Not Another Good Guy

by 8542Madness

Rating: teen
Tags: Human, Main 6, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Other, Princess Luna, Princess Celestia
Length: 58543

What makes a good man? What defines a bad man? Which am I? I know that I used to be evil, but I don't know anymore. Can I change? Does my past still define me? Can I ever be considered good after all I have done?

Everyone asks themselves this question at least once in their lifetime: Who am I? Few mean it literally. Even fewer get an answer. I may just be the only one who wishes he could forget.

Unfortunately, I started this story before the season four ending. Keep that in mind when reading.
Story contains mild language and serious violence. If that bothers you, read something else.
11/13/14: This was featured. You all have odd choices in literature.

Just to be clear, this story is my actual first attempt at writing fiction. I'm extremely new to all this, as you'll see. That said, I'm writing these stories because I want to improve. Whether or not you enjoy the story, please leave a comment. It's the only way I can get better at this. Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy.

Ah, jeez. This story. Yeah, I'm not continuing this. Ever. I can't even look at it without being embarrassed. I'll leave it up but don't expect updates or a revisit to this. I'm truly grateful to those who read it and commented, though. It really helped me improve. Thanks, everyone.

Published 2013-11-25 00:50:02 UTC
Last updated 2014-11-14 00:15:59 UTC

Chapter 1: Awakening

My eyes opened to see a vibrant blue sky above me. Pain throbbed in my skull. I did not perceive any of this with any level of cognizance, as my mind was as blank as a newborn's. I felt my mind grasping for the information and memory that should have been there, thoughts and words to describe the scenario I was in, but there was nothing but pain. Pain needs no words to describe it nor any past experience to associate with. Pain was my world until the nameless blue faded and I passed out.

A voice sounded in the darkness. "Well, it worked! Er, sorta. Hello? Are you in there?"

The following silence would have been deafening if I had been able to comprehend it.

"Oh, it looks like I forgot to replace your brain. Silly me! Let's see here... Physical control?" I felt my body twitch slightly. "Check. Survival instinct?" I suddenly felt very hungry and thirsty. "Check. Communication and language?" Nothing. "Nope, can't forget that!" For a few moments, an itching sensation ran through my entire being. It faded a moment later and I felt clarity enter my mind. My thoughts began to form coherent sentences again. Now that I could think, I listened to the voice that was rambling on in my mind.

The voice was male. It was deep, but not very much so. The voice sounded mischievous yet soothing at the same time. Some fragment of my mind recognized it as the voice of someone with a silver tongue, a characteristic I had learned to identify quickly in those I met. At least, I think I did so.

Enough listening. "Hey! Who are you and where are we?" I shouted at the voice. At least, as close as I could get to shouting in my mind. Wait, what is shouting anyway?

The strange voice disregarded me completely and continued rambling for a while. After some time, I felt his attention return to me.

"So, you're awake."

"Yeah, and you didn't answer my question."

He chuckled. "So I didn't. You need not concern yourself with who I am, and you'll find out where you are soon enough. Right now, your mind is in a fragile state. I don't have enough time to fix you, so you'll need to help yourself for a while."

With that I heard a loud SNAP and a bright light filled my vision. I jolted upright from where I had been laying on my back. The moon was shining brightly above. I wasn't sure, but I didn't think the moon was normally that vibrant.

I turned to get a better look at my surroundings. I appeared to be in a peaceful grove in a forest. The scenery was quite picturesque. Even at night, the world looked bright and colorful and sounded rich and full of life. The grove itself was open to the sky above. It had a little creek running right through the middle and luscious foliage edging the clearing.

"Wow, I wish I had my camera," I said to myself. No sooner had the words left my mouth that an annoying buzzing filled my head. "Wait, what is a camera anyway?" I shook my head and decided to think about something else. It was at this point I realized just how little I knew about anything.

"I know that this is grass," I muttered as I ran my hand along the ground beside me, "and I know that those are trees, which are part of a forest." The strange feeling returned. "But who am I? Where am I? Do I live here? Is anyone else here?"

I stood up to get a better appreciation of my surroundings. I don't know why I stood, it just came naturally to me. So did my movement, which I also began without thinking. It was a very strange method of transportation. At least I think it was. I would almost be falling over forward, but my lower appendages would rush forward and catch me in time to continue the momentum forward.

"Walking! That's what it's called!" The word seemed to simply appear in my mind along with it's meaning. Proud of my accomplishment, I walked around the edge of the small grove. I noticed something lying on the ground. It was made of a sturdy material and had multiple openings on it that seemed to somehow be closed. As if my limbs were moving on their own, I reached forward with my strange upper limbs and curled my little stubby things around a strap on the object, then slung the straps over my back and put the limbs through the straps.

"Why did I do that? What the heck is this thing anyway?"

A bolt of pain lanced through my head. A blur of sound and images swept through my thoughts and then ended as soon as it had began.

The sudden outburst of thoughts startled and confused me.

"These things... I must have known them at some time. Why don't I remember more of them? What is going on here?"

My thoughts drifted back to the voice in my head. While he certainly hadn't been helpful, he was right about one thing. I was going to have to help myself until I could find someone. Judging by the forest I was in, that might not be for quite some time. Due to the relative brightness of the stars and the loud noises of the woodland creatures, I was able to conclude that I was far away from any of the paths-that-guide-metal-on-wheels or the big-building-clusters that polluted the sky.

I instinctively grasped my head in pain and tried to remain standing. That's when I noticed an odd smell in the small clearing. It drowned out my thoughts and made my head spin, making it even more difficult to not fall over. Thankfully, the wind shifted direction and I could breathe and think clearly once more.

I had no idea what direction to go in, no knowledge of the land (or any knowledge, for that matter), and no clue as to what I was doing. Needless to say, it sucked. I spent a good amount of time walking in circles just trying to decide which direction I should go, or if I should even move at all.

"I shouldn't stay here. Who knows what could happen to me in the middle of the forest in the dead of night?" said the worried part of my mind.

"I shouldn't move from here. I don't know where I'm going and there might already be somebody out here looking for me. Leaving could just cause more problems than it solves," said the logical part of my mind.

The foul smell clouded my thoughts again. It wasn't so bad this time since I knew what to expect, but that didn't mean it was any less revolting. It tickled my nose quite a bit, and I let out a loud sneeze that shattered the silence of the clearing.

Wait a minute... Something's wrong here. I looked apprehensively around the clearing again. Just as before, nothing to worry about. It was just an empty, quiet clearing. I was about to blame this on paranoia when the feeling got stronger.

I took a step away the trees and back into the center of the clearing. I heard twigs snapping beneath my feet. The sound they gave off was startling in the tense silence. That's when it made sense.

What happened to all those woodland creatures that had just been making so much noise?

I got my answer as two forms emerged from a particularly dense clump of bushes. They were quite large and extremely intimidating. They were also familiar, and I felt the tug on my mind that signified a missing memory. At the same time, there was something about them that wasn't familiar. Was it the predatory stance? Maybe it was the wooden body?

I gasped in pain and fell slightly to the right. It was a good thing I did, because the wolf lunged and barely missed me. I would have been wooden wolf chow if I had moved a second later. The two circled around me, seeming to wait for something. Then I realized something else was odd about these wolves. The animals I knew of that name hunted in large packs, not pairs.

As if the universe simply wanted to spite me, five more wolves appeared from the thicket. It was at this point that I rediscovered the most basic of instincts.

And so I ran. I didn't choose any particular direction. All I focused on was staying out of the jaws of the wolves, which I was doing very well. It was made easier by the thick foliage and branches that littered the forest. While the wolves had to sacrifice speed on every turn and obstacle, I hardly lost any momentum.

As the forest began to thin out, the wolves gained the advantage. I had less opportunities to force them to turn and less obstacles to throw in their way. A cold weight settled on me when I realized that they were closing in all around me, and things only got worse from there.

I was forced to run straight forward since they had circled around me, and they had chose their direction wisely. A large, empty field stretched out before me, and I was being herded right into it. Out there with no way for me to use my superior agility, their sheer speed would overwhelm me.

It turns out that they didn't need speed. I burst out onto the open field to realize that there were two more wolves already waiting for me. I turned to run the other way, but was quickly closed in a circle of wolves. I had failed. I had come this far just to die. There was nothing left that I could do.

Or is there? The thought sprung my mind back into action. The wolves aren't fleeing. They are coming after me. What if I did that to them?

As the first wolf leaped at me, I tested this new idea. My hand slammed down on top of the wolf's head in midair and it crashed to the ground. I quickly stomped on it and it shattered into pieces.

That... That felt good. What is this?

Ignoring the throbbing in my head, I let myself settle into a better stance. I remembered this now. Shoulders back, fluid movements, slight crouch, hands up. All of it was natural to me.

The second wolf tried its luck and met the same fate as the other. My foot smashed into its side and it was woodchips. The rest of the pack met the same fate. Each one of them leaped and then fell to me. It took only moments for them all to be reduced to bits and peices. Satisfied, I turned and continued onward through the open field.

After a minute of walking, I could see more trees up ahead. As I got closer I noticed that they weren't like the forest trees from earlier. These trees were in neat rows and had shiny red things hanging on it that seemed to gleam even in the darkness of night. The only thing between me and those pretty trees was a small river. I stopped to admire it for a moment. Everything about it was amazing! The beautiful night sky, the crystal clear river, the babbling of water, the sudden rustling of the grass, the-

Rustling grass?

I turned around to be greeted by the pack of wolves that I had just beaten. I wasn't given time to figure out what was going on as they all rushed me at once. With only a split second to move, I smashed one with my leg while throwing another behind me as I dodged out of their way. The rest of the wolves fell the same way.

Then, to my horror, they got back up. As the one directly at my feet started to regenerate as if by some sort of magic, I kicked it into the river. I got ready to fight it another time, but the pieces of the wolf swirled around in the water and were unable to join together again.

Perfect.

I waded up to my knees in the water as the remaining wolves eyed me warily. One of them took a few steps into the river, but swiftly turned back upon entering the current. The wolves knew better than to try their luck in the water.

"Sorry guys, but I win this round. Better luck next time, woodchips!" I said with a good laugh. I shook the water off of me on the other side of the river and smiled. Things were going very well, considering that I knew nothing. I had no plan, no memory, and no clue what I was doing. Still, just moving around made me feel... something. I couldn't remember what it made me feel. The feeling was comforting, so it didn't really matter if the feeling had a name or not. What really mattered was finding civilization, and the orderly trees in front of me were a clear sign that I was not far from finding it.

I wandered through the tree fields for a while, aimlessly searching for any other life. After about half an hour of seeing what seemed to be the exact same trees no matter where I walked, I started to get a little worried. That's when the universe decided it would be funny to make me absolutely panic.

It started small. I could swear that I saw some tiny blur fall from the sky every once in a while. I began seeing it more and more often as time went on. I realized that it was water when one of them landed on my arm. Yeah, water. From the sky. That freaked me out.

Did the sky break or something? If water is falling from the sky, then what will happen to all of the land?

Then the water fell faster and faster. My breathing became rapid and I frantically began running, searching for some kind of way out of this sky-water. After a few minutes, I found salvation in a small shack up in a tree. There was a convenient ramp that let me run straight up to the door and inside as quickly as possible. Here, I could relax. The sky-water wouldn't get me now.

I took a deep breath to calm my nerves then took in my surroundings. The room was simple. A desk in the corner, a table, a nice fuzzy thing covering the wood floor, two windows, and a few boxes. Curious, I opened the boxes up. Inside one of them was a ridiculous amount of whoopee cushions and stink bombs. Another had a large amount of art supplies. One box in particular caught my attention. The only thing in the box was a bunch of red fabrics. The material was surprisingly soft, so I threw one in my backpack. Who knows what I could use it for later?

I went ahead and threw the rest of the fabrics on the ground, making it soft enough for a good night's sleep. I was starting to feel a bit worn out from all of the running and fighting that had been required of me, and it wouldn't hurt to rest. I certainly wouldn't be going back out into that sky-water anytime soon. Tomorrow would come, and I would be ready to face it with a well rested mind.

Unless it had sky-water. That stuff was scary.

Author's Note

Author's notes. Who reads those, right?

Well, apparently you do, but that's not important. What is important is that you haven't abandoned my story yet. Thanks. I've been working on improving this as I go.

Unfortunately for you, these improvements aren't really visible until after Chapter Six, which is a decent chunk of words and four confusing plot points away from this chapter. I don't expect you to put up with bad writing for that long to get to something decent. Feel free to bail out now.

If you do decide to keep reading my story, Thanks! I promise that I will never stop trying to improve my writing as this continues.

That all said, please leave a comment letting me know what you think at some point. I thrive on feedback, so don't be shy! It's the only way I'll improve.

Chapter 2: Into the Orchard

BOOM

I jolted awake at the explosion of sound. I leaped up and looked around wildly for the sound, my mind on full alert. I could feel every heartbeat pass as I waited.

BOOM

I jumped again when this time the sound was accompanied by a powerful flash of light that disappeared just as it arrived. I cautiously edged to the window to look outside. It appeared to be early in the morning, but it was hard to tell as clouds had darkened the sky.

BOOM

I dove back onto my makeshift bed, covering my ears and shutting my eyes. My head was in agony, my heart felt like it was trying to escape from my chest, and my stomach wanted to reject whatever I last ate. On top of all this, the world outside was exploding! To make matters even worse, the sky-water was still falling! Now that I thought about it, the explosions might have something to do with the sky-water. Maybe the sound of the explosions was the sky breaking? It would explain why the water was falling everywhere.

BOOM

Rainbow Dash kicked the thundercloud again and again, lamenting the disruption of her sleep schedule. The storm had originated out in the wild everfree forest and had quickly began drifting towards Ponyville. It was her duty as weather manager to stop the rouge thunderstorm and protect the town, a duty that she took very seriously.

Once the cloud was bucked back into a normal raincloud, she moved onto another that was crackling with energy. Ears ringing from the booms, she beat cloud after cloud into submission until every last one of them was stable. Hovering above the storm, Rainbow Dash examined the results of her work.

Sure enough, she had beaten all the lightning out of the storm. The wind was still strong enough to be a problem, but there wasn't very much to be done about that without the entire weather team present. It would have to do.

Oddly enough, the sky stopped exploding after about ten minutes. The sky-water still fell at an alarming rate, but that didn't bother me as much in comparison. It was actually making a really soothing sound as it fell on the roof of the tree shack. I easily drifted off into slumber...

...Only to hear that strange voice again.

"Hey, I know you can hear me! This is important, so listen up!" I rolled my eyes.

"Hold up. I'm not listening to anything until I know exactly who you are and what is going on."

Despite my bravado, I knew I had no real grounds for demanding anything of him. I could only hope that he didn't come to that conclusion as well.

"Hmm... Fair enough. If I tell you then you agree to listen to me?"

I grinned. This is going much better than I thought it would. I may have actually outsmarted him! "Yes, I'll listen if you tell me."

"Alright. Who am I? I am a sentient being composed of millions of cells. What is going on? Right now we are having a conversation, but who knows what will happen next? As I was saying, this is important so-"

"Hey!" I gritted my teeth as I realized how easily I had fallen for the verbal trap. "That's not a fair answer!"

"Ha! If you wanted a fair answer than you should have asked for one. Now are you done interrupting?"

"Yeah, whatever. Just get on with it." I grumbled.

"You are discovering information too quickly. Stop thinking as much about things."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"You remember how every time you received some new memory, your head would hurt?" I nodded. "The spell I used to bring your memory back is unfinished. It is just a prototype, never meant to be used. If you remember too much at a time then it will literally burn up your brain."

"WHAT!? You mean to tell me that you zapped me with some crazy magic without knowing if it would actually work or if it would just kill me?"

"Hmm..." He almost sounded thoughtful for a minute, then replied, "That isn't quite how I would have said it, but yes."

I didn't expect that. I was sure he would try to convince me that I would be fine and not to worry. Instead he just confirmed my fears. Not too helpful, is he?

I called out to him again. "You gave me some memories earlier, why can't you just give me more like that?"

"Like I said, I don't want to burn you up."

"Why do you care if I die? What does it matter to you?" I regretted the words as they left my mouth. I could feel his emotions for a moment, as if he had accidentally let them slip. What I felt was guilt and shame. Just as they had appeared, the feelings were gone. He continued on as if nothing had happened.

"I suppose I can give you some more very basic information without soldering your little mortal mind. Don't come crying to me if your head explodes. Actually, please do. I would love to get a photo of that! Anyway, here's your precious memory."

I suddenly felt very foolish as I remembered what was happening outside the treehouse. Scared by some rain and lightning? What am I, a baby?

He addressed me once more. "I gave you the knowledge of ordinary things that you will see on an everyday basis. Try to be careful about how much you dig into your memories though, and avoid deep and complex thoughts. Shouldn't be too hard for you."

"Hey! I'm still here you know!"

"I wouldn't have said that if you weren't here. Now get up. You have slept for long enough. There's a whole world out there just waiting for you to mess with it!"

I awoke much more gently this time, immediately noticing the bright sunlight streaming through the window as it burned my eyes. Outside I could clearly see the midday sun blazing above without a cloud in the sky. The drastic change in weather was confusing, but I didn't pay much attention to it. I was fully focused on what I had missed the night before.

Apples. Tons of them. I didn't know much about myself, but I knew that I was hungry and that apples were good.

I used the fabric, which I now recognized as a cape, to gather up a bunch of the apples. I had assumed that I would need a good amount of them to fill me up, so I was surprised to find that I could barely finish just one. Whoever grows these apples really knows what they are doing. Hopefully they won't be too mad that I took some, but I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

Finished eating, I chose a random direction and started walking again. What really matters is finding someone. Who knows? Maybe they will even recognize me. They could just tell me who I am and I can go back to a normal life.

As time went on, I became increasingly lost in the trees and lost in my thoughts. There sure are a ton of trees here. Why apple trees though? Have they ever heard of variety? I heard a noise behind me, but attributed it to one of the many animals I had seen around already. This farm is huge, so I'm guessing that I am in the countryside or near a small town.

I heard the noise again. It sounded like wood that was under heavy strain. Curiosity got the better of me. Finding a town can wait a bit longer I guess. I turned around and headed toward the noise as it steadily got louder.

"Just a little more! Cmon, you're almost there!"

I arrived at the source of the noise to be greeted by a strange sight. There were three little horses trying to pull down a rope on a strange wooden contraption. I didn't care much about the wooden thing, those obviously intelligent horses had my full attention. At about three and half feet in height, they were multicolored with ridiculous hues on both their bodies and manes. The orange one had wings and the grey one had a horn, but the yellow horse didn't have anything strange about it. I don't think I have ever seen these kinds of creatures before, yet I cannot help but feel that they don't look right.

A crack brought my attention to the wooden device. Somehow, I knew exactly what it was. It was pure trouble in the form of a projectile launcher, the greatest weapon of the pre-gunpowder ages. It was a trebuchet.

It would have been impressive if there hadn't been a major flaw in its design. The supporting frame was not sturdy enough to support the weight being put on it and was cracking along one side.

"Look out!" I shouted at the horses as the frame shifted unnaturally and let out a loud shriek. Wait, that shriek was the orange one. It stared at me with wide eyes and screamed as it noticed me for the first time.

The frame shifted again with a crunch and the other two horses dove behind the boulder they had secured the rope to. A moment later a grey hoof pulled the still screaming orange horse behind as well. I had nowhere to hide as the frame snapped. It fell to the side and all hell broke loose. The rope snapped and the arm began its ascent as the counterweight did its job. A large piece of the base shot off directly towards my head. I dove to the dirt as it flew close enough to pull at my hair as I fell. The payload of the trebuchet was released prematurely as it was falling and soared straight up.

That's clever, clustered rocks. I noted as the rest of the wood fell and splintered. When the dust cleared, I could hardly believe my luck. I didn't have a single piece of wood lodged in me!

WHOOMP

I almost screamed in surprise when a large rock impacted the dirt directly in front of my face. I looked up again just in time to see its smaller companion falling to me. So much for good luck. I thought before everything went dark.

The three Cutie Mark Crusaders had been sure that they were going to get their cutie marks in siege warfare. Now it looked like they would get their cutie marks in murder and panic.

"Sweetie Belle, fix it with your magic or something!"

"Apple Bloom, you know that I don't know how!"

"Well what are we gonna do with it?" she retorted.

"AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!"

Both fillies turned to their still panicked friend and yelled, "SHUT UP, SCOOTALOO!"

Apple Bloom turned back to her only sane friend. "We can't just leave it here! Help me drag it to the house and find Applejack. Mah big sis will know what to do!"

Sweetie Belle's eyes widened in surprise. "Apple Bloom, do you know what this means? We could get our cutie marks in saving lives!"

"If ya keep running your mouth instead of helping me, we'll be getting our cutie marks in corpse disposal!" Apple Bloom looked over at Scootaloo, who was beginning to hyperventilate. "Cmon, he's just bleedin a bit," she said. Scootaloo's eyes widened even further as she stared at the blood. "Scootaloo? You ain't looking too good."

Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom watched as their friend paled even further and then passed out. "Apple Bloom, I'll carry Scootaloo. You can get the... thingy."

"Fine, just hurry up." She grumbled as she gripped the 'thingy' by the straps on its strange saddlebags and began to drag it towards the barn where Applejack and Big Mac would be repairing the doors. They had been damaged in the violent storm late last night and needed fixing right away.

Sweetie Belle situated Scootaloo on her back and walked up to Apple Bloom's side as they made their way to the barn, unaware of the significance of the injured creature they dragged along the ground.

Chapter 3: How Not To Make Good Impressions

I came back to reality to hear an angry voice barking out questions.

"...told you not to! What in the hay made y'all do it?"

"We're sorry, Applejack!"

"...siege warfare cutie marks..."

Just as I seemed to be coming around, I blacked out again. It was sometime later that my consciousness resurfaced.

"...anything like it..."

"...too much blood..."

"...should be dead."

That last statement managed to somewhat bring me out of my stupor. Dead!? Panic began to well up in my chest. My heart began to race and I heard more voices starting to become clearer.

"Get Fluttershy, she's the specialist on exotic creatures."

"Why can't we just fix him up with healing magic?"

"We already tried that, it's not working. Fluttershy's experience in nonmagical healing will be invaluable with this creature."

My senses were coming back, but only slightly. I could smell blood, and lots of it. Behind that was the smell of sterilization and antiseptics. I was fairly certain I had been in a place like this before. I tried to push myself up but my arms simply twitched in response.

"Sweet Celestia, it's moving!"

I could feel more of my body with every passing second. I sat up and opened my eyes but the glaring white of the walls blinded me.

"Keep it down, it's not safe to be moving!"

"Put it under!"

Uh-Oh. Before I could begin to protest I felt a sharp point stick into my leg and a cold feeling enter my body as something was injected into my blood. I fell back against what I assumed to be a bed as the cold spread through my body.

Wow. They used the good stuff. I chuckled to myself as I began to remember the last time I had been in a hospital. So close... to remembering... Too late for the memory to resurface, I fell back into the embrace of my induced coma.

It was some time later that I woke up for good. I braced myself for the harsh light to blind me, but it never came. I opened my eyes to find that only a small light on a desk in the corner and soft moonlight pouring in through the window. My head pounded as I sat up and gathered my bearings. The smell of blood was still present, though not to the same degree as it was before. I could see my backpack on the floor next to the bed and some lights on in the hallway outside. I reached up to scratch an itch on my head when my hand brushed cloth instead of flesh.

Curious, I carefully climbed out of the bed and over to the desk where a small mirror was placed and winced at my appearance. The cloth was a large bandage that wrapped around my entire head. It was soaked red from my blood. Against my better judgement I unraveled it and took it off to inspect the damage. What I found came as a shock.

Where is... well, anything? My head was curiously devoid of any bruises, cuts, or marks of any kind. I looked back at the bandage in my hand with my blood on it. How did I bleed without a wound? The more I began to assess the damage to my body, the more confused I became. How in hell did I survive a direct hit from a trebuchet without a single bruise?

I sighed, exasperated with this strangeness of it all. Why does the universe seem to take great joy in making me as completely confused as possible? I stared at the mirror again for a while until I felt tired again. Might as well get some sleep. It's not like staring at my reflection will do me any good. A yawn broke my thoughts. These creatures may have saved my life. I may as well stick around long enough to thank them, or at least learn more about them. Maybe they know me? As unlikely as it was, the hope that they could help me gave me reason to relax a bit as I climbed back into the bed.

The cool night air flowing in from the window felt perfect and the faint sound of a gentle breeze began to lull me into deep relaxation, until I looked out the window at the moon. For some reason, it unnerved me. That can't be the moon. I can't explain why but it just looks... different. The more I stared out the window at it the more frustrated I became with it.

It was then that I decided to try something new. Disregarding the advice of the mysterious voice, I steeled myself for the incoming headache and began probing my mind for a memory of the moon. After five minutes, my only discovery was disappointment. It seems that I can't recover my memories on my own.

Cursing my predicament, I rolled onto my other side so that the sight of the moon wouldn't bother me as I fell asleep. Sleep came quickly, likely due to the near death experience with the trebuchet and the 'not really bleeding' blood loss.

I felt great when I woke up in the morning. It may have had something to do with it being the first time I fell asleep by my own choice without a crazy voice in my head.

I heard voices in the hallway approaching the door. An instinct of some kind kicked in and I fell back into the bed, pretending to be asleep. Without even meaning to I had slowed my breathing and lowered my heart rate. When did I learn to do that? Before I could contemplate my actions further, the door opened and I heard two voices enter the room.

"Thank you for coming, Ms. Fluttershy. We're at our wits end with this one. None of our healing magic works and Redheart is out on vacation for the week, so we figured that you were the right pony for the job." So I wasn't going crazy yesterday, they really are a society of intelligent animals.

I felt something poke my side as the voice spoke up again. "I just hope we didn't mess up anything."

"Oh, I'm sure you did fine. Just look at how peaceful it is."

If any voice could melt hearts, this one had the potential to liquefy everyone within a mile. I almost felt guilty for tricking her into thinking I was asleep. Almost.

"Where did you find such an adorable creature?" I suddenly found it difficult not to smile. Aww, she thinks I'm adorable. Wait, what? Snap out of it, man!

"Oh no, we didn't find it. Applejack brought it in after some sort of incident with the crusaders." The voice let out a heavy sigh. "They were arguing about siege warfare again. I thought they learned their lesson after the ballista incident. Anyway, the major concern we had last night was the large wound across the forehead and the cracked skull."

WHAT?

Unaware of my imminent panic, he continued. "The skull fracture is not too severe, but it certainly was worrying. It was the amount of blood lost that had us most concerned. The creature really gave our cleaning team a workout with how much he bled out."

I felt gentle hooves pull the bandages off of my head. "Umm, I don't want to be rude, but I don't see anything."

"What do you mean?" The first pony got closer. "Strange. Later I'll go and check the log to see if somepony tried another healing spell after I left the creature with the nighttime staff. Sorry to bring you out here on such short notice for it to end up being nothing."

"That's alright. I'm glad that it isn't hurt after all," she said. She then paused for a moment, as if in thought. "What is it anyway?"

"Sorry, we have no idea."

Crap. There goes any hope I had of these ponies knowing who I am.

Suddenly the door swung open and another pony rushed into the room. "I can't believe nopony came to me about this sooner! The discovery of a new species is far too momentous of an occasion for me to miss. How is the thing anyway?"

"The creature is faring surprisingly well. We are just guessing at this point, but it appears to be fully healed and in perfect condition." The nurse replied.

"Oh. Well, I had hoped to dissect it, but I can still study it alive. It's good that the creature is doing so well."

Study me? Like some kind of dumb animal? I don't think so! I remained still as the three chatted about various things, seemingly unconcerned with the fact that they had a strange creature in the same room. Eventually, their conversation drifted to other topics that were meaningless to me. Missing ponies, a brother working for some sort of royal guard, and something about a 'party' were discussed. Thankfully, they left the room after a couple more minutes of idle chatter.

As soon as I was sure that they were far enough away to not hear me, I leaped out of the bed and grabbed my backpack before dashing to the window. I threw it open and looked outside. Thankfully, there wasn't anyone around to see what I was about to do. Carefully, I climbed out and stood on the windowsill. In a sudden burst of incredible finesse and grace, my foot slipped off the edge of the windowsill and sent me tumbling downward. Somehow, my shoe managed to come off and hit me in the face on the way down.

Just as I had resigned myself to becoming a chunky splatter on the ground, the impossible happened. As if I had been doing it all my life, I quickly righted myself in the air before I hit the ground feet first and rolled. I pulled out of the roll and came to a perfect standstill in the grass three floors below where I had started. Where the heck did past me learn to do that?

A moment later my shoe caught up with the fall and bounced off my head, interrupting my train of thought. As I went to pick it up, something odd caught my eye. During the fall, a large amount of small sticks with red points on them had come loose from somewhere in the shoe and were scattered in the grass around me. Putting my shoe back on, I knelt to pick one up and examine it closer.

I instinctively dropped them right away. I felt something stirring inside me at the thought of fire. It was a dark, impulsive desire mixed with pain and fear. I realized after a few moments that I must have been kneeling there for a decent amount of time, and shook my head to clear out the strange feelings.

"Lock down the building! Dangerous creature on the loose!" I suddenly heard a voice blare over the building's intercom. Looking back up, I saw the face of the purple pony peek out from the window and look right at me.

"Stop, creature!" the purple one yelled from the window.

"You forgot to say please!" I yelled back.

Her jaw seemed to drop a considerable distance, and she said, "It can talk?" just barely loud enough for me to hear. I rolled my eyes and started running. I was not going to be studied, thank you very much!

Alright, it's time get out of here. Where the heck do I go? I could either go back into the forest (not happening) or I could push through the town and hope for the best (bad idea). With no time to think I settled for the latter and poured on the speed. I passed right through what must have been the town square and nearly gave all the ponies a heart attack. I grinned as I passed the startled groups. I wish they could see the looks on their faces. This is too funny!

My glee was dampened as I looked behind me to see a small group chasing after me with the purple one leading the charge. They were quickly gaining ground on me even as I ran at a full sprint. Time to change the playing field. I turned sharply and ran through an alleyway. I came out the other side and quickly chose another alley at random before rushing through it as well. Just like the wolves, they outmatch me in raw speed but don't stand a chance against my agility.

After a few more alleys, it became clear that I had lost them. I'm not in the clear yet. I can't stay in the town, but where can I hide? It was then that I noticed a familiar sight of apple trees. I may as well work with familiar territory.

The sun was setting as I made my way through the trees, hoping to find that treehouse again. Instead I came across a large clearing with an old barn and a weathered and beaten house.

I suppose that a rundown house is better than none at all. Might as well- Movement in the house caught my eye and I dove back behind a tree. I hope they didn't just see me. With no further movement in the house, I set my sights on the only other building. Alright then, the barn it is.

I waited until night had fallen to make my way over to the barn. I reached the door and was about to enter before deciding against it. I experimentally gave a light push on the door and was rewarded with an explosion of sound from the hinges. Good thing I didn't barge in this way. Thankfully the windows were not as bad and I managed to enter the barn without any further noise. Closing the window behind me, I observed the interior of the barn.

As my eyes adjusted to the dark it became clear that the barn had seen better days. The wood was old and falling apart from years of wind and rain. The interior was filled with machinery and farm equipment that was covered in a thick layer of dust. The barn had a loft that was empty so I decided it was as good a place as any to get some rest.

