merging, they would have been drawn to each other enough to date most likely.”

The farm pony felt like her heart was breaking. ‘They were meant for each other, no if’s an’s or but’s about it.’

“But onto the Love Line. Love Lines are the magical manifestations of the true love threads I showed you when Star’s past was explained to everypony. The only difference is that because of the merging of magic, the love between the two ponies can physically manifest and be seen where they were connecting with magic.” The former foal sitter looked over to where AJ looked miserable but was looking up with a tiny shred of hope. “It means that the only difference between you two and the two you love is Dash has magically given it form.”

Tipping her hat in front of her eyes, she didn’t want the others to see her shed any tears of joy. ‘Thank Celestia, it means ah am just as meant for my beau as much as RD is.’

“In this case it worked out for the best as that connection made real with magic allowed me to use my own talent to amply the love between Novo and Dash enough to banish the darkness surrounding his love so the Crystal Heart could heal him and reenergize him.” Standing up and stretching now Cadence looked towards her balcony where the sun was streaming in. “However, while he is better now, those lines of love that connect you two to his various hearts, they are in trouble of breaking. Right now they are very fragile, but some of the stronger I have seen in a long while. If either of you wish to continue being in his life and heart, I suggest you two work something out between you both. If you can’t, neither of you will end up in his heart at best and only end up as friends again.”

Both of the mares had the same thought at the same time as they asked. “And at worst?”

Sighing and no looking at either of them she said it. “At worst he will come to completely hate you two, and you two will come to completely hate him with no chance for friendship at all.”

The train ride home was uneventful, nothing exciting happened, no changelings jumping out of corners, no dark crystals jutting out to harm them, not shadows wanting to overtake and rule them, no conversations either. Not a single member of their group spoke as they all had the same thing on their minds: forgiveness.

For Twilight, she had already made up her mind to help out Star in whatever he needed from now on. ‘No pony should be alone for as long as he was, hurt so many times, living with a constant reminder that he wasn’t like other ponies. No I am going to make it up to him, I will show him that Pinkie isn’t his only friend and I hope he forgives me.’

As was her nature she was already writing a list of possible things to earn forgiveness and having Spike double check it of which the assistant was actually eager to do as he also felt the need to seek forgiveness since the pony had not really hurt him all that much as Spike had liked all the forms he had met. He really didn’t see much of a reason not to just keep going on as he had since now they really were three different ponies, he still felt bad he didn’t speak up for him in the cell though.

The only problem now for Twilight at least, was waiting for him to wake up, till then she decided to do some research. ‘The Princess may know the answer to his problem but doesn’t know she knows, maybe it’s something simple that is mixed with other things, or maybe it’s something complicated seen in a new way, either way, I am going to look for a way to cure his memory problems and answer why he can change. I just need to get back to the library to start.’

Rarity was having a different sort of problem, it was both simple but complicated and it wasn’t just a single problem either. She was more than willing to admit Star was a good looking stallion in any of his forms and that was part of the problem in that two of his forms had chosen Applejack and Rainbow Dash. She found herself questioning herself because her thoughts kept coming back to a simple question: why them and not her?

She loved her friends more than anything in the world, but the green eyed monster kept coming back to remind her that she was more lovely then both of them, that she was better kept then them both as well, not to mention she actually put time into her looks where as they seemed to wake up every morning and just come out like they did.

Chewing on her hoof her thoughts continued to war in her mind. ‘Come on Rarity, don’t be like that, sure Velox is admirably brave, Novo is distinguished, and Lego is-.’ For a moment her thoughts became impure as she had remembered her secret magazines with the candid pictures he had taken for money. ‘-is a gentlecolt and highly intellectual. So why did the first two pick the ones who don’t even try, what did they do, is it cause they-NO RARITY do not lower yourself to those thoughts these are your friends.’

However the thoughts wouldn’t leave her mind so easily.

Fluttershy’s guilt was manifesting itself into more of a self loathing sense of hate for her own self with each major encounter between the versions of the pony in question and herself. ‘There was the manticore, oh how I am sure that my words had brought guilt to him, I could have easily said something or even done something to make him feel a little less bad, but I didn’t cause I wanted him to know how horrible it was to take the life of a forest creature.’

