Sideways: A Mare in the Snow

The dream always starts in the dark. The smell of dry blood and sweat fills the air like a miasma. I can hear my friends, their whimpering pleas for release. Light slowly filters in, dimly illuminating the dungeon. Twilight, bound to the gray slab of metal, her body pristine and unblemished, it will not stay that way. I reach for the silver tray next to her. It's perfectly arranged, like dinnerware at a fine society meal. Here are the scalpels of all different sizes, each sharpened to perfection. There, the bone-saw, polished and gleaming. Beside that is the orbitoclast, the long beautiful spike of stainless steel, untarnished from its use in the previous hours. Like a gourmet selecting an hors d'oeuvre I chose one of the smallest scalpels and lifted it to eye level and briefly admired my reflection in its flawless surface. My mind screamed, it railed against my actions. Twilight begging as I lowered the blade to her face, tears staining her eyes as I removed them...

My eyes snapped open as I woke from the nightmare, the memory, panting and covered in a cold sweat. My back aching from having fallen asleep in my sewing chair and my head pounding from the fifth I had drained the night before to provide me with the few hours of blackness I'd enjoyed before the dreams began again. It was barely morning, the sun was just now beginning to peak over the horizon. I knew I would not be achieving anymore sleep beyond the four hours I had just managed. The most I'd slept all week. I poured myself a cup of cold black coffee and endured the headache that it would cost me to reheat it using my magic. I let out a shuddering gasp as steam rolled up from the cup, I took a sip and sighed.

“Worth the pain,” I muttered to myself as I sat on one of the bar stools at my counter and nursed the headache, sipping the hot coffee and breathing in the bracingly cold morning air. Before what happened at Sugercube Corner I had always made a habit of sleeping in if I could but lately that hadn't been an option. Still, I could see what Applejack found so charming about these abominably early hours of the day. The cold chill of the air, everything smelling fresh and new, it was enough to dull the edge of my aching skull at least. It even, at least for a moment, made me forget that my world was a darker place now. The sun rose and I nursed my third cup of coffee, my headache was fading and the bone-deep exhaustion I had grown accustomed to living with lately had begun to set in. Still, no point in complaining about it, I had work to do, I finished a few of the smaller orders I had back-logged as the sun began is daily climb. It was just before noon as I put the last few stitches in the new nurses uniforms I'd been contracted to make for Cloudsdale Medical Center. Boring and unfashionable but the little jobs paid the bills in the dry spells between fashion seasons. As I set the work down I shivered, the sun was high in the sky and although it was fall the air should have been warm. I gathered the outfits into a bundle and put them into my saddlebag. “Sweetie Belle!” I called, my little sister generally slept til noon on the weekends and consequently was up all night, “I'm going to the post office dear, I'll be back soon!” I heard I muffled, sleepy reply come down the stairs and I smiled, at least someone in this house was getting some proper rest.

The town felt empty, but it had been that way for awhile. Ever since the murders the little hamlet that I called home had become subdued. Where once there had been vivacious life it now felt like some of that life had gone out of Ponyville. Which it had of course. Nopony wanted to admit it. Nopony would say even her name, probably not for years, but Pinkie had been a big part of Ponyville's life. Without her everypony felt confused and lost. I know I did. It would have been bad enough if Pinkie had simply died, if she had just been another victim. But she wasn't. She was a murderer, one of the worst criminals Equestria had ever known. It was a betrayal on the most fundamental level and everypony felt it. Mayor Mare was the mind of Ponyville, it's residents the body, the Apple family was it's heart. But Pinkie had been it's soul, and without her... I felt the sadness gnaw in my belly as I stepped into the post office, it was quiet as everything else, I dropped the package and the bits for postage, gave the address and left. Simple. Painful. It was too quiet and as I stepped out into the empty streets, for a moment, I stared up at the blue sky and cried. Silently and passionlessly I let out the-

Despair.

I hiccuped and started. There had been a voice, or... something. I was sure of it. But there was nopony to be seen. Just empty streets. I sniffled and hiccuped again, wiping the tears from my eyes as I peered into the shadows around me. Nothing. I was alone. Right?

Never.

