Path to Infinityby 2DChaptersPicturesqueObsidian TeethReverenceRuinationPicturesqueShunted among the sloping mountain ranges to the west and spilling out into the beautiful rolling hills to the east, the bountiful Whitetail Woods are home to many wonders. Sightings of strange creatures and stories of lucid experiences are common when you drop the mere place name forest. It is a place of wonders cupping on the seashore. Yet while it might be a wonderful place it's also a very badly charted one. Estimates on the size of the forest are made every passing year, even though detailed calculations of its size can be made with the help of pegasi. One day a size for the forest crops up, and the next day a rambling explorer disproves it. Sweet green canopies and lush undergrowth invite any and all into the bowels of the forest. Infact bowels is a very good term for the forest innards due to their sheer size. All sorts of explorers have lost themselves in the trees for months on end, sometimes even years. Travellers are sucked up by the forest and some of the departed never even return. It is because of these disappearances that foul and fickle rumours abound. Therefore whenever thinking about the Whitetail Woods, it's good to bear in mind the distinction between fact and fiction. What we do and don't know are always key things the unwary adventurer needs to remind himself of when preparing to explore. However there exists a distinct grey area. Few of the legends that surround the mystical forest are based on somewhat truth. Starswirl the Bearded, scholar to the sun, wrote of a city of pearl white and obsidian black. With spires and columns that reached up to the stars, stairways that never ended and doubled in on themselves and even doors to nowhere and everywhere. Perhaps if he had given the city a name then there may be an endeavour to decipher his cryptic messages. All the things he wrote of were related to the magical workings of our world, and some believe this fabled city to be a very important key. But as all fairy tales it ended abruptly. ================================================================================ Light lapping waves gently nudged the side of the lake as a leaf settled on the surface. It was midday and the sun was out in full force as it journeyed across the sky. Clear water stretched out as far as the eye could see in all directions. Three sides of the perfect lake were cropped off with a short shore and a sudden wall of trees. It was a mysterious canopy that seemed to hum with life. The remaining side of the lake was backed off by a huge mountain. Craggy cliffs jutted from its surface and densely packed trees collected around the lower sides. However beautiful the lake may have looked it was unsettling to a degree, because the sun was not reflected nor the bottom seen. Skipping stones skid across the water suddenly. Making a plopping noise thrice before sliding once more and making a splash. All four of the thrown stones carried out the same pattern. However within this limbo between two places a solitary respite existed. Muddy yellow stone rose from the water for about an inch or three, forming a base. Upon that base of dirty limestone there sat a pearl cathedral. It was a rather small cathedral mind you, about the size of a bungalow that'd been hit by a stick of TNT; but there it was. Frail grey bricks stacked up and up on one another to form a small dirty tower. It leaned over the water like an expectant mother. Thrown up against it were some faded white tiles that arched over to form a half-oval. A few windows peeked out from the sides with shattered glass panes, and even a black brick roof on the tower. Supports had failed and the roof of the main building had fallen in on itself; from within bloomed a canopy of green. Pillars lined the side of the half oval before one split and fell slightly into the water; somehow still standing despite the rest of the building disappearing. Underwater was where the ruins led it would seem. Off in the distance some way there were arches and pillars made of faded marble. Covered in weeds with trees and vines wrapped around them these monoliths blended in almost unnoticed. There wasn't an entrance or an exit to this place. It just sat atop the water alone and crumbling. There was a door to this place, but opening it only led you to the lake and the shore beyond. Wind scarcely danced along the lake surface or anything else within the glade. Throughout the glade was still and calm as if time had just stopped. Within the building there were many things to notice. When you walked through the rotten doors you would be provided a staircase with which to walk down to the main "level" of the church. Wooden supports were run across the floor in a sort of chequered pattern. Clumps of rotten planks were nailed to them here and there. The middle of the level was dominated by an oval hole flanked by ornate wooden fencing. The hole was flooded with water, and perhaps had once had a meaning; now lost. Strips of cloth were loosely hanging from the alcoves of the archways along the sides. Musky air hung limp in the tight and dimly lit space. A bright glow washed over the floor for a few inches before the level above blocked it from view. Only splinters of white escaped through the wooden floor above. Small silent mice and scheming savage rats had not made homes here. The lower floor of the chapel was devoid of all forms of life and not even a breeze dared enter. Pure water was invading the lower area of the decaying building, it was drowning the infrastructure as the floor fell into its maw over time. Tapestries hanging forlorn and etched with little but lichen and blood lined the upper floor walls. Tiny shattered glass windows were surrounded by ivy and lilac devilweed. Hollow frames were only filled with the place holders for what had once been beautiful glass artwork. Frail chains were strewn across the roof and dangling down to the floor in heaps, vines had crawled up the metal and taken over the bindings. One single chandelier sat at the very back of the building besides the front doors; it had fallen without fuss. Dusty old pews were lined up and facing a forgotten service. Blue clear water stretched out for miles before being met by the shoreline beyond, and the broken chapel had such a view. Where the building ended abruptly the open air began. It had fallen apart at an angle and as such the left side was slightly larger than the right. Floorboards were rotten and slack yet somehow supporting the audience of one. Order was discarded thanks to the missing pew on the right-hand side; probably fell away with the floor. Beyond the walls of this limbo jutted a single warped mass of wood and rose gold. Pipes and keys were strewn in an upward and ungodly manner. A statue merely sat atop a tower made of rotten wood. Spike sat alone on the left front-most pew with his legs lax and his arms slack slightly. His bipedal form was roughly the right size to sit in the strange seat with little discomfort, yet he wasn't exactly fussed about sitting correctly. One of his arms was wrapped around the back of the pew while his other rested on his lap. Rough lines were worn into his fingers and carved paths through the small scales before his claw. Minuscule bags sat under his sunken eyes while he stared out towards the statue. Much like his clothing the statue had an unkempt look with a pleasing effect. It was certainly a very spiritual object, containing tell-tale signs of divinity. The young dragon had known of and met few gods in his time but the one depicted before him seemed to transcend the sculpture it had been encased within. It was not unlike the statue of Discord he had once seen. Deep black obsidian was tinted with rose gold, both pleasing and disturbing. With a sigh he pulled his hood up with his right hand before standing up. Leather straps that hung off his coat jostled while be rummaged through a bag by his side. Bizarre things lay inside but a rarer one was retrieved and rolled around in his thin pointy fingers. Blue crystal sat in-between his thumb and index finger as he stared into the jewel. An arm wrapped around his own and someone pressed up against him without his knowledge beforehand. He suppressed a laugh; she was something else. "It's time to go," he said flatly as he turned away from the effigy. "I know," a voice replied sweetly. -=-=-=-=-=- "Rarity... why am I here, again?" Twilight asked nervously as the pair trotted down a high street at a leisurely pace. "I mean I understand why I'm here but I—" "There's no need to get tongue tied, dear," Rarity interjected as the two of them stopped to browse a flower stall. There was quite an impressive selection. "I keep telling you to get outside more often, a Princess needs the love of her ponies!" she chirped as she placed a flower in Twilight's hair. "Ponies don't love a shut in." "Well I suppose that's true," Twilight said while blushing slightly. "I'm not complaining I'm just..." "Complaining?" Rarity offered as they began to trot once more. Both shared a laugh and Twilight waved her off. "No, I'm just still adjusting to things is all. Becoming a Princess was a life changing experience in many ways! For both me and my friends." Twilight beamed bashfully and rubbed the back of her neck. She wasn't wearing her element at the moment, but Rarity had begun making a formal wardrobe for her - not too formal mind you. Both of them smiled a little bit and Twilight was about to speak up but Rarity spoke first. "It's... a real shame Spike wasn't there to see you become a Princess." The two of them shared a look quickly. "Speaking of Spike, it was his birthday last week, right?" "Yeah, he would be—" "Oof." "Oh my I'm terribly sorry!" Twilight back-pedalled slightly and offered her hoof to the stallion she'd just knocked over, who took it with a smile. "Are you alright?" "I wasn't looking where I was going!" he laughed quickly, picking up his parcel and placing it back on his back. "Don't worry about it, Princess." With a nod to Rarity, he started off across the road and down one of Canterlot's many service roads. "What were you saying, darling?" Rarity asked as the stallion disappeared from sight. "I didn't hear you finish." "...you know I don't remember," Twilight said sheepishly as she looked at her hooves. "Can't have been to important, though." Taking a small step to check she was alright, Twilight started trotting again with Rarity falling in behind. Rarity walked forward a few more paces before she suddenly turned to Twilight with stars in her eyes. "Speaking of important things, I heard an absolutely amazing story the other day! One of my regulars told me that a magicsmith in Canterlot can cut inviolable deepstones!" "Impossible," Twilight said in a flat tone as she continued trotting at a slightly faster place. "Starswirl the Bearded was the only pony to ever attempt such a feat and succeed." Her voice betrayed slight hints of excitement. "Celestia would have informed me of such a pony." "Well... why don't we go see for ourselves?" Rarity said with glee as she started walking in a different direction. "We're shopping right? I think a deepstone necklace would go wonderfully with my new design!" Twilight groaned but maintained a smile as she followed. "What was the unicorn called, do you remember?" The purple Princess asked out of curiosity. "I might know them." "I only know the name of the shop. It was called Crystal Rapier, if memory serves." Deep foreboding filled Spike from toe to top as he could feel his body lay weighty and dead beneath the covers. Was it a veil? Had he finally been deemed inappropriate to the new world and thrown into the abyss? Slick sweat ran down his scales like drops of rain. Air was stuffy and tight as he gasped for breath while his eyes refused to move. Darkness enveloped the entire room and surrounded him; suffocating him. It was pushing down on him almost as if it had gained a weight of its own. To have weight was to be alive, was the air alive? It did not hum with activity or move with grace, it sat atop him while he struggled to move. Fever filled his mind and made his thoughts sluggish and slow, the memories and ideas were like flowing water running through his palms. A council loomed above his coffin with an unmistakable presence. Alien and unwanted contact was forced upon him as his blood ran cold and his eyes went limp. Silently screaming and unable to move he was forced to watch the hands push themselves inside his skull. Metaphysical in nature each began to tear apart his being. It was horrifying because he could do nothing for himself in the company of gods. Rarity and Twilight had spent the last two hours trying to find the shop named Crystal Rapier. Their search had taken them down dark alleyways, into a ballroom, through a post office and into the Royal Palace. It had involved far too much bribery and a fair share of sweet talking, on both Rarity's and Twilight's side. Now however they stood before the store in question. It was somewhat un-ordinary yet at the same time mundane and plain. Beige brick stacked up and made the walls whilst a red tiled roof sat atop the store. It was squashed between two other stores that looked exactly the same because of its location in the poorer part of Canterlot. Muddy glass was offset in one half of the building with a few items of interest behind it. They were hard to make out from this distance but were probably quite expensive. The door and window-frames were painted a rich maroon and a small gold trimming was beneath the roof. "Welcome," called a gruff old voice from some unseen location. The girls had only just entered the store as the voice called out to them and before long a stout stallion came to the counter. "We'd like to know ab—" "We're just here to browse," Rarity interjected with a nervous laugh and a hoof over Twilight's muzzle. "I'm a dressmaker and my friend here is a sorceress; any recommendations?" "Ah well," the old stallion started as he rubbed his chin. "I believe you may be looking for decorative stones? They're in the front of the store, and your friend there might be wanting some runes; which are down back." He nodded to himself twice. "Thank you ever so much for your help." Rarity nudged Twilight, who gave a weak smile before trotting off towards the magical items. Rarity walked a little to her left over the creaking floorboards and gazed into the small display case before her. "Hmmmm..." she mused to herself as her eyes scanned the jewel before her. There was no doubting the quality of its cut or the precise cleaning. A rather well done job much like her own. However the small gemstone lacked a certain flare she wanted, so it wasn't a purchase she would be willing to make. The case above held a more impressive gemstone with an orange tint. It was glowing very faintly in the mid-afternoon sunlight that streamed through the window. Placed upon a velvet cushion, Rarity could respect the quality of the cut and the design it had been shaped with. Sadly she was looking for cooler gems and orange was too warm a colour. Meanwhile Twilight was looking at a large and impressive collection of runes and magical compendiums that accompanied them. All of the runes and their books were kept under heavy lock and key within a metal display case. It didn't look too secure but was probably reinforced with some kind of binding spell. Leather bound tomes that probably had a musk of the past were certainly enticing to Twilight, however the contents within probably weren’t to her taste. Although not technically illegal the practice of binding spirits and the dead was seen as immoral, so compendiums such as Arts of Indissoluble Nature and Ars Spirits didn't appeal to her. Journeys Into Unknown seemed like a very heretical text, and she was tempted to bring it up with the storekeeper. Gateway magic definitely was illegal in all forms. It was astounding that such a text and accompanying rune had remained in public display! "Excuse me?" Rarity asked from across the store. "I would like to examine this gemstone closer. Will you get it out for me, please?" "Most certainly," the storekeeper replied as he levitated a set of keys from his pocket. Walking over to Rarity he pointed to a display case and asked, "This one?" A curt nod was given in response and he opened the holder with a sliding of tumblers. Sparks flew off the surface of the gem as it was levitated to a surface, at which point the stallion stepped sideways to allow Rarity a closer look. "It's obviously a fine quality..." she said slowly as her eyes scanned the gem. "Could I get it in a smaller cut, though?" "Probably," said the worn man. "You'd need to ask my boy in the back though, he cuts the stones." "Oh that would be wonderful!" Rarity beamed as the store-owner pointed toward the door to the back. "I suppose he's a rather fine magician, then?" "Mighty fine," came the response from the owner. "Word to the wise; don't scream." "Pardon...?" -=-=-=-=-=- Spike's hands twirled the long tube in his hands slowly whilst he breathed down the length of the metal tube into the gather. Glass was lumped at the end of the metal pipe in an angry red blob. Slowly swelling in size and becoming thinner around the edges the gather slowly formed into a little rounded vase. He started swinging his hands in a circular motion in an attempt to increase the width of the gather, but his concentration slipped and he dropped the blowpipe. A small curse escaped his dry lips as he looked at the molten glass and sighed. Picking up the pipe with his left arm he turned it vertical and placed it in some water. After he'd placed the pipe in some water Spike moved over to where the glass was sitting and scraped it up using his hand. Despite how unbearably hot it was his scales remained fine and he promptly threw the blob into a pit nearby. Slapping his hands together to get rid of the excess, he took the blowpipe back and decided to start again. Bringing the blowpipe end to his lips Spike let loose a stream of green fire for a few moments. Once he felt the tip was sufficiently heated he took himself to the furnace and slid the blowpipe into its maw. Glass was contained in something like crucible within and he started to collect it on the end of his pipe. Just then he heard the door to his workshop open. "Oi, Spike, you have some visitors... a customer wants a custom cut jewel," came a rough voice from behind him. "Tell them to come back in a bit because I'm busy, old man." Spike didn't bother looking over towards the door as he took the blowpipe from the furnace and grasped it in his fingers. "Oh my..." Rarity said as she peered through the door and beheld the dragon. "Spike is that really...?" "Yeah, it's me," he said taciturnly as he brought the blowpipe to his mouth. "They can stay for a bit, then you get them to buy something and throw them out." "Are they friends of yours or something?" the old stallion questioned as he walked into the workshop to examine the failed glass vase. "You don't let many folks in here, you know." "You could say that..." Spike turned to the elderly salesman and gave a morbid expression. "I told you about them I think, my foster sister and one of her friends." He slowly started blowing into the glass gather at the end of the pipe. By now Rarity and Twilight had entered the workshop as well and were staring wide-eyed at Spike, who wasn't even interested in looking their way while he worked. They weren't really thinking in the now as both looked at him blowing the glass. Something was off about him and he looked so... mature. Even though they couldn't see his face, hidden by a hood and facing away from them, both Twilight and Rarity could feel a pair of eyes in the back of his head. Before he left Spike was barely as tall as Twilight but now he towered over her. His slender bipedal figure gave off a feeling of power and presence as he worked his craft. Once mild lilac scales were now a deep purple and much more rigid. Fingers that had been stubby and claws that were originally blunt were now much longer and sinister; looking sharper than a blade. Green spikes were hidden by a worn leather jacket that managed to keep his form. A long strong tail was wrapped around his leg. "Spike it's beyond wonderful to see you!" Twilight cried out as she slowly made her way over to her foster brother. "Where have you been? What's happened to you?" "Darling you don't know how great it is to see you!" Rarity said in delight with a quiver in her voice. "It's been so long, we've missed you!" She started to walk towards Spike but stopped herself when his hands stilled. "Where were you? Why did you leave?" Spike took the pipe from his mouth and sighed as he placed it in the water trough by his side. He didn't look directly at Rarity but he did look over his shoulder at Twilight. His glare made Twilight subconsciously shiver - those weren't the eyes of the Spike she knew. "Afternoon Twilight," he said simply. "As for why I left..." Spike stood up as he spoke and flexed one of his claws. "...it's not really any of your business, Rarity." He didn't even look at her as he shrugged off her concern. It seemed like he was looking somewhere else entirely; somewhere far away from this place. "Spike we haven't seen one another in years! We need to get together and talk things out, because we're friends." Her voice remained level but she bit her lip before she continued. "Everybody was upset when you left and now that you're back we should talk about it." Spike suddenly clenched his fist but otherwise remained apathetic. Twilight was about to speak up but Spike cut her off. "Don't talk down to me like I'm a child, Rarity. I'm more experienced and much wiser than you. My business is just that and I'm not going to share." He gave a shallow laugh and turned to look at her. "Friends? Who says we're friends? I haven't seen you in years let alone thought about you." What upset Rarity most wasn't his words but rather the way he was looking at her. It may have been bearable if he resented her, tolerable if he loathed her. No light entered or escaped his eyes as he looked at her; it was disinterest. Jade pebbles stared at her unchanging almost as if they were staring through her. "Spike!" Twilight said in shock as she looked up at him in disbelief. "How could you say such a thing? You used to be so close to Rarity!" Her eyes kept flicking between the two of them as she struggled to see the full picture. "You're right Twilight; used to be." "Ahh... maybe I should be going?" Spike turned to look at his employer who was noticeably uncomfortable. "I feel a smidgen out of place amongst this ruckus." "Yeah, sure. Why don't you check the storeroom again. You were taking inventory earlier, right?" Spike nodded toward the exit and received a nod in return as his boss left the room. "Darling it's imperative that we talk about this," Rarity insisted as she put her hoof down. "You're obviously upset about something and as your friends, me and Twilight need to help cheer you up." Twilight nodded in agreement as Rarity finished. "You..." Spike inhaled deeply as his patience began to wear thin and walked over to his workbench. Picking up a small glass figurine he walked back and held it out in front of Rarity. "What do you think of this?" he asked with a tone of annoyance. Rarity picked the figure up in her telekinetic grasp and brought it closer for examination. It was a dainty glass model depicting some woman who was bipedal in nature, wrapped in alluring cloth in a pose of artful nature. Although the sculpting looked as if it was made from glass, Rarity thought it might have actually been some kind gemstone. She promptly placed it back in Spike's open palm. "It's beautiful," she said honestly as he walked over and placed the figurine back on his workbench. "Did you make this yourself?" "He must have," Twilight commented as she eyed the figure now resting on the bench. "No normal fire can soften such a dense material like a rune." Her cheeks flushed slightly as Rarity stared at her with a puzzled expression. "Twilight is correct; I sculpted a rune into a figurine for decorative purposes. It's easier to hide them if they're made like decorations." He put a hand in his pocket and looked down at Rarity with an expectant look. "However that's not the point of why I showed it to you. What does that make you think of?" The pearl white mare stared up at the jaded dragon for a few moments before managing, "...that you've grown?" "Exactly.” Clicking his claws together as she finished her sentence, Spike gave her a hard look. "I grew up independent from your discriminative society. I'm not a lapdog anymore... I'm an adult." Twilight smiled at Spike as he finished speaking. "You may have grown up without us there for you, but Ponyville has been and always will be your home, Spike." Rarity noticed how Twilight tactfully avoided his other comment; as did Spike. Green flames leaped from Spike's grimacing mouth and flowed up across his face. He opened his mouth slowly as his stare turned cold. "Don't fuck with me, Twilight," he spat. "Ponyville will always be my home? I have my own home, now. I don't need Ponyville." In the blink of an eye Spike had shoved Twilight with some form of whiplash motion, similar to a flicker jab. One of his fingers was pointed at her with the claw tip sitting on her brow. "You used me. I choked up damn mail for you and stacked your fluffy misguiding books all my life!" He pointed at himself and stood back straight. "I'm free now! Why would I go back to a life of solitude when I have so much now?" "I... I never..." Twilight back peddled slightly and failed to look Spike in the eye. "You're my foster brother and I just..." she couldn't find the words to finish her sentence. "You're right, I am your foster brother." Spike crossed his arms and looked over at the door. "That's what makes your actions disturbing, Twilight." "You," he said sharply as he pointed at Rarity. "You used me in worse ways by feigning ignorance for my feelings. I'm not mad that you didn't return my feelings, they were those of a childhood crush, I'm pissed off that you used me as a slave." He threw his arms up. "I was literally your pincushion!" Rarity walked closer to Spike and put her hoof on his side, only to have it removed by his hands. "Spike, darling, this is exactly why we need to talk! I wish we'd met on better terms, but you have something against us, and we need to work together to sort it out and get you back home." "No!" he said angrily as he pushed her back. "I'm telling you, Ponyville is not my home. Dammit you two just listen to me for a single second!" Very slowly the purple dragon pulled his hood down to expose his face fully. Rarity managed to keep her composure but Twilight was evidently shocked. "What...?" Rarity began. Garish black lines were engraved in the back of his scalp and probably down his neck as well; some more were probably hidden by his shaggy hair. Each was abhorrent in nature with an understandably dark intentions. Spike rolled one of the sleeves of his jacket up and exposed yet more of these lines. "This was my rite of passage. It marks me as a member of my race in blood and name." "That doesn't matter!" Rarity said with a tone of annoyance. "You're our friend no matter what and we need to help you adjust. You've obviously been through some horrible things!" "Rarity you don't—" Spike started before Twilight suddenly whispered something bizarre. "Rarity, you don't understand how severe those are," Twilight said in shock as she looked at her old friend. Her eyes were shaking in their sockets as if the scene before her had knocked her about. "Markings like those bring only misery and madness; Spike can't come back to Ponyville. He shouldn't even be in Equestria." "But everyone misses you!" Rarity suddenly cried out. "When you walked out on us all I—" Rarity was stopped midway as Spike placed a hand over her muzzle. His hands felt so awfully alien to her as he forced her mouth shut with a grimace. "When I walked out on you all you what, Rarity? Were you sad or upset? Your slave walked off one day so you had to work harder?" "Spike how dare you!" Twilight said emotionally as she looked away from Spike. "You go off and break the law, mutilate yourself and talk to my friends like that? I don't care who you were, but that's not okay!" "I didn't break the laws of my people, only those of yours," he stated flatly. "I really do care for you Twilight, but I have my own life now. I've got my own things going on the way I want them to, and I've travelled my own path!" Then he turned to Rarity and began walking out of the room, without looking back. "Don't get involved with me after today. I left for a reason." -=-=-=-=-=- Keys were violently pulled from a leather jacket and thrust into a battered door lock. Defiant sticky tumblers refused to budge; but was eventually broken entirely. Metal flew aside as a fist punched a hole through the old lock and handle, letting the door open on its own. Spike stepped in through the doorway and closed the door behind him. Leaning up against the bulky door he let a stream of fire out onto his claw. After a few seconds his claws were glowing a vibrant hue and he quickly welded the door shut. Afterwards he slumped down on the floor and put his head in his hands. Clenching his fists into balls as he grit his teeth with a growl the young dragon punched the floor with a sigh. His arms went lax and his breath slowed as he stood and staggered, before walking farther into his flat. Shrugging off his leather jacket and casting it aside as he went, Spike entered his living room and beheld it in the light of dusk. Unkempt piles of books and magazines were on the coffee table whilst the two couches were littered with clothes. As he walked past the door to the kitchen he noticed it was surprisingly clean. Spike spotted several drinking glasses lined up besides the sink as he entered the kitchen. Picking one up and sniffing it briefly he placed it under the tap and ran a glass of water, quickly throwing his head back and pouring the water down his throat. The kitchen was covered in black stains from his failed cooking. Smooth polished wood passed underfoot as he padded toward his bedroom. Opening the door without bothering to shut it Spike walked over to the right side of his bed and fell face first into the pillows. A long drawn out groan escaped from his lips as he felt the tension in his body wash away; soaked up by his mattress. As quickly as he felt his body embraced by his covers an arm wrapped around him from behind and someone was pressed up against him. "I keep telling you that we're in separate rooms for a reason," he said simply while burying his face father into the pillows. "Now that's no fun," came a cooing reply as the invader pressed up against him. "Are you trying to tell me you don't like me, Spike?" He abstained from commenting and received a light chuckle for his silence. "Get off of me," the tired smith moaned as he turned on his side and weekly tried to push his companion off. They merely stopped hugging him. Instead the embracing bed intruder grasped his outstretched hand and wrapped their fingers between his; there was no resistance. "Why don't you start by telling me what happened?" said a feminine voice in a sweet tone. Spike was turned against his will to be facing upwards. Staring up into a pair of pure forest orbs Spike felt his resistance slowly crumble around him. "I ran into some ponies I knew from a while back; nothing too major." Noticing the gentle tan fingers that were binding his Spike closed his eyes and let out a shallow breath. Lips. Seemingly soft and inviting but the moment he closes his eyes they were pressed up against his own. Although overridden by mild surprise Spike didn't open his eyes, he savoured the flavour rosemary and liquor that came and went in a flash. Opening his eyes he started up at the one who'd just kissed him with a mixture of a dumbstruck smile and a soft glare. "It didn't sound like nothing major, you know." The woman ran a finger up his chest slowly as she spoke. "It kind of sounded like you ripped the door open. You didn't rip the door open, did you? We need a door..." She placed her finger on his lips and whispered, "Ponies might hear us, you know." "Oi stop screwing with me," Spike said with a laugh as he shoved the girl off of him and onto the bed. "Somebody might hear us? You spent a few hundred years in silence, can't you do it some more?" He smiled slightly but rubbed his forehead and lay down, staring up at the ceiling in thought. "So who did you meet? Anybody important?" Her tangerine and tangelo hair wrapped around her neck as she pressed up against Spike, still holding his hand. "I met Rarity and my foster sister, Twilight," he said grimly. "Things started out fine I suppose but they wouldn't listen to me and that frustrated me to no end. Rarity seems set to try indoctrinate me back into Ponyville, and Twilight... I don't know what she thinks." A chuckle rang out from besides Spike. "Rarity always sounded like a mule to me," his companion said sourly. "She used you far too much as a child and now she's trying to reel you in?" Her eyes closed in thought. "Pretty disgusting." "It just dawned on me," Spike mused as he flexed his hand. "You're still in my bed. You could kill me you know that, right? Calling you wild is an understatement." "I'm sure you'll allow me to indulge for one night." An arm wrapped up and around his face, sliding back down and onto his chest. "You seem like you need the company after all, so why not break the last few rules that keep you in place?" "I can't handle you," he said bluntly. "Sure you can, you're a—" Spike placed a hand over her mouth, only to have his fingers licked and a grimace creep over his face. Sighing as his eyes drooped shut in the dusk light he felt his companion cuddle up besides him. "We'll work it out together; that's what we've done ever since the day we met, right?" "Yeah," he spoke sincerely. "We're a master and spirit, Amaranth." Obsidian TeethSpike was standing in-between two pillars that rose up into an infinite sky. Following the pillars of marble upward into the sky would only cause him to go mad from such insane implications. Perhaps if he had more time to study the delicate flower petals carved into their surface, the hours to spend attempting to figure out the runic marks which adorned the shape, he might figure out what they meant. Cold was the only thing the pillars were willing to give up; an overbearing feeling of coldness. Secrets untold might have possibly lay within these constructions, but only one was given up. They had an arch between them which hung tiny bells and beads, and were connected to a larger structure. Stained glass shrank behind the pillars that seemed to hold up the sky, a cathedral of marble and granite sat atop the water with little relation to anything around it. Walls and structure was huge in scope and size; a place of gods. Trees from the sides of the lake grew over the water toward the building. Canopies of green and blue surrounded the pearl cathedral encasing it in a pure block of nature. From afar it seemed as if the entire thing rose from the forest which surrounded it. Cracked spires and wonky helices clawed upward from the structure of gods, a city of gods, falling apart. Spike made his way inside through a shattered pair of doors; not even a frame to them. The interior of the cathedral was surprisingly bright considering the size. Sunlight streamed in from empty window frames and nearly blinded him. Before him were row upon row of pews facing nothing in particular. Capitulating the sense of loneliness this place gave off was a revolting effigy that twisted and bubbled from where it stood. Seemingly screaming and clawing at its rocky flesh the statue was placed in the centre of the building. It gave off a feeling of coldness as the air whispered sorrowfully. "What are you thinking about?" said a voice from somewhere. It had a sweet sound that seemed to drape itself across his arm. "Where are you going?" It trailed up his arm and latched to his shoulder before being blown away by the midsummer breeze. Walking toward the statue with a slump in his step, Spike placed his hand up against it with a plain expression. Turning around slowly and pressing his back up against the effigy, Spike allowed his legs to slide outwards as he slumped against the cold obsidian. His stationary figure was drawn into the statue by claws that didn't exist. Light humming filled the