The Voices of Nobody

Chapters

Chapter 2
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 1
Chapter 3
Chapter 21

Chapter 2

I regained consciousness after what I can only assume were hours. I took a minute or two to gather my wits and take a look at my surroundings. I was, in fact, in a thick, dark forest. I sat up, and almost immediately regretted doing so because of the pain in my side. I felt around and unfortunately discovered that I had a dislocated rib. I worked up the courage to grab hold of it and shove it back into place. That part was also very painful, but the pain susided after a few deep breaths.

I looked at my left leg, recalling that pain from when I hit the ground. It looked alright, but when I put pressure on it, I realized that I had a badly sprained ankle. I couldn't just keep walking on it, so I tore a branch down and used it as a sort of crutch. I did not know which direction to head, so I just picked a path and started walking. Limping, rather

I wandered for what felt like another hour before I reached the edge of the accursed forest. I looked out upon a beautiful scenery. I saw a green valley placed between several mountains, and resting in that valley was a colorful and active town consisting of cottages, gardens, gazebos, and I think I saw some sort of town hall.

I spotted what looked like an apple orchard and a farm to the left, and it was pretty close to my position, which made me notice that I was suddenly very hungry. I hadn't eaten much since I started practicing the ritual almost non-stop. I limped over to the orchard in a hungry haste. There was a short white fence, but it posed no deterrent.

I somewhat strolled through the seemingly boundless rows of apple trees and looked for a suitable apple, but it was like each and every single one was the perfect shade of red or green. I wondered how the farmer could grow all of them so perfectly; I would expect to see at least a few rotten, worm-ridden ones to be lying on the ground, but all of them were just... perfect.

I just grabbed a dark red one near my head, and sat down under the shade of its tree. It was so juicy and delicious.

After a few minutes, I spotted motion behind one of the rows of trees. I saw a man's body, from the shoulders down, pushing a wheelbarrow practically overflowing with the fruit. I then heard some one, a woman, but with a southern drawl and a hint of toughness say, "Alright, Big Mac. Just that last batch an' we'll be done fer the day."

I got up, grabbing my crutch, and ventured off in their direction. i poked my head out from behind the foliage right behind the man, but the sun was quite an irritant. I lifted my arm up to shield my eyes. But because I did it with my crutch-wielding arm, I seemed to look like an assailant about to hit the man in the back. I did not think that at the time, but I put two and two together when I heard the female shout, "Big Mac! Behind you!"

The man, apparently this "Big Mac," turned his head to look at me with a calm "Hmm?" and he was upon me in less than a second, pinning me to the ground with his left hand on my crutch arm, and his right on my throat.

I hadn't gotten a good look at him earlier, but now I could see him perfectly. He had medium-sized blonde hair, light stubble, green eyes, and a stalk of wheat in the corner of his mouth. He seemed to be in his late twenties to early thirties. I looked at his apparel; he was wearing a black-and-red plaid button-up shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows, and a pair of worn down jeans. But what caught my attention was his physique. He was, without exaggeration, an Addonis. But his face; it held this plain expression of calm and apathy.

Just before my eyes completely glazed over from the strangulation, he released his hold on my throat. And as I lay there, coughing and hacking and wheezing, the source of the female voice walked over and stood over me along with Big Mac.

"Sheesh, Big Mac. Ah said to look out, not kill 'em."

Big Mac shrugged.

"Anyway, who are you, an' what're ya doin' in Sweet Apple Acres?"

She was a young blonde girl, with a few freckles across her cheeks, green eyes, and her long hair was set in a ponytail that hung over her left shoulder. She had a brown stetson on, cowboy boots, and an orange plaid button-up like Big Mac with the sleeves rolled up.

"Ah said, 'Who are you, and what're ya doin' here?' And what's with that funny-lookin' getup?" Her voice was kind, but concerned.

She was referring to my ritual clothes and body paint. I was wearing a black sleeveless hooded robe with coattails that reached my ankles and had an arcane design stitched in gold going through the dull red borders. The body paint was literally full-body. It resembled a skeletal image and could have easily frightened a small child.

"Uh... It's my ceremonial robe and body paint," I answered awkwardly.

"Uh, okay... but that doesn't answer who y'are or what you're doing here."

"I was, uh, my name is... is..." Why couldn't I remember my name? Could the fall have been severe enough to jar my memory? It's possible, but then how could I remember everything else about myself?

"I-I don't... remember my name. I don't remember my own name."

She looked at me puzzledly,"Um, well ah'm gonna have to call you something..." She rubbed her chin, deep in thought, "How about Nobody?"

Big Mac looked at her with a face that said something like, "Really?"

"What? What else should we call him?"

"No, no. She's right. Just call me Nobody..." I supposed that that would be just as suitable a name as any.

"Alright, then. But what're ya doin' here?" she pressed.

"I was, trying to speak with Mephisto and see if he would take the voices away. I swear I did the ritual and the spell correctly, but somehow, I ended up here." I didn't care if they thought I was a lunatic. They wouldn't be completely wrong if they did.

"Wait," she said,"Did you say 'spell?'"

"Yes. I'm a, I'm a Necromancer," I said, now a little embarrassed.

"That involves magic, doesn't it?" she asked, sounding a little confused.

"Yes," I answered.

She looked at Big Mac questioningly, and he gave her a shrug as a reply. It seems I've either confused them somehow or just made them think I'm crazy.

"You, a normal earth being, can use magic?" she asked, now sounding a little sarcastic.

"Earth being? What do you mean e-" What she said struck something in me. What if I'd done the ritual correctly and this was the Underworld? What if she was a messenger of Mephisto? That must be why she said "earth being." I've landed in the Underworld, and these people must be demons!But what if I've offended them? What if I can't seek counsel with Mephisto because of this?

I quickly rolled over and got on my knees, put my hands on the ground in fromt of me, bowed my head, and quickly blurted out "O' forgive my insolence, great messenger of Mephisopheles! I did not mean to offend! Please, I merely seek counsel with your almighty leader!"

Author Commentary:

Sorry this chapter was as long as it was. The length of each chapter will vary a lot, but they'll stay around the same size. Next chapter: A wild Rainbow Dash appears!

Chapter 4

Applejack led me to the upstairs bathroom in her house on the farm and brought me some of Big Macintosh's old clothes to change into. I could tell just by looking at them that they would be big on me.

I took a quick, cool shower to rinse the paint off my body. Then I got the feeling that something was off. Something about me. Have you ever not noticed something until you realized it wasn't there? Like a sound that goes unheard until it ceases. This is what it felt like. I couldn't feel the voices. I could feel them all the time, even when they were completely silent, but now I couldn't.

Without turning off the refreshing water (it felt to good to shut off), I sat cross-legged in the shower and meditated. I slowed my breathing, and relaxed until the outside world faded away softly. I delved deep into my mind, and discovered that the voices were still present, but they were dormant. They felt like they were... asleep, for lack of a better word. It felt like they were... being patient; like they were waiting for something to happen. What?

Before I could go deeper, a loud crash that came from downstairs snapped me out of my trance. My curiosity got the better of me, and I quickly got out of the shower, dried off, clothed myself, and hurried downstairs to see the cause of the commotion. I reached for my makeshift crutch, but notices that my ankle was feeling a bit better by now, so I just left it.

Upon my entering the living room (estimated source of the noise), I was charged and trampled by three small girls who were no doubt on some sugar rush. They bombarded me with questions about who I was and where I came from and what I was doing there and why I was wearing Big Mac's clothes. Before I could answer anything, Big Mac came to my rescue and lifted the three girls off of my chest with two in one hand, one in the other. I realized they were small, but the ease with which he lifted them amazed me. I exhaled with relief and thanked him. Applejack came in later and scolded the three girls while they put on their puppy dog eyes.

"How many times have Ah told ya not to tackle strangers?"

They hung their heads in shame.

"Applejack, ow, who are these girls?" I asked, standing back up.

She stopped wagging her finger at them to answer me, "Well, this little troublemaker here's mah little sis, Applebloom," she said, gesturing to the one with the red hair and the large bow on her head. She was wearing blue overalls over a cream-colored shirt and red sneakers. She had orange irises and an adorable blush across her face.

"This one's Scootaloo," (I stopped caring about the odd names by now)

She pointed to the second child. She had purple hair, with matching purple eyes. She wore an orange shirt and baggy pants both riddled with stains. She also had a small pair of orange feathered wings on her back.

"And finally, we have Sweetie Belle. She's the little sister of a friend o' mine."

She pointed to the last little girl, a well-dressed young lady with a white little dress that had a frilly bottom, light purple tights, and what looked like ballet slippers. Her hair was curly with the combination of periwinkle and off-white running through it. But poking through her bangs was something I hadn't seen yet: a pure white horn. I wanted to lean in close and examine it, but held back, feeling that it would be rude.

Applejack turned back to the shamed trio, "Now, apologize to our guest fer stompin' all over him."