I nearly screamed. I heard it that time, for sure. It wasn't just a trick, it couldn't have been. It was too clear. I felt a chilling grip run down my spine and I took off at full gallop for the boutique. I hit the door running, fumbled at the latch for a moment, swearing under my breath in colors that would've made Applejack blush. I felt it. Breathing down my neck like a predator closing in.

Rarity. You're not alone. Never alone.

I hiccoughed as tears of abject terror slid down my face, I nearly cried out in relief as the latch popped and I rushed inside, slamming the door close. I heard little hoofsteps coming down the stairs, Sweetie Belle. I couldn't let her see me like this, I slipped into the downstairs washroom and closed the door. A tiny tapping came a moment later.

“Uhm, Rarity? You ok?” Sweetie called from the other side of the door, concern rich in her voice.

I sniffled into a towel as I let my nerves calm before answering, willing my voice not to crack. “I'm fine dear, just got something in my eye and needed to wash it out.” I was quite proud of how calm that came out. I had managed to put the primal screaming terror into a little box in the corner of my mind. It wouldn't stay there long though.

“Oh, uhm, ok, hey Rarity can I go over to Applebloom's for lunch?” I bit back the urge to immediately yell my agreement.

“Oh, well...” I made a show of pretending to think it over, she 'pleeeeeeeeaaaaased' as hard as she could after which I let up and said “I suppose that's alright, but do try and have Big Macintosh walk you back if you stay late.” She squealed with glee and thanked me before rushing off. I let out a sigh and let my knees go out as I dropped to the floor. I dabbed at my tear-stained face. As I pulled the cloth back I dropped it like it was a vile and poisonous insect. I stared at it and backed into the washroom corner. The cloth was stained black.

I remember hyperventilating, breathing in and out in short harsh gasps as I stared at the cloth and grasped at anything that might explain it. Failing at that I mentally willed it to not exist. Of course that did no good either. My panicking was interrupted by another series of tiny taps at the door. “S-sweetie Belle this really isn't a good time,” I said, no longer caring if my voice cracked.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

“Sweetie Belle I said...” I stopped and listened, the was a cold, harsh breathing outside the door, “S-S-Sweetie Belle... that's not-”

Never. Alone.

This time I didn't even bother biting back the scream.

I don't know how long I spent curled up on the washroom floor, the voice didn't speak again, the tapping stopped. Celestia help me but I couldn't make myself open that door. I couldn't move I was so scared. Scared that I was going mad. Ever more scared that I wasn't. Finally I plucked up the courage to scoot over to the door and listen. Nothing. No sound, just quiet. The way an empty fashion boutique should sound. I finally reached out and touched the doorknob. It was like ice, it was so cold I could barely keep my hoof on it. I turned it anyway, summoning up my magic as the door swung open. Nothing. The room was cold, like winter and somepony had left a window open. I looked around, paranoid and scared. Just an empty showroom. I let out a relieved sigh. I was... I shook my head, not allowing myself to think the word for fear that it would prove to be some kind of talisman that called the voice back. I went upstairs and into my room, digging through my personal effects I eventually found it, a little treasure I kept, one of five. A little pink ribbon with a baby-blue sapphire in the middle. A hairpiece I'd made for Her. A present, I'd made one for each of us. The sixth one, a bright cyan ribbon with a cerise topaz I'd left in the coffin of the pony I'd intended to give it to. I still cried about that sometimes. This one though, I didn't know what to do with. So I kept it. A last secret between friends.

“Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye...” I whispered as I held it close. I gripped it tight as I felt the beginnings of hot tears behind my eyelids, “I miss you Pinkie...” my voice cracking with sorrow.

I miss you too Rares.

I stared down at the little bauble for a moment. That was the final straw. I tossed the pin back into the jewelry box I'd taken it from, went to the kitchen and opened the tallest cabinet. I reached into the back of the highest shelf and pulled out a bottle filled with amber liquid. My latest discreet purchase from the Cafe, I hadn't expected to be cracking the seal so soon but... I wrenched the top off and pour a generous measure into a glass. I threw it back and relished the burn as it worked its way down my throat and into my belly. I dragged myself over to my chair, I didn't bother bringing the glass as I tipped the bottle back and tried vainly to find some solace in the bottom of the damned thing.

