Author's Notes:

https://youtu.be/Tt233sCKIbc

Mood music to put the chapter into perspective. This music shaped the chapter and made it what it is.

The sight of his old room filled Dim with a strange panic and he struggled to control himself. This place was haunted with old, unwelcome memories and pain. All of his old things and all of the memories associated with them. His dusty bookshelves, full of treasured books, with everything seeming to be right where he left it. The alchemy table was covered with notes, inkwells, and curious, bulbous roots. Everything was so much larger than he remembered it, or maybe he was smaller and couldn’t tell.

Glancing about, Dim found one thing that was most certainly out of place: a tiny stuffed Luna doll. It was blue, made of velvet, had black button eyes, and a glittery mane and tail made out of electric indigo coloured yarn. It sat on the top shelf of the bookcase by his bed, right where an old unicorn skull once sat. Thinking back, Dim realised that he had never asked about the skull, where it came from, or who it might once have been. Eyes narrowing, he gave the Luna stuffy a suspicious stare, and could not remember his bookshelf being so tall.

Beneath his hooves, his floor was scorched and left rough in some places; old experiments, failed conjurations, successful conjurations, and spells that had gone wildly out of control, all of these things had left their mark. Dim knew this place all too well, and seeing it brought old, troubling thoughts to mind, awful, disorientating thoughts such as what if the inside of the tower hadn’t been dimensionally stretched to accommodate the entirety of the family, but, what if instead, the family itself had been shrunk down to live inside of an all too-cramped tower?

Nothing his family had done could be trusted, reality could be altered—he himself had done it—and nothing was ever quite what it seemed to be. Just like this place, this dream. Hearing hooves, he whirled about to face the doorway, but remained mindful of the strange Luna doll right behind him. The heavy ironwood door had a familiar creak from its hinges, the sound of trouble coming to his room. Most of the time, it was Darling or his mother, and that creak now carried dire connotations that left him with uncontrollable trembling.

But it was not his mother, nor was it Darling. The cheerful pink pelt was out of place, it didn’t belong within these walls, and the mere sight of it caused Dim’s blood to freeze within his veins. Princess Cadance was enormous compared to him, and he tried to make sense of why he only came up to her knee. What trickery was this? Was this real or was she a construct?

“You are far too large,” he said, too distracted to make a proper greeting.

“And you are an adorable little foal!” Princess Cadance paused mid-step, one front hoof still raised as she looked down at Dim with her face aglow.

Feeling the searing fires of indignant outrage, Dim made his feelings known with a ferocious, dimpled scowl and a protruding, parchment-thin lip. “Why must you demean me in this manner?”

“I’ve done nothing of the sort!” Cadance, hoof still raised, lowered her head down to be closer to Dim’s eye level. “This is your dream. You are in control here. I am powerless and at your mercy. If you wanted to do so, you could set me ablaze right now and I would suffer horrendously. The psychic backlash might even give me physical wounds. I am trusting you, a pony not known for mercy, to be merciful.”

Still cautious, still suspicious, Cadance’s response did nothing to alleviate any of Dim’s concerns. He found himself wanting to trust her now, even though he was still somewhat resentful of her intrusion. Magic made things complicated, but he was quick to fall back upon his well-honed sense of reason. Cadance hadn’t done anything to hurt him, that he was aware of. Because of Cadance, Dim had his first true friend, which had the potential to be so much more. All of those truthful, heartfelt confessions, those moments when he had bared his soul, Cadance was responsible for these moments of weakness, these dreadful reveals of vulnerability—the very things that had endeared him to Blackbird.

“Celestia and Luna, they worry much about saving others, as it should be”—Cadance brought her maternal gaze to bear upon Dim—“and when we made plans on what to do with you, I asked both of them about who will save you?” With her wings fluttering against her sides, the pink alicorn’s eyes filled with a sadness that Dim could not bear to witness, and he turned away from her. “Celestia and Luna both are good ponies, the very best of ponies, but sometimes… sometimes… there are times when the lives of individuals become as mere details, lost within the bigger picture—”

“As it should be.”

Blinking, Cadance appeared to be stunned and it took her several long, confused seconds to make her reply, which she stammered out, “W-w-what?” After making a sharp inhalation, she continued, “But the lives of individuals matter!”