air as he let out a tired sigh. The voice stroked against his cheek as the wind died down, filling his ears with the sweet sound of love. "You've been wandering so long..." Spike didn't bother to respond as he pulled a packet of cigarettes from his pocket, flicking the lid of the packet open with a claw. Worn out card held a precious few sticks of lung cancer within. Plucking one up with no amount of haste the capricious dragon put his packet away with a small struggle; having to wiggle it back into his pocket. Taking the small rolled pipe of organic decay between his left ring and index fingers, Spike brought the tip up to his mouth and let out a small yet of green flames. Flames leaped up and across the front of the wad before sinking in deep and beginning to slow-burn the fag. It met his lips with the taste of maturity yet stank of disgust. Breathing in deep through the tight-fag Spike allowed his emotions to lose themselves for a moment. For a split second he was absorbed and rejected by the plume of decay that wriggled around his lungs. Breathing out the poison with a bored expression he watched the black smoke filter and flow between his eyes, before drifting off on an invisible wind. Ponies and griffons didn't smoke a brand Spike had discovered, he had to buy his fags from minotaurs. It was strong stuff. Bringing his left leg up close to his body the purple wanderer rested his left hand on his knee. The cigarette burned down slowly as he stared at the embers that slid off the tip. Spike eventually brought the fag back up to his mouth and took in a deep breath from the plume within, closing his eyes and letting his body slide closer to a back-to-front prone position. Whispering in the distance made him freeze up momentarily, the delicious smoke escaping him as the tension got the better of him. He probably should have expected it to happen so soon but he'd deluded himself. Opening his eyes once more he found himself lost amongst a writhing mass of grubby black hands clawing for salvation. The effigy behind him was bubbling and convulsing in a disgusting manner. What had once been a cathedral on a lake of pure blue had become a flat open expanse of nothingness. Scraggly white trees with needles for branches sprung up here and there, whilst a multitude of decrepit hands and screaming faces formed the landscape. "L̴͇͖̪͎̗̼̙̫̣͕͌͂͑̐̀i̵̙̱̩̥͉͈̗̯͈̳̯̝̝͕̟͇ͧ͗ͤ͛̋̑̏ͩͮͣ̇͑̄ͨ̚͘ͅͅê̸̡̆̿͂́̽̔̑ͧ̽̌ͧ͐͛̐͡͝͏̪͈̻̻̗͈͚̫̭͙̻s̮̮͇̟̟̮̜͕̹̲̮̦͙̪̝̥̯̾ͣ̋̏͗ͭ̕͜͡͠ ̱̹͉̙̟̥̗̺̤͕̜̮͍̫͕̥͊̿ͨ͛̿ͭ̑ͮ̽͒͆͠͠ͅlͪͭ̄̍̈́̄̈̔͒͏̵͉͚̠̺̘͉̖̥͈͍͘i̵̵̶̹͚̲̖͈͉̫͔͎̱̻̱̱̙̩̯ͣ̊̍ͭͬ͢ͅe̵̎̑ͫ̆̈́͒ͫ̏̃̀ͨ͘͟҉̷͇̲̝̫̥̮̱̯̰̼̯͓̦̩̫͓͙s̛̹̲̗̖̣̝̮̫̯̓̊ͯ̌̏̄̊̓͟ͅ ̶̧̮͓̗̰̰̳̱͍̰͔͈͎͐̄ͮ͌͂͘͟͝s̥̺͈̯̳̘̺͓̲̯ͦ͛͌͗̅ͩͤ͗͑͛̃̅̽͂ͤ͛ͨ̕͝o̶̡̯̣͓ͦͨ̄͗̿̎̉̃̒͆̏ͣͫ̓͜͞ͅ ̷̷̧̞̩̱̥͙͕̠̰̍̂̎̎̃ͪ́ḿ̵̨̩̥̰̪͍̼̦̩͇̠̜̯͎̥̋̋̀̄̈́̇̂ͯ̏͝â̢͎̫͉̖̦̺̩̜͈̥̼̪̱͕͔͓̙̹͋̏͂ͩ̄̔̌̎̇̋̓ͩ͑ͫ͆̽͢n̸͚̟͎̹͓͙̩̰̩͖͔̬̖̗͈̹͛̾͊̋ͩ̽̀̿̍ͧ̈̐̌ͥ̿ͩͬ͜ͅy̡͈͚̩̼͉̭̬̜͚͎̮̳͇̣͓͕̹̞ͫ̏ͣ̑̍̈́ͦ̈ͪͮ́͘͟ͅ ̨̅̽͑̽ͩ̒̀͆̚̚͏̨̤̭̻̪̹͕̻͍̭̝̙͓̳͉̫̳͎l̢ͥ͂͑̒̌͢͝͏̱̱̯͚̼̺̱̗ͅͅi̛̯͔̭̥̭̗̤̎̏ͣͮ̏̿̈́̿ͮ̿̔́ͭ̌̋̉́̀͞ẽ̵̆̋̌ͨ҉̷̶̲̙̘͚̜̤̭̞͖̱͕s̡̙̮̯͖̠̍̂ͯ͐̑ͩ̏ͯ͑ͫ̚͝ ̷͑̌ͩ̈́̈́͛̍͠͝͏̩̺̳͖̼̩̞̤̻̳̻͜g̑̾̎ͣͤ̿͆̊͂͏̷̩̠̮̺̰̩̞̗̼̻̣ï̸̪̪̟̳͖͉̂ͦͯͥ͗̒̌̐ͦͮ̅̒́̒̎̌̐́͠͝v̵̹̱̟͔̦̻͖͔̻͇̾ͪ̊̄͊͐͌ͣ͗̎̇̑̓̇̽̒́̚͟͟e̪͈͈͇̘̻͔̰̣̣͇̼̼̲̺̎̔͒̆ͫͤͩ̉ͯͣ͒ͦ̓ͦ́̕̕n̷̨ͩ̇ͤ̃̆̌͒̑ͩ̌̅ͧͭ̿̕͠͏͉̙̻̟̣̯͍̭̼͕̤̖̪̼ͅ ̈̑̂́͗ͯ͛̀ͤ̋ͨͬ̅̅͑͆͊̆̚͢͏̥̫͔̼̤͔̺͔̭̥͘t̷̠̝̝̝̝͎̪͎̂͌̓͗̓̋͆ͬ͒̃̉ͣ͊ͫ̆̽̀͜͞o̴̊͑̃̇҉̛҉̮͓̯͉̫̳̺̗͈̻͙͓ͅ ͇̲͓̝̈̈̎̌̄̏ͭ͋̀̒ͯ͜͞uͦ̂ͦ͑̋͋̄͌̋ͣͨ̈̑̇̊̚̚͏̙͙͈̰͔̱̤̭̠̦̞̲̝͙͎̭͟s̢̨̾͛͐̓̋̾͂̀̉ͩ̇͏̼͓̥͉̮ͅ ̵̢͔̹̩̪̞̞̜̹͈̳̟͔̯̲̤̰̞̽͂͊̉ͤͩ̿͂͗͂ͧ̅̚͘̕͞b̧̰͍̱̼ͯͩͩ͛ͤ̄̓̔y̢̢̘̹̼̩̤͍͓͈̭̰̤͕ͦͫ͌̂͒͗͐̉̿̀͠ ̴̵̧̙͖͎̳͇͈̬͈̏̓̅͊͗̆̇́ͧ̃t̸̷͉̖̗͈̬̯̗ͮ͊̄͆ͬ͛͒ͪ̐́͊̈ͮ͝ͅh͚̤͚͙̭̘̮̙̞̝͕̣̩̞̩͆̔ͬ͞ͅe͈͉̙̦̯͖̖̦ͥͮ͋̒̉̑̊̓̎̀̀͢ ̜̼͕͖̻̫̤̥͕͙̤̮̫̖̒ͧͪ̒̊̾ͭͮ͌̈̅̌̆̎ͣ͑̄͝g̛̰̪̻̘͆̋̔̃̎͛ͪͯ̔ͦͯ̅̾́̀͞͞͝o̡̢͇̼͖̠̼͎̰̟͓͂͌ͭͧͨ͂̈ͫ̃͌̐͜͡ͅd̷̢͕̻̙̤͍̜̈̋ͮ͆͑͆̕ ̛̦̰̙̖̯̝͕̬̲͎̜̗̣̮̥̟͚̖̫̑ͦͫ̇ͥ͂͛̇̚͟hͤ̓͌͊͆ͬ̉̈́̓̆ͩͦ́̉̎̕̕҉̤̺̙̦͍̀i̸͖̺̻̦̤̰͊́̀͑̇̊ͫͧ͘̕͢͜m̴̢̛͉̖̯̟͖͖̜̻̹̭̩͎͕͚̗̜̄ͭ́͂̔̿̎̓͊̔̂̅͜s̴ͬ̈ͮͥ̽͂͛ͯ̔̾͆͘҉͙̰̠͚̗̰̠̱̲̞͕̩̦̩̝͈͙͘ę̵̸̛̫͕̤͈͂̉̑ͧ̇ͯ̔̀l̸̴̘̱̳͓͔͕̳͉̖ͤ͗̋ͨ̏͛ͭ̆̅̔f̛̛̖̗̣̟̲̜͌̃̚͜͞ ̷̷̤̪̣̟̣͖̦͖ͬ̐ͣ̓̒̐ͥ̓̔ͭ͊͆͆ͧͯ̿̀̚̕͟ͅw̶̗͍̰̯ͦͧ̊ͭ̌̅ͩͤ̒͝hͣ̓̑͂ͭ҉͙̟̥͖̝̣͖͇̭̦͕̙̼o̓ͥ̿̒̃͋ͬͭ̒҉҉̵̷̘͚͙͈̟͇̝̘̫ ̵̦͓̫̼͔̣͖̥͍͎͙̯͕̜̓̽̒̇̓ͯ̐̆͐̍̎͝ͅs̷̢͔̲̗̱̲̠̘̗̍ͭͭ̆̈̇͋̄̊͑́̄͆ͥ͐̈́ͬ́͋͢t̵̨̘͉̦̠̺̳͈̦͎̪͖̘̦̣̲͍̤ͪͥ̇̒̀̽̿͌ͥ͒͢͝͞a̵̢̤̝̮̦̘͎͖͉̩̙̰̝̩̗͉̼̫̜̯̓͊̐̐ͩ̈̊͊̓͒ͫ͛͐ͪ͒ͨ̏n̸͙̠̰͈̼̟͇̥̱̗̟͚̳ͬ̋̏̃͐ͩͮ͒͌͡ͅd̛̩̖̱̝̑̃ͣ̏̐ͧ̂̎̎̓̈́͐͞s̢͙̣̮̲̹̘̺̘̠͙̝̤̮͙̙̉̓͐̏̉̽̄͐͟ ̴͉̫̤̦́ͨ̃̂̊ͯ̑͒̈́̄̆͛̚͟͜͞ǔ̞͉͙̠̼͇͕̮̩̏͑ͦ͋̊̀̚͟͞ṕ̴̖̠̖͔̟̺̻̝̮͕̟̣̼̯͇̒͑͌ͬͦ̍̄͞ò̫͎̻͈̬̤͖̰ͪͩ̈́̏̽ͬ̀̚n̴̴͎̱̜͚͖̯̮̘͙͔̬͍̲͆̑̍͐̀̕ ̸̛̮̗̲̫̗̜̭͎̓̓͒̂ͣͣͭ̾̌ͧͅt̄̀ͭ͌͐ͪ͑ͤ͊̑̎̀͗̉ͩ̃ͦ͏҉̢͔͇̦̖͍̹̹̤̣̖̟̯h̷̡͉̥͍̠̰̼̫̲̬̗̬̖̠̭͖̥̰ͨͫ́̑̍́ͬ̎ͫ̈́̽ͪ̓̚̕͟aͣ͒̋͋͋̏ͥ̓ͧ̌͆̌ͨ̒̔̉͏̛̛̥͎͙͓̰̣̗̖t̴̵̨͈̪̝̥̗̣̙̰̝̞̥͚̲̼̰̤͈ͪ͊ͮ͒͋̆ͫ̓̈́̑̈́̊̃̄́͠ͅ ̒̄́̏͌̎̌͆ͦ̓ͧ̋̑͂̚͏̘̗̬̮̺̼̪͕̹̙̘̺͞c̷̣̟̤̳̺͔̞̝̬̮͓̫͚̩̆̓ͭ̅ͩ̈́̓ͫ́͡ŗ̸̸͈̜̻̮͍͊̿ͩ͒ͩ̉̊̊ͬ͘yͮͭ͂̃̀͏̶̹̹͍̣̦̕s̨̡̡̰̜̥̫͓̰͙͕̦̞̭̤ͩͫ̆͐̍̃̏͒̅̔̆̎̇͂t̵̢̮̱̪̲͎ͮ̅̋ͮ̃͋͒̆̓̅͊ͩ͜ȃ̵͕̤͇̬͓̮̩̻̪̘͉̯̺͚̏̐ͪ̌͂͌͗ͭ̄̽͗́͞͝͠l̵͈͖͓͎͓̠̺͒̽̾ͯ͆ͯͮ̀ͨ̓́ͭ́̎̕͜ ̢̛͉̱̹̘̺̜̱̱͙̩͓ͨ͂͑͌ͫ̚͟͞ṫ̿͗̏́͏̨͏̷͇̩͙̝̖h̴̭̫͓̭̝̉̇̎̅̾̌̍͆̑̌́͞͞r̴̸̛̖͕̦̘̭̥̮̀̃ͣ̎͑ͫ̿̿͑̍ͮ͗̈́̋͜ŏͯͭ̽̑͌ͫ̈̎̆̋̍̆͢͠҉͚̜̰̮̙͙̤̜̻ͅǹ̨̗̙̖͇̪̯͈͕̹͙̘̫͊͒̂̎̈́̒ͭ͊͝ͅe̸̘̠̤͍͔͗̂ͥ̇́́͝ͅ ̸̭͙̼͇̫̗͕̜̼̠̞͓̼͑̎ͫ́ͣ̍̓͐̂ͦ̓͐ͯ̍̔͘d͆ͫ̐͑ͣͧ͐ͫͫͨ́͒̌͑ͯͬ̽ͣ̚҉̧̖̺̻͇̭̫̗̭͔̙̥̹̯̹̗͓̟̺̕͟͡ͅe̡̢̞̯̻͎̖̝̰̟͇̠̭̹͎͕̦͈̮͍̓͐́ͧ̆̓̃̏͋ͩ̂͞v̴̝͖̗̳̲̹̱̣͇͕͋ͮ͑̄ͪ͋̂̔̾ͦ́͟͞͞o̧͚̼̣̼͚̝̟̺̫̪ͧ̔ͨ̂́͜͝͡ͅȗ̴̴̴̠͙͍͓̼̣̙͇͙̘̻̥̩̗̭ͧͥ͊́r̵̛̥̭͚̹̗͎̱̥͙͙̰̯̙̞̰̠̐͆̽́͢͝ẽ̵̷̹̰͚͒̉̿ͮ̽͋̓̓͗̂͛̈́ͤ͌̌̚ͅd̴̺͙̱̼ͨ͆̉͌̋ͫ͊͞ ̶̶̿ͣ̌́̏̄̓̈̆̔͟͞҉̬̹͇͔͉̰̘̪͖̺̹̘̜ͅḅ̨͓͖̥̻̭̱̘̹͖̫͔̻̓̂͋ͥͮ̂̆̾̆̎ͤ̍̆ͨ̎ͥ̓͆̕͢͠ỵ͇͈̼͓̖̪̤̮̭͙̺͕̱͖̤̜̄̊͌̐͒̒ͣͪ̀̚̚͟ ̤̗̗̫̣͔̞̭͖̖̩̳̓ͨ̐̾̈́ͮ̇̂̈ͭ͋̒͐͒ͪ́͞ͅt̵͕̬̟͈̙̦̘̫̀͌̄̽̇̋͂ͦͭ̐̆̅̌̂̏̆͌̅́̀̚h̵̨̜͙̲̻̭͇̩̺̭̹̦̙̤̳͎̾̐̿̒͞e̴̗͉̘̥̫̮̰͚̮̙̙̞̲̝̹̔͆̌͟͠ ̮̘̻̲̮̟̣̲̰͉̪͓̥͎͉ͣ͂͋̏̓̂͌̀ͦ̐̅ͭ́̌ͥ̀́͞͡ͅm̵̢̛̜̮̯̱̎ͣ̒̿̏̾͌͒̀͡ͅa̻͚̻͎̠͚̭͗͂̈́̑͞ẘ̧̰͔̝̥̎̄͒́̌̔ͭ̔͘͡͠ ̈́̏̽̋͑͗҉̢̨̦̖͉̠̟̖̺͘o͆ͦ̐̍͆ͮ̀̈͊̄̒̓ͪ̈ͮ̚҉̴̯̘̫̖͟ͅf̙͇̺̗̻̦̠͓̖̰̱̟ͦ͊ͭ́̿̅̀̌̏ͬ͐ͫ̇̅̾ͭ̐̀͆͜͞ ̷̷̖͇̘͕̰̳̦͎̱̮̖̫̮ͪͮ̔͊ͨ̐̑͂ͩͧ̏̍ͪ̆ͫ̚͢ͅiͯ̔̂ͨͬ̏̃ͨ̍̂ͬ̌̃͒͗͢҉̶̧̮͍͎̼̼̮̟̹̝̝ņ̸̨̰̞̮̩̬̜̗̬̟̙̜̟͍̅̂ͮ̎̂́͒ͣ̋ͮ̅̎ͥ͌ͨ̿̋ͨ͟͢f̷̵̷̻͉͕̹ͪͮ̍̏̅ͭͨ̃ͭ̚͜i̸̧̟͈͍̫̤̦̰̩͍͚͉͖̯͓̤͙͚͆̀͐̀ͬͫ́͟ͅṋ̤̣͖̫͈̻̯͒̌͒̂̂̈ͥ͛͊̾͒̈́͜͜͜͡͞i͐ͬ̄̈͗ͩ̅ͤͬ̍̈́̓̋̊̍̓̂́̓҉̨͎͕̤̭͓̝̳̀̀t̢̯̺̫͍͎̮͇͍̬̙͖͚̼̻̘̼̝̍ͮ̌͛ͨͬ͑ͩ̐̅͆ͨͥ͂̀̚̕ͅŷ̸͂͊̀͛̇͜͢͏̯̘̲̜̱̝̰̼.̷̛̝̞͈͍̦͖̝̳̙̗̗̗͓̽͂ͩ͊̓̽̆͋ͩ͗͑̉ ̡̤̗̻̗̣͔̰͚̮͎͉͖͚͇̬͔͍ͯͤ͊̈́͌̇ͦ͗ͬ̑̑̇̔͋̔ͫͨ̂ͦ͟͞ͅͅPͩ͋̐̓̉̊͋ͨͯ̚͏̵͙̫͚̗̪̣̜̫̩͖̕͡r̶̲̰̙̱̟͔͓̹ͯͪ̿͛͋̃ͭ͊̉ͥ̅͋́̚͞͠a͌ͤ͌̊ͤ͏̸͇̯͔̻̙͍̫̫̯̩̮͕̗̫̖ḭ̶̡͇̭̙̱͍̲͖̭̜̫̠̝͙́̄̾͌ͦͮ̐̆̿̈̈́̿̑̍̀s̷̭͔̹̗͖͉̠͇͓̺̣̞̪̯̰̩̼̅̐̾̐̆̍͑ͭ̊̓̏͒̈́̌̌̎̀͠ͅe̶̷̽ͧ͑̏ͭ̾͒ͯ̍̀̽ͨ̈̿̚̕͢҉̘̱̣̻̯̜͔̰̼͓̼̰ͅ ̸̵̦̞̳̘͖̓ͣ̃̒̉͛ͩ̓̑͒̚b̸̷̡̡̞̮̝̝̖̼̱̘̻̦͉̖̱̪ͪ̏̊̓ͨ̌́̎ͧͭ͂̀ͅë̲͇̰̮̘͙͉͉̩͓͓̖̹̪͈͎̭̻́̒͐ͪͦͨ̂ͭ́͟ͅ ̧̼̘̜̣̥͎͆̃͆̅̅̃̏̍͊͞h̾̈ͣ́ͨ̐͌͐̓̆͒̓̆̐̒̂͊̒҉̛̱̩̞̭͎̘͘͘͡į̫̜̣̯̰̱̩̥̘͉̼͉͐͂ͥ̋͠m̵̵̆̔͑͛ͬͩ̓̉͜͏̝̗̭̱̜̥̯̱͔̰̯̳̥͔̮,̢ͮ͛͌̈́ͯ̓͋̒͑ͦͭ̅ͪ̀̕҉̼̟̗̭͎̦̠̲ ̴̡̰̥̫͙̻͖͈̥̪̲̞̉ͬ͛̌̄ͤ̍̓́̔̆̐̌͆͌̇̕p͎̞̬̙̩͉̞̰̻̗͉̰͇̦̳̭͕ͦ̋̄͛͐ͧ́͗̋ͨ͗̆͋̍ͪ̾͞r̛̊͌ͯͫ͋̿̈ͮ̏̾҉̥͔̤̫̹̫̥͍͇͍̜̰͈̰̞̮͡ͅa̴̡͎̱̮̫͉͇̫̲̰͓̦ͫ́ͥ͒̒̀ͤ͛̀̃͊̕͢i͉͇͖͔̩͉̼̝ͩͭͭͯ͂̓͒̊͒̃̑̀͘͘͜͠s̛̩̖̩̳͙̝̫̜̗̏̔̑ͪͭ̿ͫ̈́̿ͤ̋̉͊̓̔͂́̕͟͡ĕ̈́̂͂ͥ̈͒̊̃ͪ̈́͊͑̿͛͐̓ͨ҉͏̴̨͍͍̰̹̮̫͚̙͚͚͡ͅͅ ͨ̓̿́̿͌͌̓ͩͧ̇͏̸͖̻̠̱̫̬̭̰͓̺̺͖͜͟b̏ͮ̇͗͋̉̄ͥ̉̆̽ͤ̈́͗̔̇̚̚҉̷͟҉̝͔͈͙̦͕̫̣̲̰̕e͎̺̥͓͎̩̱͋͆̃̅ͦ͗̿͂͑̓ͥ̑͊ͨ̿͑ͦ̓ͭ̕͠ ̴̦̘̞͖̣̙͙̯͕̰͍̗̯̻̳̞̰̙̈́̀͆̆͊̋ͪͭ̂̏ͬ̏̇̆̕͟ͅh̵̛̞̼͕͎̥̱̖̪̗̹̒͂̈͢͞iͪ͗̄̿̾ͤ͋ͬͦ̓ͪ͑̏ͩͩ̾̚͏̡͉͎͎͙̖͕͚̗̙͉̻͝m̸̩͍̩͓̞̜̏͆͛̑̊̽ͫ̾͊͑ͧ͑̋̅ͥ,̡̡̠͓͕̆̋ͩ͆̽ͥ́̅ͫ̌͢ ̵͑͊́ͦ̚͘҉̳͕̖͙g̃̓ͫ̀͏̨̪̹̯̥̯̞͉̤̞̣̣̣̰̯̩̲o͍̯̭̯͓͕̼̼̜̱̭͔̠̫̥̗̹̙̣ͤ́̎͐̌͐͐̍̄̓̊̂ͯ͐͘͞d̢̗͓̲̙̱̰̫̠̣̩̜͍̮̯͓̖̩͔̳̒̾̓̈́̐́̅̔̾̋͗͗̽̋͛͂̀͠ ͙͙̠͉͓͇͖̤̱͙̝͂̇̈́̈́́͟s̵̴ͥ̀̌̓ͧ̾ͦͮ̾̓ͪ̚͢҉̜̻̫͉p̨̢̺͎̺̮̫̉ͯ̎͑̓̅̅ę̴̶̞͖̳̜͖̼̥̳̪̒͌̽ͪ͗̔̓̎̽̀̌̽ͭ̿̔ͭͬ͜ȩ̨̠̙̜̱̜̦̳̟̱̹̳̟͙̜͒ͮ̾ͧ͗ͭ̂͑ͬͣ͗ͮ̏͊̑̒̕͜ḑ̰̝̖̱̂̆ͧ̄̾͛͒̎͗͗̐̉̊̈ͥͧͪ̕ͅ ͐̐͌̾ͩͯ̿̑͋͜͜҉̩̥̻̲̟̩̣͠͡y̶̶̧̲̖͚̮̟̞̆͛̍̂͊ͨͭ̀͞ͅͅȱ̷̴̦̞͈̳̠̲̺͍͌̇ͣ̚͟u̠͈͚͚̬̠̱̲̲̞͖͙̭ͭ̏̊ͮ̂ͯͤ́ͮ̅͂͒̌͘͟r̶̸̵̻̰̤̱̺̫̱̣͙̘̼̞̝̝̦͐͊̉̃ͪ̑ͦͨͨ̊͋ͫͯ͛̅̇ͩͪ͡ ͋̒͂ͯ̃̌̇ͮ̃ͯ͋̓̃ͯ̂ͩ̚͞͠͏̱̹̳̩t̶̨͖̜͇̥̗̥̟͕̖͍͕͒̉̎̃̈ͨ͝ͅͅi̷̳͈͖͕̳̼̫̥̝̘̹͚͙͔̪̹͑̈́ͨ̂̔ͣͭͣ̀̕n̶̻̫͉̫͇̖̜̱̊͂̎͗͑͛͢͢͝͠y̴̳̪̲̲̰̙͐̓̎ͬ̔ͨ̽̅́̓̐̉͛̀͢ ͍͈̳͔̮͙͕̱͇̯̞̖̻͖̹ͣ̉̏ͣͤ̋ͧ͌́͝ͅf̷̨̤̗̗͈̣͓͓̳͚̘̩̈́̒̃̀ͪ̕͡ͅį̯̞̮͇̥̱͕̜͈͇̳͙̪͖̲̳̗ͮͨ̈̉̾͛͑̽͞ŝ̷̛̼͈̭̮̪͇̳̜̤̩̳͖̇ͯ̿̅͑͒̆ͪ͑̀́͟t̸̹̞̝̯̲͌ͨ͌̉ͭ͞s̷̷̨̛̳̱̩̻͖̮ͪ̿̔̃̈́̋̀̍̿̂ͫ͗̅ͥ̈́" Screaming voices tore at his ears as the entire landscape reverberated with the sound of the ones left forlorn. Tossing the fag aside with a flick of his fingers, Spike pulled his hood up and stood to leave. A hand grasped his ankle as a face appeared below him. "S̽̿̒̿́ͧͬ̀̒ͪ͐ͫ̚͏̨̢̪̥̙̩̰͎̼̲̝̭͖̮̼̖̝͔̳ͅͅa̡ͯͪͥ̓̄̓ͦ̂̋ͮ͆͏͘͡҉̱͔̙̟̼͚̱̮v͚̝̩̭͈ͭͦ̾͐ͥͭ̿̀͠e̛̜̠̲̟͚̖̩̩̦̭͉͈̻͛ͥ̋̊ͯ͐͌̾ͩ ͭͨ͌̓̈̅ͫ͏̶̹͈͔̳̺͢ͅu̷̗̣̳͇̓̓ͪ̆ͮ͒̔͑̉ͩͯ̍̍̎̚͢s̖̥̞̣̤͔̼̗̞̠͍̩̗̀̆̀̌ͣ͛̆͐̈̑ͮ͐̄ͫ̓̓͂̍̇͟͝ͅͅ ̨̨̛̤̱͎̯͍͇̦͓̣̻̲̜̼̼̝͋ͤ͂ͬͯͯͪ͋͂̓̈ͣ̾ͯͨͫ͠y̛̺̮̜̱̤̙̘̞͈̼͚̦͇̓̑̒͆̀̾ͤͫ͒͋̂͒ͥ̂̓ͬ̊͝ŏ̴̷̻̫͓̻̘̘̖̩͈͐̾ͪͤͤ̎͂̈͆̒͋̓ͣ̀ͅu̷̸̘̝̰̫͓͇͕̻̹͈̫͈͚̦͇͔̍ͪ̓͐ͧ̔͜͜͡r̸͔͙̺̞͖̉̋ͦ̓̏ͥͬ͗́ͣ̍̂̊ͨ͛͝ ͍̗͙̥͙̬̳͕̪̠̖̳͇̤̦̞̔ͪͮ͢͜͝g̷̸̣͚̺͙̟̗̫͕̳͕͉̱̤̜̪͖͒̊ͨ͂ͭ̑͑͗̄̇̊͊̄̀̚̚͟͡ŗ̵̸̡͚̜̦̦̥̣͎̥͒̽ͪͣa̵͍͔̲̟͚̘̺͕̙̙̝͋̈͋ͯ̓̉̔̉̎ͧ̿͋́̚͜͡c̛̺̙̤̞͉̙̯̳̯̙̰̻̙̎̆͑͊̽̾̎̕e̷̡̗̬̥͓͈̪͚̤̗̥̽̌ͮ̋ͮͨ͗̂̔͟͟ ̷͍̲̺̝͇̼̟̮̝̞̗̟ͦ̇̒̑̊̄ͪ̈ͣ̎̀͞s̛͈̮̥̩̘̻̰̱̘̖̤͔̩͕̭͎̮̅͂̅͒̿͆͌ͭ̎̑͑ͭ͐̓͂̑͂̌͝å̽̍̂̈́̅ͣ̅̍ͯ̿͊̈́͊ͧ͝҉̸̷̨̥̻͓͓̺v̴̖͕̲̝̖͉͙̘̝̗̣̞̱ͬ̉̈̓̑̉ͯ̀ͣ̓ͣͯ͛̇̐͒͗̊̂͟͜e̸͕̫͔͙̞̜̜̯̼̯̳͕̞̥͌̋͌ͮ̋͌̎ͫͤ̾ͭ̾͌́̐ͮ͠ͅ ̸̸̧̦͙͙̮̜̦̺̗̗̹̭̤̖̂̍͆̈̔̀̅ͥ̆͒ͦ͂̓̽ͧ͛u̷ͭͤ̓ͣ͋̓̋̔̊̒͐̉ͮ͂ͩ̐̂ͥ́̀̚҉̘̤͔̪̦̝͎̞͔̠̜̹̭̼́ͅś̸͇̹̰̭̙̹̹͎͈̥̙̯̟̟̝ͨͨ͗̎ͮ̚ͅͅ ̘͙̜͉̗̰̗͍̩̝̜̟͉͖̽̎̓ͪͬ͌ͤͯ̌̒͌ͨ͘ͅͅf̌ͭͥ̾̎ͯ̀҉̵̡̙͔͕̼͝r̒̎ͧ̊ͦ̇̚҉̷̡͍̮͙͎̘ͅo͊̈́̐ͦͫͤ͐ͧ͌͋ͤ҉̳͕͇̤̲̫̹̗͍m̛̮̲͔͇̥̂ͨ̿ͣ͂ͯ̑ͤ̉̽́ ̸͔̥͇̭̫͚̮̠͖͉̳͚̯̙̝̱̟̃ͧ͋̽̐͟o̶̶̝̭̮̬̙̠͉͖̝ͬ̾̈́ͥ͛ͫ̓̽ͨ̏ͣ͜͜uͦͩ̇̾̓͆̀͏̸̟͓̥̫̠́r̴͂̉ͦͩ̐ͮͥ͛̒͛́ͫͫͬͩ͗́̚̕͏̢̱͔͕̥̗͓̰̹͙̥̻͍̯̝̘ͅs̵̾̿̄̆͛ͫ̌͜҉̶̩̩̯̰͖̙͙̮̠̟̳͞ͅͅḛ̡͓̻̮͈̜͍̫̪̗̰ͩ̔̅͐̔͑ͥ̓̈̚̕l̔̽͌ͭ͏̶̶̡̛̼͍͕͖͇̖̮̘͖̙̜͙̞̹̮̙v̋̽͂͂͆̒͑̎̽͛̾͗̓̅ͤ͂̂͘҉̴̶̞̣̝͠e̢̡͓̦̖̖̅͐͛ͨͮͫ̂͌̏̏̌̽ͪ́̀̚͢ş̸̧̠̪͙̩͈̩͎̬̩̦̙̬̄͊͛́̈͆͐̀́͢!̧͋͑ͪ́͆̈ͩͫ̑͋̾̇ͩ̀ͤͣ̍͛̑͡҉̸̦̖̼͎͈̦͖̬̜̯̗͎̯̯͉" Spike kicked the clawing hand off and sighed, looking over at the landscape. "I don't have time for this," he mumbled apathetically. Blood red sunshine streamed down on the land of black and white, and as he started up at that eye of madness, Spike could only wonder of the implications. Brief wind danced over the fields of suffering. As quickly as the breeze came it left... Spike along with it. Spike was awake. He had to blink a few times to check that he was in fact awake and not in some lucid state, but he was most defiantly awake. Gentle light was streaming in from the ragged blinds that covered his bedroom window and dancing among the dust. For a small while he just lay there with his eyes half open. It was... it was kind of nice. In fact, he'd woken up in a good mood for once. For the first time in perhaps five years he'd woken up without calling out. It felt so surreal to have such a peaceful morning. Maybe it was because he'd seen his sister again, perhaps it was because he'd put his problems with Rarity to rest. Maybe even it was because he'd woken up with a woman in his— Hold up. Suddenly Spike snapped his eyes open and looked to his right. Biting his lip and tutting to himself he found his worst fears confirmed. Amaranth was laying next to him fast asleep and had her arms wrapped around him. Gears in his internal mechanisms stalled and began to clog up as he struggled to get the situation. He'd... slept with his contracted Spirit? More over had he just slept with his best friend? From an outside perspective sleeping with her wasn't the worst thing in the world, but given their situation and relationship, he didn't really know how to feel. Therefore he decided not to feel anything at all and adopted indifference. Laying back down in the bed after his short period of confusion, Spike decided to make himself comfortable and moved in place slightly. Hesitantly he moved his arm around his sleeping partner; although he didn't look at her. Then he merely closed his eyes and let out a small sigh. It wasn't supposed to be like this and he knew that. Deep down inside he never wanted things to change, because the monotony of his old life had been peaceful. But that was part of the problem. It was a false sense of peace harboured by lies. Once he'd seen through it there was no returning to those days. Disgruntled with his own thoughts he brushed Ponyville aside and focused on more important things. What was he going to do now that Rarity and Twilight had found him? He might be forced to switch jobs or perhaps he'd need to leave Equestria again. He didn't mind either option, seeing as he wouldn't have to complete his task for a few months. While trying to figure out which of the two options was more likely due to Rarity's tenacity the bedsheets were moved slightly. Soft and playful yawning tickled his neck as an arm wrapped around his chest. Radiant amber orbs started up at him with the focus of a blind drunkard; obviously unable to see him clearly. "Good morning..." she said with another yawn. Pulling herself closer to Spike she blinked a few times to clear her sleepy eyes, looking up at him a little more focused. "Did you sleep well~?" "Yes," Spike said simply as he sat up in bed. "No thanks to you, though. You've left a bad impression on me, you know that?" Stretching his arms out and flexing his back slowly he smiled smugly. "You didn't want to let go of me, even when I tried to pry you off, no deal." Pressing herself up against his back and placing her head on his shoulder, Amaranth whispered, "Wasn't I satisfactory, master?" "Hey hey let's really not," Spike said hurriedly as he pushed her away. "That's seriously creepy." Rolling over to the opposite side of the bed, Amaranth stood and had a quick stretch before playing with her hair. "Well I suppose we'll just have to sleep together from now on." Her voice was full of cheer as she aimlessly scanned a few items on her friend's shelf. "We'll become even closer~!" Spike groaned and placed his head in his hands. "You're seriously going to kill me, I hope you realize this." Swivelling to the side and standing up slowly, he grabbed a vest off of a coat hanger and slipped it on. "How could I kill you, silly?" she said briefly as she turned to look at him. "I'm not even wearing clothes and you think I'm dangerous?" "You're dangerous because of the sp— Pardon me?" Spike turned around to face her, but quickly changed his mind and decided to keep looking at the manky wall. "Why are you naked, Amaranth?" he asked slowly. She stood in thought for a few moments, playing with her hair while she pondered the question. "I think I got into bed naked. Didn't you notice?" "No, I didn't notice. I was too busy being tired I suppose." Spike was about to tell her to put some clothes on but a sharp knock at the door made him halt. "One moment," he said briefly. "Let's see who wants me." -=-=-=-=-=- "Arrrrgh!" Twilight whined through grit teeth as she slumped into the book she was reading. "I keep finding all these discrepancies and the more I look into them the more... the more heretical everything becomes!" Tossing the tome aside and levitating another one over from the deep white shelf, the young Princess began to flip through the pages with increasing speed. Rarity was sitting opposite her reading a textiles book, although she was skimming it in all honesty; her concern was Twilight. "Darling, what ever is the matter?" she questioned slowly. "I'm not sure I really get all this fuss..." "No, you really don't!" Twilight said in irritation as she threw the heavy book aside and pulled another from the shelf. "I'm struggling to even comprehend how many laws he's breaking by being on our land, let alone how many religious boundaries he's trampling..." Falling into incoherent mumbling as she flicked through the pages the lavender unicorn didn't notice her friend pick up one of the books she'd thrown. Reading the title of Entropy with an unchanging expression, Rarity started looking through the book. She wasn't very good with magic so she failed to comprehend half the runic markings, but it was clear that the book was attempting to teach dimensional magic. "Twilight..." she said slowly, looking up to see her friend glaring daggers at the book before her. "Why exactly is this such a bad thing? It's just some magic." "Rarity!" Twilight practically screamed at her friend. "It's not just magic it's heresy!" "Yes, yes I understand that," she said with a trace of annoyance. "But I'm yet to hear you explain why." Looking over at the pure white mare with an expression halfway between loathing and pity, Twilight closed her book and sighed. "It goes against the teachings of the Solar Throne, doesn't it?" Pointing at Rarity in a condescending manner she continued, "I understand that your parents were hicks, but for Celestia's sake, this is Harmonism!" Turning quiet for a moment, Rarity decided to swallow her pride and push on. "So, Your Highness, what tenants of Harmonism does dimensional magic break?" Opening another book and showing it to Twilight, she spoke up again. "It all seems fairly well thought out." "But it's all lies!" Twilight slammed the book shut with a larger magic pressure, and threw it aside. "Rarity we're facing the first religious crisis in over one thousand years, we can't afford heretics in our midst. Not now." Rarity placed down the other book and went silent as the conversation died off a little. "Misguided beliefs that other realms exist go against the core tenants themselves." Standing from the table they were sitting at in the Royal Library the two unicorns began to put the books back. "It might be against our religion, darling, but it's not against his," Rarity said softly. "He said it himself; it's a dragon thing." Twilight kept putting books back without saying anything. Her eyes twitched now and then as they looked set to cry, but her voice was level when she spoke. "But he's here in our land, our holy city, Rarity. Perhaps if things were calmer we could let him fly under the radar, but one of the Goddesses died, and panic is spreading." "Yes, it was such a shock to hear that Celestia, bless her soul, was killed. Such an open display of deicide was... unsettling." Finishing their task for the moment, the two friends began to walk in silence. It wasn't an uncomfortable silence; more of a remorseful one. Golden arches and shelves of marble filled the imposing library they were exiting. Between four shelves which sloped towards the sky there was a helical spire of soft blue light. It shone upwards into a pure glass orb which levitated at the centre of a black dome. Golden scripture was etched into the sides of the dome and flowed down like water throughout the library, each and every word making up a very sacred message. Sadly its meaning was lost throughout time. Both of the unicorns turned to face the pillar of magical essence as they walked past, bowing their heads as they did so. Once it was out of sight they returned to a forward-facing view and remained silent. This respectful silence lasted until they reached the exit. It was a door shaped in such a way as to appear like stone tree. "Perhaps we should ask Spike?" Rarity said as they left the building. "Let's ask him exactly what's going on and why he returned. He's our friend, and it's our job to find out why he's become like this." "Yes, yes that's it!" Twilight suddenly shouted as she turned to face the pure white fashionista. "The inquisition! Rarity you're a genius an absolute genius. Why didn't I think of it sooner? What better way to deal with a rogue than the inquisition?" Clapping her hooves together with a giddy smile, Twilight set off toward St Clover's Cathedral. Rarity went from a small smile to an abhorrent griamce as she caught up with her friend. "No no no no!" she shrieked. "We need to go there with no ill intention! Twilight dear he's your younger brother, you raised him yourself; surely you're not willin—" "No, that's exactly why I'm willing," the purple monarch said with ice. "He was born and raised a Harmonist, and now he's gone off and filled himself with sin. It's my jo— no, our job... to set him straight." Turning to look at her friend, Twilight nodded in the direction of the Cathedral. "We'll have him by mid afternoon, right?" Biting her lip with a slight sweat Rarity looked away for a moment before looking back. "O-of course, Twilight," she said with a twitching smile. Tied down by invisible chains and gagged with fever, the young dragon found himself in the same place once again. Shadowy figures loomed as a council above him; menacingly whispering just low enough to avoid understanding. Metaphysical traces of death lingered throughout the room and Spike could feel the evil which permeated the room. Imbued with a sense of dread and beginning to panic he tried to move his arms. Unlike before he could drag them upwards, and in a flurry of madness sparked by false hope, he attempted to shake them off. Screaming as soon as he discovered his voice, the pressure that had existed in the room pushed down on him as he resisted. Ice flooded his mind. Ö̴́̅ͫ̇͌͑ͣͫͦ̽ͮͬ̕͏̧̤͚̘̗͉̥͔͍̹̺̳̼̦́ͅP̈̾ͬ̒̏͆̒̈̒̚͏͏̺̣͈͍͚̞̫̱Ḙ̶̢̞̝̼͔̮͎͖͉͔͎͎ͬ̐ͬͫ̔̊̽̓̏ͩͧ̿͢ͅN̷̛̺͍̣̲̳̫͔͕͉͓ͯ̑ͪ̒̌͐ͩ̆́́ ̸̴̣̠̫̝͎̪̬͔̉̔̍̊̍́̚T̶̛̖̭̲̗̝̳̗̲̹̙͉̖̠̺̩̯ͪ͗͆͐̔ͦͧͣ̍͟͠ͅH̞͇͇͚͍̦̳̟̊̂̍̀͜ͅE̸̡̱̫͕̜̱̭̪̓̎̅͌͌̈ͪ͋ͩ̎͒̊͑̇̒ͨ͡ ̨͙̻̠͓̳̦̳̣͙̬͔͚̰́ͣ̚͠W̵̜͚̙̝̼̤̗̮ͮͪ͌̀̉̚ͅO̊̂̇ͥ̔͆̎̽͒͑̽͛ͯ̋̄̋̓͢͝҉̡͖̹̲̰͉̙̝̪͓̻͎̜̩͙̠̯̞͠ͅŲ̬͓͎̻̜̼̗̤̟̤̻̔͂ͯ͒ͬͥͮ͊̎ͯ̾̿N̵̟̝̗̞͉̦̱̝̺̫̺̮̞͚̟͈͐͐̅ͭ̄̍̌̄ͪ̀͘͝ͅͅḐ̶̷̶̒̊ͦͯ̈́ͦ͊͗̅ͩ̊̎͑͏̦̩̣̮̘̘͇͇̣͕̖̯̭̖̺ Black tendrils that fuzzed and blinked out of existence reached towards him. Black became blacker as they blocked his vision and reached inside his head. Too scared to speak, too humbled to scream, he struggled futility. C̷̘̱̼̰͇̼̥͙̲̫͎͍̥̲̎͑̉ͦ̋ͦͩ͆̒ͭ̒̎̓ͥ͌͒̑̍́͜͡Å̯͎͈̰͖̭̗̘͎̖̲̫͚̝̹̥̗̼̠̇̔̽́́̚̕͟͠S̱̞̖͔͈͍̘͔̪̹̲͉̐̓̆͆́̀ͅT̨̛̖͔͓͈̥̤͎ͪ̃̽ͮͧ͝R̴ͪͫ̿̋̈̏͆͊̂̿ͥ͋̔̌͆̚͏̢̨̦̪̞̱̻͈̗̰̟̞̖Ą̢̂͑ͬ̅̑̾ͭ̚҉̥̘͎̼͇̥̜̹͓̙ͅT̶̵̛̻̮̻̺̣͖̟͊͐͗̒͋ͣ̃̄̃̇ͦ͢͞ͅE̸͖̪̺̯ͪ̂́ͫ̀͟͜ ͨͦ̃̑̄̈̎̊̈́ͥ̽̽̃͂ͣ͏̷̜̙͖̘̹̹̱̺̯̭͔̯̗̟͡͠T̸̋̿͗̎͑ͧͥ̉ͨ͊̎̉̇ͯͫ҉̧͍̠̻̩͍͜H̶̰͚͎͔̘̮͕͉̻̺̀͊̽ͤ́̕Ē̅ͫ́͟҉͚̟̠̖̦̝̻̬̙͈̣͝ ̵̺͚̪̮͐͌ͤͣ̈́̾̽͋ͥͩ̂̃̚̕͢͡ͅF̶̶̛̦̻̙͙̥͚́̽͋͛̓L̛̛̫͕͎̰̥̱̼̲͎̗̠͚̟̘̱̮͎̞̒ͦͯͣ̉ͨ̈́̔̈́͑̀ͭ̇̓̅̆̔̚͜͢͞ͅĖ̷̛͎̥̞̲͚̣̣̙ͧͧ̽̃͊̎Ś̢̨͈͔̭͔͎̮̼̲̽̓̆ͫͭͯ̔̆̈̀͝Ȟ̴̨̭̝̩͎̦͓͉̰̩̝̪̹̤̹ͥͧ̓̀͢͝ ͇̣͉̺̻͖̪̖̗̫̑ͣ͛͂͆̎̅̑͐̏̇̇͟͟͠ That which had thrust itself into his head fumbled about within his skull; seemingly searching. Ice began to radiate from the bed slowly whilst the inconsistent whispering that had previously filled the air became lunatic screaming. Suddenly the pressure within his head became unbearable and he screamed in agony. i]͔̹̯̘̠̞̤̺̺̉ͯ̎̏ͧ͐͐͛̐̐́͢]Ḓ̸̷̸̱͈͈̘͈͇̫͉͚͈͖̋ͨ͌͆ͨ͑̅̀̏ͩ͗̌̀͋͢ͅȨ̴̹̱̠̞̓̒ͬ̔̌̏ͦ̎ͯ̍͑̂̄̾͟͢ͅV̸͓͎̘̟̗̖̺͈̦͓͙͍͕̈́̐̎͂͆ͮͤ̀͘͠O̶̴ͯ̀̔̂ͤ̉̒̒ͭ̊͟҉͉̞̩̥͙̭͙̼̥̟̻̭́ͅƯ̫̥̯̠̯̩̥̓̂͛̓̇̈̒ͧ̓̀̚̕͢͟R̯̟͇͙̥̬̺̪̤̪̾ͨ̆͋̓ͧͤ͑̈́͗ͦ̕̕͜ ̡̢̜̗̟͈̯̺̱̓̆̈ͭ̔̂̋͒̓ͨͮ̑̇ͧ͜͝T̶̮͇̱̮̹̹̣̲̝͙̮̣̤͕̗̬̭ͮ͋̈̏̓̓ͮ̆̄ͥ̔̉͐́̕͢͜ͅH̵̨̨̛͖̱͖͎̜͙̪̻͓̐͒͂̇ͫ͂̄̂̒̏̄̿̑͝E̵̢̠̩̦̫̩̦̘̭̻̋̐ͪ̈́̊̇̐̌͋ͭ̈̾͐ͪ̈́̓̌ͫ ̢̈̋͗̅ͯ̽̉ͥ͏̶̱͖̝̝̯̺̝͎̯͈͖̮̘̬Ş͔̘̗̖̝ͮͥͨ͛͗͊ͫ̒̀̉̿̄ͧ̈́̒́͒̓́͢͡Ǫ̶̢̪̬̟̗͈͉̘̬̖̠ͤͦͧ͛͠͡U̷ͧ̋͒ͬͨ̅̿ͩ̌̆̈ͯ͐̄ͫ̅̍͟҉̧͍̠̞̯̺͔ͅḶ̸̘̦̜ͤ̆ͪ̆ͦ͂͗̒͗̃͐̏̂̅̃͛̔͊͝ ̸̢̞̪̹̭̲͔ͬͯ́ͤͅ Triumphant deformed laughter filled the room as the flickering hands ripped themselves free from Spike all at once. Invasive pressure vanished as they did so with a snapping feeling and the shaking and scribble-like black figures slowly moved into focus. Even as his vision was filled with the black spots of an impending sleep, the faces still became clear. It was horrifying. Spike went to open the door only to realize that he'd broken the lock. "Hold on a moment," he said to whomever was knocking. Moving his left hand down to the warped metal he drew a circle with his claw aimlessly. Flicking the shavings off of his claw he drew his arm back and punched the lock. It connected and ripped a hole in the metal. Allowing the door to swing open Spike nearly laughed as the clearly shocked group of hooded ponies were stumbling about. "Are you guys here to sell something?" the purple dragon asked as he leaned in the door frame. "I'm just a humble magicsmith, I ain't got no money worth spending." Suddenly and without warning one of the ponies jumped at Spike and grabbed his midsection. Tackling the dragon to the floor with a great heave the cloaked individual quickly cast a spell and stood up. "Clear!" he shouted to his friends, who all breathed a little sigh of relief before walking into the building. Spike blinked once then twice and stood up slowly. Shaking eyes followed him as he stood and the unicorn who had cast the spell looked pale white. "I let you into my house, you know," he said in irritation. "You could at least have the kindness to tell me why you attack." "The heretic is still conscious!" the leading pony said in horror; apparently deciding to ignore Spike. Looking back at the barely clothed dragon as they walked backwards slowly the group began to chant in low voices. "Behind me the darkness, in front of me the light. As the wheel turns, I know that every end is a beginning. I see birth, death and regeneration." Blinding light enveloped the group of five presumed unicorns as they continued chanting. Spike merely stood in place dumbfounded and tired as the light assaulted his eyes. Becoming more and more irritated by the brilliant light in his hallway, the purple warlock clicked his fingers and sighed in relief as the light vanished. "Wha— aa..." the lead figure began as he trembled. "What kind of monster are you?!" "Oh, now you talk to me," Spike said sarcastically as he finished stifling a yawn. "I told you when I opened the door, man, I'm just a magicsmith. Are we done here? I kind of want to get dressed..." Scratching his hair aimlessly he looked past the group and spotted a certain white unicorn. "You!" he shouted suddenly. Before Rarity could say anything in response, Twilight jumped into view with a snarl. "Spike! Prepare to face the inquisi— wait, what's going on?" Starting in fury and ending in fumble the lavender unicorn looked over her subjects with confusion. "Why are you all cowering like that?" Sighing suddenly and dragging a hand down his face with little pleasure, Spike mumbled incoherently. "So that's what this was about, huh? Let me start over, then." Walking into the middle of the hallway in full view of all the ponies, he dropped to his knees and spoke in a patronising voice. "Oh please, please have mercy! I am not a heretic by choice, nay, nay I was forced!" Throwing his head up and slumping on the floor he let out a mocking wail. "Please Twilight show me grace!" He then promptly stood and brushed himself off. "There you go," he said while picking at his teeth. "Are we done here?" "How very dare you dismiss me! You foul breathed purple fleshed lizard!" Twilight huffed angrily as she stepped over the trembling forms of her 'inquisition'. "Get out of here, you useless fools!" she screeched as she flicked her tail in anger. "You have failed both myself and Celestia." The five cloaked figures dashed off in a hurry as Spike chuckled to himself. "That was a little harsh, Twilight," he said to himself more than anyone else. "Welcome to my humble abode, I suppose. Do you want tea or coffee?" Twilight didn't say anything as she stared Spike down. "I want you to give yourself up, heretic," she hissed. Rarity slowly made her way inside while the two former friends looked at one-another with opposite expressions. "Your being in these lands is going to cause all kinds of trouble. Turn yourself over, and after we're done, you can walk off unharmed." "So... I take that as a no for both options?" Shrugging and walking back into his home he merely said, "suit yourself." "Don't play with me Spike! I'm older and wiser than you!" Screaming at him in the Canterlot Voice, Twilight pushed onwards into his flat. Rarity carefully followed her without a word; she didn't want to get involved right now. Spike had stopped walking. Twilight was about to shout something else but he turned, and in that brief instant, her words died in her throat. A thousand mile stare skewered her in its grasp and ripped her apart before him. She was no longer looking at the eyes of Spike; they were different entirely. "Older...? Yes, you're much older than me Twilight." "Wiser? Don't be so presumptuous as to amuse the thought that your false ideals and childish morals can even hold a candle to the things I have seen with these eyes." Walking over to the unicorn who was trapped on the spot, frozen in horror, he ran a finger up her neck. "I have seen so many things." Twilight stumbled backward and cried out. Determined not to make a fool of herself, seeing as this journey was her idea, she calmed herself. "Your heretical beliefs are nothing compared to my power! I am the Princess of Equestria, and you will respect my authority." "Oh, but of course, Princess." Spike laughed suddenly as the word 'respect' flashed in his mind. Opening his mouth to speak once more, the feeling of warm skin against his back and a shriek from Rarity made him pause. Amaranth had her arms wrapped around Spike from behind with her head resting on his shoulder. From what he could guess she was still naked and judging from this position she was on her tiptoes. "Master..." she purred in a sultry tone. "Who are the new guests~? I was... recovering, from our night together when a loud scream awoke me." I'll kill you, Spike said to her in the back of his mind. Rarity and Twilight were both standing with their mouths agape as they stared at the scene before them. "B-b-b-b-bu," Rarity began as she tried to work out what was going on. "Ah, Rarity! Good timing, this is my Spi—" "I'm Spike's girlfriend," the gentle pink woman said as she looked over at the pure white unicorn. "It's so lovely to meet you, darling. Spike has told me the most abhorrent things about his time with you," Amaranth chuckled to herself and whipped her barbed tail around. I'm seriously going to kill you, Spike said more harshly in his mind. Only the light gasp from his companion made him aware that she'd heard him. "Ahaha, yes yes, she's such a joker this one. She's actually my contracted Spirit, you see, but I still haven't tamed her just yet." The word slipped out before he realized it, and he bit his lip with a 'tch' as his mischievous friend made a 'kyun' sound. "This changes nothing!" Twilight suddenly shouted as she pointed at Spike accusingly. "You're a heretic, I'm a Saint! We're going to crack down on you for this transgression onto holy land, drain you of your secrets, and throw you out wishing you were dead!" -=-=-=-=-=- Pillars of breathtaking platinum and glass swooped upward in unison and met beneath a gentle slope of golden grace. From this golden peak sprouted a series of smaller towers and arches, all of which ended before they hit the clouds. One impressively large tower, supported by numerous pillars and feeding aqueducts of all sizes, managed to just brush against the clouds. However Spike was not in this lovely cathedral of peace, love and harmony. Rather he was sitting in a dungeon cell somewhere beneath the large and beautiful holy building. There was no sound down here besides the dripping of slimy water, the frantic shouting of condemned heretics and the heavy breathing of Twilight Sparkle. One side of the cell he found himself in was a series of steel runes that lined all four sides of a perfectly rectangular opening. Shimmering air was all that sat between the runes yet it formed a near-unbreakable barrier; to ponies at least. The other three walls were rocky and offered little comfort besides damp. One bunk was squashed into the corner, but it was too small for Spike, so he was using it as a seat. Because of the problem with size and the fact that the cell itself was so small, he was squashed up besides Amaranth. Seemingly enjoying herself and now fully clothed, Spike didn't mind so much but the stares from Twilight, Rarity, and the guards were annoying. "How long was I supposed to sit here, again?" he asked in boredom. "You had the good will to turn yourself in... don't ruin it by pestering us while we work." Twilight stared at him from the hallway emotionlessly. She hadn't moved from that spot for a rather long amount of time and seemed dead set on unnerving him. So far she'd only managed to piss him off. Stretching out an arm and feeling it brush against the cramped ceiling he kept complaining. "No seriously how long is this going to take? I only have a very short time slot to spend in Equestria before I leave again." There wasn't any real weapons to be seen around him, so if push came to shove, he'd have to rely on his companion. He couldn't use magic here for fear of the result. "Stop playing it by the book and tell us what we want to hear, heretic," said one of the burly guards outside the cell. Spike was fairly sure he'd heard his voice before but unless he saw him he wouldn't be able to tell. Seconds became minutes as Spike made no move to speak, merely sitting in the cell. Rarity came closer to the entrance and tried her best to smile but failed miserably. "Spike, why don't you tell us what's happened these past few years? Maybe there's something we need to clear up?" "I thought I told you to leave me alone," he said coldly. Dragging a claw along the rocky wall as he stared off into space, the young dragon sighed. "Twilight's completely right Rarity. I'm not denying the fact that I'm a heretic in the eyes of Harmonism." He stopped his claw and looked her in the eye. "I'm denying the religion in and of itself." "What?!" Twilight screamed as she nearly gagged. "You're denying the practices of the Solar Throne? What kind of monster have you become, Spike?" Laughing to herself Amaranth looked over at the purple unicorn with a smile. "You're assuming being a monster is a bad thing, Twilight. I'm a bad person, horrible, inexcusable... but because of that there's so much more to me. I have looked upon all things presented to me, sought out that which was hidden, but never striven to understand everything." "What are you insinuating?" Rarity asked with more curiosity than concern. "Harmonism is a religion that denies everything in the world," Spike said simply. "I'm merely telling you that I'm unwilling to blindly follow a faith built upon a throne of lies." Running his hand through Amaranth's gentle orange hair the scaled warlock looked at Rarity with disinterest. "There's nothing beautiful about your religion." Twilight slammed her hoof into the barrier and didn't flinch as it flickered and sparked in protest. "How dare you! You would speak of Celestia's teachings so disrespectfully? Why shouldn't I kill you as you stand?!" Throwing a ball of energy at the invisible shield with more remorse than anger she held back a sob. "Don't think I won't!" "Twily there's no reason t—" "There's every reason to kill me, Captain Armour," Spike said with a small smile. He finally recognized the voice of the guard who'd brought him here. "I stand against everything she's ever believed, I mock the Goddess who turned her into a mare and I sit here telling her that her entire world is a lie." Shining Armour walked into fully view and wrapped an arm around his now crying sister. Burying her in his chest with a light grimace he looked over at Spike. He wasn't angry. It was that look that an older brother might give when he wants to know the full story. Spike could respect that. "I'm not particularly devout myself, heretic," he said slowly. "So I'm willing to hear you out before we make any rash choices." "You ever meet a griffon, Captain Armour?" Spike asked genuinely. Thinking on it for a moment before shaking his head the Captain replied, "No, I haven't." "Why do you think that is?" Spike let the question hang in the air for a few moments before he smiled. "It's because ponies are the most disrespected race on our planet. Your society is so utterly pathetic that a lot of nations can't be asked with you. Your three races are inferior in all fields, a mere jack-of-all-trades among the world stage of masters." "You ever hear a story of a pegasus racing a griffon? No, because they already know who would win." Twilight was visibly trembling but her elder brother was wearing a more serious look. "Ever see an earthpony challenge a minotaur? No, because they'd be crushed by such strength." Standing suddenly and earning a surprised 'meep' as his friend fell over in his absence, the snarling dragon walked up to the barrier and smirked. "You ever see a unicorn outdo a dragon?" Twilight was about to reply but her voice died pitifully as Spike shattered the barrier with his claw. Millions of tiny magical energies exploded outwards as he stepped out and stared down at her. "No, because a dragon can kill with a thought." Rarity looked up at Spike and mumbled something. He looked down at her with a raised brow but she remained silent. "Don't feel too bad, Twilight," Spike said with a genuine smile. "You're nothing compared to me. Pitting yourself against me is like trying to argue that stone is superior to the sun; it's absurd." "Why are you in Equestria?" Rarity whispered under her breath. She knew she shouldn't be asking too many more questions yet something drove her on. "If we're so inferior to you then why are you here?!" Spike looked over at Rarity and smirked. Amaranth wrapped herself around his left arm and looked over at the pale unicorn also. "You sure you want to know the answer to that?" His jade pebbles stared deeply into her eyes as he stood there. Shining Armour was about to say something but his sister cut him off. "Tell us," she choked. "Tell us right now." "I'm here to kill you, Twilight." Rarity fainted a few moments after he finished whereas Twilight was still in a state of shock. Shining Armour was preparing to murder Spike and Amaranth was blushing slightly as she looked up at Spike. "Don't worry though Twilight, I'm not planning on killing you yet. I have a few things to sort out first." "What things? What do you mean you're going to kill my sister?!" Shining Armour shouted as he shoved the dragon back harshly. "What kind animal thinks killing someone is a small matter?" Spike laughed and bit his thumb and drew blood, using it to draw a quick rune on Amaranth's palm. "No no, I'm taking my job very seriously Captain Armour." He smiled and looked down at Twilight. "After all I'm the one who killed Celestia." ReverenceResting in a crest between the mountain and its