I pulled one of the capes from the treehouse out of my backpack and used it as a blanket while I rested my head on the backpack. It wasn't luxurious, but at least it was a roof above my head and a somewhat decent place to sleep.

Just as I was getting comfortable, a voice yelled from outside. "We know you are in there, monster!" I think I liked 'creature' better. I peeked over the edge of the window to see a small group of ponies. They wore dented armor that was missing some pieces and were armed with bent short swords that were so dull they probably couldn't cut butter. It must have been a local militia of about twenty. Even if they had no experience with those worn down weapons, I had no hope of getting past them all. In front of the group was a brown pony with a hourglass tattooed on its flank.

"Come out slowly and surrender!"

"What's with the sudden hostility?" I shouted back.

The surprise on his face was absolutely delightful to witness.

"I'm just doing my job. Come on out here and surrender peacefully so we can get this over with."

I chuckled. "What are you going to do if I don't, Timebutt?"

His face reddened as he went livid in response to his new nickname. I could only imagine his humiliation at being insulted by a strange creature in front of everyone. I did my best not to laugh out loud at him as he yelled, "Surrender now or we will use necessary force!"

I knew I had to stall for time until I could come up with something. "Sure, sure, I'm on my way out now."

I climbed down from the loft with the backpack on my back. The first thing I did was to push a piece of metal machinery part through the barn door handles. Why does the door have handles, anyway? They can't grab them with hooves. Anyway, I hope they aren't smart enough to use the window. If they do, I'm screwed. I desperately looked around for anything I could use to help me escape. Aside from the machinery, the only things there were a large pile of sawdust and a small catapult.

A small bit of memory tugged at the corner of my mind. Something about sawdust and fire. Without stopping to consider what I was doing, I ripped off my shoe and began investigating it. The matches from earlier had to have come from somewhere in there. When I looked closer at the back of the shoe, I noticed something odd. The heel on my left shoe had been stripped of padding and had been filled with miniature matches. There was also a convenient rough patch to light the match head on.

"What is going on in there?" I heard from outside.

I allowed myself to leap into action, not thinking but instead allowing my inner pyromaniac instincts to burst forth. The sawdust went into the catapult, which was aimed at the door of the barn.

"You agreed to come out and surrender, now do so and save us all the trouble."

I didn't bother to respond as I cranked the rope around the wheel of the catapult, securing it when it was taught enough. I'm not going to argue with how well this has gone, but past me had some serious issues with pyromania. I paused for a moment as my crazy grin grew wider. Maybe the backpack has some gasoline-

"That's it, you have taken long enough. We're coming in!" With no time to waste, I took the metal out of the door and kicked them wide open. I struck the match and threw it onto the sawdust pile, then released the rope. The sawdust shot out of the barn and the ponies dove out of the way. Timebutt had barely managed to get out of the line of fire (no pun intended) as the flame took hold and a giant fireball lit up the world.

The sawdust was consumed by the inferno and the flames died as quickly as they came. I strolled out the barn doors with a smile on my face. The ponies stared at me as I stepped out onto the scorched ground, seemingly unsure of how to react.

Sawdust is fun to set on fire. When compacted, sawdust does not have any interesting properties. The best thing about it is that when dispersed with enough oxygen and an open flame, it creates a massive fireball that disappears shortly after combustion. I had assumed, judging by the lower levels of technology I had seen in the town, that they would see the fireball as some sort of advanced power.

"Arrest that monster!" one of them shouted.

Okay, maybe they aren't so easily fooled. I turned and fled back into the barn, the only place I could go. As I passed the catapult I kicked some of the glowing ashes on the floor behind me to try to ward off anyone that was too close. That was the biggest mistake I had yet to make, barring anything from my lost past.

The kick itself was perfect. The natural curve of my foot scooped and flung burning ashes directly towards the militia pony that had gotten close. The dodge performed by the pony was equally beautiful. It was a clean roll directly out of the way of my projectile. This roll carried the pony to a harsh impact with a large pile of sawdust, which was flung into the air.

It only took a moment for me to see the danger. The ashes had been reignited by my kick, which had delivered it directly to oxygen and fuel in the sawdust now falling through the air.

"HIT THE DIRT!" I yelled as I dove straight through the pile of sawdust. My bound carried my directly into the pony already there and I shoved with all my strength. Just as I had shoved the pony away, heat seared my back. Orange dominated my vision as pain became my world. I thrashed in agony but nothing could save me from the inferno. It was a few moments later that I could no longer hold onto consciousness and let everything slip away into darkness.

Chapter 4: A Disturbing Dissection Discovery

Twilight paced around the library, thoughts running through her head at a million miles a second.

"How could I have been so stupid? I should never have assumed it was asleep."

"Uh-huh," said Spike as he watched her make her rounds. "If you keep pacing around the table, you'll wear a new moat into the floor." He could already see scuff marks that he was sure Twilight would have him getting rid of later.

"Spike! This is no time for joking around!"

"I'm not," he muttered as Twilight ignored him and continued berating herself.

"I may have just killed an entirely new species!"

Spike sighed with irritation. "Come on Twi, you know that creature did all that to itself. You didn't burn down the barn, it did."

"Yes Spike, but I'm the one who made the choice to alert the militia and tell them that we had a potentially dangerous creature on the loose. If I'd have just let him go, or even approached him on my own, then none of this would have happened. It's all my fault!"

A sudden knocking at the door interrupted them. Spike opened it to find the nurse from the hospital. "Twilight, it's the hospital pony."

He was immediately shoved out of the way as Twilight rushed to the door.

"Please tell me it's alright!"

The nurse grimaced and shifted awkwardly. Twilight simply looked at her hooves and wallowed in shame in the short silence that followed. After a few moments the nurse spoke.

"I'm sorry, Princess Sparkle, but the creature did not survive. It lingered for a while, unconscious, but did not recover from its wounds."

Twilight let out a deep sigh. "So... what now?"

He shrugged. "Last I checked, we didn't have many laws on corpse disposal for unidentified species. If nopony else has already done it, you could go and claim the body. You can still study it like you said you wanted to."

Twilight's face lit up at the thought, all previous concerns forgotten. "This is great! Spike, prepare my dissection supplies and some notes. We are about to perform a major contribution to the scientific community!"

Spike ran to do as she asked as she shoved past the confused nurse and made her way to the hospital. Twilight paused for a moment to shout, "FOR SCIENCE! I've always wanted to say that!" as other ponies stared at her in confusion.

The nurse looked back at Spike. "Does she always have such drastic emotional swings?"

"Yeah. You should see her when a book is put out of place on the shelf," Spike said.

"She's that extreme about it?" the nurse asked in disbelief. Spike did not even need to reply, as the look on his face said everything.

"Umm... alight then, I'll be off. Try not to let Twilight do anything too crazy with the creature, alright?"

One hour later, Twilight was ready to begin. It had been easy to get the body and transport it to the library basement. Of course she had banned Spike from watching; he would always be a baby dragon to her and she didn't know if he was ready to handle this big of a dissection. It could be... messy. That meant that she wouldn't have a helper, but she was confident in her ability.

With all preparations complete, Twilight levitated over the case of dissection tools and brought out the scalpel. It was obvious to see that Spike had not sharpened it like he was supposed to. It was an easy fix though, and she cast a spell to sharpen the edge. Twilight used her magic to bring a floating light closer as she brought the scalpel forward. The edge touched the creature's burnt flesh and-

Twilight gasped and nearly lost control of her magic, causing the light to wobble and the case to spill its contents. She checked again but found the same thing as before. Its chest rose and fell, albeit ever so weakly. It was still breathing.

I'm not sure how long I was out. I woke up feeling really funny all over and there was a really bright light all around me. It seems that I have died and gone to heaven. I chuckled weakly. Looks like somebody made a clerical error at the gates.

"Holy horseapples, it's alive! Okay Twilight, just calm down. Just calm down. Just calm down...”

"Repeating it won't change a thing," I remarked as I pushed at the light. It went out a moment later and my close surroundings came into view. Something smelled funny but I didn't stop to think about it. "What the hell did you do?"

She scoffed indignantly at me. "I could ask you the same thing! You burnt down a barn and put a pony in the hospital!" She stopped a moment before her attitude completely changed.

"I am having a conversation with a new species. A new intelligent species." I swear I could hear the gears in her brain turning as she contemplated that thought. "This is the greatest scientific discovery since Star Swirl the Bearded discovered time magic! I have to document everything!"

"How about you document the effects of burning alive? That's the only thing I really know about." I looked around as my blurry vision slowly got clearer. "Where am I anyway? This doesn't look like the hospital." I looked over at her. That was when I recognized her as the jerk who wanted to 'study' me.

"You brought me here to kill me, didn't you?" I growled out through gritted teeth.

"No, I swear!"

I could feel the slow pulse of rage quickening in my heart. "Letting me live wasn't good enough for you?!"

"You don't understand!"

"There is nothing to understand!"

"You were already dead!"

My anger cooled instantly into an icy fear that strangled my heart with its cold tendrils. "What did you just say?" I asked much more calmly than I felt.

The pony looked nervously at me. "Y-you died. In the fire. Last night. I brought your corpse here for disse-...study."

I wish I could say that I took this in stride with some witty comeback like, "I'm alive right now, how do you like them apples?" Instead, I lay there in silence as I considered what had been said. Maybe they didn't know how to properly determine death?

"Hey, purple."

Despite her previous guilt, she glared at me. "It's Twilight. Twilight Sparkle."

"Whatever, is it possible that one of your doctors incorrectly pronounced me dead?"

She shook her head at me. "We have a life detection spell just for that purpose. It is unfailing in accuracy."

Now that I've eliminated the practical answer, I guess I can only assume the insane... I really did die in that fire. Why am I alive again?

Twilight began putting away supplies as she brought out a notebook from somewhere. "I have so many questions to ask you! OK, what are your-"

"Hold up, I think I deserve to ask a couple questions before you do. It's only fair considering you tried to dissect me."

She hesitated a moment, then gave in. "Alright, what do you want to know?"

"There was another pony in the barn when it burned. Is it alright?"

She looked at me in surprise. "You saved Derpy?"

"I don't know. I dove into the sawdust to push one of them out of it just seconds before it went up. I would hate to think my death was for nothing."

The surprised expression remained on her face as she answered. "Yes, she survived. I think she is still in the hospital, but she is doing fine."

Well that's a relief. I'm glad that something good came out of last night.

"Where am I?"

If the surprise on her face got any heavier, I was sure it would peel off and fall to the floor. "You really don't know?" I just shrugged. "We are in the Ponyville library. Ponyville is a small town in the country of Equestria."

I don't think I have ever heard of those before. Damn, I had hoped that finding out where I was could trigger a memory. "I'm not familiar with those names. Alright Sparklers, ask away"

She rolled her eyes, but otherwise ignored the nickname. "Why did you save Derpy instead of assuring your own safety?"

"I don't know. It just seemed like the right thing to do at the time."

"Oh, okay. Are you resilient to pain?"

"No, why?"

"Then how do you not feel that?"

I frowned at her. "Feel what?"

She pointed a hoof at my chest. I looked down at myself for the first time since I had woken up, and I had to try not to throw up. The flesh was blackened and covered with lacerations. Looking down at the damage done to me, I knew I should not have been alive.

I forced my eyes away from the sight. "Well, that is an interesting development. I know that it SHOULD hurt, but it doesn't. Did you use some kind of painkillers or anesthetics on me recently?"

"Not that I know of. Like I said, you were dead last night and have been for at least eight hours."

I pushed myself up and ignored that sound of my crispy flesh crackling and breaking. As creepy as it is, I'm glad that I am not feeling any pain from this. "Sparklight, can I at least get out of this dungeon and get some food? I can't remember when I last ate."

She turned toward the staircase in the corner. "Alright, I guess it wouldn't hurt. It's just up these stairs to the kitchen."

"Before that, I only have one more question."

Curious, she looked back at me. "What is it?"

"Where the hell are my clothes?"

Ten minutes later, I sat fully clothed at a small table. I sat on a small stool so that I could be comfortable. The table was obviously not intended for seating someone of my body shape and size, but we managed to make it work. A purple dragon (I think his name was Spork. Something like that anyway.) was making food in the kitchen as Twinkle asked me questions.

"What are you?"

"I don't know."

"How old are you?"

"I don't know."

"Are there more of you?"

"I don't know."

"Does your species live in groups or do they prefer isolation?"

"I don't know."

"Don't you know anything!?" She shouted in frustration.

I fought back a laugh as I replied, "I don't know," and leaned back on the stool.

It was difficult not to find humor in her reaction. Her face was bright red as she fumed and dropped her floating notes onto the table. I could have sworn that at any second, she would burst into flames and I would burn to death again. Just as I thought she was about to snap, the dragon walked in with the food.

"Here you go, Twi. Hay fries and your favorite cucumber and daisy sandwich."

Anger forgotten, she beamed appreciatively at him. "Thanks Spike."

"Hey Twilight, I was wondering if-"

Twilight rolled her eyes and interrupted him. "Yes Spike, you can go gem hunting with Rarity."

"Thanks!" Spike was immediately out the door with a bucket in one hand and a shovel in the other. This must be a regular occurrence. Why would a dragon like gems anyway?

My grumbling stomach interrupted my thoughts. I picked up one of the fries and inspected it. It seemed harmless so I popped one in my mouth. I instantly regretted it.

Twilight paused in her eating and smiled at me. "Spike makes really good hay fries, doesn't he?"

I forced myself to swallow the nasty thing without shuddering. Not trusting my voice, I simply nodded and moved onto the sandwich. Please be edible, please be edible... On a hunch, I opened up the sandwich and removed the daisies.

When Twilight looked at me in confusion, I simply replied, "I have a very serious flower intolerance," and ate the bread and cucumbers instead. She accepted this without any visible doubt, much to my relief.

Once I was finished, the interrogation continued. "The way you use your hands reminds me of the minotaurs, except that you seem to have much greater dexterity with them. Can I look at them a bit closer?"

I suppose it couldn't hurt. I laid my hands out flat on the table in front of me as Twilight began taking notes.

"Can you show me how you use them? Just move them around a bit, I'm curious."

I amused her with cracking my knuckles, crossing and bending my fingers, and picking up random objects. After a while of this I noticed something odd about her and decided to ask, hoping that it wasn't a racist question.

"Sparkly, why is it that you have both a horn and wings while all the other ponies have only one or none at all?"

"It's a long story, but it's not normal for ponies to have both. We're called alicorns. I only know of three other alicorns in that are alive today, and they rule over a specific aspect of the world. Princess Celestia rules the sun, Princess Luna rules the moon, and Princess Cadence rules love."

It did not take long for me to realize the implications of being an alicorn. Lucky me, I was almost dissected by royalty. "So if each alicorn rules over something, what do you rule over?"

She fidgeted nervously and shrugged. Huh, must be a sensitive topic for her.

I looked over her wings and horn again. "Since you've gotten to study me a bit, is it fair if I ask a bit about you?"

"I don't see why not."

"Alright, can I touch your wings?"

"What?!" she yelled, her eyes widening in shock.

I raised my hands and backed up in the most non-threatening way possible. "I didn't mean anything by it, I was just curious as to what they feel like. As far as I know, I use touch as a means to understand things. Specifically, touch with my fingers."

She looked a bit less angry as she quizzically eyed me. "What do you mean 'As far as I know'?"

"I mean just that. When I kept telling you that I didn't know any answers to your questions, I was being completely serious. I had no memory at all when I woke up in a forest here," I said, trying to keep my voice as calm as possible.

I was really getting used to her confused face by this point. Maybe if I keep confusing her, it will freeze up like that.

Despite her confusion of my circumstances, she moved on. "Among pegasi, rubbing wings is a more-than-friendly gesture. I couldn't have expected you to know the implication of that question." She paused for a moment in thought. "Alright, you can touch them. Just this once, and be careful. They're very sensitive."

I moved over to her and very cautiously moved my hand to her wing. When my finger was just a few inches away, the universe flipped its shit again. An explosion of light and sound went off and I was thrown onto my back. Just when I thought it couldn't get worse, my flesh began to hurt. Everywhere that I had been burnt was glowing white and getting increasingly more painful. Within moments I was writhing in agony on the floor.

I am unashamed to say that I screamed. I screamed and screamed as pain consumed everything. I could hear Twilight yelling, but I couldn't make out what she was saying. This went on for about a minute until the pain gradually began to disappear. Twilight stopped panicking as she noticed that I was pulling out of whatever it was that had happened to me.

"Are you alright? What the heck was that?" I ignored her as I removed my shirt to examine my skin again. I shouldn't have been surprised by this point, but I still sat in shock as soft pink skin covered what used to be blackened flesh. I poked it cautiously. Yep, this isn't an illusion.

"Did you heal me?" I asked as I stood up and dusted myself off.

"No, I didn't do anything to you. Do you normally heal like that?"

I chuckled weakly. "Like I said before, I don't know. However, something like this did happen after I was hit by the trebuchet. The nurse claimed I had a large gash on my head and a cracked skull. When I unwrapped my bloody bandages, I did not have a single scratch on my body."

She scratched her chin in thought for a moment before responding. "I have never heard of any magic that works like that. I'll write to Celestia about it, she would know."

For some odd reason, I felt a sense of apprehension. "Sparkler, would I be correct in assuming that this 'Princess Celestia' is the ruler of this world?"

She nodded. "That is somewhat true. She is the more politically active member of the diarchic government. The other would be Princess Luna, but she tends to avoid the political aspect of her station."

I couldn't shake a feeling of unease about Celestia. "I'd rather you not tell them about my existence. I would like to stay out of the knowledge of your leaders."

"What?! Princess Celestia is the nicest pony in Equestria! What could you possibly have against her?"

Knowing a losing battle when I saw one and uncertain of my own unease, I relented to her wishes. "Fine, fine, just keep it simple."

I thought back on the craziness that I had encountered so far. It seems that I have been developing a disturbing trend of narrowly avoiding death. I really hope fate doesn't have too many more of those in store for me...

I looked at my healed skin again. I didn't have any way to be sure, but I was fairly certain that I didn't normally heal like that. Somehow everything that had been burnt away had been completely restored. That reminds me of something else.

"Hey, Sparkle? You said I burnt down that barn?"

She got a peculiarly serious look on her face. "Yes, the entire barn is gone."

"I would like to meet the owner of the barn. Since I burned it down, I want to fix it."

"You don't have to do that, you know." When I didn't respond, she continued. "While it is true that whatever you did set the barn on fire, we were the ones who came after you without any proper reason to. Just because we didn't understand what you were is no excuse for sending the militia after you."

I was having some really mixed emotions about this. While the rational part of my mind told me that I needed to right my wrongs, another part of me was arguing against my altruism. Why should I care about these ponies when they have only done me harm?

"No." I shocked myself with the conviction I spoke with.

"What?" The confused look was back again. It seems that body language is extremely important in their communication. That would explain why she seems to flip between emotions so quickly.

"That's wrong." I continued on before I lost my motivation. "What you said, that is. It is true that you ponies made a serious mistake in reasoning when you sent armed guards after me. However, it was my choice and my choice alone to start that fire. I won't let myself make excuses to get out of the results of my actions, and I damn well won't let someone --um, pony, I guess-- else make excuses for me."

She looked about as stunned with my response as I felt about it. I simply had the better poker face. What the heck is poker, anyway?

"I'm sorry, I wasn't aware you felt that way. Most ponies in your situation would have gladly opted out of the responsibility. Despite everything you have gone through, you still want to help?"

"Yes," I said. It's not like this is an action of pure goodness. I need to do this is so that I can stay on the good side of these ponies. As weird as everything is already, I need to have as few enemies as possible. That is, until I understand their capabilities.

"Alright then, I'll send a short letter to the princess --I know, I know, I'll keep it simple-- and then I'll show you the way to Sweet Apple Acres," she said as her horn flared up with light and objects flew around the room. "While the doctors were unable to save your life last night, your strange bags and clothing were easily saved with a repairing spell. Don't worry, nopony has gone through your belongings yet."

The backpack landed on the floor in front of me with a dull thud as Twilight quickly jotted down a letter. "I'll write a note for Spike to send this letter when he gets back and we'll go meet Applejack, the owner of the barn."

We headed outside a few minutes later. I stepped out into the midday sun and stretched my limbs. I slung my backpack over my shoulders as Twilight locked the door. The weight of it on my back was familiar and comforting. As we took our first steps towards the farm, I felt surer of myself. I knew I was ready for anything.

Princess Celestia was enjoying one of the rare days in life: Castle maintenance day. While the organization and cleanliness was important, it was not what gave her such joy. Since Day Courts were closed on maintenance day, she could spend more time relaxing without troubling herself with the squabbling of the nobles.

The castle chefs, knowing that today was a special day for their princess, had baked a marvelous cake to help her enjoy her day off. She had just cut herself a slice and was about to bite into the sweet, delicious-

*POP*

Celestia looked up from her food with mild annoyance. The letter that had been sent had the worst luck of appearing halfway inside the chocolate layering.

"Who would send me a letter on my day off?" She muttered to herself as the wrapped the letter in her magic and brought it to her. Unraveling it and scraping off the cake lightened her heart as she saw it was from her favorite student.

"Let's see what friendship lesson you learned today, Twilight Sparkle..."

The letter gave her pause as she noticed that it was uncharacteristically short. Normally Twilight enjoyed giving lengthy, detailed explanations. This letter was short, quick, and to the point. Her worry increased as she read the brief description of the strange creature that had appeared. By the end of the letter, she understood exactly what had happened.

"Guards!"

The two guards who were always posted at her door were at her side immediately. "What is it, Princess?"

No trace of her usual kindness was visible as she gave her orders. "Summon Luna to the throne room at once. We shall be departing for Ponyville as soon as possible, without the guard."

The guards seemed about to protest, but Celestia gave them no choice. "You may not accompany me. What my sister and I must do is far too dangerous for even you," she said as she turned and looked out the window as the sun slowly trekked its way to the horizon.

"Twilight Sparkle, I can only hope you are safe."

Chapter 5: Human For Hire

Author's Note

Ah, here it is. This chapter.

This is the point, when I first wrote this, that I decided I was going to push the story in a new direction. That was probably my biggest mistake.

I did learn a lesson from it, though. Never try to force a sudden change that doesn't make sense. Don't make major changes now with the plan to find a way to explain it later in the story.

Chapter 5: Human For Hire

The walk to the farm was boring compared to the chaos I had been experiencing so far. The other ponies seemed to have no problem with me at all when I was walking around with Twilight.

I decided to ask her about it. "Twarkle, why do all the other ponies seem to not care about me? Just yesterday they took one look at me and panicked. Now that you and I are walking together they don't react in the slightest."

She chuckled slightly. "Well, I am the resident princess and bearer of the Element of Magic so crazy stuff tends to happen around me. When they see that you are with me, they know that it's just more of the usual weirdness that comes with my position."

"Element of Magic? What is that?" It sounded oddly familiar, more so than anything else in this strange world did.

"The Element of Magic is one of the Elements of Harmony, a magical force that helps protect the world. There are six of us in all. We are Honesty, Generosity, Kindness, Loyalty, Laughter, and Magic."

That sounds so familiar, but something sounds wrong about it as well. This is so annoying! "Just those six? There aren't any others?"

She shook her head at me with a small frown. "Just six. Why do you ask?"

"Just curious," I said, suddenly feeling an odd desire to change the topic. "So who is this Appleback that owns the farm?"

"That would be Applejack. She is the Element of Honesty."

"Oh." What is with this weird apprehension I feel about meeting her? I was getting along with the Element of Magic just fine.

We trudged on in silence to the farm. When we finally arrived, I felt more confident again. All I have to do is work out some way to pay off the damages and do my part to make sure I don't have any ponies who want to kill me. Easy enough.

When we saw her some distance away, Twilight called out, "Hey Applejack!" and trotted ahead. I caught up just as Twilight was finishing her explanation of my situation.

"...so he wants to help out to make up for it."

I had to force myself not to reel backwards at the cold glare that was given to me by the farm pony.

"You burnt down my barn."

"Yeah." I mentally slapped myself. Smooth comeback, dumbass. Real smooth.

Twilight nervously backed up a bit as the silent staring wore on. I decided to break the silence on a good note, rather than wait for a bad one to arise.

I stuck out my hand. "Hello Applesauce, it's nice to meet you. My name is-" Well, crap. I don't even know my name. "Well anyway, I figured that I may as well try to right my wrongs while I'm here since I don't know how long I will be around." -And I really don't want to piss you off.

Silence reigned. The sun's warmth must be the only reason I have not frozen solid from this mare's cold glare.

Applejack reluctantly shook my hand after a few moments. "Ah'm Applejack."

I put on my best smile. "Nice to meet you. When can I get started?"

"Never."

My smile broke off my face. "Um... What?"

Applejack's glare never wavered. "You heard me. Get off my farm and don't come back."

Twilight seemed shocked at her friend's behavior. "Applejack! He's just trying to fix his mistakes! What got into you?"

"Nothing, Ah just don't need help from a monster."

I fought to keep a calm demeanor. "Please, there has to be something I can do to help fix the barn."

She snorted at me. "With those flimsy little limbs of yours? You're just likely to get killed."

"What if I can prove that I'm capable?" I asked.

She laughed coldly. "Yeah, right. If you can even buck ten trees of apples, I'll consider letting you help."

"Deal," I said.

She only laughed again and left for the house, which was thankfully unharmed by the blaze.

Twilight approached me afterward. "I'm so sorry, she doesn't normally act like that."

I shrugged, trying to hide my frustration. "It's fine."

"How can you just be fine with that?" Twilight sighed.

I just shook my head. "Be honest with me. If I burnt down your home you would be furious, even if I wanted to fix it. Am I right?"

Twilight nodded reluctantly after a moment. "I guess I can see what you mean. Still, I'm disappointed."

"I'm not. I still got her to agree on a job for me, even if she doesn't take me seriously. I just have to buck ten apple trees."

Twilight gave me a worried look. "Do you really think you are strong enough to even buck one tree?"

I grinned and shrugged my shoulders. "I don't know until I have tried." I took a quick look at all the trees around me and approached one.

"What the heck is apple bucking anyway?"

Twenty minutes later, I sat in front of the tree. I had tried punching, kicking, ramming, anything I could think of. I hadn't even gotten the damn thing to do more than rustle. Nevertheless, I got up again.

I sized the tree up. "Maybe I can get a running start and try a jumping kick?"

"For most ponies, it’s less about strength and more about technique," she said, shaking her head at me. "For you, it's simply a lack of physical ability. Face it, you simply aren't strong enough."

I sat back down again and considered my current problem solving skill sets.

How have I dealt with problems so far? I guess it's just

A) Run

B) Fire

C) Die
Maybe it's time I just accepted that the farm mare doesn't want me around.

I thought about it for another second before speaking. "Hey Twinkie, what kind of job could I get in Ponyhill?"

She rolled her eyes at me. "I don't know. Why do you ask?"

"If she doesn't want me to help out around the farm to pay her back, I could just work somewhere else to get enough funding to pay her. I know she said she didn't want me around, but she didn't say that I can't pay her."

Twilight paused in thought, bringing a hoof up to her chin. "That might actually work. You would try whether or not I helped you, so I may as well come along. At least the others will be less likely to run away in panic if I go with you."

With that, we made our way back to town.

The first place we went to was a small costume shop that had a "help wanted" sign out front. While I was no judge of pony attire, I marveled at the way that each outfit seemed to convey the character represented. The scary costumes actually felt scary instead of silly, and the silly costumes didn't look like the hallucinations of a colorblind schizophrenic. Ironically, they wouldn't hire me because they were afraid I would scare away the customers. As if the zombie costume isn't doing that already.

A few minutes later we passed by a small place that had a bunch of clocks in the windows and a 'now hiring' sign on the door.

"It's worth a shot," I said as I pushed open the door. Inside, I met an old friend.

"Timebutt!"

His jaw dropped and bounced off the counter he sat behind.

Twilight came in behind me. "You two know each other?"

I rushed him and gave him a bear hug. "Aw yeah, me and Timebutt here are just the best of friends!" The look of horror on his face was worth the embarrassing act. I gave him a noogie as Twilight looked on skeptically.

"Just yesterday we were discussing how I could die next time," I said, grinning wildly.

"Go... fuck... a manticore," he choked out through my rib crushing buddy cuddle.

"See, he's really creative!"

Twilight shook her head and turned to the stallion in my arms. "Sorry about this, Time Turner. We were trying to get him a job so he could help pay Applejack for the barn. How do you know each other already?"

I loosened up my bear hug to let him speak for a moment.

"I'm the head of the militia, Ms. Sparkle. I was there when the human burnt the place down."

I dropped him to the floor as pain flooded my head. "I remember now. I'm a human." I groaned, releasing my head and shooting Timebutt a look of confusion. "How do you know what I am?"

"Lyra described something like you a few times and called it 'human', so I just assumed that's what you are," Time turner said with a shrug. "Honestly, humans are all she talks about some days. It gets really annoying."

"Can you tell me where I could find this 'Lyra' pony?" I asked.

"Actually," said Twilight, "I know where to go already."

"Awesome," I said, walking over to the door and holding it open. "Lead the way, then."

Twilight quickly muttered an apology to Time Turner before stepping out. I grinned and winked at him as the door slammed shut, and I could almost feel him glaring back through the door.

Unfortunately, Lyra was on vacation. Her roommate, Bon-Bon, was very helpful to us in her absence. She was a valuable source of information the second she opened the door.

"So, humans really do exist," she said, looking me up and down.

To say that I was a bit surprised is like saying that nuclear detonations can be warm. "How do you know what I am already?"

She laughed and said, "Lyra goes on and on about humans all the time. For years she has been convinced that you were real even when nopony else would believe her. Now one of them just shows up at our door and she is on vacation. Talk about bad timing!"

Twilight was visibly disappointed with Lyra's absence. "We were hoping that Lyra could tell us more about humans, considering that the only one in existence doesn't have any memory."

"Sorry, Twilight. All she really has are a bunch of drawings, but you can take a look at them if you want to."

The pictures were surprisingly accurate. While they did not have any useful information on them, the knowledge that something here knew anything about me was comforting. It was the closest thing we had to a lead on finding out about my past. I still didn't have a job though, so we thanked Bon-Bon and went looking for more employment opportunities.

"This is sugarcube corner," Twilight told me as we approached the shop. "The owners, Mr. and Mrs. Cake, are very nice. My friend Pinkie Pie works here too."

I opened the door and found myself face to face with a bright pink pony.

It's face lit up with sheer, explosive joy when it saw me. "Omigosh! You're new in town! I have to-"

"Nope."

*SLAM*

Without wasting a second, I turned and walked away.

"Where to next?" I asked a flabbergasted Twilight.

"This is Fluttershy's cottage. She cares for many of the animals around Ponyville and may be convinced to hire you as a helper."

"It's worth a shot," I said as Twilight knocked on the door.

The door opened to reveal the yellow pegasus from the hospital. Unfortunately, we never got the chance to ask her about my employment. She took one look at me and instantly froze.

"Uhh...Twirkle, is she alright?" I asked.

At the sound of my voice her eyes seemed to shrink backwards into her head. It was extremely creepy.

Twilight sighed and performed a facehoof. "Fluttershy, he's a friend. The barn incident was an accident and he doesn't want to hurt anypony."

Her words had no effect at all, and the panicked mare was getting oddly pale. It was definitely freaking me out by that point.

"Twilight, how about we leave before your friend passes out?"

