Twilight woke in darkness. Though “darkness” was too mild of a word for the lack of light around Twilight. She was in an all-pervasive blackness that was darker than even the most moonless night, darker than the bottom of a deep cave, darker than anything she had encountered before. The only saving grace seemed to come a few seconds later as Twilight realized she hadn’t opened her eyes.

She couldn’t open her eyes…

Something smooth was pressing firmly against her eyelids, preventing them from opening, and as Twilight began to become more and more aware of her body, she realized that same slick strength was holding every inch of her body in an implacable grip. Pressing down with a crushing strength that held her as easily as an anaconda held a rabbit in its coils.

Twilight however, was no rabbit, and immediately threw herself against whatever force it was that was holding her immobile. She pushed, pulled, writhed and stretched her body with all of her strength for several minutes, at most moving perhaps a bare inch before whatever it was she was in snapped her body back into an upright position.

Exhausted, Twilight discovered that she couldn’t even pant properly, so tightly were her chest, lungs and diaphragm compressed by the force around her. The only reason that she was able to breathe at all was due to some sort of breathing tube with a mouthguard-like extension holding her teeth and tongue securely in place. Combined with the pressure around her head and muzzle, Twilight was rendered thoroughly mute and blind.

Twilight forced herself to relax, allowing her body to replenish the oxygen burned in her futile struggles while she took stock of the rest of her body.

Eyes, mouth and tongue had been rendered useless. Check. Her body was encased in something that seemed like her suit but felt much larger and stronger. Check. Twilight took a moment to try to inhale through her nostrils but they were completely blocked. Something was not only in front of them blocking airflow, but actually in the nostrils giving her a strange sort of tickling sensation whenever she tried to twitch or scrunch up her muzzle.

Twilight cataloged those sensations before moving on. She was a scholar at heart and a scholar needed as much information as possible before they could create a proper hypothesis for testing, much less draw conclusions from the data.

Next was hearing, and despite straining that sense as much as she could, Twilight could only hear two things. The beating of her heart and the rhythmic sound of her own breathing, accompanied as it was by the whoosh of air in and out of the breathing hose wedged in her maw. After which was of course Twilight’s magic, and as expected it was completely useless. Any foe who would bind her this thoroughly would definitely not make the elementary mistake of leaving her magic unrestrained.

The interesting thing was that Twilight couldn’t even feel her magic. It wasn’t being drained away, as her suit did. Nor was it being stopped by a horn blocker or other instrumentality, as Twilight knew how of those sorts of devices worked and how they felt when applied to her. No, it was as if she had absolutely no magic at all.

Moving on, Twilight could feel the interior edges of a tall rigid collar around her throat, likely as much protection for her airway as it was restraint. Regardless, it was there and something to remember. Moving down and along her body, her legs and wings were both fixed solidly in place by the force that held her, and as near as she could tell, she was being held off the ground and in an upright position.

Carrying her self-examination to her hindquarters, Twilight's tail and hips were as solidly locked in place as the rest of her, but the interiors of her thighs were…

Twilight gave out a sigh that momentarily was strong enough to push back against the device that was keeping her respiration even and steady. Something long and rigid was buried deep in her ass. She had gotten used to the feeling of her suit’s medical probe being lodged there, but this felt longer and somehow even more intrusive than that had been.

The alicorn flexed her interior muscles as best she could. Yup, definitely locked inside of her and was that… Twilight clenched her core. Nothing was there but something pinched just below the gateway to her pussy, something right by her clit. Then Twilight searched her memories of the many medical texts she had read, both in serious and recreational study.

Then it hit her, she had been catheterized, and as that final datum slotted into place Twilight turned her concentration away from her kinesthetic senses toward her internal mindscape. There, in the place where chains could not hold nor ropes bind, she assembled all the information her limited senses had been able to accumulate and began creating various hypothesis as to what was going on.

Many concepts came to the fore and were just as quickly discarded, for the key in such thought experiments is to find the best theory that fit as many facts as possible, not to find the best facts to fit a given theory.