“Not so much,” Dim replied as he glared up with foalish defiance. “History is built upon the broken backs of a countless number of forgotten lives, each spent trying to achieve some greater good, some goal, some purpose, some great monument, some cause. I am a unicorn… you are an alicorn… act like it. Stop being a disgusting primitive.”

“Why, I never!” Cadance let out an indignant sniffle-snort and stomped her hoof against the floor. “I stuck my neck out for you! I risked everything for you, as an individual who has been swept up in these events! I pitied you!”

Dim, his lip curling back from his teeth in an aristocratic sneer, responded with, “You idiot.”

“Why must you try so hard to be unlikable?” With a snort and a toss of her head, Cadance sashayed away, her ears bobbing from her bouncy, almost flouncy gait. Whinnying, she threw herself down upon the end of his bed, made an impromptu nest from his bedding, and then settled into a ponyloaf position. Then, she focused her commanding stare upon Dim.

“Come here and let me huggle on you for a while.”

“No.”

“Dim, this is your dream. All of this is your making. I am the way I am because this is how you choose to see me. You are the way you are because this is either what you wish to be, or what you really are on the inside—an emotionally stunted stallion-foal whose internal development was crippled by his mommy-issues and intense emotional scarring.”

Dim’s thunderous silence was deafening.

Undaunted, Cadance plowed forwards. “Do you plan to find a way to kick me out?”

“No.”

“So you want help? You want to be better?”

“No.”

“No?” With a perplexed look upon her face, Cadance patted the makeshift nest with her wing, inviting Dim to come and be with her.

“What I really want to do is fuck Blackbird and to listen to her whorish moaning while I rail her tight little kitty-slitty. I want to know if she’ll yowl like a common alley cat.”

Cadance blinked once, her eyes went wide, she swallowed, and a gulping sound could be heard. Her ears pivoted forwards, turned a much darker shade of pink, and her pupils became pinpricks. For a moment, it appeared as though she might say something, her mouth opened, her lips moved, and her tongue pressed against her teeth, but no words came out.

“Here I thought you appreciated honesty,” Dim said with a snark that could only be described as cauterising. “I mean, all those embarrassing, awkward things that I could not keep to myself, the things I said to Blackbird. How I bared the darkest corners of my soul and confessed even my most vile deeds. I could keep no secrets from her and I was forced to endure such painful, agonising honesty.”

“Touché.” Cadance, not giving up, patted the bed beside her with her wing once more, all while doing her best to recover from her sudden, unexpected shock.

“I do want Blackbird,” Dim continued, and rolling his eyes, he looked up at nothing in particular on the ceiling. “I want her in a way that I never wanted Darling. There are confusing moments when I want to be a better pony, in the hopes that she finds me more agreeable. These moments leave me filled with shame.”

“Why be ashamed, Dim?”

Shrugging, he did not have an answer. “I dunno.”

“Dim, just so you know… since we are being honest... I had part of my soul and my consciousness splintered just for you. It’s happened once before, as I was learning animancy, and I was able to put a tiny part of myself into a construct. It was part of my advanced lessons. When and if you come back to me, I’ll be able to withdraw it from you with but a touch. Hopefully, this part of me will have stayed with you long enough to learn the true nature of this… this… shadow curse you have, this corruption of your cutie mark. Celestia and Luna both have learned much already, but there is still much that isn’t known. We don’t understand the mechanics of it, not yet, and while we all fear what you might become should this curse consume you, I, personally, have a vested interest in saving you.”

“Am I to be some kind of project? A learning experience? Something you have to do to graduate?” Dim was startled by the lack of ire in his voice, and the sardonic snide that was typically present was—at the moment—nonexistent. “You are already a princess, so am I to guess that this is for self-enrichment?”

“Self-betterment.” Cadance sighed, inhaled again, held it for a time, and let it out in a huff. “I started off as a pegasus. My total lack of magical control lead to some real embarrassment with Queen Chrysalis. After that… after almost losing everything I held dear to me, I threw myself into my studies. Luna splintered off a tiny piece of herself to act as my instructor in dreams, because my days are already busy and long.”

In respectful silence, Dim listened, something he was rather good at when the mood struck him.

“I am a Princess of Equestria, and the Empress of the Crystal Empire. I am also a magical dud.” Pouting, Cadance tucked her wings against her sides and then just lay there, staring at Dim.

“I too, am a magical dud—”

“Dim, are you mad?”

