Bellesmith sat on her haunches, her forelimbs curled up to her chest as she stared at a dense wall of partially chiseled rock. A lone manatorch was all that illuminated that particular niche, a spot within the subterranean reaches of Blue Shelf where the concrete corridors stopped dead against craggy earth. Her breaths were long, even, and melancholy. A perpetual curve alighted the mare's vulnerable eyes, glistening in the manalight.
From behind, Dalton shuffled up, his gray features forming a slight sheen from the nearby torch. He took one look at Bellesmith, mustered up his strength, and quietly approached her. "You know, two days ago, Professor Garnet told me that you 'needed time to think.' I didn't expect that meant seeing you here, brooding by your lonesome within Black Level, like it was a cemetery."
Belle didn't look at him. After a slight shiver, she said, "There were hundreds of slaves in this place, Dalton, droves of rams, buffalo, deer, and mules. Between here and the door to the machine world, they labored in sweaty huddles, banging away at rock and starving by the dozens. Garnet was here. Felicity and Placid were here. The place reeked of spilled blood and smoke. I can still smell the decay; I can still hear the pained moans and the banging of metal pickaxes."
Dalton trotted over and quietly sat down beside her. "Black Level... was named glibly because when the Ledomaritans who built this place dug their way to this part of the mountain, they deemed the rock ahead to be too unstable, and thus it was not worth risking the lives of the Council's workers to trudge ahead. We've since not had the funding to patch this area up with concrete. So, to keep it off limits, we've entitled it 'Black Level.'" His mustached muzzle smiled. "Perhaps it was a silly attempt to make the place sound somewhat foreboding. Spark knows what that must have done to your imagination."
"And just k-kind of an imagination is that, Dalton?" Belle finally looked at him with a grimacing expression. "I have never dealt with hardships before I met Professor Garnet and—" She winced even harder, sighed, and ran a hoof over her face. "I have never dealt with hardships before." She gulped. "True, I never got along too well with my family, and the zeppelin crash at Mountfainfall changed a lot of things, but I've always had an easy lot in life. No pain. No suffering."
"Agony is relative, as far as I'm concerned," Dalton said with a consoling smile. "The scientist within you is aware of your well-to-do lot in life. It takes a great deal more to convince your heart of that as well."
"Where was the scientist when I was sequencing? Huh?" Belle frowned. "Being a fugitive on the run?! Befriending slaves, turncoats, and traitors?! Being chased and pursued as property?! How could I have dreamed all those things up?!"
Dalton nodded as he breathily said, "Your dreamscape did have... a lot of common themes; that's for certain. Perhaps you are a great deal more cynical than you wish to believe, darling."
"In what way?"
"Well, now, we all know that the Confederacy isn't perfect. Ponies like Garnet will hang posters of the Queen left and right, but that doesn't wipe the slate clean, now does it? Hmm?" He smiled wearily. "Non-pony citizens have dealt with prejudice and unequal representation for years. Decades, even. It's very difficult for... say... a ram or a mule to get a high paying job in service to Her Majesty. These rules aren't written anywhere, but no single citizen of Ledomare can grow up and somehow deny it without turning red in the face. For some, they simply choose to ignore it. For others—those with a caring, compassionate heart—they struggle with the guilt and the confusion that comes with acknowledging life's imbalance."
Belle stared into the craggy, black wall. "I... I-I can't say that I have ever... been at peace with the things I have learned about Ledomare..."
"And in your dreams, when you were cast loose from the spheres of the subject, you had no predominating consciousness to control what you felt or perceived," Dalton said. "You were a victim to your desires and fears, darling. Things came at you and you had no ability to guard against them."
"How... w-would I possibly desire such terrible things to happen to such innocent equines?" Belle murmured, her voice wavering a bit. She sniffed and rubbed a hoof across her golden cheek. "It frightens me to think that my mind has the ability to create such... such darkness..."
"I do not believe desire has anything to do with it, Belle," Dalton said. "If I recall from your sequencing accounts, however frantically relayed, you were quite often the subject of intense persecution and punishment at the hooves of those more powerful and more entitled than you. If nothing else, I would venture to guess that your guilt and misgivings in real life produced a relatively... masochistic experience within the fantasy."
"You mean..." Belle's lip quivered. "I was p-punishing myself?"
"Think of it as a way of desperately trying to empathize with those you've otherwise only read about or heard about," he said.
She hung her head, frozen in thought. After a while, she eventually said, "And those visions I had... of Rainbow Dash... of her life..." She bit her lip. "So much suffering. So much loneliness. Did... did I create those too?"
"Darkness is something that's found in all of us, even if what we most desire is the spark of life. Tell me, was this 'Rainbow Dash' character somepony who embodied cruelty? Was she a spreader of the darkness?"
