Reignite

"Well...well are you enjoying yourself?" A voice echoed out laced with a bitter tone, "Are you having fun in your own delusions? Walking around believing someones lies?"

"Lies? What lies?" The mare cried out, "You've got some damned nerve accusing me of living a lie!"

"Heh, I can't say I don't blame you..." The voice continued, "It's a happy lie at the very least...a loving family...a cute daughter who you would move heaven and earth for...and a farther who can be there for her...far much better of what I had to deal with." The voice sounded remorseful, lamenting over something that happened in the past. "But that changes nothing...I can't have you going around pretending someone you're not."

"Just what are you babbling on about man!" The mare demanded. "Who are you?"

"Do you really not recognize my voice?" The voice laughed, "You of all people should know me best...No...I don't think you know me at all and yet I know everything about you and what you have done in my absence!" The voice was nothing short of angry. "I don't know what ever that...thing did to me, but I will not allow some impostor take away my life...my future...MY VERY IDENTITY AWAY FROM ME!!!"

"If anyone is the impostor here it's you and your twisted mind games!" The mare yelled back, "Just who the hell do you think you are!?"

A man in his mid twenties stood before the mare, blue eyes looked down at her with a look of contempt. His other features was obscured by a simple gray mask, the only other detail the mare could make out was dusty blonde hair.

"My name is Mark Geary..." I introduced myself, "And I am the person you are pretending to be...though whatever that thing did to me, it took a part of me and made you." I snapped my fingers and in place of the mare in front of me was a woman of my height, with the same hair and eye color as mine. She was gazing at me with an angry glare.

"What did you do to me!" She demanded, "Just what did you do to my body?"

"Wasn't your body to begin with...hell this isn't even your mind!" I returned her glare. "This is my mind, my body and what I want is what you and that thing took from me!"

"I don't even know what that is!" She screamed at me, "What ever this thing did to you isn't worth taking out on me!"

"No...No I suppose not..." I replied, "But the fact doesn't change that you have something that was originally mine and I want it back."

"..." She went quiet, "Is that why you have that mask on?"

"Yes..." I answered, "I've always wore a mask of some sort, even here in my own mind...wear it too long it becomes a part of you."

"...No you're not me!" She screamed, "I would never do such a thing to myself!" I grabbed her by the throat, she let out a gasp when I did so.

"I told you that it isn't the case!" I shouted at her enraged, "If anything YOU are MY shadow! You do not get to choose that! Why should you have all that happiness when I get nothing! I will not have some god damned impostor living my life!"

"...F-fuck...you!" She spat out. "Why...don't you take off that...fucking mask...and face me like...a man!"

"Heh..." I chuckled bitterly as I tossed her aside, "Alright then I'll humor you." I removed the mask covering my face and felt a change wash over me. My impostor just watched on with the change, and soon enough she looked at me.

"N-no...you look just like me..." She said with disbelief, staring at a woman who looked just like herself.

"My name is Marcia Geary..." I reintroduced myself, "This is the real me, my real self that I have hidden behind this mask."

"No! This isn't possible! You're not me!" She screamed refusing to believe her own eyes.

"Do you know what this mask is made of?" I asked, she shook her head in response. "It is made of the one thing you lack and I don't." I continued, "It's negativity, hardship, anger and my very own hatred. It is literally the side of me that I had to embrace to keep myself strong and it's the cause of all my own inner demons."

"..." She continued to say nothing.

"Have you figured it out yet?" I asked, "What you have that was taken from me?" She shook her head again.

"W-what is it?" She finally spoke.

"It's my very nature, who I am at my very core." I explained, "That thing should have destroyed me when he made you...but the funny thing is you can't erase a person heart, and I assure you he had a reason to do so."

"Why..." She asked.

"Because he didn't want anyone to suffer like he did." I answered, "As far as I could tell, but in doing so he gave us all a choice...at least that's what he told me."

"What choice?" She pleaded, "Please tell me what choice!"

"Of what to do with you." I answered grimly, "A test to see if I could take back what's mine by force, or if I could convince you to accept who you are."

"B-but...my daughter...Shane..." I sighed.

"I'm not going to kill you..." I reassured her, "You are a part of me at the end of the day, and I just don't have it in me to kill someone."

"Something...deep down...here..." She points to her heart, "Tells me you're right." The mask in my hands began to crack.

"That's what I wanted to hear." I explained, "You have to understand as we both are now we aren't whole. All that hate and rage you lack...all that negativity it's a part of you and you need to accept that and rise above it."

"And what about you?" She asked, a question I've been waiting so long for someone to ask me.

"I need to accept that I don't need to wear a mask, that I don't need to hide myself from the world...that I'm not like my father and just be my own person." I answered her, "I need to accept myself both the good and the bad." The mask cracked again in my hands starting to crumble apart. "I know it's going to be hard...it never is, but if I make a mistake I'll learn from them."

She urged me to go on not noticing she was fading away...

"It's not weak to cry, to be upset at something, I don't want to be cold to people...I don't want to push the people I love away..." I admitted feeling something wet run down my cheeks, "I don't want to be alone...to be someone who doesn't hold any value in the people around me, but I don't want to be someone who can't stand on her own two feet."

"I-I'm glad..." The woman said fading away a bit more, "Even if it was just for a little while...I had someone who loved me for simply being me...but I had no right taking all that away...to deny myself who I really was."

"I know..." I replied sitting down beside her, "But I guess we both needed this we both needed to face ourselves...I meant what I said you'll just be returning to who we originally were...you are my heart after all."

"..." She said nothing, "You know I can't even remember my name anymore."

"It's Marcia," I told her, "It always has been, but I guess everyone is going to be calling me that from now on." I joked, "Like I said you're me, just without all the negativity I do."

"Was it worth it?" She asked, "Being whole and feeling all that misery and anger again."

"It will be in the long run." I reassured her, "It'll be hard but It'll be worth it in the end."

"Your mask is fading..." She pointed out.

"I know..." I said sadly, "After this I'll not be able to wear it ever again, it's part of the price I have to pay to be whole again." There wasn't much of my reflection left now, but there was enough for me to see her shed one last tear. "For what it's worth I'm sorry..." The mask and my doppelganger finally faded away from nothing, leaving me alone in this empty canvas of my own mind.

I let out a bitter laugh I knew what I just did would cost me in the long run, what little magic I had was even less now...but at least I was myself again.

Funny how things work out...I lost my masculinity out there waking world against my own will, and now I'll never be take on my form male again in my own mind.

It's gonna get a bit awkward between myself and Shane for a while, what can I say he's more or less fucking me while that doppelganger was in control...no who am I kidding she was still me...at least some part of me.

What am I going to do...I have her memories as well as my own true memories now. I'm a mother...a mother to a child I gave birth to...that hooded man said he had changed it so she was my biological daughter.

What kind of frightening power does he possess to do something like that? He may look it but he's not human...at least not anymore.

I'll just have to take it one day at a time...because I think it's about time I woke up...