Placing her hooves over her head practically trying to hide from herself her mind didn’t let up. ‘Then there was when I accused him of forcing himself on Rainbow Dash. I used The Stare on him with no possible chance to even consider his side of the story. Even when he was cleared of the suspicion I still didn’t trust him, I kept away from him and tried only to be polite.’

The worst incident came when they had all seen his reveal, where she just ignored him and once again thought the worse. ‘The thought he had tricked Dash into doing things with him, and then AJ too if the looks she was giving him was any indication, made me wish I had done what Rainbow Dash had done. With how bad I have treated him he must absolutely hate me; I know I do for what I did.’

Applejack thoughts were more somber then the others cause unfortunately the Element of Honesty was just that, honest with herself. It came down to one simple statement that she didn’t know how to answer: could she share Star with Dash even if the minds were different, it was still the same body.

Having to grow up with siblings without her parents, practically raising Apple Bloom, running a farm, and helping Granny Smith in her elderly age she had little time to herself much less in the way of possessions. She was used to sharing everything in her life with everypony else.

‘But not this, ah don’t want to share my special somepony with somepony else, ain’t fair. Ah shouldn’t have to share this with another pony, but Dash…Dash said ‘that’ to me, ah mean it’s an option and there are plenty of ponies that do that. But…ah don’t want to share.’ If any other pony could hear her thoughts it wouldn’t make any sense or it would have been something for a sordid book that she admittedly checked out sometimes from the library before Twilight had come to Ponyville and became the librarian.

She had to order those books now special order and she made sure no pony would ever see her reading them; those were for late night when all other ponies were in bed so none would suspect her of enjoying those. After all it was where her idea to be a cowpony and ‘ride’ Velox had come from.

It was also on her mind to look to those books to help come up with ideas to help make him forgive her for the way she treated him, the guilt of that was almost as bad as the thoughts to share him.

‘Maybe ah should try that thing from The Bronco and the Bride, but it would mean…it would mean.’ If embarrassment could take physical form AJ would have steam coming out of her ears at the thought going through her head.

Rainbow Dash, a pony of confidence found herself wavering between overconfidence in that she could make it up to her coltfriend, which she was now thinking of him in such a way in her head, and going to extreme depression if somehow she bucked it up and he left her.

‘I hit him back at the Crystal Cell, maybe he doesn’t want me cause of that, what if he hates violent ponies, I mean-’ Shaking her head and trying to bring some of her amazing awesomeness back she smiles and looks out the window of her room. ‘Na he is a cool pony, at least five percent less cool then me, but that makes him at least twenty to a hundred and twenty percent cooler than most ponies. Maybe when we make up we can…’ POMF was the sound in the room as her wings shot out in full extension as she quickly tried to rub them calm again. ‘Damn Pegasus instincts.’ As she was rubbing her wings calm she slow the strokes and imagined another pony touching them, the one that was in her heart. ‘I don’t want to lose him, not many ponies take interest in me, the ones that do are just jackasses wanting a piece of tail to hit and quit. I know I am not the best looking mare or the prettiest, I mean look at Rarity or Fluttershy…maybe he will want one of them instead of me.’

There was a moment where she could feel tears bubbling up in her eyes as she imagined him walking off with Fluttershy and merging with her with a blissful look to both of them. She would tap her hooves against the sides of her face to snap herself back to reality and to wipe away those images.

“Come on Dash, mare up, if you don’t act he will leave you so just be the awesome pony you are and it should work out.” Flexing her wings one at a time cause of the small cabin she was in, she looked at her feathers and thought long and hard about something. ‘Should I give him a Primary…isn’t that too soon?’

Sighing softly she wondered if AJ had thought about what she said. “It does solve some things if she agreed.”