Twilight rolled her eyes. "Don't worry, it usually takes her another thirty-four seconds before she-"

As if on cue, Fluttershy's legs gave out and she hit the floor. Twilight sighed defeatedly before she used her magic to pick up her unconscious friend as she let herself into the cottage.

"I get the feeling that this isn't the first time you've had to do this," I remarked as I followed her inside.

Twilight nodded distractedly as she levitated her friend into the living room. "Unfortunately, this is normal for Fluttershy. You'll get used to it if you stay around," she said as she placed the yellow mare on a couch. "You must have really frightened her though. She usually can hold out longer than that."

"Glad to see that everyone is taking my appearance so well," I grumbled. "Will she be fine when she wakes up? I didn't cause any serious brain damage, did I?"

Twilight smiled reassuringly. "She will be absolutely normal when she wakes up. Come on, we need to focus on finding that job for you. There are plenty of other ponies looking to hire."

With that, we set out again on our probably doomed quest of employment.

As the day wore on and more and more ponies turned me down, I grew increasingly angry. While none of them panicked or rioted against me, many of them would glare at me or hurry away as I approached.

Why do I care? Part of me asked. To be honest, I wasn't completely sure why. I felt that I shouldn't care about these ponies at all, yet I still wanted their approval. At the very least, I didn't want them to hate me.

Why should I care if they hate me? I belong among other humans, not among ponies. That much I know for certain. Just as before, I had no reasonable explanation. I shouldn't care, yet I still did.

My internal conflict did nothing to quell my increasing frustrations, and I found myself snapping at Twilight more than I should have. As we were walking through the park to the next potential employer, she confronted me about it.

"What is it with you all of a sudden? Why the sudden grouchy attitude and rudeness?"

I responded without thinking. "Go to hell." Immediately I felt terrible. I took a deep breath to calm myself. This isn't her fault. Don't take it out on her.

"I'm sorry Twilight. I've just had a long day. Everyone keeps giving me these strange looks and I can't get a job anywhere because every pony thinks I'm a monster. On top of all that, I barely have any memories."

Maybe I should tell her about the crazy voice and the memory flashes. I entertained the thought for a second. Not yet. She seems trustworthy enough, but I'll keep this to myself for the time being.

She looked at me with a mix of frustration and concern. "I know it has been tough for you, but that can't be everything."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"A little frustration over a few odd looks and some memory loss don't add up with how angry you seem. It's as if you are going out of your way to just be as spiteful as you can to everypony you meet!" she said.

Her eyes softened a bit. "I'm worried about you. What is it that is troubling you so much?"

"I don't know."

"I just want to help," she pleaded. "You can tell me what it is."

That only made me even more frustrated. "I told you, I don't know! I have no idea why I'm so angry. Everything is just too chaotic right now." I sighed and turned around. "I'm going to go back to the apple place and work this out on the trees. I'll be there if you want to find me." She said nothing, so I left.

I felt bad ditching her there after how nice she had been, but I needed to vent my frustration somehow. I didn't want her to be on the receiving end of that anger. If it had been any other pony I would have gone off on them. Maybe it's just because she is the only one to help me so far. That, or I really have gone insane.

I felt a pang of loss as I watched some pegasi play around in the skies. They were tossing around a ball, laughing and cheering each other on. Watching it made me feel lonely since the first time I entered this strange land. It was another emotion atop a mountain of my confusion that was slowly melting into anger.

I tore my gaze away from the happy friends and focused on the path to the farm. I idly scratched an itch on my neck and bumped cool metal instead of flesh. What the heck?

Around my neck rested a simple metal chain with a small perfectly clear crystal in the shape of a circle hanging from it. I had no idea what purpose it served, but I knew it was incredibly important. This was no ordinary jewelery, of that I was sure. No matter how hard I tried I couldn't remember why.

Why? Heck, that question sums up everything. Why am I here? Why don't I remember anything? Why is this necklace so important? Why do I still care about fixing this stupid barn? I growled in frustration and kicked away a stray rock in my path.

I stopped to calm down as I came to an open field. I really need to control my anger better. I can't let it get to me. I took a moment to look around me. It really was picturesque. The tall grass swayed gently in the light breeze. The treetops rustled softly and birds chirped sweetly. No ponies were around. It was a peaceful moment all to myself. I sat down and leaned against a tree as I enjoyed the serenity of the moment and tried to just let go of my anger. It wasn't easy but I was starting to feel a bit calmer after some time.

I closed my eyes as the gentle sounds of nature lulled me into relaxation. I could use a nap about now.

"There you are, monster!"

...or not. Any anger I had gotten rid of rushed back twice as powerfully. I cracked one eye open to see who the idiot that disturbed my sleep was. I did not expect a sudden blast of light to fill my vision. I pushed myself upright but was quickly shoved from behind. I fell into the dirt as I heard a small pop. A moment later, I felt myself flung through the air by a strange force that seemed to encase my entire body. Just as I impacted the earth again, the world was rocked by an explosion of fire that seemed to have centered on my chest.

It burned so much. I had held on to some hope that burning alive would hurt less after I had already done it, yet I had been proven wrong already. Aww c'mon universe! I can't even go one day without burning alive!

"Come, Sister, we must finish off the monster."

That was the final straw. I had been through enough already! The tipping point had been reached, and my frustration and anger boiled over into pure hate. I hated being called creature. I hated burning alive. I hated these ponies. I HATE!

I tore my eyes open to a new sight. Two alicorns were before me, both blasting me with that strange aura from their horns. While I could have sworn it had been a blue sky and sunny day, I now beheld a darkening atmosphere. Everything seemed tinged with red as I forced myself upright out of the crater I was blasted into. I heard the two shouting to each other, but it didn't matter anymore.

I took a step forward.

Nothing mattered to me now. It was only about one thing: hate. The hate for these two ponies that dared to challenge me.

Another step.

The hate that fueled my steps as I slowly pushed back against the twin beams. My flesh was literally melting away underneath the searing power of their combined light, yet it was returning just as fast.

Just a few feet away. Hate.

Another step.

Everything was glowing red. Hate. I could feel the power of my rage fueling me.

Another step.

I could see the pain on their faces as they poured all their effort into their attack. Hate kill them hate hate. The closer I got, the tougher it was to take another step. HATE

Another step.

My pain meant nothing to me now. HATE The beautiful power coursed through me as I rushed forward and grabbed the white one around the throat. The blue one screamed something that I ignored. I backhanded her and sent her stumbling backwards with the strength of my HATE.

My grip tightened on the white one. My nails cut flesh and more red flowed out. I spat in her face and laughed as she fell limp. I heard the blue one screaming again, but my pounding heartbeat in my head drowned out the words. Doesn't matter. I wrapped one arm around her neck and reached with the other to grab her head. I gathered my strength to end her... and I stopped.

The blue one was lying where I had left her. The most she could do was make her horn spark a bit. It was truly pathetic. Yet something in those eyes stopped me. They were the eyes of the broken of spirit. The eyes of the weary and powerless, only watching the inevitable with sorrow.

I blinked.

I blinked.

I blinked.

I stared into her eyes again. I still felt the hate, but it was subdued by my own sorrow. I released the alicorn and fell to my knees in shock.

I'm a killer. I stared down at my shaking hands. They were bloodied, literally and figuratively. I'm a murderer.

Chapter 6: Oh, The Humanity

Something has gone wrong. We don't seem to have an archived copy of that chapter.

Dream 1: Truth

I double checked the maps again, then threw them into the truck's back seat in frustration. Where the hell is he?

The fields of Kansas are extremely flat. Because of this, you would assume that it would be very easy to find a specific point on a specific piece of land. You would be wrong. Each piece of land looks exactly like the past eighty pieces of land you drove past, and asking for directions doesn't help at all. I found that out when I asked an old man for help at one of the information kiosks at a rest stop.

"Excuse me," I asked, "do you know where I can find a man named Alvar? He runs the company that just started drilling near here."

His face brightened considerably. "'Course Ah do!" he shouted with an outrageous accent. "Ol' Al and Ah go way back. Why, just the other day Ah was tellin Lilly about the time..."

I nodded and smiled while silently fuming. I should have just grabbed a local map. Ten minutes later, he got around to giving me equally unhelpful directions.

"Take a left at the barn that Jim built with the boys, then a right at the place where the mayor crashed his car last year. Straight past the stump Timmy set on fire on his sixth birthday ya'll find a big fence that Jacob built for Billy last year. Take a left there and go straight until the Jackson's farm is in sight, then take a right. Alvar's work site is on the left. Can't miss it."

"Thanks," I said, taking a map and a small pamphlet on local natural gas sources. Alvar was always near his work. His natural gas and oil company was his pride and joy, and it was also my ticket to finding him. The info it had on drilling locations, combined with the local map, gave me enough knowledge for me to think I could find him on my own.

Oh how wrong I was.

I just began to lose all hope when I saw a truck pass me on the road with "Alvar Natural Gas" emblazoned on the side. With a sigh of relief, I followed it the rest of the way to a small trailer home. Alvar himself stepped out of the truck and stood waiting for me in front of the trailer. I parked a good distance away before grabbing my backpack and stepping out.

"I know why you have come," he shouted.

"I expected nothing less, Truth," I shouted back.

"You aren't worthy of addressing me by my title, traitor!" he yelled as he walked towards me with brisk steps. "You corrupted the Light and you think you can just show up here to kill me? I've known you would try this ever since you took to the shadows. The others already know about you, too! You won't succeed, monster!"

"I knew you would be the first to see the truth, no pun intended," I chuckled to myself. "You really should have sent an email instead of a letter. Letters can be stolen from the post office and burnt, but emails aren't so easily destroyed. As far as the others know, I'm the same as I've always been."

His face contorted into a sneer as we got closer. "It doesn't matter. I won't let you do this to the Light. You leave me no choice."

At about thirty feet away from each other, we both stopped from some unspoken cue. No more words were needed for what we had to do next. The only thing left was to act.

Alvar acted first. He pulled out a small handgun cleverly hidden in his jacket, proving that he had been prepared for this conflict for some time. He aimed and pulled the trigger with speed and accuracy that would have made gun enthusiasts shed tears of joy. Alvar was truly a master of his weapon. However, so was I.

Before he had ever acted, I had begun building up power within myself. The power of hate starts out slow and subtle, very small and direct. It is difficult to force hate into existence, but I had practice. I brought to the forefront of my mind the hate I felt for Alvar specifically. It was a mild hate, but it was enough.

Just as he pulled the trigger, I stepped into motion. I did not have much power yet, but I nudged the safety mechanism to lock the trigger just in time.

Alvar stood there awkwardly for a few moments, repeatedly pressing the trigger with no effect. I grinned as he dropped the gun. His scowl only deepened. "You think you can control darkness? You have no power. You are only a slave to evil!"

I could feel more hate filling my veins. "I beg to differ." I thrust my arms forward with a burst of dark energy that blasted a small trench into the ground between us and threw him backwards.

The hate was building faster and faster inside me, like an out of control train picking up momentum. I focused on my hate for the Element of Truth. I wanted to crush the bearer. I hated him.hate. I hated Truth. I hated Alvar. I hated!

Alvar picked himself up as my powers took their toll on the air around us. The sky darkened and my vision flooded red. I could see the object of my hate picking himself up. He glowed with a soft light emanating from a ring around his finger, like a puny candle before a hurricane of HATE. In contrast, the sharp darkness emanating from my necklace almost completely snuffed out his light.

Truth drew a switchblade and rushed me in a futile attempt at striking me down. The knife was fitting for his element; it was as sharp and as harsh as Truth could be ever be. Fitting, but pointless.

Hate him kill him I dodged his thrust and summoned a burst of energy to disarm him and snap his wrist. In an extreme lack of forethought, he tried to tackle me to the ground just as I attained the full power of darkness.

I sidestepped and let him fall to the ground before me, where he belonged. Wasting no time, I picked him up by the neck and let him struggle as his lungs failed him and he suffocated in my grip. I put his face to mine and forced him to see me as the last thing he would ever know. The lights finally faded from his eyes and he hung limply in my grasp. I snapped his neck without ceremony. It was clean, quick, and efficient. With that done, I let go of the hate.

The darkness disappeared as if it had never been there in the first place. A few dark clouds lingered above, leftovers of energy from the dissipating dark power. I threw Alvar's body into the bed of his truck after taking his ring. His dead eyes still seemed to linger some of his anger, and they stared at me in silent accusation as I took his gun and knife as well. The Element of Truth had been my goal, but I would be a fool to turn down good weapons.

I placed the Element of Truth into a small box I had obtained for holding it. It would not work for me, but I still needed it if I was to keep up my end of the bargain. The gun and switchblade were stowed with the box in the hidden compartment in the backpack. It wouldn't fool the TSA, but it would be safe from prying eyes until I needed it to complete the deal.

With my task completed, I got back in my truck and got out my maps again. Joy and Charity were closest to my current location and they shared an apartment, so taking them out would be much easier. I-

Suddenly, a sound like an old reel in a movie theater breaking down filled my mind and the dream stopped.

"I think you've seen quite enough. Too much, actually."

With a flash of light, I found myself floating in half-conscious space. I could feel the presence of the voice, but he seemed oddly subdued.

"Tell me what that was. I want to know what kind of bargain I struck, why I killed that man, and what the hell the Element of Truth is. Start talking," I said, feeling oddly calm for having just witnessed myself murder someone.

"If only it were that easy," he muttered. There was a deep sadness in his voice that I had not expected. He continued before I could dwell on it for long.

"You weren't supposed to see that memory. Not yet, at least. As you remember, the spell I brought you to Equestria with was a twisted fragment of a spell with heavy modifications. One of the parts of the spell that I changed was the ability for you to keep past memories."

"I already found out that I'm a killer. Why is it such a bad thing that I regain the rest of my memories?"

"That would be one of those things I cannot say."

I could feel my hold on the dream world beginning to slip away as I woke up.

"I think you owe me an explanation after everything you've done!"

He was silent for a moment before bursting forth with rage. "How dare you speak to me with such insolence on matters which you know nothing about! You have no idea what I have gone through to keep you alive and sane! YOU KNOW NOTHING!"

Just as quickly as he fell into rage, he returned to a state of misery. "You know nothing of my pain. You know nothing of my sacrifice. You don't know me."

The last of the dream slipped away. I awoke violently in cold sweat, saved from a fall to the ground by the straps of my backpack. The sun had not yet risen, but I could not bear to fall back into sleep for fear of watching myself murder again. I stayed awake admiring the beautiful night sky, longing for answers that seemed about as reachable as the stars.

Chapter 7: Around The Town

I watched the sunrise from my tree when the morning came around. The sun seemed to rise oddly quickly here, but I didn't exactly have any memories of past sunrises to compare it to. Instead of rising, the sun seemed to jump into position.

I dropped out of the tree and began to idly wander towards the town. I might as well see what the ponies are up to. I'd rather know about the approaching mob before they reach me this time.

The sun suddenly seemed to twitch and lurch higher into the sky. I stopped, puzzled by the sudden movement. Something is definitely going on here.

"Twilight? Twilight, wake up. Hello?"

Twilight slowly dragged her eyelids open to see Spike standing in front of her, shaking her awake.

"What happened?" she said, struggling to pull her thoughts together.

"I was about to ask you the same question. I came downstairs this morning and you were all just lying here like you had a big sleepover party."

Twilight looked around the room and saw all her friends still asleep around her. Then she saw Celestia and Luna, and she remembered everything.

"Spike! How long have I been asleep?"

He shrugged. "I dunno. Couldn't be more than overnight. The sun just rose."

Twilight let out a sigh of relief. "That's good, I suppose. If it hasn't been too long, then the human couldn't have gotten far. Help me wake up everypony and then we can get to planning."

"What is that supposed to mean?" he said, gently shaking Fluttershy's head. "About the human, that is."

"The human fought the princesses, brought them here, reflected my sleep spell, and we now have no idea where he is or what he is doing."

"What?!" Spike yelled, dropping Fluttershy's face into the floorboards.

"I know it sounds crazy, but it really happened," Twilight said as she gave Rainbow Dash a particularly forceful push. Despite their efforts, they couldn't get anypony to wake up.

"It's no use, Spike." Twilight said as Spike pulled open Pinkie Pie's eyelids. "The spell must not have worn off on them yet. We will have to wait for them to wake up on their own."

That's when Twilight spared a brief moment to look out the window and see the beautiful sunny morning.

The beautiful sunny morning.

The sun.

"Spike," Twilight began with a slightly quivering voice, "when did you say the sun rose?"

"Just a little while ago. Couldn't have been more than half an hour."

Twilight whirled around and ran over to Celestia. Sure enough, the solar princess was still unconscious with low levels of magic.

"That's impossible! There's no way that Celestia could have raised the sun! Come to think of it, how did the moon get lowered?"

Spike followed Twilight as she ran back over to the window to stare at the sun again. "If Celestia didn't raise the sun, then who did?"

"I don't know, Spike. Nopony even has the power to do that!"

Discord was not having a good time. Lowering the moon without letting it crash into Equestria was difficult enough, but raising the sun and keeping it on a continuous path through the sky? It was so dull and orderly! Boring!

However, it had to be done. He consoled himself by making the sun only move on in erratic jumps and letting it shine with a slight shade of green. Everypony would notice that something was different, but they would never be able to put their hooves on it. It was perfectly chaotic!

On second thought, blue was a better color. With a snap of his talons, it was so. Satisfied, he contented himself with floating over Canterlot Castle and watching the world below. He would never admit it, but there was a certain pleasure to watching everything go by peacefully. As nice as it was, he still preferred chaos.

Fortunately, he wouldn't need to wait very long. The human had arrived. Chaos would ensue, it was inevitable. He had known this day would come since he first became a statue all those years ago, and he had been preparing ever since he had regained his freedom.

Discord summoned some chocolate milk and silently toasted himself for his brilliance. The plan was absolutely infallible. All he had to do was some subtle manipulations for everything to turn out exactly how he wanted it to.

He swallowed the glass and threw the chocolate behind him, where it turned into a model of his head that fell into the streets of Canterlot far below.

Well, maybe not everything would be how he wanted it. The human was proving to be a problem. As much as Discord appreciated chaos, the human was a bit too much of a wild card. The human's unpredictability and irrationality could be the undoing of all of his efforts. All his schemes would be for naught if this plan was foiled.

Not like he could do anything about it right now. All he could do was watch and wait. And change the sun to a slight pink. Pink was better than blue.

I just can't figure out what it is, I thought as I wandered into town, but something is just... off about the sky. Not the jumping sun, but something else. I just can't put my finger on it. It's so frustrating!

I shook my head and tried to think about something else. No sense getting frustrated over something I couldn't do anything about. I watched the townsponies, but they seemed to have no negative reactions to me. A few even gave me a friendly wave as I passed.

Huh. I wandered as yet another pony gave me a wave. I guess that Twilight and her friends haven't told anyone else about that incident. Heck, maybe they haven't even woken up yet.

That put a slight spring in my step, but it was a still a step without proper direction. I had no idea what to do. Fortunately, inspiration struck me as I wandered further into town and noticed a familiar building: the hospital. According to Twilight, my escapade at the barn had put a pony in there. It would be wrong not to at least apologize.

"Twilight, this is ridiculous."

"Be quiet, Spike. I'm still calibrating the celestial detection fields."

Spike sighed as he watched Twilight continue to cast spells on the princesses. Somehow Twilight had convinced herself that she could find the answer this way, but he wasn't too sure about that.

"Twilight, we aren't going to get any useful information out of this."

"Uh huh."

"I'm just saying that if Celestia didn't raise the sun, then wouldn't it be pointless to try to trace the magic from her?"

"Uh huh."

"Are you even listening to me?"

"Uh huh."

"No you're not."

"Uh huh."

Spike groaned and facepalmed. It was going to be one of those days.

"Can I burn down the library?"

"Uh huh."

"Become an agent of evil?"

"Uh huh."

"Overthrow the Crystal Empire?"

"Uh huh."

Done with his fun, he quickly scrawled down a note for Twilight. He would be going outside and performing "field testing" at Sugarcube corner. Maybe the answer to all this would be in the bottom of a smoothie. It wouldn't hurt to try. Grabbing a few bits, he left Twilight to do her own thing.

I walked into the hospital, not sure of what to expect. I didn't expect to see a familiar face, given that I only knew a few of the ponies here.

"I certainly didn't expect to see you back here," the nurse said.

"Well, I was dead. Not exactly every day that someone comes back to life."

He cocked an eyebrow at me. "I'm guessing that you haven't heard of the Cutie Mark Crusader Necromancy incident."

"The what?"

"Thought so. With how often crazy stuff has happened in this town, it isn't really that surprising to see an alien resurrected. As nice as it is to see you doing well, I'm guessing that you didn't just come here for a friendly chat. What can I do for you?"

"I came here looking for a pony named Derpy." Hard to forget a name like that. "I thought it would be appropriate to apologize, considering that I am the one who put her here."

"You're in luck. She should be checking out of here any minute now. Feel free to wait for her," he said.

"Thanks. By the way, I never did get your name."

"Clockwork. Yours?"

I shrugged. "I really don't know. I can't remember anything. I've just gone by human."

Surprisingly, he didn't question my strange explanation. "All right then, see you around, human. Derpy will be here soon. You can't miss her." he said over his shoulder as he left through an "employee only" door.

Just then, a mare came a through a pair of side doors. Both of her wings were in casts, but that wasn't what got my attention. Her eyes were... well, for a lack of a better term, derpy. As soon as she saw me, both of her eyes righted themselves to stare at me.

"Hey," I said. She only blinked in response. Well, it's a start.

"I just came to talk to you about that incident at the barn. I just wanted to apologize for getting you sent to the hospital."

Her brow furrowed for moment in thought. Aww crap, I said something wrong. She's going to-

My mental processes were cut off by a powerful hug. "Apology accepted! It's nice to meet you!"

I could hardly believe it. "You just forgave me? Just like that?"

She smiled. "Yup!"

"You aren't angry at me?"

"Nope! You said you're sorry, and you really looked like you meant it. That's good enough for me!"

I stood there for a moment, baffled by the strange feelings running through me. It was such a foreign concept to me that someone could so easily forgive and forget. It left me extremely confused, and a little bit of something else. Something happy, but warmer and fuzzier. Whatever it was, I just couldn't quite-

Oh. Indeed, it was joy that had touched my heart. A few things had happened to me so far that made me happy, but nothing so far had made me feel this way. It was an unfamiliar and invasive feeling that wouldn't leave me alone. It wormed its way through my heart and through my body until it filled my being with its presence.

I liked it.

Derpy smiled at me. "Wanna go hang out? I just have to sign a few forms and then I'm out of here."

I shrugged. "Alright, I didn't have anything planned for today anyway."

"Awesome!"

Ten minutes later, we were waiting in line at a bakery known as Sugarcube Corner. I remembered the place from when I first met the terrifying pink monster, and only agreed to come because I did not see her anywhere.

"Hey, what are you looking at?" Derpy asked.

"...nothing," I replied after reassuring myself that there were no particularly peculiar pink ponies nearby.

"Dude, you look way too worried. What's on your mind?"

I sighed and rubbed the back of my neck, stalling as we moved forward in line and I tried to think of a good answer. I just almost killed your rulers and now the protectors of your world are in a coma. Aside from that, no worries!

"I suppose that the problem is in the question," I finally said.

"Whoa. That's too deep for me."

I suddenly had the oddest urge to slap my hand to my forehead, but I managed to resist. "I mean that I keep thinking about how kind everyon- er, everypony- has been to me, especially you. It really confuses me."

"What's so confusing about that?"

"I don't know. It seems strange to me that you would so quickly give forgiveness to me after my actions put you in the hospital."

She shrugged as we moved forward again. "I suppose that most ponies wouldn't be so eager to let it go so quickly. I, however, believe strongly in second chances. If nopony would have given me a second chance years ago, I wouldn't be the mare I am today."

Just then, we reached the counter and were greeted by a polite blue mare. "Hello Derpy, what can I get for you today? The usual?"

"Yeah, but double it." She grinned and elbowed me in the side. "I got a friend with me today."

A... friend? The word felt unfamiliar and out of place to me. Despite the worry the word caused me, it also brought hope. Hope of something new, hope of something beautiful. It brought a grin to my face, which quickly split into a smile.

I had a friend. It drew up that feeling of joy that I had felt earlier and it reinforced that emotion as it swelled up inside me. I felt then that I truly knew joy.

Speaking of joy, the bakery pony was just returning with a giant box full of something that smelled amazing. My stomach growled loudly, and I realized just how hungry I was.

"Thanks, Mrs. Cake!" said Derpy as she tossed the box onto her back and gave the bakery pony a few coins.

We sat down at a table outside and opened up the box. Inside, I was greeted by the glorious sight of muffins. I didn't have any distinct memory of them, but they must have been in the "common knowledge" the voice gave me. It didn't matter either way, because they were absolutely delicious.

"In all my time here," I said between bites, "I have never had a better muffin."

"I thought you just came to Equestria two days ago?"

"My point exactly," I said, reaching for another muffin.

We ate in silence afterwards until all the muffins were gone. Then Derpy spoke up.

"I never did finish my explanation, did I? I'm such a firm believer in forgiveness and second chances because of how often it was shown to me." She leaned back in her chair with a deep sigh, and her eyes took on a faraway look.

"You don't have to tell me if it's a bad memory." I said.

"It's fine. It's good to talk about these kinds of things anyway. Thanks for caring about my feelings, though. Anyway, we moved to Ponyville about five years ago."

"We? Who else came with you?" I asked.

"My daughter, Dinky. We came to Ponyville to get away from my jerk ex-husband. She was just a little foal at the time. She's the reason I got away from that awful stallion. It wasn't for me, it was all for her." She sighed wistfully. "I got away from him, but it took a long time for him to stop affecting me. I got really depressed and took to drinking a lot. I'm somewhat of a lightweight, so that never turned out well. It got to the point where I couldn't be the mother I needed to be for Dinky, and the Foal Protection Service took her away."

She had to stop for a moment to wipe her eyes. I just sat there, unsure of how to respond to all this.

"That cut me deep, and I fell even deeper into depression. I was drunk almost every day. As you can imagine, this made it difficult to hold a job. The mayor was kind enough to give me a few odd jobs here and there, but after I accidentally destroyed the town hall she stopped hiring me.

"The final straw came at the Sisterhooves Social a few years later. She entered with her sister from the foster family she was with at the time. It hurt to see her doing so well without me that I began to think I didn't even need to be around anymore. Like, not around at all. Ever. Permanently."

At this point I was in a cold sweat. I wanted to say something to make her feel better, but I didn't want to say the wrong thing and make her feel bad or make her angry. It was obvious that she needed to get this off her chest, but why did it have to be me? Moreover, why did I care so much about hearing her out when I had no real reason to?

"By this point I was living in a tree in the park, and didn't have any bits on me at all. I did, however, manage to steal a bunch of meds from the pharmacy. I just took a bunch and lay down to die on a bench. That night was when I was given a second chance, and a new friend.

"A teacher by the name of Cheerilee was walking through the park on her way back to the school. She had forgotten her gradebook or something, neither of us can remember now. She saw me laying there with an empty bottle of powerful painkillers and she did the first thing she could think of to save my life. She bucked me in the stomach. Left quite the bruise, too. Worked though, I threw up all of that stuff. She carried me back to her place, still covered in vomit, and got me cleaned up. I remember waking up the next morning with a killer migraine and her screaming in my face."

That caught my attention. "Wait, she did what?"

"Insulted me."

"How is that supposed to help!?"

"It shocked me back to reality. Nopony had taken the time to snap me out of my depression, so she did it in the quickest and most painful way possible. She got in my face and told me that I owed it to my daughter to live on and be the best pony I could be, and that I had failed my little Dinky by thinking I could just leave her forever."

"I still don't see how that helped."

"It got me angry. Angry enough to try to prove her wrong, which of course I couldn't. After that, she took me in and helped me get my life back on track. Cheerilee constantly challenged me to do better, and I did. I got my life back, and later that same year I got back my little Dinks.

"Long story short, if Cheerilee had never saved my life and given me a second chance then I wouldn't be who I am today. Hay, I wouldn't be here at all. She didn't have to accept the broken drunk I was, but she did. If she could do that for me, then what kind of pony would I be if I can't even forgive you?"

I thought about that for a moment. It makes sense, I guess. It sounds like this Cheerilee pony used Derpy's anger as a constructive force to get her life on track. It also does reasonable explain why she is so forgiving. It isn't how I would have gone about saving a life, but maybe ponies just think differently than humans about this kind of thing.

Derpy's right eye began to slowly spin. Or maybe Derpy is just weird.

Spike cautiously opened the door to the library and peeked inside. He had seen all the curtains drawn when he approached, and that was never a good sign. He noted first that all of the ponies that had been sleeping in the main room of the library were gone. Second, that an odd glow was coming from the door to the basement.

The basement was an odd place in the otherwise normal library. He was hardly ever allowed in the basement since Twilight had made it her permanent lab a few years ago. She refused to talk about what she did down there most of the time, and had begun neglecting her friends in favor of science. Again. It had taken her long enough to break that habit, and here she was doing it again.

Spike dragged his thoughts back to the present and crept into the library, silently shutting the door behind him. He then walked over to the basement and pushed the door open just a hair to look through.

Twilight was channeling a spell while pacing around a large table, upon which lay Celestia and Luna. Her other friends were all in the far corner, still fast asleep. His draconic eyes quickly adjusted to the darkness and revealed instruments pushed to the side of the basement to make room for the other ponies currently occupying the space. Reassuring himself that it was safe, he pushed open the door and began descending the stairs.

"Twilight! You'll never believe this, but I found the human."

That must have ranked high enough on the 'importance' scale in Twilight's mind, because she turned to him with eagerness rather than frustration at having been disrupted.

"Where? What was he doing?"

"I saw him over at Sugarcube corner about half an hour ago. He wasn't doing anything really, just eating muffins and chatting with Derpy."

"This is awful! He's probably trying to win over the town through kindness so that he can incite a rebellion once they've come to trust him!"

Spike stopped for a moment before responding, just to make sure he had heard correctly. "Twilight, that's ridiculous. Derpy and the human were having a completely normal talk. Anyway, if he could take down both of the princesses then why would he need anypony to back him up? Whatever he's doing, I doubt that it involves harming anypony. He would have already done that if it was his goal."

"He already did, Spike. That's why Celestia and Luna are currently unconscious in a basement!"

"No, the other princesses are here because the human brought them here to prevent a panic. Why would he do that if he wanted to hurt them?"

"I don't know, but there has to be a reason. He already assaulted the lead diarchs of Equestria and used dark magic, both of which are serious crimes. I'm certain he isn't here to make friends."

"You seem to only be capable of seeing the worst of his actions! I trust you, Twilight, but I don't see the connections between what you think he is doing and what he already is doing."

Twilight was loathe to admitting that her logic was flawed, but Spike did have a good point. She'd begun to notice that he did that a lot recently. Spike's growth, both mentally and physically, seemed to be becoming much more pronounced. Twilight felt a great sense of pride for the young dragon. He had spent far too long feeling like he was stuck under the shadow of the Elements of Harmony, and it was good that he was becoming more self confident and independent.

Back to the matter at hoof though, Spike wasn't wrong. After what she saw the human do, she couldn't believe that he had good intentions. She did, however, see that her theories as to why the human did it were flawed.

Spike unfolded a small letter that Twilight had not noticed him carrying when he came in. "Twilight, you might also be interested in this. Discord sent it to me while I was out."

She picked it up in her magic and levitated it over to her so that she could read it.

