Twilight sparkle groaned in discomfort and frustration. She’d been trying for what felt like eight ice ages to get to sleep, and yet it was a futile effort. Her library was silent, and yet, even with how tired she was, her body refused to co-operate with her requests for sleep, and instead dampened her coat and mane with a cold sweat, with was accompanied by a sense of unease, and nervousness. Spike rested peacefully not far away, his side rising and falling slowly as he breathed in peaceful sleep. With yet another groan of irritation, Twilight slowly shambled out of her bed, and stumbled down the stairs to the floor below.

Nothing was out of place. It was all exactly as she had left it, not a single book or item of any sort was even remotely out of place. Twilight sat down on the couch, and pondered her current condition. She was trying to determine if she had come down with some form of sickness. She ran over hey symptoms; Cold sweat, inability to sleep, constant awareness, and a sense of growing unease. She knew of a few conditions that had at least a few of those symptoms, but none immediately off the top of her head with all of them, without having more that accompanied them.

Either way, it frustrated her. Twilight paced mindlessly around the room, occasionally glancing outside the window to try and determine the passing of time. The sense of unease was growing. Twilight glanced out the window once more, and paused mid-step. She spotted something in the starry night sky. With a now curious expression, she slowly approached the window, and looked out. There was a vibrant ribbon of color up in the sky. It looked almost like an aurora. But, how was it here, this far south? Auroras typically only ever surfaced in the arctic sections of the world.

Twilight decided to not question it. It was a beautiful sight, nonetheless. The multicolored ribbons dancing to and fro in a slow, mesmerizing waltz was more than enough to transfix the lavender unicorn, and draw her attention for quite some time. Finally, she broke her attention away from the glowing light and back to her library. Immediately, she froze. Ok, something was definitely wrong now. There was a glowing pool of glowing water in the corner, looking like it was growing.

“Huh?” Twilight blurted. She froze up as she felt the familiar sense of unease suddenly spike. Her eyes slowly turned towards the window, and another gasp escaped her. Something was happening with the aurora. It was rippling violently, fluctuating and twisting, bending as though blowing in some sort of powerful gale. Twilight backed away from the window, as the aurora began to lash about the sky like a lightning whip.

“What’s happening?” Twilight asked, and turned back to the pool of glowing light. Her eyes narrowed, and she slowly approached. As the puddle came into view beneath her, she saw her reflection, and the scenery behind her. It was different. Twilight gulped. Her reflection was different on so many levels. Her mane was a mess, mangled, and longer than usual, as though it hadn’t been tended to in weeks. Her eyes were bloodshot, and looked tired, and irritated, bags under them. Twilight also noticed her reflection had her fair share of healing wounds.
Lastly, was the library; it was in ruins. Somehow, despite that, a smile was on twilights reflection, though Twilight could easily tell it was forced. The reflection spoke.

“Good. You came.” The reflection said. Off to the side, Twilight heard rarity speak.

“Come on, Twilight, hurry! I don’t know how long I can keep this open!” She said. Twilight looked around, trying to spot where Rarity was. She wasn’t in the room. She focused her attention back down on the puddle. The other her had lowered her head, and appeared to be holding back sobs. The reflection slowly looked back up, and spoke.

“Listen to me. I can’t go into detail, and can only tell you what I heard; don’t blame yourself. Something is coming that you simply can’t prepare for. There is nothing in your sea of knowledge that will prepare you for what’s coming. Just… don’t beat yourself up over it. Keep a clear mind, and enjoy life while you can…” The reflection was slowly starting to murk up. She seemed to notice this, and spoke hastily. “Keep your friends close, closer than ever before. I’m out of time… Good luck.”

The puddle slowly evaporated, and the reflection faded with it. Twilight looked where the puddle used to be, reduced to a simple dark spot on the floor. She slumped down, and released a breath she hadn’t known she’d been holding. Something was coming? She looked back out the window. Outside, she spotted the aurora, still writhing in the sky. She looked at it intently, deciding that the two were somehow connected; the puddle, and the aurora. Spikes voice came from the stairs, a low tired groan. Twilight turned and spotted the baby dragon stumbling down the stairs.

“What’s going on out there?” Spike mumbled tiredly. Twilight looked outside again, and sat down in silence. “Twilight?” Spike asked, now a worried tone to his voice.

“Huh? Oh, sorry… I’m just a bit lost in thought.” Twilight muttered. A bit was an understatement. Her mind was a whirlwind of questions, theories, answers which quickly got dispelled as impossible, and more theories. The sense of unease as well as the cold sweat was starting to subside, replaced by a sensation of being shaken, confused, and under-informed. Twilight suddenly snapped out of her trance of thought when Spike spoke for the third time since she went quiet.

“Twilight? Are you OK?”

Twilight jumped and looked back over at Spike, a startled look crossing her expression. She sighed weakly, and stood back up. “Sorry, Spike. I’m just tired, and those lights outside have me confused.” She explained, purposefully leaving out the part where she had seen her reflection in the puddle. That reflection unnerved her tremendously. It almost scared her. Just the way her reflection had looked was enough to make her worried. Twilight shivered from a sudden cold, and yearned for the warmth and comfort of her bed again.