As for Pinkie, she was happy to know that Star had no hard feelings towards her and as such she was already trying to think of ways for her other friends to wipe their lines clean. ‘Well first step is a part of course, a ‘welcome back to Ponyville you three in one pony you’ party. Maybe I should add ‘forgiveness to all ponies’ in the banner too, but that might be too much. Oh I also got to get treats for everypony, let’s see, Puddles likes spicy, Waffles likes sweet things, Coffee likes sour stuff, OH I should get some of those pastries Dash likes the sweet and sour ones, that should cover three ponies all at once, Pinkie you are a genius!’ She thought to herself now as she started to try to think up ways to have fun with everypony.

If one had to sum up what Pinkie was doing it would be simply: Pinkie was Pinkieing.

The ponies of Ponyville were both shocked to find the resident knight pony hurt, but even more shocked when Twilight and the others told them who the brothers all really wore. They had come to this decision while talking to the Princesses that if Star wanted to live in Ponyville the ponies there would have to know. It was also up to them if he/they were to stay.

Twilight had no doubt the ponies of Ponyville would choose for him to stay but in order to keep it all fair she had decided on a ballot so no pony could influence another. She was glad for the idea of the blind ballot especially after Filthy Rich started to open his mouth stating things about freaks and to think of the foals. Since it was to become a hidden ballot she thought for sure that would stop Filthy Rich from trying to sway the ponies…she was wrong.

She had overheard ponies talk, but never actually caught it in the act, that Filthy Rich was buying the votes left and right of the more influential ponies first. Apple Bloom had told her sister that she had overheard Silver Spoon say her parents were going to get paid by Mr. Rich for throwing the freak out of town. As such it was her friends and her own job to inform the ponies of what he has done and how he has helped others even if it hurt himself. They were all pitching enthusiastically Twilight thought. She was amazed to see how hard all the girls were working though she wasn’t surprised at the same time; they were working for a friend after all.

It was nearly a week and Novo still had not woken up yet but it was the day of the ballot, the girls and Rich had all been working without resting for the week and needless to say she was nervous. Her mind was looking at it similar to how she looked at a test, but this one was of friendship and how well the ponies could trust him. She was one of the first to throw her vote in for the day and unfortunately that was both great that it was over for her, but horrible as now she had the rest of the day to worry about the results.

She knew how the others were feeling as throughout the week they had all expressed their concerns at one point or another, though for the most part she felt that a lot of the reasons her friends gave were the ones on the bottom of the list or near it for their priorities

‘Though then again, they might just be afraid to voice their real concerns.’ Was Twilight’s thought on why they were only telling her those particular ones.

At the end of the day Mayor Mare took the boxes into her office to count them telling them she will be back shortly. Shortly cause there wasn’t all that many to count since only the adults could actually vote and Ponyville was a small town.

Dinner was finished for mostly everypony when the Mayor called them all to town hall to read off the votes. The girls had all met up outside the hall and what Twilight observed of her friends was mixed. Applejack looked tired and from the leaves and branches in her hair Twilight had guessed she worked entirely without a break till now. Dash’s eyes were puffy and red as if she had been crying the whole time. Fluttershy had a look of abject misery to her, something which Rarity seemed to share but the source of it seemed directed at something else that Twilight couldn’t name. Pinkie Pie was bouncing and she seemed energetic and sure it would work out, but Twilight could see that there wasn’t as much puff to her hair as normal.

Finally Spike, he was a lot easier to read in that he basically told her how he felt. “I hope he gets to stay, I would hate to lose a friend.”

Giving him a quick hug Twilight felt the same way. “Me too Spike, me too.”

Heading inside finally all the ponies settled down before the Mayor came out with a white board that was flipped around to where they couldn’t see it. “Ladies and Gentlecolts, I have called everypony here to tell you the results of the town wide vote on the matter of whether to keep one Velox, Novo, and Lego Bright Star as part of our town or if he/they should be expelled.”

The Magic Bearer could hear the crowd gossiping and sadly she heard a lot more Anti-Star voices then she would have thought, so did her friend as they all looked unsure with reactions raging from shock, to a deflating of mane, to a hat being tipped over their face, or even unshed tears.

