Chapters With all light, there is darkness.
With Virtue, there is Sin.
Those two opposites occur no matter what universe you go to.
However, the lines are easily blurred, like with the story of one man, forced to carry innumerable sins, but kept his heart facing the light.
And it all began with an convention, an altered fate, an explosion, and an idiot void dweller who couldn’t double check what the person was cosplaying as.
“WHY THE HELL AM I ALWAYS THE ONE CALLED IDIOT WHEN I MAKE MISTAKES!? I DON’T EVEN MAKE ALL THAT MANY!"
Shut up Aaron and get back to your story!
Anyway, the journey does start at the convention but the story starts with a weary Twilight Sparkle crawling into bed after an exciting day in the north, dealing with the Crystal Empire’s reappearance.
She had no idea how she had gotten so tired and she collapsed on her bed, trusting Spike to clean up. In her last moments of consciousness, she vowed to get him some ruby cupcakes for saving Equestria.
As the unicorn slipped into her dreams, black lines outlined with red started to snake over her body from her horn.
Her eyes shot open but instead of the brilliant violet, they were a dark mustard collar.
As ‘Twilight’ sat up, her mane and tail started fading into black.
She looked down at her front legs as her eyes widened. “No...” She crawled out of bed, heading to the mirror. “No no no, this can’t be happening…”
She carefully looked into the mirror and the spirit possessing Twilight Sparkle had only one reaction.
“Shit.”
Twilight groaned, hearing the birds singing in the morning light. At the moment, she hated them due to the headache she had. She felt around for a pillow to cover her face but felt nothing but dirt, twigs and leaves.
The unicorn’s head shot up and she looked around to see she was in Whitetail Woods. “How did I get here?” Twilight started to get up but faltered, feeling her body aching. “Maybe I sleep walked here…”
Despite the pains, she trotted right back to the library, ignoring the looks the other ponies gave her.
She entered the library, seeing Spike already cleaning.
Twilight didn’t exactly hear what he said as she walked past and started preparing the coffee machine, putting in three scoops of ground coffee beans.
“You know, I think two scoops would have been enough. ”
“Spike, I don’t think I got a lot of sleep last night since I was sleepwalking, I need a lot of caffeine to get through the day.” Twilight responded automatically, pouring water into the machine.
“What? I didn’t say anything, Twilight.”
Twilight blinked in confusion. “Wait, if that wasn’t you then…” The unicorn started looking around her kitchen, starting to feel paranoid.
She closed her eyes and thought back to one of the detection spells, her horn glowing as she prepared it and let it flare.
Glancing around with her eyes still closed, she saw only three sparks of life in the library. She started to relax, knowing them well.
“I must have been hearing things.” She sighed, going back to her coffee.
The thing is, if she had looked in a mirror with that spell, she would have seen a second soul in her...
Twilight collapsed on her bed, her horn glowing as she pulled the covers over herself, expecting a nice night of sleep.
She went from falling asleep to standing in what looked like Canterlot Castle but she could tell that she wasn’t. For one, there were books everywhere. They were in neat but chaotic piles everywhere. With a glance outside, she could see all the banners had her cutie mark on it and the statue guardian had all its statues, including Discord, replaced with statues of her friends and family.
She smiled, seeing all this and came to a quick conclusion. “I must be having a lucid dream.”
Twilight looked to the large doors and walked toward them, the doors automatically opening.
She froze as she looked outside at the rest of Canterlot, which looked like it was completely on fire with shadowy wolf like demons prowling on the streets.
She could see something in the distance right slap dab in the middle of Canterlot. It was a huge tower made of something black that formed into tentacles with three prongs sticking out at the top holding up a ball of pure darkness. She could see that it seem hollow with something red glowing within.
Twilight shivered as she looked at her, thinking of all the villains she had met before she started walking into town, taking care to hide from the demons as she got closer to the tower.
As she got closer, she made note of several things. One, the buildings that were still standing were filled with fancy but huge libraries. Twilight didn’t even look in the books yet but she was very curious about how the libraries could be bigger on the inside.
Two, despite how bleak everything looked, with rubble littering the street and fire everywhere, the sky was still a clear bright blue with the sun shining down like it was any other day.
The third thing made her start thinking that maybe it wasn’t a dream after all.
The fire.
It didn’t give off heat but when she stuck her hoof in it, she got flashes of something else.
It was a large room filled with tables with weird monkey like beings wearing clothes holding books called The Lovely Bones.
“Mark Tyr, can you read the next part aloud for us.” The monkey being at the front of the room
Twilight felt her head nod before looking down to the book and she heard a male voice, the same one from the kitchen this morning, start speaking.
“ That night my mother had what she considered a wonderful dream. She dreamed of the country of India, where she had never been. There were orange traffic cones and beautiful lapis lazuli insects with mandibles of gold. A young girl was being led through the streets. She was taken to a pyre where she was wound in a sheet and placed up on a platform built from sticks. The bright fire that consumed her brought my mother into that deep, light, dreamlike bliss. The girl was being burned alive, but, first, there had been her body, clean and whole.***”
Twilight shook her head as she was brought back to the ruined Canterlot. “That was weird…”
She started to walk again, coming close enough to the tower to see what it was made of.