“Well, yes, actually, I am, but that doesn’t—”

“Magical dud?” Cadance gave her best incredulous look, and Dim felt a growing frustration.

After grinding his teeth for a moment, Dim tried to express himself once more. “I was only above average! I verged on the exceptional but my mother was all too happy to always remind me that I was not the pinnacle of Dark perfection! Some spells were out of reach for me, spells that came so easily to others. But some magics I did excel at… I guess… but I was forever hearing my failings on what I couldn’t do. The truly powerful magics exhaust me if I can even cast them at all… my mother on the other hoof… and Eerie… I am a gnat compared to them. I am insignificant. I am nothing!”

“Dim—”

“This is why I threw myself into alchemy. Anypony can be great in alchemy, with enough drive and ambition. Alchemy only respects hard work, not whatever you are born with. I can do things with potions that even skilled wizards would have trouble replicating with spells. I lived in the dark shadow my family cast, and I found my own self-worth in alchemy.”

While he took a moment to catch his breath, Dim saw a curious expression pass over Cadance’s face. She was thinking, so she was, and the tip of her left ear sagged in distraction. Something that he had said had left behind an impression, and for whatever reason, Dim hoped that it was a good one. Within him, there was an inexplicable urge to have Cadance like him, and he wanted her friendship, though it galled him to acknowledge this.

“I too, feel like I have a lot to prove,” Cadance confessed and her countenance became one of intense worry, at least, this is what it appeared to be to Dim, though he could not be certain. “Compared to the other princesses, I feel so mundane sometimes. Twilight has her powerful magic and her studious nature. I struggle with concepts that she takes to like it was breathing. Celestia’s studies into animancy blaze new trails. She is exploring a whole new frontier. Luna has her dreams. And when I compare myself to them, I just feel so plain and so common.”

“So you allow a part of yourself to be placed into the mind of a demented psychopath so that you might prove yourself. You take risks just so you can say that you’ve taken them.” Overcome with a strange compulsion, Dim took a few stiff-legged steps in the direction of his bed, and then halted when he became aware of what it was that he was doing.

“You shouldn’t say that.” Cadance’s eyes focused on Dim, her mouth drew into a tight pucker, and her ears pricked straight up, no drooping.

“But I am—”

“You saved Blackbird. You didn’t have to do that. Mind you, this happened after you cut down Darling Dark with no mercy. I had some doubts about you, I’ll admit, and Shepherd’s Shore made me wonder for the state of your soul. It pains me to say it, but I started to ask myself if perhaps I had seen something that wasn’t there. But then, you saved Blackbird, at great risk to yourself. You felt something for another living, breathing being and it was so strong, so overpowering, it overcame your own powerful, selfish sense of self preservation.”

Why had he saved Blackbird? This question plagued him, it echoed in his mind, and the more he thought about it the more it ate away at him. It was still selfishness, because Blackbird was something he wanted, something he craved. Could one say that one had done something for good when they had done something for themselves and their own justifications? What was the nature of redemption? What made him worthy? Cadance’s words suggested that by saving another, one could save themselves, but he was uncertain about the validity of this.

Dim’s thoughts were interrupted when Cadance asked, “Why don’t you come over here with me?”

Blinking, Dim, in a little foalish body, shook his head from side to side.

“Why are you so resistant to something you want? You made this dream, this room, you created your own self image and everything that I am right now, all of it is your creation. I am nothing more than a psychic sliver, a protrusion that can on occasion project my voice into your thoughts. I am not even sure if the real me is awake and aware of myself right now. For all I know, the real me might be sleeping, she might be disconnected, or she might be sitting on the potty after having to judge yet another cheese log competition that my subjects are so fond of. For them, freedom means having cheese log competitions on a whim.”

There was a brief pause when Cadance sighed, and then she continued, “All of this is your doing. Your magic, your own special connection to the dream realm, it has interacted with my little sliver in ways that I had not anticipated. All of the words that I am saying now are things you want me to say. I am the voice of reassurance that you need.”

“Why tell myself this?” Dim demanded.

“Because, this is wish fulfillment and the honesty you crave.” Once more, Cadance sighed and rolled her eyes. “I honestly don’t know where I end and you begin. One day, when I reabsorb myself, I will become cognisant of this knowledge and everything that is done here. If anything, I will be super-embarrassed to discover that you and I had a cuddle in the bed together. You clearly want something, something you are starving for, so why not come and get it? Enjoy the fruits of your labour.”