The dream always starts in the dark. The smell of dry blood and sweat fills the air like a miasma. I can hear my friends, their whimpering pleas for release. It's so very cold. Light slowly filters in, dimly illuminating the dungeon. Twilight, bound to the gray slab of metal, her body pristine and unblemished, it will not stay that way. I reach for the silver tray next to her, covered in a delicate frost of ice. It's perfectly arranged, like dinnerware at a fine society meal. Here are the scalpels of all different sizes, each sharpened to perfection. There, the bone-saw, polished and gleaming like ice. Beside that is the orbitoclast, the long beautiful spike of stainless steel, untarnished from its use in the previous hours. Like a gourmet selecting an hors d'oeuvre I chose one of the smallest scalpels and lifted it to eye level and briefly admired my reflection in its flawless surface. My black eyes, rich with violent despair glower back at me. Tears of pitch running down my face. My mind screamed, it railed against my actions. Twilight begging as I lowered the blade to her face. Begging to be allowed to die. No. They could never die. I wouldn't let them. If they died, then I would be alone. I never want to be alone. Never. Alone.

I woke up choking on my own scream, I was freezing. I could only stare forward for a moment, the memories of that dream were so vivid. I could still feel the cold weight of the scalpel in my hoof, I could...

The scalpel clattered to the floor as it fell out of my grip.

No. It wasn't real, it was a lie. I was still dreaming. Still asleep at home in the chair, drunk out of my mind on backroom whiskey. The cold hard truth of that shining scalpel glittered mockingly on the floor of my... my... home? I looked around. I wasn't at home. I couldn't be, the walls were rotted and decayed, the ceiling was mostly a collapsed wreck and the floor was a creaking mass of ancient timbers. It was dark in a way, but more like the dim false night of an eclipse rather than true nighttime darkness. Shadowed but possessing its own sort of ghostly illumination.

Then, like a splinter in my mind, a impulse rattled through me. I could compare it to a voice I suppose. I think a part of me expected something overt. A voice that scratched and grated inequinely, like a monster or a nightmare. But it was not, it was quiet, a sharp pain like a hypodermic needle followed by words.

My love. My silence. So lonely I am. So very very lonesome.

The voice carried a bone-deep ache of sorrow, it was an empty thing. Like a cold so penetrating that there was no feeling. Only an absence to remind me that something was terribly wrong. This thing's voice was emotional frostbite.

Find me. I'll find you. Find you and hold you so close. So cold and lonely.

“No, please...” I pleaded almost silently, the room was getting colder. The residue of cold sweats were caking to my coat, hardening to an icy rime.

I'm cold sweet love. Cold and lonesome. No hearts to warm me.

The frost crept across the fragments of glass left in the windows, the boards of the ruined caricature of my home creaked and moaned as the unnatural elements took hold. I heard a crack, like a hoof splitting ice, come from the front door. A ghastly light slithered out from beneath the cracks.

Oh sweetness, make me warm again. Let me taste your warmth. Let me devour your heart.

The last words became a hiss as the door split like a rotten log, and through it peered an eye as black as pitch. I snapped out of my fugue. Panicking I turned away and scrambled up the ruined stairwell. So I was mercifully spared vision of the thing as another, louder, snap told me the door was no longer impeding its progress. I was breathing raggedly, I moved down the remains of the hallway as quickly as I dared, treading bare studs and timbers carefully, fully aware that one misplaced hoof could bring the whole ceiling down. I could hear its hoofsteps on the stairs behind me, I moved faster, the portal to my bedroom was in sight, I made a few more ginger steps and slipped inside. The door was hanging on rusted hinges but, fueled by desperation I gripped it with my telekinesis and forced it shut. The distorted timbers ramming into the frame and jammed there. The bed was a rotten ruin, but the window... It was still whole but I seized the quickly frosting glass and tore at the frame.

Please. I'm so lonely. My sweet heart. Let me show you how empty. So empty.

“NO!” I screamed, at the warped doorway, “I know... I KNOW WHAT YOU ARE!” I wrenched and the lodged window cracked. “I WON'T LET YOU HURT THEM EVER AGAIN!” My voice was hoarse and the cold was numbing in its intensity. A mighty heave I tore the window frame free just as the doorway began to give way to an intense pressure, “NEVER!” I screamed at it before hurling my self out the top floor. The impact was painful, I landed wrong and cracked my head against the ground, my vision swam and there was a painful ringing in my ears, I tried to rise but I couldn't move. Then I felt something warm, somepony wrapped their hooves around me and pulled me into a nearby building, I cried out as pain shot through my side, I saw a trail of blood, faint but present as I was dragged into the shadows.