Belle looked at him and emphatically shook her head.
Dalton smiled. "Seems like, in spite of all your vision's nightmarish qualities, you still held onto hope. That's quite nice to think about, isn't it?"
"Rainbow Dash... always peservered... in spite of all adversity..."
"Much like yourself, I would venture to guess."
Belle ran a hoof over her bangs and sighed. "I couldn't ever be compared to that mare..."
"But that didn't stop you from taking her place from time to time," Dalton said. "And, being most familiar with your own work, your mind used the nature of our scientific practices here in Blue Shelf to create that bridge between you and the model mare you always wanted to be. Eliminate that bridge, and what do you have? One pony, split into two different beings, unaware that she has the strength and potential to be both identities at once. If only you could embrace that other side..."
"Maybe..." Belle gulped. "Maybe I kind of did..."
"Maybe indeed," Dalton said, nodding.
Belle sighed. She gazed into the black rock and muttered, "Is it... is it that I've been depressed? That I've been so gloomy for so long?"
"What makes you say that, darling?"
"Because... I-I just can't get over how..." She shrugged her shoulders. "How wonderfully tranquil Blue Shelf actually is. I feel like I was gone for weeks, and all that time I was exposed to so much evil and cruelty within the heart of Ledomare." She turned and gazed up at Dalton. "I even... I even dreamed that Mildred was dead and that they had your grandfoals held hostage..."
Dalton's smile left him slightly. Nevertheless, he breathed evenly as he said, "I am pleased to assure you that my grandfoals are safe. As for Mildred, my beloved, well... she did indeed pass away several years ago."
Belle's lips pursed. "Oh, Dalton. I'm... I-I'm so sorry..."
He waved a hoof gently. "Now now, nothing to be sorry about. You've been through a lot. Undoubtedly you forgot that I told you shortly before your last sequencing."
"No, I... I remembered it," she said gently, looking back at the walls of Black Level. "Perhaps I didn't want to, which is why my mind weaved a bizarre tale around it, but I remembered..."
"Listen to me, Bellesmith." Dalton placed a hoof on her shoulder. "Life may be a lot better in the real world than it was in your delusional state, but it is still not perfect. There are many roads that need to be paved... many barricades that need to be erected against what's ugly and dangerous on this continent. We may not have established Her Majesty's utopia yet, but we are working on it, like good and honest souls. If there's anything that your visions have taught me—and I hope they can reinforce the truth in you as well—it's that you are more than willing to pursue happiness in all its forms, and that makes you the most benevolent kind of citizen this land could ask for. You should be proud of what this experience has taught you, and not be overwrought with confusion and dismay."
"But... it's just so hard..." Belle gripped her head in two hooves and seethed. "There's so much... so very much to comprehend..."
"Well, if you must know, I came here to deliver a message," Dalton said. "Garnet has made true to his promise for giving you a reprieve. He'd like you to venture to the surface for no less than two weeks."
"Two... weeks...?"
"Go, Bellesmith," Dalton said. "Collect yourself, darling. Take time to meditate, to relax. And, most of all, spend some quality time with Pilate."
Belle froze. Slowly, her head tilted up, and her eyes moistened. "B-Beloved...?"
Here comes the moment of truth.
Yeah, seeing dream Pilate!
And Pilate will have questions.
Lies and spite make me sick. I will be glad when this is over.
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And zebra will not be zebra. Maybe he'll have a mustache and horn, or maybe freckles and a stetson.
So she's accepted this world as real, then.
Now she just something drastic to give her a wake up call...
Time to visit Pilate!
Life would be so better for Belle if this was real. So much better.
We'll know if it is or not when we see Pilate. Calling it now: He's got his eyes.
Don't give in, Belle!
Oops.
2885836
Something something Allegory of the Cave.
2885869
I like this, better. It's in the same vein as Phoenix being in place, but makes more sense, logically. He has O.A.S.I.S., that memory is too strong to ignore, but Nightshade misses the lack of sight in an ironic lack of sight.
2886025 If we surpass the shadows - we are blinded by the light...
2885885 Of you're going to call out typo's then get them all... like Professor Shell
So, we will see Pilate soon? He will have lots of questions. And maybe some answers too hopefully.
Oh boy, she believes. Let's hope that she isn't too enamored by this reality and is able to break free.
Is this Nightshade trying to show her the utopia she wants to make?
Hm. There were quite a few mistakes in this one. Colon, don't be getting complacent with us now, old boy. Not much destroys the atmosphere of the story more than getting the main antagonist's name wrong.
And if Belle hasn't lost her horn, there is probably little reason for Pilate to be blind, I presume, since they acquired these injuries during the same incident. Of course, this might be complete twaddle too, as this peaceful new reality likes to mess with us quite a bit, it seems.
