Path to Infinity

Resting 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.