Applebloom spoke up in a cute southern accent, "Mister, we're sorry fer jumpin' all over ya. We were just excited about gettin' our tryin' to get our Cutie Marks."

I would have been overcome by their... cuteness of their "we're sorry" faces if I hadn't been struck by curiosity at the mention of a "Cutie mark."

"What's a 'Cutie Mark?'" I asked. I assumed they were some impossible-to-not-know subject when I saw Applejack mentally face-palm before saying, "Are you serious?"

I blushed, even though I had no reason to know what they were, but they didn't know that.

"A Cutie Mark is that mark that people get when they find out what they're good at. For me, it's being awesome!" Rainbow Dash said boastfully as she entered the living room, rubbing her eyes.

"Sorry, Big Mac. I was taking a nap in your bed."

Big Mac just waved his hand dismissively.

I asked Rainbow Dash, "What does yours look like?"

She unzipped her jacked and pulled down one side to show me the image of a cloud firing a multi-colored lightning bolt located on her upper arm.

"Hm. Interesting," I said.

"You're darn right it is!" she replied proudly, "Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna fly some laps around town," she said just before opening the front door and shooting off into the sky with her wings, hitting all of us with a powerful blast of wind.

"What's yours, Applejack?" I asked.

She rolled up her sleeve to show me the image of three red apples, most likely representing the fact that she worked on an apple farm.

"So, is it some sort of coming-of-age ritual?" I assumed.

"Yeah, Ah guess it's somethin' like that."

Scootaloo spoke at this, "We're trying to get ours by doing everything we can think of!"

Them? But they're only children. If these "Cutie Marks" are tattoos or brands, children shouldn't be striving for them, should they? I pushed the thought out of my mind of children recieving tattoos.

"Alright, Nobody," Applejack was addressing me now, "We should go meet Twilight before it gets late."

"Okay," I replied.

"And uh, you three go and, uh, wrestle with Big Mac or something." she told the three children. Their eyes all got big and they gasped in unison and looked at each other before all shouting "Cutie Mark Crusaders: Professional Wrestlers!!"

They nearly burst my eardrums. I never thought such small vocal cords could make such gargantuan sounds.

Chapter 5

"'Cutie Mark Crusaders?'" I asked Applejack as we walked through town.

It was a beautiful place, full of bright colors, quaint houses, cottages, stores, vending stands, and gardens. The people were everywhere, socializing, buying and selling things, and just looking happy. Even the townsfolk were bursting with colors. Hair of every color and style, eyes of the oddest color and size. I saw people with wings, horns, and neither. I almost felt... sorry for the ones with neither. But it made me feel better seeing something normal and not so... alien.

"Hmm? Oh, those three formed a little group, since none of 'em have their Cutie Marks yet. They just run around and try ta find out what they're good at so they can get 'em, but they usually just end up buggin' the living daylights out of everybody, but they don't mean no harm," she answered.

"Ah," I replied boringly. I stared off into space for a few seconds absent-mindedly before another question appeared in my head, "Now, who's this Twilight we're going to see?"

"Oh, she's just a good friend o' mine. She's kind of a book worm. She works at the local library. She was also Princess Celestia's top student in magic school."

Princess Celestia? Magic school? Just more things to add to my ever-growing list of curiositites. I was about to ask another question that would no doubt get me yet another facepalm when I suddenly hear, "LOOK OUT!!"

And before I can react, I see a wagon carrying various pastries and sweets flying towards me and Applejack followed by a pink blur. There is an incredible crash and the next thing I know, I'm lying on my stomach and Applejack is on said cart slowly rolling towards a street vender with a vegetable cart.

I look in front of my and see a woman, roughly my age, with big curly pink hair and an all-different-shades-of-pink ensemble looking into the sky worriedly with her arms out trying to catch something.

Before I could shout angry obscenities that would make a sailor blush at her, I see a plate of cookies fall into her left hand. She then caught a basket of various muffins on the top of her foot, a bag of candy on her arm, a tupperware container of jelly-rolls in her right hand, and another basket of muffins in her mouth.

I was astonished by how fast she acted to catch all of that food and not have anything drop or spill. She then yelled in relief, "Yesh! I did ick!" The basket in her mouth was impeding her speech.

She then looked at things in her possession one by one while saying, "One, choo, free, four, fah -(gasp)- Where's shix?!"

I looked up, and there it was, shix. It was a tray of cupcakes falling from the sky. From my perspective, I could tell it was headed straight for Applejack. I got to my feet in such a hurry I nearly tripped over myself. I ran over to the supposed ground zero of the cupcake bombardment while the pink Cirque du Soleil reject hopped in place and shouted "Hurrreeeeeeee!" at me through the basket.

I quickly got in front of Applejack and the cart and shoved it backwards with my foot and prepared myself to catch the falling tray. I played a countdown in my head as it fell.

3...2...1... nothing. Nothing? I had my eyes closed for the impact, so I had no idea what had happened. I opened them, but all I saw were my hands raised to the sky. I looked over at the pink menace and saw Rainbow Dash hovering over her and handing her the tray after she (the pink one) had put the other items on the ground. I was just left standing there like an idiot with his arms in the air.

Rainbow Dash looked at me and winked and said, "You owe me," and flew off. I helped Applejack off of the cart and she said to the pink one, "Watch it, Pinkie! Ya coulda killed us!"

"Sorry, Applejack, I was just on the way to Roseluck's birthday party and," the pink one's words just came out as a bunch of rapidly passing but coherent sounds. I could have sworn she was either a, ADHD patient, or on a sugar rush, which, considering the amount of sweets she had, seemed pretty possible. And her sentence to subject change ratio was about 2:1.

"...but I couldn't catch all the frogs in time, so I took a bunch of tin foil and- Hey! Who's that?!"

"Oh, I'm Nobody."

"Don't be silly, you've gotta be somebody, right? I wouldn't be talking to you if you were nobody," her words sort of cheered me up.

"No, I don't remember my name, so Applejack decided to call me Nobody," It occurs to me that she might have decided on that name because I seemed to be an attacker and she was thinking of me negatively at the time, but I thought it was suitable. In this world, I am Nobody: no name, no family, no history, no anything. I literally just fell out of the sky one day.

"What? You don't remember your name?" the pink one said, "Ooh! I know! You should go see Twilight! She's great with memory spells."

"Actually," Applejack interjected, "that's where we're headed now.

"Ooh! Can I come?"

"Uh, don't you have a party ya gotta go to?"

I almost thanked Applejack for bringing that up.

"Oh, yeah! Sorry guys. Gotta run," and then she went barreling down the street with her cart of food.

"You know, one day she might kill someone doing that," I stated.

"Aw, she don't mean no harm. She's just being Pinkie Pie."

Her name was Pinkie Pie? How... suitable.

"Wait, you know her?" I asked.

"Of course! She's one of mah best friends. Oh, well will ya look at that? we're here."

Chapter 6

I looked up, and I saw a large treehouse, but not a tree with a childish box nestled in the branches. I saw a tree with a house built around, inside, and throughout it. There was what looked like an observation deck with a telescope on it poking out of one of the bunches of leaves.

Applejack rapped on the door and I heard a frustrated groan from inside followed by "Ugh, Why can't I get it right?!" and a book crashed through one of the windows and landed a few feet away from me and Applejack. Then, the door opened, revealing a young boy, maybe thirteen or so, with green, spiky hair, a purple hoodie, and khakis with purple tennis shoes.

"Oh, hey AJ. Listen, you kinda came at a bad time. Twi's in the middle of-"

The boy was cut off by a woman walking into the room and nearly shouting, "Spike! Who's at the door?"

She was roughly the same age as Applejack, had long, disheveled levender hair with a pink streak going through it and bangs that just covered her eyebrows. Her eyes were a reflective purple color and had dark bags under them.

She wore a white T-shirt that said "I heart magic," only the "heart" was replaced by a sparkle with smaller sparkles around it. She also had on white and purple poke-a-dot boxers and one single white slipper. Why one?

Upon seeing us, she changed attitudes from a tired and grouchy Twilight into a much more pleasant and inviting Twilight.

"Oh, Applejack! Hi. Come in and uh," she gave herself a once-over, "let me get decent. Spike, go and get our guests something to drink."

"Sure thing, Twi," the boy, Spike, replied

After Twilight returned, Applejack simply handed her the book she needed to return and went back home and left me and Twilight alone while Spike was cleaning other rooms and organizing books.

(It turns out, she not only runs the library, she lives in it. The whole place is her house. Her sleeping quarters are upstairs, her "lab," as she put it, was downstairs, and the public part of the library was on the ground floor.)

It wasn't visible in her frizzy and matted hair, but after she cleaned herself up and brushed it, I could see her horn.

It was most likely some sort of bone, or at least matted hair fibers like that of an ox, but had a light purple tinge to it, and it was coming out right at her hairline. It was about three and a half inches long, and had a swirled look to it and a rounded tip. I almost found myself staring at it.