"Sorry, I tried to get as much earwax off as I could."

"Earwax?" Twilight asked, dumbfounded as to how Spike could have gotten earwax onto the letter.

"The note popped out of my ear. It felt really weird, too."

The letter read:

Dear Nerd Twilight Sparkle,
Since the current raisers of the sun and moon are taking an extra long nap in your library and you did not do so, I took the liberty of setting the sun last night and raising it in the morning. I hate this job, so splash some water on the sleeping beauties and get them to do it so I don't have to.

Your Arch Nemesis, Friend, Discord.

Twilight could only stare at the note in frustration. "I've spent this whole time working on tracing the energy to find out who raised the sun, and it was just Discord? Wonderful. At least we can still use the celestial detection fields if I can get them to work."

"What could we possibly use celestial detection fields for? And why aren't they working?"

"The fields pick up on the specific energy used by Celestia and Luna. The human took their energy, so he can be tracked if I can get the fields to work. I don't know what's wrong with them, but I did everything exactly the way it is supposed to be done."

Spike picked up the book Twilight had been casting from and gave the instructions on the page a quick glance.

"Twilight, it says here to have the conduits outside so that they can pick up the celestial energy better."

"Celestia and Luna are right here. That's an abundance of celestial energy for the conduits to pick up on and trace."

"Alright then. It says here that you sometimes have to reposition the conduits. Did you try that?"

"Eight times."

"Did you try recalibrating the fields?"

"Twelve times. Like I said, I followed all the instructions."

"Did you try constructing additional pylons?"

"What?"

"I don't know. I'm just reading what the book says."

Twilight shook her head. That book was a strange one, indeed. "It doesn't matter. Spike, I need you to send a message to Thunderlane. He's the secondary weather manager, so he ought to know that Rainbow Dash will be unable to do her job for a while. Also send a letter to the Cakes and the Apples; they will need to find a way to compensate for a missing worker. Don't go into specifics. Just let them know that we don't know when they will be able to return. I'll find somepony to take care of Fluttershy's animals for the time being."

"I'm on it!" Spike said.

Twilight giggled quietly to herself as he sprinted up the stairs. Even after all these years, he was still happily her number one assistant. She would have to get him a gemstone later.

For now, she had to complete the spell. Keeping track of the human's whereabouts was the top priority. The safety of everpony was in counting on it.

Derpy and I parted ways after eating at the bakery. Her words and actions had touched me, and I was eager to meet her again.

Unfortunately, that was going to have to wait. Before I wasted any more time in this strange land, I needed to get to know it. I needed a place filled with knowledge and resources for me to extend my understanding of this world.

I needed a library.

Twilight was about to recast the spell when Spike burst into the basement, slamming the door behind him and bolting down the stairs.

"Slow down, Spike! What's going on?"

"The human! Here! Upstairs!"

"What!?" Twilight immediately ran over to the door and peeked through the slight gap at the bottom of the door. Sure enough, the human had just entered the library. He also had rudely ignored the "closed" sign. The nerve!

The human walked over to the blinds and fumbled with them for a moment, but Twilight had previously cast a spell to keep them shut. He gave up and walked around the room for a minute before grabbing a book. He opened it, but put it back a moment later.

Good, Twilight thought. Maybe he'll just leave since he can't read anything in this darkness.

I wasn't sure what was going on, but the library was extremely dark. The windows had been blocked to prevent almost all light from coming in, making it impossible to read anything. Not to be dissuaded, I searched for some alternative means of lighting the room. After a quick search, I found a candle on the desk. I tried searching for matches in the desk, but all the drawers were locked.

How am I supposed to light the candle now? I kept looking, but didn't find anything to light the candle with. Suddenly, I remembered that I did have a match. A lot of matches, actually. I pulled one out of my shoe and easily lit the candle. Maybe shoe matches aren't such a strange idea after all.

Twilight's hopes fell when the human summoned fire from his foot. "That shouldn't be possible! I didn't see a spell, and the matches are locked in the desk. Spike, you can see better in the dark. What did he do?"

"I didn't see that, but you probably want to see this."

Twilight turned away from the door and saw what Spike was looking at. The celestial detection field was lighting up between the conduits surrounding the princesses, probably in response to the huge amount of magic being carried around by the human.

"Spike, grab the spell book!" she said as she raced over to the conduits. "We might not get a chance like this again!"

I spent the next couple hours reading about the history of Equestria. I noticed that there was very little describing time before the reign of "Discord", whoever that was, about 3000 years ago. It only says that he ruled for a thousand years until Celestia and Luna used the Elements of Harmony to defeat him and turn him into a statue. I'd read more into the history of their capital city, Canterlot. It certainly was an interesting city. The book went as far as to claim that there were hundreds of unexplored tunnels deep in the mountain that the city was built on.

I was getting tired and hungry, so I put the book back where I had gotten it from. Part of me wondered where Twilight and her friends were, but the rest of me was too hungry and tired to care. I left the library and made my way out towards the edge of town to grab some apples from the farm before returning to my tree.

I managed to get a small fire going by the time the sun fell beneath the horizon. When I say that the sun fell, I mean it literally. The sun just dropped out of the sky like a rock. The moon popped into existence in its place a moment later and the temperature dropped quickly, but the fire kept me warm. Turns out that apples taste really good if you warm them up a bit.

I put out the fire after a while and climbed into the tree. I needed the sleep, but I had a bad feeling about the dreams that I might encounter. I didn't have any say in the matter though, so I drifted off to sleep with a warm meal in my stomach and a cold weight on my mind.

Chapter 8: The Cult of Man

I awoke in a cold sweat, then immediately leaned over and threw up from my tree. I know, sounds like a great way to start the day. Can you really blame me though? I just watched my past self willingly become a slave to darkness. That wasn't exactly easy to live with.

Unfortunately, I didn't have any choice. Life went on whether I wanted it to or not. All I could do is make it better or worse. Now was not the time to mope about and wish that it changed. Now was the time to change life myself.

First things first. I wasn't going to wear the Element of Darkness any longer. Now that I knew for sure what it was, I wanted nothing to do with it. I ripped it off and threw it in my backpack. I might not be using it, but I sure as hell wasn't going to just throw it away for anyone to find. I would keep it until I found a safe way to destroy the damn thing.

So far, the best source of information had been the library. It wouldn't hurt to go back there again. The more time I spent learning about this world, the more likely I would be to find some way to get rid of the Element.

I let myself into the library on the assumption that the ponies were still sleeping from whatever I bounced back at them. I had wondered where they had disappeared to if that was the case, but decided to not to question it. I didn't want to jinx what little good fortune came my way.

I noticed an odd musty smell in the air, but ignored it after a moment's consideration. It was a library. It made perfect sense for it to smell old and musty. I walked over to a particularly funny smelling nonfiction shelf and began reading.

I dragged myself through a multitude of tomes on history for hours on end. The Tribal Era, the First Equestrian Era, and the Discordian Era all had poorly recorded history, but still managed to contain enough information to make sense.

I had just opened a book on the Second Equestrian Era when a certain picture in the table of contents made me do a double take. I saw a pony cloaked in shadow, surrounded by crystals. Beneath the picture it read: Sombra, master of hate magic and ruler of the Crystal Empire for a short time prior to the Solar Era.

I immediately turned to the corresponding chapter and began to read.

Very little is known about King Sombra, other than that he took over the Crystal Empire and was soon after defeated by Celestia and Luna. He was banished into the shadows of the Frozen North for over a thousand years, but returned to reclaim the Crystal Empire in the third year of the Third Equestrian Era.

I flipped to the timeline in the back of the book to see more about when all of this happened. I found the Third Equestrian Era and read the footnote.

The Third Equestrian Era began when Princess Luna was freed from the spirit of Nightmare by the Elements of Harmony. Prior to this time, Equestria was ruled solely by Princess Celestia.

I looked over my shoulder at the calendar by the door. It read April, 4 T.E. "Not that many years ago," I muttered to myself as I began to read about Sombra again.

King Sombra is most widely known for his use of hate magic, also known as dark magic, to make his rule absolute. He is the only pony in recorded history to successfully use excessive amounts of hate magic without burning up from the power. Many believe that this is due to his immortal nature and oddly shaped horn, but these theories lack substantial evidence. The most commonly accepted theory is that the hate magic warped his body into a form suitable for the use of dark power, but this also has distressingly little support. The only thing that is agreed upon by magical scientists is that Sombra is the only pony ever to master hate magic, and that he is immortal.

I flipped the page to see if there was more about Sombra, but I only found something about a fair and the power of love driving him away. Frustrated, I checked the index and several other books for more information. There wasn't any. It was as if nobody knew anything significant or definitive about him at all.

Isn't this just great. The first time I get something even close to a bit of helpful information, it turns out to be a fruitless search. I need to learn more about hate magic if I plan on getting rid of the Element of Darkness, but where am I supposed to find that information?

I let out a sigh of irritation and idly turned the page.

The Crystal Library

That caught my attention.

The Crystal Library is said to be the greatest center of knowledge in Equestria. The library features the complete set of works by Starswirl the Bearded, the complete set of the Chaos Theory by Spell Blaze, and many other famous books on magical theory and practice. While the library is most famous for the magical knowledge held within, it is also the largest collection of first person accounts of historical events. The amount of historical knowledge gained by the reappearing of the Crystal Empire in the first year of the Third Equestrian Era is immeasurable.

My eyelids had begun to get a little heavy. Odd. I wasn't even reading anything boring. I put the book back on the bookshelf and took a quick walk around the main room of the library to clear my head. Maybe it's this musty smell messing with me. I could use a lunch break outside to clear my head and fill my stomach. The library isn't going anywhere. I yawned and walked over to the door, giving it a pull on the handle.

It didn't budge.

I frowned and gave the door a push, just to make sure I wasn't being stupid. It didn't move that way either. I checked around for any locks that might have been holding it closed. There was a bolt lock, but the bolt hadn't been slid into the door frame.

I could feel panic welling up in my chest, but it was quickly being snuffed out by a deep urge to sleep. In desperation, I threw myself at the door. The most I could do was fall against it and weakly twitch as the last shreds of my waking mind submitted to the sudden narcoleptic impulses.

The first thing I noticed was the headache. This headache had transcended the normal levels of pain and had transformed into a full on migraine.

Then I noticed the muffled sound of a multitude of voices. There were voices all around me, but I couldn't discern the words they were saying. It was as if someone had stuffed my ears full of cotton and then sealed it in with earplugs and glue.

Then there was the feeling of something nice and cold being pressed against my forehead. Even through the pain, the cool feeling against my head was absolutely divine.

Another thing I noticed, and the most confusing, was that I was laying on a surface that was comfortable enough to make even the toughest souls "Ahh" in pleasure. It was as if someone had taken pure fluff and mixed it in with some refined poof to make the nicest trap in the world. I could easily imagine myself never leaving this spot.

I groaned and sat up, rubbing at my bleary eyes. Immediately, the voices went silent. I blinked a few times to clear my vision, but my eyes refused to focus. I suddenly lost my balance and fell back into the fluff as I fought off a wave of nausea. The voices were suddenly active again, moving around like a swarm of angry bees. I felt a cool blackness wash over everything as I passed out again with my last thoughts noting the similarities to my first visit to the Ponyville hospital.

I woke up on the fluff again. I felt infinitely better this time. I sat up, stretched, and tried not to have a panic attack when I looked around. I had no clue as to where I was, but it certainly wasn't the library. I was in a large room made entirely out of red and black crystals. I realized that the fluff was actually a bed of what appeared to be clouds. Other than a desk and a crystal lamp hanging from the wall, the room was bare. I was relieved to see my backpack on the desk and my clothes still on my body.

Just as I had finished examining the room, a door appeared out of the wall next to the lamp and a pony stepped through. Upon seeing me, he stopped and bowed low. After a few moments of awkward bowing, I realized that he was probably waiting on me to do something.

"You can stop now," I said.

He rose to look at me again, and I noticed something odd about his eyes. His irises were a solid red, and the whites of his eyes flickered with an unearthly green glow.

"Master," he said, "it is wonderful to see that you are awake and well. If you would come with me, our leader can explain everything to you."

"Uhh... sure." I didn't exactly have many other options. If I wanted to figure out what the heck was going on, then it was obvious that I needed to meet their leader. Judging by the reverent gaze given to me by the pony who was currently acting as my guide, I was not intended to be harmed. I was still confused about the whole "master" thing, but I would be lying if I said that I didn't enjoy it a little bit.

He walked over to the wall and pressed his hoof against the crystal I had assumed was a lamp. Suddenly, the door appeared out of the crystals and opened. Instead of questioning that impossible feat, I simply shrugged and followed him through. I just assumed it was magic. So far, that had been a valid answer for most of my questions.

The door led to an empty hallway that lead to another blank wall with a door crystal hanging on it. He opened that door too and gestured for me to enter with a hoof. I walked through the doorway and came to a stunned stop as I stepped out on the other side.

Like the room and hallway I had been in before, this area was made entirely out of the scarlet crystal. The difference was that this put the other rooms to shame with its majesty. The ceilings vaulted upwards and curved into a giant dome while the floors radiated a crimson sheen. Giant columns of intricate crystal patterns were evenly placed around the room to hold up the ceiling, and they each glowed with a powerful inner light that made me feel alert and energized just by being in their general vicinity.

The most amazing thing about this room was the massive crowd of ponies that filled in almost every square inch. The entire room, as gigantic as it was, could not give ample room for this large amount of ponies. The sea of ponies stared at me for a moment in dead silence. Then the most amazing thing happened.

They all bowed to me. Every single one of them had their noses to the floor and their eyes refused to rise to see mine. Stunned, I waited for a few moments to see what would happen. Just like the other pony who had gotten me from that bedroom, they all awaited my order to rise. Each and every single one of them demonstrated their complete obedience and submission to me with the simple act of a bow.

It was creepy. As disturbing as it was to my logical mind, another part of me loved it. It was that darker side of me that I had been repressing. It almost seemed to be getting stronger from all of this, as I could feel the sinister thoughts begin to form in my mind. It felt right to be the master of all. It felt good to have the multitudes bow before my power. I tried not to let the dark thoughts gain a foothold in my mind, but I straightened my spine and stood up a little bit taller as I took a few steps forward experimentally.

As I expected them to, I noticed with a grim delight, they all moved to clear a path before me without raising their muzzles out of the bow. What little elbow room had existed before was now completely gone as the ponies gave up all of their comfortable personal space for me. I couldn't stop a sinister smile from crossing my face.

"Lead on," I said, turning to the pony who had been escorting me. "Take me to your leader."

I was lead to a normal looking door, for once. It was still made out of crystals, but it actually swung on hinges instead of magically appearing. I pushed it open and walked into a small room that appeared to be some sort of study. Shelves of books covered the walls on all sides. A small cot was pushed to the side in the corner of the room. At the center of the room sat a large desk that faced towards the door with a unicorn mare currently sitting at it. I only noticed these things as an afterthought to the one thing that drew my attention and set a cold fear in my limbs.

A small crystal, only about the size of my fist, floated in the back of the room behind the desk and its occupant. The crystal shone with a hellish black that darkened the entire room. The sheer evil that radiated from it was eerily similar to the Element of Darkness.

"Hello, Master," said the pony at the desk. She rounded the desk and bowed before me.

"You may rise," I said much more confidently than I felt.

She rose and looked at me, her eyes taking on a look of bliss. "So, you are the human we have waited for. I must apologize for the way you were brought here. The poison trap was meant for the usurper who would try to divert you from your true course, and the agents assigned to that mission were incompetent failures."

Wait, what?

"Sorry, but can you just start from the beginning? I'm afraid that I have no idea what is going on here."

"As you wish, Master. A little under four years ago, I entered the Everfree forest to search for magical anomalies. I was a part of a science team that located and neutralized unstable magics, and it was my assignment to prevent this rouge magic source form becoming a threat. While investigating, I found a hidden entrance to these caverns that was revealed by the strange magic. I followed it here and found more than just the magic source."

She turned and walked over to the dark crystal hovering behind the desk. "This was the source of the magic. I found it here, along with a pile of ancient books and scrolls. The scrolls were written about two thousand years ago. They spoke of the last moments of the Discordian Era, when a great bipedal creature's soul came to our land from another dimension. Its physical form was destroyed by Celestia and Luna after they turned Discord to stone, but its spirit continued to linger. The books were more recent, but still over a thousand years old. They were the writings of a great prophet who knew of the power of the human. He said that the human would return shortly after the stars aided the Nightmare's escape.

"The prophets writings were from the time before the Solar Era, the time during which Luna was banished to the moon. How he could have known about the Nightmare before it happened is still a mystery, but it helped me realize that he must be right about the human as well. He claimed that the human would return with the powers of darkness to aid him. His writings spoke of a powerful magic that gained power when stored in crystals, the same kind of magic the human used. This is hate magic.

"I touched the crystal then, and my eyes became opened to the truth. We ponies were unworthy of this world that is rightfully belonging to our master, the human. I have been gathering followers since then to prepare for this day when you would return to claim this world as your own."

She bowed deeply to me again. "We all live to serve you, Master."

Wow. So I've been in this 'Equestria' before, apparently. Everything is still as clear as mud, but at least I know a bit more about my past. I realized that the mare was still bowing to me. I gestured for the her to rise from her bow, stalling for time so that I could think this through. I'll play along with this for now. If I can find out more specifics about what is going on here, I might be able to make things right.

"What is your name, pony?" I asked.

"Lyra Heartstrings, Master."

That name is familiar... I'll have to look into that later.

"Lyra, you mentioned that the poison that hit me was meant for somepony else, a usurper. Tell me about that."

She grinned evilly, and I hate to resist the urge to shiver as my skin crawled. "Would you rather see for yourself, Master?"

I nodded, and she grabbed a set of keys in her telekinetic grasp and set off down the hallway that I had approached her study from. We rounded a corner and came to a set of heavy crystal doors. Lyra unlocked them and then beckoned me into the darkness beyond them. After a moment, she used her magic to illuminate the room. I kept my face as impassive and controlled as possible when I saw what was before me.

"The usurpers are right here, Master!"

Of course. It only made sense, looking back. Lyra and her cult must have set up the trap before I arrived, so obviously they would have cleared out the library beforehand. The light Lyra shone was just enough to make out the ponies closest to me. Unnecessarily large chains bound them to the crystal walls and a circle of jagged crystals surrounded them, so they weren't going to be escaping any time soon. As I walked closer to them, I was able to see the individual treatments they received.

The timid yellow one and Rainbow both had what appeared to be crystals coating their wings, probably to prevent their flight. Not like they could be flying anywhere with those chains, anyway. Flairity had crystals coating her horn, I assumed to prevent magic. That didn't seem to be an unreasonable measure, unlike the wing coating. Appleknack and the pink demon had a thick coating of crystals on their hooves, probably to prevent them from tapping into their powerful strength from the ground. It seemed that, overall, the Earth ponies had fared better in captivity than the others.

The princesses had the worst of it. Each of them got the treatment of all the others combined. It made sense that because alicorns were the combination of the other three races, they would get the restraints of the other three as well.

"We have been waiting since their capture for you to awaken so that you may pass judgement on the usurpers," she said.

"Judgement?" I asked, even though I had a feeling I knew what she meant.

"Their manner of execution," Lyra replied.

"Oh," I said in a small voice.

"Is something amiss, Master?"

Think of something, quick! I nearly gagged on the terribly obvious lie, but began speaking. "I was just thinking about the execution. It seems pointless to get rid of them so quickly after spending the effort to capture them alive and bring them here."

She stopped for a moment and rubbed a hoof against her chin in thought. "Good point, Master. What would you have us do with them?"

"Hold off on the execution as long as they still have hope. Let them suffer as all their hope of survival wilts away, and then kill them," I said as I put on my 'evil grin' and tried to be as convincing as possible. I was sure that not even the most gullible of idiots would see through my terrible lie, but Lyra only nodded enthusiastically.

"Of course, Master," she said.

Something still seemed to be off about this whole situation, besides the obvious part about the dark cult. I realized it after a minute of thought and decided to question my guide.

"Lyra, I assume that you found these ponies in the library when you set up the trap," I said.

"That is correct, Master."

"Well since the trap wasn't for me or for them, then who was it for?"

"The trap was set for Time Turner, the head of the local militia. Aside from the Elements of Harmony and princesses, he is one of the greatest threats to your rightful rule. We sent him a fake note from Twilight asking him to meet her at the library. Unfortunately, you sprung the trap early. He probably found the library locked and then went home."

I spent another minute examining the prisoners to make sure that they weren't badly injured. Oddly, only Twilight showed any sign of struggling. She wasn't hurt very badly, but a number of bruises and cuts were apparent. After a while I had searched everyone and found them mostly alright, and turned back to Lyra, who had been waiting patiently.

"I suppose I'm done here. I want to see what else the caverns hold," I said.

"Certainly, Master. This way." She and the light both moved back to the door, and I followed suit.

"This is where we create new crystals."

I looked around the room. It was small and unimpressive, a complete opposite of the grand main hall that I had been through earlier. A large metal table stood in the center of the room. A small circle of red surrounded it, and another red circle was on the table itself.

"How does it work?" I asked.

"The crystals are formed in that small circle atop the table when enough hate magic is gathered within the outer circle. After that... Actually, it would be easier to show you. May I?"

I hesitated a moment before nodding my head, and she stepped into the circle. She concentrated for a moment, and the larger circle turned black. The darkness that I had come to associate with hate magic began to coalesce around her horn before flowing into the smaller circle on the table. For a long moment, nothing happened. I was about to ask if something had gone wrong when I noticed that something was happening. the darkness in the smaller circle began to form a solid substance. The crystal that began to grow was not red like the rest of the crystals I had seen, but instead held the same darkness of hate that the magic had.

After the crystal had grown to about a foot in height, she stopped casting the spell. It had apparently taken a lot out of her, as she took in ragged breaths and wobbled over to the crystal. I expected her to pick it up and the nightmare before me to end, but it wasn't over yet. She picked it up with her magic and did the most horrifying thing possible.

She impaled it into her chest directly between her front hooves.

What sickened me even further was her reaction. Her eyes rolled back into her head and she moaned in bliss as her blood flew out and coated the crystal embedded in her. The crystal slowly changed from black into the crimson shade I had seen on all the other crystals in the caverns. I realized then that all those thousands of crystals were made from a mix of blood and hate magic. These caverns were literally built from blood and evil. That wasn't even the most sickening part. No, the worst was far more disturbing.

The most terrible discovery yet made itself apparent to me. When I watched Lyra gain pleasure from spilling her blood onto the crystal, it awakened the darker side of me that I had hoped to leave behind when I took off the Element of Darkness. I enjoyed it. There was a grim satisfaction from watching her happily bleed out in service to me.

I was shamefully disappointed when she pulled the crystal out and set it on the floor. The dark magic flowed around her for a few moments afterward, and then it cleared to reveal no trace of the wound she had received.

"That is how the crystals are made."

The terrible desire to try it myself overcame me, and I found my legs moving me into the circle before my rational mind could argue against this course of action. I focused on all the hatred I could possibly feel and let it build within me. Then I focused on the small circle in front of me, fueling it with energy the same way I channeled power into the match from my latest dream.

The results of my efforts were instantaneous. A small black shard burst into existence before me and began to grow rapidly. It had already reached two feet in only a matter of seconds.

"Be careful not to make it too big!" Lyra shouted. I hastily stopped the flow of energy and observed the fruits of my labor.

Before me stood a crystal spire that was easily as tall as I was. It was an impressive display of my own power, to summon that much energy and not even feel slightly tired. Of course I couldn't just stop there. I found a jagged fragment of crystal on the side and, bracing myself, pressed my arm against it. A cold feeling ran through me as the crystal pierced my skin, and then everything changed. Light flooded my vision as a powerful rush of energy flowed through me.

I had never felt this much strength before. I felt as though I could tear open a planet with the power coursing through my veins. I could burn everything into ashes. I could freeze all life into a sudden cold death. I could call down thunder until nothing remained. I could do anything. It took me a moment to drag myself out of that train of thought and back to reality. With an incredible amount of will, I was able to pull my arm off the crystal. I looked back to the crystal again when the light faded from my vision, and my jaw dropped.

The crystal did not turn crimson like all the others. Instead, it shone with a radiant purple that lit up the entire room with a powerful brightness. The shades of purple seemed to shift and move with life of their own as the surface of the crystal shimmered and rippled in strange patterns.

"Wow," said Lyra, who seemed about as shocked as me. "I've never seen such power..."

She turned to me and bowed again. "There is no doubt, you are the human of the prophecy. We of the cult of man will serve you forever, Master."

I tried to fight the dark smile that crossed my face, but it was no use. The grin refused to leave my visage as I motioned for Lyra to rise.

"Show me the rest of the caverns, Lyra."

The rest of the crystal caverns were not nearly as interesting as their occupants. Try as I might, I couldn't help but feel extremely satisfied by the sight of all the ponies bowing before me whenever I passed them. The caverns were filled with ponies of all kinds, each from places all over Equestria. To my surprise, ponies were not the only residents. I had seen at least fifty gryphons during the tours of the numerous caverns. They claimed to be from a small religious tribe that hailed me as "The Great Predator" and had been worshiping me for over a thousand years. They traced their roots back to the "Prophet of Man" that Lyra had told me about earlier. I was curious about who this prophet was, but sadly nobody seemed to know much about him. He simply appeared, wrote some stuff, left it in the cavern, and then disappeared.

"That's everything," said Lyra as we exited the cafeteria, snapping me out of my thoughts. "Anything else I can do for you, Master?"

I thought for a moment. I can't just outright ask for more information. If I did that, she would figure out that I'm not everything she thinks I am. I can't afford to lose the only card up my sleeve. Metaphorical sleeve, actually. Mine are still burnt off. That reminds me...

"Yes, Lyra. Two things, actually. First, I'm going to need new clothes. Second, I will need to speak to the prisoners alone."

She nodded enthusiastically. "I'll get working on the clothing right away. The key to the dungeons is on the desk in my study. Take it whenever you wish, Master. I will have a lamp placed in the dungeon as well." She gave a quick bow and then left, probably to get new clothes for me. I didn't really care about the clothes, it was just a nice distraction to stop her from thinking about my strange request for the prisoners.

Just like she said, the key to the dungeons was on her desk. The dark crystal still floated there, unnerving me with the eery similarity to the Element of Darkness. I ignored it, focusing on grabbing the keys and leaving.

Just as Lyra had said, a small lamp awaited me at the door to the dungeons. Its glow was enough to illuminate a good portion of the room, but not enough to be harsh on the eyes. The pleasant yellow light accompanied me into the dungeons as I shut the door behind me and made me way over to Twilight.

"You can stop pretending to be asleep, Twilight," I said.

"How long have you known?" she asked, opening her eyes and stretching as far as the chains would allow.

"Since I came by earlier."

"So why didn't you say anything then? Were you trying to give me some hope that you could crush later before my execution?"

"I completely made that up," I said, sitting down on the cold floor. "I don't want anyone to get hurt because of me."

"Said by the one who almost killed the princesses, has a cult dedicated to evil, and uses hate magic," she said, coldly glaring at me.

I sighed and rested my head in my hands. "You aren't too different from them, honestly. Both of you see me as a monster, but for entirely different reasons."

"A monster is all you have proven to be."

"You haven't given me many chances to prove otherwise."

She was silent for a bit after that. We both just stood there awkwardly for a few moments until I broke the silence.

"I want to help you, Twilight. I want to get you and your friends out of here and find some way to put an end to this cult. To do that, I'm going to need your help. I don't have long until these ponies realize that I'm not who they think I am, and they might not react too kindly to being fooled."

She scoffed at me and glared. "I don't believe you. This is probably just some sort of trick to get me to work with you so that you can do... something. But I won't fall for it!"

I sighed and rubbed my temples in thought for a moment. She won't believe anything I say at this point, and I can't really blame her for feeling this way. Even so, there has to be some way to make her see the truth.

Suddenly, an idea came to me. The plan was crazy but perfect. If it worked, then Twilight would undoubtedly see that I was telling the truth. If it didn't, then I would probably die. It was better than doing nothing, so I grabbed the lamp and left.

I was going to show Twilight the Truth.

I came back to the dungeon about half an hour later, this time with my backpack. I brought the box of rings out and braced myself for what would happen next.

"Do you know what these are, Twilight?" I said as I opened the box, revealing the five rings and the necklace. "These are the Elements of Light. You probably recognize Darkness, which I admit to being to well acquainted with. Here I have Joy, which always knew how to find a silver lining to the darkest of situations. This is Charity, which reminds me that giving of yourself is the most meaningful gift."

She stared at me oddly as I pointed out each element. She probably thought I had lost my sanity by this point. I was questioning it myself. Still, I pressed on.

"Honor, an element I'm not worthy to wear. Finally we have Love, the absence of hate. That isn't everything, though. There is one more that I think will interest you."

I pulled out an orange ring from the box and held it up so that he could see it. The ring gave off no visible light, yet it still seemed to glow in the relative darkness of the dungeon.

"This is Truth. The truth of the matter is that we can make our own bright side to our current situation. Getting to it is going to require a bit of self sacrifice, but it is the honorable thing to do. Maybe this way, I can prove to you that I'm not all just hatred."

I took a deep breath in preparation for what I was about to do. I hadn't ever tried this before, so I had no idea if it would actually work. I was just going to have to hope for the best.

I put on the Element of Truth.

I groaned and pulled my face off the floor. Apparently, Truth didn't like me so much.

"What just happened?" Twilight asked.

"Truth rejected me at first. At least, I think so. It makes sense if you think about it. I'm here because of the culmination of hundreds upon hundreds of secrets and untruths, both on my account and by others. It's perfectly reasonable that Truth would not agree with me so easily."

I pushed myself up onto my knees. Sure enough, the ring was resting securely on my index finger. It felt odd, almost as if it just wasn't sitting right on the finger. That was probably due to Truth not getting along with me. I resolved just to get this over with so I could take it off before it exploded or something.

"Alright Twilight, this is the moment of truth -- no pun intended. I have no intention of harming you, your friends, or any pony for that matter. I want to help you escape from here, but I will need your help as well. This is not a trick or a trap of any kind, this is only the truth."

We both sat there for a few moments. I'm sure she was thinking the same thing as me: the Element of Truth was going to kill me. Surprisingly, nothing happened. Truth continued to glow on my hand without any change.

"You're still alive," she said, with some awe in her voice. "Alright, I believe you. Mainly because you would have to be suicidal to think about lying while bearing the embodiment of truth."

I let out a sigh of relief, but she heard me and said, "Don't think that I completely trust you now just because you said a few words while under the compulsion to tell the truth. The truth can be stretched and exaggerated. It has much more gray area to it than simple honesty. Still, your truth will suffice for now."

"You don't seem too convinced of that," I remarked.

"I'm not, to be honest." she said, almost turning the word honest into a sneer. "I haven't forgotten what you did to Celestia and Luna, and I certainly haven't forgotten about you using dark magic. I'm only willing to work with you because I don't really have any other choice. I can either be executed by your cult, or I can put up with you for a while and have a chance at getting out of this alive. After that, things will be able to return to normal. I can get back to my studies and you can go rot in the dungeons."

I was a little bit taken aback by her anger towards me. I couldn't really say that I hadn't expected her to be mad, but I had still hoped that we could at least get along. I suppose that I shouldn't really be too surprised about her feelings, especially considering that I did almost kill Celestia and Luna. None of that really matters though. As long as she honors her agreement to work with me then things can still turn out for the better.