Hopefully,seeing Pilate will give Belle a very needed wake-up call.
If this really is some Inception bullshit, and Nightshade pulls out Pilate just to fuck with Belle, the property damage alone that I would do to Nightshade industries will be enough to make at least several of her contractors (if not all of them) shit solid gold bricks, not to mention the wrath that I would incur upon Nightshat herself.
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Second option would be very interesting. Really brings out RD's influence on Belle.
Hrrmrmmrmmr. I really wonder what the heck's up with all of this. I don't doubt that Garnet's the real Garnet, and is working for Nightshade to keep Belle from the truth. But what is happening outside of this? What did we see that was true, and what was false? I doubt we'll get to see for a little while yet.
Wow, Belle is very accepting of all of this. Maybe there'll be something up with Pilate that makes her doubt it all.
2885847
Zebra will be Serpent. And mustache will be FAAABULOUS!
Poor Belle. This is quite the emotional roller coaster she's being taken on. And then there'll be the mental stress of waking up from all this and confronting the fact that what she thought wasn't real is and what she thought was real wasn't. Methinks that realization will come with stripes.
I also wonder about the title. I know it's a reference to Plato. But if memory serves, in the eponymous Allegory, the shadows, thought to be real by the imprisoned subject, were cast by forms hidden behind him. It makes me wonder how much of this is Nightshade and how much really is Belle's own subconscious (fears, insecurities, etc.) At the very least, it seems obvious that Nightshade is utilizing Belle's memories to construct this dreamscape (sequencescape?), so it doesn't seem outlandish that Belle's own psychology could be factoring in here. After all, some of Dalton's questions or bits of wisdom seem oddly divorced from any conceivable motives on Nightshade's part. He seems genuinely concerned for her, as if his perspective really is part of the constructed reality here. Or maybe I'm just not seeing the whole picture.
I guess we'll see.
Come on plot device, do your magic...
That's it. She's still sequenced in and I think it's Madame Nightshade that's fucking with her to get information. Replacing a reality with an even worse one so she will accept a better one and once Belle starts talking to "Pilate" there...I think she's still on that table with Phoenix and Kera nearby....I hope. If it's true that means I hope Nightshade dies just as horribly as Shell, lol.
Thing is, I expect Pilate to have eyes and vision. But as Nasty Mister said, that might be expected of him from her. I mean, if the crash which supposedly damaged her horn happened somehow else, why not have it keep Pilate's vision? Obviously still a dream though, IC wouldn't dare start a series, and completely flip the objective, protagonist, etc., over 500 chapters in.
Is Nightshade trying to give Belle an image of a war free world to sway her to her side, or something? Nighty wants above all else (ostensibly) to end the war, and now in Belle's vision/sequence/whatever it has been over for years. Things are relatively peaceful, relatively safe. Not sure how that would factor into everything, just seemed like a bit of a coincidence.
Well, all caught up once again, and I'm even more on the edge of my seat than ever. As always, thanks for a great (and twisty) story. Until tomorrow!
Pilate won't be blind.
Oh god, oh my god
Dat ultimate mindfuck
IIIIIt's Dashie's 12th Marathon Evaluation Time!!!!!!!!!!!!
And now we're going to meet dream Pilate. What with everything being so perfect in this world...I'm willing to bet that he isn't blind anymore. Also...everything is falling into place. This world is plausible. And that only makes me even more frightened of what is to come...These are my thoughts so far.
-MASH
P.S. That's it, but I may do a few more.
Guess I was wrong about the zebra fetish thing then... guess it was kind of a long shot, ha!
In other news, this chapter was certainly interesting. Mainly due to the way in which Belle is being convinced that this reality is the real one.
What is Plates job?
Pilate won't be blind.
-Spirit
The trip is real.
bullshit c:
I actually think Pilate will still be blind here. Though I could easily be wrong. It would fit into this world/dream/reality if he could see.
and yea, this is quite plausible. it could still be reality. not giving up hope.
So Pilate is alive here indeed...
god, I can't even think anymore. I'm just along for the ride now.
Gah!
5809339 of course he is. That's the hook. The trick to make her want this world to be real as opposed to just suspecting it might be.
It's a trap!
I want to get off Nightshade's wild ride!
Getting some maaaaaaajor Inception vibes here.
BWAAAAAAAAAMMMMMMM
Getting all Platonic here.
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For all we know he's the meat cleaver who chops up Angels
Nope it's not real. I telling you it's not real shell has her in a machine.
Don't tell them anything Belle
It's a trap!
If this is fake I wonder who is doing it? I am pretty sure that to create your own world in the landscape you need like the mind power of 100 ponies all focusing as one due to the sheer complexity.