"So, Applejack tells me you can perform magic. Is that true?" she asked me. She had this tone of curiosity and intrigue.

"Huh? Oh, well, yeah. Kind of," I was a little embarassed about the subject. It would certainly buy me a straight jacket in my world, but when I was talking to Twilight about it, I felt like she wasn't curious about the magic itself, but curious about me performing magic.

"How does that work? Did something happen to your horn? Or is it some genetic gift?"

I was reminded of a question I had earlier about horns and magic.

"Actually," I lifted my bangs to show my bare forehead and hairline, "I never had a horn," I could tell I sparked something inside her because her eyes widened a little and her back straightened up.

"Really? I-I don't understand how that's possible; an earth being who's studied in magic. Hang on, let's sit down and talk about this," she motioned me over to the sofa and some chairs. I sat in the velvet-colored wingback, while she took the couch.

It felt like one of the many, many therapy sessions I'd had in the past.

She told me about her -this- world, first. Equestria. This world was created by a race of super-intelligent, all-powerful equines known as Alicorns. They created the citizens here in an image that they... borrowed from another world, and gave them the qualities of the Alicorns. The citizens treated all equines as equals and went so far as to name most of their large cities and towns after them. The town I was in currently was called Ponyville. She told me all about the major history of Equestria. And I mean all. About the two princesses who controlled the sun and the moon, about the six elements of harmony, about how the mismatched creature Discord unleashed chaos on the world, and about her and all of her friends' misadventures.

"Wow," was all I could say when she'd finished speaking.

She also told me about the Earth, Air, and Magic Beings. The air beings were the ones that had wings. They had the ability to touch, stand, sit, and even sleep on clouds, in addition to flying, of course. There was even a group of air beings who were assigned to control the weather of the town.

Earth Beings were the ones with neither wings nor horns. They were generally the strongest of the three beings and handled most of the grunt work of the world.

Magic Beings were the ones with horns. Their horns were made of special bone that could use and focus the "magic" inside the owner's body and do whatever their will is.

Every Being had magic running throughout their body. The three types just channel it differently. Air Beings channel their magic through their wings and feet, allowing for weightlessness in the air. Magic Beings channeled it through their horns and brains, allowing for manipulation of space and, on very rare occassions, time. Earth Beings channeled their magic through their muscles, giving them hightened strength.

The most powerful of the Beings were the Omni Beings. They had attributes of all three of the Beings. They are the rarest Beings, and two of them, Princess Luna and Princess Celestia, rule over Equestria and control the moon and sun, respectively. A long time ago, Luna became jealous of her sister and tried to consume the world in darkness. Celestia overpowered her and banished her to the moon for a thousand years. Upon Luna's return, she was possessed by an evil entity called Nightmare Moon and tried to repeat the action. Twilight and her five friends (three of which I have met) used the Elements of Harmony (kindness, laughter, generosity, loyalty, honesty, and magic) to defeat Nightmare Moon and restore Luna.

After she finished, we switched roles and I blathered on about my world and all the war and sadness and the few happinesses of it. She became truly shocked and appalled when I began telling her about my life story which might as well be called a tragedy. The Tragedy of Nobody: an autobiography.

"I'm... so sorry you had to go through all of that," Twilight said, knowing she could never understand what I'd been through. "I just wish there was something I could do... Maybe, what if I try to help you remember your name?"

She spoke to me like a caring parent speaking to a hurt child, but it didn't bother me. Perhaps I needed a comforting spirit in my life.

"I guess it couldn't hurt to try," I said.

"Okay, I'll see if I can find the spell. Spike!"

Spike poked his head through the doorway. "What?"

"I need you to help me find a spell that works for amnesia. You check upstairs and we'll check downstairs."

"You got it," Spike complied.

What was Spike, anyway? I couldn't tell if he was some kind of indentured servant or paid assistant, or was he just a really nice friend?

After a minute or two of looking, I heard Spike exclaim, "Found it!" from upstairs, and he came down and gave it to Twilight. She flipped to the table of contents and ran her finger down the page until she found "Amnesia spell... 236" and went there.

"Darn!" she said.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"It says I need some ginkgo biloba leaves and incense candles, and I don't have those."

"Why? What do those do?"

"Well, it says here that the gingko biloba helps the subject focus and the incense helps them relax."

"Well, where do we find some, then?" I asked.

"Um, I think Fluttershy might have some. Yeah, there's some at Fluttershy's cottage."

Fluttershy was one of Twilight's friends. She represents the element of kindness, mostly because she has a soft, practically liquid, spot for animals and such. From what I was told, she lived on the edge of town, near the Everfree Forest, where it is said that monstrous creatures dwell.

Author Commentary:

Whew, finally got to doing 6. I assure you, this will NOT be the longest chapter.

Chapter 7

After a brief walk, we reached Fluttershy's cottage. There were animals literally everywhere I looked; birds on the roof and backyard fence, squirrels and mice building homes in the ground and trees, and there was one bunny that kept staring at me with a look of displeasure.

Twilight knocked on the door

"Fluttershy, Fluttershy it's me, Twilight."

And from behind the door I heard a meek and gentle female voice say, "Oh, come in, it's open..."

Upon entering I noticed a distinct smell, or, rather a lack of smell. I would have bet money on the cottage smelling of cat urine and rodent droppings, but it smelled of natural freshness and flowers.

I saw Fluttershy putting food down for a cat with a cast on its leg. Twilight did tell me Fluttershy was the local unofficial vet.

She was a cute girl, one of the youngest of Twilight's five friends. She had long pink hair that flowed down from her head. She had on a yellow gown that went down to her shins and, because the gown was sleeveless, I could see that her Cutie Mark was an image of three pink butterflies.

She said, in her quiet voice, "Hello Twilight. What brings you he-"

She stopped the moment she made eye contact with me.

She had glassy blue eyes that told me everything about who she was. I could tell that she was the gentlest person in any world; she wouldn't hurt a germ; she would choose her friends over any earthly or unearthly possession.

"T-T-Twilight..." she became much quieter and started blushing while she tried to hide her face behind her long bangs. She was only a fraction of a decibel louder than a whisper, "Who's th-that?"

"Oh, don't worry Fluttershy; he's just a friend of mine. He's new in town."

Just because I'd lived alone for so many years doesn't mean I'd forgotten my manners. I stuck out my hand for a handshake and politely said, "Nice to meet you, Fluttershy."

She cowered a little and just looked at my hand for a few seconds before hesitantly shaking it. She kept looking down and avoiding eye contact with me. Twilight told me she was shy, but I wasn't expecting this kind of shy.

"S-So, Twilight, what brings you here?"

"I'm trying to get ingredients for a spell; some ginkgo biloba. I thought you had some," Twilight explained.

"Oh, um, yes I have some. It's, uh, in the kitchen..."

Fluttershy headed toward a cabinet above the sink in the kitchen and rifled through jars and bottles of herbs and medicines until she found and pulled out a little jar with a few leaves in it and handed it to Twilight.

"Here you go. Is there anything else you need?

Twilight remembered the candles, "Oh, yes. Do you have any incense candles I can use?"

"Umm..." Fluttershy looked around the room before picking up a box on the coffee table and looking into it, "Is six enough?"

"Sure, that'll be fine," Twilight said before taking the box and heading for the door, "Thanks, Fluttershy."

She looked up at me through her pink bangs, her blush fading, smiled shyly, and gave me a quick wave before I closed the door behind me as I left.

Upon Twilight opening the door, I realized the inside was darker than when we'd left.

"Ugh," Twilight complained, "Why did Spike turn off the lights? I can't see a thing."

She felt around for a switch on the wall. When she found one, she flipped it, and I almost had a heart attack.

When the lights came on, my eyes caught a large banner strung across the ceiling that read "Welcome Nobody!" There was a large amount of people in the room and food arranged on tables, streamers were everywhere, but before I could react, everyone and their brother shouted, "SURPRISE! WELCOME TO PONYVILLE!"

Twilight shrieked, and my heart nearly skipped a beat, not because I was surprised, which I was, but because of how much it sounded like the voices when they would all shout at me once when I was about to fall asleep. The fear of them coming back overtook me, causing my heart to beat quickly and uncontrollably while my vision began to blur, and I clutched at the sides of my head and leaned against the wall slid down it until I was lying on my side and mumbling, "no, no, no, no," to myself. My intense fear of the voices and sudden shock affected me more than I thought it would, but I found myself quickly passed out near Twilight's doorway.

Author commentary:

Sorry. This chapter was really slow and boring with a side of pointlessness, but I assure you: Next Chapter: s(yay)t gets real.

Chapter 8

I opened my eyes after I don't know how long, but I was no longer in Twilight's abode. I was in an endless, green, grassy pasture with a few hills here and there. It looked like it was the middle of the day, except the sky was an odd dark red.