"We can settle our personal feuds after we get rid of this cult. Until then, I need to be certain that I can depend on you to help me out. Can I count on you for that, Twilight?"

She cocked an eyebrow and gave me a dubious stare for a long moment, but relented. "Fine. You have my support until we get rid of the cult. After that..."

"I know. After that, you go back to trying to bring me to justice. I understand. I would do the same, were our positions reversed."

She didn't seem to know how to respond to that. Empathy was probably the last thing she expected to hear from -- let's be honest here -- a monster. Seeing all that has happened because of me had made me finally realize that she was right in that regard. I really am a monster. It's obviously too late to fix the past, even if I have no recollection of it. It might even be too late to fix here and now, and the future is still as uncertain as ever. The only certainty here is that it is all my fault. I am a monster.

I left then, partly because I didn't have anything else to say and partly because I needed to think some things over. It had been a short day so far, but it was still extremely tiring. I needed a nap, so I ordered one of the cultists to escort me back to where I was sleeping. It didn't occur to me what I had done until he bowed and left me at the doorway to my room.

Not even the incredible softness of the fluffy cloud bed could comfort my thoughts as I drifted off. How can I fix this? How can I make everything right when I'm a monster? Can I be anything but evil?

Can I ever be good?

Dream 3: A Friendly Chat/ Lessons of the Past

"I'm getting really tired of this, kid. You seem to have the wonderful ability to screw up everything."

Oh boy. Another great dream talk with the strange voice.

"I didn't see you showing up to help me get away from my cult. In fact, I haven't seen you at all. I think you owe me some sort of explanation as to who you really are and why you have such an interest in me," I said.

"We've talked about this before. I owe you nothing. Learn your place, human, before I put you in it by force," he said with a growl.

"I doubt that you could, considering that I put the two most powerful creatures in the world into a coma."

"You put the two most powerful ponies in the world into a coma. You've seen by now that ponies are not the only creatures in this world."

Looking back, I really should have just dropped it right there. I completely missed the frustrated edge to his voice and continued on without thinking.

"Even if you aren't a pony, I don't think that I should have to listen to you. As far as I have seen, I am the most powerful creature in existence. Honestly, I think your bluffing about how much power you really have. The only leverage you hold over me are my memories."

I felt an incredible pressure building around me. "Have you learned nothing, fool? Make no mistake, I am the most powerful creature in all of time and space. There is nothing equal to my power in any world! Be careful when speaking about matters of which you know nothing."

Thankfully, the pressure dissipated a moment after he was done speaking. It was a good thing, too. My head felt like it was about to explode if I had to bear that much force any longer. It made me re-evaluate my assumptions about the strange voice. If he commanded this much power through my dreams when we were distanced from each other, then could I really be so confident in my power if we met in person? Despite my fears of further angering him, I still wanted to get answers from him.

"If you have so much power, they why can't you just show up in person and help me?"

"It isn't a matter of can or can not, it is a matter of will or will not. I won't because of the chance that my presence may trigger a bad memory within you."

"If you are so worried about me recovering bad memories, then why haven't you censored my dreams?"

"I promised your teacher, Aubade, that I would try to trust you a bit more. Part of this is trusting you to handle that information. Be honest with me now. Regaining those memories of darkness tends to affect how you feel and act upon waking up, doesn't it? You would have been horrified by the cultists when your mind was clear. Now that your head has memories of hate in it, you stand tall as they bow before you."

As much as I didn't like it, he was right. As my memory had been returning, so had some of the darker aspects of me. I shuddered to think about what would have happened if I had awoken in the forest with all of my memories right away. Maybe it was best that he kept his distance to prevent my dark side from coming out for as long as possible.

"If you have anything else to ask, you should do so now. We are running out of time."

"You seem to know a bit about the cult. Tell me how to stop them and get everyone out of this safe and alive."

"Oh, but what would be the point of doing that?"

I was so appalled that I didn't know what to say. If he had the knowledge needed to help me save countless lives and to prevent my cult from doing more horrendous deeds, then what gave him the right to withhold that information?

He must have noticed my frustration, for a moment later he said, "Lighten up a bit. Twilight already knows everything that I could tell you. She just doesn't trust you enough to tell you about it."

"I talked to her while wearing the Element of Truth! What else could I possibly do to make her trust me?"

"Trust is not something so easily given. Gaining her trust will take more time than you have left to use, so you will need to force her hoof in the matter."

I wasn't comfortable with the idea of manipulating someone to work with me, but I didn't really have any other choice. If making a promise while being forced to tell the truth isn't enough to make Twilight trust me, then maybe it would be best for the sake of everyone to give her no other options and force her to help me.

"Alright. I don't like it, but I'll do it. How can I get her to help me if she won't trust me? What leverage can I possibly have that will change her mind?"

"Don't worry about that yet. I've been watching this cult a bit more intently, and it would seem that you arrived at a perfect time. The leverage you need to get Twilight to help you will almost literally be thrown at you."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"That means exactly what it sounds like. I don't just speak for the pleasure of hearing this voice, you know."

Something about the way he said that didn't sit well with me. Just as I was about to voice my concerns, he spoke up again.

"Looks like we're out of time here. You need to move on to other dreams before my presence in your mind burns up your little body. Ta ta! Come visit again when you've got this whole cult thing figured out, and maybe we can talk about happier things."

The dream came into focus in front of a small cottage out in the forest. I was slightly younger than my waking self, probably about twenty years of age. The change bothered me for a moment, but that wasn't the strangest thing about the dream. The cottage and forest were shrouded in darkness, and an evil looking figure leaned against the doorway of the cottage.

The figure chuckled and shouted, "Really, Aubade? This is the best you could come up with to defeat me? Instead of an army, you seek to stop me with six completely ordinary people? Pathetic! You could have at least taken the loss of the elements with some dignity."

I noticed that there were five others with me, but didn't have time to dwell on it as my dream self spoke up. "You think you can destroy the elements just like that? Well, you're wrong, because the spirits of the elements are right here!"

His eyes narrowed. "What?"

My dream self was suddenly seemed much more animated than before. "Alvar, who wasn't fooled by your illusions and lies, represents the spirit of Truth! Esme, who cared enough about her friends to put herself in harm's way for them, represents the spirit of Love!"

As I continued, a flash of light appeared on the hand of each of them and a ring appeared. While the bearers themselves seemed shocked, my dream self continued to grin as if he had seen this coming. "Abby, who kept our spirits up when the end seemed inevitable, represents the spirit of Joy! Janice, who was ready to give up her own life if it meant keeping your monsters away from us, represents the spirit of Charity! And Ernest, who rejected your offer to betray us for personal power, represents the spirit of Honor! The spirits of these five people got us through every challenge you threw at us."

"You still don't have the sixth Element! The spark didn't work!" he shouted desperately.

"But it did! It was a different kind of spark! It was the spark that all of mankind feels when they see all five elements working together in harmony. The spark is the true perfection that mankind has always been striving for. You see, Umbra, when all the elements are brought together in harmony, it creates the sixth element: the Element of Light!"

I suddenly felt it around my neck. I was more than just a man in that moment. I was a principle, an idea, a thought. I was pure. I was perfection. Evil could not even exist in my presence, and it tore off Umbra like a house stripped of its roof during a tornado. All of the evil that had been empowering the monster fell away to reveal a normal man before us. Everything was completely silent and still for a moment as we stood there.

Alvar shook his head and laughed. "Tom, when I first heard you talking about this element nonsense I asked myself what kind of drugs you had to be on. Seems you were right after all."

I chuckled a bit as well. "Honestly, I didn't know if it was real or not until the rings started popping into existence. I was just going on a hunch up until then."

Ernest frowned. "You mean that you ran into this with no idea what you were doing?"

Before I was forced to explain my extreme lack of forethought, Abby interjected. "Oh! Oh oh oh oh oh! Look, the sun is back!"

"Huh. So it is. I guess that means that we really defeated Umbra, didn't we?" said Janice.

"Did anyone else think that this whole thing was just a little bit too easy?" said Esme.

Alvar scoffed. "What, did you not have enough of a challenge with the monsters Umbra sent after us?"

"That isn't what I meant. I'm just wondering why, in the end, it was so simple. It was almost like a fairy tale, with how the good guys just swoop in and stop the bad guy. Isn't it just a little bit odd that everything turned out perfectly?"

"Not entirely perfectly," said Ernest, pointing over to Umbra. "We still got to deal with him."

"And deal with him I shall," said a new voice from behind us.

We all had to cover our eyes for a moment when we turned around. It was almost like staring directly into the sun, but through a telescope. Considering who we were looking at, that wasn't too inaccurate of a comparison. Aubade appeared out of the bright spot a moment later. The harsh light dissipated, and all of my friends began to bow.

"Stop that! Cut that out this instant!" My friends stopped mid-bow, stunned and confused.

"I am so sick and tired of being bowed to. Why do you think I left the castle behind and went for the little cabin? Seriously, I stopped enforcing that tradition over seven hundred years ago and people still bow to me like I'm some kind of god."

My five confused friends hesitantly came out of their bow. Ernest was standing at attention, which made Aubade chuckle a bit as he passed us and walked over to where Umbra lay.

"It has been a thousand years since I have seen you healthy and whole, Nocturne. It is time to put our past behind us. We were meant to work together, little brother."

"Brother!?" we all exclaimed.

"Yes," said Aubade without taking his eyes off Nocturne. "For a long time, I treated my brother like dirt. Eventually I pushed him too far and his anger got the best of him. He was corrupted by dark magic into the creature known as Umbra, but you managed to save him from himself with the Elements of Light."

"In my defense," said Nocturne, who was beginning to stir, "you were an asshole."

We were sure right then that Nocturne was going to get blasted into a million pieces, but Aubade only smiled.

"Yes, I was. You had every right to be furious with me. I regret the past, but we need to put that behind us now for the betterment of everyone. Will you forgive me, Nocturne?" Aubade said, extending a hand to his brother.

For a tense moment, nobody moved. Then, to our great relief, Nocturne took his brother's hand.

"I forgive you," he said, then stood and embraced Aubade.

A collective sigh of relief escaped from the six of us. My friends, now. We had done it. Umbra was defeated and Nocturne returned. Aubade was freed and got his brother back. The elements had been remade. The good guys won, just like they always do.

The dream shifted again and I found myself back outside of the cottage. I carried a massive book with me as I raced up to the door and knocked quickly. Aubade had barely opened the door when I began speaking.

"I just finished reading the book you gave me on Merlin's time spells, and I had a bunch of questions that couldn't wait!"

"The whole book!? I just gave it to you this morning!"

"So?" I asked, confused.

"...Nevermind. Come on in and I'll answer your questions."

I spent a long time just talking with him and absorbing as much knowledge as I could. If anything was true about me, it was that I loved to learn. Since Aubade was like a living library of information, talking to him always rewarded me with all kinds of new information. Today, however, there was something more specific that I wanted to learn from him. Something that had been on my mind for a while, but I hadn't gotten up the courage to ask yet.

"Aubade, can you teach me about the other types of magic?"

He calmly folded his hands in his lap, his face an emotionless mask. "Whatever do you mean? You already know love magic, light magic, time magic, healing magic, combat magic, and defensive magic. What else could you want to know?"

"I was thinking about maybe learning some chaos magic."

The calm mask turned into a scowl. "I am not comfortable with that idea. I understand that you want to learn more about magic, and I'm always happy to teach you. Unfortunately, that is not knowledge that I feel I can safely impart unto you."

"Alright," I said with a sigh. I grabbed my book and left with a quick goodbye, prepared to go back to the apartment I lived in near the edge of the woods.

Suddenly an idea hit me. There was another way that I could learn about chaos magic! While Aubade was the first one I thought of when I wanted to learn something, I had another teacher that I had forgotten about. It took me only a couple of minutes to find him when I went looking. When he wasn't at home, he would be in a small grove a bit deeper into the forest. I found him leaned up against a tree with a small sketchpad, drawing a hummingbird.

"Hello, Nocturne."

"Greetings, Thomas," he replied, greeting me with a small smile.

"C'mon, call me Tom. Thomas just sounds weird."

"Why would you not wish to be called by your name?"

"We're friends, we don't need to be so formal with each other," I said with a smile.

"Friends..." he said, mulling over the word for a moment. "We are friends?"

"Of course!" I said. "I thought that much was obvious ever since we saved you from that darkness."

"I suppose that we are friends then," he said with a growing smile.

I sat and watched him work for a while in companionable silence. After a while, he must have noticed that my mind wasn't on the scenery.

"What is on your mind, Tom? You seem quite pensive today."

"I've been thinking a lot about the forbidden kinds of magic. I want to learn about them more, but Aubade doesn't want to teach it to me."

"Pray tell, why do you wish to learn about the darker aspects of magic?"

"If I am to be trying to stop darkness, then it would assist me greatly to understand my enemy."

Nocturne nodded in agreement. "An admirable goal. Come," he said, standing up and offering me a hand. "I will teach you what you wish to know. It wouldn't do to have you ill-prepared for the tasks that will come before you."

I let him help me up and followed him deeper into the woods. Eventually we reached a secluded spot that was extremely different from its surroundings. Small stone spires were arranged in a circle around a central point. Each spire glowed faintly in the evening light as we approached, seeming to resonate with power.

"I created this as somewhat of a training ground a long time ago. The spires will help provide magical energy for spells while also preventing any of the energy from leaving the circle. That way I could prevent a bad spell from destroying something, which had happened more times than you would believe. Step in, don't be shy."

I somewhat nervously stepped into the circle and made my way to where he stood in the center, remembering the first magic circle I had made. It had turned me into a fish for a few hours. The next one had exploded. Overall, I just had very bad experiences with these things. It was hard not be a bit nervous in one, even when it had been built by very capable hands.

Nocturne smiled as I approached. "Alright, stand in the middle of the circle. No, the middle. Three steps to your left. OTHER left. perfect. Now, you're going to help me set the sun!"

"What!?"

"You heard me. I need to make sure that you can use this magic circle for a big spell, that way the little ones can be done with little concentration. I need to raise the moon soon anyway, so I may as well get both tasks completed at the same time."

"That's crazy! I don't have nearly enough energy to do that!"

"You don't, but the circle does. Your Element does too, but I see that you aren't wearing it right now. Pity. Anyway, you can pull energy from the circle to help you. I'll be right here if anything goes wrong. Go on, give the sun a little push!"

I focused as hard as I could, but I couldn't make the sun budge a single inch. No matter how much power I threw behind the spell, it simply wouldn't move. After a moment, I felt another force pushing the sun with me. Suddenly, the sun began setting. It dipped below the horizon a few moments later, and I collapsed onto the ground.

"I can see that this is your first time attempting to use an energy field to augment your spells. Probably your first time moving an object so far away as well. It's alright, you did better than I did on my first try. Let's try raising the moon now. Don't worry, I'll guide you through it much more closely.

"You're going to need to learn how to control your magic differently. Instead of gathering all your magic before using the spell, continually drain the magic out of your surroundings as you cast the spell. This way prevents your body from overflowing with magic and allows for much smoother spellcasting. It also allows you to cast spells that you normally won't have enough energy for in a single casting. Think of it as drinking from a glass of water that refills itself as quickly as you drink it. You are the cup, the water is magic, and the energy field is pouring the water back in as you pour it out."

Taking his advice, I focused on raising the moon before tapping into the energy all around me. I allowed it to flow through me as I continually cast the spell instead of giving a mighty push on a fixed amount of energy. Sure enough, the moon began to rise into the night sky. It wasn't very quickly or smoothly, so Nocturne had to step in and finish the job after a few minutes of watching me struggle.

"Well done, Tom! Also, your arm is on fire."

"What?" I said before realizing what he had said. Nocturne laughed as I quickly put out the small blaze.

"That happens sometimes when you try to channel that much magic over a long period of time. The human body isn't made to pass that much energy through it. Our bodies can store the energy just fine, but using it is extremely risky. I recommend you wear your Element whenever possible, as it will act as a natural casting buffer and prevent things like this from happening again.

"Now if you want to learn about the magics you may find yourself facing, the very first you need to know about is hate magic. You already know that emotion can severely effect our abilities to cast spells, but clearing your mind is not always how a spell is cast. Hate magic is an extremely powerful focus on all the rage and bloodlust that the human mind is so easily capable of producing. It uses these emotions to fuel the spells cast by it. You heard me right, emotional spell augmentation is very real. Aubade prefers to teach people to clear their minds before casting a spell to prevent stray thoughts from interrupting the flow of energy, but I prefer to take that risk for the extra strength."

A dark shadow seemed to cross his face for a moment. "Of course, that is where hate magic comes in. You remember how I had been overtaken by darkness. I focused too much on my anger and let it consume me. Anger is by far the strongest emotion to augment a spell, but incautious use of it leads to hate magic. I suppose in some ways it is very similar to love magic. Both use passion, but for completely different purposes. Hate magic destroys things, and love magic protects things. This is why it is almost impossible to have an offensive form of a love spell and a defensive form of a hate spell. It just goes against their very nature.

"The best way to learn from here is to just see it yourself. Watch closely."

He walked a good distance away from me before casting his spell. When he did, darkness pooled around him and covered his form. For a few moments, I couldn't see him at all. When he brushed the darkness away, it sent shivers down my spine.

He was Umbra.

"Calm down! It's still me!" he said, noticing the distressed look on my face. "This is only a change to my physical appearance. I just wanted you to see what hate magic looked like in action so that you can recognize someone else using it." He released the spell a moment later and looked just like normal after a few seconds.

"Why haven't I been taught about emotion energy before?" I asked.

"This is high level magic, Tom. Aubade would have eventually taught you, but he likes to take things slower and more cautiously than I do."

"If I could use this power for good-"

"Hold it right there! That is not going to happen." Nocturne said with a frantic look in his eye. "Even my little disguise was a risky spell to cast using hate magic. The smallest of spells fueled by hate can turn against their caster, corrupting their minds. How do you think I became Umbra? It wasn't through a love spell, that's for certain. Trust me Tom, you could cast a spell with hate power and have the best intentions in the world. The hate magic would still pose a threat of great evil to you and the world. I will happily teach you any other kind of magic so that you will be better prepared, but not hate magic. Now please Tom, promise me that you won't attempt to practice hate magic. Promise me."

"Okay Nocturne, I promise. I will never use hate magic for any reason."

"Good. Now, how about I teach you how to use chaos magic? Step into the middle and start drawing energy from the circle's energy field again."

The dream blurred out of focus for a bit, but became clear again after a few moments. I was back at the training circle, but this time I was alone. I walked out into the center of the circle and immediately began draining energy from my surroundings. I assumed that some time had elapsed since the first time I used the circle, since my dream self was able to use it much more easily than before. That's the point when I realized something horrible. I was about to do it. I was about to do the one thing I had promised to never do.

The area lit up as the Element of Light glowed and radiated its light across the forest. Slowly, the aura changed from the pure white into an inky blackness. I could feel my past self forcing himself to focus on all the rage within him, but I simply couldn't hold it. The black turned back into a pure white as my focus on anger slipped. Sighing with frustration, I left the circle.

I must have been imagining things, because I could have sworn that the crystal on the Element of Light wasn't as bright as it used to be.

"Master?"

The dream world shifted and abruptly shattered.

"Master, we have something to show you."

I sat up and groggily rubbed the sleep out of my eyes. "What is it?"

"New initiates into the cult, Master. Some guards from the Crystal Empire region will be joining us today."

That caught my attention. It wasn't just normal ponies getting involved in this anymore. If the guards were getting involved, then this cult had deeper connections than I thought. I certainly wanted to see them to figure out more about the kind of ponies that join a cult dedicated to my worship.

"Alright, lead on," I said to the messenger.

After a minute of walking, I realized that the path we were on was extremely familiar. It was the same path I walked when I went to the dungeons.

Surely they don't have the new cult members in the dungeon? What sort of cult would get more followers by doing that?

Somehow, the cult denied my logic. A minute later saw me standing at the door to the dungeons. I decided to use the method that had served me well so far in this world to face this new situation.

"To hell with it," I said, blindly forging ahead to whatever lay beyond the door.

Chapter 9: Shining in the Darkness

The first thing I noticed upon entering the room was the new prisoners. Five ponies were chained in a row on the opposite side of the room from the Elements of Harmony, covered in enough shadow so that I could not see defining characteristics but could easily see their race. Two normal ponies, two pegasi, and a unicorn all suffered the crystal coverings on their hooves, wings, and horn. It didn't take a genius to deduce that they were not here willingly.

The next thing I noticed was that Lyra was waiting for me over by the new ponies. Beside her floated the dark crystal I had seen in her office.

What is that doing here? I wondered as Lyra beckoned me over to her. "Welcome, Master. Here-"

She was cut off by an explosion of sound from where Twilight and her friends were. Chains rattled in a frenzy of concussive blasts that repeatedly assaulted my eardrums. It took only a moment to identify the source of the horrific noise.

The pink demon.

"What is she doing?" I yelled at Twilight. I had to shout it multiple times over the rattling produced from the insane shaking before she could hear me.

"It's... doozy!" was all I could make out. Finally, Lyra cast a spell that turned the cacophony into a quiet buzzing.

"What did you say?" I asked.

"She does that whenever something really big is about to happen," said Twilight.

I frowned in confusion. "But she's asleep!"

"Pinkie sense. Don't question it," she replied, her tone laced with near-lethal levels of snark.

"How dare you speak to your master that way!" shouted Lyra. Right before my eyes, she underwent a stunning transformation. The shadows seemed to bend and flow like liquid around her. Her eyes glowed a demonic red and green and her horn gave off a sickening purple-green aura. Before I could react, she fired a bolt of magic that hit Twilight square in the jaw.

"Stop!" I yelled as she charged up her horn again.

"As you command, Master," she said, instantly changing back to her normal appearance as if nothing had happened. Don't piss her off, I thought to myself before turning to Twilight. Thankfully, she was fine. The magic seemed to stun and disorient her more than it did actual harm. There were a few singed hairs, but that was the worst of the damage. She caught me staring at her and glared, so I turned my back on her and gestured for Lyra to continue.

"Here are the new initiates. These guards were taken by surprise while camping for the night on the road from the Crystal Empire to Canterlot."

Walking closer, I could see them clearly. They had their heads bowed and shoulders slumped in defeat. Their eyes were downcast, and the closest one in the group was silently crying. All of them had given up. All, that is, except one.

The last one in the line of ponies, the only unicorn, gazed directly ahead. His eyes did not waver from some unseen spot directly ahead of him. He sat up straight and proud, despite the obvious inevitability of his predicament. Even without any way of knowing who they were, I had no doubts that this was their leader.

"I sent for your presence here, Master, because I assumed that you would wish to see how we came to see your greatness."

"Uh... yeah." I mentally slapped myself, but Lyra failed to notice my lack of enthusiasm.

"Then we shall begin. You," she said, pointing a hoof at the first pony in the row, "what is your name?"

"B-b-brook. My n-name is Brook," she said, more tears falling from her eyes.

"Look me in my eyes, slave," when Brook did not comply, Lyra harshly slammed a hoof into her muzzle and forced Brook to meet her gaze.

"Now..." Lyra said, levitating the dark crystal from her office over Brook's face. "Serve me, Brook."

"What?"

"Serve me."

"No!"

"Serve me."

My blood turned to ice and I fought to stop myself from running out of the dungeon. Lyra's eyes had turned to the demonic red and green I had seen before while her shadow seemed to grow darker, despite there hardly being enough light to cast a shadow at all. Even though Lyra was no longer forcing their eyes to lock, Brook seemed unable to break her gaze from the dark depths of the unicorn's glare.

"I'll... Never..."

"Serve me."

Lyra's voice was now more akin to a hissing, and I could see tints of green flecking the whites of Brook's eyes.

"Serve me."

This time, Brook did not respond. She merely swayed on her hooves and stared forward.

"Good slave," said Lyra, tapping the dark crystal to Brook's forehead. The mare swayed a moment longer before collapsing to the floor with a blissful smile on her face. The shadows seemed to darken around her, similarly to the shadows that flowed around Lyra as if they had a mind of their own. Three of the remaining guards sharply flinched as she hit the floor, while the unicorn at the end of the row did not even blink.

"What is your name, slave?" Lyra said to the next pony, his wings twitching in fear.

"I... I'll never tell you!" he said, his voice quaking.

"Serve me."

"...No...I won't..."

"Serve me."

"Silver Spear."

"Good slave," As before, the crystal hit his head and he hit the floor with a dull thud.

I looked over at Twilight to see how she was handling all of this. Like me, she was unable to look away from the horrors unfolding before our eyes. It seemed like she had been crying, but it was hard to tell in the darkness.

"What is your name, slave?" Lyra said again. This time, the pony met her gaze with rage instead of fear.

"It's Justice," he said, voice smoldering with hatred, "and I would rather die than serve you or your cult! Go to Tartarus!"

Lyra smiled and froze him with her magic. "You will serve me no matter what," she said, slowly running her hoof down his face, "but you don't have to be alive to do so." She leaned in closer to his frightened face until they were almost touching muzzles. "I think your blood will make a beautiful crystal."

His eyes widened and he frantically struggled at the spell binding him, but to no avail. His eyes met mine and he silently screamed for me to save him. I knew right then that I would never be able to live with myself if I let him die. At the same time, I knew that it would be impossible to free him. I had to compromise.

"No," I said, barely managing to keep my voice from quavering. "We have enough crystals already. He can serve us better in life."

The hope that had briefly shone in Justice's eyes was quenched in that moment. The other guard fidgeted for the first time since I had seen him. I couldn't blame him, the hopelessness in the air was almost palpable.

Lyra frowned, but did not question my decision. "Yes, Master."

The rage in Justice's eyes felt like it was cutting me to the bone. Whether or not he would have preferred to die was irrelevant; I would not allow him to. This way there was still a small chance for me to save him later. If he was drained to build a crystal, then there would be nothing left to save.

I tried to block out the noise as Lyra resumed her hissing demands, but the sound still chilled my blood. Justice was remarkably resilient, but inevitably was forced to submit to the strange magics at work. He went without a word, simply passing out as the shadows darkened and claimed him.

I'm sorry. I silently thought as he lost the mental battle. I wish there were another way to save you.

The last prisoner in the row began twitching quite a bit more as Lyra turned to face the next prisoner, a pristine white pegasus. She, like Justice, met Lyra's harsh gaze. Her eyes, however, will not filled with the indignant rage in Justice's. Her eyes were as cold and cunning as a wolf's.

"My name is Glacia," she said. "I have no desire to fight this. I will join you and serve willingly." The last prisoner shot her a glare and muttered something under his breath before shifting around a bit more.

Lyra smiled with approval. "Good. We need more members with initiative like yours." The dark crystal tapped Glacia lightly on the head as Lyra spoke. "Join us in the darkness and accept this gift."

The shadows bent towards her for a moment. The small amount of light in the room dimmed into almost nonexistence. I felt as if a small part of me was being pulled in as well. Suddenly, the shadows flowed into Glacia's body and were absorbed. She looked very much the same with the exception of her eyes. Like Lyra's, they glowed a sickly green and red.

"Welcome," Lyra said as she broke Glacia's chains with her magic. "Go and find another member to show you around your new home."

"As you command," she said. She paused for a moment to bow to me before doing as Lyra said. Once she was gone, we turned to face the last prisoner. He had stopped moving around, but I didn't think anything of it at the time.

"Wait a minute..." Lyra said, peering at him in the darkness. "I know you." The unicorn turned his head to look her in the eye.

"Yes. We met briefly a little under four years ago, but I think you are more familiar with my wife."

Twilight gasped sharply and a look of recognition passed over Lyra's face. "Of course. It's nice to see you again. It'll be even nicer if you submit willingly."

"No!" shouted Twilight.

"My thoughts exactly," he said with a glare.

Lyra shrugged. "Very well then. Now," she said bringing the dark crystal closer to the unicorn. "serve-"

A loud crack and a flash of light exploded from the mysterious prisoner's horn, despite the crystals covering it. I was tossed backwards, landing with a sharp pain in my eyes and ears. Wasting no time, I pushed myself up and looked back to the prisoner.

Make that the ex-prisoner. Lyra was trapped by a small pink bubble that surrounded her and prevented her numerous spells from leaving the bubble. The unicorn was just freeing the last of his hooves from the chains holding him as I got up. Ignoring me, he walked up to Lyra and tapped on her bubble.

"It's love magic. Your hate power doesn't stand a chance against it." He turned to face me with grim determination on his face. "I learned how to counter dark magic a long time ago, monster. You don't stand a chance."

"Run!" shouted Twilight. I got the strangest feeling that she wasn't talking to me.

"Who the hell are you?" I asked.

"I'm the Captain of the Crystal Guard. I'm the Prince of the Crystal Empire."

"Drama queen," I muttered.

"Most importantly, I'm the brother of Twilight Sparkle."

"Oh." That would explain Twilight's sudden panic. I don't suppose he would be open to simply talking this one out?

"I am Shining Armor, and I am going to put you down." I'll take that as a "no".

With that, he charged at me.

Right from the beginning, I knew that my chances of defeating him were nonexistent. I had only the basic memories of combat, whereas this guy obviously had years of experience against opponents far stronger than me. The only thing that was saving me was my agility, and even that didn't work forever.

When he charged me again, I leaped out of his way just like I had every other time. This time, however, I heard the sound I had come to associate with magic. I slammed into a wall of pink, unable to get out of his way. The strange barrier seemed to drain me of my energy and willpower. It was akin to a burning sensation on the inside of my body, not unlike the effects of my strange regenerative powers.

The wall dissipated and I dropped to the floor, dazed and unable to move. My ribs cracked as he leaped on top of me and began slamming his hoof into my chest.

"This is for my sister!" he shouted as he pummeled me.

After a moment, I found myself able to move again. With all the force I could muster, I pulled my legs together and sprung them out into his stomach. He was only knocked back a few feet but it was enough time for me to get up and start moving again.

"That was a cheap shot. I would expect nothing less from the kind of coward who uses dark magic!" he yelled as he approached me again. Instead of charging at me, he instead slowly circled around me. I moved as well, keeping him directly in front of me. In a sudden burst of motion, he sprung forward with an uppercut. I managed to avoid it, but his other hoof swung around and caught me in the leg as I was moving. I quickly hobbled backwards to avoid a sweep at my legs and we circled each other again.

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Twilight struggling with her chains. Whatever they had put her in must have been much stronger than what they put Shining Armor in, because she couldn't work her way free from it. No amount of wiggling, pulling, or stomping on the chain was doing anything for her.

Shining Armor quickly took advantage of my distraction. He surged forward and struck me in the side of the head with a brutal hook, sending me skidding across the floor of the dungeon. I came to a stop a few feet away, coughing and spitting out blood. At this point, all hope seemed lost. I simply had no way of beating him. I was beginning to regret taking off the Element of Darkness. I could have really used some power, even if it wasn't from a great source.

He said something to me, but I couldn't understand him. My ears were ringing and felt like they had been stuffed with fuzz. A moment later, I saw another flash of pink. I briefly felt myself hurtling through the air before I was reunited with the floor. Blinking my eyes clear, I realized that I was next to Lyra's bubble and that Shining Armor was no longer paying attention to me. He was trying to help Twilight get rid of the magic blocker on her horn, but seemed to be having some trouble.

I noticed Lyra a moment later, frantically waving and pointing at something next to my head. I managed to groggily roll over to look at where she was pointing, and I saw it. The dark crystal that she had been using to brainwash the prisoners was still laying forgotten on the floor. Focusing on it, I could feel the dark power radiating from it. It felt eerily similar to the power that came from the Element of Darkness.