Black mud. It seemed to surround the tower and gave off an ominous feeling.
The curious unicorn started to step closer, staring up at the tower and avoiding the mud.
That’s when she heard a cough.
She looked down and saw it. One of those monkey like creatures leaning against the tower, but he looked radically different.
His skin was dark and covered in dark and red lines and symbols. He eyes were a cold mustard color and his hair was a dark grey, almost black. He wore very little, only some red rags to cover his modesty, and black bandages on his arms and legs. Also a red headband.
He stepped away from the tower and spoke.
“Welcome to your mind, Twilight Sparkle. I’m pleased to meet you at last.”
Twilight gasped as she recognized the voice as the same one from the vision.
“I am Avenger.”
Author's Note
***Excerpt from “The Lovely Bones” by Alice Sebold.
Yup. An Avenger Displaced.
Next chapter has the reveal of how he got stuck in Twilight’s head.
Thanks to Jsyrin for Aaron’s little appearance and generally helping.
The sound of stone smashing into the ground was heard throughout the whole of the ruined Canterlot, broken by Twilight’s repeated screams of ‘GET OUT! GET OUT! GET OUT!’ and Avenger’s constant repeats of “OH SHIT! OH SHIT! OH SHIT!”
The demons briefly looked to the streets to see the intimidating looking Heroic Spirit fleeing from a lavender unicorn magically wielding a large pillar to try and smash him. One of them was even recording the incident on a… smart...phone…. DAMMIT AARON.
Avenger was terrified of Twilight Sparkle now, given how the unicorn was trying to kill him!
He just wanted to talk to her but he wanted to add his own flair to their meeting.
He gave a very unmanly squeak as he found that he had taken a wrong turn. He jumped to the very end of the dead end, the ‘dead’ part getting close.
He rolled over, shouting the first thing that came to his mind. “I just want to go home!” He screamed as he covered his face with his arms, expecting a quick and gruesome death.
What he felt instead was a slight tap of stone on his head, the pillar having stopped at his words. He peeked out and fell over at how close he came to death.
“What? What do you mean?” Twilight asked, peeking at the man curled up on the ground, now; when she heard it.
The soft sound of sobbing.
She moved the pillar and walked over to the shaking person, seeing him in the fetal position with his hands covering his face.
“I-I don’t want to be here! I didn’t ask to be this!” Avenger sobbed, feeling Twilight rubbing his head.
Avenger continued, tears leaking from his eyes in great streams, “I-I just w-want to go home! I didn’t m-mean to use the mud! I didn’t! B-but Celestia! She didn’t believe me…. she tortured me for days on end….”
Twilight bristled at that last statement.
There’s no way Celestia would do that… right?
She shook that idea out of her head for the moment and continued to listen to Avenger talk.
Soon, after talking for what felt like ten minutes, he seemed much calmer.
“Do you feel better?” The lavender unicorn asked him, Avenger sitting up straight now.
He nodded. “Yeah... I’m sorry for scaring you.”
“No no no!” Twilight waved a hoof quickly. “It’s my fault for acting so rashly.”
Avenger chuckled lightly, Twilight joining him.
It was the start of an odd friendship.
~~~
“So, how did you end up… here?” Twilight asked, motioning to their surroundings as they walked back to the castle.
Avenger rubbed his head a little. “It’s complicated. I mean, it might rub you the wrong way about Celestia. She is responsible after all…”
“What?” Twilight looked up at the nervous Heroic Spirit, “Why would she put you in my head?”
“Well, it’s more that she probably thought the Elements would slowly destroy me if I was sealed in them. The Elements actually read my mind and were much kinder than I expected.”
Twilight was about to ask about why he was put in the Elements in the first place but caught herself, remembering what he was saying while he was crying.
He had done something by accident with that mud but he never said what he had used it on or for.
She knew he probably wouldn’t tell her what that mud was about right now.
“The Element of Magic actually put me to sleep until a year ago… when Discord was around.” Avenger shuddered as Twilight stopped.
“Y-you’ve been in my head for an entire year!” She shouted, thinking back to all the personal moments.
“Y-yeah, but I’ve only been able to do anything or look out your eyes when you saved the Crystal Empire!” Avenger moved away, fearing more attacks by the cute little unicorn. “And I don’t want to see you shower! I’m better than that!”
Twilight was still fuming when she felt a weird sensation, like she was floating.
“Oh, you seem to be waking up.” Avenger noted, Twilight starting to fade for him.
“Wait, will I be able to talk to you again?” She asked quickly, everything starting to fade to white for her.
“Of course. I think we’ll be able to talk outside of here if you remember it?”
“Wait, what do you me-?” Everything went completely white.
Twilight rolled out of bed, feeling rather refreshed. She looked to Spike, who was still fast asleep.
She smiled warmly at her little assistant before sneaking down the stairs to make pancakes for him.
The entire time, she had a nagging feeling at the back of her mind that she had forgotten something important.