"What? Where am I?" I asked no one.

I stood up and looked around; I was totally alone in an endless sea of green. Although, I could hear things: incoherent whispers. I double-checked and found that I was still alone. I walked around some to try and find out where the whispers were coming from, and noticed that everywhere I had stepped had changed into a patch of dead grass. I started to panic. The whispers seemed to be getting louder, no, closer! I tried to run in one direction, but the whispers kept getting closer. I ran faster, but something had brought me back to the spot I'd woken up on. How?! I had run in a straight line! I ran in a different direction, but ended up with the same result.

The whispers kept getting closer and closer until they were practically in my ears. I tried covering them up but they wouldn't go away. I held up my hands to the sides of my head and screamed, "Shut up! Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP!!"

It ceased.

I opened my eyes and slowly removed my hands from my head. Now, the sky was pure blood-red, and all the grass in the pasture was dead.

There were eight pointed, curved pillars in a circle around me. They were my height, black, and didn't look like anything I'd ever seen before. The texture looked like a cross between dead wood and stone. I warily approached one and slowly, oh, so very slowly, put my hand on it.

The instant my fingers made contact, the ground vibrated and my ears were filled with the sounds of fear. I heard the terrified screams of men, women, and children. I heard the sound of a knife piercing through flesh, the sound of a car swerving and hitting another, the sounds of crying boys and girls, a family begging for their lives, and then it all stopped.

My eyes shot open, and I was panting like a dog and sweating bullets. Everyone was gathered around me, Applejack, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Twilight, Pinkie Pie, and someone I had yet to meet.

I was gasping between words when I said, "What... just happened? Where am I?"

Twilight put her hand on my shoulder, "It's okay. You're just on my couch; you're with friends."

"Ya took a spill by the door an' started talkin' in your sleep," Applejack told me.

And then the stranger spoke up. She was a magic being, her horn being pure white. She had purple, wavy hair and indigo eyes. She wore a white slim dress and a vest with three blue diamonds emblazoned on the left breast.

"Oh, goodness. You started shaking and mumbling for something to 'shut up' in your sleep." She spoke with a touch of sophistication and regalness in her voice.

"Who are you?" I was calming down now. I was still fearful and aware, but I was calming down.

"Oh, why I'm Rarity. Surely Twilight's told you about me."

A guilty look crossed Twilight's face, "Eheh-heh... I might have forgotten just a little bit..."

Rarity gave a quick "hmph" and crossed her arms.

I sat up more on the couch, and saw over the back that everyone from earlier was still present. The banner was up, and the party favors were still out, and everyone was whispering to one another about what just occurred.

"Hey," I asked, "What's going on?"

Pinkie Pie answered, "Well, you know how I ran into you, literally, today? Well, I knew I'd never seen you before, which meant that you were knew in town, because I've seen everybody in town, so I decided to throw you a surprise Pinkie Pie style welcome party! But it kinda didn't work out since you had a breakdown and..." her hyperactive mannerisms were not impeded by the scary fact that I actually just had a mental breakdown, but I didn't mind, "So, how about it?"

"Huh?" I had zoned out during most of her rant.

"I said, 'Do you still wanna par-tay?'"

I looked around the room again and thought for a few seconds.

"Hmm..." Pinkie's eyes grew wide with anticipation. I decided that something cheerful would take my mind off of the horrific nightmare just moments before, "Sure, let's party."

And as soon as I said those words, Pinkie exclaimed "Woo-Hoo!!" and pulled a confetti cannon (quite literally) out of nowhere and fired it into the air.

Author commentary:

I told you it would get real. Also, if anyone would like to give me a cover image for this story, they're welcome to. Just sayin'.

Chapter 9

The next two hours were filled with laughter and happiness and music. There was the occasional lamp shade hat and the sound of something breaking followed by "Oooooohhhhh!!"

The ironic thing is that I decided to go along with the party so I could take my mind off of that horrible nightmare. And yet all I could find myself doing was sitting down and thinking about nothing but the nightmare. What were those odd pillars? What were those screams and death cries?

After the party had ended, everyone went home. Applejack, Pinkie, Rainbow Dash and I helped Twilight clean up.

Twilight approached me and said, "It's late. You should get some sleep."

I looked at the clock, and it showed eleven-thirty.

"Yeah, I guess you're right. But where am I gonna stay, though?"

"Well, uh, I've got some extra blankets and pillows; you could sleep on the couch if you like," she suggested.

Then Applejack spoke up, "Or you could stay at Sweet Apple Acres in the guest room."

I thought I'd take Applejack up on her offer and go to her place for the night.

I helped clean up some more before I left, but as I was working on the hallway, I saw a bit of white fabric poking out from under a closet door. I opened the door to find Rarity and Spike both unconscious (fully-clothed, mind you), probably drunk from whatever drinks they were serving at the party (If these people had alcohol, there seemed to be no age restriction for the consumption of it. I saw both adults and minors drinking the same beverages).

Spike had a dopey grin and smeared lipstick on his face, so I assumed that he enjoyed whatever occurred in the closet. I gave him a silent thumbs-up and quietly closed the door again.

"Oh, no," I heard Twilight say from the living room.

"What is it, Twi?" I asked.

"Because of Pinkie's party I forgot all about the spell."

"Don't worry, it's been a long day. You and I can try it tomorrow."

"Alright," She sounded a little disappointed. It seemed like she really wanted to perform that spell.

When Applejack and I got back to Sweet Apple Acres, I moved my robe from the bathroom (where it had been left since this morning) into the guest room. It was a good-sized room with a comfortable bed and a desk and chair and a bedside bookshelf/nightstand.

"Ah hope you find everything to your likin'. If ya need anything, just gimme a holler."

"Thanks, Applejack. I, uh, I really appreciate everything you people have done for me."

Everyone's hospitality and willingness to help out has far exceeded that of the people on my own world. These people have barely known me for a day, and yet they've done so much. They've clothed me, saved me from falling desserts, tried to cure my slight amnesia, thrown me a party, and even housed me temporarily. Back home, I wouldn't have gotten anything more than pity for the crazy guy with the body paint and voices in his head.

"Aw, shoot. It's nothin'."

"No, really. Back home, I wouldn't have gotten anything like this. I just wish I could do something to pay you all back for it."

I did feel kind of bad having to mooch off of these people and waste their time.

"Well, maybe you could help with the apple buckin' tomorrow. You could help by catchin' 'em as they fall."

Apple bucking? The subject made me curious.

"Sounds... fun," I said tiredly. It was around midnight when we got back, and I was already exhausted from the weird day I'd had.

"Well g'night, Nobody."

"Good night, Applejack."

I turned off the bedside lamp and Applejack closed the door. Good night... if only it were.

Author commentary:

Heh heh heh... Since I don't think Spike gets the props he deserves in the show (or most fanfics, for that matter), I decided to give him a little wink, wink, nudge, nudge victory scene.

Chapter 10

I sat on the floor, cross-legged, and tried to meditate in order to calm my mind due to my lack of sleep. Funny, I would think I'd be used to it by now. I imagined peaceful sights, like a waterfall, or a forest. It was working for a time; my heart rate slowed, and I felt at ease. But one image flashed in my head. It then began to flash repeatedly. It was that pasture.

It was that dead pasture. I kept seeing all the dead grass, the bloody sky, and those accursed pillars. I could never forget those pillars. I could never forget the screams when I touched them.

The image of the pillars kept appearing in my mind, no matter how much I focused to try and keep them out. But then, the image of the pillars no longer showed. Now there was only the image of a face. It changed from the pasture into an evil, horrible-looking face with pitch black "skin" that looked like it was pulsating and moving, and the eyes and mouth were like that of a jack-o-lantern, just empty holes for eyes with a swirling, glowing, red-orange void behind them. The mouth had jagged, black teeth that surrounded the same void, and had dark smoke leaking out of the corners.

I tried my hardest to keep the image out, but it kept forcing its way back to the front of my mind. I couldn't do anything to stop it, so I stopped meditating immediately.

I opened my eyes. It was morning already. I was no longer in the guest room; I was in the kitchen with my hand in the silverware drawer. Apparently, in my frightful trance, I had been sleep-walking. I closed the drawer and looked out the window onto the apple orchard and saw that Big Mac and Applejack were outside doing what I assumed was "apple buckin'."

I put on some decent clothes and went outside to help them out.

"Hey, yer up," Applejack greeted me pleasantly.

"Morning," I said back, "What are we doing?"

"Well, you can come over here an' catch the apples in the baskets after I knock 'em down."

"Alright, well how are you going to knock them do-" Before I could finish my sentence, Applejack lifted her leg up and delivered an incredibly strong kick to the trunk of a tree, sending nearly all of its fruit to the ground.

"H-How did you do that?" I was astonished by her strength, "Oh, right. Earth beings are strong."