“Now, all the votes have been counted, and I would like to take a moment for the turnout of towns pony’s that have-” Sadly whatever she was going to say was interrupted.

The pony who interrupted her was the pompous leader of the Anti-Star movement. “Mayor Mare, While I don’t want to sound rude can we possibly move on to the results, it is late and most of us have children we have to prepare and worry about in case that monster stays in this town.”

Twilight had just enough time to restrain the cyan and orange mares that were just about to get up and tell him off and with a quick whisper she hoped to get the point across. “Don’t do that; if you fight him it may just prove his point.”

Dash and AJ didn’t look happy but it did keep them from doing something they may regret. “Well I suppose it is late and I haven’t had dinner yet cause of the vote so here is the results everypony.” The group held their breath as the gray civic pony flipped the board around for all to see. “It’s sixty four percent to thirty six in favor of our resident knight to keep living in Ponyville.”

All the girls shouted in cheer and was hugging each other as did many other ponies, surprisingly amongst them Twilight could see the Cakes, Lyra and Bon-bon, Octavia, Vinyl Scratch, Derpy, and a strange and weird pink fluff pony that seemed to sputter with her tongue, as well as many others of the town.

Of course amongst the cheer she heard the one most opposed to this stand up and shout. “This is an outrage; I will have your office for this!” With that Rich stormed off with his supporters leaving the rest to rejoice in peace.

This feeling was nothing new, the sense of displacement, of floating, of watching. The grayscale of this world he knew he was in his dreams, but he wasn’t alone this time, and strangely at the same time he was. Lego, Novo, and Velox all could see each other through their own perspectives and the others at the same time.

“Ok this is weird/strange/interesting.” Came the voices at the same time as if spoken by one pony with multiple voices. “Any clues what is going on this time?” Since they all said it they knew that none of them knew.

“Ahh ---- there you are.” It was an elderly voice, the same one that he/they had heard before in a previous dream only this time it was friendly. “We know you are not used to how things work yet so do not worry we will teach you slowly.”

The brothers were about to ask who were they talking to when the grayscale changed; slowly gaining color and they found themselves in a city. Buildings everywhere of all shapes and sizes became visible, from the magnificent to the humble but most of all were the inhabitants of the city: Alicorns.

Not just one or two, not even a half dozen, but every single pony was an Alicorn, but something was wrong, something he/they couldn’t quiet place. They put it to the back of their minds for now as they followed the voice given flesh. She was an Alicorn, no surprise there as in this freaky dream everypony was an Alicorn so they decided to just play along and let their brain and dream interpret things as it will. The Alicorn leading them was a gradient going from gray to yellow in her coat, as well as her mane and tail as if it was from old age. Strange on many accounts as they didn’t know if Alicorns could age or not and two it would mean at one point all color on her was the same as butter. The strange thing was when he/they tried to look at her cutie mark it was as if the dream warped reality so that they could never get a clear look and their eyes fell on something else that seemed to have drawn their eyes.

“Alright everyone should be in this building.” She said as she had stopped in front of a rather modest looking cottage even if it was set apart from every other building in the village. “Or I suppose the vernacular is everypony now, either way I do hope you get along with them. My name is ---- it’s nice to meet you.”

The elderly pony’s voice had cut out again and it was starting to annoy Velox more than the others but he knew it was just a dream and he had no control over it.

“I do hope you get along with *Beep* he can be such a stuffy one but his *Beep* is in the right place with his actions.” The elderly sounding Alicorn told them. “Just watch out for *Beep* it can really come out of no *Beep* to get you. So as long as *Beep* you should be *Beep* understand?”

He didn’t but he didn’t need to as he knew what was going on now. She was opening the door and that confirmed it for him as the light behind the door encompassed everything and he knew the dream was ending.

The feeling of opening your eyes from a dream where you felt like you were already awake was always a strange one for any pony, mostly it was coming from one perceived reality to another and adjusting ones thinking that was the most troubling. For Star he didn’t have as much of a problem adjusting so much so as organizing his minds to line up with one another.