neighbouring hillside some creaking wood and battered shades law strewn about. Ghastly ripples arched up from the warped smooth stone surface and formed an unnatural circle. Shingle covered the depressions in the mountain while dead saplings spread their fingers. Scattered about as if thrown about a number of old pages lay in the shade of a giant tree. It reached up so high as to touch the heavens with the decayed leafs. As the unnatural breeze blew through the screaming branches small drops of black tar gently trickled from the leafs. A cover of bark the colour of dusty tomes; cut through by a knife of gods. Fog rolled in from a place unknown to mortals and gently danced about the mountaintop ice. Slowly the rolling blanket of mist travelled down the side, reaching a forlorn forest of dense undergrowth and intrigue. Amidst the clearing of peculiar stone sat the lone figure of Spike. His hood was up across his head and his lips curled into a smile. Carved silver formed a zippo in his hand; which he flicked open and closed. "Have you lost purpose, Moros?" Spike didn't look up at the giant snake which occupied the clearing. "Moros? I keep telling you not to call me that." Closing the small device and pocketing it he patted the alter beneath him. "Want me to set you free?" Resounding laughter bounced about the stone. "Oh you tease, Moros. It is impossible to undo the seal here, you know that better than anyone else." "You're chatty for a deity, you know that?" Spike looked up at the snake flatly. "Maybe the reason they sealed you here was to shut you up." Once more the laughter filled the area. It had the grating sound of rocks and pebbles. "No, no. It was not a god who sealed me; it was something much worse." Leaning down over the dragon a pair of scarlet orbs stared down sorrowfully. "At the very least my last patron had dignity. You stop at nothing, Moros." Looking up from his feet Spike scanned the rugged terrain. His eyes drifted over the numerous dead snakes stabbed into the rocky plinths, outcroppings, and chasms. They were fresh and bleeding; frozen in time. "Gods ask that you make sacrifices, no?" Looking back up at the huge snake the dragon remained devoid of expression. "What better way to awaken an old god than to sacrifice his servants?" "So many sacrifices. Are you sure you weren't making a statement to others?" Looming over the mortal body the deity tasted the air. "I awoke the first time yet you made me watch." "I hate snakes," Spike spat as he looked back down. "Nasty little things that'd rather bite you than let you by." Coiling itself back around the large tree slowly the snow white snake rested its head upon the dead branches. "They weren't ordinary snakes, Moros, they were parts of my soul." "Hebi... the snake god who binds and constricts the fate of mortals." Rising from the archaic alter the purple dragon licked his lips in the frosty air. "I'd have preferred never to meet you but times change." "So do you. Why I remember the first time you set foot in this place...." Laughing in a mocking tone the giant snake looked up at the mist. "You used to be a very nice boy, didn't you? Now you have an inch of your life left and the personality of wallpaper." Spike grit his teeth and cursed. "I'll turn your skin into wallpaper if you're not careful." "Oh, how scary. Is that what you said to Discord when you killed him, too?" Flicking its tail and chuckling the immense god probed Spike. "At least that's what everyone thinks you did, isn't it?" Spike stood from the altar and looked down at it with mixed emotion. "He wasn't a bad guy, you know? Barely spoke to him before the wind carried him off... but he was alright." "Mm, that he was." There wasn't much more to say on the subject as the mist continued to roll in. "What do you plan on doing, then? There's only one left now and it's already within reach." The god of fate wrapped itself around Spike and spoke venom. "Are you going to take your time?" If the cold leathery skin agitated him Spike made no indication of it. "We have forever to spend together. The mortal realm is just what holds it all in place." "I suppose you didn't sell three quarters of your soul just to be held back, then." Letting Spike go without a word the deity merely looked down at him through dead eyes. "Use it wisely." "As if I wouldn't, Hebi." Touching the altar for one last time the jaded dragon made his way toward the steps. His figure slowly being engulfed by the mist as mid-morn rain slowly started to fall. Slipping down the branches as the bound god was forced back into the alter, his skin stripping and flaking as the blood rose up and sunk into the stone. Two eyes stared out across the forlorn clearing before they too were sucked in. His last words to Spike were, "Don't repeat your mistake, Moros." "She still hasn't calmed down?" Shining Armour nodded and levitated a stack of papers to his subordinate, Flash Sentry. "That is correct, Lieutenant Sentry." Sorting out a few other papers as the young unicorn began reading his own, the Captain continued. "We're going to consider this threat a legitimate security concern from today onward." "Surely we already considered him a security concern, Sir." Without looking up from the paper he was reading the young guard sighed. "Yes, you'd think we would have, Lieutenant." Gritting his teeth as he finished gathering the stray papers, Captain Armour placed them down on his side of the table. "I suppose we just never saw him as a threat. Everyone thought he was dead." Moving his paper slightly and looking his superior in the eye, Flash Sentry grimaced. "Dragons never die, Captain." "Careful, Flash, that's heresy at its finest." Shining Armour levitated a small mug filled with lukewarm coffee to his lips, taking a brief sip. "Not like lugheads such as us would understand what that meant." Chuckling slightly and scanning his eyes down the report, Flash Sentry couldn't help but agree. "Yeah... I don't even understand what half of this stuff means." Spotting a particularly complicated phrase he sighed dejectedly. "What's a contracted spirit?" Captain Armour tried to find the phrase on his paper, scanning for a few moments before raising his eyebrows. He muttered a curse and looked off to the side. "One minute spirits don't exist, the next minute there's a dragon walking around with one." Looking back down at the report he paled. "We might be in over our heads." "Maybe we should ask your sist— Princess Sparkle, for some help?" Moving on to the next report in the pile Lieutenant Sentry started reading again. "She's supposed to be a magical genius, right? I bet she'll be willing to help out once she's calmed down." The mid-afternoon breeze made the young subordinate shiver, and it was only after the silence dragged on for a few minutes, that he looked up to see his Captain's torn expression. Flash didn't say anything as he started reading the next paper in the pile; it was about rural disappearances. Shining Armour took another sip from his coffee mug and sighed. "Twilight is the smartest idiot around, Lieutenant. I doubt she'll be of any help." About to say something but perhaps realizing it was a bad idea, Lieutenant Sentry merely nodded and kept reading through his report. "Still, this guy... Spike, was it? He seems like a pretty bad deal. We know hardly anything about him currently, but from what your sister managed to disclose, seems like we're up against something serious." "You know, it's been bugging me for a while, but hear me out." The dim orange subordinate blinked in surprise and perked up as his Captain voiced concern. "Of course, Sir." Taking a deep breath Captain Armour continued. "King Sombra didn't show up in the end, did he? We saw all that evidence that he was going to come back and then... nothing. That was about the same time my wife died, too." "Are you saying you think the two events are connected, Captain?" Flash didn't doubt his superior but the idea was a little out there. Shining shook his head. "No, but I do think the fact that Sombra didn't turn up is concerning." Pulling up another report and handing a copy to his subordinate Shining grimaced. "This is something I dug out of the archives. We have barely anything on Spike during the time he was serving Twilight, but this is what we do have." Flash started reading the hefty document he'd been handed. After about three or so minutes he furrowed his brow. "He disappeared ages ago, comes back threatening to kill the Princess, and even when he lived here we know nothing about him?" Sighing and dropping the paper the young soldier looked fed up. "This is all just info about how he was a nobody." "Yet somehow he became a somebody, right?" The Captain stood from his seat and walked over to the nearby window, looking out over the city calmly. "We're being kept in the dark, Flash." Turning to look his subordinate in the eye, Shining ground his teeth in frustration. "Someone doesn't want us to know the full story." "Would that someone be anyone in particular, Sir?" asked the orange upstart. Walking back over to the table and looking down at the document they'd been reading, Shining Armour changed topic. "We're going to head down to the archives, Lieutenant. Someone is hiding things from me and I want to know why." Levitating the papers back into a neat pile he cast a glare towards Flash. "I'm going to use all my authority to find out just what in the hell is going on." "Sir!" -=-=-=-=-=- Rarity was going to see Twilight. She'd put it off for a few days while she tried to get her bearings but now was the time. From what she'd heard Twilight wasn't leaving her room, and no matter the circumstances, that was always a bad sign. Rarity had hoped to speak to Fluttershy about everything, to vent, but the meek yellow mare was nowhere to be found. She'd vanished. Rarity had a very bad feeling about that. Maybe it was because the Guard had reported sightings of a purple wanderer near the Everfree. Maybe it was because Fluttershy was more knowledgeable about the world than her... or maybe it was because the aforementioned soldiers had never reported back. All this and more was racing through Rarity's head as she approached the door leading toward the living quarters. Deep within the Canterlot Cathedral of Harmony, down past numerous doors, guards, and pilgrims; one might find the overly extravagant door leading toward the living areas. Priests, monks, and the odd Saint or two took residence here. Not being a particularly religious mare, Rarity felt no amount of humbling as she stopped before the pearl door. "Excuse me," she said in her politest tone. "Could I enter the quarters, please?" Smiling in a simple yet courteous manner, while the soldiers looked her over, the well dressed fashionista did not fidget. "I'm a close friend of the Princess, you see." One of the soldiers widened his eyes and gave a small nod. "Ah, yes, Saint Rarity. You'll have to forgive our slowness. We've been bombarded by pilgrims these past few months and... well ponies tend to blend together after a while." "No problem at all, darling." Smiling as widely as need be she walked through the now open door. "I'm glad you take your job so seriously. The world needs more ponies like you." A monotone grunt was the only response she got as the door swung shut behind her. Rarity huffed quietly but carried on forward. The inner most part of the cathedral was laid out before her, and it was honestly breathtaking. She'd been here numerous times before but it still looked outstanding to her. Inlaid gold surrounded exquisite oil paintings depicting scenes from holy scripture. Red velvet drapes were hung throughout the long hall and across the walls beside the doors. Ornamented stands showed off relics of lesser calibre and held necessary religious items, such as basins. Thirteen doors lead from the lavish hall and into private quarters for the current cathedral residents. Skivvies had their quarters elsewhere, however. As Rarity washed her face using one of the studded basins a bell rang throughout the cathedral. From somewhere almost ethereal she could hear the sound of bells, chanting, and prayer beads. Gently spreading the purified water across her features the pale white non-believer tried to block out the noise. This was why she rarely visited the cathedral. Something about the chilling atmosphere given off by the near absolute silence. A feeling of wrongness that permeated the entire building, the entire area, and sent shivers down her spine. Standing before the heavy golden door which lead to the Princess' quarters, Rarity quickly made sure her mane was done up correctly. Then, she knocked thrice and called out. "Twilight, darling," she said sweetly. "I've come to visit. May I come in?" The door opened by itself. Spike could feel it now. Digging, digging, unwinding his soul. Tiny claws beneath his rippling skin climbing higher, higher, higher into his skull. Veins bubbled and burst beneath his scales, frothing from their open maws and allowing more of the poison to crawl in. Shambling down the infinite stone hallway he futility tried to escape. Tiny bubbles were escaping from inside him but he couldn't put them back in. Thick roots like chains wrapped up and around him slowly, giving him enough time to scream in agony as they slipped through his wounds and into the veins. Wriggling up and through his body the coarse wood morbidly began to take root within him. From his stomach blossomed the seed of pain and envy. Black slimy tendrils grew up his throat from within his body, grasping hold of his lungs to suffocate him, protruding out his mouth as his body covered with buds. Something grew from the black protrusion, a ghastly white eel, covered in bristles and spines. Deformed teeth ran the length of the head whilst a pair of malformed and bulbous eyes looked Spike over. With a terrifying and primal screech the creature drove itself into his eye socket. Devouring his eye and lodging itself into his skull, Spike couldn't even scream in agony; his vocal chords now overgrown. Wriggling about and screeching in delight as it began to devour him whole, Spike felt as if a thousand suns had been forced into his head. Millions upon millions of voices seemed to rise and swell like a coming tide, his scales were becoming dry and brittle as his life was sucked free. Blooming inside his mouth a pair of new vocal chords gave life to a horrendous screaming, wailing, and moaning. Anguished cries fell on deaf ears as he felt himself consumed. His bones and their marrow became the channels through which the poison could run, the frothing wounds now spreading out deformed muscle. Skin and scale collapsed in on itself, bent, twisted, and reformed to show an array of white flowers. They spread out across an invisible wind, and the newly made Spike was laid to rest amongst a clearing of still rolling hills. He tried and failed to stand. Vomiting up the black, the tar, the eel and the root. His eye grew back into place and his scales regained their texture. He was merely left alone, kneeling in a forest of the gods. He'd been tortured, murdered, slaughtered, interrogated, scrutinized, and finally reborn. Flash Sentry looked up from the pile of books he'd been scanning through. "Sir," he said briefly as he waved over his superior. "I might have found something relevant." Pointing at one book in particular he continued. "Come take a look, will you?" "Excellent timing, Lieutenant Sentry," Shining Armour said in a low tone as he trotted over to his subordinate. "I've also found a few things that may be of interest, although I wanted your opinion on them." Letting his magical aura go a small number of parchments, a book, and a small rune landed with a collection of 'clunk' noises. "What have you got for me, then?" "Well..." Flash looked at their surroundings for a moment before sighing. "Before I tell you what I've found, why don't you tell me where we are? I haven't gotten a word out of you since we entered this library." He gazed up at the intimidating black pillar between the four central bookshelves and shivered. Captain Armour grimaced and bit his lip. "This is a place only known by one name, 'Pantheon.' It is the place which houses the knowledge deemed heretical and unfit for consumption." Looking back at the ominous black pillar Shining Armour carried on. "It was not made by us, nor anything we know of; it merely is." "What does that mean?" "I don't know," Shining said with a tremble in his voice. "This place defies a lot of our own beliefs. Luckily for me and you, we're a little too thick to understand any of this." Both stallions shared a hasty laugh before looking back at their work. "What a place to build a city on, though..." Flash Sentry raised his eyebrows. "A city? How large is the Pantheon?" "We don't know that, either. Once the religion really got into full swing it became illegal to even talk about this place." He grinned ear from ear as his subordinate drained of colour. "We're the law, though, so I'm sure if we looked long enough we'd find something." Pointing to the book Flash had pointed out his smile dropped. "What did you find, then?" Clearing his throat the pale soldier focused. "Yes, r-right. I found a book that mentions dragon magic, although you're not going to like it, sir." Captain Armour raised an eyebrow but remained silent. "It appears what you were told is correct. The difference in power between a dragon and a unicorn is... well, to put it bluntly, it's like comparing an ant to a sky whale." There was a pause but the cloaked Captain motioned for him to keep going. "If we consider him on the lower end of dragon ability, then you could possibly rout him by attacking him with... well, every able unicorn." "...and that's assuming he's even a normal dragon," Shining said with disdain. "Sir?" Opening a very brittle and cracked pile of scraps, Captain Armour sighed. "This is am extremely old text, dating back so far as to be of an entirely different time measurement system. It was written whenever the year two hundred and seventy seven E.S. may have been." Letting the information sink in for a moment Shining went through the pages in a gentle manner. "It speaks a lot of mad gibberish, and has quite a few diagrams I don't understand. But a few things made sense. From what I can gather it's a book about gods." "My mother would kill me if she knew I was accepting the idea of gods besides our own," Lieutenant Sentry muttered swiftly. "Why do you think that's important, then?" "I also found a few books on spirits, you see." Opening the aforementioned books he laid them out between Flash and himself. "But of these five books I found, only three of them mentioned anything vaguely similar to what I saw." He then pointed at one book in particular. "Even then, only one of the books, a journal no less, gave me information on what she was." Flash blinked a few times as he chewed his words. "You mean the demon you saw, right? The tanned bipedal thing?" "According to this journal, she's not a demon. She was a seraph." Sentry's jaw nearly hit the floor. "Come again?" Shining pointed back at the pile of scraps apparently a book on gods. "In this text there's a supposed list of gods that the author knew of, or believed in. One of them was called Olympus, and It was said to govern time," Shining chuckled and digressed slightly. "I say 'It' because there's no gender. I only spotted one or two legible entries in this book with a gender." Flash grinned slightly but kept his tone level. "So, why is this 'seraph' of ours so special? Is she some kind of almighty angel of conquest?" Shining's face dropped suddenly and he sighed. "That's just the thing. She's supposed to be a by-product of Olympus. See, look, just here." He pointed to a faded set of glyphs in the torn book. "She's listed as related to this god. Maybe we should call her their daughter? Anyway, she's directly associated with the god of time." "That's not so bad, right?" Lieutenant Sentry chuckled and patted Shining on the back. "She's probably just the seraph of seconds or something. If she's being dragged around by a dragon, no matter how powerful they might be, she can't be anything major." Lighting his horn up and floating a smaller, more well kept book over to Flash, Shining Armour spoke in a morbid tone. "This journal was written by Starswirl the Bearded, about two thousand years ago." Flicking through the pages until he found the one he was after, Shining looked his subordinate in the eye. "During his trip to the Whitetail Woods, he met a woman called Amaranth. He's talked a lot of fluff about the encounter, but most worryingly, he comments on her name especially." "Why?" Flash asked with a tilt of his head. "What's so important about her name?" "Amaranth is a legendary flower that blooms on Olympus. It lives forever, never wilting, never effected by the seasons." He then turned to the book and read aloud, sending a chill down Sentry's spine. "'What a lovely flower is the Rose, a favourite alike with Gods and with men. I envy you your beauty and your perfume.' The Rose replied, 'I indeed, dear Amaranth, flourish but for a brief season! If no cruel hand pluck me from my stem, yet I must perish by an early doom. But thou art immortal and dost never fade, but bloomest for ever in renewed youth.'" -=-=-=-=-=- Rarity was seated on a pile of velvet cushions and before an intricately decorated pearl coffee table. She was sat opposite Twilight who now had her mane and coat in tidy fashion, much to Rarity's delight. It'd taken a very long process of begging, shouting, insisting, and explaining to make Twilight stop working; and an even longer process to make her clean herself up. Still, now the two friends were sitting around a table, drinking coffee in a calm manner. Nothing could possibly go wro— "So, Spike wants to kill me," Twilight said as she put her mug down. Dammit. "Y-yes, so I heard darling. I was there after all." Rarity nervously chuckled as she finished speaking, putting her mug down in kind and smiling as best she could. "But we really shouldn't worry about such a silly thing. I think we should focus more on trying to figure out how to treat him properly." She almost screamed as Twilight's look became a glare but managed to keep her cool. "He's being violent for a reason... so let's figure out why." "Oh, I agree," Twilight said with an edge in her voice. "That's a great idea Rarity. Why don't we ignore a death threat from a heretic and instead focus on how to make him happy." She scornfully laughed and looked the pearl unicorn dead in the eyes. "You could win awards for such brilliant ideas." Rarity bit her lip but kept her resentment in. "Twilight, we're all Saints of Harmony. We just need to figure out how to reform Spike and the—" "Reform?" Twilight said harshly. "Oh, yes, let's reform a heretic to our religion. Wonderful, truly outstanding. We'll make a murderous savage into a peace loving Harmonist." Taking a long sip from her coffee and taking a deep breath, Twilight sneered. "It's not going to work, Rarity." Rolling her eyes at Twilight, Rarity next tried to console her. "It's not your fault, Twilight, dear. With the Elements of Harmony we can defeat anyone, even Spike." "I'm well aware of that," Twilight said slowly. "But we can't use them for this." "Pardon?" Rarity asked with some disbelief. "Darling, even with your magic, we can't defeat Spike witho—" Twilight huffed and cut Rarity off with a sharp dismissive gesture. "My magic isn't capable, you're right, but more importantly we can't reform him. We could try turning him to stone but with that spirit around I doubt it'd work." Her face fell slightly and she slumped on the table. "At this rate I might have to use the Alicorn Amulet." "No, Twilight I'm not going to let you do that." Rarity took Twilight's hoof into her own and tried her best to smile convincingly. "Friends don't let friends hurt themselves. We'll do what we always do. We'll use the magic of friendship to right the wrongs, okay?" Twilight smiled meekly and looked up at her friend. "You're right Rarity. I just... I just wish this was all a bad dream, really." Sitting upright and drinking the last of her coffee the middle aged Princess levitated a small check-list over to herself. "I'll issue nation wide search for Spike. If we're going to solve this problem, no matter how, we need to know where he is." -=-=-=-=-=- "C'mon," Amaranth said sweetly as she grabbed Spike. "You know you want to~!" "Haha, no," he said flatly. "That would kill me. Seriously. Goodbye. Spike's dead." Pushing her off and standing up from the bed he looked out over the river, and smiled. "Still, at least we're somewhere nice, right?" Amaranth looked out from the balcony and watched the horizon intently. Her tan skin shone in the afternoon sunlight as her deep green eyes looked off to a place immaterial. "You have a funny sense of location, you know?" she said with a smile. "You'd normally think a lake filled with dead souls was a horrendous place to visit." "'S a nice view, though," he said jokingly as he pointed at the lake. "Just look at it!" He spread his arms wide in an exaggerated fashion, before grabbing Amaranth by the shoulders and turning her toward the lake. "Look at that. Look. It's premium real estate as far as the eye can see, with a view almost as grand as a calamity." She brought a hand up to one of his own, turning around to press up against him, wrapping her fingers between his. "I'm more interested in what's on this side of the room," she said softly. Looking him in the eyes she tried her best smile. "Please?" "No, it's not happening." He let go of her hands and grinned slightly, walking to the old sofa and sitting down. "I'm not ready to die just yet, y'know?" Picking up a small blue gemstone he rolled it between his fingers and smiled contentedly. "I ever tell you how much I love this?" Rosy blush spread across Amaranth's face as she fiddled with her hair. "That old thing? I gave that to you ages ago..." "Yeah, I know." Bringing it up to his eye and looking through it, Spike kept smiling. "Dragons love gems, like... we really love gems. Like... really." Placing it down on the table and rolling it around with a finger, the young dragon looked up at her. "It's the clearest gem I've ever seen in my life." "Stop it..." she hid behind her hair as she spoke. "Don't say such embarrassing things~" Spike laughed a hearty laugh and slapped the table as he did so. "What was that? One moment you're begging for sex, the next one you're telling me not to be embarrassing?" Amaranth nodded meekly and he laughed even harder, nearly crying as he rocked back and forth with amusement. "What's next? Huh? Are you going to freeze up halfway through a shag when I mention holding hands?" "Don't say it like that!" she yelped ecstatically. "You know what I mean!" Walking up to him and forcibly slapping him, Amaranth kept her hair up to hide the furious flush covering her features. "You're such an asshole sometimes, I swear!" Spike rubbed his cheek while grinning from ear to ear. "An asshole you want to screw, mind you." He got slapped again, on the other side of his face, and yelped in surprise. "I don't even know why I spend time with you, Spike," she said with a sigh. "I'm pretty sure it's because I contracted you," he said with a shrug. "Otherwise I'm about as clueless as you when it comes to this sort of thing." Rolling the gem across the table whilst Amaranth took a seat next to him, he smiled. "Still, the gem was a nice gift." "I don't remember where I got it," she said quickly, looking over at Spike. "I think it belonged to whoever I knew before you. But I don't remember them, either." She smiled softly and rested her head against Spike's shoulder, placing a hand on his lap. "I don't want to forget you." Spike sighed and wrapped an arm around Amaranth. Looking down at her silently for a few moments, he gave a soft smile devoid of malice, and squeezed her gently. "That's why we're doing this whole thing, right? I know it. You'll never forget me." "But what if—" Clicking his claws together to interrupt her, he placed a finger against her lips. "It's going to happen, no matter what. I've been doing this for years, since we first met, and I won't stop now." Running his hand through her tangelo hair he smiled and pulled his finger back. "It's going to happen, because you want it to." Amaranth smiled sweetly and wrapped her arms around Spike, pushing him down onto the sofa and leaning over him with a funny look in her eye. "Please~?" Blushing lightly and scratching his neck the young dragon laughed slightly. "Well... just this once." A field of white flowers all spread across the hills. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. Sometimes he saw a beige flower, sometimes he saw a pearl flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. Sometimes he saw a new flower, sometimes he saw an old flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in a field of white flowers all spread across the hills. Flowers made from his intestines, flowers from his bones. Flowers made from his lungs, flowers from his kidney stones. Flowers made from his eyes, and flowers from his knees. Flowers of this garden, devoid of bumblebees. Spike was left to wander, and wander he did, within the garden made for quid. His bright scales grated in the wind, losing their colour and becoming white. Spike was white. The flowers were white. The sky was white. A field of white flowers spread across the white sky. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. He never saw a beige flower, he never saw a pearl flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. He never saw a new flower, he never saw an old flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in a field of white flowers all spread across the hills. One day he heard a pop, a sharp scream, the sound of the world colliding. His colour came home and his agony returned. For the first time in millennia he screamed. A flower turned red. His eyes became bees and his lungs turned to tar. Another flower turned red. His blood was acid and his muscle was decay. The flowers bloomed red. His scream became a gargle, his flesh coming undone. The flowers dripped red and called to their friends. The sky became red. His hands wriggled free and clawed at his sin, his eye sockets plugged with his marrow. A flower turned red. His organs turned to slop and his gargle became a gurgle. Another flower turned red. His scales all fell off, like autumn leaves, and his bloody skin screed in delight. The flowers bloomed red. His bones splintered and shattered, his spine going limp. The flowers dripped red and called to their friends. The whole world was red. Spike turned to mush. The flowers were all red. Spike sunk into the earth. The hills were red. Spike was no longer alive. Booming words called out across the red, "Save us your grace, save us from ourselves." The world was white, and Spike was still here. He paid his price long ago and now he was alone. His skin had become the earth, his muscle the sun. So long had he wandered, that his blood was the rain, and his eyes were the breeze. Chosen for a task long ago, yet only a few years back, he was walking forever and never. A field of white flowers all spread across the hills. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. Sometimes he saw a beige flower, sometimes he saw a pearl flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. Sometimes he saw a new flower, sometimes he saw an old flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in a field of white flowers all spread across the hills. Flash Sentry was reading through the old tome while Captain Armour slept. They'd been down in the Pantheon for over a day now, trying to figure out what they could do to keep Twilight safe. So far they'd only managed to uncover the truth behind Spike's companion, Amaranth. Even then they were clueless about what exactly they could do to halt his plans. "This is ridiculous," he mumbled to himself as he stared down at the maddening glyphs. Stories of gods who had created the world, stories of gods who tried to destroy it. Fables of heroes who rose and slew gods, and legends of men struck down by them. There was no shortage of things Shining had learned about the world by reading here. He felt as if he could spend a lifetime reading all the books kept here, and yet, never understand anything at all. Perhaps most disturbingly about this whole affair was the fact that the more he read, the more he discovered was untrue. In fact he was beginning to believe his entire life, his society, and his religion was a lie. The theories kept locked away in these books were... correct. The heretical spells often said as wrong, impractical, and dangerous; worked fine. In a quest to gain more answers, Flash had delved deeper into Pantheon in order to find more dangerous information. He needed to know exactly what he was up against to help create a plan to protect Twilight, and in turn, protect Canterlot. But he'd made a mistake. The best way to protect his Princess and her country would have been to stop looking, to never start, to have kept his mouth shut and did as he were told. Instead he delved deeper, and deeper, to the point where he no longer knew where he was. Lost amongst obsidian bookcases decorated with skulls he'd never seen before, and surrounded by a dense jungle of literature; he felt sick. Unable to teleport due to some strange phenomena he gave in and opened a book. It was titled Ex Deo Trucido, and through reading it, a horrible thought jumped to his mind. There was no Goddess of Harmony. It had been creeping up on him the entire time, since he first walked into the Pantheon to the moment he closed the book; but it was true. Their religion was a lie, the world wasn't a kind and friendly place. Here, in this book, he'd had described to him how to summon an audience with a god... just to ask for someone to die. Sitting there aimlessly, without any real way to get back, Flash Sentry decided to test the book before him. His society might not be a lie, so long as this spell didn't work. Drawing in a sharp breath he lit his wing on fire, groaning and eventually screaming in agony as he waited for his skin to strip. Once it had, he opened the burnt flesh, using it to draw a diagram on the floor around him. Checking, double checking, and triple checking his runes; Flash sat amongst them. He'd never used magic, being a pegasus and all, but apparently anyone could use a set of runes. Slowly but surely he read from the book in front of him, his smile grew wider as nothing seemed to happen throughout. He finished the incantation and waited. Nothing happened. He stood up an— Crush Where Flash Sentry had stood there was now a pile of bloody feathers, mutilated flesh, twisted bones, and organs. Blood was everywhere in-between the bookshelves and up the spines of the books themselves. The runes were now completely covered in new blood, the book crushed with Flash and now a pile of torn soggy papers. Within the Pantheon a hum sounded. The ancient pillar that stood in the very centre stood still, watching, and waiting. RuinationSpike could feel it now. It was coming closer, closer, to his heart. He stood at the edge of the forlorn chapel for one last time, looking up at the disgusting statue of himself. His scales felt cold in a world devoid of love or hope. Standing on the edge of a frozen forever, his eyes stared up at a deformed self, not caring for the shadows lingering about. Rippling obsidian portrayed a devilish and disgusting set of features, a pair of living eyes staring right back down at him. "Finally here, huh?" Turning to face the empty chapel the young dragon sighed, scratching the back of his neck and stepping forwards. Rotten wood creaked and moaned beneath him as he slowly walked down the aisle. Facing away from the gold and black effigy Spike stared off into the gloom. "I figured you'd turn up eventually," he said to the empty building. "Took your time, though." Looking down at one of the pews he traced a finger across the wood. Ghastly wind blew in from the torn hole in the chapel, causing Spike to look back and shiver. Frozen ice stretched out a far way before meeting a shoreline blanketed in snow. One of the chains hanging from the rafters slowly froze before his eyes. Picking up his lazy pace the purple upstart sighed. Rotten boards cracked underfoot and groaned with protest. Their soggy forms had turned icy, becoming brittle. Vines and flowers that had grown into the building were dead. Killed by the chill and left to rot or freeze, only the metal and brickwork remained strong. The frost had begun climbing into the chapel, too, digging its icy fingers into the walls and spreading across the floor. Nearly the entire roof was ice. Spike stumbled as he walked and cursed, listening to the snapping wood with dread. "You know, when most people come visit, they don't destroy the world." Hollow frames that had once held beautiful glass work were now encased in ice, the metal frames deathly cold and hidden behind semi-clear frost. Books lay scattered and burned in useless piles of scraps, merely littering the floor and giving the building a smell of musk. Tapestries had once hung proudly along the walls. Lichen had died and gone grey, falling off and peeling back to reveal a painted wall. Whatever had been painted there, however, would never be known; it was decrepit and crumbling. Stepping onto the first stair to the lower level, Spike looked back to the statue. He felt a pent up breath release itself as he stared into the cold black eyes, filled with life, filled with hatred. Slowly and carefully making his way down the curved staircase, the renegade dragon whistled a small tune. It was a very brief bout of sound. Spike had tried to mimic a song Amaranth had once sung to him, but failed horribly, and stopped once he reached the bottom of the chapel. "I kind of wish I'd met you on better terms, honestly," he said flatly. Spike knew that wasn't possible. "Still, at least we met once. It's been worth it, I suppose." The door to his right was locked firm by the forces that be, and he had no way of leaving through it to begin with. Walking down beneath the rotten boards, avoiding the hanging mold, Spike stood before an oval depression. It was surrounded by wooden banister, decaying but still elegant. Bringing his leg up and forcing it out sharply, he knocked out a part of the rail. It shattered easily as the rot was set free. Walking forward slowly he stopped at the edge and looked down, seeing nothing but deep water. It was the only part of the lake not yet frozen and it gave no reflection back to him. Zipping up his jacket the young dragon took out a packet of cigarettes. Clenching his fist slightly as he held the packaging, he dropped it in the water. It was devoured by shadows. Laughing bitterly and biting his thumb, Spike started drawing something on his palm. "I don't know how this even got passed, by the way. A lake full of souls? You guys are fucking crazy, seriously." His hand burst into ethereal flame and he hissed in pain, staggering slightly and letting out a small groan. Turning himself away from the pool and facing the door, he walked backwards until he was at the edge. "I'm sure you won't mind if these souls, and this lake, disappear, right?" Ice encroached on the water, engulfing it in the blink of an eye. Spike laughed sourly and looked off to the side, seemingly staring straight at someone. "I hate you," he said simply. "So that's why..." falling backwards into the frozen surface, he smiled as it blossomed a deep blue. Outside, the entire world snapped as the frost lifted itself instantly. "...I'll take away everything." "She did what‽" Captain Armour screamed in abhorrence. "Twilight did what‽" "You heard me correctly, s-sir," mumbled one of the guards in the barracks. He'd been trying to play off his superior to avoid a fuss, but it was too late. Everyone was looking at them now. "Princess Twilight took Saint Rarity with her and journeyed to the Whitetail Woods." Watching the other stallion's face practically go nuclear, the guard felt a cold sweat grip him. "She intends to stop the... the dragon, most likely." Shining Armour exhaled heavily and closed his eyes, slowly breathing back in. He opened his eyes and looked the soldier in the eyes. "You are going to give me a good reason for letting my sister walk to her death, or I will end you." "Her death?" called a younger scout from across the room, drawing more attention to the situation. "Princess Twilight is the most powerful being in existence, how is she walking to her death?" A murmur of agreement sprung up in the barracks, with new faces slowly slipping in as the confrontation dragged on. Glaring over at the pegasus who'd spoken up, the Captain of the Guard nearly spat. "You have no idea what she's going up against, none of us do!" Turning to face the scout fully, Shining Armour grit his teeth. "She won't just die, at this rate, she'll be wiped from existence!" The murmuring stopped and the room fell silent. Captain Armour's voice bounced off the walls as his words died in his throat. Some of the soldiers stared at him, others turned away in disgust. "Seize him," called a voice from the corner. Shining found himself surrounded by disgruntled guards, all of whom intended to end him. "Lock him up." "You don't understand!" he cried in frustration, knocking one of the stallions away. "If we don't stop her it's all over!" "Seize the heretic and place him in the dungeons!" The bellowing order resounded throughout the barracks, and the men followed it. Binding the former-captain in ethereal chains the men grumbled amongst themselves. "I shall see to his imprisonment personally." From the corner walked Major Biceps, one of the less intelligent but all-round most respected men of the Guard. His towering muscular figure and stern eyes portrayed an absolute command wherever he walked, his rippling form on-par with even the strongest of earthponies. "Sir!" came the reply from one of the unicorns who had bound Shining. Looking back down at the heretic, he noticed a slight glow in his eyes. "Major Biceps, sir, the prisoner is radiating." Looking Shining Armour over with an inquisitive eye, the bulky superior laughed. His laughter resounded throughout the barracks. A stern glare snapped to his features as he looked down at the bound unicorn. "This heretic poses no threat. He lost his dignity the day he allowed his wife to be murdered." Turning his glare to the room as he scanned, the major found who he presumed was his direct subordinate. "Colour Sergeant Featherfall, I want you to arrange a clear path throughout the city for our friend here." Sneering down at Shining, Major Biceps continued. "We're going to display him in public before we lock him up. Our ponies need to know just how effective we are at treating discrepancies." "Of course, Major Biceps. I shall arrange a parade route momentarily," came the reply. Major Biceps smiled for a brief moment, before turning his attention to another soldier. "You there," he called. "What's your name, rank?" "Private Turner, sir!" the stallion said, clumsily saluting. "With the fifth exploratory platoon, currently on leave, sir!" Screwing his face up slightly the commanding officer stepped forward. "Turner? What kind of a name is Turner?" "Time Turner, sir! Watchmaker by trade!" "Aaah... I see." Nodding his head slowly the major's features returned to normal, remaining intimidating none-the-less. "A clock boy, eh? I can respect that. Takes skill to make a piece of kit that'll tell the time through rain and snow." Looking back over at the Colour Sergeant, and the now bound form of Shining Armour, the white block of meat had an idea. "Tell you what. Go fetch Warrant Officer Iron for me." The young man nodded quickly, saluting once more and running off. "Oh, and make me a pocket-watch while you're at it!" the major called after him. "I broke my last one." Skidding to a stop, falling over, getting back up and dusting himself off, the young private saluted again. "Make sure it's good!" By this time most of the other soldiers had trickled out of the barracks, eager to get away from Major Biceps, and his former subordinate. Featherfall was still standing at attention with a trio of unicorns keeping Shining in check. "We're ready when you are, sir," said one of the unicorns. He was a petite blue stallion. "We can have him brought to the apex for proper binding while the Colour Sergeant figures out a path." "Good idea," grunted the Major as he stroked his meaty chin. "I'll have the dungeons notified of our special guest. I'm sure they'll prepare suitable accommodation for such an esteemed member of the Gu— oh, sorry. I mean former member of the Guard." Bellowing laughter filled the room as Colour Sergeant Featherfall left to make preparations. The young trio nervously joined in with their superior, stopping only when he glared at them. Shining Armour merely looked down at the floor, his blood boiling and seething. I'll save you, Twily, he thought to himself. I'll save you from that monster, somehow.... -=-=-=-=-=- "Oh my. So you think she's coming, then?" Fluttershy was seated on an arrangement of large plush cushions, made of velvet and silk, with her head resting in her hooves. Rather than hide behind her hair the young mare was looking up at Spike, who was sitting cross-legged atop a small helical pillar. Amaranth was sitting on a the same pile as Fluttershy, playing with the mare's tail delicately. "Yeah, I figure she's got about an hour or so before she stumbles into the basin." Spike shrugged slightly and took his last cigarette from a pocket on his jacket, brining it to his lips and lighting it with a puff of green flame. "Did I ever tell you how much I hate smoking?" he asked aimlessly. Sucking in a plume from the slowly burning wad, he grimaced. "I really hate smoking." The meek yellow mare smiled softly, her cheeks turning a rosy shade. "I know exactly why you do, though." "Don't," he said with a sigh, looking down at her. "It's not funny." "Shining Armour used to smoke, didn't he?" she asked sincerely. "You like him more than you'd care to admit." Spike spluttered and coughed up some of his fire, causing both girls to laugh. He looked away from them in order to hide the small smile on his lips. Amaranth was constantly fiddling with the young pegasus' tail, as she simply adored the soft texture. "Although the reason he chose to smoke is a mystery, the fact that he has to is obvious," she said simply. "Even he can't maintain his integrity for long without the herbs." She looked up at Spike sweetly, but whether he heard her or not, she didn't know. "That's the last one, right?" she called loudly. "Yep," he said simply. Inhaling some more of the dark purple smoke his lips curved into a smile. "I would've had twenty left over if we hadn't of f—" "No no no!" she shouted. "We promised not to talk about that, remember!" Fluttershy looked at Amaranth, and then at Spike, her smile growing larger as her blush became more profound. Spike laughed softly as he looked over the forest canopy, his eyes scanning the horizon. Fluttershy hummed slightly and looked Amaranth in the eye. "You finally did it, hmm?" "No we di— well yes we did, but I— no we... nono no!" Amaranth let go of Fluttershy's tail and leaned back slightly, waving both her hands in the air as a furious blush spread over her face. "We defiantly didn't. No!" Spike laughed from his perch atop the ivory pillar, one of his hands playing with the creeping ivy that had climbed the side. "I had to smoke twenty of them after that. Twenty." He laughed again and looked down at the pair of them, a devious smile on his lips. "Who knew getting personal with a cosmic force would destabilize a person? I didn't." From behind her silky pink hair the middle aged mare gave a short laugh, putting a hoof up to cover her mouth as she did so. "Oh, Spike, you haven't changed at all, you know that?" Amaranth was hiding behind her tangelo hair and trying to block the conversation out. "You're still a little deviant, you know that?" Spike snorted slightly, his smile curling slightly. "Oh you know me. I was always trying to get in Twilight's way. A few misplaced quills, a couple of crumpled scrolls. Maybe a book or two out of place..." his smile turned bitter sweet as he blew out a tuft of purple smoke. "Good times. Simpler times." Apparently having recovered from her embarrassment, Amaranth spoke up. "Well, the fun times are over, because now you have to kill her." "Oh, that's true..." Fluttershy said sadly, looking back up at Spike. "Do you have anything in mind?" "No, not really," he said slowly, finally snubbing the cigarette and dropping it. "I've opened the path to the basin for her, but honestly, I still haven't figured out what to do with her." He sighed and bit his lip. "Maybe I'm hesitating." Fluttershy nodded her head slowly, her eyes darting around the glade. "However you do it, please make sure it's quick." "I'd do it the easy way but she's bringing Rarity with her," he said with a grumble. "As much as I dislike her I'm not the kind of person to scar someone needlessly. I'll have to choose my actions carefully." Amaranth went back to stroking Fluttershy's tail with care, playing with the silky hair. Her features were content as she spoke. "Shy, you noticed anything? You seem pretty jumpy all of a sudden." "Oh, sorry," she said meekly, looking at Amaranth. "I just noticed that the spirits are getting flighty. I hope they're not upset, poor dears." The yellow epitome of kindness sighed and brushed her mane aside, resting her head on her hooves once more. "Maybe you've outstayed your welcome, Spike." He nodded slowly and stood where he'd been sitting, jumping off the helical perch and landing with a light thud. "Yeah, you're probably right. We're not that far into the woods so we probably spooked them. Surprised it took so long to notice us, though." "I can't feel the animilacus anymore, though..." she said slowly, biting her lip and mumbling something under her breath. "It's... it's probably nothing." Nodding to herself, she stood off the comfy pile and turned to Spike. Walking over to him quickly she nuzzled his hand gently, and looked up at him with a smile. "I'm ready to go." He nodded. "Seeya' in the next one, Fluttershy." With a click of his fingers, she was gone, sent back home and away from this godly forest. Spike looked at his right hand, the one she'd touched, and smiled softly. Pocketing it and turning to Amaranth, he titled his head to the left. "We better get going too. Can't keep our friends waiting, right?" "Your friends, you mean," she said flatly. "Fluttershy is a nice one, though. How quaint that the only mare to understand you would be the most disconnected one." She sighed in a gentle manner. "Maybe if she'd gotten to you sooner..." "Leave it," Spike said gruffly. "It's in the past." "I suppose you're right." Her face brightened up and she did a little twirl, wrapping herself around his arm. "Let's go!" So they did. P l e a s e t e l l m e When they had entered the Whitetail Woods, Twilight had said to Rarity, "Don't look back." But Rarity wasn't the kind of woman who let others push her around, and this only added to her reasons to look back. She was deathly afraid of these woods, of not looking back, for a great many reasons. She was the kind of woman who let things happen to others, and was always ready to leap at a moments notice. So when she looked back, the moment they stepped in, she knew it was over. Because when she looked behind them there was nothing but thick, deep forest. The moment they crossed the threshold from field to forest, it swallowed them whole. Twilight insisted they'd been walking for a good hour now, but Rarity knew better. She also knew not to push the truth to those unwilling to accept it, so she merely smiled and agreed with Twilight. "Silly me," she said. Silly her. Originally she'd been trying to keep track of time as they walked. It proved a useless effort. Her pocket-watch had stopped on the twelfth hour, despite them having entered on the fourth. Twilight had grown despondent as her compass began to spin in all manner of directions, before breaking entirely. The map they'd brought with them was writing itself, apparently trying to tell a story of how it came to be. They'd thrown and burned it the moment it started, however. Despite this the two of them never got lost. The path always lead where they wanted to go, where they needed to go, and never once had it led them astray. When Twilight had wandered off into the forest to look at a certain flower in the distance, she'd arrived back on the path ahead in minutes. She thought she'd gone in a circle, and thus tried again, and again, and again. Rarity and Twilight learned the truth the moment that walking back the way they came, proved to only make them appear farther ahead and walk the right direction. Either the forest was alive, or it had a master controlling it. In her vanity Twilight had adopted the idea that the forest was sentient and guiding them to Spike, whereas Rarity decided to believe that perhaps Spike was masterminding the path. But she had no way of knowing for sure, and in the end, she agreed with her friend. While not vehemently believing the forest was alive, Rarity decided it was folly to think Spike would lead them to him. He wasn't that confident... surely. Although the path was leading them to Spike, it still took them time to clear the forest. It was huge after all, and no matter how straight the path, travelling takes long amounts of time. How much time neither of them was sure, as both their time-keeping spells had said ridiculous things. Rarity's had decided that their travels had taken minutes, while Twilight's had opted for years. Signs that they were nearing their destination came in the form of ruins. Beautiful white pillars were dotted alongside the road every so often, sometimes accompanied by a decayed building or base of some sort. Soon they walked beneath a small arch of sorts. It had a single word inscribed at the peak of its form. Terminus. Neither of the girls knew what it meant, but as they crossed beneath it, both felt a majestic energy radiate from within themselves. Off in the distance and above the scarlet canopy there were monolithic structures. Archways made of pearl and gold, covered in decay and nature, falling apart and remaining proud; standing tall for all to see. The longer the pair walked the quieter they became. Their reason for coming to the woods was lost in the beauty and mystery of the surroundings, their eyes taking in every detail as they continued onward. It stopped. As abruptly as the forest had began it stopped, and in its place, there was a depression of otherworldly scale. Digging deep into the earth and heading straight down to the unknown, a large and perfectly circular maw awaited them. It was filled with stairs, platforms, buildings, pillars, pools, statues, doors, and all manner of other things. Both of the unicorns stood at the edge and looked down, a mixture of emotions plastered onto their faces. "Wow," Twilight said simply. "That's... amazing." Rarity nodded to herself more than anyone else. "It's absolutely gorgeous. Just look at how delicately constructed everything, how wonderfully decorated it all seems." Her eyes were practically glued to the structures beneath her. "Some of it's supported, and some of it is just... floating...." "How long do you think it'll take us to find Spike?" Tapping her hoof against her chin, the delicate white mare pondered the question. "Does it matter?" she asked sincerely. "We're here, and I doubt we can leave until we're done." Smiling at Twilight, Rarity wrapped an arm around her friend. "What was Celestia's saying, again?" "Our longest journeys are often our easiest, and the shorter your trip, the less you learn," Twilight said with a smile. "Exactly." Looking around the edges of the huge hole, easily the size of a lake, Rarity chirped up. "There's a staircase over there. Let's get going, darling. I'm sure Spike is waiting for us." -=-=-=-=-=- Shining could feel everything around him. He couldn't block it out anymore. He never should have read those books, but he read them for Twilight, or maybe he read them for himself? No, no, he read them with Twilight. Wait, Twilight? Where was she again? He was beginning to lose track of things, precious things, and he needed to keep them in. "Look at him, snivelling and crawling around. Ha!" One of the guards outside insulted him. Shining didn't care right now because he was trying to keep everything in. "You know, I remember when I joined the Guard. That bastard told me I'd never make it past my induction. Look at me now!" Another pony could be heard sighing. "Yeah, sure thing Private Heavy. You showed him good. Yippee." "Are you making fun of me?" the former asked. The sound of hoofsteps could be heard growing fainter. "I made it. I'm going to keep climbing higher and higher. If I handle this right I'm on the fast-track to officer rank." He snorted and kept walking, his steps growing louder. "The Major entrusted me with this. The Major! He saw something in me, Comb, I just know it." "Oh yes," the stallion apparently named Comb replied. "I'm sure he did. Why, everyone knows just how outstanding you are, Heavy." Private Heavy grumbled something under his breath and walked off, shouting back at Comb. "You'll see! I'll outrank you once this is over!" "Sure, sure," the other stallion replied with a yawn. Shining Armour couldn't keep it in any longer. He was trying so hard but it just wouldn't stop coming out. They'd made him do it, yes. Yes it was their fault. THEIR FAULT. Even though it was their mistake he was the one tied up. He didn't like that, not one bit. Fractious Helix Syndrome. What did that mean again? He couldn't remember, or rather he couldn't bring himself to remember. There was something about that phrase, something about that... "Aaaaaaaaaurgh!" Screaming and writing in agony the stocky unicorn slammed his head against the floor repeatedly. "Out! Out! Out!" He started repeating the word as he slammed his head down, gnawing his own teeth and gums in frustration. "Out!" "Hey... hey!" A chair fell over somewhere and a clattering of hooves could be heard. "Shining, Shining? Snap out of it!" Pounding resonated through the room as someone smacked on the barrier. "Ah, horseapples..." a tone of fear was adopted. "Uhh... Heavy. Shit!" The banging stopped and someone ran off, calling out for assistance. It was there now. Shining could feel something building up inside his head that wanted to be set free. His screaming fluctuated between growling and groaning, as if something else was taking hold. His slamming became quicker and quicker as he started to lose breath. "OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT!" Then it stopped. A strike too far. His horn cracked and screamed as it sucked in the air around him, resonating with a ground-shattering boom. Some form of shockwave radiated from Shining and blew the barrier out, extinguishing the lights, cracking and denting the age-old stone walls. His screaming continued as his skin became riddled with holes, blood pouring from the open wounds. Soon the buds began to grow. Worming up from inside him, tiny little buds made from sinew and bone. His screaming only increased tenfold as he found himself patron to a garden show. Blood ran down from his eyes as the walls began to buckle further and further, his buds slowly opening. "W-what the hell...." From behind him came a confused and scared voice. Then the sound of vomiting and the drawing of swords. "What in Celestia's name is going on here‽" Fleshy flowers made from pus and skin bloomed all around Shining Armour, his eyes rolling back as his cutiemark bust into flames. He no longer screamed, he merely stood in place and turned to face the soldiers. Flowers fell off one by one, making sloppy sounds as they littered the floor. His coat was immaculate as the holes vanished. Where his eyes had been hollow, they were now full. Full of understanding. "I see now," he said simply. In his voice. "Now I understand." The stallion who had vomited managed to wipe his mouth clean and stand tall, looking over at Shining. He lost his nerve as the former-captain's hair started turning black, and bone began to grow on his face. "Stay right there, heretic!" Shining could see everything in this room. Even their souls. "Sorry Private," he said to the previously boisterous soldier. "You're not getting promoted." He crushed his windpipe and let him drop where he stood, turning to face the other stallion. "Sergeant Comb, was it? Don't worry. You won't have to put up with idiotic subordinates anymore." There was a sharp crack, and the stallion's head was ripped clean off.His body dropped dead, and moments later, the head rolled across the floor. "Don't worry Twily," Shining said as he looked off to the side. "I'm coming." He teleported away just as the alarms were sounded. -=-=-=-=-=- Two pairs of eyes were staring intently at a small mechanical device set into the centre of the room. Spike and Amaranth were both glaring at a small cube, no larger than an eyeball, which was made up of delicate pieces of machinery. Somewhere held within were six very small, very special runes. "How long did it take you to find this, again?" Amaranth asked curiously. Spike scratched his chin and shrugged. "Probably something like fifteen years, although they were spent here, not out there." He cracked a small smile. "So I'm still pretty young." His smile grew wider as he turned his eyes towards Amaranth. "Defiantly younger than you." "I hate you," she said jokingly as she stuck her tongue out. "It's not like I decided to spend my time like this." Spike nodded and walked over to a pile of velvet cushions, flopping down into them face first and groaning. "Speaking of time, how long until your friends arrive?" "Uh, probably another hour or so, give or take a few." He rolled over onto his back and closed his eyes, concentrating on a tiny nub of energy in the back of his mind. "I'm leading them to us, else they'd be looking for a few years." Amaranth slowly moved from the centre of the room, her hand tracing along the small obelisk, before dropping down to her side. She nimbly sat down besides spike, drawing her knees up and hugging her legs, sitting her head atop them. "It always comes to this, doesn't it?" "Yeah, it always comes to this," he said solemnly. "First it was Cadence, then Sombra...." He smirked and bit his thumb nervously. "That guy still gives me nightmares. He was something else." Dragging a finger through her silky hair, the infinite maiden smiled at Spike. "It wasn't so hard was it. What did you say to him again? 'I don't care if you're the manifestation of hate, I don't care if you were once emperor of the land, and I don't care if you slew thousands of gods in the process. I need you to die' - was it?" "Shush you," Spike said with a light blush. "I was angry, alright? I can only take being ripped apart so many times, eventually, enough is enough." She hummed to herself more than anyone else and laid back in the pile, covering her eyes with a hand, then drawing it back and looking up at the ceiling. "It's exciting," she whispered. "To await what lies beyond the end." Spike laughed and ruffled her hair. "I'm not sure you'll find much besides the crushing abyss, but hey, you're free to wonder." His laughter turned bitter as he held his face in both hands. Letting them slide down his face the young dragon let out an exasperated sigh. "Ponies think that Celestia looks after them in the next world, you know?" "Really?" Amaranth asked as she looked up at Spike. "Do you think it's true?" Spike shrugged. "Probably. All lesser gods go to the afterlife when they die. There's probably a good... fifty or so 'Celestias' in the afterlife." He looked over at the box with a glare in his eye. "The Imperium is going to fix all that. It's going to fix you." "I suppose you're right," she said simply. "We've come a long way just to fill that little box." "It's five down, one to go." Spike grit his teeth and turned his back on Amaranth. "I just wish it wasn't Twilight." W h a t a m I ? Twilight had finally found the room in which Spike was residing. Somewhere along the way she'd been split apart from Rarity, but she didn't care. She wouldn't need Rarity for this, she knew it. She... knew it. So, why couldn't she open the door? Why did her hoof struggle to even near the ebony wood, trembling in place pathetically? Biting her lip Twilight forced her hoof towards the door, only for her foreleg to freeze up. Why? She wanted to scream. Why? She wanted to shout. Why? She wanted to cry. Her frustration turned to bitter self-loathing as she struggled. Touching the door handle, she felt a moment of triumph, but it was pulled from under her as the door opened by itself. Spike was standing to the side with a knowing smile plastered on his face. "Looks like you were having trouble," he said. Twilight flared up and made a move to use her horn, but a click of Spike's fingers stopped her in her tracks. "Now now," he said mockingly, adopting the tone of voice Celestia used. "Come along my little pony, tea, friendship, and biscuits await you." About to say something insulting in return, the purple monarch was cut off by a sharp laugh. "Just kidding. There's none of that." The door closed behind Twilight as she stepped inside the room, but she was too busy examining the space to notice. It was rimmed with a delicate series of runes, carvings most likely, that adorned both the top and bottom of the walls. The middle was left blank, with a strip of gold running the way around. In the middle of the room there were two obelisks. One was attached to the roof and pointing downwards, whilst another was attached to the floor and pointing upwards. In the space between them there was a small cube, made of worn gold, that was spinning slowly. It was balanced on its points in a diagonal fashion. Both obelisks were covered with runes, although these ones glowed a faint blue. Attached to the roof was a black obelisk, whilst the one on the floor was made of gold. Five sides of the cube seemed to be radiating softly, whilst the last was devoid of any outward features. Not even the clockwork within moved. Velvet cushions were piled atop one another at the end of the room, upon which sat Spike and his succubus friend. "I'm here to end this," Twilight said harshly as she stopped before Spike. "I want to get this matter over and done with." "Woah woah," Spike said with apparent surprise, putting his hands up in a pseudo surrender. "Calm down Twily. Why don't we have a discussion about good friends over some hot chocolate?" Snapping his claws together, an overly feminine set of teacups appeared, followed by a teapot. Spike poured them both a cup. This would have been fine except he was pouring upside down, and the hot white chocolate was floating upwards into the cups. Also, it was white chocolate. Seeing the look on her face, Spike once again adopted the hands raised pose, and the cups, pot, and all disappeared. "You took a while to get here, so before you try to kill me, why don't you ask some questions?" Spike spoke sincerely, and put his hands down slowly. "It's not like I'm against telling you what you need to know. I'm an open book... bar a few topics." "Why did you kill Celestia?" Twilight seated herself opposite Spike, on the floor, and bored holes into him with her eyes. Figuratively. "Better question: why didn't someone else kill her?" Laughing at his own joke, he made a shooing motion and grumbled. "I can't answer that. I can tell you what I did with her though." "Shoot." Spike pointed to the rotating box in the middle of the room. "She's in that," he said plainly. "Or rather, her soul is in that. There's no way for you to bring her back. I could, but honestly, I don't want to. It'd defeat the purpose of killing her." Twilight wanted to scream there and then, but she held her tongue in check. "Who else is inside the... thing?" she asked accusingly. "Who else have you murdered?" "Five lesser gods," came the reply. "And now there's only one left to go." He looked at Twilight. "G-gods?" she nearly spluttered entirely. "What do you mean, gods?" Spike rubbed his chin in thought, pondering how to answer. "There are lesser and higher gods in this world. Lesser gods are mortal, made by the whims of higher gods to serve a purpose. Higher gods have been around since time itself, maybe even before, and exist to shape our world as they see fit. Or other worlds." Looking over at Amaranth, the young dragon let out a soft sigh. "She's an angel. Angels are... complicated, to say the least. She's a seraph, but it's complicated, so we'll leave it there." "Why am I a god?" Twilight asked sincerely, her anger forgotten for now. "Uhh... well, you see..." Spike laughed awkwardly, turning his gaze away from Twilight. "You're not, not yet at least. Celestia would have made you into one, if I hadn't killed her." His features grew tense. "Celestia was somewhere between higher and lesser, for... difficult to explain reasons." Pointing to the floor, the purple murderer grimaced. "This used to be a lake. A very deep lake, filled with souls. It was used to resurrect Celestia every hundred years or so. You would've been turned into her, to put it bluntly." Twilight practically exploded. "You expect me to believe that?" she cried. "I'd sooner see myself flayed alive than believe such blatant blasphemy! What do you take me for, a fool? A miscreant? I'm not going to fall for your games! I've had enough." She stopped ranting and took an aggressive stance, staring Spike in the eyes. "It's time to end this!" she screamed. Amaranth looked at Spike with a sad smile, as he stood and opened his arms wide. "Go ahead," he said simply. "Wh-wha— rrrrrrgh!" Partly confused at but mostly angry by being treated inferior, Twilight let lose a hail of ice in Spike's direction. He didn't move, and he didn't flinch. Instead he let each and every piece find its mark in his chest, spluttering slightly as he coughed up blood. His face remained neutral, however, devoid of his earlier manner. "Are you done?" he asked in a disconnected tone. Screaming louder, the purple unicorn continued to send shards his way. Each and every one sunk deep into his flesh with a sickening slice, ripping his muscle apart and painting the marble and velvet in blood and gore respectively. How long did she attack him, Spike wondered. Ten minutes? Thirty? An hour? Five? Or maybe only for a minute and a half? He couldn't tell, he didn't want to know either. Where new ice hit, it pushed the old out, ripping him wide open. His health was immaculate, and he healed as each deathly pellet hit him. Endless streams of blood seemed to seep out from inside him, organ bits and pieces only growing back. His face wasn't spiteful, his features were not in pain. His eyes were empty, hollow, devoid of all things. His voice was despondent. "Are you done?" he asked. In fact he asked many times, again and again, until it became routine. So it was. Twilight pumped him full of ice, ripping him apart as he allowed himself to be ripped apart. Blood, gore, organs, and sinew would fly from within him, coating the floor in viscera. Then he would ask her "Are you done?" It would begin anew. At some point Rarity walked in, standing by the door, watching her friend rip her old assistant to pieces; only for him to ask "Are you done?" "Are you done?" Twilight was done. Sagging her head in defeat, nearly vomiting as her eyes fidgeted upwards, the purple princess nodded her head. Tears streamed down her cheeks, bloody cheeks, splattered with gore. Spike stood in the same spot he'd been before. His chest was ripped open and splattered out behind him, already healing. The velvet behind him was stained crimson with his blood. It seemed as if behind Spike a pair of red wings had sprouted, the splattering of blood and gore immense. "I'm done," she whispered. "Then we're done," he responded. Rarity screamed. Spike lifted his arm up besides him and showed Twilight his open hand, then smiled. "Count to ten," he said softly. "Count to ten and it'll all be over." She nodded meekly, mouthing the numbers to herself. Ten. His open palm was visible to all. Nine. It came closer to his chest. Eight. Rarity was screaming. His elbow was bent. Seven. Amaranth turned away, she didn't want to watch. Six. Spike stopped smiling. Five. Rarity screamed louder, begging him to stop. Four. Twilight kept counting. Twilight kept crying. Three. Spike twitched his fingers. Two. Rarity screamed one last time. One. Spike balled his hand into a fist, and pulled down. Her heart exploded in her chest, ripping a hole wide open in her front. Rarity collapsed in sobs, and Spike started chanting. A dim white glow drifted from Twilight over to the Imperium, and Amaranth looked back. Why? He wanted to scream. Why? He wanted to shout. Why? He wanted to cry. Twilight Sparkle was dead. The Imperium was complete.