Item: She was being held in a near immobile state. The near being important.

Item: Her breathing was being assisted.

Item: She had a catheter in her.

Item: Unknown devices were in her nose and her rectum.

Theory: She had suffered cervical trauma and her voluntary nerves were damaged, requiring her to be on a respirator and fitted with a catheter and… an enema tube?

Discarded. While an injury would explain many things, her voluntary muscles were functional and strong. However, the enema plug possibility was a new datum and suggested a new branch of possibilities.

Theory: She was encased in something, possibly webbing, possibly a changeling pod, and being held against her will on a long term basis.

This theory felt better, but a stray thought reminded Twilight that somepony had mentioned an “Empress” just before she had gone completely under, and while her home dimension’s Chrysalis was still an enemy, she styled herself a queen and not an empress. That still left the possibility that she was either encased or wrapped in some form of semi-solid material.

Whatever it was it had to both be pressing down on her with great force and have semi-elastic properties, which suggested either webbing—

“Hello,” said a voice, one that Twilight quickly recognized as that of 143, Trixie’s dimensional sister. While the two ponies were technically identical the ordeals that 143 had been put through had changed every part of her, including how she spoke. What was odd though was that the sound of 143’s voice was not only clear and perfectly understandable, but that it also seemed that the slavemare was speaking directly into Twilight’s ear.

“They say you should be awake by now, or nearly so,” 143 continued, a voice in the void. “Either way 143 was ordered to come here three times a day so that she could speak to you. 143 was told to tell you certain things. 143 was also ordered not to tell you certain things. 143 does not agree with this, but all of you know that 143 cannot refuse an order.”

Twilight felt a pang in her breast. As much as she had done for 143, rescuing her, arranging for therapy and treatment, 143 still had to fight daily against the bars of a prison that had been burned into her mind.

“But, although 143 cannot refuse an order, how she obeys is up to her,” 143 added, with just a hint of Trixie’s smirking confidence and Twilight could feel her lips curl up in a smile.

“So, 143 can tell you that all three of you are safe and well. You are all being kept suspended inside of large frames made out of sheets of symbiote material. Not actual living suits, but stuff made from them,” 143 started explaining. “Some force keeps pushing the material against the three of you with enough strength that even Celestia couldn’t get out of that when she tested it.”

“I don’t know what they are calling the contraption, but Fluttershy explained to me that you aren’t being hurt and that air, food and water are all being fed to you, and that all your waste products are being dealt with. Apparently, you could be kept there nearly forever,” 143 concluded, and Twilight couldn’t stop herself from a useless attempt at escape.

“Hey hey, calm down,” 143 soothed, and Twilight thought she felt something stroke her head. “You are all safe. One of the things 143 isn’t allowed to tell you is that the Regent isn’t sure what to do with you, especially with the Empress having taken her property off on a sudden sabbatical.”

While Twilight was appreciating the mental gymnastics 143 was going through to inform Twilight about the situation while still managing to obey the letter of her geas, it was all maddeningly incomplete. Who was this “Empress”, or the “Regent”, for that matter?

“Unh,” 143 groaned. “143 needs to be more careful, but Cadance would be proud of 143 if she was here and not back in the Crystal—.” There was a sudden silence that had Twilight's heart leaping into her throat. A silence that seemed to go on forever.

“143 is a good pony. 143 is an obedient pony,” came the panting voice of 143 a minute later. “Obedience brings pleasure, disobedience brings pain. 143 is a good pony. 143 is an obedient pony.”

Twilight could feel the prick of tears trying to escape her sealed shut eyes.

“143 will try again later. You all need 143 to try again later,” Trixie’s sister stated, voice firming back up. “In the meantime, 143 will obey her orders to read to you three times a day for mental stimulation. So, 143 will start with ‘Internal Incantations: The Philosophy of Magic’ by Starswirl the Bearded.”

“When considering whether magic is a force for Good or Evil…” 143 began, starting to read from Starswirl’s classic treatise on how the intent behind magic shaped its morality. While Twilight appreciated 143’s book selection, considering how Twilight felt about the ancient mage and all he had done to shape magic and magical theory as it was known, Twilight felt herself tuning out 143’s voice in favor of more thought.

