Since the first day Vinyl met Octavia, she made a promise. A promise saying that she would visit her every day after work. And, so far, she had managed to keep that promise. For almost two months now, Vinyl had spent a couple hours of her night with the lonely spirit. The more time they spent together, the more the bond between the two of them grew; in both a metaphorical and literal sense.

And as that bond grew stronger, it eventually turned into something more. Something that the white mare now wondered how she could have lived without: love. Not the love of a family member, or from a friend, but from somepony who truly completed her; who shared a bond thicker than blood. Although at first, she was reluctant to accept the situation. How could she be in love with a ghost? The idea was absurd, and it would certainly never work out.

But, just as a ghost existing defies reality, Vinyl, too, challenged reality by falling in love with said ghost. And, together, they made it work out. Vinyl, much to her delight, found Octavia to be an ‘extremely cost efficient’ marefriend, with not having to pay to take her out.

Currently, Vinyl found herself drawing close to the theatre. She pushed open the worn double doors, causing the rusted hinges to squeak in protest. Doing this action usually alerted the single resident (if she was waiting in the foyer for her guest to arrive) and today was no exception.

The phantom of the theatre appeared in front of Vinyl, wrapping her in a quick hug and giving her a quick kiss on the cheek. “Hi, Vinyl!”

The white mare returned the brief embrace. “Yo, Tavi. Waiting all night for me again, I see?”

The spectre blushed and pulled back from her marefriend. “Shut up! I do other things, for your information! I just… happened to be waiting for you this time.”

“And the last time?”

Octavia’s blush deepened.

“And the last ten times before that, actually.”

Octavia mumbled incoherently.

Vinyl chuckled and made her way to the stage, the blushing mass that was Octavia in tow. “You can admit it, y’know: you just can’t get enough of me. You’re so excited to see me every night that you wait at the door like a puppy.”

“I do not!”

Vinyl sat down on the stage. “Sure you don’t.” She winked, then motioned to the spot next to her. “Now, come here and cuddle with me.”

As much as she wanted to stay ‘mad’ at Vinyl, Octavia felt her anger slowly fade once she snuggled up to her tangible lover. “Why do you have to tease me so?” she asked as she rested her muzzle on Vinyl’s shoulder.

“Because you’re adorable when you get mad,” Vinyl replied as she lifted a hoof and brought it to her marefriend’s nose. “Boop.”

Octavia’s nose scrunched up at the contact. “You are absolutely unbelievable, sometimes!”

“Yeah,” Vinyl began with a shrug, “but, you love me anyways.”

Octavia could help but let out a chuckle. “Yes, that I do.”

Silence then reigned over the broken down theatre. Now words were said, as none needed to be said. Both parties, both living and past, enjoyed the other’s company and basked in the warmth they provided. This has become the routine, as mere touch was all that was needed for both to feel content; happy and complete.

All was right.

But, this peace was eventually breached by the familiar tug that pulled Octavia to her instrument. It was like an eternal calling that she was forced to obey by some higher power. She left Vinyl’s side in favor of her cello, picking it up and readying herself.

Vinyl, for her part, braced herself for the mental torrent that was to come as soon as the music reached her ears. But, the pain never came. The sound was familiar. It didn’t sound like a new part of the song, but rather something she’s heard before. It was slow and neutral. Ambient, almost. She stood up, regarding Octavia with curiosity, who remained in her seat and played her unearthly instrument. What’s going on this time?

Before she could voice her concerns, the corners of her vision began to deteriorate. Vinyl looked around, watching as the world crumbled to white. Everything around her broke apart, piece-by-piece, until there was nothing left but her and Octavia. The stage was gone. The theatre was gone. The world, and everything in it, had crumbled into an oblivion of the white abyss.

Vinyl turned her gaze down and dared a step forward. Her hoof held purchase on an unseen floor, one that she could not even feel.

What the…?

The white mare returned her eyes forwards, and then focused back on the charcoal grey mare, the only thing to breach the abyss of nothingness. An oasis of color in a sea of white. Suddenly, Octavia opened her eyes and looked around. Oddly, her concentration was not broken even as she looked around the fractured reality with wide eyes. Her hooves continued to guide the song that her instrument played: the music continued to play, undisturbed.

Everything had been ordered before. It was predictable; consistent. The music usually brought with it memories of her past, moments she had once thought lost forever, but not this time. Why was it different now? What had been the catalyst to this unusual shift?

Octavia was about to speak, to voice question upon the nature of what was going on, but was beaten by a sudden shift in the void. All around the equine pair, images flashed. They were all pieces, chunks of memories that went by too fast for either to comprehend fully. If they tried to focus on one, another would take it’s place before anything specific could be rendered. From what they could gather, they seemed to range from a young Octavia to a teenage Octavia, and finally to the mare just before she died.