PicturesqueShunted among the sloping mountain ranges to the west and spilling out into the beautiful rolling hills to the east, the bountiful Whitetail Woods are home to many wonders. Sightings of strange creatures and stories of lucid experiences are common when you drop the mere place name forest. It is a place of wonders cupping on the seashore. Yet while it might be a wonderful place it's also a very badly charted one. Estimates on the size of the forest are made every passing year, even though detailed calculations of its size can be made with the help of pegasi. One day a size for the forest crops up, and the next day a rambling explorer disproves it. Sweet green canopies and lush undergrowth invite any and all into the bowels of the forest. Infact bowels is a very good term for the forest innards due to their sheer size. All sorts of explorers have lost themselves in the trees for months on end, sometimes even years. Travellers are sucked up by the forest and some of the departed never even return. It is because of these disappearances that foul and fickle rumours abound. Therefore whenever thinking about the Whitetail Woods, it's good to bear in mind the distinction between fact and fiction. What we do and don't know are always key things the unwary adventurer needs to remind himself of when preparing to explore. However there exists a distinct grey area. Few of the legends that surround the mystical forest are based on somewhat truth. Starswirl the Bearded, scholar to the sun, wrote of a city of pearl white and obsidian black. With spires and columns that reached up to the stars, stairways that never ended and doubled in on themselves and even doors to nowhere and everywhere. Perhaps if he had given the city a name then there may be an endeavour to decipher his cryptic messages. All the things he wrote of were related to the magical workings of our world, and some believe this fabled city to be a very important key. But as all fairy tales it ended abruptly. ================================================================================ Light lapping waves gently nudged the side of the lake as a leaf settled on the surface. It was midday and the sun was out in full force as it journeyed across the sky. Clear water stretched out as far as the eye could see in all directions. Three sides of the perfect lake were cropped off with a short shore and a sudden wall of trees. It was a mysterious canopy that seemed to hum with life. The remaining side of the lake was backed off by a huge mountain. Craggy cliffs jutted from its surface and densely packed trees collected around the lower sides. However beautiful the lake may have looked it was unsettling to a degree, because the sun was not reflected nor the bottom seen. Skipping stones skid across the water suddenly. Making a plopping noise thrice before sliding once more and making a splash. All four of the thrown stones carried out the same pattern. However within this limbo between two places a solitary respite existed. Muddy yellow stone rose from the water for about an inch or three, forming a base. Upon that base of dirty limestone there sat a pearl cathedral. It was a rather small cathedral mind you, about the size of a bungalow that'd been hit by a stick of TNT; but there it was. Frail grey bricks stacked up and up on one another to form a small dirty tower. It leaned over the water like an expectant mother. Thrown up against it were some faded white tiles that arched over to form a half-oval. A few windows peeked out from the sides with shattered glass panes, and even a black brick roof on the tower. Supports had failed and the roof of the main building had fallen in on itself; from within bloomed a canopy of green. Pillars lined the side of the half oval before one split and fell slightly into the water; somehow still standing despite the rest of the building disappearing. Underwater was where the ruins led it would seem. Off in the distance some way there were arches and pillars made of faded marble. Covered in weeds with trees and vines wrapped around them these monoliths blended in almost unnoticed. There wasn't an entrance or an exit to this place. It just sat atop the water alone and crumbling. There was a door to this place, but opening it only led you to the lake and the shore beyond. Wind scarcely danced along the lake surface or anything else within the glade. Throughout the glade was still and calm as if time had just stopped. Within the building there were many things to notice. When you walked through the rotten doors you would be provided a staircase with which to walk down to the main "level" of the church. Wooden supports were run across the floor in a sort of chequered pattern. Clumps of rotten planks were nailed to them here and there. The middle of the level was dominated by an oval hole flanked by ornate wooden fencing. The hole was flooded with water, and perhaps had once had a meaning; now lost. Strips of cloth were loosely hanging from the alcoves of the archways along the sides. Musky air hung limp in the tight and dimly lit space. A bright glow washed over the floor for a few inches before the level above blocked it from view. Only splinters of white escaped through the wooden floor above. Small silent mice and scheming savage rats had not made homes here. The lower floor of the chapel was devoid of all forms of life and not even a breeze dared enter. Pure water was invading the lower area of the decaying building, it was drowning the infrastructure as the floor fell into its maw over time. Tapestries hanging forlorn and etched with little but lichen and blood lined the upper floor walls. Tiny shattered glass windows were surrounded by ivy and lilac devilweed. Hollow frames were only filled with the place holders for what had once been beautiful glass artwork. Frail chains were strewn across the roof and dangling down to the floor in heaps, vines had crawled up the metal and taken over the bindings. One single chandelier sat at the very back of the building besides the front doors; it had fallen without fuss. Dusty old pews were lined up and facing a forgotten service. Blue clear water stretched out for miles before being met by the shoreline beyond, and the broken chapel had such a view. Where the building ended abruptly the open air began. It had fallen apart at an angle and as such the left side was slightly larger than the right. Floorboards were rotten and slack yet somehow supporting the audience of one. Order was discarded thanks to the missing pew on the right-hand side; probably fell away with the floor. Beyond the walls of this limbo jutted a single warped mass of wood and rose gold. Pipes and keys were strewn in an upward and ungodly manner. A statue merely sat atop a tower made of rotten wood. Spike sat alone on the left front-most pew with his legs lax and his arms slack slightly. His bipedal form was roughly the right size to sit in the strange seat with little discomfort, yet he wasn't exactly fussed about sitting correctly. One of his arms was wrapped around the back of the pew while his other rested on his lap. Rough lines were worn into his fingers and carved paths through the small scales before his claw. Minuscule bags sat under his sunken eyes while he stared out towards the statue. Much like his clothing the statue had an unkempt look with a pleasing effect. It was certainly a very spiritual object, containing tell-tale signs of divinity. The young dragon had known of and met few gods in his time but the one depicted before him seemed to transcend the sculpture it had been encased within. It was not unlike the statue of Discord he had once seen. Deep black obsidian was tinted with rose gold, both pleasing and disturbing. With a sigh he pulled his hood up with his right hand before standing up. Leather straps that hung off his coat jostled while be rummaged through a bag by his side. Bizarre things lay inside but a rarer one was retrieved and rolled around in his thin pointy fingers. Blue crystal sat in-between his thumb and index finger as he stared into the jewel. An arm wrapped around his own and someone pressed up against him without his knowledge beforehand. He suppressed a laugh; she was something else. "It's time to go," he said flatly as he turned away from the effigy. "I know," a voice replied sweetly. -=-=-=-=-=- "Rarity... why am I here, again?" Twilight asked nervously as the pair trotted down a high street at a leisurely pace. "I mean I understand why I'm here but I—" "There's no need to get tongue tied, dear," Rarity interjected as the two of them stopped to browse a flower stall. There was quite an impressive selection. "I keep telling you to get outside more often, a Princess needs the love of her ponies!" she chirped as she placed a flower in Twilight's hair. "Ponies don't love a shut in." "Well I suppose that's true," Twilight said while blushing slightly. "I'm not complaining I'm just..." "Complaining?" Rarity offered as they began to trot once more. Both shared a laugh and Twilight waved her off. "No, I'm just still adjusting to things is all. Becoming a Princess was a life changing experience in many ways! For both me and my friends." Twilight beamed bashfully and rubbed the back of her neck. She wasn't wearing her element at the moment, but Rarity had begun making a formal wardrobe for her - not too formal mind you. Both of them smiled a little bit and Twilight was about to speak up but Rarity spoke first. "It's... a real shame Spike wasn't there to see you become a Princess." The two of them shared a look quickly. "Speaking of Spike, it was his birthday last week, right?" "Yeah, he would be—" "Oof." "Oh my I'm terribly sorry!" Twilight back-pedalled slightly and offered her hoof to the stallion she'd just knocked over, who took it with a smile. "Are you alright?" "I wasn't looking where I was going!" he laughed quickly, picking up his parcel and placing it back on his back. "Don't worry about it, Princess." With a nod to Rarity, he started off across the road and down one of Canterlot's many service roads. "What were you saying, darling?" Rarity asked as the stallion disappeared from sight. "I didn't hear you finish." "...you know I don't remember," Twilight said sheepishly as she looked at her hooves. "Can't have been to important, though." Taking a small step to check she was alright, Twilight started trotting again with Rarity falling in behind. Rarity walked forward a few more paces before she suddenly turned to Twilight with stars in her eyes. "Speaking of important things, I heard an absolutely amazing story the other day! One of my regulars told me that a magicsmith in Canterlot can cut inviolable deepstones!" "Impossible," Twilight said in a flat tone as she continued trotting at a slightly faster place. "Starswirl the Bearded was the only pony to ever attempt such a feat and succeed." Her voice betrayed slight hints of excitement. "Celestia would have informed me of such a pony." "Well... why don't we go see for ourselves?" Rarity said with glee as she started walking in a different direction. "We're shopping right? I think a deepstone necklace would go wonderfully with my new design!" Twilight groaned but maintained a smile as she followed. "What was the unicorn called, do you remember?" The purple Princess asked out of curiosity. "I might know them." "I only know the name of the shop. It was called Crystal Rapier, if memory serves." Deep foreboding filled Spike from toe to top as he could feel his body lay weighty and dead beneath the covers. Was it a veil? Had he finally been deemed inappropriate to the new world and thrown into the abyss? Slick sweat ran down his scales like drops of rain. Air was stuffy and tight as he gasped for breath while his eyes refused to move. Darkness enveloped the entire room and surrounded him; suffocating him. It was pushing down on him almost as if it had gained a weight of its own. To have weight was to be alive, was the air alive? It did not hum with activity or move with grace, it sat atop him while he struggled to move. Fever filled his mind and made his thoughts sluggish and slow, the memories and ideas were like flowing water running through his palms. A council loomed above his coffin with an unmistakable presence. Alien and unwanted contact was forced upon him as his blood ran cold and his eyes went limp. Silently screaming and unable to move he was forced to watch the hands push themselves inside his skull. Metaphysical in nature each began to tear apart his being. It was horrifying because he could do nothing for himself in the company of gods. Rarity and Twilight had spent the last two hours trying to find the shop named Crystal Rapier. Their search had taken them down dark alleyways, into a ballroom, through a post office and into the Royal Palace. It had involved far too much bribery and a fair share of sweet talking, on both Rarity's and Twilight's side. Now however they stood before the store in question. It was somewhat un-ordinary yet at the same time mundane and plain. Beige brick stacked up and made the walls whilst a red tiled roof sat atop the store. It was squashed between two other stores that looked exactly the same because of its location in the poorer part of Canterlot. Muddy glass was offset in one half of the building with a few items of interest behind it. They were hard to make out from this distance but were probably quite expensive. The door and window-frames were painted a rich maroon and a small gold trimming was beneath the roof. "Welcome," called a gruff old voice from some unseen location. The girls had only just entered the store as the voice called out to them and before long a stout stallion came to the counter. "We'd like to know ab—" "We're just here to browse," Rarity interjected with a nervous laugh and a hoof over Twilight's muzzle. "I'm a dressmaker and my friend here is a sorceress; any recommendations?" "Ah well," the old stallion started as he rubbed his chin. "I believe you may be looking for decorative stones? They're in the front of the store, and your friend there might be wanting some runes; which are down back." He nodded to himself twice. "Thank you ever so much for your help." Rarity nudged Twilight, who gave a weak smile before trotting off towards the magical items. Rarity walked a little to her left over the creaking floorboards and gazed into the small display case before her. "Hmmmm..." she mused to herself as her eyes scanned the jewel before her. There was no doubting the quality of its cut or the precise cleaning. A rather well done job much like her own. However the small gemstone lacked a certain flare she wanted, so it wasn't a purchase she would be willing to make. The case above held a more impressive gemstone with an orange tint. It was glowing very faintly in the mid-afternoon sunlight that streamed through the window. Placed upon a velvet cushion, Rarity could respect the quality of the cut and the design it had been shaped with. Sadly she was looking for cooler gems and orange was too warm a colour. Meanwhile Twilight was looking at a large and impressive collection of runes and magical compendiums that accompanied them. All of the runes and their books were kept under heavy lock and key within a metal display case. It didn't look too secure but was probably reinforced with some kind of binding spell. Leather bound tomes that probably had a musk of the past were certainly enticing to Twilight, however the contents within probably weren’t to her taste. Although not technically illegal the practice of binding spirits and the dead was seen as immoral, so compendiums such as Arts of Indissoluble Nature and Ars Spirits didn't appeal to her. Journeys Into Unknown seemed like a very heretical text, and she was tempted to bring it up with the storekeeper. Gateway magic definitely was illegal in all forms. It was astounding that such a text and accompanying rune had remained in public display! "Excuse me?" Rarity asked from across the store. "I would like to examine this gemstone closer. Will you get it out for me, please?" "Most certainly," the storekeeper replied as he levitated a set of keys from his pocket. Walking over to Rarity he pointed to a display case and asked, "This one?" A curt nod was given in response and he opened the holder with a sliding of tumblers. Sparks flew off the surface of the gem as it was levitated to a surface, at which point the stallion stepped sideways to allow Rarity a closer look. "It's obviously a fine quality..." she said slowly as her eyes scanned the gem. "Could I get it in a smaller cut, though?" "Probably," said the worn man. "You'd need to ask my boy in the back though, he cuts the stones." "Oh that would be wonderful!" Rarity beamed as the store-owner pointed toward the door to the back. "I suppose he's a rather fine magician, then?" "Mighty fine," came the response from the owner. "Word to the wise; don't scream." "Pardon...?" -=-=-=-=-=- Spike's hands twirled the long tube in his hands slowly whilst he breathed down the length of the metal tube into the gather. Glass was lumped at the end of the metal pipe in an angry red blob. Slowly swelling in size and becoming thinner around the edges the gather slowly formed into a little rounded vase. He started swinging his hands in a circular motion in an attempt to increase the width of the gather, but his concentration slipped and he dropped the blowpipe. A small curse escaped his dry lips as he looked at the molten glass and sighed. Picking up the pipe with his left arm he turned it vertical and placed it in some water. After he'd placed the pipe in some water Spike moved over to where the glass was sitting and scraped it up using his hand. Despite how unbearably hot it was his scales remained fine and he promptly threw the blob into a pit nearby. Slapping his hands together to get rid of the excess, he took the blowpipe back and decided to start again. Bringing the blowpipe end to his lips Spike let loose a stream of green fire for a few moments. Once he felt the tip was sufficiently heated he took himself to the furnace and slid the blowpipe into its maw. Glass was contained in something like crucible within and he started to collect it on the end of his pipe. Just then he heard the door to his workshop open. "Oi, Spike, you have some visitors... a customer wants a custom cut jewel," came a rough voice from behind him. "Tell them to come back in a bit because I'm busy, old man." Spike didn't bother looking over towards the door as he took the blowpipe from the furnace and grasped it in his fingers. "Oh my..." Rarity said as she peered through the door and beheld the dragon. "Spike is that really...?" "Yeah, it's me," he said taciturnly as he brought the blowpipe to his mouth. "They can stay for a bit, then you get them to buy something and throw them out." "Are they friends of yours or something?" the old stallion questioned as he walked into the workshop to examine the failed glass vase. "You don't let many folks in here, you know." "You could say that..." Spike turned to the elderly salesman and gave a morbid expression. "I told you about them I think, my foster sister and one of her friends." He slowly started blowing into the glass gather at the end of the pipe. By now Rarity and Twilight had entered the workshop as well and were staring wide-eyed at Spike, who wasn't even interested in looking their way while he worked. They weren't really thinking in the now as both looked at him blowing the glass. Something was off about him and he looked so... mature. Even though they couldn't see his face, hidden by a hood and facing away from them, both Twilight and Rarity could feel a pair of eyes in the back of his head. Before he left Spike was barely as tall as Twilight but now he towered over her. His slender bipedal figure gave off a feeling of power and presence as he worked his craft. Once mild lilac scales were now a deep purple and much more rigid. Fingers that had been stubby and claws that were originally blunt were now much longer and sinister; looking sharper than a blade. Green spikes were hidden by a worn leather jacket that managed to keep his form. A long strong tail was wrapped around his leg. "Spike it's beyond wonderful to see you!" Twilight cried out as she slowly made her way over to her foster brother. "Where have you been? What's happened to you?" "Darling you don't know how great it is to see you!" Rarity said in delight with a quiver in her voice. "It's been so long, we've missed you!" She started to walk towards Spike but stopped herself when his hands stilled. "Where were you? Why did you leave?" Spike took the pipe from his mouth and sighed as he placed it in the water trough by his side. He didn't look directly at Rarity but he did look over his shoulder at Twilight. His glare made Twilight subconsciously shiver - those weren't the eyes of the Spike she knew. "Afternoon Twilight," he said simply. "As for why I left..." Spike stood up as he spoke and flexed one of his claws. "...it's not really any of your business, Rarity." He didn't even look at her as he shrugged off her concern. It seemed like he was looking somewhere else entirely; somewhere far away from this place. "Spike we haven't seen one another in years! We need to get together and talk things out, because we're friends." Her voice remained level but she bit her lip before she continued. "Everybody was upset when you left and now that you're back we should talk about it." Spike suddenly clenched his fist but otherwise remained apathetic. Twilight was about to speak up but Spike cut her off. "Don't talk down to me like I'm a child, Rarity. I'm more experienced and much wiser than you. My business is just that and I'm not going to share." He gave a shallow laugh and turned to look at her. "Friends? Who says we're friends? I haven't seen you in years let alone thought about you." What upset Rarity most wasn't his words but rather the way he was looking at her. It may have been bearable if he resented her, tolerable if he loathed her. No light entered or escaped his eyes as he looked at her; it was disinterest. Jade pebbles stared at her unchanging almost as if they were staring through her. "Spike!" Twilight said in shock as she looked up at him in disbelief. "How could you say such a thing? You used to be so close to Rarity!" Her eyes kept flicking between the two of them as she struggled to see the full picture. "You're right Twilight; used to be." "Ahh... maybe I should be going?" Spike turned to look at his employer who was noticeably uncomfortable. "I feel a smidgen out of place amongst this ruckus." "Yeah, sure. Why don't you check the storeroom again. You were taking inventory earlier, right?" Spike nodded toward the exit and received a nod in return as his boss left the room. "Darling it's imperative that we talk about this," Rarity insisted as she put her hoof down. "You're obviously upset about something and as your friends, me and Twilight need to help cheer you up." Twilight nodded in agreement as Rarity finished. "You..." Spike inhaled deeply as his patience began to wear thin and walked over to his workbench. Picking up a small glass figurine he walked back and held it out in front of Rarity. "What do you think of this?" he asked with a tone of annoyance. Rarity picked the figure up in her telekinetic grasp and brought it closer for examination. It was a dainty glass model depicting some woman who was bipedal in nature, wrapped in alluring cloth in a pose of artful nature. Although the sculpting looked as if it was made from glass, Rarity thought it might have actually been some kind gemstone. She promptly placed it back in Spike's open palm. "It's beautiful," she said honestly as he walked over and placed the figurine back on his workbench. "Did you make this yourself?" "He must have," Twilight commented as she eyed the figure now resting on the bench. "No normal fire can soften such a dense material like a rune." Her cheeks flushed slightly as Rarity stared at her with a puzzled expression. "Twilight is correct; I sculpted a rune into a figurine for decorative purposes. It's easier to hide them if they're made like decorations." He put a hand in his pocket and looked down at Rarity with an expectant look. "However that's not the point of why I showed it to you. What does that make you think of?" The pearl white mare stared up at the jaded dragon for a few moments before managing, "...that you've grown?" "Exactly.” Clicking his claws together as she finished her sentence, Spike gave her a hard look. "I grew up independent from your discriminative society. I'm not a lapdog anymore... I'm an adult." Twilight smiled at Spike as he finished speaking. "You may have grown up without us there for you, but Ponyville has been and always will be your home, Spike." Rarity noticed how Twilight tactfully avoided his other comment; as did Spike. Green flames leaped from Spike's grimacing mouth and flowed up across his face. He opened his mouth slowly as his stare turned cold. "Don't fuck with me, Twilight," he spat. "Ponyville will always be my home? I have my own home, now. I don't need Ponyville." In the blink of an eye Spike had shoved Twilight with some form of whiplash motion, similar to a flicker jab. One of his fingers was pointed at her with the claw tip sitting on her brow. "You used me. I choked up damn mail for you and stacked your fluffy misguiding books all my life!" He pointed at himself and stood back straight. "I'm free now! Why would I go back to a life of solitude when I have so much now?" "I... I never..." Twilight back peddled slightly and failed to look Spike in the eye. "You're my foster brother and I just..." she couldn't find the words to finish her sentence. "You're right, I am your foster brother." Spike crossed his arms and looked over at the door. "That's what makes your actions disturbing, Twilight." "You," he said sharply as he pointed at Rarity. "You used me in worse ways by feigning ignorance for my feelings. I'm not mad that you didn't return my feelings, they were those of a childhood crush, I'm pissed off that you used me as a slave." He threw his arms up. "I was literally your pincushion!" Rarity walked closer to Spike and put her hoof on his side, only to have it removed by his hands. "Spike, darling, this is exactly why we need to talk! I wish we'd met on better terms, but you have something against us, and we need to work together to sort it out and get you back home." "No!" he said angrily as he pushed her back. "I'm telling you, Ponyville is not my home. Dammit you two just listen to me for a single second!" Very slowly the purple dragon pulled his hood down to expose his face fully. Rarity managed to keep her composure but Twilight was evidently shocked. "What...?" Rarity began. Garish black lines were engraved in the back of his scalp and probably down his neck as well; some more were probably hidden by his shaggy hair. Each was abhorrent in nature with an understandably dark intentions. Spike rolled one of the sleeves of his jacket up and exposed yet more of these lines. "This was my rite of passage. It marks me as a member of my race in blood and name." "That doesn't matter!" Rarity said with a tone of annoyance. "You're our friend no matter what and we need to help you adjust. You've obviously been through some horrible things!" "Rarity you don't—" Spike started before Twilight suddenly whispered something bizarre. "Rarity, you don't understand how severe those are," Twilight said in shock as she looked at her old friend. Her eyes were shaking in their sockets as if the scene before her had knocked her about. "Markings like those bring only misery and madness; Spike can't come back to Ponyville. He shouldn't even be in Equestria." "But everyone misses you!" Rarity suddenly cried out. "When you walked out on us all I—" Rarity was stopped midway as Spike placed a hand over her muzzle. His hands felt so awfully alien to her as he forced her mouth shut with a grimace. "When I walked out on you all you what, Rarity? Were you sad or upset? Your slave walked off one day so you had to work harder?" "Spike how dare you!" Twilight said emotionally as she looked away from Spike. "You go off and break the law, mutilate yourself and talk to my friends like that? I don't care who you were, but that's not okay!" "I didn't break the laws of my people, only those of yours," he stated flatly. "I really do care for you Twilight, but I have my own life now. I've got my own things going on the way I want them to, and I've travelled my own path!" Then he turned to Rarity and began walking out of the room, without looking back. "Don't get involved with me after today. I left for a reason." -=-=-=-=-=- Keys were violently pulled from a leather jacket and thrust into a battered door lock. Defiant sticky tumblers refused to budge; but was eventually broken entirely. Metal flew aside as a fist punched a hole through the old lock and handle, letting the door open on its own. Spike stepped in through the doorway and closed the door behind him. Leaning up against the bulky door he let a stream of fire out onto his claw. After a few seconds his claws were glowing a vibrant hue and he quickly welded the door shut. Afterwards he slumped down on the floor and put his head in his hands. Clenching his fists into balls as he grit his teeth with a growl the young dragon punched the floor with a sigh. His arms went lax and his breath slowed as he stood and staggered, before walking farther into his flat. Shrugging off his leather jacket and casting it aside as he went, Spike entered his living room and beheld it in the light of dusk. Unkempt piles of books and magazines were on the coffee table whilst the two couches were littered with clothes. As he walked past the door to the kitchen he noticed it was surprisingly clean. Spike spotted several drinking glasses lined up besides the sink as he entered the kitchen. Picking one up and sniffing it briefly he placed it under the tap and ran a glass of water, quickly throwing his head back and pouring the water down his throat. The kitchen was covered in black stains from his failed cooking. Smooth polished wood passed underfoot as he padded toward his bedroom. Opening the door without bothering to shut it Spike walked over to the right side of his bed and fell face first into the pillows. A long drawn out groan escaped from his lips as he felt the tension in his body wash away; soaked up by his mattress. As quickly as he felt his body embraced by his covers an arm wrapped around him from behind and someone was pressed up against him. "I keep telling you that we're in separate rooms for a reason," he said simply while burying his face father into the pillows. "Now that's no fun," came a cooing reply as the invader pressed up against him. "Are you trying to tell me you don't like me, Spike?" He abstained from commenting and received a light chuckle for his silence. "Get off of me," the tired smith moaned as he turned on his side and weekly tried to push his companion off. They merely stopped hugging him. Instead the embracing bed intruder grasped his outstretched hand and wrapped their fingers between his; there was no resistance. "Why don't you start by telling me what happened?" said a feminine voice in a sweet tone. Spike was turned against his will to be facing upwards. Staring up into a pair of pure forest orbs Spike felt his resistance slowly crumble around him. "I ran into some ponies I knew from a while back; nothing too major." Noticing the gentle tan fingers that were binding his Spike closed his eyes and let out a shallow breath. Lips. Seemingly soft and inviting but the moment he closes his eyes they were pressed up against his own. Although overridden by mild surprise Spike didn't open his eyes, he savoured the flavour rosemary and liquor that came and went in a flash. Opening his eyes he started up at the one who'd just kissed him with a mixture of a dumbstruck smile and a soft glare. "It didn't sound like nothing major, you know." The woman ran a finger up his chest slowly as she spoke. "It kind of sounded like you ripped the door open. You didn't rip the door open, did you? We need a door..." She placed her finger on his lips and whispered, "Ponies might hear us, you know." "Oi stop screwing with me," Spike said with a laugh as he shoved the girl off of him and onto the bed. "Somebody might hear us? You spent a few hundred years in silence, can't you do it some more?" He smiled slightly but rubbed his forehead and lay down, staring up at the ceiling in thought. "So who did you meet? Anybody important?" Her tangerine and tangelo hair wrapped around her neck as she pressed up against Spike, still holding his hand. "I met Rarity and my foster sister, Twilight," he said grimly. "Things started out fine I suppose but they wouldn't listen to me and that frustrated me to no end. Rarity seems set to try indoctrinate me back into Ponyville, and Twilight... I don't know what she thinks." A chuckle rang out from besides Spike. "Rarity always sounded like a mule to me," his companion said sourly. "She used you far too much as a child and now she's trying to reel you in?" Her eyes closed in thought. "Pretty disgusting." "It just dawned on me," Spike mused as he flexed his hand. "You're still in my bed. You could kill me you know that, right? Calling you wild is an understatement." "I'm sure you'll allow me to indulge for one night." An arm wrapped up and around his face, sliding back down and onto his chest. "You seem like you need the company after all, so why not break the last few rules that keep you in place?" "I can't handle you," he said bluntly. "Sure you can, you're a—" Spike placed a hand over her mouth, only to have his fingers licked and a grimace creep over his face. Sighing as his eyes drooped shut in the dusk light he felt his companion cuddle up besides him. "We'll work it out together; that's what we've done ever since the day we met, right?" "Yeah," he spoke sincerely. "We're a master and spirit, Amaranth."