“Ssshhh, it's ok...” the voice was distorted by the ringing, I couldn't focus, but I felt safe. The smell of sweets and bubblegum filled my nostrils as blackness overtook me.

I snapped back to wakefulness and I was back in my home, aching but alive and well in my familiar, and untarnished, boutique. Night had fallen and I for a moment I almost believed that it had all been a terrible nightmare. Then a sharp pain surged from my side, a gash that had been neatly bandaged and cared for ran along my left side across my ribs. The bandages were new and only a little stained by fresh blood. Out of habit I brushed my mane out my eyes to get a better look at it but my mane was firmly held in place over my ear. It was held there by a little pink ribbon inset with a baby-blue sapphire.

Never. Alone. No. They could never die. I wouldn't let them. If they died, then I would be alone. I never want to be alone. I relish her cries as the blade pierces her flesh. The sound of pain and the soft patter of blood droplets striking the floor. So sweet and warm. And I'm so very cold. Like an artist, a painter, I carve thin red lines in her beautiful face. I savor the warmth she bleeds out into the air. I hunger for it. I run my tongue along her cheeks, tasting the warm vital essence as it spills from her veins. She pleads with me. Begs for me to stop. To come back. I can't though, I'm so alone. So empty. And she is so very warm. I'll never be alone again.

My eyes snap open, I'm back in that place. That horrible nightmare place where everything is rotten and ruined. I fell asleep again. This time though I wasn't trying to forget. My eyes are hard as ice, she's coming. It's coming. I can feel it. I'm not afraid anymore. I can't be afraid anymore. Yesterday I had eaten lunch with my friends. My Family. I told them I loved them. That I missed them. I couldn't afford to be afraid anymore. I needed to face this horror. Whatever it was.

“Come on,” I hissed into the empty air, “Where are you?”

“I'm here,” a voice, small but strong, came from behind me. I felt a chill run up my spine. It wasn't her, it, that thing. This voice I knew only too well.

“Oh...” it was a single sound, a single syllable carrying a lifetime of sorrow and loss, “Oh Pinkie...” I turned to face her. Her face was a mask of shame, she was hiding in the shadows. I knew why, a necklace of severed horns hung loosely from her neck and the edges of a vile dress whispered and writhed.

“Don't...” she said, not meeting my eyes, her hair hung limp and lusterless, her eyes were the color of stormy seas. “Don't look at me...”

She wouldn't meet my eyes, so she didn't get a chance to move as I rushed forward and pulled her into a close embrace. I felt the shock register as she went rigid. Shame, anger, grief, and a dozen other emotions whirled through her. It didn't matter.

“W-why...” she finally whispered, “H-how can you stand it?” We parted, tears were pouring hot and fast from her eyes. “How can you even touch me?” her voice cracked as a little bubble of snot burst.

“Oh darling,” was my only answer as I pulled up a ragged bit of curtain to dry her eyes, “If there's anypony who knows what it's like...-”

“It's ok, just do as they say”

She bit back a scream as the knife drove into her side.

“I forgive you Rarity”

“-that pony would be me,” I finish. She hiccups and finally smiles, a tiny weak thing, but it was a start.

“O-ok...” she sniffles before shaking her head to clear away the muddled thoughts, “Ok, c'mon Rares, I need you're help.” Pinkie immediately turned and went out the door. The door which I noticed was still shattered and splintered from being forced open by that thing. I followed behind her quickly, there would be time for questions later, Pinkie wasn't usually this focused so I knew it had to be important. We walked in silence. Not companionable silence but in stealth. There were things in this place that I knew in my bones that I didn't want to encounter. Pinkie seemed to know the way. Eventually we made it to our destination. Sugarcube Corner. Where it all started.

“Pinkie, what's going on?” I had a lot of questions but that was the first one that sprung to mind.

Pinkie was quite for a second as we stood in the shadows of a ruined building across from the Corner. “Something bad is coming, it'll be here soon, can't you feel it?” she asked, looking me in the eyes. I looked back at that place where so many of my nightmares lived, for a moment there was nothing, then...

