The chirping of birds stirs the two mares, and the light of early dawn casts its weary rose fingertips into the blissful room. Twilight Sparkle, laying close to another pony, opens her eyes to a surprise both wonderful and heartbreaking. Applejack, her close friend, lay next to her, deep into the throes of a merry dream. The voice, Menti as Twilight had named it, stirs her further from the comfort of endearing sleep. "Twilight, why would you risk our safety and sleep with another pony?" Twilight, remembering that others couldn't hear the voice, mutters that quietly. "I'm not sleeping with her! I just... just..." Menti, not phased by the feign Twilight was putting up, continues to inquire. "Your pheromone levels are unnaturally high, Twilight. Are you attracted to this mare? That's not normal, Twilight." As the lavender mare walks out the door, she raises her voice. "Neither is having another person in your head!" That shuts up the voice for a couple of seconds. Then, as soon as Twilight had calmed down, Menti speaks up again. "You can't have offspring with that pony. Why should you feel that way toward her?" That breaks the unicorn, who grips the sides of her head tightly in the clefts of her hooves. "I DONT LOVE HER! DAMNIT, LEAVE ME ALONE!" The voice, taking her anger and siphoning it into comedy, laughs, and then goes silent. It remains silent for a while, and Twilight begins to wonder if she really was crazy. She starts to worry that it was gone forever, and that Applejack would think she was just a crazy mare. "Haha! I knew you loved her! You just needed to think about it yourself, unprovoked!" The unicorn is caught by surprise, and doesn't even feel angry or sad that the voice is still there. "Twilight..." The obsessive unicorn, eager to hear what Menti had to say, responds briskly. "Yes, what is it Menti?" The voice pauses for a while, seemingly reflecting on knowledge that they shared. "... Don't ask me to leave you alone. I can't leave you alone, because I am you. I am you looking into a mirror. They all see you, but only you see me." It pauses again, and speaks, this time with more rasp to its voice. "Also, there is something you really need to consider. When you get mad, I get mad. When you get scared, I get scared. Be cautious of what you do; because I am directly affected by your actions." Twilight, now not as mad as she was, looks up from her angry run. She is far from her house, farther than she had ever dared to go on foot. The Everfree Forest stands like a green wall before her, and that was at the outskirts of Ponyville. She shakes her head, and just as she does so, Twilight hears a distinctive sound. No, she hears a voice, a southern voice, carried thick on the morning wind. Twilight turns, and sees Applejack, standing a couple hundred yards away. The unicorn is crying, but they are not tears of sadness; rather, they are tears of joy.

"I'm sorry Applejack. I should have told you earlier. It just isn't fair, keeping these things from friends as close as you." The tan earth pony, still processing what Twilight had told her, sits in a chair across the room. "So, y'all tellin' me that ya' got some voice in your head, an' it sometimes... takes over?" The unicorn, tracing back to that part of the conversation, tries dearly to simplify it, to preserve what little sanity they both still retained. "Yes. Yes, it takes over. I don't know how it got.. up there... but it's just.. there." She sighs, and pushes back her unkempt purple mane. It has been about six hours of Twilight trying desperately to explain her predicament to Applejack, and Applejack taking it all in. And then it hit Twilight. Applejack, headstrong and defiant, was probably not absorbing a single word of this. The earth pony was probably shunting it off, like a tin roof sheds rain. Applejack was also never one to deal well with big ideas, and was very simplistic in her mannerisms. Why on earth should Twilight turn to someone like her, for a problem like this. "Applejack, are you alright?" The mare was quivering, face blushed around the cheeks and paled everywhere else. Applejack was shuddering, like she had a bomb in her chest and wanted to scream, but screaming would set it off. "Twi?" Twilight looks endearing at her companion, and tries her best to hide her worries. "Yes, Applejack?" The earth pony turns to her, her eyes large, round, black mirrors, rimmed with emerald. "When y'all was with that stallion..." She starts to shudder more violently, and Twilight considers going to comfort her, but as she gets up, she begins to shake worse. "... It made me feel somthin' that I never thought I'd feel before." Her eyes open, showing clear-as-day, her instability. "Ah felt jealous of him. As wrong as it sounds, I were jealous of that stallion." Twilight Sparkle looks at her companion, with a look of both confusion and understanding. "Why on earth would you be jealous of that dirtbag? He was insane!" Applejack; feeling even more nauseous that the pressure was back on her, decided that it was about time to let her guard down, to let her true colors fly. Twilight had told her secrets; it would be just wrong not to tell hers. "Twilight, Ah'v felt this way fer way too long. I jes' couldn't fix myself to tell ya'. I know how wrong it sounds, and Celestia if it don' make me a fillyfooler, but..." Applejack looks up once again, with tears rimming her eyes, streaking down her rose visage and wetting her cheeks. "Ah love you, Twilight. Ah always have."

(OMG CHAPTER 7 BABY! I never thought this story would get this far, but Lo and Behold, Here is Chapter 7 of Blessings Of Misery. I'm proud to say that this story has hit 500 views, and as such, am very, very happy! I hope to have chapter 8 in as soon as I can stop crying over how heart wrenching this chapter is. Anyways, here is a little present from my editor that signifies our 500 view cap!)

Darkness, it seems,

Plagues me even in my dreams,

Twisting and tearing my mind at the seams.

Light, alludes me,

Screaming and thrashing to be free,

I'll break out, you all will see.

Scream my name,

It's all you know,

Play my game,

You can't let go,

Fight and scream,

Kick and shout,

Fall into my dream,

Go ahead, tire yourself out.

Then you'll be mine.