“Are those more memories?” Vinyl asked, the first of the two to break the silence.

“Yes, I believe they are,” Octavia began, her hooves unhindered as she continued her song. “I believe they are the gaps in my memories; the pieces that connect them all together.”

“Oh…” Vinyl muttered, pausing as she tried to make sense of the situation. “So… so what’s happening? Why is this one different? How are we both here?”

The charcoal grey mare closed her eyes, taking a deep breath. In her mind, the fractured remains of her memories of her life slowly began to fill in, the missing pieces slowly, but surely, sliding into place. The experience made her feel as if she was being completed, that, once they were all there, she would be… whole.

But, this feeling did not bring with it any understanding of why or what was happening. “I don’t know,” she replied softly, opening her eyes to view her confused lover. “I don’t know…”  

The images continued, flashing across the once blank void. All the while, the song of the solo cellist continued. The song was constantly shifted and seemed to accompany the shifting images perfectly. The two went hoof and hoof, though how either of them knew this was unknown.

It just… fit.

Then… they stopped. The atmosphere around the two shifted once again, the images ceasing and the white shifting to black. Soon, the entirety of the void was a pitch nothingness—a true void. But, it was not only the images that stopped. Octavia’s song also ended as well, cut off as if suddenly silenced before it could finish, leaving both the DJ and Cellist in complete silence.

A complete void.

“Tavi… what the hell is going on?” Vinyl asked, slowly trotting around the black void. Like before, her hooves trotted on an unfelt, unseen ground.

“I don't know, Vinyl. I'm not controlling this, I swear!” the cellist responded, placing down her instrument and shrinking from the void. The emptiness scared her, reminding her of her life before the mare that now shared it with her.

“Tavi, wait there—I’m coming over to you!” Vinyl called out, noticing her lover’s discomfort. She trotted closer, but her approach seemed to haunt as her hoofsteps brought her no closer to her distinction.

What the?

Her casual trot shifted to a canter, then a gallop. The white mare sprinted as fast as her hooves would carry her, but the distance between her and her love refused to change.

“Tavi!” Vinyl screamed.

“Vinyl!” Octavia responded in turn. The mare rose to her hooves, pushing past her fear as she began to gallops towards her love.

Like her love, Octavia made no ground.

The two continued to run at each other in vain attempts to come together; the distance only seeming to get farther and farther apart. They both continued until they could no longer, each panting in exhaustion as their hooves finally said no more.

Panting and out of breath, the two spots in the void lay a fair distance apart. The cellist hugged her hind hooves and she curled herself into a frightened ball while the DJ sat on her back and cursed into the void. One was filled with sadness, while the other anger.

“What the fuck is going on?!” Vinyl screamed between breaths, finally regaining enough strength to return to her hooves. Her eyes shone death at what she perceived as the sky, her face contorted with rage. “Who the fuck is doing this?!”

Octavia lay on her side, tears flowing like a raging river from her eyes. Fear, sadness, and a feeling of being alone filled the ghostly mare; all reminders of a time in her afterlife she wished to forget.

Vinyl stomped her hoof on an intangible ground, her face scrunching up as she held back tears of her own. “What’s going on…” she muttered, her anger fading.

Suddenly, the black void flickered. The ether that surrounded the two began to shift, taking the shape of a familiar looking theatre. Unlike the images and flashes before, this one was more like the usual memories that Vinyl had walked in before. The white mare tried to take a step forwards but found herself remaining in place. She went to speak but stopped when she noticed a familiar mist run straight across her vision. A static, unstable form of Octavia wandered around the hall that had formed around her. Vinyl then turned her vision towards where the other Octavia had been and was shocked to see that she was, in fact, still there, standing on her hooves and watching the scene with wide eyes.

The static Octavia finally stopped her random wandering and made her way towards the door. She tried to push on the large oak doors, but screamed and fell back as soon as her hoof made contact. She scooted away, looking as if it had bitten her.

The scene fast-forwarded, shifting again. They were still in the theatre but in a different orientation. The static version of Octavia ran frantically around the theatre, and Vinyl could see the fear and confusion that practically radiated from her. In the image’s haste, it tripped over a chair and fell right through another. Seeing half of her body phased through another object disturbed the filly more than anything, and the horror was clearly written on her face.

The scene jumped again. This time, the static copy of Octavia seemed more somber than afraid. She sat alone on the stage, the theatre decaying in front of her as time flew by, her eyes closed and head down.

Skipping ahead once more, Vinyl found herself hovering in the air, a very depressed looking Octavia hanging from the rafters. The static copy laid on her back, staring at the ceiling and letting life go by without her. But, this didn’t last, as her head suddenly perked up, and she looked down at the stage below. Vinyl watched the mare disappear, only to reappear below her behind a pony she had not noticed until now.

