Inner Demon

Rion trotted confidently through town. He knew just about everypony there, and he was quite well-known himself. Supposedly, he was an exceptionally gifted unicorn at the academy. Rion tended to be the modest type, never really admitting his true skill or potential. It was a bright, cheery day that September in Peaksedan. Rion smiled a bit, breathing in the fresh air. He greeted ponies as he walked by, as he did every day before going to his classes and training sessions. Rion sighed, attempting to relieve the tension in his body. He felt strangely pent up today, and he had no idea why. He mentally shoved it aside, dismissing it as something trivial. He hadn't the time nor the patience to deal with his mind nagging at him twenty-four seven, especially over what appeared to be absolutely nothing.

"Running late," Rion muttered to himself. "There goes my perfect attendance. Oh well."

Suddenly, the sky began to turn gray. Ponies stopped what they were doing, staring at the sky as it grew darker. A small fog began to gather. Rion stopped as well. Something wasn't right...

"Oh Rion..."

Rion jumped slightly, startled. He furiously looked around for the source of the voice. There wasn't a soul around him. Strange, there were ponies all about just a moment ago...

"Why don't you let me play?"

That voice again...Who was it? Rion suddenly broke out in a cold sweat. He was surprised at himself. Rion hardly became nervous...but some kind of strange feeling was overtaking him. He caught himself trembling. Was he...afraid? Was this fear? It made sense, in Rion's mind. The only thing that didn't make sense was...What exactly was he afraid of? The voice, perhaps? Rion looked down at his hooves, his eyes widening at what he saw.

His coat was starting to turn black. Rion tried to call out to somepony, but the words wouldn't come out. His throat suddenly went dry, and he lost the ability to speak. In his head, he heard a small cackle. It soon turned into a fit of maniacal laughter. Rion was slowly becoming even more terrified. He had no idea what was going on whatsoever.

"This is going to be a lot of fun..."

Everything went black.

Rion's eyes fluttered open, slowly. His vision was blurred, so he couldn't see well. He tried to sit up, but pain racked his entire body. He collapsed in a heap, grunting. An extremely unpleasant odor was in the air. It smelled like-Oh no...

Rion rubbed his eyes furiously, looking around. The once proud, bright buildings of Peaksedan lay in shambles. Fires were everywhere, small to medium, medium to large. Other than the occasional flicker and crackle of flames, he heard nothing. Rion then realized he was laying in the middle of a particularly large crater.

"What in the world...?" Rion said. He stood up, met by much protest from his legs. Rion could hardly feel them. Slowly, but surely, he crawled out of the crater. He suddenly wished he didn't.

Streaks of blood covered the streets and walls. Mutilated bodies of ponies lay nearly everywhere. Rion heard shouting in the distance. Probably a relief squad. Though, from what Rion saw, a relief squad, or even many relief squads would be of absolutely no use. There wasn't anything to relieve at this point, except for Rion's aching body of course. Rion slowly dragged himself the rest of the way out of the crater. He looked at his hooves again, just barely noticing a small black patch dissipate into red. After which, he simply passed out.

After what seemed like an eternity, Rion awoke once again. His head was throbbing. Rion sat up, rubbing his temples, trying to soothe this pounding migraine. Rion then suddenly realized he was laying in grass. Well that was weird, there was DEFINITELY no grass in the streets of Peaksedan. His memory was all a blur, he couldn't remember much before he woke up in...well, wherever he was. It looked like was in a very dense forest. So dense, in fact, he couldn't rightly tell what time of day it was. Suddenly, a wave of pain hit him like a brick wall, and he fell to the ground, gasping. Rion felt his consciousness slowly slipping away. The last thing he heard before he blacked out again was that same voice in the back of his head.

"Nighty night, Rion..."

-~~-xx-~~

Twilight Sparkle stared in horror at this dark red unicorn.

"W-what?" she managed to choke out.

"I was there," Rion muttered back. "I remember..."

"D-did you?" Twilight said. She couldn't bring herself to end her sentence.

Rion said nothing.

"Dear Celestia..." Twilight muttered to herself.

"I dunno," said Rion.

"But you said-"

"Yeah, I remember. The screams, the fires, the blood...All of it, except..."