A pulse. Like a heartbeat. A feeling of dread washed over me as I felt something, like the exhalation of some massive apex predator.

“You felt it huh?” Pinkie had that small knowing look on her face. I nodded, I felt... something. Something alive. Something Evil.

“What is it?” my voice was a whisper.

“A curse. The Curse,” was her answer.

The darkness was closing it.

You can fight it Rarity. You need to fight it.

“I... I can't... Oh Celestia... it hurts, it's so empty... please... Pinkie... I can't.”

You can. I know you can.

“I'm not strong enough... she's coming, I can't stop her. Oh please... it's so cold... so cold and empty... Pinkie please... don't let me hurt anypony.”

Ice and pain. Screaming grief filled my ears as I fought tooth and nail for purchase in my own mind. I felt her. So close. Whispering in my ear as she slithered violently into my skin. Sweet goddess the pain was like being peeled apart, inch by inch, as she coiled around my insides. It was violation of the deepest kind. I felt her, it, Despair. My Despair. She peeled the muscles away from my ribs as she slunk into my chest, tore the tendons from my legs as she forced herself inside, my heart froze in a gory rime as her emptiness swallowed it whole.

oH yEsss... sO waRmmmmm...

I vomited as I felt her inky blackness race up my spine like molten ice. My world became darkness, my voice was drowned out by weeping. Then she opened my eyes and my mind was eclipsed by Despair.

“Pinkie...” I was so weak, fading fast as I begged her, “end it...” I begged. I had only moments to reflect that this was not the first time I had begged my friend for death.

Time sped past like a broken clock, its hands swinging wildly to and fro as I gasped and struggled. It was like fighting the tide, but I could see land, solid ground somewhere ahead of me. I heard noise from outside, screaming. A voice crying out.

Twilight?

Another voice, deep and masculine that rumbled like thunder above me. Macintosh. What was happening? A crash of sound like glass breaking somewhere above and far away. I had to fight, to move forward. My head broke the surface of the ocean of black ink that was drowning me, “PLEASE!” I was pulled under again before I could cry again, I had no idea how long I'd been under.

“MAC! WE AREN'T GOI-”

I broke the surface again, I hear her again, my friend. She was in danger from me, from despair, I swore viciously and surged forward, drawing from a well of strength I hadn't realized I possessed, I felt her fighting me every inch, clinging to my coat and mane, wrenching hair out and cutting furrows in my mental flesh. Every breath brought me closer to myself until finally... Pain filled my senses, I felt every sickening crack as my bones snapped into familiar equine shape. I gasped raggedly as I black bile poured in a torrent from my through and ink spilled from my eyes, eating away at the snow below me before reality itself spasmed and I was torn back into the nightmare world.

I woke from my soul-sick fever in a side-room in the ruins of town hall. My head was on a collection of pillows that were at least less mangled than usual, Pinkie was keeping watch out the nearby window.

“P-Pinkie?” I rasped, my throat was raw from my latest failure, “D-did I...?” She gave me a small smile and shook her head. I hadn't killed anypony. This time. My heart was still sick remembering my last failure. Oh goddess, poor Carrot Top, at least it had been quick for her. Not like my first time...

My song filled the air, my sorrow. The emptiness of my heart stole all warmth, even the world around me turned to ice as I sang. Desperate for warmth, for love. Anypony would do, I was so alone.

There. So sweet, so small. Little filly come to me. Don't cry.

My ice numbed her tiny limbs as she scrambled desperately away, trying to leave me. Trying to leave me alone again. No. Not again. It wasn't fair. Black tears poured hot from my eyes and corroded the ground beneath my feet as I screamed my rage and grief at the little mewling thing. I seized it by its back legs. With a thought I slipped my shawl around her and with a furious wrench I felt the little bones snap. Let it try and leave me now. Little plum, so fresh and soft. But still it tried, it crawled and crawled on numb hooves blackening slowly with the intensity of my cold. So cold.

WHY WOULDN'T SHE JUST STAY WITH ME?!