"Ya gotta be quicker than that, Nobody," Applejack teased, "And after ya fill the baskets, just dump 'em in the cart over there. Then you can put the empty ones under the next tree."

The next hour-and-a-half passed by calmly and sweatily. I would move empty barrels under a tree, Applejack would "buck" the apples out, I would unload them into a cart, and repeat. Big Mac and Applebloom worked on one half of the orchard while we took care of the other.

When we were finished, we went inside to cool down. There was a knock on the door. I answered it and saw Twilight. She had come to tell me me that all the preparations for the amnesia spell were ready, and Applejack came with me to see if the spell would work.

"Okay," Twilight said as she handed me a cup with hot tea in it, "I made this tea out of the ginkgo leaves. Just drink that and think about wanting to know your name. Spike! Bring in the candles, please."

Spike walked into the room with the box of candles and a book of matches. He still had that dopey grin on his face from yesterday, and his cheeks were a little flushed. He must have really enjoyed what went on in that closet last night.

"Aheh-heh... Here ya go, Twi..."

"What's got him so happy?" Applejack asked.

"I don't know; he won't tell me, but it must be good. He's been like that all morning," Twilight said. We all watched him blissfully stumble out of the room.

I drank the tea and focused while Twilight looked back at the spell and lit the candles. I sat on a table and assumed a meditative pose and focused on my name while I deeply inhaled the incense and let the tea take effect.

"Are you ready, Nobody?" Twilight asked. I nodded slowly as a reply.

"OK. Just focus on your name."

Her horn started glowing a pale pink color, and she put her hands on the sides of my head, closed her eyes, and touched her horn to my forehead. I closed my eyes.

The instant bone touched flesh, I no longer felt like I was on a table in Twilight's house; I felt like I was outside and sitting on... dead grass. I stood and looked around to see that I was back in that god-forsaken pasture. I saw those god-forsaken pillars, and I heard those god-forsaken screams.

I ran from the circle of detestable pillars, ignoring the grass and the sky and the sounds. I ran until I was sweaty and exhausted. I never stopped, and never looked back. But I was unfortunate enough to trip over my own feet and land on my hands and knees. Panting, I made a foolish and terrifying mistake: I looked back.

The circle was a mere three feet away from where I'd fallen. I stood up and screamed.

"AAAHHHHHH!! WHAT DO YOU WANT?! GO AWAY!!"

I ran up to it and started just punching it as hard as I could, even after I saw my own blood splatter on the queer obelisks. I looked at my still-clenched fists, to find that the bones in my knuckle were visible through the stained and torn skin.

I broke down. I collapsed to my knees and started bawling into my bloody hands.

"(sob)... What... What (sob) do you want? What do you want, huh?! WHAT?!"

Then, in the most terrifying three seconds of my life, all of the screams and cries and whispers were replaced by an abhorrent, nightmarish voice -a voice that sounded exactly like all of the whispers and voices in my head all rolled into one multi voice. And it said to me, "TO BE FED..."

The ground rumbled violently, and I looked up from my bloody weeping and saw that the circle of eight pillars was... rising!

I crawled away backwards, unable to take my eyes away from the horrific sight. The ring was pushing out of the ground, bringing with it more odd, black, stone-looking mass, and the pillars did not just form a large ring, it formed the horny crown of a nightmarish head, the same head I saw while meditating in Applejack's guest room. That black skin, those empty eyes, the jagged teeth, they were all an exact match. The inside of it all looked like that red-orange void. The beast had a massive and angular head. The thing had a very relatively thin neck, and I would have wondered how it held its head up if I hadn't been paralyzed by fear.

The thing stared at me with a wicked, ear-to-ear smile on its otherwise dead face. It leaned down and opened its massive limitless jaws, and as I stared into the red-orange, it engulfed me in its void.

Author commentary:

...And a skeleton popped out!

Chapter 11

I felt myself fall off of the table, and I saw Twilight get forced back by something. She stumbled, but regained her balance.

"What in the world was that?!" she exclaimed.

"I (pant) don't know..." I was terrified. My heart was racing, and somehow, all the running I did in my mind wore me out physically.

"Nobody, are you alright?" Applejack sounded genuinely worried and frantic.

"I'm-I'm fine (cough), don't worry," I reassured her. I held my hand up to her to enforce that statement, but when I did, I saw that the backs of my hands were covered in blood.

That was impossible... That only happened in my mind, there was no way the injury could have existed on my physical body. I then looked at Applejack and Twilight as if they had some insight on my situation. But something was off... They weren't looking at me; they were looking at the table I just fell off of. I turned around to see what had captivated them, and I saw me. My seemingly lifeless body was just sitting on the table, head hung low and arms hanging limply.

I cupped my hand to my mouth to keep from screaming and scrambled backwards. I then got up and slowly reached out to touch this mystery on its shoulder, and as my red, wet finger was a mere inch from its shoulder, the whole body sprung off of the table and stood swaying on the floor. The motion was so sudden it caused a gasp to escape from all three of us.

It stood there for a few seconds swaying side-to-side before standing erect, and placed one hand on its hip and one running through its black hair. It opened its eyes and inhaled deeply through its nose. Its eyes were a little wide, and the pupils were half their normal size, and had a trace of red in them.

"N-Nobody? Are you... okay?" Twilight was aware that something was wrong.

"No! Twilight, I'm over here! That's not me!" I tried to get her attention, but it was clear that they couldn't see me.

The thing manipulating my body looked at me, directly at me, and chuckled tauntingly.

"Actually, Twilight," The thing licked its lips and hugged itself strangely, "I feel delightful... I'm so glad your spell worked the way I wanted it to..."

A little bit of relief showed on Twilight's and Applejack's faces, "Oh, so you remember your name? What is it, if you don't mind my asking?" She sounded less tense now.

"My name..." the thing's face instantly switched from a wicked smile to a look of seriousness. It forced a weird spash of syllables out of its mouth, "Hmm?" It did it again.

"Hmm... It seems human vocal cords cannot pronounce my name... Ah!" It then lumbered over to one of Twilight's bookcases, "Someone gave me a Latin name once... Oh, what was it?"

Twilight and Applejack both looked at each other confusedly.

It yanked one book off of a shelf and began just flipping through the pages, not even bothering to actually read them. It closed that book and threw it behind itself, much to Twilight's dismay. It grabbed another book and did the same thing. And another. And another. It grabbed one more book and stopped on one specific page.

"Ah... Vesania. Latin for madness. Mmmm... how fitting." It discarded the book just as he did the others, and made a grand gesture with its hands, "I am Vesania! Consumer of human souls!" It then began tittering madly as it stroked its face and torso.

Twilight approached it cautiously, "Nobod- er- Vesania... Are you alright?"

It grabbed her shoulders and began examining her face with its beady eyes. It stuck a pinky into her mouth, pulled it back out, and then licked it, as if taste-testing some liquid, "Mmmmm... you taste... exceptional... Hmm-hmm, aha-ha-ha..."

She pulled away from it in fear and disgust.

"Nobody, stop this crazy talk! You're scarin' Twilight!" Applejack demanded.

"Is that so, Applejack?" The thing began to get closer to her, pressing her against the wall, "You're shaking, Applejack. I can see you trembling..." it whispered in her ear. It swiped a finger across her forehead, apparently collecting her light sweat, and then tasted it like it did Twilight's saliva, "Mmm... tastes like fear... wonderful..."

"Stop it!" Twilight yelled, "What's gotten into you?"

"Okay, let me break it down for you," it said, leaving Applejack alone, "Nobody isn't home right now. It's only me, Vesania. If you'd like to know, Nobody's standing by that table there," it then waved at me and smiled, mocking me.

It then began to get a nosebleed. It reached up to touch it with his finger and looked at it, his smile never fading, "Oh, it seems this body is too weak to support me like this."

Its eyes started to well up with blackness, and dark smoke started leaking out of its nose and mouth.

"You see, due to... technical difficulties, I'm going to cut this little talk short. But don't worry, we'll surely see each other again... Surely..."

The smoke flooded out of its mouth and covered the entire ceiling of the room, and a red-orange face appeared in the center, and in a flash, the smoke escaped through an open window, leaving a mad laughter echoing in the room. And with nothing occupying my body anymore, I found myself being pulled back into it. The sudden rush of feelings was unbearable, and I found myself vomiting on Twilight's floor. I couldn't handle what had just happened, and I passed out next to my puddle of blood and vomit.

Author commentary:

Yep. You guessed it. This is where it starts to get good. What is this, now? 5? 5 chapters posted in one day?

Chapter 12

"...obody... Nobody... Nobody!"

I snapped open my eyes to see everyone gathered around me again, but this time, I was in a bed. I was in a hospital room, with an IV attached to my arm, and a heart rate monitor next to the bed.

"W-What's going on?" I asked weakly.

"After that... that thing flew out o' the window, ya blew chunks on Twi's floor and passed out," Applejack said bluntly.

"Do you have any idea what that was?" asked Twilight.