I eagerly reached out to grab it, but hesitated at the last moment. Is this really the right decision? I swore not to use dark power again, but do I really have a choice? I glanced over at Twilight and Shining Armor as they continued to struggle with the crystal magic inhibitor. If I do the "right thing" and refuse the use of dark power, then Twilight and Shining Armor will probably get themselves killed trying to escape. Not to mention the fact that I will die, as I seem to be bleeding out.

I glance back over at the dark crystal laying nearby. Such a small rock for so much power. If I use its power to put a stop to their escape, then I will have complete control of the situation again. I can take Shining Armor prisoner until I find some way to set all them free and break the spell over this cult. That way I can keep them all safe.

I looked back and forth between the two, pondering my decision. Do the ends justify the means? After another moment of thought, I steeled my will and dragged myself over to the dark crystal. It doesn't matter. I refuse to die here, and I refuse to let Twilight and her brother ruin any chance I have of fixing this. With that, I grabbed the crystal.

Immediately, arcs of black lightning ran up and down my body. They scorched my flesh and left agonizing burns that made me scream in pain. As much as it hurt, it felt good. It felt really good. Every bit of agony made me feel a bit more powerful. That burning strength building inside made all the pain go away. I felt only power now.

Dark electricity still raced across my form as I forced myself upright. Twilight and Shining Armor stared in horror as my flesh sizzled and popped, making itself whole again. I wiped a bit of blood from my mouth and smiled.

"I'm back."

We exploded into motion at the same moment. Black sparks danced across the floor towards Shining Armor. At the same time, he launched a wall of force at me. He erected a shield to defend himself and I sidestepped his magic with a speed I didn't know I was capable of.

We traded shots at a range until we realized that it was pointless as neither of us could land a hit on the other. It was with some relief that we wordlessly agreed to come closer, as I was out of the dark electricity that had appeared earlier. Apparently that was mostly for show, as it did seem to terrify Twilight and make Shining Armor's movements more cautious. I wasn't too worried about the loss of the lightning though, as I was still a force to be reckoned with even without it.

The crystal I held quickly made up for the loss of the lightning as we entered close combat. Shadows flowed around my hands like a large glove molded into the shape of my fist. Shining Armor brought his own magical prowess forth, conjuring a magical shield that floated in the air before him. Every one of my assaults was met with a counter or block from him, and all of his met the same from me. Time after time we traded blows with no change.

Seeing that neither of us could currently defeat the other, Shining Armor got clever and changed the rules. He leaped backwards and cast an odd spell that left a glowing pink light covering him. Fueled by the power running through me, I failed to see the danger in attacking him again.

My fist collided with the pink aura and I collapsed as my world became pain. It was as if every fiber of my being was being ripped out through the hand that touched the shield. Shining Armor looked down on me coldly as I writhed in suffering on the ground.

"That is a love magic shield, a trick I picked up from my wife," he said, his tone as harsh as his glare. "It is almost lethal to creatures of darkness and cuts through hate magic effortlessly. I'm impressed you've gotten this far, but love always wins in the end." With that, he put a bubble of that love magic around me, much like the one Lyra was in.

Something about his words threw me into blind rage. As he turned and walked back over to Twilight, every ounce of my mind was screaming for revenge. My flesh yearned to make him suffer. My soul was filled with the desire to see him burn. All of that was summed up with one thought.

"I hate you."

I subconsciously tightened my grip on the dark crystal in my hand. With a herculean effort, I began to push against the magical barrier. I could see nothing but pink. I could feel nothing but agony. I could barely force myself to keep pushing, but I did.

I took a step forward.

My foot dragged through heavy resistance from the burning wall. I wasn't able to take a full step, but I still managed to slowly move.

Another step.

My emotions were accelerating like an out of control train. My vision narrowed as my heart beat faster and faster, breaths coming shorter and shorter.

Another step.

Suddenly, I burst through the bubble. Pieces of magic shield flew across the room for a few seconds before dissipating into nothingness. Both Twilight and Shining Armor were in stunned silence as I recovered and turned to face them again.

"I hate you."

Shining Armor charged at me, a pink spear materializing out of the air next to him. He never even had a chance to run me through with it. I heeded my blind rage and set about casting the only magic I knew about so far. I pulled a match out of my shoe and focused all of the hatred into that small point. The raging inferno inside me finally had an outlet, and it all came rushing forth like a dam bursting.

Just as Shining Armor was upon me, I let go of the magic. An explosion of fire sucked the air out of my lungs and obscured my vision before the explosion formed into a solid ball of fire about as large as my chest. It simply hovered in front of me, waiting to respond to my will.

Shining Armor lay dazed on the ground a few feet away. I tackled him and grabbed his head, slamming his horn into the ground to stop his love magic before putting him in a headlock. I wanted him alive and conscious for this.

I snapped my fingers, and the ball of fire rolled over to rest directly behind Shining Armor. He yelled something and tried to struggle, but I couldn't hear. All I knew was the hatred in my veins and the pounding of my heart in my head. I snapped my fingers and the fire touched his back hooves.

He began struggling again, but would not scream for me. I smacked his horn and intensified the heat. Still, he would not give me the pleasure of seeing him break. Not a single tear was shed, nor did a single whimper of fear escape his mouth. It was infuriating! My break in concentration caused me to lose control of the fire, and the blaze licked up the fur along his legs and back.

"No! Please! Sto- AAH!"

Finally! I could hear his screams perfectly clearly. It was music to my ears. Each agonized groan, every shriek of suffering, and every shaking sob was exactly what I had been waiting to hear. Oh, how he struggled. He shook violently as he suffered by my hand, and I loved every second of it.

I blinked. Something was in my eye, preventing me from witnessing the beautiful suffering before me. Wiping my hand across my eye, I noticed something peculiar.

I was crying.

The fire sputtered out as I numbly dropped the dark crystal and the hatred flowed out of me. What had I just done? I was vaguely aware of Twilight screaming something behind me, but I was too stunned to listen to her words.

They were right. All of them. I really am nothing more than a monster inside.

I released my hold on Shining Armor and backed up. He didn't even seem to notice with how much pain he was in. His screams continued to echo throughout the dungeon. I slammed my hands over my ears in desperation to keep it out, but to no avail.

I don't know how long he suffered. It could have been seconds or it could have been hours. I only noticed that something had changed when it was Twilight screaming at me instead of her brother.

"You monster! You killed him! You k-killed..." I couldn't hear anything else as she broke down into a mess of despairing sobs. Scarcely able to believe myself, I walked back over to Shining Armor. He wasn't moving.

Before panic could fully set in, I realized that he was still breathing. It was shallow and weak, often coming in sharp bursts, but it was still there. He was upon Death's doorstep, but I could bring him back. I could still save him.

But how?

I couldn't be too obvious about my next move. Lyra was still watching me through the bubble, but she didn't seem to be able to hear me. If Lyra realized that I wasn't here to take over Equestria, then she could turn the entire cult against me. I could try getting her to heal him with magic, but that would first require me to break the magic bubble around her. I wasn't sure I had it in me to do that twice.

Twilight could probably help me the most here, but I wasn't willing to try that option. I would first have to remove the magic blocking crystals, and that would be very obvious to Lyra. Even if I decided to risk Lyra's wrath, Twilight might not be in the right state of mind to be using magic at all. Even worse, she might just blast me to pieces once I free her. All of this was assuming that I could figure out how to get the crystals off her horn in the first place.

No, whatever I did to save Shining Armor would have to be on me alone. I wondered for a moment about my own regenerative abilities, but realized after a moment that it probably wasn't extendable to others. Lyra seemed to be able to regenerate as well, as I remembered her wounds healing after she bled herself to create a crystal. Maybe regeneration is limited to users of hate magic?

A terrible thought crossed my mind. It was just crazy enough to work, but Twilight would never forgive me and would likely refuse to ever work with me to escape this place. It was a fate far worse than death if I couldn't reverse it later.

I grabbed the dark crystal and rested it on Shining Armor's forehead, focusing on pushing all of the power into him. It felt like an infinite time that I sat there straining to channel the magic to him. For a painful amount of time, nothing happened. Just as I was about to give up, something changed. The shadows around us began to condense on him and flow into him, just as I had seen with the prisoner who joined the cult willingly. Miraculously, his charred body began to slowly knit itself back together out of the shadows. When his healing was fully underway, I cut the flow of magic and stepped back to admire my work.

Rather than simply restoring him, the dark power seemed to have improved him. His already obvious muscles stood out even more than before, giving him a menacing appearance even as he lay in a coma on the floor. His pure white coat, which previously had seemed to complete his "good guy" look, now managed to make him appear malicious. His eyes now had the same green that-

He blinked.

I managed to stop myself from jumping away, but I still flinched at the unexpected movement. After a moment, he blinked again and slowly pushed himself to his hooves. Twilight gasped out loud, but otherwise seemed unable to vocalize her thoughts. I was having a similar reaction.

After a moment he turned to me, his eyes filled with a fiery rage. I immediately prepared to fight him again, so I did not expect what came next.

"I live to serve you, Master," Shining Armor said, bowing to me. "I see the truth now. You are far greater than any of us, and it is you who should rule this world."

"What have you done?!" shouted Twilight, who had been reduced to hysterical sobbing on the floor. "You couldn't just let him die, you had to make him a monster just like-" A cloudy grey aura covered her face and a muzzle appeared, cutting her off.

"Well," said Lyra, now freed from the magical bubble, "that could have gone better." She walked over to Shining Armor and looked over him approvingly for a moment. "You appear to have benefited greatly from our master's magic. Your blood seems to accept the darkness faster than most of the others. You will be very useful in the coming days."

"I am glad to be able to serve," he said.

Twilight could only weep for her lost brother.

The hours following the escapade in the dungeon seemed to pass by in a blur, probably due to the shock I was in. I couldn't afford to show it, but I was on the verge of a panic attack. I had just burned alive the brother of the pony I was trying to save, adding insult to injury when I brainwashed him.

"Master?" said Lyra, bringing me out of my plummeting thoughts.

"Sorry, what?"

"I assigned a few guards to keep an eye on the dungeon to prevent something like this from happening again. Also, I've assigned Shining Armor to be your personal guard. I thought you might enjoy that, seeing as he is the first to be converted by your own powers."

As odd as it was, it did feel good to keep Shining Armor close. I tried to convince myself it was a side effect of the magic that bound him to my will, but it was hard to be certain of the truth. Either way, it would be easier to keep an eye on him if he followed me around. I owed Twilight that much after everything I'd done.

"Of course. Give him a day to rest first and make sure a healer looks at his legs. I kinda set them on fire."

"I'll see to it right away, Master. I'm glad you managed to keep him in one piece long enough to show him the truth. We need more fighters like him if we are to take over the surface world. With the way he threw himself at you, I was certain that you would utterly destroy him."

My heart skipped a beat and my head spun when she spoke those words. "What did you say?" I asked, suddenly intensely focused on her words.

She blinked in surprise. "Uh, I said that we need more fighters and that I'm glad you kept him alive."

"No, what exactly did you say? The last part."

"Oh. I said that it was impressive how he threw himself at you and I was certain you wouldn't let him live." she said.

Threw himself at me... Why does that sound so familiar? Suddenly, I remembered the words spoken to me in my dream.

"I've been watching this cult a bit more intently, and it would seem that you arrived at a perfect time. The leverage you need to get Twilight to help you will almost literally be thrown at you."

"No way," I said, rubbing my temples in frustration.

"What is it, Master?" said Lyra, frowning with concern.

"Nothing," I lied. "I'm getting cleaned up and then I'm going back to sleep. Don't wake me unless it is important." I've got somebody I need to talk to for a while...

Twilight didn't know what to do anymore. Her entire life had been torn apart in less than a week due to a monster with dark magic and his brainwashed cult. Now her brother was one of them. She almost wished him to be dead rather than a mindless slave to darkness. This and many other thoughts went through her mind as she sat alone in the darkness. The only way she could see anything in the room was by the light of the twinkling stars in Luna's mane. She stared at it for a while, distracting herself from the hopelessness of her situation. If only she had the same level of magic that could make her mane flow like that, then she could-

Twilight gasped out loud, scarcely able to believe her eyes. She blinked and shook her head, but the sight before her remained unchanged. Luna's magic was returning, and she would inevitably awaken. Judging by the look of Celestia's mane, the solar princess was not far behind.

She smiled for the first time in what felt like forever, then began a spontaneous plotting session. There were plans to be made, and by Celestia she was the pony to make them!

Dream 4: We Shall All Burn Together

As the dream world began to build itself, I noticed that things were not going as I had hoped. Instead of confronting the strange voice, I was going straight into a memory. Before the physical objects fell into place, I could hear a cacophony of voices. They were all around me, moving in every direction. Yelling, whispering, hollering, screaming, they did it all. What am I doing in such a confusing place?

Sight returned to me as the memory strengthened. I was standing in a massive room filled with people. Everyone was going somewhere, following a multitude of signs and billboards or listening to announcements blared across speakers throughout the facility. The crowd was a sea of confusing motions and directions, yet everyone seemed to know where they were going. There was a semblance of order within the apparent chaos consuming this place.

Ah, yes. The airport. I was in the airport. Where I was going was uncertain, but my past self seemed to know his destination. He walked forward with a determined stride that exuded confidence. Despite the confidence felt, there was something else as well. Fear? No, it couldn't be. Apprehension? No. I found the word a moment later. Anticipation. Something big was going to happen, and my past self could hardly wait.

"Thomas!"

My heart soared in my chest and I turned to look for the voices.

"Thomas! Over here!"

A moment later, I saw two hands waving over the crowd. I barely managed to stop myself from sprinting towards it as joy filled the entirety of my being. A moment later, I was out of the crowd and standing before the people that made me so happy.

"Mom! Dad!" I said, embracing them both. "It's been too long."

"No kidding," said Dad.

"Six years. Six years is far too long," said Mom, who looked like she was trying not to cry.

"Hey, cheer up!" I said, ending the hug. "We're together again!"

"Yeah, but for how long?" said Dad.

"That doesn't matter," I said, forcing some positivity into my voice. "What matters is what we do with the time we have. Let's not waste it debating how much we have to use."

"Alright then," said Mom, who seemed to be forcing a smile to placate me, "what do you want to do with our time together?"

I pulled a piece of paper out of my pocket. "On the flight over here, I built a list of the things we could do!"

They both cringed and groaned, but their smiles got a bit wider. We were just happy to be together again, so it didn't matter what we did.

Eventually, we agreed to go into the mountains and rent a cabin for a week. It would be the perfect time together as a family, away from the city and out into the wintery wilderness. We had skiing, hiking, and many more activities planned out by yours truly. The plan was to have fun, and fun would be had!

As I watched my past self talk with my parents, I felt an odd pain in my chest. It was odd. I should have been overjoyed at the chance to regain a happy memory of my family, but instead I felt hurt. The faint aching continued as I watched a week go by in my memory. I observed joyous recounting of tales. I gained experiences through words that replaced the moments I was not present for. I saw a week of a content family, happy simply to be in the presence of each other.

Of course, all good things must come to an end.

The memory began to sharpen as on the last night of our vacation. Every moment seemed so much more important than the week leading up. Every word from their lips and every second that passed left an invisible weight on my soul until it felt that I could not breathe. As my past self went to bed on the last night, I watched with terrible foreboding in my heart.

I awoke in the middle of the night, coughing and wheezing as thick, smoky air billowed about the loft I was sleeping in. Instantly, I was wide awake and on the move. I grabbed the Element of Light from my nightstand and threw it around my neck as I bolted towards the stairs, but never made it there. The floor beneath me suddenly gave away with a loud shriek, providing a painful shortcut to the living room directly underneath the loft.

Fire surrounded me. It was everywhere. Nothing could escape the horrible orange glare that swirled around me. For a split second, I could only stare in shock. A moment later, a piece of the wall fell apart and smothered a bit of the blaze, clearing a path to the front door.

My ears rung and my entire body ached when I pushed myself off the floor and sprinted for the door. I grabbed the emergency supply backpack (that I so carefully and thoughtfully planned for just this sort of situation) and flew through the doorway. Two steps out, I slipped on some ice and hit my head on the porch railing. The world spun and blurred as I tried to stand up, but I only succeed on falling onto my back and crushing the contents of the backpack into my spine. My ears felt as if someone had filled them with cotton, and all of my thoughts moved painfully slow. Despite this, I managed to make out one sound as my ears cleared up.

Screaming.

"Mom! Dad!" I tried to yell, straining my charred throat and sluggish mind. Even if my voice could reach them, it no longer mattered. It was too late. I had failed them. I watched in horror as the cabin suddenly collapsed, throwing up ash and smoke to blind me once more. Still trying to come to my senses, I failed to notice the burning wooden beam until it fell onto me and crushed my right ankle.

I screamed as the fire consumed my leg, only for the Element of Light to glow and heal the flesh. My moment of relief was torn away as the fire caught on me again, burning its way through my skin. Once again, my element knit the flesh back together. The cycle of agony continued for what could have been hours as I was powerless to do anything but scream in pain. Pain for the loss of my family. Pain from the fire that I could not escape. Pain from the knowledge that I failed the people who loved me the most.

And then there was darkness.

I came back to reality when the rescue team pulled my still burning body from the collapsed cabin. I blindly fought against them as they extinguished my crushed leg and carried me away from the building. My parents were still in there. I screamed, I begged, I cried, but they kept a firm hold on me as they lifted me onto a stretcher. My vision swam and blurred as I saw flashing lights all around. I faintly heard the sound of voices asking questions, but they sounded distant and unimportant.

Nothing mattered anymore. The two most important people in the world died because I failed. As they put me in an ambulance and left the cabin far behind, a part of me died as well. Nothing was right anymore, and it was all my fault.

I spent a week in the hospital afterward. Oddly, the Element of Light stopped healing me at some point. My right leg was harshly burned and the ankle horribly scarred, but I didn't care about that. I stopped caring about anything the night everything burned. I spent my days slipping further and further away from reality as my heart shut itself off from all emotion.

On the eighth day, Aubade showed up. He didn't say anything for a long time. We simply sat in silence together as he struggled to find the words to say. I barely registered his words when he finally did speak. Gas leak. Nothing I could have done. Don't blame myself. There for me. "Sorry".

I involuntarily twitched. Sorry, he had said. Something inside me had sparked for a moment at his words. Something unfamiliar and unsettling, yet oddly pleasurable as well.

Aubade let out a sigh that snapped me out of my thoughts. "I'll be heading back home soon, and I'd like you to accompany me. It will be good for you." I nodded, but otherwise remained quiet. A small frown crossed his lips, but he stayed silent as well. A look of pity flashed on his face for a moment before he left me, presumably to talk to a nurse about my release from the hospital. That look brought back that spark inside, but only for a moment. Then it was gone.

With nobody there to see it, I cried.

Back at Aubade's little cottage in the woods of the far north, I sat on the bed in the spare room and scratched at the scar on my inside of my ankle. The Element should have healed it, Aubade said. There were a lot of things that should have happened that didn't. I should have been able to save my family. The scar was just another "should have" on a list of things that never came to pass.

I opened my eyes and rolled out of bed. I stared into the mirror that rested on my wall. I remembered a time where the eyes that stared back at me were full of life. They were the eyes of the hopeful. The face of someone who saw a better day and strove to make that day today. These were not what I saw today. No, the eyes of today were of broken and sorrowful spirit.

From the door came a soft knocking. When I failed to respond, Aubade opened the door and brought in two items that I never thought I'd see again. The first was an old pocket journal that I had forgotten about years ago. The second was the survival backpack from that night.

Aubade tossed them both onto the bed and looked at me with a sad smile. "I can tell you don't want to talk about it right now," he said, his eyes a mix of sorrow and compassion. "I thought maybe it would help you to write it out like you used to when you were young." He turned and left when I didn't respond, that look still frozen on his face.

I understood what he was trying to do. He probably thought that giving me some way to express what I felt without talking would help me feel better about what happened. It didn't help at all, but I did not fault him for trying. With nothing better to do, I stuffed the journal in my pocket and opened up the backpack to go through its contents.

Unfortunately, there was a problem. A jar of healing slave and a water jug had burst open and spilled over the other contents of the backpack, rendering all of them useless. After digging through a pile of molding bandages, I found a small red cardboard box. I gave it a small shake and some things rattled inside. I didn't remember what it was. My curiosity piqued, I opened the box to see the only things that had survived that fiery night...

Matches.

I felt something at last. After weeks of nothingness, I had my first emotion. It was the same emotion that had came to me in a flash back in the hospital. Rage.

I could feel every pulse of my heartbeat as I stormed out of the cottage and into the forest. I started running, not sure where I was going. I ran until the scream inside that I had been denying burst its way free. I fell there, howling at the world around me until I thought my head would explode.

It felt good. Simply letting the rage vent made me feel almost a little dirty, but still so wonderful at the same time. Above all else that I felt in that moment, I felt powerful. Every pounding beat in my chest was a scream for destruction. Every breath in my lungs was a call for violence.

Something about where I had collapsed suddenly caught my attention and snapped me out of the rage. I looked around the circle of stones and felt a small wave of nostalgia. This was Nocturne's practice circle, the place I had always wandered to when I was stressed. I ran my hands along the runes and let the familiar shapes and memories calm me down.

Almost without thinking, I began going through a series of forms that Nocturne had taught me. The stretches and poses had helped clear my mind countless times in the past, and they proved fruitful again as the minutes wore on. When I was almost done, I felt a little bit better. I still felt broken inside, but the pain felt less harsh than it did before.

When I reached the last pose of the final form, I let a small flow of magic through my hands. It had become tradition for me to cast a small amount of pure light magic at the end of the exercise. Light magic was a representation of the purest power available only to those pure of heart, and simply summoning it healed both the body and mind.

Well, it would have. I stood there for a moment, hands extended and magic flowing. Nothing. I frowned, the let my hands fall to my sides. I went through the motions of the final form again, pushing energy into the air around me. At the last movement, I pushed a large amount of power into my hands and watched for the soft glow that signified a successful cast. Still nothing. Frustrated, I tried again and again. Every time I met the same result: failure.

"Having trouble seeing the light?" asked a voice that emanated from everywhere and nowhere at once.

The memory seemed to blur and fade for a moment as I almost jumped awake. I knew that voice from outside the memory, I was sure of it.

"Eris!" I shouted. "Stop hiding and show yourself!"

A large zipper appeared out of thin air, unzipping itself as a strange creature stepped out. It was a strange mixture of limbs from all sorts of different animals that all got jumbled together, a rare creature known as a draconequus.

"You called?" she said, folding her arms behind her head and floating in place.

"Don't play games with me. What are you doing here?" I asked, not bothering to hide my irritability.

"I thought we were friends! Don't friends show up and help each other in tough times?" she asked, pouting and batting her eyes.

"The other element bearers are my true friends. Not you."

"Oh really?" she asked, looking around the stone circle. "Where then are these friends of yours? I don't see them here to support you."

I tried not to listen. I knew very well how her words could worm their way into the mind and devour all logic to be found. Even knowing this, her words still stung me.

"In fact," she said, ignoring my silent fuming, "it seems that I am the only one here for you."

"What do you really want, Eris?" I asked.

Her innocent grin dissipated. "It seems you know me too well." I rolled my eyes, but otherwise did not respond. "To be honest, Tom-"

"Only my friends call me Tom."

"Right, right. Anyway, you've been so boring these past couple weeks. Your little outburst was the first abnormal act you've performed in over a month. A month without chaos! A whole month!"

"Get to the point," I grumbled.

"You have been so dull recently, and it bothers me. I'm here to get you feeling better so you can go back to being spontaneous and chaotic!" she said, throwing confetti into the air and summoning balloons.

"Hooray." Instantly, the balloons popped and the confetti disappeared.

"Bah. You're no fun," she said, snapping her fingers and winking out of existence. When I was certain that she was finally gone, I let out a long sigh and sat against one of the standing stones. I idly floated a few pebbles around with my magic. "Magic works fine," I muttered, dropping the rocks back to the floor. "But what happened to the light?"

I tried the final form one more time, promising myself that this would be the last try. I began going through the movements once more. Each was smooth and fluid, one position flowing to the next with ease and...

I frowned, pausing in the middle of the form. Something felt off about the movements. I was doing them correctly, but they didn't feel as in tune with me as they had in the past. I started the motions again, a bit faster. Better... but not quite there yet.

After a few more trials, I felt more in tune with the motions. Instead of flowing from one position to the next, I erratically flew through them. At the end of the form, I released the magic just as I had done so many times. Instead of the soft glow I was so familiar with, a harsh red flash went off on my fingertips.

"Dark magic!" I breathlessly whispered to myself. For years I had been trying to cast such a spell without success. I had almost given up on it entirely. My first instinct was to go run and tell Nocturne and Aubade of my success. That quickly died as a different thought came to mind.

What if I just made it my little secret?

It was a tempting thought. I mean, it's not like I was hurting anyone with it. It was just a little bit of practice, that's all. Since light magic wasn't working, I had to practice something. I idly floated some more rocks around as I paced and walked. That's when I noticed something odd about the glow surrounding them. Whereas my magic was normally a pure white, it was now a cold black.

Maybe I should do some more trials and research before making a decision...

Weeks flew by in the dream. I would spend most of my free time exploring the new field of dark magic available to me, taking care to not alert Aubade and Nocturne to my new talent. I eventually began bringing the matches with me, as they were a perfect catalyst for the dark energy. It seemed fitting that the thing that took my parents away would bring me great power.

I also began using that old journal that Aubade gave me, but not for the reason he intended. I needed some place to record my new discoveries and log my experiments, and the journal was just the place to do it.

Day Twenty-Nine
Solid objects confirmed success for dark catalyst. Gems and crystalline structures are best for energy storage and efficient use, but any material will suffice if enough energy is present. Nocturne noticed me taking matches last week. No further signs of notice since I hid them in my shoe. Dark spell success rate at eighty-seven percent, twelve higher than the last trial.

I yawned and shut the journal. I had been pouring over my old notes and developing new spells relentlessly for hours. It turned out that I was just as proficient in dark magic as I was in light magic. My eagerness to learn more about this new power was only kept in check by my need to eat and sleep, the latter of which I hadn't done in... some uncertain amount of time. I looked over at the calendar, then opened the journal and made a modification.

Day Twenty-NineThirty-Five

"There we go," I muttered, closing the journal once more before lazily flopping onto the bed. I was grateful for Aubade's hospitality in allowing me to live here with him and Nocturne, even if I didn't quite understand it. Seriously, my apartment was literally less than an hour away. Why bring me here?

While I may not have understood it, I certainly was taking full advantage of the closeness to Nocturne's practice circle. There, I had been able to safely and discreetly develop my new powers. I couldn't do dark magic in my apartment, that's for sure.

As I lay in bed and contemplated all of the things I could do to test out the new field of magic, I slowly began to drift into sleep. That is, until a set of voices drew me out of my slumber.

"What the heck is going on with those two at this hour?" I grumbled, rolling out of bed and shambling over to the door. Down the hall, the door to Aubade's study was slightly cracked and Nocturne's frustrated voice could be heard.

I approached the door, ready to give them a piece of my tired mind, when I heard Nocturne say, "We really ought to keep a closer eye on him." I froze, immediately wide awake. Where they talking about me?

"I am sure that he is fine. He is still trying to cope with his grief. As such, it is completely rational that his behavior will seem odd for some time," Aubade calmly replied. Certain that they were discussing me, I silently crouched next to the door and listened in carefully.

"I don't think you understand." Nocturne replied, his voice sounding strained. "Thomas has become increasingly obsessed with fire. Don't you think it's unhealthy for him to fixate on the thing that killed his parents?

"It is only natural, Nocturne. That is probably his way of coping with what transpired that night."

I clearly heard Nocturne's frustrated sigh. "There is another thing that has been bothering me. Have you seen Thomas perform any magic around us? Any at all?"

"I cannot say that I have. Why?" replied Aubade, his voice not wavering from its usual calm tone.

"Don't you find that odd? He used to run around performing incredible feats of magic with just the flick of his wrist. He absolutely loved showing us his latest discovery or a new spell he made."

"Like I said, he is dealing with a lot of grief. He probably feels too emotionally tired to perform such taxing spells. I am certain that Thomas will return to normal in time."

"No, no, that's not what is so strange. If he just simply dropped his fascination for magic while grieving, I would completely understand. Aubade, he's still casting magic regularly."

"What?" said Aubade, a small amount of worry worming its way into his voice.

"You heard me. Don't tell me you haven't noticed the magical energy that lingers about him. Don't tell me you haven't noticed the way he eats enough food to sustain a dozen men. Both are obvious signs of excessive magic use and magical fatigue."

I heard the groan of wood as Aubade leaned back in his chair before replying. "It sounds like he is still in denial of his situation and is simply avoiding contact with other people so as to not be forced to accept the truth."

I flinched as Nocturne slammed his hands into the desk. "Listen to yourself, Aubade! It is not Thomas who is in denial, it is you!"

"Mind your tongue, brother!" Aubade growled, all pretenses of calm gone from his voice.

"Please listen to me, Aubade! You remember what happened last time you ignored a problem until it was too late. Don't let him be another mistake that you'll have to live with!" shouted Nocturne.

"Is that what I am?" I asked, pushing open the door and revealing my presence. They both stared at me, slack-jawed. "A mistake that you are forced to live with?"

Nocturne was the first to gather his wits. "No, of course not!"

I crossed my arms and glared at him. "I don't believe you," I said, turning and walking down the hall.

"Thomas!" Aubade shouted. "Wait!"

I walked into my room and threw my few belongings into my backpack, and then put the Element of Light on my neck. Not that it would do me any good. The darn thing stopped working for me weeks ago. I ignored Aubade and Nocturne's pointless apologies and pleadings as I slung the bag onto my back and walked out the front door. Just a few steps out, I felt Aubade's hand on my shoulder.

I cannot accurately describe what I felt in that moment. It was as if every ounce of anger that I had felt in my life had been doubled and compounded into one burst of emotion. "Rage" didn't even hold a candle to what I felt. No, I felt something far stronger.

Kill him.

"I hate you!" I shouted, turning and swinging my fist into Aubade's chest. I heard bones crunch and snap as he flew backwards into the cottage and took out a wall. Instantly, Nocturne was upon me.

"Stop!" he shouted, desperation in his eyes. "Please, Thomas, don't go down this road!"

"Die!" I shouted, shooting bolts of dark magic at him. He swatted them out of the air and fired multiple icy blasts at me.

"You don't have to do this!" Nocturne said. "You can stop before it's too late!"

I began throwing every ounce of effort into my attacks. A dark glow swirled around me as I launched blast after blast of dark magic, only to be stopped by Nocturne's efficient use of ice magic. Time after time we traded shots until suddenly a lucky hit knocked him off balance. Just as I was about to finish him off, a searing bolt of heat lanced through my chest.

Gasping, I looked down at my body. A hole the size of my fist was right where my heart was supposed to be. I fell to my knees as blood sprayed over my hands and soaked the ground beneath me. As my vision rapidly blurred and darkened, Aubade limped in front of me.

"Thomas... I'm sorry," he said.

My vision cleared immediately. Blood sprayed out even faster as I lurched upright and bellowed a roar of pure hatred. Even as I bled out faster, I felt revitalized. The darkness covered my chest like a mist and quickly knit the flesh back together. I felt a heart begin beating once more with the pulse of rage, and I was not one to deny it.