"Except?.." Twilight was terrified, and confused. But mostly terrified.

"I don't really know how it happened," Rion finally replied.

"O-oh..."

Twilight still had her doubts. It was just all too convenient. Peaksedan completely wiped out, then this unicorn shows up in Everfree Forest. Rion spoke up again.

"How about we move on to a less depressing topic?" Rion asked. "I'd...really rather not think about what happened in Peaksedan..."

Twilight then couldn't help but notice the change in the atmosphere. That uneasy feeling she had was completely gone. Twilight let out a sigh of relief.

"That, I can agree with," Twilight said, putting on a smile. Rion found himself smiling back, glad the tension in the air had finally evaporated. He quickly recovered over the proceeding hours, and soon enough found himself wandering around Ponyville, as Twilight had informed him. He noticed it was a lot like Peaksedan, or, well, how Peaksedan used to be. Rion closed his eyes, and therefore did notice a bright pink mare bounce past him. All of a sudden, a huge gasp invaded his ear drums, causing Rion to jump significantly. He turned to face his attacker, but seeing nopony. Rion raised an eyebrow in confusion.

"...O-kay..." he said, turning around. He almost immediately regretted it. He ended up face-to-face with a bright, pink-coated mare, with a very poofy and curly pink mane, though it was significantly darker than her coat. Her cutie mark appeared to be three balloons. He stared right into her cyan eyes. Rion was about to turn around when...

"Oh my gosh, I've never seen you around before! My name's Pinkie Pie and I know EVERYPONY in Ponyville! And since I don't know you, that must mean you're new! And if you're new, that means I have to throw you a WELCOME TO PONYVILLE PARTY!" the mare screamed while bouncing around wildly.

Meanwhile, Rion was still recovering from the latest assault on his ears. Did this pony ever stop talking? He shook his head, massaging his temples again. That blasted headache returned. He tried to tune out the pink mare's nonsense. It worked for the most part, although he'd occasionally catch random bits involving some kind of pastry or sweets. Rion really wished she would be quiet.

"Why don't you just blast her to smithereens? It'd be an easy way to make her shut up, not to mention fun!"

That voice again. He dreaded that voice, ever since that day in Peaksedan. Or at least, what he could remember of that day. Rion's head felt like it was about to split in half, and he crouched on the ground, clutching his skull in agony. The pink mare finally realized something was wrong.

"Er...Is there something wrong mister unicorn?" she asked, her voice now full of concern.

When Rion didn't respond, she sped off quickly, saying something about 'getting help'. Rion picked himself up off the ground. He tried to activate his magic to teleport, but with his head screaming at him in pain, he couldn't focus. So, instead, he ran as fast as he could out of Ponyville. Occasionally, he would knock over signs or mailboxes, sometimes both, which earned scowls and angry shouts from their owners. Rion couldn't care less. He just wanted to get away. Rion looked up, his vision becoming obscured. He was probably going to pass out again. Rion tripped, falling into the dirt.

~~-xx-~~

Pinkie Pie burst into Twilight's library.

"Twilight!" she shouted.

Twilight blinked, looking up from the book she was reading. Pinkie was breathing heavily and had a mixture of concern and fear plastered on her face. Twilight sat up instantly.

"Some new pony looks like he was hurting a lot, we gotta help him!" Pinkie yelled.

Twilight instantly realized who she was talking about.

"Let's go!" Twilight exclaimed.

Pinkie led Twilight to the spot where she had seen Rion, only to realize he had fled the scene.

"He was here a few minutes ago..." Pinkie said.

"He must have ran out of town or something," Twilight said, albeit more to herself. "I'd like to help him, but he could have gone anywhere. I guess we can only hope he comes back soon."

"Yeah," Pinkie nodded. She clearly didn't like the idea of leaving a pony in pain, but there wasn't a lot of choice in the matter. Twilight didn't much like the idea either. Instead, they went around Ponyville asking all the ponyfolk if they would inform them whenever they saw Rion, including their other friends. Their friends agreed instantly, as did most of the other ponies. Some did mention being too busy, but for the most part, the entire town was on the lookout for the mysterious unicorn.