I didn't know what that creature was, but it felt like I'd known it my whole life. It just felt so eerily familiar.

"No... No, I don't..."

A woman in a nurse's uniform came into the room, "I'm sorry, girls, but visiting hours are over. You'll have to leave, but you all can come see him tomorrow."

"Very well, Nurse Redheart," Rarity said. She picked up her purse, waved me goodbye, and left the room. The others followed, until it was just me and Twilight.

"You know, if you need to tell us anything, you can trust us," I knew I could trust them, but the thing was that I had nothing to tell her.

I looked at the clock on the wall, and noticed that it was nine o'clock. I figured I should get some more rest after that frightful ordeal, so I waved her goodbye, and slowly drifted off to sleep.

I should have not gone to sleep. When I opened my eyes, I saw that evil figure hovering over me; its smoky form lumbering over the bed. I sat up, and would've screamed had it not forcibly thrust his black fingers into my mouth to shut me up. It -he- held one finger up to his smiling, red mouth, and in that multi-voice whispered, "Shhh... You might wake the other patients..."

I was terrified. The taste of his smoke-fingers was gagging me.

"Now, I'm going to take my fingers out of your mouth, and when I do, you are not going to scream, capiche?"

I nodded quickly. He did something that looked like raise an eyebrow and said, "Promise?" I nodded again.

He removed his fingers and waited for a few seconds to see if I would scream. When he was sure I wouldn't, he patted my head and said, "Good boy. Now, I'm sure you have a lot of questions, and because I don't like to keep people clueless, I'll let you ask away."

He cupped his hand around his "ear" and waited for me to say something.

"Who... are y-you?" I gulped.

"Ugh, I know you were there when I possessed you and said my name twice. But fine; my name, for now, is Vesania. It's got a ring to it, don't you think?"

"What are you?"

"In short, I'm just a demon that possesses humans and makes them do... naughty things. Jack the Ripper; that was me. Gilles de Rais; that was me. Jeffrey Dahmer; that was me, too.

Basically, if my host body accepts me, I get control over it. I make people commit murders because when I kill someone, I can consume their soul (cheesy, I know), but I must say, they taste delicious. I tried going on an animal diet, but humans taste so much better..."

Vesania licked his lips after he stopped talking.

"W-Wait... weren't you living inside me?"

"Yes... Ever since you were a child."

"Then... Then how come you never killed anyone while you had me?"

Vesania chuckled. I was worried beyond belief.

"Now, who said I never killed anyone? Who do you think happened to your birth family?"

He had another ear-to-ear smile on his face. He was expecting a reaction, and he got one.

I knew exactly what happened: he possessed me to kill my own family.

Four people were stabbed to death on June 17, 2011. A father, mother, and two sons were murdered in the night. The first born son was physically unharmed during the murder. He was asleep during the nighttime attack, and the killer was never found.

That's what was told. That's what everyone believed. Some did suspect that I did it, but somehow the evidence did not point to me. But they were right. Half-right, anyway. I killed my family with a knife from the kitchen. He possessed me while I was asleep, and made me kill my family.

Author commentary:

Dramatic plot twist!

Chapter 13

I clutched at the sheets of the bed as tight as I could, and then tightened more.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Vesania said in a taunting, babyish tone, "Did I hit a nerve? You look so sad, and your face is all red..."

Tears were falling off of my face and onto the bedsheets. I wanted to strangle him. I wanted to kill him.

"So, I guess you'll be mad to hear that I did the same for your adoptive family..."

I lost it at that point.

"YOU FU-" He quickly put his fingers back in my mouth again and put his face uncomfortably close to mine. I flailed my arms about wildly, trying to hit and claw and choke the monster, but all attacks passed right through him.

"Shhh..." he whispered, "I told you not to do that. Oh, well. I might as well give you the whole story while I've got you here.

"I entered your body when you were, about, six. I had just finished a killing spree, and needed to simmer down and let my food digest, so I just picked you at random.

By the time you were fourteen, I had worked up an appetite. I waited until you fell asleep, and possessed you to do that thing that made you so very upset...

Aha ha ha... you should've seen it. They were all begging for their lives, and it was even more fun to watch the looks on their faces realizing that they were being murdered by their own flesh and blood. Oooohhh... It felt so good. And the best part is that the taste of fear lingers in their spirit for a while after death. You can bet I savored it.

And then, when you were seventeen, I worked up another hunger. I cut your adoptive family's car brakes in the night, but unfortunately, I couldn't see the actual accident since they drove off without you to your sister's, what? Soccer game? But when you got the call and ran all the way to the site of the crash, I helped myself to their shocked and confused souls. Ha ha! They barely knew what had happened! It was so funny!

However, after you ran away and moved into an isolated area far away from people and became a loner, I thought that since I saw no forseeable feeding time for me in the near future, I might as well ditch you and find a new body. But, and this pissed me off to no end, somehow, your brain had matured beyond what I had expected, and I found myself running into the insides of your head over and over again. Escape was so close, and yet so far away.

Those 'voices' you heard were hearing was just me blowing off steam. I was so... angry with you. I hated you for a while. And if I couldn't be happy, neither could you. Petty, but it worked. Besides, messing with you eased my boredom, just a little.

All those religious practices you performed didn't really do anything; I just gave you false hope for my own amusement. False hope: it's my favorite kind.

However, Necromancy gave me some issues; headaches, nausea, you name it. You see, I have Necromancic roots with the underworld and all that. I tried to get as far away from it as I could, so I hid in the back of your head, just laying low.

Oh, and this last part made me so happy, when you did that ritual thing that landed you here, I felt so, so, so close to escaping your damned head. That transmutation circle you drew altered your mind, probably why you forgot your own name, but more importantly, it brought me that much closer to getting out.

What else was there... hmm... Ah. When you were meditating in 'Applejack's' guest room, I was so close that I could invade your conscious thoughts. I was almost to the point of possessing you again; I got your hand in the silverware drawer. But, unfortunately, you regained control again, breaking my hold.

Luckily for me, things turned around. That friend of yours, Twilight? Yes, Twilight. When she did that 'amnesia spell' thing, heh-heh-hee... All she did was unlock the door from your head. I didn't just open that door, I ripped it off its hinges! Hahahaha! I got out! I got out of your damn head! Do you know how hard it is to eat so little in twenty years? Just seven people! My breakfast alone is at least twelve! Look at me! I'm so malnourished I'm barely even matter!

Phew, I'm cool... I'm cool... But wait, there's more! When I got out, I felt a thousand times stronger than I ever have before. In fact, I'm pretty sure I don't even need a host body any more..."

Every word he said made me angrier and angrier. Eventually, I just gave up trying to struggle and sat there limply, crying silently.

"Well, it's good to see I've shut you up. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to catch a snack, and I do mean 'catch,'" he said as he turned towards the window and took his fingers out of my mouth. He then stuck them in his own mouth and slurped loudly and purred.

"Wait..." I said. The instant he looked at me, I flung the heart rate monitor at his head, and after it flew through the air for a half of a second, I remembered that he was mostly intangible.

The machine crashed through the window after phasing through Vesania's head. A few seconds later, the nurse from earlier, Nurse Redheart, burst into the room, "What's going on in here?! Who's -" She stopped the very instant she saw him.

He looked at me and a smile slowly crossed his face, and he said to me, "Why thank you so much for giving me my first taste of Earth Being..."

"No! Get out of here! Run!" I shouted at the nurse, but she was frozen with fear. She shook and stared wide-eyed as Vesania's outstretched index finger came closer and closer to her forehead. When it made contact, she shivered and whimpered.

"Stop! Stop it! Leave her alone!" I jumped out of the bed and lunged at him, but just passed through his intangible body. I hit my head on the linoleum floor and started seeing double. I looked up at the nurse, and saw Vesania's finger go straight through her forehead. Only it didn't tear through flesh and bone and send blood dribbling down her face; it merely passed through like there was nothing there. But when Vesania pulled his finger back out of her head, something blue and transparent was stuck to the end. He pulled more and more of the weird blue substance out of the nurse's body, and I noticed that it had a form. The blue thing being slowly extracted from her body was a blue, whispy image of the nurse herself. It looked exactly like her, clothes and all.

Eventually, he fully removed the blue copy of the nurse, and her hollow body dropped to the floor with a sick thud. Vesania held the nurse's soul over his gaping mouth and noticed that I was watching him disgustedly.

"I noticed you were watching... I assume that you've deducted that this is the nurse's soul? It's funny: they always wear what the physical body is wearing when they die. I never quite understood that. But you know, I think I'm gonna savor this one, just for you..."

And he stuck her feet in his mouth and let her hang loosely. Then he slowly, horribly slowly, slurped her up like a noodle and swallowed her whole. I vomited again, and remained conscious long enough to see him escape through the shattered window before security guards came into the room and saw the... the dead nurse. But just before I passed out, I managed to utter two words.