Obsidian TeethSpike was standing in-between two pillars that rose up into an infinite sky. Following the pillars of marble upward into the sky would only cause him to go mad from such insane implications. Perhaps if he had more time to study the delicate flower petals carved into their surface, the hours to spend attempting to figure out the runic marks which adorned the shape, he might figure out what they meant. Cold was the only thing the pillars were willing to give up; an overbearing feeling of coldness. Secrets untold might have possibly lay within these constructions, but only one was given up. They had an arch between them which hung tiny bells and beads, and were connected to a larger structure. Stained glass shrank behind the pillars that seemed to hold up the sky, a cathedral of marble and granite sat atop the water with little relation to anything around it. Walls and structure was huge in scope and size; a place of gods. Trees from the sides of the lake grew over the water toward the building. Canopies of green and blue surrounded the pearl cathedral encasing it in a pure block of nature. From afar it seemed as if the entire thing rose from the forest which surrounded it. Cracked spires and wonky helices clawed upward from the structure of gods, a city of gods, falling apart. Spike made his way inside through a shattered pair of doors; not even a frame to them. The interior of the cathedral was surprisingly bright considering the size. Sunlight streamed in from empty window frames and nearly blinded him. Before him were row upon row of pews facing nothing in particular. Capitulating the sense of loneliness this place gave off was a revolting effigy that twisted and bubbled from where it stood. Seemingly screaming and clawing at its rocky flesh the statue was placed in the centre of the building. It gave off a feeling of coldness as the air whispered sorrowfully. "What are you thinking about?" said a voice from somewhere. It had a sweet sound that seemed to drape itself across his arm. "Where are you going?" It trailed up his arm and latched to his shoulder before being blown away by the midsummer breeze. Walking toward the statue with a slump in his step, Spike placed his hand up against it with a plain expression. Turning around slowly and pressing his back up against the effigy, Spike allowed his legs to slide outwards as he slumped against the cold obsidian. His stationary figure was drawn into the statue by claws that didn't exist. Light humming filled the air as he let out a tired sigh. The voice stroked against his cheek as the wind died down, filling his ears with the sweet sound of love. "You've been wandering so long..." Spike didn't bother to respond as he pulled a packet of cigarettes from his pocket, flicking the lid of the packet open with a claw. Worn out card held a precious few sticks of lung cancer within. Plucking one up with no amount of haste the capricious dragon put his packet away with a small struggle; having to wiggle it back into his pocket. Taking the small rolled pipe of organic decay between his left ring and index fingers, Spike brought the tip up to his mouth and let out a small yet of green flames. Flames leaped up and across the front of the wad before sinking in deep and beginning to slow-burn the fag. It met his lips with the taste of maturity yet stank of disgust. Breathing in deep through the tight-fag Spike allowed his emotions to lose themselves for a moment. For a split second he was absorbed and rejected by the plume of decay that wriggled around his lungs. Breathing out the poison with a bored expression he watched the black smoke filter and flow between his eyes, before drifting off on an invisible wind. Ponies and griffons didn't smoke a brand Spike had discovered, he had to buy his fags from minotaurs. It was strong stuff. Bringing his left leg up close to his body the purple wanderer rested his left hand on his knee. The cigarette burned down slowly as he stared at the embers that slid off the tip. Spike eventually brought the fag back up to his mouth and took in a deep breath from the plume within, closing his eyes and letting his body slide closer to a back-to-front prone position. Whispering in the distance made him freeze up momentarily, the delicious smoke escaping him as the tension got the better of him. He probably should have expected it to happen so soon but he'd deluded himself. Opening his eyes once more he found himself lost amongst a writhing mass of grubby black hands clawing for salvation. The effigy behind him was bubbling and convulsing in a disgusting manner. What had once been a cathedral on a lake of pure blue had become a flat open expanse of nothingness. Scraggly white trees with needles for branches sprung up here and there, whilst a multitude of decrepit hands and screaming faces formed the landscape. "L̴͇͖̪͎̗̼̙̫̣͕͌͂͑̐̀i̵̙̱̩̥͉͈̗̯͈̳̯̝̝͕̟͇ͧ͗ͤ͛̋̑̏ͩͮͣ̇͑̄ͨ̚͘ͅͅê̸̡̆̿͂́̽̔̑ͧ̽̌ͧ͐͛̐͡͝͏̪͈̻̻̗͈͚̫̭͙̻s̮̮͇̟̟̮̜͕̹̲̮̦͙̪̝̥̯̾ͣ̋̏͗ͭ̕͜͡͠ ̱̹͉̙̟̥̗̺̤͕̜̮͍̫͕̥͊̿ͨ͛̿ͭ̑ͮ̽͒͆͠͠ͅlͪͭ̄̍̈́̄̈̔͒͏̵͉͚̠̺̘͉̖̥͈͍͘i̵̵̶̹͚̲̖͈͉̫͔͎̱̻̱̱̙̩̯ͣ̊̍ͭͬ͢ͅe̵̎̑ͫ̆̈́͒ͫ̏̃̀ͨ͘͟҉̷͇̲̝̫̥̮̱̯̰̼̯͓̦̩̫͓͙s̛̹̲̗̖̣̝̮̫̯̓̊ͯ̌̏̄̊̓͟ͅ ̶̧̮͓̗̰̰̳̱͍̰͔͈͎͐̄ͮ͌͂͘͟͝s̥̺͈̯̳̘̺͓̲̯ͦ͛͌͗̅ͩͤ͗͑͛̃̅̽͂ͤ͛ͨ̕͝o̶̡̯̣͓ͦͨ̄͗̿̎̉̃̒͆̏ͣͫ̓͜͞ͅ ̷̷̧̞̩̱̥͙͕̠̰̍̂̎̎̃ͪ́ḿ̵̨̩̥̰̪͍̼̦̩͇̠̜̯͎̥̋̋̀̄̈́̇̂ͯ̏͝â̢͎̫͉̖̦̺̩̜͈̥̼̪̱͕͔͓̙̹͋̏͂ͩ̄̔̌̎̇̋̓ͩ͑ͫ͆̽͢n̸͚̟͎̹͓͙̩̰̩͖͔̬̖̗͈̹͛̾͊̋ͩ̽̀̿̍ͧ̈̐̌ͥ̿ͩͬ͜ͅy̡͈͚̩̼͉̭̬̜͚͎̮̳͇̣͓͕̹̞ͫ̏ͣ̑̍̈́ͦ̈ͪͮ́͘͟ͅ ̨̅̽͑̽ͩ̒̀͆̚̚͏̨̤̭̻̪̹͕̻͍̭̝̙͓̳͉̫̳͎l̢ͥ͂͑̒̌͢͝͏̱̱̯͚̼̺̱̗ͅͅi̛̯͔̭̥̭̗̤̎̏ͣͮ̏̿̈́̿ͮ̿̔́ͭ̌̋̉́̀͞ẽ̵̆̋̌ͨ҉̷̶̲̙̘͚̜̤̭̞͖̱͕s̡̙̮̯͖̠̍̂ͯ͐̑ͩ̏ͯ͑ͫ̚͝ ̷͑̌ͩ̈́̈́͛̍͠͝͏̩̺̳͖̼̩̞̤̻̳̻͜g̑̾̎ͣͤ̿͆̊͂͏̷̩̠̮̺̰̩̞̗̼̻̣ï̸̪̪̟̳͖͉̂ͦͯͥ͗̒̌̐ͦͮ̅̒́̒̎̌̐́͠͝v̵̹̱̟͔̦̻͖͔̻͇̾ͪ̊̄͊͐͌ͣ͗̎̇̑̓̇̽̒́̚͟͟e̪͈͈͇̘̻͔̰̣̣͇̼̼̲̺̎̔͒̆ͫͤͩ̉ͯͣ͒ͦ̓ͦ́̕̕n̷̨ͩ̇ͤ̃̆̌͒̑ͩ̌̅ͧͭ̿̕͠͏͉̙̻̟̣̯͍̭̼͕̤̖̪̼ͅ ̈̑̂́͗ͯ͛̀ͤ̋ͨͬ̅̅͑͆͊̆̚͢͏̥̫͔̼̤͔̺͔̭̥͘t̷̠̝̝̝̝͎̪͎̂͌̓͗̓̋͆ͬ͒̃̉ͣ͊ͫ̆̽̀͜͞o̴̊͑̃̇҉̛҉̮͓̯͉̫̳̺̗͈̻͙͓ͅ ͇̲͓̝̈̈̎̌̄̏ͭ͋̀̒ͯ͜͞uͦ̂ͦ͑̋͋̄͌̋ͣͨ̈̑̇̊̚̚͏̙͙͈̰͔̱̤̭̠̦̞̲̝͙͎̭͟s̢̨̾͛͐̓̋̾͂̀̉ͩ̇͏̼͓̥͉̮ͅ ̵̢͔̹̩̪̞̞̜̹͈̳̟͔̯̲̤̰̞̽͂͊̉ͤͩ̿͂͗͂ͧ̅̚͘̕͞b̧̰͍̱̼ͯͩͩ͛ͤ̄̓̔y̢̢̘̹̼̩̤͍͓͈̭̰̤͕ͦͫ͌̂͒͗͐̉̿̀͠ ̴̵̧̙͖͎̳͇͈̬͈̏̓̅͊͗̆̇́ͧ̃t̸̷͉̖̗͈̬̯̗ͮ͊̄͆ͬ͛͒ͪ̐́͊̈ͮ͝ͅh͚̤͚͙̭̘̮̙̞̝͕̣̩̞̩͆̔ͬ͞ͅe͈͉̙̦̯͖̖̦ͥͮ͋̒̉̑̊̓̎̀̀͢ ̜̼͕͖̻̫̤̥͕͙̤̮̫̖̒ͧͪ̒̊̾ͭͮ͌̈̅̌̆̎ͣ͑̄͝g̛̰̪̻̘͆̋̔̃̎͛ͪͯ̔ͦͯ̅̾́̀͞͞͝o̡̢͇̼͖̠̼͎̰̟͓͂͌ͭͧͨ͂̈ͫ̃͌̐͜͡ͅd̷̢͕̻̙̤͍̜̈̋ͮ͆͑͆̕ ̛̦̰̙̖̯̝͕̬̲͎̜̗̣̮̥̟͚̖̫̑ͦͫ̇ͥ͂͛̇̚͟hͤ̓͌͊͆ͬ̉̈́̓̆ͩͦ́̉̎̕̕҉̤̺̙̦͍̀i̸͖̺̻̦̤̰͊́̀͑̇̊ͫͧ͘̕͢͜m̴̢̛͉̖̯̟͖͖̜̻̹̭̩͎͕͚̗̜̄ͭ́͂̔̿̎̓͊̔̂̅͜s̴ͬ̈ͮͥ̽͂͛ͯ̔̾͆͘҉͙̰̠͚̗̰̠̱̲̞͕̩̦̩̝͈͙͘ę̵̸̛̫͕̤͈͂̉̑ͧ̇ͯ̔̀l̸̴̘̱̳͓͔͕̳͉̖ͤ͗̋ͨ̏͛ͭ̆̅̔f̛̛̖̗̣̟̲̜͌̃̚͜͞ ̷̷̤̪̣̟̣͖̦͖ͬ̐ͣ̓̒̐ͥ̓̔ͭ͊͆͆ͧͯ̿̀̚̕͟ͅw̶̗͍̰̯ͦͧ̊ͭ̌̅ͩͤ̒͝hͣ̓̑͂ͭ҉͙̟̥͖̝̣͖͇̭̦͕̙̼o̓ͥ̿̒̃͋ͬͭ̒҉҉̵̷̘͚͙͈̟͇̝̘̫ ̵̦͓̫̼͔̣͖̥͍͎͙̯͕̜̓̽̒̇̓ͯ̐̆͐̍̎͝ͅs̷̢͔̲̗̱̲̠̘̗̍ͭͭ̆̈̇͋̄̊͑́̄͆ͥ͐̈́ͬ́͋͢t̵̨̘͉̦̠̺̳͈̦͎̪͖̘̦̣̲͍̤ͪͥ̇̒̀̽̿͌ͥ͒͢͝͞a̵̢̤̝̮̦̘͎͖͉̩̙̰̝̩̗͉̼̫̜̯̓͊̐̐ͩ̈̊͊̓͒ͫ͛͐ͪ͒ͨ̏n̸͙̠̰͈̼̟͇̥̱̗̟͚̳ͬ̋̏̃͐ͩͮ͒͌͡ͅd̛̩̖̱̝̑̃ͣ̏̐ͧ̂̎̎̓̈́͐͞s̢͙̣̮̲̹̘̺̘̠͙̝̤̮͙̙̉̓͐̏̉̽̄͐͟ ̴͉̫̤̦́ͨ̃̂̊ͯ̑͒̈́̄̆͛̚͟͜͞ǔ̞͉͙̠̼͇͕̮̩̏͑ͦ͋̊̀̚͟͞ṕ̴̖̠̖͔̟̺̻̝̮͕̟̣̼̯͇̒͑͌ͬͦ̍̄͞ò̫͎̻͈̬̤͖̰ͪͩ̈́̏̽ͬ̀̚n̴̴͎̱̜͚͖̯̮̘͙͔̬͍̲͆̑̍͐̀̕ ̸̛̮̗̲̫̗̜̭͎̓̓͒̂ͣͣͭ̾̌ͧͅt̄̀ͭ͌͐ͪ͑ͤ͊̑̎̀͗̉ͩ̃ͦ͏҉̢͔͇̦̖͍̹̹̤̣̖̟̯h̷̡͉̥͍̠̰̼̫̲̬̗̬̖̠̭͖̥̰ͨͫ́̑̍́ͬ̎ͫ̈́̽ͪ̓̚̕͟aͣ͒̋͋͋̏ͥ̓ͧ̌͆̌ͨ̒̔̉͏̛̛̥͎͙͓̰̣̗̖t̴̵̨͈̪̝̥̗̣̙̰̝̞̥͚̲̼̰̤͈ͪ͊ͮ͒͋̆ͫ̓̈́̑̈́̊̃̄́͠ͅ ̒̄́̏͌̎̌͆ͦ̓ͧ̋̑͂̚͏̘̗̬̮̺̼̪͕̹̙̘̺͞c̷̣̟̤̳̺͔̞̝̬̮͓̫͚̩̆̓ͭ̅ͩ̈́̓ͫ́͡ŗ̸̸͈̜̻̮͍͊̿ͩ͒ͩ̉̊̊ͬ͘yͮͭ͂̃̀͏̶̹̹͍̣̦̕s̨̡̡̰̜̥̫͓̰͙͕̦̞̭̤ͩͫ̆͐̍̃̏͒̅̔̆̎̇͂t̵̢̮̱̪̲͎ͮ̅̋ͮ̃͋͒̆̓̅͊ͩ͜ȃ̵͕̤͇̬͓̮̩̻̪̘͉̯̺͚̏̐ͪ̌͂͌͗ͭ̄̽͗́͞͝͠l̵͈͖͓͎͓̠̺͒̽̾ͯ͆ͯͮ̀ͨ̓́ͭ́̎̕͜ ̢̛͉̱̹̘̺̜̱̱͙̩͓ͨ͂͑͌ͫ̚͟͞ṫ̿͗̏́͏̨͏̷͇̩͙̝̖h̴̭̫͓̭̝̉̇̎̅̾̌̍͆̑̌́͞͞r̴̸̛̖͕̦̘̭̥̮̀̃ͣ̎͑ͫ̿̿͑̍ͮ͗̈́̋͜ŏͯͭ̽̑͌ͫ̈̎̆̋̍̆͢͠҉͚̜̰̮̙͙̤̜̻ͅǹ̨̗̙̖͇̪̯͈͕̹͙̘̫͊͒̂̎̈́̒ͭ͊͝ͅe̸̘̠̤͍͔͗̂ͥ̇́́͝ͅ ̸̭͙̼͇̫̗͕̜̼̠̞͓̼͑̎ͫ́ͣ̍̓͐̂ͦ̓͐ͯ̍̔͘d͆ͫ̐͑ͣͧ͐ͫͫͨ́͒̌͑ͯͬ̽ͣ̚҉̧̖̺̻͇̭̫̗̭͔̙̥̹̯̹̗͓̟̺̕͟͡ͅe̡̢̞̯̻͎̖̝̰̟͇̠̭̹͎͕̦͈̮͍̓͐́ͧ̆̓̃̏͋ͩ̂͞v̴̝͖̗̳̲̹̱̣͇͕͋ͮ͑̄ͪ͋̂̔̾ͦ́͟͞͞o̧͚̼̣̼͚̝̟̺̫̪ͧ̔ͨ̂́͜͝͡ͅȗ̴̴̴̠͙͍͓̼̣̙͇͙̘̻̥̩̗̭ͧͥ͊́r̵̛̥̭͚̹̗͎̱̥͙͙̰̯̙̞̰̠̐͆̽́͢͝ẽ̵̷̹̰͚͒̉̿ͮ̽͋̓̓͗̂͛̈́ͤ͌̌̚ͅd̴̺͙̱̼ͨ͆̉͌̋ͫ͊͞ ̶̶̿ͣ̌́̏̄̓̈̆̔͟͞҉̬̹͇͔͉̰̘̪͖̺̹̘̜ͅḅ̨͓͖̥̻̭̱̘̹͖̫͔̻̓̂͋ͥͮ̂̆̾̆̎ͤ̍̆ͨ̎ͥ̓͆̕͢͠ỵ͇͈̼͓̖̪̤̮̭͙̺͕̱͖̤̜̄̊͌̐͒̒ͣͪ̀̚̚͟ ̤̗̗̫̣͔̞̭͖̖̩̳̓ͨ̐̾̈́ͮ̇̂̈ͭ͋̒͐͒ͪ́͞ͅt̵͕̬̟͈̙̦̘̫̀͌̄̽̇̋͂ͦͭ̐̆̅̌̂̏̆͌̅́̀̚h̵̨̜͙̲̻̭͇̩̺̭̹̦̙̤̳͎̾̐̿̒͞e̴̗͉̘̥̫̮̰͚̮̙̙̞̲̝̹̔͆̌͟͠ ̮̘̻̲̮̟̣̲̰͉̪͓̥͎͉ͣ͂͋̏̓̂͌̀ͦ̐̅ͭ́̌ͥ̀́͞͡ͅm̵̢̛̜̮̯̱̎ͣ̒̿̏̾͌͒̀͡ͅa̻͚̻͎̠͚̭͗͂̈́̑͞ẘ̧̰͔̝̥̎̄͒́̌̔ͭ̔͘͡͠ ̈́̏̽̋͑͗҉̢̨̦̖͉̠̟̖̺͘o͆ͦ̐̍͆ͮ̀̈͊̄̒̓ͪ̈ͮ̚҉̴̯̘̫̖͟ͅf̙͇̺̗̻̦̠͓̖̰̱̟ͦ͊ͭ́̿̅̀̌̏ͬ͐ͫ̇̅̾ͭ̐̀͆͜͞ ̷̷̖͇̘͕̰̳̦͎̱̮̖̫̮ͪͮ̔͊ͨ̐̑͂ͩͧ̏̍ͪ̆ͫ̚͢ͅiͯ̔̂ͨͬ̏̃ͨ̍̂ͬ̌̃͒͗͢҉̶̧̮͍͎̼̼̮̟̹̝̝ņ̸̨̰̞̮̩̬̜̗̬̟̙̜̟͍̅̂ͮ̎̂́͒ͣ̋ͮ̅̎ͥ͌ͨ̿̋ͨ͟͢f̷̵̷̻͉͕̹ͪͮ̍̏̅ͭͨ̃ͭ̚͜i̸̧̟͈͍̫̤̦̰̩͍͚͉͖̯͓̤͙͚͆̀͐̀ͬͫ́͟ͅṋ̤̣͖̫͈̻̯͒̌͒̂̂̈ͥ͛͊̾͒̈́͜͜͜͡͞i͐ͬ̄̈͗ͩ̅ͤͬ̍̈́̓̋̊̍̓̂́̓҉̨͎͕̤̭͓̝̳̀̀t̢̯̺̫͍͎̮͇͍̬̙͖͚̼̻̘̼̝̍ͮ̌͛ͨͬ͑ͩ̐̅͆ͨͥ͂̀̚̕ͅŷ̸͂͊̀͛̇͜͢͏̯̘̲̜̱̝̰̼.̷̛̝̞͈͍̦͖̝̳̙̗̗̗͓̽͂ͩ͊̓̽̆͋ͩ͗͑̉ ̡̤̗̻̗̣͔̰͚̮͎͉͖͚͇̬͔͍ͯͤ͊̈́͌̇ͦ͗ͬ̑̑̇̔͋̔ͫͨ̂ͦ͟͞ͅͅPͩ͋̐̓̉̊͋ͨͯ̚͏̵͙̫͚̗̪̣̜̫̩͖̕͡r̶̲̰̙̱̟͔͓̹ͯͪ̿͛͋̃ͭ͊̉ͥ̅͋́̚͞͠a͌ͤ͌̊ͤ͏̸͇̯͔̻̙͍̫̫̯̩̮͕̗̫̖ḭ̶̡͇̭̙̱͍̲͖̭̜̫̠̝͙́̄̾͌ͦͮ̐̆̿̈̈́̿̑̍̀s̷̭͔̹̗͖͉̠͇͓̺̣̞̪̯̰̩̼̅̐̾̐̆̍͑ͭ̊̓̏͒̈́̌̌̎̀͠ͅe̶̷̽ͧ͑̏ͭ̾͒ͯ̍̀̽ͨ̈̿̚̕͢҉̘̱̣̻̯̜͔̰̼͓̼̰ͅ ̸̵̦̞̳̘͖̓ͣ̃̒̉͛ͩ̓̑͒̚b̸̷̡̡̞̮̝̝̖̼̱̘̻̦͉̖̱̪ͪ̏̊̓ͨ̌́̎ͧͭ͂̀ͅë̲͇̰̮̘͙͉͉̩͓͓̖̹̪͈͎̭̻́̒͐ͪͦͨ̂ͭ́͟ͅ ̧̼̘̜̣̥͎͆̃͆̅̅̃̏̍͊͞h̾̈ͣ́ͨ̐͌͐̓̆͒̓̆̐̒̂͊̒҉̛̱̩̞̭͎̘͘͘͡į̫̜̣̯̰̱̩̥̘͉̼͉͐͂ͥ̋͠m̵̵̆̔͑͛ͬͩ̓̉͜͏̝̗̭̱̜̥̯̱͔̰̯̳̥͔̮,̢ͮ͛͌̈́ͯ̓͋̒͑ͦͭ̅ͪ̀̕҉̼̟̗̭͎̦̠̲ ̴̡̰̥̫͙̻͖͈̥̪̲̞̉ͬ͛̌̄ͤ̍̓́̔̆̐̌͆͌̇̕p͎̞̬̙̩͉̞̰̻̗͉̰͇̦̳̭͕ͦ̋̄͛͐ͧ́͗̋ͨ͗̆͋̍ͪ̾͞r̛̊͌ͯͫ͋̿̈ͮ̏̾҉̥͔̤̫̹̫̥͍͇͍̜̰͈̰̞̮͡ͅa̴̡͎̱̮̫͉͇̫̲̰͓̦ͫ́ͥ͒̒̀ͤ͛̀̃͊̕͢i͉͇͖͔̩͉̼̝ͩͭͭͯ͂̓͒̊͒̃̑̀͘͘͜͠s̛̩̖̩̳͙̝̫̜̗̏̔̑ͪͭ̿ͫ̈́̿ͤ̋̉͊̓̔͂́̕͟͡ĕ̈́̂͂ͥ̈͒̊̃ͪ̈́͊͑̿͛͐̓ͨ҉͏̴̨͍͍̰̹̮̫͚̙͚͚͡ͅͅ ͨ̓̿́̿͌͌̓ͩͧ̇͏̸͖̻̠̱̫̬̭̰͓̺̺͖͜͟b̏ͮ̇͗͋̉̄ͥ̉̆̽ͤ̈́͗̔̇̚̚҉̷͟҉̝͔͈͙̦͕̫̣̲̰̕e͎̺̥͓͎̩̱͋͆̃̅ͦ͗̿͂͑̓ͥ̑͊ͨ̿͑ͦ̓ͭ̕͠ ̴̦̘̞͖̣̙͙̯͕̰͍̗̯̻̳̞̰̙̈́̀͆̆͊̋ͪͭ̂̏ͬ̏̇̆̕͟ͅh̵̛̞̼͕͎̥̱̖̪̗̹̒͂̈͢͞iͪ͗̄̿̾ͤ͋ͬͦ̓ͪ͑̏ͩͩ̾̚͏̡͉͎͎͙̖͕͚̗̙͉̻͝m̸̩͍̩͓̞̜̏͆͛̑̊̽ͫ̾͊͑ͧ͑̋̅ͥ,̡̡̠͓͕̆̋ͩ͆̽ͥ́̅ͫ̌͢ ̵͑͊́ͦ̚͘҉̳͕̖͙g̃̓ͫ̀͏̨̪̹̯̥̯̞͉̤̞̣̣̣̰̯̩̲o͍̯̭̯͓͕̼̼̜̱̭͔̠̫̥̗̹̙̣ͤ́̎͐̌͐͐̍̄̓̊̂ͯ͐͘͞d̢̗͓̲̙̱̰̫̠̣̩̜͍̮̯͓̖̩͔̳̒̾̓̈́̐́̅̔̾̋͗͗̽̋͛͂̀͠ ͙͙̠͉͓͇͖̤̱͙̝͂̇̈́̈́́͟s̵̴ͥ̀̌̓ͧ̾ͦͮ̾̓ͪ̚͢҉̜̻̫͉p̨̢̺͎̺̮̫̉ͯ̎͑̓̅̅ę̴̶̞͖̳̜͖̼̥̳̪̒͌̽ͪ͗̔̓̎̽̀̌̽ͭ̿̔ͭͬ͜ȩ̨̠̙̜̱̜̦̳̟̱̹̳̟͙̜͒ͮ̾ͧ͗ͭ̂͑ͬͣ͗ͮ̏͊̑̒̕͜ḑ̰̝̖̱̂̆ͧ̄̾͛͒̎͗͗̐̉̊̈ͥͧͪ̕ͅ ͐̐͌̾ͩͯ̿̑͋͜͜҉̩̥̻̲̟̩̣͠͡y̶̶̧̲̖͚̮̟̞̆͛̍̂͊ͨͭ̀͞ͅͅȱ̷̴̦̞͈̳̠̲̺͍͌̇ͣ̚͟u̠͈͚͚̬̠̱̲̲̞͖͙̭ͭ̏̊ͮ̂ͯͤ́ͮ̅͂͒̌͘͟r̶̸̵̻̰̤̱̺̫̱̣͙̘̼̞̝̝̦͐͊̉̃ͪ̑ͦͨͨ̊͋ͫͯ͛̅̇ͩͪ͡ ͋̒͂ͯ̃̌̇ͮ̃ͯ͋̓̃ͯ̂ͩ̚͞͠͏̱̹̳̩t̶̨͖̜͇̥̗̥̟͕̖͍͕͒̉̎̃̈ͨ͝ͅͅi̷̳͈͖͕̳̼̫̥̝̘̹͚͙͔̪̹͑̈́ͨ̂̔ͣͭͣ̀̕n̶̻̫͉̫͇̖̜̱̊͂̎͗͑͛͢͢͝͠y̴̳̪̲̲̰̙͐̓̎ͬ̔ͨ̽̅́̓̐̉͛̀͢ ͍͈̳͔̮͙͕̱͇̯̞̖̻͖̹ͣ̉̏ͣͤ̋ͧ͌́͝ͅf̷̨̤̗̗͈̣͓͓̳͚̘̩̈́̒̃̀ͪ̕͡ͅį̯̞̮͇̥̱͕̜͈͇̳͙̪͖̲̳̗ͮͨ̈̉̾͛͑̽͞ŝ̷̛̼͈̭̮̪͇̳̜̤̩̳͖̇ͯ̿̅͑͒̆ͪ͑̀́͟t̸̹̞̝̯̲͌ͨ͌̉ͭ͞s̷̷̨̛̳̱̩̻͖̮ͪ̿̔̃̈́̋̀̍̿̂ͫ͗̅ͥ̈́" Screaming voices tore at his ears as the entire landscape reverberated with the sound of the ones left forlorn. Tossing the fag aside with a flick of his fingers, Spike pulled his hood up and stood to leave. A hand grasped his ankle as a face appeared below him. "S̽̿̒̿́ͧͬ̀̒ͪ͐ͫ̚͏̨̢̪̥̙̩̰͎̼̲̝̭͖̮̼̖̝͔̳ͅͅa̡ͯͪͥ̓̄̓ͦ̂̋ͮ͆͏͘͡҉̱͔̙̟̼͚̱̮v͚̝̩̭͈ͭͦ̾͐ͥͭ̿̀͠e̛̜̠̲̟͚̖̩̩̦̭͉͈̻͛ͥ̋̊ͯ͐͌̾ͩ ͭͨ͌̓̈̅ͫ͏̶̹͈͔̳̺͢ͅu̷̗̣̳͇̓̓ͪ̆ͮ͒̔͑̉ͩͯ̍̍̎̚͢s̖̥̞̣̤͔̼̗̞̠͍̩̗̀̆̀̌ͣ͛̆͐̈̑ͮ͐̄ͫ̓̓͂̍̇͟͝ͅͅ ̨̨̛̤̱͎̯͍͇̦͓̣̻̲̜̼̼̝͋ͤ͂ͬͯͯͪ͋͂̓̈ͣ̾ͯͨͫ͠y̛̺̮̜̱̤̙̘̞͈̼͚̦͇̓̑̒͆̀̾ͤͫ͒͋̂͒ͥ̂̓ͬ̊͝ŏ̴̷̻̫͓̻̘̘̖̩͈͐̾ͪͤͤ̎͂̈͆̒͋̓ͣ̀ͅu̷̸̘̝̰̫͓͇͕̻̹͈̫͈͚̦͇͔̍ͪ̓͐ͧ̔͜͜͡r̸͔͙̺̞͖̉̋ͦ̓̏ͥͬ͗́ͣ̍̂̊ͨ͛͝ ͍̗͙̥͙̬̳͕̪̠̖̳͇̤̦̞̔ͪͮ͢͜͝g̷̸̣͚̺͙̟̗̫͕̳͕͉̱̤̜̪͖͒̊ͨ͂ͭ̑͑͗̄̇̊͊̄̀̚̚͟͡ŗ̵̸̡͚̜̦̦̥̣͎̥͒̽ͪͣa̵͍͔̲̟͚̘̺͕̙̙̝͋̈͋ͯ̓̉̔̉̎ͧ̿͋́̚͜͡c̛̺̙̤̞͉̙̯̳̯̙̰̻̙̎̆͑͊̽̾̎̕e̷̡̗̬̥͓͈̪͚̤̗̥̽̌ͮ̋ͮͨ͗̂̔͟͟ ̷͍̲̺̝͇̼̟̮̝̞̗̟ͦ̇̒̑̊̄ͪ̈ͣ̎̀͞s̛͈̮̥̩̘̻̰̱̘̖̤͔̩͕̭͎̮̅͂̅͒̿͆͌ͭ̎̑͑ͭ͐̓͂̑͂̌͝å̽̍̂̈́̅ͣ̅̍ͯ̿͊̈́͊ͧ͝҉̸̷̨̥̻͓͓̺v̴̖͕̲̝̖͉͙̘̝̗̣̞̱ͬ̉̈̓̑̉ͯ̀ͣ̓ͣͯ͛̇̐͒͗̊̂͟͜e̸͕̫͔͙̞̜̜̯̼̯̳͕̞̥͌̋͌ͮ̋͌̎ͫͤ̾ͭ̾͌́̐ͮ͠ͅ ̸̸̧̦͙͙̮̜̦̺̗̗̹̭̤̖̂̍͆̈̔̀̅ͥ̆͒ͦ͂̓̽ͧ͛u̷ͭͤ̓ͣ͋̓̋̔̊̒͐̉ͮ͂ͩ̐̂ͥ́̀̚҉̘̤͔̪̦̝͎̞͔̠̜̹̭̼́ͅś̸͇̹̰̭̙̹̹͎͈̥̙̯̟̟̝ͨͨ͗̎ͮ̚ͅͅ ̘͙̜͉̗̰̗͍̩̝̜̟͉͖̽̎̓ͪͬ͌ͤͯ̌̒͌ͨ͘ͅͅf̌ͭͥ̾̎ͯ̀҉̵̡̙͔͕̼͝r̒̎ͧ̊ͦ̇̚҉̷̡͍̮͙͎̘ͅo͊̈́̐ͦͫͤ͐ͧ͌͋ͤ҉̳͕͇̤̲̫̹̗͍m̛̮̲͔͇̥̂ͨ̿ͣ͂ͯ̑ͤ̉̽́ ̸͔̥͇̭̫͚̮̠͖͉̳͚̯̙̝̱̟̃ͧ͋̽̐͟o̶̶̝̭̮̬̙̠͉͖̝ͬ̾̈́ͥ͛ͫ̓̽ͨ̏ͣ͜͜uͦͩ̇̾̓͆̀͏̸̟͓̥̫̠́r̴͂̉ͦͩ̐ͮͥ͛̒͛́ͫͫͬͩ͗́̚̕͏̢̱͔͕̥̗͓̰̹͙̥̻͍̯̝̘ͅs̵̾̿̄̆͛ͫ̌͜҉̶̩̩̯̰͖̙͙̮̠̟̳͞ͅͅḛ̡͓̻̮͈̜͍̫̪̗̰ͩ̔̅͐̔͑ͥ̓̈̚̕l̔̽͌ͭ͏̶̶̡̛̼͍͕͖͇̖̮̘͖̙̜͙̞̹̮̙v̋̽͂͂͆̒͑̎̽͛̾͗̓̅ͤ͂̂͘҉̴̶̞̣̝͠e̢̡͓̦̖̖̅͐͛ͨͮͫ̂͌̏̏̌̽ͪ́̀̚͢ş̸̧̠̪͙̩͈̩͎̬̩̦̙̬̄͊͛́̈͆͐̀́͢!̧͋͑ͪ́͆̈ͩͫ̑͋̾̇ͩ̀ͤͣ̍͛̑͡҉̸̦̖̼͎͈̦͖̬̜̯̗͎̯̯͉" Spike kicked the clawing hand off and sighed, looking over at the landscape. "I don't have time for this," he mumbled apathetically. Blood red sunshine streamed down on the land of black and white, and as he started up at that eye of madness, Spike could only wonder of the implications. Brief wind danced over the fields of suffering. As quickly as the breeze came it left... Spike along with it. Spike was awake. He had to blink a few times to check that he was in fact awake and not in some lucid state, but he was most defiantly awake. Gentle light was streaming in from the ragged blinds that covered his bedroom window and dancing among the dust. For a small while he just lay there with his eyes half open. It was... it was kind of nice. In fact, he'd woken up in a good mood for once. For the first time in perhaps five years he'd woken up without calling out. It felt so surreal to have such a peaceful morning. Maybe it was because he'd seen his sister again, perhaps it was because he'd put his problems with Rarity to rest. Maybe even it was because he'd woken up with a woman in his— Hold up. Suddenly Spike snapped his eyes open and looked to his right. Biting his lip and tutting to himself he found his worst fears confirmed. Amaranth was laying next to him fast asleep and had her arms wrapped around him. Gears in his internal mechanisms stalled and began to clog up as he struggled to get the situation. He'd... slept with his contracted Spirit? More over had he just slept with his best friend? From an outside perspective sleeping with her wasn't the worst thing in the world, but given their situation and relationship, he didn't really know how to feel. Therefore he decided not to feel anything at all and adopted indifference. Laying back down in the bed after his short period of confusion, Spike decided to make himself comfortable and moved in place slightly. Hesitantly he moved his arm around his sleeping partner; although he didn't look at her. Then he merely closed his eyes and let out a small sigh. It wasn't supposed to be like this and he knew that. Deep down inside he never wanted things to change, because the monotony of his old life had been peaceful. But that was part of the problem. It was a false sense of peace harboured by lies. Once he'd seen through it there was no returning to those days. Disgruntled with his own thoughts he brushed Ponyville aside and focused on more important things. What was he going to do now that Rarity and Twilight had found him? He might be forced to switch jobs or perhaps he'd need to leave Equestria again. He didn't mind either option, seeing as he wouldn't have to complete his task for a few months. While trying to figure out which of the two options was more likely due to Rarity's tenacity the bedsheets were moved slightly. Soft and playful yawning tickled his neck as an arm wrapped around his chest. Radiant amber orbs started up at him with the focus of a blind drunkard; obviously unable to see him clearly. "Good morning..." she said with another yawn. Pulling herself closer to Spike she blinked a few times to clear her sleepy eyes, looking up at him a little more focused. "Did you sleep well~?" "Yes," Spike said simply as he sat up in bed. "No thanks to you, though. You've left a bad impression on me, you know that?" Stretching his arms out and flexing his back slowly he smiled smugly. "You didn't want to let go of me, even when I tried to pry you off, no deal." Pressing herself up against his back and placing her head on his shoulder, Amaranth whispered, "Wasn't I satisfactory, master?" "Hey hey let's really not," Spike said hurriedly as he pushed her away. "That's seriously creepy." Rolling over to the opposite side of the bed, Amaranth stood and had a quick stretch before playing with her hair. "Well I suppose we'll just have to sleep together from now on." Her voice was full of cheer as she aimlessly scanned a few items on her friend's shelf. "We'll become even closer~!" Spike groaned and placed his head in his hands. "You're seriously going to kill me, I hope you realize this." Swivelling to the side and standing up slowly, he grabbed a vest off of a coat hanger and slipped it on. "How could I kill you, silly?" she said briefly as she turned to look at him. "I'm not even wearing clothes and you think I'm dangerous?" "You're dangerous because of the sp— Pardon me?" Spike turned around to face her, but quickly changed his mind and decided to keep looking at the manky wall. "Why are you naked, Amaranth?" he asked slowly. She stood in thought for a few moments, playing with her hair while she pondered the question. "I think I got into bed naked. Didn't you notice?" "No, I didn't notice. I was too busy being tired I suppose." Spike was about to tell her to put some clothes on but a sharp knock at the door made him halt. "One moment," he said briefly. "Let's see who wants me." -=-=-=-=-=- "Arrrrgh!" Twilight whined through grit teeth as she slumped into the book she was reading. "I keep finding all these discrepancies and the more I look into them the more... the more heretical everything becomes!" Tossing the tome aside and levitating another one over from the deep white shelf, the young Princess began to flip through the pages with increasing speed. Rarity was sitting opposite her reading a textiles book, although she was skimming it in all honesty; her concern was Twilight. "Darling, what ever is the matter?" she questioned slowly. "I'm not sure I really get all this fuss..." "No, you really don't!" Twilight said in irritation as she threw the heavy book aside and pulled another from the shelf. "I'm struggling to even comprehend how many laws he's breaking by being on our land, let alone how many religious boundaries he's trampling..." Falling into incoherent mumbling as she flicked through the pages the lavender unicorn didn't notice her friend pick up one of the books she'd thrown. Reading the title of Entropy with an unchanging expression, Rarity started looking through the book. She wasn't very good with magic so she failed to comprehend half the runic markings, but it was clear that the book was attempting to teach dimensional magic. "Twilight..." she said slowly, looking up to see her friend glaring daggers at the book before her. "Why exactly is this such a bad thing? It's just some magic." "Rarity!" Twilight practically screamed at her friend. "It's not just magic it's heresy!" "Yes, yes I understand that," she said with a trace of annoyance. "But I'm yet to hear you explain why." Looking over at the pure white mare with an expression halfway between loathing and pity, Twilight closed her book and sighed. "It goes against the teachings of the Solar Throne, doesn't it?" Pointing at Rarity in a condescending manner she continued, "I understand that your parents were hicks, but for Celestia's sake, this is Harmonism!" Turning quiet for a moment, Rarity decided to swallow her pride and push on. "So, Your Highness, what tenants of Harmonism does dimensional magic break?" Opening another book and showing it to Twilight, she spoke up again. "It all seems fairly well thought out." "But it's all lies!" Twilight slammed the book shut with a larger magic pressure, and threw it aside. "Rarity we're facing the first religious crisis in over one thousand years, we can't afford heretics in our midst. Not now." Rarity placed down the other book and went silent as the conversation died off a little. "Misguided beliefs that other realms exist go against the core tenants themselves." Standing from the table they were sitting at in the Royal Library the two unicorns began to put the books back. "It might be against our religion, darling, but it's not against his," Rarity said softly. "He said it himself; it's a dragon thing." Twilight kept putting books back without saying anything. Her eyes twitched now and then as they looked set to cry, but her voice was level when she spoke. "But he's here in our land, our holy city, Rarity. Perhaps if things were calmer we could let him fly under the radar, but one of the Goddesses died, and panic is spreading." "Yes, it was such a shock to hear that Celestia, bless her soul, was killed. Such an open display of deicide was... unsettling." Finishing their task for the moment, the two friends began to walk in silence. It wasn't an uncomfortable silence; more of a remorseful one. Golden arches and shelves of marble filled the imposing library they were exiting. Between four shelves which sloped towards the sky there was a helical spire of soft blue light. It shone upwards into a pure glass orb which levitated at the centre of a black dome. Golden scripture was etched into the sides of the dome and flowed down like water throughout the library, each and every word making up a very sacred message. Sadly its meaning was lost throughout time. Both of the unicorns turned to face the pillar of magical essence as they walked past, bowing their heads as they did so. Once it was out of sight they returned to a forward-facing view and remained silent. This respectful silence lasted until they reached the exit. It was a door shaped in such a way as to appear like stone tree. "Perhaps we should ask Spike?" Rarity said as they left the building. "Let's ask him exactly what's going on and why he returned. He's our friend, and it's our job to find out why he's become like this." "Yes, yes that's it!" Twilight suddenly shouted as she turned to face the pure white fashionista. "The inquisition! Rarity you're a genius an absolute genius. Why didn't I think of it sooner? What better way to deal with a rogue than the inquisition?" Clapping her hooves together with a giddy smile, Twilight set off toward St Clover's Cathedral. Rarity went from a small smile to an abhorrent griamce as she caught up with her friend. "No no no no!" she shrieked. "We need to go there with no ill intention! Twilight dear he's your younger brother, you raised him yourself; surely you're not willin—" "No, that's exactly why I'm willing," the purple monarch said with ice. "He was born and raised a Harmonist, and now he's gone off and filled himself with sin. It's my jo— no, our job... to set him straight." Turning to look at her friend, Twilight nodded in the direction of the Cathedral. "We'll have him by mid afternoon, right?" Biting her lip with a slight sweat Rarity looked away for a moment before looking back. "O-of course, Twilight," she said with a twitching smile. Tied down by invisible chains and gagged with fever, the young dragon found himself in the same place once again. Shadowy figures loomed as a council above him; menacingly whispering just low enough to avoid understanding. Metaphysical traces of death lingered throughout the room and Spike could feel the evil which permeated the room. Imbued with a sense of dread and beginning to panic he tried to move his arms. Unlike before he could drag them upwards, and in a flurry of madness sparked by false hope, he attempted to shake them off. Screaming as soon as he discovered his voice, the pressure that had existed in the room pushed down on him as he resisted. Ice flooded his mind. Ö̴́̅ͫ̇͌͑ͣͫͦ̽ͮͬ̕͏̧̤͚̘̗͉̥͔͍̹̺̳̼̦́ͅP̈̾ͬ̒̏͆̒̈̒̚͏͏̺̣͈͍͚̞̫̱Ḙ̶̢̞̝̼͔̮͎͖͉͔͎͎ͬ̐ͬͫ̔̊̽̓̏ͩͧ̿͢ͅN̷̛̺͍̣̲̳̫͔͕͉͓ͯ̑ͪ̒̌͐ͩ̆́́ ̸̴̣̠̫̝͎̪̬͔̉̔̍̊̍́̚T̶̛̖̭̲̗̝̳̗̲̹̙͉̖̠̺̩̯ͪ͗͆͐̔ͦͧͣ̍͟͠ͅH̞͇͇͚͍̦̳̟̊̂̍̀͜ͅE̸̡̱̫͕̜̱̭̪̓̎̅͌͌̈ͪ͋ͩ̎͒̊͑̇̒ͨ͡ ̨͙̻̠͓̳̦̳̣͙̬͔͚̰́ͣ̚͠W̵̜͚̙̝̼̤̗̮ͮͪ͌̀̉̚ͅO̊̂̇ͥ̔͆̎̽͒͑̽͛ͯ̋̄̋̓͢͝҉̡͖̹̲̰͉̙̝̪͓̻͎̜̩͙̠̯̞͠ͅŲ̬͓͎̻̜̼̗̤̟̤̻̔͂ͯ͒ͬͥͮ͊̎ͯ̾̿N̵̟̝̗̞͉̦̱̝̺̫̺̮̞͚̟͈͐͐̅ͭ̄̍̌̄ͪ̀͘͝ͅͅḐ̶̷̶̒̊ͦͯ̈́ͦ͊͗̅ͩ̊̎͑͏̦̩̣̮̘̘͇͇̣͕̖̯̭̖̺ Black tendrils that fuzzed and blinked out of existence reached towards him. Black became blacker as they blocked his vision and reached inside his head. Too scared to speak, too humbled to scream, he struggled futility. C̷̘̱̼̰͇̼̥͙̲̫͎͍̥̲̎͑̉ͦ̋ͦͩ͆̒ͭ̒̎̓ͥ͌͒̑̍́͜͡Å̯͎͈̰͖̭̗̘͎̖̲̫͚̝̹̥̗̼̠̇̔̽́́̚̕͟͠S̱̞̖͔͈͍̘͔̪̹̲͉̐̓̆͆́̀ͅT̨̛̖͔͓͈̥̤͎ͪ̃̽ͮͧ͝R̴ͪͫ̿̋̈̏͆͊̂̿ͥ͋̔̌͆̚͏̢̨̦̪̞̱̻͈̗̰̟̞̖Ą̢̂͑ͬ̅̑̾ͭ̚҉̥̘͎̼͇̥̜̹͓̙ͅT̶̵̛̻̮̻̺̣͖̟͊͐͗̒͋ͣ̃̄̃̇ͦ͢͞ͅE̸͖̪̺̯ͪ̂́ͫ̀͟͜ ͨͦ̃̑̄̈̎̊̈́ͥ̽̽̃͂ͣ͏̷̜̙͖̘̹̹̱̺̯̭͔̯̗̟͡͠T̸̋̿͗̎͑ͧͥ̉ͨ͊̎̉̇ͯͫ҉̧͍̠̻̩͍͜H̶̰͚͎͔̘̮͕͉̻̺̀͊̽ͤ́̕Ē̅ͫ́͟҉͚̟̠̖̦̝̻̬̙͈̣͝ ̵̺͚̪̮͐͌ͤͣ̈́̾̽͋ͥͩ̂̃̚̕͢͡ͅF̶̶̛̦̻̙͙̥͚́̽͋͛̓L̛̛̫͕͎̰̥̱̼̲͎̗̠͚̟̘̱̮͎̞̒ͦͯͣ̉ͨ̈́̔̈́͑̀ͭ̇̓̅̆̔̚͜͢͞ͅĖ̷̛͎̥̞̲͚̣̣̙ͧͧ̽̃͊̎Ś̢̨͈͔̭͔͎̮̼̲̽̓̆ͫͭͯ̔̆̈̀͝Ȟ̴̨̭̝̩͎̦͓͉̰̩̝̪̹̤̹ͥͧ̓̀͢͝ ͇̣͉̺̻͖̪̖̗̫̑ͣ͛͂͆̎̅̑͐̏̇̇͟͟͠ That which had thrust itself into his head fumbled about within his skull; seemingly searching. Ice began to radiate from the bed slowly whilst the inconsistent whispering that had previously filled the air became lunatic screaming. Suddenly the pressure within his head became unbearable and he screamed in agony. i]͔̹̯̘̠̞̤̺̺̉ͯ̎̏ͧ͐͐͛̐̐́͢]Ḓ̸̷̸̱͈͈̘͈͇̫͉͚͈͖̋ͨ͌͆ͨ͑̅̀̏ͩ͗̌̀͋͢ͅȨ̴̹̱̠̞̓̒ͬ̔̌̏ͦ̎ͯ̍͑̂̄̾͟͢ͅV̸͓͎̘̟̗̖̺͈̦͓͙͍͕̈́̐̎͂͆ͮͤ̀͘͠O̶̴ͯ̀̔̂ͤ̉̒̒ͭ̊͟҉͉̞̩̥͙̭͙̼̥̟̻̭́ͅƯ̫̥̯̠̯̩̥̓̂͛̓̇̈̒ͧ̓̀̚̕͢͟R̯̟͇͙̥̬̺̪̤̪̾ͨ̆͋̓ͧͤ͑̈́͗ͦ̕̕͜ ̡̢̜̗̟͈̯̺̱̓̆̈ͭ̔̂̋͒̓ͨͮ̑̇ͧ͜͝T̶̮͇̱̮̹̹̣̲̝͙̮̣̤͕̗̬̭ͮ͋̈̏̓̓ͮ̆̄ͥ̔̉͐́̕͢͜ͅH̵̨̨̛͖̱͖͎̜͙̪̻͓̐͒͂̇ͫ͂̄̂̒̏̄̿̑͝E̵̢̠̩̦̫̩̦̘̭̻̋̐ͪ̈́̊̇̐̌͋ͭ̈̾͐ͪ̈́̓̌ͫ ̢̈̋͗̅ͯ̽̉ͥ͏̶̱͖̝̝̯̺̝͎̯͈͖̮̘̬Ş͔̘̗̖̝ͮͥͨ͛͗͊ͫ̒̀̉̿̄ͧ̈́̒́͒̓́͢͡Ǫ̶̢̪̬̟̗͈͉̘̬̖̠ͤͦͧ͛͠͡U̷ͧ̋͒ͬͨ̅̿ͩ̌̆̈ͯ͐̄ͫ̅̍͟҉̧͍̠̞̯̺͔ͅḶ̸̘̦̜ͤ̆ͪ̆ͦ͂͗̒͗̃͐̏̂̅̃͛̔͊͝ ̸̢̞̪̹̭̲͔ͬͯ́ͤͅ Triumphant deformed laughter filled the room as the flickering hands ripped themselves free from Spike all at once. Invasive pressure vanished as they did so with a snapping feeling and the shaking and scribble-like black figures slowly moved into focus. Even as his vision was filled with the black spots of an impending sleep, the faces still became clear. It was horrifying. Spike went to open the door only to realize that he'd broken the lock. "Hold on a moment," he said to whomever was knocking. Moving his left hand down to the warped metal he drew a circle with his claw aimlessly. Flicking the shavings off of his claw he drew his arm back and punched the lock. It connected and ripped a hole in the metal. Allowing the door to swing open Spike nearly laughed as the clearly shocked group of hooded ponies were stumbling about. "Are you guys here to sell something?" the purple dragon asked as he leaned in the door frame. "I'm just a humble magicsmith, I ain't got no money worth spending." Suddenly and without warning one of the ponies jumped at Spike and grabbed his midsection. Tackling the dragon to the floor with a great heave the cloaked individual quickly cast a spell and stood up. "Clear!" he shouted to his friends, who all breathed a little sigh of relief before walking into the building. Spike blinked once then twice and stood up slowly. Shaking eyes followed him as he stood and the unicorn who had cast the spell looked pale white. "I let you into my house, you know," he said in irritation. "You could at least have the kindness to tell me why you attack." "The heretic is still conscious!" the leading pony said in horror; apparently deciding to ignore Spike. Looking back at the barely clothed dragon as they walked backwards slowly the group began to chant in low voices. "Behind me the darkness, in front of me the light. As the wheel turns, I know that every end is a beginning. I see birth, death and regeneration." Blinding light enveloped the group of five presumed unicorns as they continued chanting. Spike merely stood in place dumbfounded and tired as the light assaulted his eyes. Becoming more and more irritated by the brilliant light in his hallway, the purple warlock clicked his fingers and sighed in relief as the light vanished. "Wha— aa..." the lead figure began as he trembled. "What kind of monster are you?!" "Oh, now you talk to me," Spike said sarcastically as he finished stifling a yawn. "I told you when I opened the door, man, I'm just a magicsmith. Are we done here? I kind of want to get dressed..." Scratching his hair aimlessly he looked past the group and spotted a certain white unicorn. "You!" he shouted suddenly. Before Rarity could say anything in response, Twilight jumped into view with a snarl. "Spike! Prepare to face the inquisi— wait, what's going on?" Starting in fury and ending in fumble the lavender unicorn looked over her subjects with confusion. "Why are you all cowering like that?" Sighing suddenly and dragging a hand down his face with little pleasure, Spike mumbled incoherently. "So that's what this was about, huh? Let me start over, then." Walking into the middle of the hallway in full view of all the ponies, he dropped to his knees and spoke in a patronising voice. "Oh please, please have mercy! I am not a heretic by choice, nay, nay I was forced!" Throwing his head up and slumping on the floor he let out a mocking wail. "Please Twilight show me grace!" He then promptly stood and brushed himself off. "There you go," he said while picking at his teeth. "Are we done here?" "How very dare you dismiss me! You foul breathed purple fleshed lizard!" Twilight huffed angrily as she stepped over the trembling forms of her 'inquisition'. "Get out of here, you useless fools!" she screeched as she flicked her tail in anger. "You have failed both myself and Celestia." The five cloaked figures dashed off in a hurry as Spike chuckled to himself. "That was a little harsh, Twilight," he said to himself more than anyone else. "Welcome to my humble abode, I suppose. Do you want tea or coffee?" Twilight didn't say anything as she stared Spike down. "I want you to give yourself up, heretic," she hissed. Rarity slowly made her way inside while the two former friends looked at one-another with opposite expressions. "Your being in these lands is going to cause all kinds of trouble. Turn yourself over, and after we're done, you can walk off unharmed." "So... I take that as a no for both options?" Shrugging and walking back into his home he merely said, "suit yourself." "Don't play with me Spike! I'm older and wiser than you!" Screaming at him in the Canterlot Voice, Twilight pushed onwards into his flat. Rarity carefully followed her without a word; she didn't want to get involved right now. Spike had stopped walking. Twilight was about to shout something else but he turned, and in that brief instant, her words died in her throat. A thousand mile stare skewered her in its grasp and ripped her apart before him. She was no longer looking at the eyes of Spike; they were different entirely. "Older...? Yes, you're much older than me Twilight." "Wiser? Don't be so presumptuous as to amuse the thought that your false ideals and childish morals can even hold a candle to the things I have seen with these eyes." Walking over to the unicorn who was trapped on the spot, frozen in horror, he ran a finger up her neck. "I have seen so many things." Twilight stumbled backward and cried out. Determined not to make a fool of herself, seeing as this journey was her idea, she calmed herself. "Your heretical beliefs are nothing compared to my power! I am the Princess of Equestria, and you will respect my authority." "Oh, but of course, Princess." Spike laughed suddenly as the word 'respect' flashed in his mind. Opening his mouth to speak once more, the feeling of warm skin against his back and a shriek from Rarity made him pause. Amaranth had her arms wrapped around Spike from behind with her head resting on his shoulder. From what he could guess she was still naked and judging from this position she was on her tiptoes. "Master..." she purred in a sultry tone. "Who are the new guests~? I was... recovering, from our night together when a loud scream awoke me." I'll kill you, Spike said to her in the back of his mind. Rarity and Twilight were both standing with their mouths agape as they stared at the scene before them. "B-b-b-b-bu," Rarity began as she tried to work out what was going on. "Ah, Rarity! Good timing, this is my Spi—" "I'm Spike's girlfriend," the gentle pink woman said as she looked over at the pure white unicorn. "It's so lovely to meet you, darling. Spike has told me the most abhorrent things about his time with you," Amaranth chuckled to herself and whipped her barbed tail around. I'm seriously going to kill you, Spike said more harshly in his mind. Only the light gasp from his companion made him aware that she'd heard him. "Ahaha, yes yes, she's such a joker this one. She's actually my contracted Spirit, you see, but I still haven't tamed her just yet." The word slipped out before he realized it, and he bit his lip with a 'tch' as his mischievous friend made a 'kyun' sound. "This changes nothing!" Twilight suddenly shouted as she pointed at Spike accusingly. "You're a heretic, I'm a Saint! We're going to crack down on you for this transgression onto holy land, drain you of your secrets, and throw you out wishing you were dead!" -=-=-=-=-=- Pillars of breathtaking platinum and glass swooped upward in unison and met beneath a gentle slope of golden grace. From this golden peak sprouted a series of smaller towers and arches, all of which ended before they hit the clouds. One impressively large tower, supported by numerous pillars and feeding aqueducts of all sizes, managed to just brush against the clouds. However Spike was not in this lovely cathedral of peace, love and harmony. Rather he was sitting in a dungeon cell somewhere beneath the large and beautiful holy building. There was no sound down here besides the dripping of slimy water, the frantic shouting of condemned heretics and the heavy breathing of Twilight Sparkle. One side of the cell he found himself in was a series of steel runes that lined all four sides of a perfectly rectangular opening. Shimmering air was all that sat between the runes yet it formed a near-unbreakable barrier; to ponies at least. The other three walls were rocky and offered little comfort besides damp. One bunk was squashed into the corner, but it was too small for Spike, so he was using it as a seat. Because of the problem with size and the fact that the cell itself was so small, he was squashed up besides Amaranth. Seemingly enjoying herself and now fully clothed, Spike didn't mind so much but the stares from Twilight, Rarity, and the guards were annoying. "How long was I supposed to sit here, again?" he asked in boredom. "You had the good will to turn yourself in... don't ruin it by pestering us while we work." Twilight stared at him from the hallway emotionlessly. She hadn't moved from that spot for a rather long amount of time and seemed dead set on unnerving him. So far she'd only managed to piss him off. Stretching out an arm and feeling it brush against the cramped ceiling he kept complaining. "No seriously how long is this going to take? I only have a very short time slot to spend in Equestria before I leave again." There wasn't any real weapons to be seen around him, so if push came to shove, he'd have to rely on his companion. He couldn't use magic here for fear of the result. "Stop playing it by the book and tell us what we want to hear, heretic," said one of the burly guards outside the cell. Spike was fairly sure he'd heard his voice before but unless he saw him he wouldn't be able to tell. Seconds became minutes as Spike made no move to speak, merely sitting in the cell. Rarity came closer to the entrance and tried her best to smile but failed miserably. "Spike, why don't you tell us what's happened these past few years? Maybe there's something we need to clear up?" "I thought I told you to leave me alone," he said coldly. Dragging a claw along the rocky wall as he stared off into space, the young dragon sighed. "Twilight's completely right Rarity. I'm not denying the fact that I'm a heretic in the eyes of Harmonism." He stopped his claw and looked her in the eye. "I'm denying the religion in and of itself." "What?!" Twilight screamed as she nearly gagged. "You're denying the practices of the Solar Throne? What kind of monster have you become, Spike?" Laughing to herself Amaranth looked over at the purple unicorn with a smile. "You're assuming being a monster is a bad thing, Twilight. I'm a bad person, horrible, inexcusable... but because of that there's so much more to me. I have looked upon all things presented to me, sought out that which was hidden, but never striven to understand everything." "What are you insinuating?" Rarity asked with more curiosity than concern. "Harmonism is a religion that denies everything in the world," Spike said simply. "I'm merely telling you that I'm unwilling to blindly follow a faith built upon a throne of lies." Running his hand through Amaranth's gentle orange hair the scaled warlock looked at Rarity with disinterest. "There's nothing beautiful about your religion." Twilight slammed her hoof into the barrier and didn't flinch as it flickered and sparked in protest. "How dare you! You would speak of Celestia's teachings so disrespectfully? Why shouldn't I kill you as you stand?!" Throwing a ball of energy at the invisible shield with more remorse than anger she held back a sob. "Don't think I won't!" "Twily there's no reason t—" "There's every reason to kill me, Captain Armour," Spike said with a small smile. He finally recognized the voice of the guard who'd brought him here. "I stand against everything she's ever believed, I mock the Goddess who turned her into a mare and I sit here telling her that her entire world is a lie." Shining Armour walked into fully view and wrapped an arm around his now crying sister. Burying her in his chest with a light grimace he looked over at Spike. He wasn't angry. It was that look that an older brother might give when he wants to know the full story. Spike could respect that. "I'm not particularly devout myself, heretic," he said slowly. "So I'm willing to hear you out before we make any rash choices." "You ever meet a griffon, Captain Armour?" Spike asked genuinely. Thinking on it for a moment before shaking his head the Captain replied, "No, I haven't." "Why do you think that is?" Spike let the question hang in the air for a few moments before he smiled. "It's because ponies are the most disrespected race on our planet. Your society is so utterly pathetic that a lot of nations can't be asked with you. Your three races are inferior in all fields, a mere jack-of-all-trades among the world stage of masters." "You ever hear a story of a pegasus racing a griffon? No, because they already know who would win." Twilight was visibly trembling but her elder brother was wearing a more serious look. "Ever see an earthpony challenge a minotaur? No, because they'd be crushed by such strength." Standing suddenly and earning a surprised 'meep' as his friend fell over in his absence, the snarling dragon walked up to the barrier and smirked. "You ever see a unicorn outdo a dragon?" Twilight was about to reply but her voice died pitifully as Spike shattered the barrier with his claw. Millions of tiny magical energies exploded outwards as he stepped out and stared down at her. "No, because a dragon can kill with a thought." Rarity looked up at Spike and mumbled something. He looked down at her with a raised brow but she remained silent. "Don't feel too bad, Twilight," Spike said with a genuine smile. "You're nothing compared to me. Pitting yourself against me is like trying to argue that stone is superior to the sun; it's absurd." "Why are you in Equestria?" Rarity whispered under her breath. She knew she shouldn't be asking too many more questions yet something drove her on. "If we're so inferior to you then why are you here?!" Spike looked over at Rarity and smirked. Amaranth wrapped herself around his left arm and looked over at the pale unicorn also. "You sure you want to know the answer to that?" His jade pebbles stared deeply into her eyes as he stood there. Shining Armour was about to say something but his sister cut him off. "Tell us," she choked. "Tell us right now." "I'm here to kill you, Twilight." Rarity fainted a few moments after he finished whereas Twilight was still in a state of shock. Shining Armour was preparing to murder Spike and Amaranth was blushing slightly as she looked up at Spike. "Don't worry though Twilight, I'm not planning on killing you yet. I have a few things to sort out first." "What things? What do you mean you're going to kill my sister?!" Shining Armour shouted as he shoved the dragon back harshly. "What kind animal thinks killing someone is a small matter?" Spike laughed and bit his thumb and drew blood, using it to draw a quick rune on Amaranth's palm. "No no, I'm taking my job very seriously Captain Armour." He smiled and looked down at Twilight. "After all I'm the one who killed Celestia."