She slowly trotted past spike, barely giving him a glance, and headed up to her bed. Snuggling tiredly under the blankets, twilight looked outside of her window, spotting the Aurora starting to dance more slowly, entering once more into its entrancing waltz. Spike came up the stairs a moment later, and looked at Twilight with a growing look of concern. But before he could ask her anything, she started snoring. Sleep had found her at last.

<><><><><>

A crash and a lot of pain suddenly flared up inside of the green Unicorn with a brown mane. His eyes were snapped shut with fear, and he rolled violently along the ground, screaming in agony. Pain rippled through his back, as his limbs were tucked up to his body to keep himself from breaking any bones. He gasped for breath as he caught some air, and regretted it as he came crashing down once more, and got a mouth full of dirt. He rolled along somewhat further, and the side of his head collided with something very solid, sending another wave of pain coursing through his body and stunning him. He finally came to a halt, and his other senses began to relay information besides pain, and his own screaming.

First, there was the sound of wind rusting leaves overhead. Then came a slowly approaching mass of voices. Countless of them, all sounding worried, confused, or scared. The unicorn tried to pop open his eyes, and was greeted by a large amount of red. He snapped his eyes shut, realizing that it was blood in his eyes. He marveled at how he was still alive. He brought up a hoof, and cried in pain as he realized with despair that his forelegs had suffered greatly, becoming broken.

He whimpered in agony. Voices started crying out in surprise, and he heard the sound of galloping ponies. He tested his back legs, and found they were not so hampered. He shook his head, and tried to rapidly blink his eyes, attempting to get the blood out. Finally, he could see, though everything was rippling, and could be described as resembling a massive blob of different colors. As his vision attempted to focus, he saw countless ponies coming his way. He appeared to be in a town of some sort. He glanced up at the ponies, and one of them yelped in surprise.

“Somepony get help! He’s hurt” The pony tried hard to keep his eyes open, but failed miserably. Within only a few seconds, he had passed out. But before consciousness left him, he spoke quietly. “Am I free…?”

<><><><><>

The first thing Twilight was immediately aware of was a deep, distant rumbling. She at first paid it no mind, figuring it wasn’t anything of vast importance. But as the rumbling slowly evolved into a grandiose rumble that jarred her form her sleep, she decided it was warranting her attention. She quickly threw off her covers, and darted towards her window. She spotted what appeared to be a massive flaming meteor heading towards ponyville. Her eyes dilated, and she watched as the meteor suddenly gained a bit of air upon striking a roof-top, before sliding into the streets out of her view. The house had been lit on fire from the impact. The sun hadn’t risen yet, but it would soon, casting a dull pinkish red glow on everything.

“Uh-oh…” Twilights mind flashed back to the pool form the previous night, as well as that aurora. She felt a sudden pang of fear, but quickly swallowed it down. Now was not the time to panic. It was the time to figure out just what was happening. She quickly darted down the stairs, and out the door of her library, leaving the door open behind her. She followed the smoke trail that was drifting into the sky, and soon was upon the scene. She rounded a corner and was in the plaza around the town hall. A rather large amount of ponies were already gathered.

There was a blazing trench, which led to a large mound of dirt and blazing grass. Twilight approached a bit more cautiously, and her breath caught at the sight. A stallion was in the crater, many of his limbs were bent at impossibly wrong angles, indicating broken bones. Somepony else noticed this, and shouted for somepony to get help. Twilight was rapidly trying to put the pieces together in her mind, yet nothing was coming up that made any logical form of sense, despite the context.

Her first thought was that he had crashed here, but how would that make sense? He wasn’t even a unicorn. Her next assumption was that he had been hit by whatever had fallen, but where were the fallen objects remains? A number of ponies had departed the scene at a gallop for the Ponyville hospital a ways off. Curiosity boiled inside of her, and reached a crescendo as she approached him a bit closer. He said three simple words. “Am I free…?” His head thudded against the ground, and he seemed to lose consciousness.
Questions were all over from the ponies.

“Who is he? I don’t recognize him…”

“Where’d he come from?”

“Shouldn’t somepony try to patch him up now? Before he bleeds out?”

Twilight opted instead to remain silent. Whatever was going on was a complete mystery to her. She was certain that this falling something was related to the aurora from last night, as well as the pool of light in which her reflection had warned her of something terrible. Whatever that warning was, she was deeply troubled by it. But she was also determined to tough it all out. She hadn’t been prepared for the issue with Discord, and yet that had all turned out OK. With a sense of confidence falling over her, Twilight figured that she could prepare for whatever was coming. She needed to some investigating, but she could do it. With this new mindset, she slowly approached the stallion in the trench.

Before she could get much of a glimpse, however, the ponies from the hospital had arrived, and were already taking the stallion away for treatment. Twilight slowly wandered back to her library, with the intention of researching the phenomenon from last night, both the puddle as well as the crazy aurora. As she entered into the main room of her library, she quickly grabbed every book she could find that related to phenomenon, and mythical happenings.