"You... bastard..."

Author commentary:

Yep. It only gets darker from here on out. To all you Nurse Redheart fans, I am deeply sorry. Truly I am. I liked her too.

Chapter 14

When I awoke, I was in a different hospital room. This one wasn't as white and didn't smell so sterile. The walls were of elegant purple and white and the floor looked like marble. At the door there were two men, air beings, with golden armor on and swords at their sides. I coughed, and they looked at me before one left the room and went off into the hallway. In the distance, I heard him talking to someone.

"Your highness, he's awake now."

And followed by that was a woman's voice saying, "Wonderful; take me to him."

"Yes, ma'am."

The guard re-entered the room, and he was followed by a rather tall woman. She had on a long, white dress with gold around the edges and the image of a sun on her upper arms. She had on a golden tiara with diamonds on the front. She had a very long horn of pure white on her forehead, and her hair nearly came down to her knees; it had pink, green, and blue flowing through it, and all of it waved in the nonexistent wind inside the room. But I also saw on her back a set of large, white wings. She was an Omni Being.

"Hello. Are you feeling well?" she asked me. I felt fine physically, but emotionally and mentally, I was a wreck.

"Who are you?" I asked. The guards both raised an eyebrow at the question. Even the woman looked a little surprised.

"I am Princess Celestia. Surely you've heard of me."

I have. Twilight told me all about her when had the heart to heart talk about each other's worlds.

"Oh, yeah. Twilight told me about you."

She walked over and sat at the foot of the bed and asked the guards to wait outside the room.

"I guess you're wondering why you're in the Canterlot infirmary..."

I looked out the window, and indeed I was no longer in the Ponyville hospital.

Canterlot was an elegant city built on the side of a mountain near Ponyville. It was where all the high-class entrepeneurs lived and had all of the best restaurants and stores. And within Canterlot was the Canterlot Royal Castle, where I was now. It was the dwelling place of Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, and it also doubled as a magic school for young Magic Beings.

"A little. Would you mind explaining that?"

"It's about what happened at the hospital. It's about... what happened to Nurse Redheart. The authorities wanted to arrest you right there, but from what Twilight has written to me, I wanted to know more about you, so I ordered that you be transferred here so that I could speak with you."

And so we sat there for about half an hour, and I discussed what Vesania was and my relationship with him. I got an occasional gesture of sympathy; her hand on my knee, an "Oh, I'm so sorry," and things of that nature.

After a while, she asked if I was alright enough to walk around, and I said yes.

I was still in my hospital gown because I had no other clothes to wear. The princess led me down several long corridors before arriving in a room where Twilight and her friends were waiting. The Princess cleared her throat to get their attention. Before I could even greet them, Pinkie Pie rushed me and locked me in a hug/death grip.

"Ohmygoshweweresoworriedaboutyouafterweheardwhathappenedatthehospitalareyouokay?how'syourtemperature?HowmanyfingersamIholdingup?" Her near-incoherent babbling almost went in one ear and out the other, although I could pick out a few words here and there.

"Oof! What? Yeah, I'm fine. Get off of me..."

I pried her off me, and the look on her face was actually one of genuine worry. Even her hair had lost some of its bouncy curliness. But after she was at least semi-sure that I was okay, she put a little smile on her face. In fact, they all looked worried, not that they had any reason not to be.

A breeze passed between my legs and I shivered. I looked down at my ensemble and felt a little embarrassed to be wearing just a hospital gown in front of all these women. The Princess seemed to notice my discomfort, for she spoke up.

"I'm told you don't have much clothing, other than your robe, so I retrieved some from the nearest store," She gestured for a servant that I didn't notice until now to come forward, holding some folded shirts and pants and the sort, "You can change in one of those rooms, and then we can discuss the matter at hand."

I took the clothes and proceeded to the nearest room to change.

I came back wearing a button-up shirt and khakis with suspenders (the pants were a tad big on me).

I explained to them the whole story. Twilight already knew the first half, and Celestia the other, but as far as everyone else knew, they were clueless.

I told them what Vesania told me, and what he did to the nurse, and both of my families. Each of them were mortified and saddened by my tale of woe in their own way. Pinkie bit her nails; Fluttershy looked at the floor most of the time; Rarity held her hand to her mouth, and so on.

When all was said, we all just sat quietly for a few seconds before Rarity asked, "W-Well, how do we stop it? We can stop it, can't we?"

"I say I should do a Sonic Rainboom in his face!" Rainbow Dash said angrily.

I didn't know what a Sonic Rainboom was, but the way Rainbow Dash said it made it sound dangerous and fierce.

"No, that would probably go right through him, "Twilight said.

"Well, we've gotta do something!"

"Hold on," Celestia interjected, "Does this 'Vesania' have any link to Necromancy?"

I hadn't thought about it much after he told me, but she was on to something.

"Actually, yes; does," I said, "He told me so in the hospital. He said it affected him somehow."

"Well, is there any way we can use that to stop him?" Twilight asked.

I delved deep into my memories of when I was in the cult.

"Well, I thought nothing of it at the time, but in one of the books we used in the cult, there was a section about an evil, soul-consuming creature that abandoned the Underworld. He was some kind of demonic overseer who was under Mephisto's rule. At least until the legendary day when Faust called upon Mephisto. While He was granting Faust endless knowledge, he discovered a way out of the Underworld and into the mortal realm. I guess he made his way to me and then into this world. I brought him here..."

"It's not your fault," Celestia said, "Now, do you remember anything about how to stop him?"

I delved deeper into my memories but found nothing on that subject.

"Uh, I don't know... I don't remember any sort of spell or ritual about him. Maybe there's something in my pocket Necromancy book." I remembered that in my old robes there was a tiny notebook with various items in it about Necromancy.

"Great!" Pinkie Pie said, "Where is it?"

"It's in my old robes in Sweet Apple Acres."

"I'll send someone to go get them," Celestia said, "In the meantime, I'll go check to see if there's anything about it in the Royal Library."

"I'll look too," Rarity offered.

"I'll check in my library," said Twilight.

"Um, I have to, uh, actually get back home and feed Angel," Fluttershy said. Angel was the name of her disgruntled pet bunny, "He gets cranky when I don't feed him on time..."

"And Ah have to chaperone Apple Bloom's sleepover so they don't get outta hand."

In the end, it was just me, Celestia, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, and Rainbow Dash browsing through the dark arts section of the Royal Library. The next twenty minutes consisted mostly of the others finding books and presenting them to me asking if they would help. The approved ones were placed in a pile on one of the tables in the library.

It was a fantastic place. Books on any subject you could think of, perfect alphabetization, and everything was beautiful. The shelves were at least thirteen feet long, and the cases almost reached the ceiling.

"How about this one?" Pinkie asked me, holding up a blue hardcover by "Star Swirl the Bearded."

I looked through the table of contents, "Uh, yeah. This is good. Set it with the others."

"Yay! Hey, where's Rainbow Dash? She took a bathroom break, like, ten minutes ago?"

"Oh, don't worry, darling," Rarity said, "Maybe she just got lost. This castle is quite confusing."

Mere seconds later, Rainbow Dash threw open the doors, panting and sweaty, and exclaimed, "Oh, sweet Celestia! I found it!" She then collapsed on the floor, tired and breathless.

"Goodness, Rainbow Dash! What happened?" Rarity asked as she put down a book to go help her up.

Rainbow replied between deep breaths, "Bathroom... castle... big... lost... panic..."

Apparently, Rarity hit the nail on the head with her assumption. The hallways of the castle were like an elaborate maze of marble and stained-glass windows with velvet curtains.

We hauled Rainbow onto one of the chairs to let her catch her breath.

"Phew, I looked everywhere for you guys. Celestia! Why'd you have to make this place so huge?"

The Princess just gave a shrug and a "sorry" smile.

"Oh, Nobody, I bumped into a messenger on the way here. Here's your book"

She reached into her back pocket and handed me my small notebook.

"Thanks. Uh, well this seems like enough," I said, glancing at the books on the table, "I guess you all can go home now."

They all gathered their things, and Celestia offered to have a guard escort them to the exit. At this, Rainbow Dash shook her head.

"Oh, no. I've had enough of this castle," She unlatched one of the large windows and flew out, hitting us with a powerful blast of wind.

Chapter 15

After all the others had left, I decided to stay in the library and look through the books for a while. Very close to sundown, Celestia came back into the room to speak to me.

"I must leave for the night, but a guard will be waiting for you outside the door. When you're redy, he'll show you to your room."

"Wait, I'll be staying here?"

"Well, I can't have you outside at night. But don't worry; the guest room is very comfortable."

"Oh. Well, that's all well and good, but what do you mean 'leave?'"

I wondered what would make a powerful and Princess with such responsibilities such as her leave her kingdom.

"I suppose you could say my shift's over. My sister is coming over in my stead until sunrise."