The fight began anew, with both brothers forcing me back into the forest. Aubade relentlessly threw spears of pure fire at me while Nocturne pushed me back with a rain of frozen daggers. It was impossible to gain any ground against the two of them.

As a burning piece of my arm regenerated itself, a terrible idea crossed my mind. Stepping out directly into the line of fire, I charged at the brothers. Each step closer resulted in another blast of frost or fire, and each blast only fueled the hate that healed me. Step by step, I made my way to the brothers until I was just a few feet away.

My pain meant nothing to me now. HATE The beautiful power coursed through me as I rushed forward and grabbed Aubade around the throat. Nocturne screamed something that I ignored. I kicked him in the gut and sent him stumbling backwards with the strength of my HATE.

My grip tightened on Aubade's neck. My nails cut flesh and red flowed out. I spat in his face and laughed as his struggles grew weaker. I heard Nocturne screaming again, but my pounding heartbeat in my head drowned out the words. Didn't matter. I wrapped one arm around his neck and reached with the other to grab his head. I gathered my strength to snap his neck and end him... and I stopped.

Nocturne was lying where I had kicked him. The most he could do was make a bit of frost form on my hand. It was truly pathetic. Yet something in those eyes stopped me. They were the eyes of the broken of spirit. The eyes of the weary and powerless, only watching the inevitable with sorrow.

Even as he fell limp, Aubade managed to choke out a few words. "Thomas... one day... I will find you again. I will... free you... from the monster... you have beco-"

*Crack*

"Pitiful," I said as Aubade's twisted body hit the ground.

Nocturne froze in shock, unable to comprehend the scene before him. In a matter of minutes, I had taken his entire immortal life and torn it apart.

"Nocturne," I said, dragging his fearful gaze to match mine with only the force of my words. "I want you to do something." I pulled a match out of my shoe and lit it with one deft movement.

"Scream for me."

He obeyed.

An hour later, I sat on the log of a toppled tree and watched Aubade's cottage burn. I found the flames to be very ironic. The thing that destroyed my life showed me the path to true power. I idly scratched the scar on my ankle as I contemplated, until a familiar voice brought me back to the present.

"I've been waiting a long time for that," said Eris, sitting on the log next to me.

I chuckled a bit. "Me too, but I just now realized it." A moment later, I laughed again. "You don't need to pretend anymore, Eris. I know you didn't come here just for small talk and frankly, I don't care anymore. Go on with whatever scheme you have cooked up this time. Just leave a bit of the fun for me, okay?"

Eris and I shared a laugh for a moment, before she leaned forward conspiratorially and spoke in a serious, hushed tone. "As it were, I actually came here to discuss something with you. I believe that we both stand to gain very much from each other."

I frowned. Usually, Eris made deals that seemed good but only truly benefited her. This time, her usual act of the trickster was gone. It wasn't like her to be serious. "Go on," I said, extremely curious as to her intentions.

She grinned at me. "Seeing as you have just killed the mortal connections to the sun and moon, somebody -*ahem*- or something will need to raise and lower them."

"Other than the planet being destroyed, what is the benefit of even bothering to keep the cycle going? I'm sure that with my new power, I could easily survive the end of the world."

Eris rolled her eyes at me as if I should already know the answer. "While you certainly are powerful, this is the true apocalypse we are talking about. You cannot survive that. No amount of power changes the fact that you are still mortal. I'm not, so I could just find a way to cross dimensions and leave before the apocalypse even starts."

"This sounds more like blackmail than a deal," I dryly remarked.

"That isn't even the real reason, so hear me out. If the sun and moon stop cycling, the world will notice. A few people probably already have noticed that the moon is traveling oddly slow across the sky right now."

"So what if they notice? I'll just wipe them out."

She shook her head at me, much a like a disappointed mother would to a child. "People will begin searching for the reason why the sun and moon have stopped. Eventually, they will realize that the only other person at the cottage with Nocturne and Aubade is also the only person not accounted for. You will become the most wanted criminal across the globe. Your evil will likely unite the entire planet to the single cause of hunting you down. Do you really think that you can take on the might of every nation in the world?"

"Fine, fine, I get it," I grumbled. "Now what is the catch? What is in it for you?"

She smiled and ruffled my hair. "Oh, how kind of you to ask! In exchange for me keeping the people of the world oblivious, all you have to do is help me take over the world once you are strong enough to do so. We share the rule of the world, and we both promise not to murder each other. So, do we have a deal?" she extended her paw to me.

"Deal," I said, shaking her paw.

"Deal," I said, shaking her paw. I blinked. Something seemed off all of a sudden. I looked around the memory to see that everything had been frozen in place. Oddly enough, I was in full control of my actions once more. I stepped out of my "body" and looked around the destroyed clearing around the cottage.

"What is going on? Why did the memory stop?" I wondered out loud.

"That would be my doing."

Dread filled my heart as I turned and watched Luna step out from the trees on the other side of the clearing. My pulse immediately quickened. Even in the dream, the Element of Darkness started glowing around my neck.

"Please," I said, backing away from her. "stay away from me."

"I think not, monster," she said, coming closer.

No! Fight it! "Don't come near me!"

With a scowl set on her features, she continued to slowly walk towards me. Her horn glowed softly, and I felt an immense power building around her.

"I don't want to fight you!" I said. Even as the words left my mouth, my own body began to disobey me. My hands began shaking and my knees began to slightly wobble. I struggled to contain the rage and pushed back the red haze that was threatening to consume my mind.

"Then surrender and accept your punishment," she said, eyes gleaming in the darkness of my dream.

I frantically grasped at the Element of Darkness, trying desperately to remove it. Somehow, maybe due to it being in a dream, I couldn't tear the damned thing off my neck. It was fueling my hatred and forcing my body to betray my mind, and there was not a thing I could do to stop it.

The first tears began to fall as my trembling hands rose and pointed towards Luna's slowly approaching form. "I'm sorry!" I shouted as pure dark energy swirled around my fingertips.

"You certainly will be," she smoothly replied.

We both stopped for a moment. In the dead stillness of the dream, I could only hear my heartbeat raging out of control and could only feel my mind following close behind. It lasted only for a second, but that moment seemed to be an eternity.

Then Luna launched a great blast of magic at me, shattering the perfect moment. Likewise, I flung all my power at her. Her cold blue magic met my dark magic directly in the center of the space between us, and time seemed to slow as an explosion rippled out from the collision.

When ten seconds passed and the magical explosion had hardly moved, I realized that time really was slowing down. I was complete frozen in place as the dream got brighter and brighter, slowly filling up my vision with pure white. Luna was unable to move either, forced to watch alongside me as the dream collapsed into nothingness.

"Wake up, Thomas," said the voice.

I burst into wakefulness in the massive crystal bedroom. I felt a sharp burning sensation around my neck, but quickly confirmed that I wasn't wearing my element. I leaped out of bed and dashed to my backpack, opening it up and dumping out the contents. Thankfully, the Element of Darkness was still there. It was still safe and, most importantly, not spewing out dark magic. I let out a sigh of relief, and then shoved everything back into the backpack.

Certain that nothing unspeakably evil was about to occur, I let my thoughts wander back to the dream. I felt like I should have been grieving, but I felt very little. Whether it was due to a cold heart or a simple lack of other memories to connect me to them, I did not feel any strong emotions about the death of my parents. While it was certainly saddening, it all felt too distant to really apply to me here. The same went with the murder of Nocturne and Aubade. Everything felt too disconnected to affect me.

The same could not be said for Luna's appearance in my dream. That filled me with a spark of hope. If Luna was awake, then surely Celestia would follow soon after. All that was left was to wake up Twilight's friends somehow, and then we could find a way out of this cult mess together.

Or... maybe not. A small bit of worry wormed its way through my optimism. There were my prisoners, and likely would not be willing to work with me at all. While it was true that I held all the cards, they still had to agree to play the game in order for me to manipulate our chances at success.

With a new goal in mind, I decided to make a trip back to the dungeons.

Discord paced along the roof of Canterlot Castle, mumbling to himself and scratching his chin in thought. He paused for a moment to snap his fingers, and his puppet illusion of Celestia gave a particularly moving speech to the day court about the castle's bakery funds. It was standard protocol when the princesses went missing for him to conjure up a temporary replacement. It had been since that Tree of Harmony fiasco so long ago.

The missing princesses wasn't on Discord's mind today, however. Oh, he had no delusions as to their current whereabouts. What troubled him was the human. Discord's brow furrowed and he grumbled, pacing faster as he thought about the previous night's troubling events.

"So close... I was so close! Then along came that meddler... interrupting everything important..." he muttered. After a moment, he let out a breath and recollected himself. That is, the body parts that had crumbled from his stress popped back into place. "Oh well. In the grand scheme, nothing has changed. Everything is still running smoothly. So long as the human continues to play his part, everything will turn out according to my plan."

Chapter 10: Choices

The moment I stepped out of the bedroom, I ran face to face into Shiny what's-his-name.

"Uh, hi there," I said, confused. "Didn't I say that you were supposed to rest for a day before you started following me around?"

He bowed before answering. "Yes, Master. You did, but I wanted to get started on my duties early." A moment later, his face fell. "Do you... wish to punish me for disobeying orders?"

"What?! No!" I said, far too loudly for the rather narrow hallway. What gave these ponies the impression that I'm some sort of sadistic tyrant?

"Thank you, Master," he said, bowing deeply again.

I sighed and rubbed my temples, trying to ward off the headache that I expected to arrive soon. This is not going to work.

"Shiny!" I said. He went back to bowing halfway out of his most recent bow. "First off, cut that out. Stop bowing to me after every sentence, stop standing at attention, and stop being so tensed up. Seriously, your whole body is going to cramp up eventually and I don't want to hear about it."

"I would never complain about serving you, Master."

Ooo-kaaay, that's not creepy at all. "...anyway, stop calling me your master all the time. My name is Tom. Use it."

He saluted me instead of bowing. "Yes, Master Tom."

I managed to resist the urge to bury my head in my hands, and instead settled for rubbing my forehead and thinking happy thoughts.

"Alright then, Shiny. We're going to go visit the prisoners. Lead the way." ...so that I don't have to feel you staring at my back the whole way there.

"Of course, Master Tom," he said, moving forward at a brisk pace.

And then came the headache.

"Halt!" shouted the guard at the dungeon door. "Who goes- Oh, my apologies, Master." Unsurprisingly, he bowed.

"Shiny here is going to relieve you of your post while I am speaking with the prisoners." I said.

"Of course, Master," he said before quickly scurrying off mid-bow.

I turned to Shiny somethingortheother. "Stand guard out here. Don't let anyone inside."

"Yes, Master Tom." Happy thoughts, Thomas. Happy thoughts. Happy, fluffy, not-killing him thoughts.

I entered the dungeon and immediately knew something was up. Nothing was obviously out of place, but Twilight had a strange look on her face. It was a look that practically screamed "guilty".

"So..." I said, casually walking over to her "You mind telling me what is going on here?"

"Nothing!" she responded a little too quickly.

"Right," I said, looking around the room. Just as I had suspected, Luna and Celestia were looking much better. Their manes had regained that strange light in them and glowed ominously. "How's Celestia doing?"

"Uh, fine, I guess," she said, confused.

"Really? So your princess hasn't moved, woken up, or done anything other than lay here?"

"Precisely!" she said, vigorously nodding.

I simply cocked an eyebrow at her. "You are a terrible liar, Sparks."

Celestia and Luna both let out sighs and sat up, stretching in what little room the chains that bound them provided. "Twilight," said Celestia with an annoyed look, "remind us to teach you how to effectively lie when this is all over."

I shook my head. "It was really obvious anyway. You fell asleep due to severe magical fatigue. If you had enough magic in you to make your mane glow, it would only make sense that you would be awake. I'm not as stupid as you seem to think I am."

"Just evil," said Luna, eying me curiously. She didn't have the glare that Celestia seemed to have mastered. She looked more confused than angry.

"Evil or not, you need my help to get out of here," I said.

Celestia gave a humorless chuckle. "Not necessarily. Discord will use his magic to come and free us as soon as he realizes that Fluttershy is involved in this mess."

"Discord?" The word felt strange to me. Just like so many other things, it was familiar but confusing at the same time. Maybe I'll ask the strange voice about this Discord person next time I meet him. If he bothers showing up to my dream, that is.

Twilight grimaced. "Yes, Discord," she said his name as if it had a bad flavor. "A self-proclaimed god of chaos who happens to be quite powerful."

"So... where is your god now?" I asked, gesturing around the room. The three princesses glared at me in silence. The pink demon let out a chuckle seemingly at random, reminding me of the sleep that claimed her friends.

"Twilight, how exactly did you manage to wake up before your friends did?"

She continued glaring at me in silence. Ah. The silent treatment. Quite mature of you, Sparkles.

"Listen, Twilight," I said, sitting down in front of her. "I am going to need your cooperation if you want me to help you get out of here."

She did not respond.

"The other option is that you and your friends die here," Twilight flinched slightly. Good, I'm starting to get through to her.

Celestia raised her head as high as the chains would allow and glared. "Not if I can help it," she said.

I shot her a glare of my own. "You can't help it. I can." I turned back to Twilight. "I don't plan on letting any of you die down here, no matter what." After a moment's pause, I let her have it. "Do you really want to end up like your brother?"

It was a good thing I had sat down out of her reach. Twilight immediately swung her hoof at my face, missing by only a few inches. "Don't you dare talk about my brother after what you did to him!"

Celestia fixed me with her best glare yet. "What have you done, monster?"

I felt particularly fed up at that point. Instead of answering, I walked over to the door and opened it up. "Shiny, come in here for a moment."

"Yes, Master," he said. Twilight began sobbing as he entered. Celestia's glare slid away and was replaced with a look of pure horror. Luna looked like she was going to be sick.

"What is your purpose in life?" I asked him.

"To serve you, Master," he said, bowing. For once, I wasn't frustrated about it.

"That's... That's impossible." said Luna.

"Is that so? Shiny, would you do anything that I commanded you to do?" I said.

"Of course, Master. Anything for you."

"Good," I braced myself for the next part. I really didn't want to do this, but I had to get their cooperation. If I had to use drastic measures to force them to work with me, then so be it.

"Shiny, go get my backpack." He quickly bowed and left without a word.

"What are you doing?" asked Luna.

"You will see," I said.

Shiny returned swiftly afterwards, setting my backpack down before me and bowing. "Is there anything else you want from me, Master?"

"Yeah, wait here for a moment and ignore everything I say to the princesses." He nodded in the affirmative. I opened up the backpack and took out the jewelery box.

"Do you recognize this, Twilight?" I said, taking out the Element of Truth. "I want to remind you now about how it would be suicidal to tell a direct lie while in contact with this." I placed the ring just at the edge of her reach, just close enough for her to be able to pick it up. "What you are going to do for me is simple. You will pick up the Element of Truth. Then, you will verbally agree to help me in any way possible."

When the only response I got was three incredulous looks, I continued. "Before I begin, I want you to consider just getting it over with and saving us all a lot of pain. You agreed to help me before I controlled your brother, so you can agree to it again. Keep in mind that I also wore the Element of Truth and told you that I had no intention of harming you, your friends, or any pony at all."

I walked over to Shiny and fished around in my backpack, coming back up with the knife. "Shiny, take hold of this knife." A moment later, it was floating in his magical grasp.

Twilight's eyes widened in alarm. "You just said that you weren't going to harm anypony!"

I gave my best nonchalant shrug, trying not to let her see how much this was getting to me. "That was true at the time I said it. Also, you can clearly see that I am not the one holding the knife." I paused as a sudden thought came to me. "It's actually somewhat ironic. This knife belonged to the previous bearer of the Element of Truth. It seems fitting that it is now ensuring the fulfillment of the words I spoke while holding Truth. Shiny, press the blade against Luna's throat."

Luna immediately jumped backwards in surprise as the knife soared over to her neck. She quickly reached the furthest extend that her chains would allow her to lean away, and the knife rested against her skin. I was caught off guard when the she softly chuckled a moment later.

Luna gave me a smug smile. "I am immortal, monster. The pain you could inflict would be only temporary. The worst you could do is separate my body from my spirit, and that would only free me from these bonds."

I shrugged. They're going to hate me even more for this. Hell, I'm going to hate myself even more for this. "Alright then. Shiny, put the knife on your own throat."

"Yes, Master," he said, the edge now resting on his neck.

That got an immediate reaction. Twilight was on her hooves and leaning against the pull of the chains in an instant. "Wait!"

"Yes, Twilight? Something to say?" I felt sick to my stomach, but I forced myself to continue. It was a necessary evil. Just as the Voice said, this was the only leverage I had available.

"Twilight!" said Celestia, who was starting to panic. "Don't give him what he wants! He won't kill your brother if it's the only thing he can use against you!"

I shrugged, trying not to let Twilight see how accurate Celestia was. "Believe what you will. Shiny, push the blade more firmly into your skin."

Twilight was continually nervously shifting in place, looking between Celestia and me as if she couldn't decide who take take more seriously.

I crossed my arms, displaying a calm attitude that I certainly did not feel inside. "I don't see any blood, Shiny. Fix that."

Twilight let out an audible gasp as the first few drops of blood stained his coat red.

"It's very simple, Twilight." The crimson coloration began to slowly spread down his neck.

Tears were freely falling down her face. "No... please..."

"Don't give in, Twilight!" said Celestia.

"Shiny, red is a good color on you. How about some more?" I barely managed to say the words without my voice shaking.

Twilight was completely panicking now. "No! Stop!"

I gestured to the ring lying at her hooves. After a moment more, her shoulders slumped. Finally.

"Fine," she said, picking up the ring and holding it on her hoof. "I promise to help you until we are free from this cult. I will not betray you or resist you until then."

I smiled at her. "See, that wasn't so hard. Shiny, drop the knife." It clattered to the floor, and Twilight let out a sigh of relief. A moment later, the dark magic in him began to repair the self-inflicted wound. Unfortunately, I couldn't stop now. "Good, now pick it up again."

The relief on Twilight's face instantly vanished. "I agreed to help you! You can't hurt him any more!"

"I don't think you are in any position to say what I can and cannot do. There is another small detail that cannot be overlooked." I deftly swiped the Element of Truth from her and tossed it between the livid Celestia and sickened Luna. "Two more promises must be made."

"Never," growled Celestia. Twilight paled.

"Alright, Celestia. This is on your head, then." Dammit, Celestia! Don't make me do this! "Shiny, back to your own neck. Start cutting."

"Celestia! Please!" Twilight pleaded as the red began slowly trickling down her brother's neck once more. Celestia did not respond.

"Pick up the ring!" Twilight cried. Luna's gaze went back and forth between Celestia and the Element of Truth, undecided over what to do.

Pick up the ring! I silently begged.

"He wouldn't dare," said Celestia, adamantly refusing to even look at the ring.

Celestia had effectively called my bluff. It was time to improvise.

"You're right, I wouldn't. Shiny, remove the knife." Twilight let out a sigh of relief as the knife hovered in front of her brother. I am so terribly sorry for what I am about to do, Twilight.

"See?" said Celestia. "He wouldn't-"

"Shiny, put the knife on your sister's throat."

The words died in Celestia's mouth. Twilight froze in fear as the blade pressed against her neck.

"What are you doing!?" Celestia shouted.

I shrugged. "Waiting for you to pick up the ring." I bit the inside of my lip to stop it from quivering.

"Don't you dare hurt her!" she screamed.

In a surprising move, Luna grabbed the ring. "I swear to do whatever you say until we have dealt with the cult. Until then, I will fully cooperate," she said before dropping the ring in front of her sister.

"Luna..." said Celestia, eyes wide. "What have you done?"

"What you are too blind to do, sister," she said, shaking her head. "Like it or not, the monster is right. We will not be making it out of here without his help. We have only put the ponies we seek to protect in more danger by resisting. I made my choice, now you should do the same."

Celestia shook her head bitterly. "You've changed, Luna."

Luna sighed. "You haven't changed at all."

I cleared my throat and pointed at the Element of Truth. "This is very simple, Celestia. You cannot win this. Cut your losses before I cut her open."

She shook her head, still seething with rage and defiance in spite of the circumstances. "You wouldn't dare."

I turned away so that none of them could see my face. My eyes were watering up, and a few tears had gotten free. I didn't want any of this to happen. I never wanted to lead a cult. I never wanted anyone to get hurt because of me.

For a moment, I reconsidered my actions. If I just went along with the cult, things would be so much easier. All I had to do was put on the Element of Darkness and let it influence me. I could just wash away all my concerns over right and wrong. I would be powerful. I could have whatever I wanted. It would be so easy...

I remembered something then. A few days ago, I had dreamed of killing Joy and Charity. As I had been driving away, there had been a moment where I had realized what I had become. For a brief moment, I had felt horrible about the things I had done. By that point, I had gone too far to turn back from the darkness.

But here, things were different. I had a choice now. Two paths were laid before me, and I was running out of time to make my decision. I could take the easy route. Let the darkness in, rule the world, take what I want, and live happily ever after in my own evil. Then there was the difficult road. I could force the cooperation of the princesses, escape from the crystal caverns, and then help them take down the evil Cult of Man. My future would be uncertain from there, and likely painful.

I turned around and looked at all the ponies who were my prisoners. Twilight still had the knife floating at her throat. Luna was glaring at Celestia. Celestia was glaring at me.

Something inside me snapped. I was sick and tired of getting only anger from these princesses. I wanted to help them, but they wouldn't listen. Now I was forced to stoop so low to make sure that they get out of this alive. This whole situation was so stupid.

The pink demon began quivering again. Twilight had said before that she does that before "a doozie", but how she did that in her sleep was beyond me. It didn't really matter though, because she was right about one thing. They were all in for a doozie.

"Shiny," I said, my choice having been made. A grin set itself upon my face. "Since Celestia won't agree to my terms, there is only one thing left to do."

Twilight began shaking slightly. "Please..." she said.

Luna could only stare at Celestia with a mix of sadness and fury.

Celestia held her adamant glare at me. She wouldn't be budging, and that was okay.

I had made my choice, and boy was it a doozie.

Chapter 11: Jailbreak

"You've made your choice, and I've made mine," I said. This was it. The final seconds to change my mind were slipping away, but I felt renewed confidence as I stepped over to Twilight and grasped the knife in my own hand, taking it from Shiny's magical grasp. I knew what I wanted to do, but actually doing it was so much more difficult than I could have imagined.

I took a deep breath. "Celestia..."

Tears were running down Twilight's face. Luna was glaring at Celestia so furiously that I was sure that Celestia would simply keel over dead. Celestia only continued her glaring. She seemed to do that a lot.

"You wouldn't dare," she said again.

In that moment, I made the difficult decision.

"You're right," I said, taking the knife away from Twilight's throat. All three princesses stared at me in shock, including Celestia. Whatever she expected me to do, it certainly wasn't this.

"You're right," I repeated, stowing the knife into my backpack. "I wouldn't dare. I wouldn't dare kill Shiny. I wouldn't dare kill Twilight. I wouldn't dare to harm any of you."

I walked up to Celestia and got in her face. I stared her right in the eyes and growled out my words to her. "I wouldn't dare become the monster that you all see in me. Now tell me something, Celestia. You were willing to sacrifice Twilight simply on the principle of not cooperating with a 'monster' like me. Who is the real monster here?"

I grabbed the Element of Truth before backing off and walking over to Shiny. Other than a bloodstain on his neck, he was completely fine. I let out a small sigh of relief before turning to address the princesses again. "I won't become a monster to get your promise, Celestia. I'm sick and tired of having to manipulate others. If you are going to help me take down the cult, then that's great. If you aren't, then stay out of my way."

With that, I walked over to the dungeon door. "Shiny, stay here and guard the princesses. Ignore everything they say. I'll be back."

He bowed me, and I stepped outside of the dungeon. I looked around. No one was there. Good.

Finally, the emotional stress of the situation caught up with me. My head spun and I simply collapsed on the spot, falling to the ground and sobbing silently. That had been so much more nerve-wracking than I had expected it to be. It would have been so easy to spite Celestia in that moment and simply kill Twilight. Hell, I didn't even need to keep Shiny around after getting Twilight's promise.

I didn't give myself a very long self-pity party. There were things that needed to be done. I needed to have a plan to get out of here. So far, I didn't even know how to get back to the surface. It was time to remedy that lack of information, and there was one pony who seemed to know everything around here.

I got up and brushed myself off. It was time to go find Lyra.

Luckily, I didn't have to search very far. As I approached the hallway leading to her personal study, she came heading right towards me.

"Hello, Master," she said, bowing. Big surprise, there. "Is there something I can do for you?"

"Yes, actually," I said. "I was wondering a bit about the caverns themselves. Could you explain some more about them for me?"

"Of course, Master. Would you like to walk with me to get some food while we talk?" I shrugged, gesturing for her to lead on. "The caverns themselves are ancient. They were created a thousand years ago by the Prophet of Man, who was the first user of hate magic among ponykind."

"Who is this prophet guy anyway?" I asked.

"We don't really know much about him. Like I said before, we only have some books and scrolls from just over a thousand years ago that were about the fall of Discord. They were written by a mysterious pony who simply vanished after predicting your return."

Return... implying that I was here before. I remember her saying that last time. What was I doing in Equestria at the time of this "fall of Discord" anyway? Too bad I can't ask Lyra. That would blow my cover like nothing else would.

Lyra continued talking as we navigated the twisting hallways. "The caverns themselves were hollowed out with the prophet's great power and dark magic. He used the crystals to fuel his magical might, making himself ridiculously powerful. I don't know the specifics about how he did it, but from the writings he left behind it seems like he just magically dug up the ground."

I feigned disbelief. "What? No secret entrance? No magical wards? Just a hole in the ground?"

Lyra chuckled. "Pretty much. I was kinda expecting more the first time I stumbled into these caverns, but that's really all there is to it."

Perfect. Now I know that getting out of here is as simple as finding the exit to the surface. I'd better go back and start planning this out with the princesses. The sooner we can figure this out, the better.

I was just about to say goodbye to Lyra and head back to the dungeon when we walked out into the main cavern where easily over a hundred other ponies were going about their business. Unsurprisingly, they all stopped and bowed to me as-

Wait. No, they weren't bowing to me. In the split second before they all rose, I noticed something was off. The ponies were all bowing just to the left of me.

They were bowing to Lyra.

It made sense. Lyra was the one who brainwashed all of them, so naturally they would defer to her authority over mine. The other times that they had bowed to me were without Lyra nearby. To them, I was just second in command. If Lyra found out that I'm not who she thought I was, they would follow her lead and turn against me.

I bid Lyra a hasty farewell over my shoulder as I turned and sped back to the dungeon. We needed to make a plan, and we needed to make it now.

Looking back, I don't know why I was surprised when I walked back into the dungeon and something had gone horribly wrong.

A crowd of about thirty ponies filled the room, each of them fully armed with some of the worst equipment I had ever seen. The armor was rusty and missing pieces in some places, and their swords were so dull that I doubted- wait, why was that so familiar?

Oh no. No, no, no, no. It can't be. It's not possible. Sure enough, I recognized the pony who had Shiny in a hold and was smacking his head into the floor. It was hard to forget the hourglass ass.

"Stop!" I yelled, and they all froze. "Shiny, stop struggling. Hey! You over there, leave that backpack alone! Timebutt, how did you get here? What are you even doing out here?"

Timebutt let go of Shiny, but kept an eye on him. "It's a long story that isn't mine to tell," he said, looking over his shoulder and nodding to someone in the group. A moment later, a figure stepped out of the small crowd.

A dragon. Spire? Spine? Spite? I couldn't remember his name, but it was foolish of me to forget about him this whole time. Of course he would realize that Twilight was missing and try to find her. Still, how did he manage to get here?

As he was about to speak, I noticed something and put up a hand. "Hang on a sec." A small group of ponies were hacking away at the chains holding the prisoners down. "That won't work," I said, shooing them off. I approached Twilight first, kneeling down and grabbing the cuff around her hoof. She flinched at my touch, but I couldn't really blame her for doing so.

I wasn't so sure about what I was doing, but it would certainly work better than trying to just smash the chains. This required precision and power. In my last dream, I had been moving objects around with my magic. What if I used that here?

I slowly began letting magic flow into my hands, getting used to the feeling. It was an unfamiliar experience, but it came as naturally as breathing. Just another thing I was re-learning how do to, I guessed. I took a deep breath and pulled on the cuffs. A moment later, I was rewarded with the sound of screeching metal and the cuff snapped apart.

I wonder what else I could do with this if I had time to experiment. Unfortunately, there was still more to do. I quickly set about snapping the other cuffs on Twilight, and she immediately ran over to her dragon friend.

"Oh, Spike," she said, giving him a massive hug. "I'm so glad you're alright."

"You're welcome," I muttered, turning to Luna. She regarded me warily as I snapped each of her cuffs, and then silently stepped away as I approached Celestia.

"Listen, Celestia," I said, lowering my voice so that only she could hear. "Like it or not, we need to work together. Right now, none of you have your magic. I don't know how to get rid of those crystals, and we don't have the time to figure it out. I do have magic, and I can use it to protect your ponies when we escape. I'm going to set you free now. Don't make me regret this." With that, I snapped the cuffs.

I stood up and looked her in the eye, and she stared back. For a moment, she hung in indecision. I'm sure she would have liked to order all of the ponies to attack me at once. In such a small space, I probably wouldn't have been able to win that fight. Thankfully, she simply turned and walked over to Luna, who regarded her sister with a cold glare.

Spike got out of Twilight's embrace a moment later and walked over to me. "Hold up," I said, stopping him once more. "I know you don't trust me right now. Unfortunately, we do not have time to debate trust. We need to get out of here as soon as possible. However, before we do anything else I have to know how you ended up here. How did you manage to get the militia into a sealed room underground in the middle of a forest?"

Spike's frown told me that he didn't like the way I had brushed him aside to speak, but he didn't make any remarks about it and instead answered my question. "Well, I had guessed that Twilight's disappearance had something to do with you. On the assumption that Twilight would be near wherever you were, I just tracked your location with a celestial detection field and used a teleportation spell on an old scroll I found."

"What!?" shouted Twilight, rushing over and grabbing Spike by the shoulders. "You did what!?"

He did what? He must have been speaking a different language because I didn't understand any of that.

Spike shrugged her off. "Calm down, Twilight. I've watched you do it hundreds of times. It was easy."

She shook him furiously. "Teleportation is not easy! More importantly, it is extremely dangerous for a baby dragon!"

I laughed. "Twilight, be real. This is a dragon we are talking about. I doubt that there is anything within a hundred miles of here that could harm a single scale on his body." Wait, how did I know that?

"He's just a baby dragon!" Twilight said.

"Dragon," I said, already having forgotten his name, "how old are you?"

"14," he replied.

I cocked an eyebrow at Twilight. "Teenage dragons, even particularly small ones like him-"

"Hey!"

"-are practically indestructible. Nothing short of another dragon will be able to harm him at this age."

Twilight opened her mouth to retort, but never got a chance. The door to the dungeon swung open and three guard's jaws dropped at the crowd of ponies. In that moment, I acted quickly and shouted the first thing I could think of.

"You didn't see us! Turn around and leave!"

They blinked and stared at me, as if unsure for a split second. Then the magical compulsion to follow my orders kicked in. They looked around in surprise, evidently unable to see any of us.

My relief vanished when the lead guard turned and yelled back down the hallway. "The prisoners are gone!"