~~-xx-~~

Rion sat up in the dirt. He groaned a bit, his earlier mind-splitting migraine still lingering a bit. He tried to collect himself, leaning back against a nearby tree for support. Rion could barely feel most of his body. His legs were mostly numb, his throat was dry, and he had this obnoxious irritation in his eyes. Rion glanced down at his jacket. It was filthy and covered with mud. He looked over toward where he picked himself up at. Great, random not-yet-dried mud puddle.

"Thank you so much for ruining my jacket. Stupid mud."

He sighed. Insulting a puddle of half-dried mud was not going to get him anywhere, and especially not clean. He contemplated going back into town, but he really didn't want another run in with that hyperactive pink pony. What was her name again? Pinkie something or the other. His head hurt way too much to bother remembering it. His head kept pounding. Rion was becoming extremely agitated. Under most circumstances, Rion would only be slightly annoyed by a headache. However, given the situation involving his recent migraines, he couldn't help but become rather frustrated. The throbbing in his head made it nearly impossible to concentrate on magic.

He wished the pain would go away. Rion started thinking back on that day in Peaksedan. He realized he actually didn't know how long ago that was. It seemed like a few days, or maybe hours, but it wasn't very likely. Unfortunately, with all the recent happenings, not to mention the unpleasant thumping in the back of his head, his mental calender became a mess. He sighed loudly. Rion tried to sit up. No pain. He also noticed feeling was returning to his legs. Alright, at least that was getting better. Rion put on his thinking face. He sighed thankfully.

That blasted headache finally subsided. Now he could focus. Rion stood up, taking a deep breath. He figured he might as well go apologize to that Pinkie or whatever her name was. And not to mention, actually learn her name while he was at it. She seemed nice, although her apparent supply of infinite energy would likely cause future migraines, assuming he planned on staying for any extended period of time. Rion doubted it, but added it to his list of possibilities. Honestly, he'd do nearly anything to drown out the memories of that voice.

Twilight Sparkle sat at her table, her eyes yet again glued into a book. In fact, she was so into reading the book she didn't hear the first several knocks on her door. She eventually was broken out of her trance when whoever it was basically punched the door ten times.

"Er..coming!" Twilight yelled. "Wonder who it is..."

Twilight opened the door. "Yes-Oh, it's you!"

Rion stood directly in front of her.

"Uh, yeah," Rion said. "Listen, do you know some pink pony named..uh..Pinkie...something."

"You mean Pinkie Pie?" Twilight asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yeah, her," Rion replied.

"Of course I do, she's my friend."

"...Oh."

Twilight couldn't help but smile.

"She came by earlier. She practically broke the door down when she came in, yelling about how somepony needed help. Somepony new. I figured it was you since you're the only new pony around that I know of. She was really worried," Twilight explained.

"Yeah," Rion said. "Kinda wanted to apologize about...ya know, running off randomly. Speaking of apologizing, I probably should go talk to those other ponyfolk whose signs and mailboxes I ran into..."

He began to trail off again. Twilight looked at him.

"Uhm, you okay?" she asked, nudging him slightly.

Rion blinked, snapping back to reality.

"Oh, uh...Yes, I'm fine," he replied. "Anyway, know where..uhm..Pinkie Pie usually hangs around at?"

"You should probably check Sugarcube Corner," Twilight told him.

"Sugarcube Corner, right. Gotcha," he said, and began walking off.

A few seconds later, he backed up and looked at Twilight.

"Where's Sugarcube Corner?"

Twilight rolled her eyes and sighed, smiling at the same time.

"Just follow me," Twilight said. Rion nodded and walked beside her as she led him to Sugarcube Corner.

Rion sighed inwardly. He could tell, especially with that Pinkie Pie's hyperactive and energetic personality, or at least what he saw of it, was going to make this already long day even longer. Rion pushed the thoughts of that voice to the very back of his mind. Rion was dead-set on enjoying the rest of this day. And he sure as hay wasn't going to let some stupid, psycho voice in the back of his head mess it up any further. Before he knew it, Twilight stopped in front of a rather large building.

"Here we are," she said.

Rion nodded.

Bring on the headaches.