I walked.

At first it was dark, but all too soon it became light... And dark again.

I kept walking.

Hunger and thirst was my only companion.

Light, dark, light, dark, light, dark, light...

I drank when ever I passed water, but never stayed long.

I grazed on grass whenever it was still green, but that was far and few in the dry land.

Dark, light, dark, light, dark...

I avoided the two legged beings, whose name I had forgotten again, at all costs.

Whenever I saw their dwellings or black stone expanses, I tried to veer away, keeping to the wilderness. But sometimes, when they were abandoned, I crossed the black stone when I could.

Light, dark, light, dark, light...

At least I could fight the wild.

One time, a pair of coyotes thought I was easy prey while I grazed.

They were wrong.

I picked my head up as one of my ears flicked, two pairs of yellow eyes greeted me in the moonlight. I growled to warn them off, but they would not be deterred.

The circled around me, attempting to divide my attention.

It didn't work.

I pounced at the one to my left before they could get into a position they wanted. Stunned with surprise at my brashness, both were too late to stop my assault.

"Yip!" the Coyote yelped as my teeth clamped down over its neck. "Yip yip yip!"

I snarled aggressively as I started to shake the coyote back and forth, whipping it around like a rag doll.

Its fellow decided to break out of its stupor and charged, eager to get me off its partner.

A single buck with my left hind leg sent it flying and gave a good bruise on its snout.

"Yip!" it squeaked as it hit the ground.

My kick left me unbalanced and gave the Coyote in my jaws a brief moment of reprise. It started to flail again, trying to break away.

So I gave it the freedom it craved.

I spun around and flung the bleeding Coyote at its partner

"Yipe!" they squealed as they collided.

I advanced threateningly, which was enough to cause the pair to run away, yowling into the night.

Blood that wasn't my own matted the fur on my face.

Dark, light, dark, light, dark...

I didn't sleep much, when I did, I often woke up to find myself still walking. But when it became too much to bear, I found myself laying down amongst the dry brush and grasses, which turned browner as the cold set it.

And it was always getting colder.

The snow had finally fallen, coating the landscape in white.

That was when it started to get very difficult. Gone were the open streams and easy grasses. Instead I had to rely on the two legs' captive Ponies.

I crawled through a gap in the wooden obstacle, cleverly made to keep the large Ponies in.

And large they were, freakishly long faces turned to look at me as I came inside their cave made of wood. A few whickered at me, but I ignored them.

My eyes were on their troughs.

They were full of some sort of grain and grass mixture that smelled most excellent.

I shoved my face into the tasty smelling mush and ate vigorously.

"Neigh!" the nearest Pony protested.

I lifted my head up and snorted at the Pony.

She had all of this time to eat, now it was my turn.

I bent back down and resumed eating.

Only when I was full did I pull myself out of the trough, which was made for the much larger Pony. I would be good for a long while now.

But this place seemed safe for the moment, although I knew it wouldn't be that way when the light returned.

A pile of hay looked very inviting.

I took the opportunity to sleep for a few hours.

It was still dark when I woke, it was time to move on.

I drank my fill from the Pony's trough of water and left the same way I came in. Through the barricade.

Light, dark, light, dark, light...

Slowly the land transformed from flat, to hilly. Trees were rare when the land was flat, but more abundant in the hills. The trees were nice, in that they kept the wind at bay. But during the Winter, they meant less Ponies to steal food from, as the two legs tended to keep away from the woods.

Dark, light, dark, light, dark...

But still it grew colder and colder. I found myself looking for the warm company of other Ponies more and more, regardless of how disturbingly distorted they were.

Light, dark, Light, dark, Light...

Finally I found something that one of the boxes in my mind jumped and rattled at.

It was one of the two legs' wooden structures. But it seemed to be almost totally abandoned.

I sniffed the undisturbed snow around the entrance.

It had been whole moons since a two leg had been here.

At first I wasn't sure why the box was so excited about this place. But it was so insistent that it got to the point where I abandoned all caution and opened it just to see what it was.

Hunting shack! Potential storage underneath! Resources!

Why was this in the box? This was a simple way to set goals while like this! What was I think-

Box.

...

I pushed my way through the snow and pulled at the door.

I glanced around, looking for another way in.

A particular mound of snow caused something to spark in my mind.

Careful to not let curiosity get the best of me, I approached and began to dig in the snow.

A chain linked the handles of the double cellar door, a lock kept it together.

I turned around without hesitation and bucked the lock. It bent, but didn't break.

So I kicked again.

Clak!

The lock broke apart and the chain fell limp.

I pulled the chain from the handles and set it aside. I then got onto my back hooves, gripped a handle and pulled.

The door opened with a groan.

The air inside smelled like old, but well cared for wood, and when compared to the air outside, felt warm.

I entered the cellar, but turned around to close the door behind me.

The dark had never bothered me, and it didn't now.

When I turned around, I realized the cellar was full of shelves. Each stuffed to the brim with canned and non-perishable goods. There even was a stack of firewood along the wall.

This wasn't just a hunting shack... It was someone's Dooms-day shack!

thaumic_field(detectable)=consiousness.exe
consiousness.exe≠data_set:knowledge/logic_algorithm.exe
if:logic_algorithm.exe set:minimum then consiousness.exe≠true

Ok in all seriousness, I know it'll be hard for the layman reader to read the code. But I swear there's a reason I'm using it.

If you've noticed, Luna's "inner dialogue" has been increasingly fragmented these past few chapters. This has been on purpose. They're not so much different personalities, as much as they are different parts of Luna's mind.

Taking a step back for a moment, last chapter I discussed how Luna was suppressing her emotions to hide herself. But with those emotions in their boxes, Luna has, for a lack of a better term, "devolved" back into a non-sapient pony. What is a mind made up of if not complex emotions? As an example; how could even a cat, arguably interesting little critters with their own emotional states, understand the complexity of even asking someone out for a first date? The anxiety, the stress, the pining, the initial awkwardness, the fear of rejection? All these super specific emotions forming into a greater concept. I'm not so sure even a chimpanzee, Humanity's closest evolutionary relative, could understand. Granted they'd get closer than a cat, but still...

Hence Luna's "devolution".

Coming back around to my original point, all of those parts in her mind are now locked away in boxes. Which includes her higher knowledge and memories.

Indiscriminate incarceration yo.

"Logic" however doesn't necessarily need all the ooey gooey emotional stuff, and is rarely idle. Even while in its box, it was active. Stripping itself down to its base essentials so it could be freed and used. Which in turn increases Luna's efficiency when it came to chances of survival. Thus fulfilling its purpose. The hardest part of that however, was stripping down Luna's knowledge base so it wasn't emotionally charged. Which is why Logic takes a while to come back out.

Anyway, the vibe! https://youtu.be/XDIqO0-MJn8?si=dkfDhHHLsxaJaFOV