“This feels like trickery.”

“Really, Dim?”

“Oh, I would most certainly play tricks on myself.”

“Why would you do that, Dim?”

“I adore schadenfreude, my own most of all.”

“I thought that meant taking pleasure in the misfortune of others.”

“Ah…”—Dim raised one small hoof as he made his point—“but right now, I am watching myself, and no doubt enjoying my own self suffering. I exist as a separate entity at this point. I would most certainly explore my own duality if it meant that I could watch the part of myself that I hate suffer.”

“Come here, you little weirdo, and let me hug you.”

“No! Never!” Now, wallowing in his own delicious-but-crippling fear, Dim began backing away.

Why had he done this? Why create his old room? Why visit these memories? What could possibly be left for him in this place, other than pain and the memory of pain? The ghosts of old hurts and wounds from the past. Turning about, he faced the tiny stuffed doll that was Luna, and he stared up at her. Using his magic sense was useless, as everything here was constructed from magic, and nothing was real. What truth could be had within the illusion of dreams?

Turning once more, Dim whirled to look at Cadance once more, and he shouted, “This is Eerie’s doing!”

“Dim, that’s paranoid, even for you,” Cadance responded.

“No.” Shaking his head from side to side, Dim knew he needed to try again if Cadance was to understand. “Eerie’s ceaseless and relentless need for affection, she’s triggered some fear inside of me, or some need within me. She’s awoken something that must go back to sleep if I am to ever know peace.” When his words made Cadance frown, he feared that this would not end as planned.

“You were shown the wrong sort of love, Dim. It scarred you. It hurt you. You suffered in a way that I can barely even comprehend. But you can’t run and hide from love, Dim. It’s like sunshine—well, that’s not a good example for you, but you get my point, I hope. You’ll die without it, or worse, you will shrivel, whither, and become something else, a fate worse than death.”

“No.” Dim’s utterance was little more than a frantic moan and he felt his resolve weakening.

“Eerie already recovers, Dim. She knows the truth of it.” Cadance’s words burned Dim’s ears and turned his desire to retreat into an overwhelming compulsion. “She has torn off the scabs, drained the infection, and now she heals. Such remarkable resilience. Surely you could do the same. This fear of intimacy will be your undoing, Dim.”

“NO!” Fear, pain, and rage restored Dim’s failing resolve, granting force to his protest. The walls crumbled, the books fell, the floor beneath him shattered, becoming little more than gravel. Like snowflakes, the debris fell for a time, until it transmuted itself into motes of light. These motes of light went streaking off in all directions, and became stars suspended in a sky of black velvet.

Cadance, now thoroughly transformed, was a constellation with a spectral pink outline to her body. Reading her face, Dim could only conclude that she was broken-hearted. Glittering stardust poured from her wings as she took flight to come to him, and he had no means to escape. Try as he might, he could not move about the vacuum of whatever space this was.

“Behold, Dim, look and see the truth. This is you as you are. With all of the illusion stripped away, with all of the layers of the dream peeled back, this is what you really are. This is where your growth halted, Dim. Look…”

This body was too tiny, too small, and looking upon it made him want to wail in frustration. Helpless, tiny, Dim ground his teeth together as he protested his plight. When it occurred to him that he was a foal pitching a fit, a colt lost to a tantrum, he ceased his struggle and stared at Cadance, pleading with her for help in silence, unable to say the words that might save him.

A short distance away, the constellation of Cadance stopped and extended her hoof to him. Her eyes were the nebulas where stars were born, galactic nurseries that spawned cosmic life. She spoke without her lips moving and her extended hoof pulsed a curious light that throbbed in time to Dim’s own heartbeat.

“This is all you,” Cadance said and her voice seemed to echo in the emptiness. “This is your doing, not mine. You are tapping into my healing magic. I don’t know how, but through dreams, you have found a way to draw upon the tiny sliver of me hidden within you. Be brave, Dim… take what you need. I will not turn you away.”

Extending his own hoof, Dim reached for the hoof held out to him and willed himself to cross the vast interstellar distance of his own soul. As he began to move, the cold deadness of his own existence became too much to bear. Craving warmth, still reaching for Cadance, Dim ignited himself and like a newborn star, he filled the void around him with radiant light. Straining, struggling, and seeking reassurance, Dim reached for the hoof held outstretched for him…