“Excuse me, what are you doing?” she asked, startling the mare.

Vinyl looked at the scene with a slack jaw. She remembered that day. It was the day Neon urged her to go to the theatre. It was the day she first met Octavia. It was starting to make sense. The scenes that were just playing before her were Octavia’s memories from when after she died.

The scene shifted, showing a timid copy of Vinyl in the audience, watching Octavia play the first part of the song. The chair she was sitting in had caved in beneath her, and the spirit was instantly alerted to her presence.

Vinyl removed her focus from the memory in front of her, turning it towards the real Octavia. The charcoal grey mare watched the scenes unfold with wide eyes, several tears making their way down her cheek. Eventually, Octavia turned her attention away from the memory and looked over to meet eye-to-eye with her marefriend. No words were shared between the two; an unspoken agreement being made through sight alone. They both returned their attentions to the memories as they played out around them, smiles soon forming on each of their faces.

Memory after memory about the time the two had shared passed before their eyes. As they did, the never ending distance between the two began to shrink, slowly bringing them closer and closer. Soon, the pair were only a hoof length away, and they wasted no time to pull the other into a mutually shared embrace. The memories passed around them, but they paid them no mind. Their focus was now glued upon their lover, clinging to each other like their lives depended on it.

Eventually, the memories ended as time returned to the present, and the world around the two once again shifted to the endless black void. Octavia had stopped crying, as she was no longer afraid, and no longer alone. Vinyl embraced her ghostly partner, holding the mare who had grown to mean the world to her. Although they felt peace in each other’s hooves, a lingering feeling that something still wasn’t quite right remained in both mare’s minds.

Octavia pulled away from Vinyl, the lingering feeling growing within her. She felt a new calling, different from the one that forces her to play. This one still held the same message, but was gentler, telling her to play instead of making her play. It was warm, inviting, like a mother asking her child.

Behind Vinyl sat Octavia’s cello, waiting for her. The instrument called for its master; to be played one last time. The spirit stood up and began to approach it. “Vinyl… I think it’s time for me to finish the song.”

The white mare smiled in response. “Go for it, Tavi.”

Octavia smiled back, nuzzling Vinyl once before picking up her instrument. For the longest time, she felt empty while playing, almost like she was nothing more than a slave to her cello. She dreaded having to play it, always wishing that one day it will all end. Now, that feeling was replaced by a warm desire.

She wanted to play.

But, she stopped herself.

She couldn’t finish the song. Not now. If their theory was right, then finishing the song would mean she would move on. The one thing keeping her tied to the mortal plane would be completed, and her purpose there would be fulfilled. She would then leave; pass on to whatever awaited her.

She would leave Vinyl.

Octavia dropped her bow. “I… I can’t do it.”

Vinyl blinked. “W-what? Why not?”

Octavia squeezed her eyes shut, trying to halt the tears that threatened to fall. Vinyl was at her side in an instant, using one hoof to hold Octavia’s and resting the other on the mare’s shoulder. Octavia opened her eyes, staring deeply into Vinyl’s. “Vinyl… if I finish the song… that means that I… I might… go.”

“Go?” It took a moment for the words to register, but when they did, they hit hard. “Oh… Tavi–”

Octavia flew her forelegs around Vinyl, cutting the mare’s words short. “I-I don’t want to go! I don’t want to leave you! I-I don’t… I-I just…”

Vinyl squeezed her tighter, holding back tears of her own. “I know, Tavi. But… you gotta.”

Octavia broke the hug, looking at Vinyl with trembling eyes. “B-but, Vinyl–”

Vinyl silenced her with a quick kiss. “I know, Tavi. I know you don’t want to go… and I don’t want you to go either… but…” She wiped a tear from her eye, her words choking up. “You have to.” Vinyl let out a sniff, wiping away her tears that had begun to fall. “You weren’t meant to be here. You were supposed to go… where ever. I love you with all my heart, but I know that your place isn’t here. We have fun together, yes, but you’re still stuck here. You can’t leave the theatre; you’re trapped. A-and I can’t always be there for you every day. Eventually, I-I’m going to get old and... die. And I’m not gonna stick around like you. And if that happens, you might not get a chance like this again to move on. I don’t want that to happen to you, Tavi. I want you to be… to be free, alright? This might be your only chance… take it. Please.” Tears flooded freely from the mare’s eyes, and she struggled to get the final words out. She looked at her marefriend through her tear-filled vision, seeing that Octavia wasn’t faring any better.

“I don’t want to go… I don’t want to leave you,” Octavia muttered softly.

“I know, Tavi… I know.”

Silence.