Dashiel and Trixie were both safe. That was the most important takeaway from what 143 had managed to tell her. Secondly, whoever this Regent pony was, they didn’t want Twilight or the others harmed. Imprisoned in what was the scariest level of long term bondage Twilight had ever heard of, but unharmed. Third, she had allies.

143 was doing her best, even at the risk of great pain, to tell Twilight what was happening and what’s more, at least one of her friends was actively making sure that she was okay. Sensory deprivation could be torture for a mind like Twilight’s, easily capable of driving her mad as her intelligence reached out for some kind of stimulus. Without some sort of external input her mind would eventually start creating sensory phantasms in a sort of defensive schizophrenia just to give it something to latch onto.

True insanity would follow not long afterwards.

All too early, 143 finished her reading and with a few, barely felt touches through the sheets of symbiote material holding Twilight captive, the mind-burned pony left Twilight in her silent prison of eternal darkness. The alicorn struggled to free herself after 143 was gone, not because she had any hope of escape, but because there was literally nothing else to do. Twilight writhed and strained against her body against the crushing force of her semi-solid rubbery prison until stars sparked in front of her eyes from lack of oxygen and all she could do was hang in place while her prison’s systems slowly eased the burning in her lungs.

Sometime later, Twilight slept, waking again as 143’s voice came to her ears again, this time reading an article from a newspaper out of Las Pegasus that talked about several new stage productions in the resort town, including a combo act by two of the town’s best known stage magicians, Big Bucks and Jack Pot.

This time, as 143 left, Twilight felt a vibration in her ass followed by a feeling of immense fullness and as that sensation faded away she had confirmation of one of her data points. She indeed had an enema plug stuffing her ass, which along with the catheter explained how they were dealing with the waste products of her metabolism, but it still left the question of how they were getting nourishment into her. Although time had no meaning in her silent prison, Twilight knew she had been unconscious for awhile after her capture and had slept or napped at least once afterwards.

By now she should be feeling some level of hunger or thirst, but she felt… nothing. Twilight tried to feel around with her barely movable jaw and tongue. Other than the fact that both were locked in place, her mouth and tongue felt just fine as far as moisture went, which meant she was being at least hydrated somehow.

The speculation kept Twilight’s mind occupied for several more hours, forming a thought experiment that Twilight deliberately didn’t bend her full mental abilities toward. After all, if she solved the problem what guarantee would there be that there would be something to occupy her mind afterwards.

Either way, Twilight was still considering and discarding possibilities when she heard the sound of 143's voice in her ears yet again. This time the pony was reading something that had probably come from Dashiel’s room. “While the Mechano-Arcane Combat Wing is a robust device, it must be properly cared for on a daily, weekly and monthly basis,” 143 was reading aloud. “Polishing of the arcane receptor sites along the primary, secondary and tertiary wingspans is of particular importance to ensure long range control of the device by the user.”

Twilight’s nerves blazed fire as she realized what 143 had just done. She had just suggested a course to Dashiel that the soldier pony use her magical connection to her war wing in order to free them. It was the only reason Twilight could think of for 143 to read that particular part of Dashiel’s field manuals. In fact, thinking back, Jack Pot was known for his escape acts, and 143 knew that Twilight often looked to the works of Starswirl the Bearded for inspiration.

As 143 had said, she had to obey orders put to her, but obviously enough of her mind had recovered that she was now capable of being maliciously compliant to those orders. Even though earlier had proven that 143’s conditioning was still prevented outright rebellion, 143 was actively fighting it by finding loopholes wherever she could, which currently was taking the form of giving Twilight and her companions suggestions on courses of actions they might be able to take.

“When 143 returns tomorrow she will start off with a book she found on various poisons and drugs. The book talks about their durations and antidotes,” 143 paused, before clearing her throat to softly add, “The wife of Princess Twilight’s brother had helped 143 touch something before Princess Twilight came back. Something great, something powerful. It wants to come out. It wants to stand on the stage again.”