Timebutt leaped into action, headbutting the leader and knocking him out cold. Two other ponies from the militia followed suit and took down the effectively blinded cultists.

"Nice word choice," said Luna. I'm just going to pretend I didn't hear that.

"Twilight, you need to wake up your friends right now! We have to go!" I said.

"I can't, I don't know how!"

I sighed in exasperation. Why could nothing ever be simple? "What do you mean? I thought you were an expert on magic."

Twilight indignantly glared at me. "I am an expert on magic. The problem is that you are the one who is powering the spell keeping them unconscious. The only reason I'm awake now is because I was the original caster, so the spell didn't have its full effect on me when you sent it back."

"What's this about a rebounded spell?" asked Luna. Celestia sent her sister a sideways glare for a split second. It was so quick that for a moment I failed to realize what had just happened. Why does she hate me so much? I understand Twilight and Luna's averse reactions to me, but Celestia's pure hatred of me is completely irrational. Even talking to me sets her off.

Twilight's response brought me out of my thoughts. "I cast a knockout spell to hold him until you woke up, but he somehow sent it back at me. All of us fell under the spell's effects."

Luna frowned. "This is troubling."

"Please tell me that you know how to wake them up," I said to her, crossing my arms in frustration. "Carrying them out will slow us down and get us all killed... or worse."

She shook her head. "The magic used in a spell like this is complicated. You are the source of the energy that is powering the spell. If we cannot figure out how to stop the flow of magic from you to them, then they will stay this way until you no longer have the energy to power the spell."

Suddenly, an idea came to me. "What if, instead of stopping the flow of magic, I simply reversed it?"

Twilight scratched her chin with a thoughtful look. "What, like a magical siphon? I suppose that it could work, but how do you plan on... oh, I see."

"See what? How are you to drain energy from a pony? Direct energy transfer is one matter, but magical siphoning is only a theory," said Luna.

"Actually, it works," I said. "Not only have I done it before, but you were the one who was drained. That's probably why you and your sister have been asleep for so long. If the same principle applies here, then it should be simple to awaken your friends, Twilight."

"Hurry, then," said Luna. "I fear we have little time."

Nodding, I approached the five sleeping ponies. Bearers of the Elements of Harmony. Six in total. I quickly shook my head, clearing out a nagging suspicion that I had been trying not to think about. Focusing on the task at hand, I stood next to the sleepers and held out my hands. I thought back to the feeling I experienced when draining energy from Celestia and Luna after our fight. I focused on the feeling of absorbing power from the dark crystal when I fought Shining Armor. Gradually, my hands began to glow with a soft light and I could feel my energy reserves being bolstered.

The shy one was the first to stir. She gave an adorable yawn, then stretched before finally opening her eyes. They closed with a quiet "eep!" a second later, her face disappearing behind her mane. Oh well, can't really blame her.

Applesnack woke up next, immediately jumping up and shouting, "What in tarnation is goin' on here?"

The purple-haired marshmallow stirred immediately afterward, with Rainbow following close behind. Both could only gawk in confusion at their surroundings. That left only the pink demon. A split second later, she sprung upwards and fixed me with a piercing glare.

"I hate cliffhangers," was all she said. I decided not to think about that, as it would probably result in brain damage.

"I don't have time to explain, but pay attention and you'll probably figure it out. We leave as soon as the militia is prepared. Be ready."

Leaving Twilight to talk to her friends, I slung my backpack over my shoulders and pushed my way through the group of militia over to the door. There, I turned and faced them. Horrible thoughts about everything that could go wrong immediately jumped to the forefront of my mind. Hopefully, I wasn't about to doom them all.

Hmm... maybe that wouldn't be such a bad thing. I could ditch them here and use them as a distraction. It would be easy to find my way to the surface without them. The group would only slow me down.

It was certainly an appealing thought. It would be incredibly easy. I looked at them all and reconsidered. That's when I saw Celestia glaring at me again. It reminded me of why I was in the dungeons in the first place. No, I won't become the monster she sees in me. At the very least I don't want to become more of a monster than I already am.

"I don't know how much you all have gathered about our current situation," I said, raising my voice to get everyone's attention, "but it isn't looking good. There are hundreds of magically empowered fanatics out there who are likely to attack us the moment we step outside. The only way out of here is up through the caverns. Stay as close to me as you can and don't stop running."

As one, the group turned and looked at Timebutt. He eyed me warily for a moment, then gave the princesses with a questioning look. Celestia didn't react at all. Twilight looked to Luna to make the choice. After a moment's hesitation, she nodded to him. Timebutt turned to the militia and said, "You heard him. Pegasi, stay grounded for now. Don't take to the air unless you have to. Earth ponies, take the lead with the human. Form a wall and keep the group together. Unicorns, stay on the edges and the back of the group. Save the magic for defense only, and don't wear yourself out."

While he was talking, I had equipped myself for combat. The ponies had armor and weapons, even if they desperately needed repairing. I dug around my backpack for my knife, but instead found a different weapon. I pulled out the little black object that I didn't recognize before and thought back to my dream when I had killed Alvar. Of course I had taken his weapons and put them in the backpack, but the only thing I had used up to now was the knife.

The gun. From what I had seen of the technology here I could assume that I held the most powerful physical weapon in the world. Unfortunately, remembering what it was and remembering how to use it were two completely different things. Even if I could figure out how to safely use it in the short amount of time left, it was probably not a good idea. I wanted to free the cultists from the brainwashing magic, not slaughter them all.

I realized that there was another option that I hadn't been considering. My hands were still glowing with magical light from the excess energy absorbed from Twilight's friends. While my knowledge of my own powers was extremely limited, it would be safe to assume that I was quite gifted in magic. Using magic as a weapon would be significantly less lethal than using the knife or gun and it would also allow me to experiment with my power to see what I could really do.

Leaving both the knife and gun in the backpack, I gestured for Shiny to come over to me. "Master, what is going on?" he asked.

"We are setting the prisoners free and escaping to the surface. Don't ask questions, just follow my orders. Do everything you can to keep them safe and to stop the other cultists from hurting them." For a tense moment, I didn't know if he would follow through with it. Thankfully, he saluted me a moment later and then went to the back of the group.

Maybe this won't turn out too badly after all. Who knows, I might just put all of the cultists in a coma. I seem to be very talented at that.

"Ready?" I asked the assembled group.

"Wait just a minute!" shouted the rainbow one, dashing up to me. She jumped in the air, probably in an attempt to hover in front of me and look me in the eye, but forgot about the crystal wing restraints and fell flat on her stomach. Instantly, she jumped back up as if nothing had happened.

"I'm not going anywhere until you explain just what the hay is going on here!"

I resisted the urge to hit her. As satisfying as I was sure it would be, it wouldn't help to be fighting each other while trying to escape. "Look, I get that you want an explanation. I would too if I woke up restrained in a cave with no idea how I got there. Unfortunately, there is no time for explanations. We can move right now and have a chance of surviving. If we sit here and all have a great chat about how we're feeling, we will either die or become slaves. Your choice."

Thankfully, she didn't seem to be in the mood to cause trouble. After shooting me a glare, she stalked over to be with her friends near the back of the group.

"There is one last thing you should be aware of before we head out there. You will probably recognize some of the ponies here. They may be your friends or co-workers or whatnot in the outside world, but here they are not. Their minds are not their own anymore." Ripples of unease went through the assembled ponies.

Taking a deep breath, I turned and grasped the handles of the dungeon door. I pushed and the door swung open. Instead of the army I had assumed would be lying in wait, I was greeted with a wall of darkness. Not literally, but I'm sure they could have done that if they wanted to. Timebutt stepped next to me and peered into the dark hallway.

"Crap," he muttered. Turning to the militia, he shouted, "Anypony with torches, light 'em up. Unicorns, focus on keeping us lit. Follow the human's lead."

Oh yeah, I never told them. "Actually, I have a name. Call me Tom."

Twilight's white friend - God, that was racist - stared at me with a look of horror. "T-T-Tom?"

I groaned and rubbed my temples. I was not in the mood for drama. "Yes, I am Tom. Thomas, if you want to be formal."

She let out a sigh of relief. Rainbow rolled her eyes and gave the white one a light smack on the back of the head. They both immediately turned and began arguing. Ignoring them, I turned and looked back into the darkness.

Maybe there was something I could do about it. Reaching into my shoe, I pulled out a match. With a slight sense of alarm, I noticed that I only had a few left. That would have to be addressed later.

I took a deep breath and focused intently on the match, building up power and releasing it the way I had done before. This time required more precision than before, however. I couldn't just summon a massive fireball. I needed to keep it controlled.

With a loud pop and some hissing, a miniature sun burst into life directly above me. After making sure my head wasn't on fire, I let out a sigh of relief. The moment I relaxed, the sphere disappeared. Damn. I don't have enough matches to be able to afford to lose one whenever my concentration breaks. There has to be some other way of getting a fire started.

My eyes scanned my surroundings, looking for anything I could use as a substitute for matches. My eye caught on the light coming from the lantern held in Timebutt's jaws.

"Can I borrow a bit of fire?" I asked. He raised an eyebrow at me and set down the lantern.

"Uh, sure. I guess. How do you 'borrow' fire?"

"I dunno."

He rolled his eyes, but opened the lantern and pushed it in front of me. Taking a deep breath, I concentrated every ounce of my mental power onto the flame inside and reached forward to touch it. Immediately, a gout of flames burst out and scorched my arm.

I swore and jumped back, trying not to let everyone see just how much that hurt. Thankfully, my regenerative powers kicked in a moment later and the flesh on my arm knit itself back together. I also noticed a considerable drop in my magical energy and the glow around my hands was significantly weaker. I seriously cannot afford to keep making mistakes.

Timebutt coughed pointedly. "If you plan on getting yourself killed, do it after you help us out of here."

I closed the lantern and gave it back to him. "Forget it. I'm leaving it up to you all to keep us well lit."

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly as he picked up the lamp and nodded to me, waiting for me to move.

Here goes nothing.

"Sister, something is bothering me."

"What, Luna?" Celestia snapped.

"Why did Tom-"

"Don't let him get to you with that name nonsense. He's a monster, first and foremost."

"Fine. Why did the monster not just summon fire with a spell?"

"Why should I know?"

"Don't you find it odd that the same monster who almost swathed Equestria in flame can't even cast a simple fire spell?"

"It's been thousands of years. Maybe he's out of practice. More than likely he's trying to fool us."

"I don't know. Twilight said that he claims to have no memory of his past."

"And you believe it?"

Luna let out a sigh. "I don't know what to believe."

"No, this can't be right," I muttered as we slowly made our way through the dark halls.

"What's that?" asked Timebutt.

"All of the cultists are just gone. These caverns used to absolutely flooded with them, and I don't think that a few escaped prisoners would cause them all to run away and disappear."

He shrugged. "I don't really care. I'm just happy that they're staying out of our way. Makes things simpler for everypony."

While his voice held a tone of confidence, I couldn't help but notice the way he continually swept his gaze all around us. As much as he wanted me to think that he was not concerned, it was obvious we were thinking the same thing: we were walking into a trap.

There was simply no other explanation for what was going on. Nobody randomly turns out all the lights and vanishes without a reason. I doubted that, with all their power, the cultists would run away when faced with a poorly equipped militia and a few powerless prisoners.

To my great surprise, we wandered the caverns for a full hour with nothing happening to us. Turning a corner, I saw a faint light shining down.

"That can't be the exit, can it?" one of the ponies in the militia asked.

"Looks like it," I said.

"So... that's it? We just walk out of here nice and easy?"

Timebutt snorted and let out a dark chuckle, but otherwise didn't respond. At the same time, I heard a loud clanking from behind us. Looking back, I saw Derpy struggling with her armor that seemed ready to fall apart at any second. I almost had forgotten that she was a part of the militia. A moment later, I saw another familiar face approach her and help to fix her armor. It was the nurse, Clockwhack. No, that doesn't sound right. Clockwork? Yeah, that's better. I didn't know he was part of the militia, too.

Turning back around, I noticed that we were ridiculously close to the exit. I suddenly felt an odd chill and quickly came to a stop as the thoughts I had been ignoring bubbled to the forefront of my mind. It's perfect. Too perfect, just like everything that's happened to me so far. The cultist conveniently decided not to immediately execute Twilight and her friends when kidnapping them. Twilight's little dragon just so happened to find some way to teleport himself and the militia directly to us, forcing us to leave immediately. The exit to this cave is completely open to us, and nothing is stopping us from leaving.

"You've gotta be kidding me!" I heard Rainbow yell as the group came to a stop behind me. "What could you possibly be waiting for?"

"I don't like this," I said.

"Yeah, right! I think you're just leading us into a trap," she said, separating from the group and trotting over to the cavern exit..

"Come back!" shouted Twilight. "You don't know what kind of traps are there!"

She only rolled her eyes and continued walking right out of the cave. A few of the militia, unable to believe their eyes, tentatively made their way over to the edge of the cavern. Gaining confidence, the majority quickly followed suit and left me standing there, dumbfounded.

After a few moments, I tentatively walked up to the edge of the cavern. Nothing bad had happened so far. Taking a deep breath and tightly closing my eyes, I stepped outside and braced myself for the worst.

Nothing happened.

I opened my eyes slowly and cautiously looked around, hardly able to believe my incredible stroke of luck. It had worked! By some stupid luck, the militia showing up with oddly convenient timing had allowed us to escape completely unharmed. For once, everything had turned out okay.

"Has anyone seen Derpy?" said Timebutt.

My blood froze.

"I saw her for a second right when we spotted the exit, but I'm not sure about after that."

"Derpy? I'm not sure."

"I swear she was right behind me not one minute ago."

I pushed my way back to the front of the militia and ran up to him. "Timebutt-"

"It's Time Turner," he growled under his breath.

"Alright, Timebutt. Just as we approached the cavern exit, I saw Clockwork helping her with her armor near the back of the group."

He frowned, chilling my blood even further. "Who?"

"Clockwork. He works at the hospital, but I didn't know that he was part of the militia."

"Tom, are you sure who you saw?"

"Absolutely," I said.

"Princesses!" Time Turner shouted. "We have a problem!"

"What's the problem? Why is that so bad?" I asked, panic rising in my chest.

Time Turner looked at me oddly for a moment before answering.

"Clockwork has never once volunteered for the militia."

I think my heart stopped beating for a couple seconds. From what sounded like a great distance away, I heard Luna say something. Then Twilight. Celestia, too, but with a harsh tone. I heard all their voices, but none of their words got through to me.

The one pony who seemed to care about me was missing and possibly dead or worse. I had failed my only friend in this world.

I felt my heart beat once more. Then again. Then another time, faster. It picked up speed until I felt a scream of pure rage burst from my throat, and I turned and stomped back towards the entrance to the caverns. The assembled militia scattered like ants as I picked up speed.

In a flash, Luna was running next to me and shouting. "Stop! Can you not see that this is a trap?"

"I don't care!" I roared back, blindly lashing out and shoving her to the ground as I ran into the cavern. Inside, I turned and saw the assembled group running to me, probably to stop me. That wouldn't do at all. I refused to allow anyone else to be put in harm's way because of me.

I reached upwards to the cavern ceiling and tapped into the remaining magic I had sapped from Twilight's friends. I felt a powerful tugging sensation in my gut, as if all my organs were twisting themselves into knots. As smoke rose from my hands, I brought them down sharply before turning and continuing to run into the dark cavern. Behind me, I heard rocks crumbling and falling. Ponies yelped and fled the cavern exit as it sealed itself behind me. I didn't care about any of that, as I had only one goal in mind.

Kill Clockwork.

Shining Armor blasted the rocks with his magic to no avail. "Master! Wait for me!"

Twilight stood some distance behind him, silently crying as she watched her brother madly attack the solid rock. Luna shook dirt off her dark crystal laden wings before wrapping one around Twilight and guiding her away. The militia looked to Time Turner for directions. Time Turner looked to Celestia, as he had no idea how to carry on.

Celestia drew herself up, still managing to look commanding in spite of the situation. "Let us retreat to Ponyville. We must prepare the town for the even of an invasion from the cult and the human."

"What about Captain Armor?" asked Time Turner.

"Restrain him and bring him with us. Be careful, he is not himself," Celestia said.

With a curt nod, he turned and motioned for a few of the unicorns to follow him. As they approached Shining Armor, Luna gently pushed Twilight and turned her away. "You don't need to see this, Twilight," she said. Twilight nodded and let out a heavy sigh, hanging her head as Luna guided her away from her brother and back towards her friends.

Celestia watched all of this with a detached look. She cared for her little ponies, of course, but she had more important issues to worry about right now than comforting them. Above all else, there was one goal that she needed to accomplish before it was too late.

Kill the monster.

Author's Note

This feels kind of disappointing. I think I could have done a lot better on a lot of different parts here, but no matter how many times I rewrite it I still feel the same way.

Dream 2: A Visit From the Past/ Joy and Charity

I was falling. At least, that's what it felt like. I could see nothing but white and feel nothing but the weightlessness of dropping. It wasn't a bad feeling, it was actually quite relaxing. I let myself hang in the air and allowed myself to indulge in the bliss of nothingness for as long as I could.

I knew it was a dream. I also knew that this dream had some sort of purpose, and my moment of peace would come to an end. As if triggered by the thought, the falling sensation began to fade and a white void stretched out before me. Off in the distance, I could see something moving towards me at an absolutely ridiculous speed. Before I could consider what to do, it dropped into existence a short distance away from me. I couldn't believe what I saw until it stood upright and looked me in the eyes.

Before me stood another man. He was about six and a half feet tall, just a little bit taller than me. His hair was a radiant blonde that seemed to glow in the sunlight that had suddenly appeared from nowhere and everywhere. His eyes, an electric blue shade, glared at me with a ferocity that actually felt like it might be burning me. His figure demanded respect by its very presence, and it was impossible not to feel the power emanating from him.

"Thomas! How dare you betray us! Had everything we done meant nothing to you?"

My jaw flapped around for a moment before I could respond. "I-I-I don't- I'm not-"

"Save your breath, demon! Thanks to you, the world is lost and I am only a shade. I have waited over two thousand years, searching for you so that I may have my revenge. I will not be denied my vengeance!"

"Stop this madness, Aubade."

Both of us jumped in surprise as the voice resonated throughout the dream world my mind was in. The man, who I now assumed to be named Aubade, looked around wildly for the voice.

"I'm not over there. I'm not over there either. Cut it out, I'm not even on the same plane of existence right now. You won't find me."

"Who are you, and how do you know me!?" Aubade yelled.

"We've never had the pleasure of meeting before, but I doubt we would have gotten along well back then. You do know of me, just as I know of you. Our mutual ally here has a hand in that."

"He is no ally of mine! Thomas has wrought hatred and evil all across the world, and I am here to put an end to his reign!"

That name. It was important, infinitely so. My head was throbbing as the word swirled around my mind, threatening to overwhelm me in pain before I could discern its meaning.

"I am here to kill my student."

Then it happened. I remembered. Nothing specific, nothing monumental, nothing really relevant to the current situation. It was so small, but it meant absolutely everything.

And then, I was.

A name. My name. As insignificant as it sounded, the simple knowledge of my name gave me a sense of completeness. I may have lost everything, but at least I knew who I was again. I was Thomas.

"Kill your student? Good thing he isn't your student."

"What?"

"Look deeper, look closer, look wider. See inside what the surface hides. Feel within what the heart knows true. See the man upon whom hope rides."

Aubade continued to glare at me as his eyes searched me for any hint of an answer for whatever odd riddle the voice had given.

"Please," I said, still slightly shocked by all that had just happened, "I don't know what you are talking about."

He glared at me for a moment longer before relaxing slightly. "Your words speak true. Yet, I am certain you are him that I seek. Spirit, you seem to know what this is all about. Explain."

"I think you already know. You suspect who I am, and your suspicions are correct. I am here to right the wrongs of the past and to aid the broken man as best I can."

"I... I see." Aubade replied. "Thomas-"

"I've been trying to keep that name from him. Hopefully to prevent him from regaining any memories. It seems a bit too late for that. Oh well. No harm, no foul."

"Regaining memories? Whatever do you... No way."

"Yes way. Do you see now?" he said with a smug tone.

"Hey!" I yelled. "Will someone tell me what the heck is going on here?"

Ignoring me, they continued. "I see what you mean, Spirit. I think I understand now. As much as I had not wished for events to conspire this way, this is not a bad way for things to be. Now the world can be healed, and we can move forward from the past."

Suddenly, Aubade started laughing. "I came here looking for a great final battle to right the wrongs of the past. I guess this is just one more unexpected turn among many."

"I'm sorry to interrupt, Aubade, but you're running out of time. He will move on to other dreams soon."

"Unfortunate, but I suppose it was inevitable. Spirit, I wish to know the details of this plan of yours. My knowledge of your world may be limited, but I can still give my advice before I go."

"Am I invisible or something?" I said.

"I would be honored to receive any wisdom you may offer. Here is my plan."

For a moment, nothing happened. Then the shimmer of a spell wove itself around Aubade, and he nodded a few times. Whatever those two were doing, it annoyed me to no end to be left out like this.

"I am impressed, Spirit. This plan is so intricate that it puts the greatest plots of Eris to shame. I have little advice that you need. You have changed much in time, and so has Thomas. You need to trust my student. He is more capable than you give him credit for. He cannot handle everything yet, but the time is approaching when he will be required to. Guide his memory on the right path, and your plan will not fail.

"Thomas," he said, finally turning to address me. "You may not have the memories yet, but eventually you will. Always remember that you were my prize pupil throughout the ages. You are the greatest student I ever had, and it saddens me that I cannot be there to guide you to your ascension. The path will be long and arduous, but patience and caution will not fail you."

The world shifted for a moment, and my vision flickered oddly. I tried to speak, but my body would no longer respond.

"Our time here is at an end. I'm sorry that I could not give you more than this."

"You've done more than enough to help us already, Spirit. I am eternally grateful to you for this."

My vision blacked completely and everything sounded distant as the dream began slipping away faster and faster.

"Thomas! Someday, we will speak again. For now, I must return to my brother. Oh, Nocturne will be so excited to hear this!"

"I understand that you have many questions. Your confusion and frustration is well placed, but you need to be patient. I will do my best to, as your teacher said, put more trust in you. This will not be easy, but if you wish to right the wrongs of the past then you have no other choice."

After what seemed to be a moment's hesitation, he spoke again.

"I suppose I should allow you to dream of the past again. Think of it as a show of trust. Although I'm not quite certain if this is more of a blessing or a curse, I will interfere less in your memories. Now, let's dream, shall we?"

I had been stuck in Colorado Springs for a week. Joy and Charity used to share an apartment here, but that was years ago. I was a fool not to consider that they might have moved out during that time. The good news was that it had been easy to get the name and phone number of the landlord, who probably had some idea as to where they had moved to. The bad news was that the landlord just so happened to be out on vacation for an unknown time and couldn't be contacted.

I sighed and leaned back in the driver's seat of my truck, then crossed another address off the list I had put together of probable places for them to go. I only had to look for apartments between a Party City store and a homeless shelter or the like. Joy and Charity were never far away from either of those.

I rolled up the list and tossed it into the passenger seat. I needed to go and get some food. I had recently been going to the same group of fast food places, but I needed something more than just cheeseburgers and fries for every meal. I settled on swinging by a grocery store to get some things for a simple sandwich.

I put my keys into the ignition and turned. Then I heard a sound you don't want to hear when starting an engine.

Silence.

I pulled the keys out and groaned in annoyance. I pulled the lever to pop open the hood, then got out to check the engine. Unfortunately, I had no idea what was wrong with the damn thing. I wasn't a mechanic. It made me wish I had read that book on engineering before-

I clenched my fists and discontinued that train of thought. I couldn't afford to stop and reminisce. I had a job to do.

I put on my backpack and made the walk to the store, leaving my truck behind. It was disappointing that it had broken down, but it wouldn't be too difficult to steal another. I thought about what kind of car I should get this time as I entered the store. Maybe a sports car? No, sports cars draw too much attention. Whatever I got needed good gas mileage; I had a lot of traveling to do. Getting to Honor and Love would be a long journey. It would be easier to fly, but taking an airplane was another point of reference to track me by. Eventually the police would catch on to me, and I didn't want to make it easy to track me down.

"TOMMY!"

"What the-"

The words had barely left my lips before I was wrapped in a full body flying tackle hug.

"Omigosh Tommy it's been so long how are you where have you been we missed you!"

"Can't breathe!"

"Oh, sorry!" she said, relaxing her death grip slightly. "I just got so excited that I couldn't control myself!"

"It's nice to see you too, Abby," I manage to say.

"You should totally come have dinner with me and Janice! It'll be tons of fun!"

"But-"

"No buts! C'mon!" she yelled, grabbing me and running out of the store. There was a quick blur of motion, and I found myself buckled in a car seat upside down as Abby started the engine. I righted myself after making sure that I was still in one piece, then gave Abby a reassuring smile as she looked at me funny.

"You look different, Tommy. You okay?"

"Yeah, it's just been a long week," I said.

"Huh. No wonder you look so down in the dumps. Somebody needs a cheering up! OOOOHHHHH-"

Of course she would have to burst into song.

As the car ride went on, I realized two things. First, that I couldn't kill her while she was driving the car. I'm not suicidal. Second, that I was quickly becoming suicidal as her singing continued.

Finally, we stopped in front of a small apartment building and Abby hopped out before skipping to the door. I followed after a moment's hesitation. I knew that I needed to do this now while it was just me and her. She was practically bouncing in place as she opened the door and ushered me inside.

I kept looking for a good place as we walked down a hallway towards the staircase. There was a camera in this hallway, so it wouldn't be possible to take her out right now. Then I pushed open the door to the stairs and caught a lucky break. There were no other people, no security cameras, and a janitor's closet was right next to me.

With her pushing me forward, I didn't have time to start gathering power for my element. I was going to have to be quick and rely entirely on my own strength. As we passed by the door to the closet, I sprung into action.

My elbow swung backwards and landed with a satisfying crack, followed by a spinning kick to the gut. She was knocked to the floor with the breathe knocked out of her, and I took advantage of her moment of weakness. I closed my hands around her windpipe and shoved open the janitor's closet, dragging her inside. She struggled for a good amount of time, but never stood a chance. The Element of Joy was never good at fighting to begin with, so she simply did not have the strength or knowledge to stop me.

After her twitching ceased, I snapped her neck and took her ring. The Element of Joy went in the box along with Truth, and I grabbed a room key from Abby.

I closed the door to the janitors closet and made sure that my own element was secured around my neck as I began gathering power. I climbed the stairs to the next floor and made my way down the hallway. 2E, the key had read. I knocked on the corresponding door and waited. After a few moments, the door opened.

"Thomas! I'm glad you finally decided to come and visit us. Come on in, Abby should be here soon. She'll be so excited to see you!"

"Thanks, Janice," I said as I closed the door behind me.

"No problem. Are you feeling alright?"

"Just fine, why?" Hate.

"You look... different. Almost like-" Her eyes narrowed, and I knew that my ruse was over.

I quickly threw a punch to her throat, preventing her from yelling for help. I followed through with a few quick jabs and a powerful shove. She hit the floor hard, but quickly recovered and leaped to her feet. Instead of attacking me directly, she lashed out at the light switch and threw the room into darkness.

I stood still for a moment, listening for any movement. Charity had always been an element that was adept with subtlety, so it made sense that her fighting style would play to her strengths. Out of the quiet came a small sound, enough to alert me to the fist that swung directly over my head as I ducked under the blow. I lashed out in the direction it came from, but only succeeded in ramming my fist into something heavy and strong.

I could feel a sufficient amount of hate power running through me, but that power was useless if I couldn't see. I took off my left shoe and tossed it somewhere over to my right to buy myself some time for my plan. kill.

I pulled a match out of my shoe and focused intently on the match head. Instead of allowing the hate to flow through me, I sent all the energy into the tiny object in my hand. I focused harder and harder until I heard another sound from where I had thrown the shoe. I focused sharply for a brief moment, preparing myself for the next part. I threw the match on the ground directly in front of me and released all the energy at once.

A massive fireball erupted in front of me, scorching the room and flooding the world with brightness. Just a few feet to the right of me stood Janice, rubbing her eyes and recoiling from the heat. It took a moment of thought and a fraction of my willpower to move the inferno, and I flung it directly at her.

The screams and smoke was sure to alert the entire neighborhood as to my actions, but at this point I didn't care. Even without the hate actively running through me, I was feeling euphoric from power. Something about the screams of a dying human in flames was so pleasing to hear. A crackling crescendo of flesh mixed with coughing and screaming was like music to my ears.

It wouldn't do to have her burn to death, however. I wanted her blood to spill on my own hands. With a snap of my fingers, the flame split and latched itself onto random sections of the room before beginning to spread. I drew my knife and walked over to Janice's barely moving form. The charring was a work of art, the black and the blood mixing together to form a beautiful symphony of suffering with me as the conductor. I let my knife trail along her stomach, up to the neck. She tried to scream, but could only cough and whimper. It was somewhat disappointing. I had hoped for more of that wondrous song before her end. Oh well.

I pulled sharply upwards and listened to the gurgling of death. It wasn't as good as I had hoped it would be, probably due to the burning on her vocal chords. It didn't really matter, I had the entire planet to practice on. I pulled the ring off her delightfully mutilated corpse and snapped my fingers once more, allowing the flames to wash over the entire apartment. I stood among the flames for a few moments, admiring the way that they cleansed the world as they consumed it. As the door collapsed, I took my leave of the inferno and calmly made my way back to the janitor's closet in the stairwell. Abby was still there, and so were her car keys.

After admiring the burning building for some time, I began driving to the Northwest. I had a long drive to reach Vancouver, where I could find Esme, the Element of Love. The only problem I could foresee in the future was dealing with Ernest, the Element of Honor. He didn't have a single place he called home, opting instead to roam the world at a whim.

Bored after a bit of driving without anything happening, I turned on the radio.

"-caught in the blaze, but officials say the number could be even higher. The fire has proven to be uncontainable as all efforts to stop it have been unsuccessful."

I shut off the radio before pulling to the side of the road and slamming on the brakes, suddenly feeling sick to my stomach. I pushed open the door and practically fell out onto my hands and knees on the side of the road.

"What have I done?" I asked myself. I grabbed my element, yanked it off my head, and threw it on the ground. The black crystal embedded on it seemed to glow and pulse with a life of its own.

"What have I done?" I repeated. Looking back, I couldn't believe what I had become. It seemed so far off from who I was. It was just wrong.

Maybe... maybe it isn't too late. It was an idea I hadn't considered before. Maybe I can stop this now, before it gets even worse. I can't reverse what I've already done, but that doesn't mean I have to keep going this way. As my hope grew, I noticed a subtle difference in my element. The crystal, previously black, was now clear.

Maybe there is hope.

The crystal gleamed a bright white now. I felt whole again, like all this time I had been missing some essential part of me. I experienced a clarity of thought and of mind that I hadn't felt before. I was the Element of Light. I was going to right my wrongs and lead the world to a better future.

And then doubts began to rise again. But it's too late already. I've already started down this path. I have no other choice. I'm lost to hate, and there is no return.

The crystal darkened again, much like my thoughts. Is it really so bad? This amount of power can't be all that bad, can it? Why shouldn't the world bow to me?

I put the element back on my neck. Now the crystal was as black as my soul, a font of pure evil and hatred. I wasn't even human anymore. All traces of the good and pure in me was gone, never to return.

I was the Element of Darkness. The world was mine, and those who stood in my way would die.