Also in the back of her mind, Avenger shuddered, realizing that she had forgotten her dream. He just knew this night would suck.
Princess Celestia looked at the papers she had been working on. She had another nightmare about him last night.
Avenger.
She winced as she remembered his last words before being sealed in the Element of Magic. Celestia felt that this was one of many horrible mistakes she had made.
She looked out the window at the sun, remembering the look on his face… the same face that kept invading her nightmares.
Author's Note
Hooray for comedy.
Also, anyone have any Void Dweller repellent?
Oh yeah, in the comments below, vote for pony or human.
Avenger sighed as he sat in Twilight’s mental castle, holding the flames the represented his last memory before appearing in Equestria. It had been two weeks since their first meeting and she still didn’t remember him. He was toying with the idea of changing her dreams so they were his memories.
Finally, he just grabbed a random flame and put it on the pedestal where a representation of her dream was and watched it spread over the large book.
Yeah, it was always books.
He sighed, knowing it would probably not change before looking to the small pool that showed her dream as it changed to a scene of destruction, fire, and death.
Twilight blinked as she found herself in a nightmarish scene.
There was fire and destruction and death everywhere.
She could see one of the bodies nearby, missing three of its limbs.
She felt like she was going to be sick but stopped when she heard breathing from the body.
It started to move, desperately clawing at the ground with blood covering it’s entire body and leaving a trail.
Twilight rushed over to help it but her hooves went right through. Then she heard it talk, rasp out a few lines.
“I want to live.” It coughed up blood. “I-I don’t want to die.” Twilight could feel tears going down her face as she desperately tried to help the being as it spoke for what she thought would be the last time.
“I-I need to live.” It whispered before it’s head hit the ground and everything started to turn dark.
“So that’s how I died.” Avenger put a hand unconsciously to his right arm. “But, how did I come back to life? And as Avenger as well? And why?”
The human turned Heroic Spirit looked to the ground of the castle, his mind just being full of questions without answers.
He snapped his head up when he noticed the screen brightening as the memory, surprisingly, continued.
Twilight was frozen, having just seen the being die before her and being absolutely unable to help.
She didn’t even notice the encroaching darkness, just staring at the being at the growing puddle of blood under it.
Then she saw a different source of darkness floating among the rubble. It was in a pipedial form and seemed to have a glowing tie, mouth, and eyes made out of light.
And it was staring right into her eyes, seemingly into her soul. Twilight could tell, it could kill her without even thinking about it.
“Ara? Oh hello there! Hi Twilight!” It waved.
And that snapped her right out of it, along with the watching Avenger. “What.”
“Ah, right, this isn’t part of the memory, Twili-chan~ But it’s nice to see you~ Aaaaaanyway, I’mma get back to the memory cuz this sad sack is probably gonna die without my help.” It turned, kicking the near corpse on the ground in the ribs and enveloping it in shadow (Avenger unconsciously grabbing his ribs there), letting it sit for a moment before letting the shadow dissipate and reveal a fully healed, though still unconscious Avenger.
“Hmm… is that what he was dressed as…? I swear if I got this wrong again I’m gonna get in so much trouble…” It shrugged and tossed Avenger’s limp body into a portal, one smelling faintly of chocolate ice cream and ozone, even through the memory.
Twilight finally found the courage and willpower to ask one question. “W-What did you do to him?”
“Just a little something-something, Twili~”
Twilight stood up, her horn glowing. “What! Did! You! Do! To! Him!?” She snapped, though her thoughts were different. ”What am I doing?! I can’t fight this.. this thing! Why am I trying to stand up for somepony I don’t even know?”
“Saa, Twili-chan, he’ll be fine… more or less. And, well, you can’t really touch me seeing as this is both a pre-recorded message and a live transmission, that being that I’m not really here.” The thing shrugged again walked over to Twilight and patted her on the head- or at least it tried, letting its hand phase through her without any resistance, Twilight shuddering at the feeling. “Anyway, good job standing up for Avenger here. You got a good heart, kiddo.”
“Avenger?” Twilight wanted to ask so many more questions to this thing but she could feel herself starting to wake up. “Who are you?!”
“Well my name is- oh shit you’re waking up now bye!”
“Wha-?” Then the memory/dream cut out with Avenger as Twilight woke up.
He could feel her moving around, obviously to go research everything she had dreamt up, but he had his own questions.
What was that thing?
Why did it save him specifically?
Why was it there and more importantly, did it cause that explosion?
If it could predict Twilight in his memory, then how did it not know about his suffering?
Was that it’s intention all along? Was that it’s reason for saving him and turning him into Avenger?
To make him suffer?
Avenger just grabbed his head, already feeling a headache coming on. “Dammit, why can’t I just get straight answers for once?”
He glanced to the empty pool for a moment before walking out of the Mindscape Castle, wanting to think through the questions somewhere else.
Author's Note
Yup. Aaron’s the reason for his displacement. And for those wondering, Avenger was not actually dressed up as Avenger. He was dressed up as Shirou.
Yeah… a small mistake on Aaron’s part, right?
Also, I need a crossover with someone. PM please.