With that silence reigned once again, and Twilight was left with only her thoughts for company. Thoughts that now blazed with hope, and fear.

Twilight had seen the terrible damage that had been wrought on 143’s mind when she had been Trixie. The magician hadn’t just been conditioned or trained into obedience by the corporate overlords of her world, it had been literally hard-wired into her brain. That she had come so far in a little less than a year spoke volumes of Cadance’s skills in reawakening what Twilight knew to be a will as stubborn as stone.

What would happen to 143 though if she attempted outright defiance of those fiery lines of control in her head? Could she snap the reins of conditioning, throw off the bridle of mind control and truly be her own mare again, or would those strictures burn ever deeper? Would they, could they, burn away her mind entirely if 143 tried to become Trixie again?

All Twilight knew was that 143 seemed determined to find out, and Twilight couldn’t say that she blamed the mare. Especially as Twilight in that world had also been reduced to an obedient, pliant and even willing slave, and had only managed to save her mind by literally giving herself a case of dissociative personality disorder. Twilight knew the horror of being trapped in her own head as a beaten, broken part of herself was forced to deal with the real world.

Twilight speculated for apparent hours on whether or not 143 might have been made into a much more severe version of what Twilight had done to herself. Could there be a part of the original Trixie in 143, still alive and active, but trapped behind a firewall of broken nerves? Was it possible that Shining Armor and Cadance had managed to reforge enough of those shattered linkages for her knight’s true sister to step back into the light?

It didn’t seem possible, but yet the signs were there. Which threw Twilight’s mind onto a different tangent. Was there any way that she herself could communicate, imprisoned as she was? She was capable of flexing the material around her to a degree, and she could grunt somewhat, which meant that as long as 143 could either see or hear Twilight, some degree of communication was possible. The thoughts gave Twilight some comfort as the hours passed and the binding blackness around her faded into the greater darkness of sleep.

She woke some unknowable time later, without any references it could have been later that day, the next day, or even the next week for all she knew. As before, her body neither hungered nor thirsted which meant that however food and water were being…

It hit Twilight at that moment. The tickling sensation in her nose was part of a gastroenteric feeding tube that went into her nose, through her nasal passages and down into her stomach to provide her with a liquid diet. It was a process occasionally used when a pony could not eat or drink due to an injury or other medical necessity.

“Good morning,” 143’s voice sounded in her ears, but something was different about it. There was a quality of strain in it Twilight had never before heard from the mare. “I want you to know that whatever happens, 143 is grateful for all you have done for me… us… I.”

There it was again, the personal pronoun.

“Last night, after 143 left you, I made sure to check on the rest of your other friends. Pinkie Pie has been keeping spirits up, and is pretty happy, but I can tell she’s worried,” 143 continued, and Twilight wasn’t entirely sure, but it almost sounded like anger in her voice. “Nopony has heard from Rainbow Dash since the Empress took Luna and Celestia away with her.”

A pained groan sounded in Twilight's ears.

“143 wasn’t supposed to talk about that,” 143 said, with a hiss of pain. “But I don’t want to be 143 anymore. 143 wants to be who she was. I want to be who I was, or at least as much as I can be so I can avenge my husband, Big Mac.”

In spite of herself, Twilight tried to turn her head to look toward 143 in surprise. She was Big Mac’s wife? How? When?

“I know Princess. I know you would prefer I didn’t risk myself, and 143 is afraid you are going to be pretty angry with her, but you need to fix the problem you made, and you need to be out of that cage to do it,” 143 continued, confusing Twilight even more with her statement that Twilight had been the cause of the current situation. “Every other pony is either locked up like you are, controlled by a suit, or too scared to try something.”

There was the sound of steel on stone.

“I’ve brought a knife,” 143 stated. “All I need to do is cut a hole in the sheets around you and the whole thing will fall apart. Then you’ll be free to fix things, and 143 knows you will do it, because you’re Twilight Sparkle. You fix things, and ponies, and places.”