Both remained quiet, as neither knew what to say. Octavia knew her options: move on, or leave Vinyl. She didn’t want to leave the mare she loved, but she also knew that this could be her only opportunity to move on. On top of that, Vinyl’s words still echoed through her head. Vinyl would get old, and eventually die. Then, she would be alone, possibly forever. She didn’t want to be alone. She never wanted to be alone ever again. The time she had spent with Vinyl only accounted for a tiny fraction she had been alive, but somehow managed to be better than the rest of her life combined.

That made her think.

Had I been trapped here… for Vinyl? Had she been the reason I didn’t move on, the cellist thought, looking at the mare in question who was currently wrapping her in a bone-crushing embrace. Perhaps… perhaps she was my second chance? My redemption to the pain that was my life? She remembered her life fully, now. All the blanks had been filled; all the puzzle pieces back in their place. So she knew for certain that her life had been pretty horrible. She had cursed the makers for giving her such a life. She cursed the unicorns for all the trouble they’ve caused and for ending her life. That was why she became a ghost in the first place. She died filled with rage and resentment towards her life, and those negative emotions kept her spirit tethered to the mortal world.

But then came Vinyl Scratch. Vinyl helped Octavia when nopony else did. Vinyl helped her get through parts of her life that Octavia would rather have left dead and buried. She helped her realize her mistakes and overcome them, and, eventually, the unbridled fury that occupied Octavia’s soul died down.

Octavia looked to her marefriend again, taking in everything she said. When it comes down to it: Vinyl was right. She needed to move on, and this may be her only chance.

Accepting her fate, Octavia leaned in to bring Vinyl into a deep kiss.

When they broke apart, Octavia muttered, “I’m ready,” and picked up her bow.

Vinyl let out another tear filled sob but nodded. She too, was ready.

Octavia floated over to her cello and took the instrument in her hooves. She ran her hoof along it’s still well-polished neck, almost as if to say goodbye to it as well. Bow in hoof, she began to play.

The symphony began, crying out through the void like a swan song. Each note held a purpose, telling the story of the damned soul. Vinyl listened, her mind replaying the memories she had visited so long ago. The song went on, and the melody followed the emotion of the memory it was symbolizing. Note after note, stroke after stroke, the song continued. Vinyl could feel the ending coming up soon once she heard the original tune that she had heard her first time in the ruined theatre. The white mare closed her eyes and braced herself for the ending, but stopped. The notes that followed didn’t sound like an ending but still reminded her of something.

The first time they met.

Vinyl listened as Octavia continued her song, new notes playing that reminded her of the times they had shared. The first time they met. When she came back. When they had first confessed their love. The first time they kissed. All of it Vinyl could practically feel as the song brought back the memories. Tears flowed down her cheeks, but not ones of sorrow. No, these were of happiness; of the memories of the times they shared.

Then, the memories stopped.

The song’s paced slowed, the tempo reaching its peak, then slowly fell on one last note. The note continued to ring out, and Vinyl watched as the world around her shifted once again. When it reformed, Vinyl found herself standing back on the stage of the theatre. Octavia sat on her stool in front of her, bow slowly holding the last note, her incorporeal body glowing with an ethereal light.

When the note ended, and the song was complete, Octavia looked up from her instrument. Tears flowed down Vinyl’s cheeks, but none graced the cellist’s own. No, the only thing on her face was a content smile of acceptance, and finality.

Vinyl watched as the mare she loved slowly began to fade, her ghostly body dissipating as if a falling mist. The white mare lunged forwards, grasping what was left of her lover. She said but three words, “I love you.”

The fading spirit smiled, reaching out a dissipating hoof and running it through her crying lover’s mane. “Shhh…” she cooed softly. “Don’t cry, my love. Live the life I never could. Keep my memory in your heart. Because as long as you remember me: I cannot die.” Up to her chest was completely faded away, leaving only her upper half. She used her hoof to pull Vinyl’s chin up so their eyes would meet. “I love you, Vinyl. You are the greatest thing to ever happen to me.” She then leaned in forwards and give Vinyl one last kiss. “Thank you…”

Then, she was gone.

Vinyl watched as the last bits of her lover faded to nothing, leaving her alone in the theatre. The once haunting feeling that the theatre had once held was now gone. The mare looked down, seeing the cello that had once belonged to the mare she loved, but now was orphaned without a master. She went to touch the ancient instrument, but it crumbled into dust before she could.

Vinyl let out a sigh and shook her head. She went to turn to leave when she spotted something in the corner of her eye. The DJ turned back and noticed a perfectly white collar with a bright pink bowtie laying on the stool in the center stage. Vinyl trotted over to the discarded piece of clothing and picked it up. It glowed with the faintest of light and brought with it a familiar feeling. Vinyl smiled, then used her hooves and magic to adorn the singular piece of clothing.

She then turned away and exited the theatre for the last time, never to return, leaving behind only memories.

Memories brought forth by the Symphony of the Damned. Next Chapter: Epilogue Estimated time remaining: 7 Minutes