ReverenceResting in a crest between the mountain and its neighbouring hillside some creaking wood and battered shades law strewn about. Ghastly ripples arched up from the warped smooth stone surface and formed an unnatural circle. Shingle covered the depressions in the mountain while dead saplings spread their fingers. Scattered about as if thrown about a number of old pages lay in the shade of a giant tree. It reached up so high as to touch the heavens with the decayed leafs. As the unnatural breeze blew through the screaming branches small drops of black tar gently trickled from the leafs. A cover of bark the colour of dusty tomes; cut through by a knife of gods. Fog rolled in from a place unknown to mortals and gently danced about the mountaintop ice. Slowly the rolling blanket of mist travelled down the side, reaching a forlorn forest of dense undergrowth and intrigue. Amidst the clearing of peculiar stone sat the lone figure of Spike. His hood was up across his head and his lips curled into a smile. Carved silver formed a zippo in his hand; which he flicked open and closed. "Have you lost purpose, Moros?" Spike didn't look up at the giant snake which occupied the clearing. "Moros? I keep telling you not to call me that." Closing the small device and pocketing it he patted the alter beneath him. "Want me to set you free?" Resounding laughter bounced about the stone. "Oh you tease, Moros. It is impossible to undo the seal here, you know that better than anyone else." "You're chatty for a deity, you know that?" Spike looked up at the snake flatly. "Maybe the reason they sealed you here was to shut you up." Once more the laughter filled the area. It had the grating sound of rocks and pebbles. "No, no. It was not a god who sealed me; it was something much worse." Leaning down over the dragon a pair of scarlet orbs stared down sorrowfully. "At the very least my last patron had dignity. You stop at nothing, Moros." Looking up from his feet Spike scanned the rugged terrain. His eyes drifted over the numerous dead snakes stabbed into the rocky plinths, outcroppings, and chasms. They were fresh and bleeding; frozen in time. "Gods ask that you make sacrifices, no?" Looking back up at the huge snake the dragon remained devoid of expression. "What better way to awaken an old god than to sacrifice his servants?" "So many sacrifices. Are you sure you weren't making a statement to others?" Looming over the mortal body the deity tasted the air. "I awoke the first time yet you made me watch." "I hate snakes," Spike spat as he looked back down. "Nasty little things that'd rather bite you than let you by." Coiling itself back around the large tree slowly the snow white snake rested its head upon the dead branches. "They weren't ordinary snakes, Moros, they were parts of my soul." "Hebi... the snake god who binds and constricts the fate of mortals." Rising from the archaic alter the purple dragon licked his lips in the frosty air. "I'd have preferred never to meet you but times change." "So do you. Why I remember the first time you set foot in this place...." Laughing in a mocking tone the giant snake looked up at the mist. "You used to be a very nice boy, didn't you? Now you have an inch of your life left and the personality of wallpaper." Spike grit his teeth and cursed. "I'll turn your skin into wallpaper if you're not careful." "Oh, how scary. Is that what you said to Discord when you killed him, too?" Flicking its tail and chuckling the immense god probed Spike. "At least that's what everyone thinks you did, isn't it?" Spike stood from the altar and looked down at it with mixed emotion. "He wasn't a bad guy, you know? Barely spoke to him before the wind carried him off... but he was alright." "Mm, that he was." There wasn't much more to say on the subject as the mist continued to roll in. "What do you plan on doing, then? There's only one left now and it's already within reach." The god of fate wrapped itself around Spike and spoke venom. "Are you going to take your time?" If the cold leathery skin agitated him Spike made no indication of it. "We have forever to spend together. The mortal realm is just what holds it all in place." "I suppose you didn't sell three quarters of your soul just to be held back, then." Letting Spike go without a word the deity merely looked down at him through dead eyes. "Use it wisely." "As if I wouldn't, Hebi." Touching the altar for one last time the jaded dragon made his way toward the steps. His figure slowly being engulfed by the mist as mid-morn rain slowly started to fall. Slipping down the branches as the bound god was forced back into the alter, his skin stripping and flaking as the blood rose up and sunk into the stone. Two eyes stared out across the forlorn clearing before they too were sucked in. His last words to Spike were, "Don't repeat your mistake, Moros." "She still hasn't calmed down?" Shining Armour nodded and levitated a stack of papers to his subordinate, Flash Sentry. "That is correct, Lieutenant Sentry." Sorting out a few other papers as the young unicorn began reading his own, the Captain continued. "We're going to consider this threat a legitimate security concern from today onward." "Surely we already considered him a security concern, Sir." Without looking up from the paper he was reading the young guard sighed. "Yes, you'd think we would have, Lieutenant." Gritting his teeth as he finished gathering the stray papers, Captain Armour placed them down on his side of the table. "I suppose we just never saw him as a threat. Everyone thought he was dead." Moving his paper slightly and looking his superior in the eye, Flash Sentry grimaced. "Dragons never die, Captain." "Careful, Flash, that's heresy at its finest." Shining Armour levitated a small mug filled with lukewarm coffee to his lips, taking a brief sip. "Not like lugheads such as us would understand what that meant." Chuckling slightly and scanning his eyes down the report, Flash Sentry couldn't help but agree. "Yeah... I don't even understand what half of this stuff means." Spotting a particularly complicated phrase he sighed dejectedly. "What's a contracted spirit?" Captain Armour tried to find the phrase on his paper, scanning for a few moments before raising his eyebrows. He muttered a curse and looked off to the side. "One minute spirits don't exist, the next minute there's a dragon walking around with one." Looking back down at the report he paled. "We might be in over our heads." "Maybe we should ask your sist— Princess Sparkle, for some help?" Moving on to the next report in the pile Lieutenant Sentry started reading again. "She's supposed to be a magical genius, right? I bet she'll be willing to help out once she's calmed down." The mid-afternoon breeze made the young subordinate shiver, and it was only after the silence dragged on for a few minutes, that he looked up to see his Captain's torn expression. Flash didn't say anything as he started reading the next paper in the pile; it was about rural disappearances. Shining Armour took another sip from his coffee mug and sighed. "Twilight is the smartest idiot around, Lieutenant. I doubt she'll be of any help." About to say something but perhaps realizing it was a bad idea, Lieutenant Sentry merely nodded and kept reading through his report. "Still, this guy... Spike, was it? He seems like a pretty bad deal. We know hardly anything about him currently, but from what your sister managed to disclose, seems like we're up against something serious." "You know, it's been bugging me for a while, but hear me out." The dim orange subordinate blinked in surprise and perked up as his Captain voiced concern. "Of course, Sir." Taking a deep breath Captain Armour continued. "King Sombra didn't show up in the end, did he? We saw all that evidence that he was going to come back and then... nothing. That was about the same time my wife died, too." "Are you saying you think the two events are connected, Captain?" Flash didn't doubt his superior but the idea was a little out there. Shining shook his head. "No, but I do think the fact that Sombra didn't turn up is concerning." Pulling up another report and handing a copy to his subordinate Shining grimaced. "This is something I dug out of the archives. We have barely anything on Spike during the time he was serving Twilight, but this is what we do have." Flash started reading the hefty document he'd been handed. After about three or so minutes he furrowed his brow. "He disappeared ages ago, comes back threatening to kill the Princess, and even when he lived here we know nothing about him?" Sighing and dropping the paper the young soldier looked fed up. "This is all just info about how he was a nobody." "Yet somehow he became a somebody, right?" The Captain stood from his seat and walked over to the nearby window, looking out over the city calmly. "We're being kept in the dark, Flash." Turning to look his subordinate in the eye, Shining ground his teeth in frustration. "Someone doesn't want us to know the full story." "Would that someone be anyone in particular, Sir?" asked the orange upstart. Walking back over to the table and looking down at the document they'd been reading, Shining Armour changed topic. "We're going to head down to the archives, Lieutenant. Someone is hiding things from me and I want to know why." Levitating the papers back into a neat pile he cast a glare towards Flash. "I'm going to use all my authority to find out just what in the hell is going on." "Sir!" -=-=-=-=-=- Rarity was going to see Twilight. She'd put it off for a few days while she tried to get her bearings but now was the time. From what she'd heard Twilight wasn't leaving her room, and no matter the circumstances, that was always a bad sign. Rarity had hoped to speak to Fluttershy about everything, to vent, but the meek yellow mare was nowhere to be found. She'd vanished. Rarity had a very bad feeling about that. Maybe it was because the Guard had reported sightings of a purple wanderer near the Everfree. Maybe it was because Fluttershy was more knowledgeable about the world than her... or maybe it was because the aforementioned soldiers had never reported back. All this and more was racing through Rarity's head as she approached the door leading toward the living quarters. Deep within the Canterlot Cathedral of Harmony, down past numerous doors, guards, and pilgrims; one might find the overly extravagant door leading toward the living areas. Priests, monks, and the odd Saint or two took residence here. Not being a particularly religious mare, Rarity felt no amount of humbling as she stopped before the pearl door. "Excuse me," she said in her politest tone. "Could I enter the quarters, please?" Smiling in a simple yet courteous manner, while the soldiers looked her over, the well dressed fashionista did not fidget. "I'm a close friend of the Princess, you see." One of the soldiers widened his eyes and gave a small nod. "Ah, yes, Saint Rarity. You'll have to forgive our slowness. We've been bombarded by pilgrims these past few months and... well ponies tend to blend together after a while." "No problem at all, darling." Smiling as widely as need be she walked through the now open door. "I'm glad you take your job so seriously. The world needs more ponies like you." A monotone grunt was the only response she got as the door swung shut behind her. Rarity huffed quietly but carried on forward. The inner most part of the cathedral was laid out before her, and it was honestly breathtaking. She'd been here numerous times before but it still looked outstanding to her. Inlaid gold surrounded exquisite oil paintings depicting scenes from holy scripture. Red velvet drapes were hung throughout the long hall and across the walls beside the doors. Ornamented stands showed off relics of lesser calibre and held necessary religious items, such as basins. Thirteen doors lead from the lavish hall and into private quarters for the current cathedral residents. Skivvies had their quarters elsewhere, however. As Rarity washed her face using one of the studded basins a bell rang throughout the cathedral. From somewhere almost ethereal she could hear the sound of bells, chanting, and prayer beads. Gently spreading the purified water across her features the pale white non-believer tried to block out the noise. This was why she rarely visited the cathedral. Something about the chilling atmosphere given off by the near absolute silence. A feeling of wrongness that permeated the entire building, the entire area, and sent shivers down her spine. Standing before the heavy golden door which lead to the Princess' quarters, Rarity quickly made sure her mane was done up correctly. Then, she knocked thrice and called out. "Twilight, darling," she said sweetly. "I've come to visit. May I come in?" The door opened by itself. Spike could feel it now. Digging, digging, unwinding his soul. Tiny claws beneath his rippling skin climbing higher, higher, higher into his skull. Veins bubbled and burst beneath his scales, frothing from their open maws and allowing more of the poison to crawl in. Shambling down the infinite stone hallway he futility tried to escape. Tiny bubbles were escaping from inside him but he couldn't put them back in. Thick roots like chains wrapped up and around him slowly, giving him enough time to scream in agony as they slipped through his wounds and into the veins. Wriggling up and through his body the coarse wood morbidly began to take root within him. From his stomach blossomed the seed of pain and envy. Black slimy tendrils grew up his throat from within his body, grasping hold of his lungs to suffocate him, protruding out his mouth as his body covered with buds. Something grew from the black protrusion, a ghastly white eel, covered in bristles and spines. Deformed teeth ran the length of the head whilst a pair of malformed and bulbous eyes looked Spike over. With a terrifying and primal screech the creature drove itself into his eye socket. Devouring his eye and lodging itself into his skull, Spike couldn't even scream in agony; his vocal chords now overgrown. Wriggling about and screeching in delight as it began to devour him whole, Spike felt as if a thousand suns had been forced into his head. Millions upon millions of voices seemed to rise and swell like a coming tide, his scales were becoming dry and brittle as his life was sucked free. Blooming inside his mouth a pair of new vocal chords gave life to a horrendous screaming, wailing, and moaning. Anguished cries fell on deaf ears as he felt himself consumed. His bones and their marrow became the channels through which the poison could run, the frothing wounds now spreading out deformed muscle. Skin and scale collapsed in on itself, bent, twisted, and reformed to show an array of white flowers. They spread out across an invisible wind, and the newly made Spike was laid to rest amongst a clearing of still rolling hills. He tried and failed to stand. Vomiting up the black, the tar, the eel and the root. His eye grew back into place and his scales regained their texture. He was merely left alone, kneeling in a forest of the gods. He'd been tortured, murdered, slaughtered, interrogated, scrutinized, and finally reborn. Flash Sentry looked up from the pile of books he'd been scanning through. "Sir," he said briefly as he waved over his superior. "I might have found something relevant." Pointing at one book in particular he continued. "Come take a look, will you?" "Excellent timing, Lieutenant Sentry," Shining Armour said in a low tone as he trotted over to his subordinate. "I've also found a few things that may be of interest, although I wanted your opinion on them." Letting his magical aura go a small number of parchments, a book, and a small rune landed with a collection of 'clunk' noises. "What have you got for me, then?" "Well..." Flash looked at their surroundings for a moment before sighing. "Before I tell you what I've found, why don't you tell me where we are? I haven't gotten a word out of you since we entered this library." He gazed up at the intimidating black pillar between the four central bookshelves and shivered. Captain Armour grimaced and bit his lip. "This is a place only known by one name, 'Pantheon.' It is the place which houses the knowledge deemed heretical and unfit for consumption." Looking back at the ominous black pillar Shining Armour carried on. "It was not made by us, nor anything we know of; it merely is." "What does that mean?" "I don't know," Shining said with a tremble in his voice. "This place defies a lot of our own beliefs. Luckily for me and you, we're a little too thick to understand any of this." Both stallions shared a hasty laugh before looking back at their work. "What a place to build a city on, though..." Flash Sentry raised his eyebrows. "A city? How large is the Pantheon?" "We don't know that, either. Once the religion really got into full swing it became illegal to even talk about this place." He grinned ear from ear as his subordinate drained of colour. "We're the law, though, so I'm sure if we looked long enough we'd find something." Pointing to the book Flash had pointed out his smile dropped. "What did you find, then?" Clearing his throat the pale soldier focused. "Yes, r-right. I found a book that mentions dragon magic, although you're not going to like it, sir." Captain Armour raised an eyebrow but remained silent. "It appears what you were told is correct. The difference in power between a dragon and a unicorn is... well, to put it bluntly, it's like comparing an ant to a sky whale." There was a pause but the cloaked Captain motioned for him to keep going. "If we consider him on the lower end of dragon ability, then you could possibly rout him by attacking him with... well, every able unicorn." "...and that's assuming he's even a normal dragon," Shining said with disdain. "Sir?" Opening a very brittle and cracked pile of scraps, Captain Armour sighed. "This is am extremely old text, dating back so far as to be of an entirely different time measurement system. It was written whenever the year two hundred and seventy seven E.S. may have been." Letting the information sink in for a moment Shining went through the pages in a gentle manner. "It speaks a lot of mad gibberish, and has quite a few diagrams I don't understand. But a few things made sense. From what I can gather it's a book about gods." "My mother would kill me if she knew I was accepting the idea of gods besides our own," Lieutenant Sentry muttered swiftly. "Why do you think that's important, then?" "I also found a few books on spirits, you see." Opening the aforementioned books he laid them out between Flash and himself. "But of these five books I found, only three of them mentioned anything vaguely similar to what I saw." He then pointed at one book in particular. "Even then, only one of the books, a journal no less, gave me information on what she was." Flash blinked a few times as he chewed his words. "You mean the demon you saw, right? The tanned bipedal thing?" "According to this journal, she's not a demon. She was a seraph." Sentry's jaw nearly hit the floor. "Come again?" Shining pointed back at the pile of scraps apparently a book on gods. "In this text there's a supposed list of gods that the author knew of, or believed in. One of them was called Olympus, and It was said to govern time," Shining chuckled and digressed slightly. "I say 'It' because there's no gender. I only spotted one or two legible entries in this book with a gender." Flash grinned slightly but kept his tone level. "So, why is this 'seraph' of ours so special? Is she some kind of almighty angel of conquest?" Shining's face dropped suddenly and he sighed. "That's just the thing. She's supposed to be a by-product of Olympus. See, look, just here." He pointed to a faded set of glyphs in the torn book. "She's listed as related to this god. Maybe we should call her their daughter? Anyway, she's directly associated with the god of time." "That's not so bad, right?" Lieutenant Sentry chuckled and patted Shining on the back. "She's probably just the seraph of seconds or something. If she's being dragged around by a dragon, no matter how powerful they might be, she can't be anything major." Lighting his horn up and floating a smaller, more well kept book over to Flash, Shining Armour spoke in a morbid tone. "This journal was written by Starswirl the Bearded, about two thousand years ago." Flicking through the pages until he found the one he was after, Shining looked his subordinate in the eye. "During his trip to the Whitetail Woods, he met a woman called Amaranth. He's talked a lot of fluff about the encounter, but most worryingly, he comments on her name especially." "Why?" Flash asked with a tilt of his head. "What's so important about her name?" "Amaranth is a legendary flower that blooms on Olympus. It lives forever, never wilting, never effected by the seasons." He then turned to the book and read aloud, sending a chill down Sentry's spine. "'What a lovely flower is the Rose, a favourite alike with Gods and with men. I envy you your beauty and your perfume.' The Rose replied, 'I indeed, dear Amaranth, flourish but for a brief season! If no cruel hand pluck me from my stem, yet I must perish by an early doom. But thou art immortal and dost never fade, but bloomest for ever in renewed youth.'" -=-=-=-=-=- Rarity was seated on a pile of velvet cushions and before an intricately decorated pearl coffee table. She was sat opposite Twilight who now had her mane and coat in tidy fashion, much to Rarity's delight. It'd taken a very long process of begging, shouting, insisting, and explaining to make Twilight stop working; and an even longer process to make her clean herself up. Still, now the two friends were sitting around a table, drinking coffee in a calm manner. Nothing could possibly go wro— "So, Spike wants to kill me," Twilight said as she put her mug down. Dammit. "Y-yes, so I heard darling. I was there after all." Rarity nervously chuckled as she finished speaking, putting her mug down in kind and smiling as best she could. "But we really shouldn't worry about such a silly thing. I think we should focus more on trying to figure out how to treat him properly." She almost screamed as Twilight's look became a glare but managed to keep her cool. "He's being violent for a reason... so let's figure out why." "Oh, I agree," Twilight said with an edge in her voice. "That's a great idea Rarity. Why don't we ignore a death threat from a heretic and instead focus on how to make him happy." She scornfully laughed and looked the pearl unicorn dead in the eyes. "You could win awards for such brilliant ideas." Rarity bit her lip but kept her resentment in. "Twilight, we're all Saints of Harmony. We just need to figure out how to reform Spike and the—" "Reform?" Twilight said harshly. "Oh, yes, let's reform a heretic to our religion. Wonderful, truly outstanding. We'll make a murderous savage into a peace loving Harmonist." Taking a long sip from her coffee and taking a deep breath, Twilight sneered. "It's not going to work, Rarity." Rolling her eyes at Twilight, Rarity next tried to console her. "It's not your fault, Twilight, dear. With the Elements of Harmony we can defeat anyone, even Spike." "I'm well aware of that," Twilight said slowly. "But we can't use them for this." "Pardon?" Rarity asked with some disbelief. "Darling, even with your magic, we can't defeat Spike witho—" Twilight huffed and cut Rarity off with a sharp dismissive gesture. "My magic isn't capable, you're right, but more importantly we can't reform him. We could try turning him to stone but with that spirit around I doubt it'd work." Her face fell slightly and she slumped on the table. "At this rate I might have to use the Alicorn Amulet." "No, Twilight I'm not going to let you do that." Rarity took Twilight's hoof into her own and tried her best to smile convincingly. "Friends don't let friends hurt themselves. We'll do what we always do. We'll use the magic of friendship to right the wrongs, okay?" Twilight smiled meekly and looked up at her friend. "You're right Rarity. I just... I just wish this was all a bad dream, really." Sitting upright and drinking the last of her coffee the middle aged Princess levitated a small check-list over to herself. "I'll issue nation wide search for Spike. If we're going to solve this problem, no matter how, we need to know where he is." -=-=-=-=-=- "C'mon," Amaranth said sweetly as she grabbed Spike. "You know you want to~!" "Haha, no," he said flatly. "That would kill me. Seriously. Goodbye. Spike's dead." Pushing her off and standing up from the bed he looked out over the river, and smiled. "Still, at least we're somewhere nice, right?" Amaranth looked out from the balcony and watched the horizon intently. Her tan skin shone in the afternoon sunlight as her deep green eyes looked off to a place immaterial. "You have a funny sense of location, you know?" she said with a smile. "You'd normally think a lake filled with dead souls was a horrendous place to visit." "'S a nice view, though," he said jokingly as he pointed at the lake. "Just look at it!" He spread his arms wide in an exaggerated fashion, before grabbing Amaranth by the shoulders and turning her toward the lake. "Look at that. Look. It's premium real estate as far as the eye can see, with a view almost as grand as a calamity." She brought a hand up to one of his own, turning around to press up against him, wrapping her fingers between his. "I'm more interested in what's on this side of the room," she said softly. Looking him in the eyes she tried her best smile. "Please?" "No, it's not happening." He let go of her hands and grinned slightly, walking to the old sofa and sitting down. "I'm not ready to die just yet, y'know?" Picking up a small blue gemstone he rolled it between his fingers and smiled contentedly. "I ever tell you how much I love this?" Rosy blush spread across Amaranth's face as she fiddled with her hair. "That old thing? I gave that to you ages ago..." "Yeah, I know." Bringing it up to his eye and looking through it, Spike kept smiling. "Dragons love gems, like... we really love gems. Like... really." Placing it down on the table and rolling it around with a finger, the young dragon looked up at her. "It's the clearest gem I've ever seen in my life." "Stop it..." she hid behind her hair as she spoke. "Don't say such embarrassing things~" Spike laughed a hearty laugh and slapped the table as he did so. "What was that? One moment you're begging for sex, the next one you're telling me not to be embarrassing?" Amaranth nodded meekly and he laughed even harder, nearly crying as he rocked back and forth with amusement. "What's next? Huh? Are you going to freeze up halfway through a shag when I mention holding hands?" "Don't say it like that!" she yelped ecstatically. "You know what I mean!" Walking up to him and forcibly slapping him, Amaranth kept her hair up to hide the furious flush covering her features. "You're such an asshole sometimes, I swear!" Spike rubbed his cheek while grinning from ear to ear. "An asshole you want to screw, mind you." He got slapped again, on the other side of his face, and yelped in surprise. "I don't even know why I spend time with you, Spike," she said with a sigh. "I'm pretty sure it's because I contracted you," he said with a shrug. "Otherwise I'm about as clueless as you when it comes to this sort of thing." Rolling the gem across the table whilst Amaranth took a seat next to him, he smiled. "Still, the gem was a nice gift." "I don't remember where I got it," she said quickly, looking over at Spike. "I think it belonged to whoever I knew before you. But I don't remember them, either." She smiled softly and rested her head against Spike's shoulder, placing a hand on his lap. "I don't want to forget you." Spike sighed and wrapped an arm around Amaranth. Looking down at her silently for a few moments, he gave a soft smile devoid of malice, and squeezed her gently. "That's why we're doing this whole thing, right? I know it. You'll never forget me." "But what if—" Clicking his claws together to interrupt her, he placed a finger against her lips. "It's going to happen, no matter what. I've been doing this for years, since we first met, and I won't stop now." Running his hand through her tangelo hair he smiled and pulled his finger back. "It's going to happen, because you want it to." Amaranth smiled sweetly and wrapped her arms around Spike, pushing him down onto the sofa and leaning over him with a funny look in her eye. "Please~?" Blushing lightly and scratching his neck the young dragon laughed slightly. "Well... just this once." A field of white flowers all spread across the hills. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. Sometimes he saw a beige flower, sometimes he saw a pearl flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. Sometimes he saw a new flower, sometimes he saw an old flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in a field of white flowers all spread across the hills. Flowers made from his intestines, flowers from his bones. Flowers made from his lungs, flowers from his kidney stones. Flowers made from his eyes, and flowers from his knees. Flowers of this garden, devoid of bumblebees. Spike was left to wander, and wander he did, within the garden made for quid. His bright scales grated in the wind, losing their colour and becoming white. Spike was white. The flowers were white. The sky was white. A field of white flowers spread across the white sky. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. He never saw a beige flower, he never saw a pearl flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. He never saw a new flower, he never saw an old flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in a field of white flowers all spread across the hills. One day he heard a pop, a sharp scream, the sound of the world colliding. His colour came home and his agony returned. For the first time in millennia he screamed. A flower turned red. His eyes became bees and his lungs turned to tar. Another flower turned red. His blood was acid and his muscle was decay. The flowers bloomed red. His scream became a gargle, his flesh coming undone. The flowers dripped red and called to their friends. The sky became red. His hands wriggled free and clawed at his sin, his eye sockets plugged with his marrow. A flower turned red. His organs turned to slop and his gargle became a gurgle. Another flower turned red. His scales all fell off, like autumn leaves, and his bloody skin screed in delight. The flowers bloomed red. His bones splintered and shattered, his spine going limp. The flowers dripped red and called to their friends. The whole world was red. Spike turned to mush. The flowers were all red. Spike sunk into the earth. The hills were red. Spike was no longer alive. Booming words called out across the red, "Save us your grace, save us from ourselves." The world was white, and Spike was still here. He paid his price long ago and now he was alone. His skin had become the earth, his muscle the sun. So long had he wandered, that his blood was the rain, and his eyes were the breeze. Chosen for a task long ago, yet only a few years back, he was walking forever and never. A field of white flowers all spread across the hills. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. Sometimes he saw a beige flower, sometimes he saw a pearl flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in the field of white flowers. Sometimes he saw a new flower, sometimes he saw an old flower. Spike wandered aimlessly in a field of white flowers all spread across the hills. Flash Sentry was reading through the old tome while Captain Armour slept. They'd been down in the Pantheon for over a day now, trying to figure out what they could do to keep Twilight safe. So far they'd only managed to uncover the truth behind Spike's companion, Amaranth. Even then they were clueless about what exactly they could do to halt his plans. "This is ridiculous," he mumbled to himself as he stared down at the maddening glyphs. Stories of gods who had created the world, stories of gods who tried to destroy it. Fables of heroes who rose and slew gods, and legends of men struck down by them. There was no shortage of things Shining had learned about the world by reading here. He felt as if he could spend a lifetime reading all the books kept here, and yet, never understand anything at all. Perhaps most disturbingly about this whole affair was the fact that the more he read, the more he discovered was untrue. In fact he was beginning to believe his entire life, his society, and his religion was a lie. The theories kept locked away in these books were... correct. The heretical spells often said as wrong, impractical, and dangerous; worked fine. In a quest to gain more answers, Flash had delved deeper into Pantheon in order to find more dangerous information. He needed to know exactly what he was up against to help create a plan to protect Twilight, and in turn, protect Canterlot. But he'd made a mistake. The best way to protect his Princess and her country would have been to stop looking, to never start, to have kept his mouth shut and did as he were told. Instead he delved deeper, and deeper, to the point where he no longer knew where he was. Lost amongst obsidian bookcases decorated with skulls he'd never seen before, and surrounded by a dense jungle of literature; he felt sick. Unable to teleport due to some strange phenomena he gave in and opened a book. It was titled Ex Deo Trucido, and through reading it, a horrible thought jumped to his mind. There was no Goddess of Harmony. It had been creeping up on him the entire time, since he first walked into the Pantheon to the moment he closed the book; but it was true. Their religion was a lie, the world wasn't a kind and friendly place. Here, in this book, he'd had described to him how to summon an audience with a god... just to ask for someone to die. Sitting there aimlessly, without any real way to get back, Flash Sentry decided to test the book before him. His society might not be a lie, so long as this spell didn't work. Drawing in a sharp breath he lit his wing on fire, groaning and eventually screaming in agony as he waited for his skin to strip. Once it had, he opened the burnt flesh, using it to draw a diagram on the floor around him. Checking, double checking, and triple checking his runes; Flash sat amongst them. He'd never used magic, being a pegasus and all, but apparently anyone could use a set of runes. Slowly but surely he read from the book in front of him, his smile grew wider as nothing seemed to happen throughout. He finished the incantation and waited. Nothing happened. He stood up an— Crush Where Flash Sentry had stood there was now a pile of bloody feathers, mutilated flesh, twisted bones, and organs. Blood was everywhere in-between the bookshelves and up the spines of the books themselves. The runes were now completely covered in new blood, the book crushed with Flash and now a pile of torn soggy papers. Within the Pantheon a hum sounded. The ancient pillar that stood in the very centre stood still, watching, and waiting.