I bared my teeth and leapt, in a single motion I stood over her. Oh how she screamed, I felt her warmth from where I stood, so warm... My tears spattered over her face and she shrieked, her flesh sloughing away as my despair poisoned her. She was trying to leave me again. Leave me cold and alone. With a thought I seized her forelegs and broke those too. Now she couldn't leave. Never. She wept with me as I pulled her shattered form close. Then she became cold. Her body black and withered.

No. I was alone again. Why was I always alone?

The those memories were as sharp as they were distant, not wholly mine but...

“You're beating her,” Pinkie said softly, snapping me out of my latest nightmare.

“Will it be worth it?” I asked quietly, my voice as hard as the grave. She nodded. “What will I become?” I had asked that question every time I came out of it. Ever since that first time when she told me what was haunting me. My Despair. My own broken soul made flesh and hunting me. It needed me. Pinkie knew because unlike me, she hadn't had a teacher to tell her how to fight it. So it had won. I knew that if I hadn't taken the fight to it I would've been lost. Just another nightmare butchering her friends and neighbors trying desperately to fill the broken and empty hole inside of her.

“I guess you'll become like me...” she said quietly as we sat in that ruined hovel. It was the first time she had ever answered that question with anything other than a shrug.

“W-will I die?”

“Maybe.”

It had been on my mind since Pinkie had first told me her plan. The broken things that hunt us can't be beaten. They can't be evaded or fooled. More importantly, they will always. Always. Come back. The only way to take them on was to play their game, then win it. Win and a you finish them for good, you become their prison. Pinkie told me she could still feel Madness laughing and screaming inside her. Counting off numbers, reciting recipes. But she also told me that everyday Madness gets a little quieter, a little more distant. The cost was so high though. Fighting those things is a war and some battles will be lost. Most of them, at least in my case. And there will be casualties.

I kept their names in my head, my sins, my failures.

Silver Spoon, Carrot Top, Lotus and Aloe.

I had cried for hours after I had come out that last one. They had been my friends, good friends. But if I didn't keep fighting I would kill more. If Despair beat me then I would become a hundred times worse than I was. Maybe one day I'll believe those words enough to forgive myself.

“It will be the least that I deserve darling,” I said stiffly as I stood up, my strength slowly returning, part of me expected a remonstration from my friend but she just met my gaze and nodded. We both had enough blood on our hooves to know not to kid ourselves.

Dying tree's covered in unseasonal snowdrifts collapsed around me.

Fight her Rarity, fight her.

“I... I'm t-trying....”

The ocean was gone, dry and empty, the sky was jagged shades of deep pitch broken by stark white. I stood there on a lone plateau rising from the vanished seas, my flesh bulging and warping as I fought to regain control. I felt her slide along my underside, slithering between rib and muscle.

“W-where am I?”

Silence.

“DAMN IT PINKIE WHERE AM I?!”

Sweet Apple Acre's

“Oh goddess no.”

CONCENTRATE RARITY!

My the flesh of my torso distended into the shape of her head, like she was trying to rip me apart form the inside, trying to finally flay my mind to bits and take control for good. I felt the warmth of blood spilling over my face, my physical face. I had killed again, I felt it. I tasted the rich coppery tang, felt her narcotic elation. No more. Bent my head to the side and opened my mouth. A mouth suddenly filled with razor sharp needles, and bit through my own skin and into her. With a mighty heave that nearly blinded me with pain and ripped her out of my flesh and threw her to the ground.
She gasped and kicked like a fish pulled out of the water and tossed onto dry land. For a moment all I could do was stare at her. Despair. My own personal demon. Yet now, standing over her, I almost felt for her, for it. She was truly a wretched thing, like a skinned unicorn stained black. Weeping inconsolably as she squirmed, trying to make her ruined legs work enough to move her away from me.

“It's over,” I said, my voice ringing with a grim finality as I moved over to the shuddering ruin on the ground. Pinkie hadn't told me about this, what I had to do, what would mean I had won. Now I knew why. She didn't need to. The thing that had been Despair tried to get away but I grabbed her by her leg and dragged her back, forcing her upright, and pulled her close. “You're not alone anymore, I'm your prison and your warden now.”

She stopped shaking, her sobs were coming in dry heaving wracks now. She didn't have the strength to fight me anymore. I had divorced her from me, all she had was empty grief. Still, she was a part of me.

“Don't worry, we'll be together now. Forever.”