“All.. I need to do… is pick up the knife,” Twilight could hear 143 beginning to pant as the mare drove her resurgent will against the conditioning that had held her for years. “Pick up… the knife. Pick it up…”

“Knife… up,” 143 grunted, and Twilight’s heart fell as she heard a heavy “thud” reach her ears as 143’s legs gave out.

“Sorry Princess… tried,” 143 gasped out. Twilight wanted to do nothing more than wrap the mare in the biggest, longest hug she could. 143 had tried so hard, come so close, but it seemed it just wasn’t meant to…

“No.”

Twilight’s blood ran cold as she heard the denial. “No” was the one word that 143 had absolutely been forbidden by her conditioning to say. For a long time Cadance had even believed that the word had been specifically burned out of 143’s mind, or worse, set as some sort of post-conditioning trigger, but here it was. Whatever came next would define the rest of 143’s life.

“I…

“I am not 143,” the pony grunted out, and Twilight again heard the scrape of metal on stone.

“I am Beatrix Lulamoon,” 143 yelled, in a clarion voice, as whatever was carrying that voice to Twilight also carried the sound of staggering steps. “Wife to a murdered husband. Sibling to shattered sisters. The last Apple of the orchard.”

Twilight could feel the power coming off of Beatrix as she corrected her course and began to approach, step by laborious step. Each hooffall carrying the power of a pony bringing all of their vital force to a single point in time and space.

“They bound my body! They shackled my soul! But no more. NO MORE!” screamed the mare, with equal parts pain, rage and defiance. “Today, dead or alive—”

“I.”

“WILL.”

“BE.”

“FREE!”

The blade lunged forward, the layers of latex parting with ease and cool air rushed against Twilight. The sound of an air pump came to Twilight’s ears and she realized that had been held in via a vacuum between layers of symbiote material, as if she was something to be preserved against spoilage. With the vacuum disrupted by 143’s knife, the layers had lost their ability to hold her in place and gravity was…

Twilight gave out a groan of her own as her downward sliding body pulled the tubes from her body that had been feeding her, allowing her to breath, and cleaning out her backside. Twilight reached down to carefully pull out her now painfully twisted catheter and then quickly dismissed her discomfort as unimportant as she was finally able to look around her and saw Beatrix lying on the crystal floor directly in front of her.

The azure blue mare lay still before her, a sharp kitchen knife bare inches away from her latex encased hoof. She was still wearing the symbiote suit that had been bound to her, and Twilight felt some relief at seeing the pulse and flow of magic through the suit’s mana channels, indicating that the pony within was alive.

“143… Beatrix, are you okay?” Twilight asked, gathering the pony into her hooves, as her magic still seemed to be absent. Blood was trickling from Beatrix’s nose and Twilight could see red blotches in the whites of her eyes as the violet orbs flickered open.

“I’m free,” whispered Beatrix.

“Yes, you are,” Twilight confirmed, pride and joy filling her heart as she used a hoof to brush back a bit of cornflower silk mane away from the slowing nosebleed. She paused for a moment as her hoof bumped against something hard in Beatrix’s mane.

“What the hay is this?” Twilight asked, using her hoof to reveal the delicate tracery of a circlet made of silver wires and moonstones set on Beatrix’s brow and woven into her mane.

“The Element of Freedom,” Beatrix whispered back, with a satisfied smile.

143 has been with us since almost the very beginning, and for a lot of that time Twilight has been doing her level best to heal the pony that befriended her in the depths of the Flim Flam dystopia. Only time will tell what effects have an Element of Freedom will have on things to come...

Oh, with Brightly Lit done this story is going to become my main writing focus, so I'll be plunging right back into the next chapter after today.

Also, special thanks to Lady Lightning Strike for coming in at the last minute to guest edit.

On a side note, I really should promote my Patreon more. You can join for as little as a dollar a month and get regular sneak peaks into what I'm writing and be on the priority queue for commissions when I open those up next month.

Until next chapter, be safe and remember not to touch pools of strange black liquids...