‘Ok this looks familiar.’ Velox told them all from inside.

Lego was felt nodding as he pointed out a slight stain on the corner of the room as if something was slung up there but not able to be cleaned completely. ‘Looks like we are in our room in the Ponyville hospital.’

“Which must mean, something had to have happened to put us in here. It is time for a recap guys.” Novo told them as they started to think about what happened.

They retraced what the last things they could remember were and this was the order they started: Braeburn, the asshole. Applejack, paused for Velox to remember their night together. Twilight being called to Canterlot for some kind of test. Then there was the train right to…the…Crystal…

None of them got to finish that thought as tears suddenly were streaming down his face as it all came crashing back into them. The change, the hurt, the loss, the leaving, and finally they were alone. His life had ended there as had his hearts even if Lego had not got his heart broken romantically it had been broken at the loss of his friends.

“Should have let nature take its course, we could have died a hero and been left without the pain that dead hearts being carried around in our chest will cause.” There were no answers from his other selves but there was a sense of agreement in what he said.

He wasn’t sure how long he laid there listening to the heart monitor and the drip of an iv while tears continued to be shed but eventually the doctor came in to check on him. “OH you are awake, that is good news.”

It was Doctor Horse the same doc who had treated him all that time ago. “Hey Doc.”

The greeting was without feeling as the Doc smiled over to him. “Glad you remember me, anyways I am here to check on you, we were all worried you wouldn’t wake up but I am glad to see you up. It means I will also get to check how the new magical muscle stimulation techniques worked on you. Hopefully it means you won’t need even a minute of physical therapy and if so we can use it on other patients.”

‘Talk of therapy means we have been here a while. Hope that spell or technique or whatever works.’ Novo watched as the doc was reading the charts on him and other things, flexing some of his muscles when asked but during that Lego brought up a good point that Novo had to ask. “Um doc I don’t mean to be rude but we have never met, you met my brother but not me.”

The beige doc smiled but it trailed off as he coughed. “Right you don’t know do you? There was a vote the other day on whether to let you stay or kick you from Ponyville. Just so you know, I voted for you to stay.”

Something was wrong, so wrong he could feel the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. “Why would you need to do something like that, I haven’t done anything wrong I don’t think.”

Tapping the weird hammer thing on his joints to test his reflexes, the doc stopped and sighed as he looked up at his patient. “Look, Novo, Lego, Velox, whatever you want to call yourself in each of your forms-” Novo’s eyes were going wide at that. “-we were told everything, how you are all three ponies in one body for some reason or another. How you can switch between them at will or something. While it is hard to believe it does make some sense, especially to me now that I have looked over you and see scars from surgeries under your coat that I did for Velox.”

The room was suddenly cold, or it felt that way as Novo was suddenly shivering. ‘Everypony know, everypony know, oh no, they are going to freak out, they are going to-wait, he said they voted…oh…I have to leave after I am finished being checked out I guess.’ Giving a hard swallow as his throat was dry he nodded. “Right I understand now doc, I will pack my things and leave as soon as you dismiss me.”

The sudden laughter slightly irritated him and he glared at the medical pony. “You got it all wrong my boy, you were voted to stay by a good margin I must say too. By almost twice the amount who wanted you to leave after the smear campaign against you by THAT pony the Mayor told everypony you were allowed to stay.”

All three of his minds were stunned by that news and for once since their separation the body spoke in a voice that they all shared. “They will let me stay?”

Horse stood up and smiled. “Yes my boy, which means that as soon as I sign you out in a few minutes I suspect you will be getting a nice welcome home party by our resident party planner.”

This time there were tears in his eyes not from sadness for once, but of joy. “I’m home.”

Author's Notes:

The second chapter of the week. Sorry if there was alot of exposition in this chapter but it was one where alot of things needed to be said.

*Is eating ice cream*

Brain are you still sad about last chapter? We posted that what five minutes ago, its in the past move on.

Fine you don't get to have any of it with me,

Hey now don't be rash here I mean just cause I don't sympathize doesn't mean GIVE ME THE ICE CREAM!