RuinationSpike could feel it now. It was coming closer, closer, to his heart. He stood at the edge of the forlorn chapel for one last time, looking up at the disgusting statue of himself. His scales felt cold in a world devoid of love or hope. Standing on the edge of a frozen forever, his eyes stared up at a deformed self, not caring for the shadows lingering about. Rippling obsidian portrayed a devilish and disgusting set of features, a pair of living eyes staring right back down at him. "Finally here, huh?" Turning to face the empty chapel the young dragon sighed, scratching the back of his neck and stepping forwards. Rotten wood creaked and moaned beneath him as he slowly walked down the aisle. Facing away from the gold and black effigy Spike stared off into the gloom. "I figured you'd turn up eventually," he said to the empty building. "Took your time, though." Looking down at one of the pews he traced a finger across the wood. Ghastly wind blew in from the torn hole in the chapel, causing Spike to look back and shiver. Frozen ice stretched out a far way before meeting a shoreline blanketed in snow. One of the chains hanging from the rafters slowly froze before his eyes. Picking up his lazy pace the purple upstart sighed. Rotten boards cracked underfoot and groaned with protest. Their soggy forms had turned icy, becoming brittle. Vines and flowers that had grown into the building were dead. Killed by the chill and left to rot or freeze, only the metal and brickwork remained strong. The frost had begun climbing into the chapel, too, digging its icy fingers into the walls and spreading across the floor. Nearly the entire roof was ice. Spike stumbled as he walked and cursed, listening to the snapping wood with dread. "You know, when most people come visit, they don't destroy the world." Hollow frames that had once held beautiful glass work were now encased in ice, the metal frames deathly cold and hidden behind semi-clear frost. Books lay scattered and burned in useless piles of scraps, merely littering the floor and giving the building a smell of musk. Tapestries had once hung proudly along the walls. Lichen had died and gone grey, falling off and peeling back to reveal a painted wall. Whatever had been painted there, however, would never be known; it was decrepit and crumbling. Stepping onto the first stair to the lower level, Spike looked back to the statue. He felt a pent up breath release itself as he stared into the cold black eyes, filled with life, filled with hatred. Slowly and carefully making his way down the curved staircase, the renegade dragon whistled a small tune. It was a very brief bout of sound. Spike had tried to mimic a song Amaranth had once sung to him, but failed horribly, and stopped once he reached the bottom of the chapel. "I kind of wish I'd met you on better terms, honestly," he said flatly. Spike knew that wasn't possible. "Still, at least we met once. It's been worth it, I suppose." The door to his right was locked firm by the forces that be, and he had no way of leaving through it to begin with. Walking down beneath the rotten boards, avoiding the hanging mold, Spike stood before an oval depression. It was surrounded by wooden banister, decaying but still elegant. Bringing his leg up and forcing it out sharply, he knocked out a part of the rail. It shattered easily as the rot was set free. Walking forward slowly he stopped at the edge and looked down, seeing nothing but deep water. It was the only part of the lake not yet frozen and it gave no reflection back to him. Zipping up his jacket the young dragon took out a packet of cigarettes. Clenching his fist slightly as he held the packaging, he dropped it in the water. It was devoured by shadows. Laughing bitterly and biting his thumb, Spike started drawing something on his palm. "I don't know how this even got passed, by the way. A lake full of souls? You guys are fucking crazy, seriously." His hand burst into ethereal flame and he hissed in pain, staggering slightly and letting out a small groan. Turning himself away from the pool and facing the door, he walked backwards until he was at the edge. "I'm sure you won't mind if these souls, and this lake, disappear, right?" Ice encroached on the water, engulfing it in the blink of an eye. Spike laughed sourly and looked off to the side, seemingly staring straight at someone. "I hate you," he said simply. "So that's why..." falling backwards into the frozen surface, he smiled as it blossomed a deep blue. Outside, the entire world snapped as the frost lifted itself instantly. "...I'll take away everything." "She did what‽" Captain Armour screamed in abhorrence. "Twilight did what‽" "You heard me correctly, s-sir," mumbled one of the guards in the barracks. He'd been trying to play off his superior to avoid a fuss, but it was too late. Everyone was looking at them now. "Princess Twilight took Saint Rarity with her and journeyed to the Whitetail Woods." Watching the other stallion's face practically go nuclear, the guard felt a cold sweat grip him. "She intends to stop the... the dragon, most likely." Shining Armour exhaled heavily and closed his eyes, slowly breathing back in. He opened his eyes and looked the soldier in the eyes. "You are going to give me a good reason for letting my sister walk to her death, or I will end you." "Her death?" called a younger scout from across the room, drawing more attention to the situation. "Princess Twilight is the most powerful being in existence, how is she walking to her death?" A murmur of agreement sprung up in the barracks, with new faces slowly slipping in as the confrontation dragged on. Glaring over at the pegasus who'd spoken up, the Captain of the Guard nearly spat. "You have no idea what she's going up against, none of us do!" Turning to face the scout fully, Shining Armour grit his teeth. "She won't just die, at this rate, she'll be wiped from existence!" The murmuring stopped and the room fell silent. Captain Armour's voice bounced off the walls as his words died in his throat. Some of the soldiers stared at him, others turned away in disgust. "Seize him," called a voice from the corner. Shining found himself surrounded by disgruntled guards, all of whom intended to end him. "Lock him up." "You don't understand!" he cried in frustration, knocking one of the stallions away. "If we don't stop her it's all over!" "Seize the heretic and place him in the dungeons!" The bellowing order resounded throughout the barracks, and the men followed it. Binding the former-captain in ethereal chains the men grumbled amongst themselves. "I shall see to his imprisonment personally." From the corner walked Major Biceps, one of the less intelligent but all-round most respected men of the Guard. His towering muscular figure and stern eyes portrayed an absolute command wherever he walked, his rippling form on-par with even the strongest of earthponies. "Sir!" came the reply from one of the unicorns who had bound Shining. Looking back down at the heretic, he noticed a slight glow in his eyes. "Major Biceps, sir, the prisoner is radiating." Looking Shining Armour over with an inquisitive eye, the bulky superior laughed. His laughter resounded throughout the barracks. A stern glare snapped to his features as he looked down at the bound unicorn. "This heretic poses no threat. He lost his dignity the day he allowed his wife to be murdered." Turning his glare to the room as he scanned, the major found who he presumed was his direct subordinate. "Colour Sergeant Featherfall, I want you to arrange a clear path throughout the city for our friend here." Sneering down at Shining, Major Biceps continued. "We're going to display him in public before we lock him up. Our ponies need to know just how effective we are at treating discrepancies." "Of course, Major Biceps. I shall arrange a parade route momentarily," came the reply. Major Biceps smiled for a brief moment, before turning his attention to another soldier. "You there," he called. "What's your name, rank?" "Private Turner, sir!" the stallion said, clumsily saluting. "With the fifth exploratory platoon, currently on leave, sir!" Screwing his face up slightly the commanding officer stepped forward. "Turner? What kind of a name is Turner?" "Time Turner, sir! Watchmaker by trade!" "Aaah... I see." Nodding his head slowly the major's features returned to normal, remaining intimidating none-the-less. "A clock boy, eh? I can respect that. Takes skill to make a piece of kit that'll tell the time through rain and snow." Looking back over at the Colour Sergeant, and the now bound form of Shining Armour, the white block of meat had an idea. "Tell you what. Go fetch Warrant Officer Iron for me." The young man nodded quickly, saluting once more and running off. "Oh, and make me a pocket-watch while you're at it!" the major called after him. "I broke my last one." Skidding to a stop, falling over, getting back up and dusting himself off, the young private saluted again. "Make sure it's good!" By this time most of the other soldiers had trickled out of the barracks, eager to get away from Major Biceps, and his former subordinate. Featherfall was still standing at attention with a trio of unicorns keeping Shining in check. "We're ready when you are, sir," said one of the unicorns. He was a petite blue stallion. "We can have him brought to the apex for proper binding while the Colour Sergeant figures out a path." "Good idea," grunted the Major as he stroked his meaty chin. "I'll have the dungeons notified of our special guest. I'm sure they'll prepare suitable accommodation for such an esteemed member of the Gu— oh, sorry. I mean former member of the Guard." Bellowing laughter filled the room as Colour Sergeant Featherfall left to make preparations. The young trio nervously joined in with their superior, stopping only when he glared at them. Shining Armour merely looked down at the floor, his blood boiling and seething. I'll save you, Twily, he thought to himself. I'll save you from that monster, somehow.... -=-=-=-=-=- "Oh my. So you think she's coming, then?" Fluttershy was seated on an arrangement of large plush cushions, made of velvet and silk, with her head resting in her hooves. Rather than hide behind her hair the young mare was looking up at Spike, who was sitting cross-legged atop a small helical pillar. Amaranth was sitting on a the same pile as Fluttershy, playing with the mare's tail delicately. "Yeah, I figure she's got about an hour or so before she stumbles into the basin." Spike shrugged slightly and took his last cigarette from a pocket on his jacket, brining it to his lips and lighting it with a puff of green flame. "Did I ever tell you how much I hate smoking?" he asked aimlessly. Sucking in a plume from the slowly burning wad, he grimaced. "I really hate smoking." The meek yellow mare smiled softly, her cheeks turning a rosy shade. "I know exactly why you do, though." "Don't," he said with a sigh, looking down at her. "It's not funny." "Shining Armour used to smoke, didn't he?" she asked sincerely. "You like him more than you'd care to admit." Spike spluttered and coughed up some of his fire, causing both girls to laugh. He looked away from them in order to hide the small smile on his lips. Amaranth was constantly fiddling with the young pegasus' tail, as she simply adored the soft texture. "Although the reason he chose to smoke is a mystery, the fact that he has to is obvious," she said simply. "Even he can't maintain his integrity for long without the herbs." She looked up at Spike sweetly, but whether he heard her or not, she didn't know. "That's the last one, right?" she called loudly. "Yep," he said simply. Inhaling some more of the dark purple smoke his lips curved into a smile. "I would've had twenty left over if we hadn't of f—" "No no no!" she shouted. "We promised not to talk about that, remember!" Fluttershy looked at Amaranth, and then at Spike, her smile growing larger as her blush became more profound. Spike laughed softly as he looked over the forest canopy, his eyes scanning the horizon. Fluttershy hummed slightly and looked Amaranth in the eye. "You finally did it, hmm?" "No we di— well yes we did, but I— no we... nono no!" Amaranth let go of Fluttershy's tail and leaned back slightly, waving both her hands in the air as a furious blush spread over her face. "We defiantly didn't. No!" Spike laughed from his perch atop the ivory pillar, one of his hands playing with the creeping ivy that had climbed the side. "I had to smoke twenty of them after that. Twenty." He laughed again and looked down at the pair of them, a devious smile on his lips. "Who knew getting personal with a cosmic force would destabilize a person? I didn't." From behind her silky pink hair the middle aged mare gave a short laugh, putting a hoof up to cover her mouth as she did so. "Oh, Spike, you haven't changed at all, you know that?" Amaranth was hiding behind her tangelo hair and trying to block the conversation out. "You're still a little deviant, you know that?" Spike snorted slightly, his smile curling slightly. "Oh you know me. I was always trying to get in Twilight's way. A few misplaced quills, a couple of crumpled scrolls. Maybe a book or two out of place..." his smile turned bitter sweet as he blew out a tuft of purple smoke. "Good times. Simpler times." Apparently having recovered from her embarrassment, Amaranth spoke up. "Well, the fun times are over, because now you have to kill her." "Oh, that's true..." Fluttershy said sadly, looking back up at Spike. "Do you have anything in mind?" "No, not really," he said slowly, finally snubbing the cigarette and dropping it. "I've opened the path to the basin for her, but honestly, I still haven't figured out what to do with her." He sighed and bit his lip. "Maybe I'm hesitating." Fluttershy nodded her head slowly, her eyes darting around the glade. "However you do it, please make sure it's quick." "I'd do it the easy way but she's bringing Rarity with her," he said with a grumble. "As much as I dislike her I'm not the kind of person to scar someone needlessly. I'll have to choose my actions carefully." Amaranth went back to stroking Fluttershy's tail with care, playing with the silky hair. Her features were content as she spoke. "Shy, you noticed anything? You seem pretty jumpy all of a sudden." "Oh, sorry," she said meekly, looking at Amaranth. "I just noticed that the spirits are getting flighty. I hope they're not upset, poor dears." The yellow epitome of kindness sighed and brushed her mane aside, resting her head on her hooves once more. "Maybe you've outstayed your welcome, Spike." He nodded slowly and stood where he'd been sitting, jumping off the helical perch and landing with a light thud. "Yeah, you're probably right. We're not that far into the woods so we probably spooked them. Surprised it took so long to notice us, though." "I can't feel the animilacus anymore, though..." she said slowly, biting her lip and mumbling something under her breath. "It's... it's probably nothing." Nodding to herself, she stood off the comfy pile and turned to Spike. Walking over to him quickly she nuzzled his hand gently, and looked up at him with a smile. "I'm ready to go." He nodded. "Seeya' in the next one, Fluttershy." With a click of his fingers, she was gone, sent back home and away from this godly forest. Spike looked at his right hand, the one she'd touched, and smiled softly. Pocketing it and turning to Amaranth, he titled his head to the left. "We better get going too. Can't keep our friends waiting, right?" "Your friends, you mean," she said flatly. "Fluttershy is a nice one, though. How quaint that the only mare to understand you would be the most disconnected one." She sighed in a gentle manner. "Maybe if she'd gotten to you sooner..." "Leave it," Spike said gruffly. "It's in the past." "I suppose you're right." Her face brightened up and she did a little twirl, wrapping herself around his arm. "Let's go!" So they did. P l e a s e t e l l m e When they had entered the Whitetail Woods, Twilight had said to Rarity, "Don't look back." But Rarity wasn't the kind of woman who let others push her around, and this only added to her reasons to look back. She was deathly afraid of these woods, of not looking back, for a great many reasons. She was the kind of woman who let things happen to others, and was always ready to leap at a moments notice. So when she looked back, the moment they stepped in, she knew it was over. Because when she looked behind them there was nothing but thick, deep forest. The moment they crossed the threshold from field to forest, it swallowed them whole. Twilight insisted they'd been walking for a good hour now, but Rarity knew better. She also knew not to push the truth to those unwilling to accept it, so she merely smiled and agreed with Twilight. "Silly me," she said. Silly her. Originally she'd been trying to keep track of time as they walked. It proved a useless effort. Her pocket-watch had stopped on the twelfth hour, despite them having entered on the fourth. Twilight had grown despondent as her compass began to spin in all manner of directions, before breaking entirely. The map they'd brought with them was writing itself, apparently trying to tell a story of how it came to be. They'd thrown and burned it the moment it started, however. Despite this the two of them never got lost. The path always lead where they wanted to go, where they needed to go, and never once had it led them astray. When Twilight had wandered off into the forest to look at a certain flower in the distance, she'd arrived back on the path ahead in minutes. She thought she'd gone in a circle, and thus tried again, and again, and again. Rarity and Twilight learned the truth the moment that walking back the way they came, proved to only make them appear farther ahead and walk the right direction. Either the forest was alive, or it had a master controlling it. In her vanity Twilight had adopted the idea that the forest was sentient and guiding them to Spike, whereas Rarity decided to believe that perhaps Spike was masterminding the path. But she had no way of knowing for sure, and in the end, she agreed with her friend. While not vehemently believing the forest was alive, Rarity decided it was folly to think Spike would lead them to him. He wasn't that confident... surely. Although the path was leading them to Spike, it still took them time to clear the forest. It was huge after all, and no matter how straight the path, travelling takes long amounts of time. How much time neither of them was sure, as both their time-keeping spells had said ridiculous things. Rarity's had decided that their travels had taken minutes, while Twilight's had opted for years. Signs that they were nearing their destination came in the form of ruins. Beautiful white pillars were dotted alongside the road every so often, sometimes accompanied by a decayed building or base of some sort. Soon they walked beneath a small arch of sorts. It had a single word inscribed at the peak of its form. Terminus. Neither of the girls knew what it meant, but as they crossed beneath it, both felt a majestic energy radiate from within themselves. Off in the distance and above the scarlet canopy there were monolithic structures. Archways made of pearl and gold, covered in decay and nature, falling apart and remaining proud; standing tall for all to see. The longer the pair walked the quieter they became. Their reason for coming to the woods was lost in the beauty and mystery of the surroundings, their eyes taking in every detail as they continued onward. It stopped. As abruptly as the forest had began it stopped, and in its place, there was a depression of otherworldly scale. Digging deep into the earth and heading straight down to the unknown, a large and perfectly circular maw awaited them. It was filled with stairs, platforms, buildings, pillars, pools, statues, doors, and all manner of other things. Both of the unicorns stood at the edge and looked down, a mixture of emotions plastered onto their faces. "Wow," Twilight said simply. "That's... amazing." Rarity nodded to herself more than anyone else. "It's absolutely gorgeous. Just look at how delicately constructed everything, how wonderfully decorated it all seems." Her eyes were practically glued to the structures beneath her. "Some of it's supported, and some of it is just... floating...." "How long do you think it'll take us to find Spike?" Tapping her hoof against her chin, the delicate white mare pondered the question. "Does it matter?" she asked sincerely. "We're here, and I doubt we can leave until we're done." Smiling at Twilight, Rarity wrapped an arm around her friend. "What was Celestia's saying, again?" "Our longest journeys are often our easiest, and the shorter your trip, the less you learn," Twilight said with a smile. "Exactly." Looking around the edges of the huge hole, easily the size of a lake, Rarity chirped up. "There's a staircase over there. Let's get going, darling. I'm sure Spike is waiting for us." -=-=-=-=-=- Shining could feel everything around him. He couldn't block it out anymore. He never should have read those books, but he read them for Twilight, or maybe he read them for himself? No, no, he read them with Twilight. Wait, Twilight? Where was she again? He was beginning to lose track of things, precious things, and he needed to keep them in. "Look at him, snivelling and crawling around. Ha!" One of the guards outside insulted him. Shining didn't care right now because he was trying to keep everything in. "You know, I remember when I joined the Guard. That bastard told me I'd never make it past my induction. Look at me now!" Another pony could be heard sighing. "Yeah, sure thing Private Heavy. You showed him good. Yippee." "Are you making fun of me?" the former asked. The sound of hoofsteps could be heard growing fainter. "I made it. I'm going to keep climbing higher and higher. If I handle this right I'm on the fast-track to officer rank." He snorted and kept walking, his steps growing louder. "The Major entrusted me with this. The Major! He saw something in me, Comb, I just know it." "Oh yes," the stallion apparently named Comb replied. "I'm sure he did. Why, everyone knows just how outstanding you are, Heavy." Private Heavy grumbled something under his breath and walked off, shouting back at Comb. "You'll see! I'll outrank you once this is over!" "Sure, sure," the other stallion replied with a yawn. Shining Armour couldn't keep it in any longer. He was trying so hard but it just wouldn't stop coming out. They'd made him do it, yes. Yes it was their fault. THEIR FAULT. Even though it was their mistake he was the one tied up. He didn't like that, not one bit. Fractious Helix Syndrome. What did that mean again? He couldn't remember, or rather he couldn't bring himself to remember. There was something about that phrase, something about that... "Aaaaaaaaaurgh!" Screaming and writing in agony the stocky unicorn slammed his head against the floor repeatedly. "Out! Out! Out!" He started repeating the word as he slammed his head down, gnawing his own teeth and gums in frustration. "Out!" "Hey... hey!" A chair fell over somewhere and a clattering of hooves could be heard. "Shining, Shining? Snap out of it!" Pounding resonated through the room as someone smacked on the barrier. "Ah, horseapples..." a tone of fear was adopted. "Uhh... Heavy. Shit!" The banging stopped and someone ran off, calling out for assistance. It was there now. Shining could feel something building up inside his head that wanted to be set free. His screaming fluctuated between growling and groaning, as if something else was taking hold. His slamming became quicker and quicker as he started to lose breath. "OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT!" Then it stopped. A strike too far. His horn cracked and screamed as it sucked in the air around him, resonating with a ground-shattering boom. Some form of shockwave radiated from Shining and blew the barrier out, extinguishing the lights, cracking and denting the age-old stone walls. His screaming continued as his skin became riddled with holes, blood pouring from the open wounds. Soon the buds began to grow. Worming up from inside him, tiny little buds made from sinew and bone. His screaming only increased tenfold as he found himself patron to a garden show. Blood ran down from his eyes as the walls began to buckle further and further, his buds slowly opening. "W-what the hell...." From behind him came a confused and scared voice. Then the sound of vomiting and the drawing of swords. "What in Celestia's name is going on here‽" Fleshy flowers made from pus and skin bloomed all around Shining Armour, his eyes rolling back as his cutiemark bust into flames. He no longer screamed, he merely stood in place and turned to face the soldiers. Flowers fell off one by one, making sloppy sounds as they littered the floor. His coat was immaculate as the holes vanished. Where his eyes had been hollow, they were now full. Full of understanding. "I see now," he said simply. In his voice. "Now I understand." The stallion who had vomited managed to wipe his mouth clean and stand tall, looking over at Shining. He lost his nerve as the former-captain's hair started turning black, and bone began to grow on his face. "Stay right there, heretic!" Shining could see everything in this room. Even their souls. "Sorry Private," he said to the previously boisterous soldier. "You're not getting promoted." He crushed his windpipe and let him drop where he stood, turning to face the other stallion. "Sergeant Comb, was it? Don't worry. You won't have to put up with idiotic subordinates anymore." There was a sharp crack, and the stallion's head was ripped clean off.His body dropped dead, and moments later, the head rolled across the floor. "Don't worry Twily," Shining said as he looked off to the side. "I'm coming." He teleported away just as the alarms were sounded. -=-=-=-=-=- Two pairs of eyes were staring intently at a small mechanical device set into the centre of the room. Spike and Amaranth were both glaring at a small cube, no larger than an eyeball, which was made up of delicate pieces of machinery. Somewhere held within were six very small, very special runes. "How long did it take you to find this, again?" Amaranth asked curiously. Spike scratched his chin and shrugged. "Probably something like fifteen years, although they were spent here, not out there." He cracked a small smile. "So I'm still pretty young." His smile grew wider as he turned his eyes towards Amaranth. "Defiantly younger than you." "I hate you," she said jokingly as she stuck her tongue out. "It's not like I decided to spend my time like this." Spike nodded and walked over to a pile of velvet cushions, flopping down into them face first and groaning. "Speaking of time, how long until your friends arrive?" "Uh, probably another hour or so, give or take a few." He rolled over onto his back and closed his eyes, concentrating on a tiny nub of energy in the back of his mind. "I'm leading them to us, else they'd be looking for a few years." Amaranth slowly moved from the centre of the room, her hand tracing along the small obelisk, before dropping down to her side. She nimbly sat down besides spike, drawing her knees up and hugging her legs, sitting her head atop them. "It always comes to this, doesn't it?" "Yeah, it always comes to this," he said solemnly. "First it was Cadence, then Sombra...." He smirked and bit his thumb nervously. "That guy still gives me nightmares. He was something else." Dragging a finger through her silky hair, the infinite maiden smiled at Spike. "It wasn't so hard was it. What did you say to him again? 'I don't care if you're the manifestation of hate, I don't care if you were once emperor of the land, and I don't care if you slew thousands of gods in the process. I need you to die' - was it?" "Shush you," Spike said with a light blush. "I was angry, alright? I can only take being ripped apart so many times, eventually, enough is enough." She hummed to herself more than anyone else and laid back in the pile, covering her eyes with a hand, then drawing it back and looking up at the ceiling. "It's exciting," she whispered. "To await what lies beyond the end." Spike laughed and ruffled her hair. "I'm not sure you'll find much besides the crushing abyss, but hey, you're free to wonder." His laughter turned bitter as he held his face in both hands. Letting them slide down his face the young dragon let out an exasperated sigh. "Ponies think that Celestia looks after them in the next world, you know?" "Really?" Amaranth asked as she looked up at Spike. "Do you think it's true?" Spike shrugged. "Probably. All lesser gods go to the afterlife when they die. There's probably a good... fifty or so 'Celestias' in the afterlife." He looked over at the box with a glare in his eye. "The Imperium is going to fix all that. It's going to fix you." "I suppose you're right," she said simply. "We've come a long way just to fill that little box." "It's five down, one to go." Spike grit his teeth and turned his back on Amaranth. "I just wish it wasn't Twilight." W h a t a m I ? Twilight had finally found the room in which Spike was residing. Somewhere along the way she'd been split apart from Rarity, but she didn't care. She wouldn't need Rarity for this, she knew it. She... knew it. So, why couldn't she open the door? Why did her hoof struggle to even near the ebony wood, trembling in place pathetically? Biting her lip Twilight forced her hoof towards the door, only for her foreleg to freeze up. Why? She wanted to scream. Why? She wanted to shout. Why? She wanted to cry. Her frustration turned to bitter self-loathing as she struggled. Touching the door handle, she felt a moment of triumph, but it was pulled from under her as the door opened by itself. Spike was standing to the side with a knowing smile plastered on his face. "Looks like you were having trouble," he said. Twilight flared up and made a move to use her horn, but a click of Spike's fingers stopped her in her tracks. "Now now," he said mockingly, adopting the tone of voice Celestia used. "Come along my little pony, tea, friendship, and biscuits await you." About to say something insulting in return, the purple monarch was cut off by a sharp laugh. "Just kidding. There's none of that." The door closed behind Twilight as she stepped inside the room, but she was too busy examining the space to notice. It was rimmed with a delicate series of runes, carvings most likely, that adorned both the top and bottom of the walls. The middle was left blank, with a strip of gold running the way around. In the middle of the room there were two obelisks. One was attached to the roof and pointing downwards, whilst another was attached to the floor and pointing upwards. In the space between them there was a small cube, made of worn gold, that was spinning slowly. It was balanced on its points in a diagonal fashion. Both obelisks were covered with runes, although these ones glowed a faint blue. Attached to the roof was a black obelisk, whilst the one on the floor was made of gold. Five sides of the cube seemed to be radiating softly, whilst the last was devoid of any outward features. Not even the clockwork within moved. Velvet cushions were piled atop one another at the end of the room, upon which sat Spike and his succubus friend. "I'm here to end this," Twilight said harshly as she stopped before Spike. "I want to get this matter over and done with." "Woah woah," Spike said with apparent surprise, putting his hands up in a pseudo surrender. "Calm down Twily. Why don't we have a discussion about good friends over some hot chocolate?" Snapping his claws together, an overly feminine set of teacups appeared, followed by a teapot. Spike poured them both a cup. This would have been fine except he was pouring upside down, and the hot white chocolate was floating upwards into the cups. Also, it was white chocolate. Seeing the look on her face, Spike once again adopted the hands raised pose, and the cups, pot, and all disappeared. "You took a while to get here, so before you try to kill me, why don't you ask some questions?" Spike spoke sincerely, and put his hands down slowly. "It's not like I'm against telling you what you need to know. I'm an open book... bar a few topics." "Why did you kill Celestia?" Twilight seated herself opposite Spike, on the floor, and bored holes into him with her eyes. Figuratively. "Better question: why didn't someone else kill her?" Laughing at his own joke, he made a shooing motion and grumbled. "I can't answer that. I can tell you what I did with her though." "Shoot." Spike pointed to the rotating box in the middle of the room. "She's in that," he said plainly. "Or rather, her soul is in that. There's no way for you to bring her back. I could, but honestly, I don't want to. It'd defeat the purpose of killing her." Twilight wanted to scream there and then, but she held her tongue in check. "Who else is inside the... thing?" she asked accusingly. "Who else have you murdered?" "Five lesser gods," came the reply. "And now there's only one left to go." He looked at Twilight. "G-gods?" she nearly spluttered entirely. "What do you mean, gods?" Spike rubbed his chin in thought, pondering how to answer. "There are lesser and higher gods in this world. Lesser gods are mortal, made by the whims of higher gods to serve a purpose. Higher gods have been around since time itself, maybe even before, and exist to shape our world as they see fit. Or other worlds." Looking over at Amaranth, the young dragon let out a soft sigh. "She's an angel. Angels are... complicated, to say the least. She's a seraph, but it's complicated, so we'll leave it there." "Why am I a god?" Twilight asked sincerely, her anger forgotten for now. "Uhh... well, you see..." Spike laughed awkwardly, turning his gaze away from Twilight. "You're not, not yet at least. Celestia would have made you into one, if I hadn't killed her." His features grew tense. "Celestia was somewhere between higher and lesser, for... difficult to explain reasons." Pointing to the floor, the purple murderer grimaced. "This used to be a lake. A very deep lake, filled with souls. It was used to resurrect Celestia every hundred years or so. You would've been turned into her, to put it bluntly." Twilight practically exploded. "You expect me to believe that?" she cried. "I'd sooner see myself flayed alive than believe such blatant blasphemy! What do you take me for, a fool? A miscreant? I'm not going to fall for your games! I've had enough." She stopped ranting and took an aggressive stance, staring Spike in the eyes. "It's time to end this!" she screamed. Amaranth looked at Spike with a sad smile, as he stood and opened his arms wide. "Go ahead," he said simply. "Wh-wha— rrrrrrgh!" Partly confused at but mostly angry by being treated inferior, Twilight let lose a hail of ice in Spike's direction. He didn't move, and he didn't flinch. Instead he let each and every piece find its mark in his chest, spluttering slightly as he coughed up blood. His face remained neutral, however, devoid of his earlier manner. "Are you done?" he asked in a disconnected tone. Screaming louder, the purple unicorn continued to send shards his way. Each and every one sunk deep into his flesh with a sickening slice, ripping his muscle apart and painting the marble and velvet in blood and gore respectively. How long did she attack him, Spike wondered. Ten minutes? Thirty? An hour? Five? Or maybe only for a minute and a half? He couldn't tell, he didn't want to know either. Where new ice hit, it pushed the old out, ripping him wide open. His health was immaculate, and he healed as each deathly pellet hit him. Endless streams of blood seemed to seep out from inside him, organ bits and pieces only growing back. His face wasn't spiteful, his features were not in pain. His eyes were empty, hollow, devoid of all things. His voice was despondent. "Are you done?" he asked. In fact he asked many times, again and again, until it became routine. So it was. Twilight pumped him full of ice, ripping him apart as he allowed himself to be ripped apart. Blood, gore, organs, and sinew would fly from within him, coating the floor in viscera. Then he would ask her "Are you done?" It would begin anew. At some point Rarity walked in, standing by the door, watching her friend rip her old assistant to pieces; only for him to ask "Are you done?" "Are you done?" Twilight was done. Sagging her head in defeat, nearly vomiting as her eyes fidgeted upwards, the purple princess nodded her head. Tears streamed down her cheeks, bloody cheeks, splattered with gore. Spike stood in the same spot he'd been before. His chest was ripped open and splattered out behind him, already healing. The velvet behind him was stained crimson with his blood. It seemed as if behind Spike a pair of red wings had sprouted, the splattering of blood and gore immense. "I'm done," she whispered. "Then we're done," he responded. Rarity screamed. Spike lifted his arm up besides him and showed Twilight his open hand, then smiled. "Count to ten," he said softly. "Count to ten and it'll all be over." She nodded meekly, mouthing the numbers to herself. Ten. His open palm was visible to all. Nine. It came closer to his chest. Eight. Rarity was screaming. His elbow was bent. Seven. Amaranth turned away, she didn't want to watch. Six. Spike stopped smiling. Five. Rarity screamed louder, begging him to stop. Four. Twilight kept counting. Twilight kept crying. Three. Spike twitched his fingers. Two. Rarity screamed one last time. One. Spike balled his hand into a fist, and pulled down. Her heart exploded in her chest, ripping a hole wide open in her front. Rarity collapsed in sobs, and Spike started chanting. A dim white glow drifted from Twilight over to the Imperium, and Amaranth looked back. Why? He wanted to scream. Why? He wanted to shout. Why? He wanted to cry. Twilight Sparkle was dead. The Imperium was complete.