I remembered that when one princess is done holding either the sun or the moon in the sky, the other takes over and holds the opposite in the sky. The cycle would then repeat over and over and over again until who-knows-when. When one is on duty, the other would be resting in a different castle somewhere in the mountains.

"Oh, well, good night, Princess."

"And good night to you, Nobody," she said before leaving the room.

A few minutes later, I went to look out the window to give my eyes a break from reading. When the horizon fully covered the sun, I saw Celestia flying away from the castle and towards the mountains in the distance. She passed another Omni Being that was flying towards the castle, Luna. After I watched them both reach their destination, I got back to reading.

When the clock struck ten, I marked my place in the book I was currently using, grabbed my own spellbook, along with a few others, and exited the library. The guard outside looked the same as the others, and when I greeted him, he replied with, "Follow me, sir."

He led me down the halls to my room, and I quickly realized how easily Rainbow Dash could've gotten lost. I was yet again awestruck by the architecture of the castle. As we walked, I took in all of the beautiful artwork on the walls; colorful depictions of the princesses performing wonderful feats, Yin-Yang symbols cleverly using the sun and moon, and some famous explorers and writers and things of that sort.

As we turned a corner, I saw a woman near the end of the hall conversing with two more guards, only these guards looked different from all the others. Their armor was a dark blue; almost black, as opposed to the typical gold, and, being air beings, their wings looked more bat-like than bird-like, and their eyes were a bright yellow and their skin looked grayish.

When we were closer, the odd guards left and I saw that the woman was an Omni Being, therefore she must have been Princess Luna.

She looked much younger than her sister. She had a small, black, reflective tiara and a sparkly dark blue dress with a silver crescent-shaped pendant on her neck. Her light blue hair hung just below her shoulders.

She saw us approaching, and I found myself staring into her dark, sparkling eyes. They looked like space was trapped behind two glass windows.

"Oh, hello. And who might you be?"

Her question snapped me out of my stupor. I was more hypnotized by her odd eyes than I thought. I had a strange feeling; her eyes looked... familiar, somehow.

"Hm? Oh, I'm Nobody."

"Surely you must have a name."

"No, that's just what everybody here calls me. I can't remember my own name since... Never mind. It's a long story."

She had some odd accent that made her sound old-timey. She spoke clearly and didn't use contractions.

"Wait," she said, tilting her head and looking thoughtfully at me, "I believe I read about you in the Equestria Daily. You were in the article about the... Oh."

It was obvious that the people here couldn't talk about death as easily as on earth. It felt like a taboo subject. I didn't want to make her feel too uncomfortable, so I decided to change the topic.

"You're Princess Luna, aren't you?"

"Yes, I am. And forgive my asking, but why are you in Canterlot Castle?"

"Well, after the incident with the... you know, Celestia asked that I be transferred here. Apparently, I'm also supposed to stay here for the night."

"Ah. Well, if you'll excuse me, I have matters to attend to- What is that?" She was referring to my spellbook in my hand."

"Oh, it's just my spellbook."

"Your spellbook? You mean you practice magic?"

"Yes, I know I don't look it, but I do practice magic. And believe me, you're not the first to ask that."

She merely raised an eyebrow at this, but asked no further questions.

"Well, I'll be on my way now. Good night, Nobody."

"I hope so..." I said under my breath. She seemed to hear it, but said nothing more.

We both waved each other off, and I caught myself staring at her as she walked away from me down the hall. I knew I shouldn't have been staring, but half of me was hoping she would turn around so I could see her eyes again and try to place that familiar feeling. The other half wanted to watch as her hips swayed side to side with each step. What's the saying? "I hate to see you go, but love to watch you leave?"

I tore myself away from the sight, and my escort led me a little farther down the hall before stopping at my room.

"We're here, sir."

"Thank you," I said as I stuck out my hand for a handshake, but was met with a military salute, and after several awkward seconds, I opened the door to my room, and was shocked to find myself in a luxury suite.

The main room itself was better than most of my house. There was a king-size bed with curtains on it, a large work desk, a wide dresser, and generously-sized bookcase all packed into one spacious room.

I sat on the bed to test it, and it felt like one of those high-class memory foam mattresses. I figured I could get a little more reading in before going to sleep. I turned on the bedside lamp and lay down on top of the covers with the book above my face. I wasn't so much reading as I was scanning the pages of text and not taking anything in. As I "read," I felt myself sinking into the mattress, and my eyelids get heavier. I didn't bother fighting it; I just put the book on my chest, and let the feeling of sleep wash over me and take me for a few short hours.

Chapter 16

I had no dreams that night, which I somewhat enjoyed, and when I awoke, comforting sunlight filled the room.

I stretched a bit, took a quick shower, and went for a walk around the castle, though I would be careful to not get lost.

I looked out a window, and saw (aside from a spectacular view) the castle's enormous courtyard. There was a topiary maze, several gazebos, and even an arrangement of large statues. I was immediately interested, and, after asking a few people in the castle for directions, I was strolling through the beautiful gardens filled with small animals wandering without a care in the world.

I looked at all the statues and admired the exact detail on all of them. Although, I was very drawn to one in particular. It looked like a dragon, only that wasn't what it was. It had the body parts of a handful of different animals; lion, horse, bat, goat, deer, eagle, snake, etc. It was the most realistic-looking statue in the garden, which made it intimidating to look at. The creature's body was in some state of recoil and fear; its face wide-eyed and screaming.

As I drew nearer, I felt the air around me shift in temperature and flow, and I could've sworn I heard the faintest chuckling in the distance.

"I wouldn't get so close if I were you," an unfamiliar voice said from behind me. The voice snapped me out of my trance, and I turned around to see several people arranging tables and setting up chairs. I was so captivated by the statue that I hadn't heard them.

"What's going on?" I asked.

"Well, what does it look like?" the man in front of me answered. He looked young, was my height, and had blonde hair, "We're settin' up for the Gala!"

"The what?" I was unfamiliar with galas still ocurring, but that was probably due to my own ignorance.

"The Grand Gala! Duh. You're not from around here, are ya?"

"Actually, no. I'm not. Can you fill me in?"

After he looked a me funny, he explained to me that the Grand Gala was an annual event where Celestia held an extravagant party that was mostly invite-only, and it took place in the castle and on castle grounds.

He told me that once, Twilight and her friends nearly destroyed the place, but made that the most fun Gala so far in the process.

"Oh, well that sounds fun," I told him. I was intrigued by what he'd told me.

"It is. But if you'll excuse me, I hafta get back to work," and he went back to arranging tables.

I was looking forward to attending the Gala, but then, a dreadful thought surfaced to the very front of my mind: What if Vesania shows up?

"Princess!" I called as I met her walking down the hall.

"Yes? What is it, Nobody?"

"What's this about a 'Grand Gala?'"

"Oh, the Grand Gala. It's one of the largest-" She obviously didn't feel as worried as I was about the whole thing.

"No, that's not what I meant. When is it?"

"Tonight, of course."

Her answer shocked me. Well, the way she said it, rather. It was so non-chalant, as if she'd forgotten completely about the major problem going on.

I cleared my throat, "Princess, have you forgotten about Vesania? Do you know what would happen if he showed up at the Gala with all those souls in one place at one time?"

"Shh!" she said sharply. This surprised me a little, "What if someone should hear us?" she whispered, "We have to go somewhere more private if we are to discuss this."

I nodded, and she led me into a random room in the hall. She closed and locked the door behind us.

"Okay, now we can speak," she said, "I'm sorry I didn't tell you about the Gala earlier, but it was short notice."

"Well, is- is there any way you could postpone it, or cancel it, maybe?"

"I'm afraid not. Believe me, I would if I could, but invitations have already been sent out, everything has been booked; I just can't do anything. My hands are tied."

My head was just full of worry and thoughts about what to do to avoid a serious incident.

"Can we warn everyone about this? Would that stop people from coming?" I asked.

"I'm afraid I can't do that. Telling the people what's going on would just send them into a panic."

I sighed. I agreed with her judgement; we certainly couldn't have panicked citizens, and I know the incident with the nurse and Vesania was such short notice, but what could we do to a catastrophe like this? Surely he would notice that many people in one place, and he'll no doubt be "hungry" again.

"Please," the Princess began, "don't worry. I know those words don't mean much, but don't worry. I've already doubled the security for tonight, and I've called in my best Magic Beings to cast a protective barrier around the castle."

"What if he gets in while using someone else's body?"

"The barrier will take care of that, too. If someone's being used by him, the barrier will prevent them from getting in."

My mind kept thinking of all sorts of things that could go wrong, but somehow the Princess had thought of virtually everything, and managed to shoot down my theories in a few sentences.

After I felt assured that she knew what she was doing, and that tonight would go smoothly, I decided that I would help with some of the preparations; table setup, decorations, and such. At around four o'clock the entertainment arrived in various forms to prepare for the Gala. There was a string quarted, a pianist, some singers, and a DJ with a head of wild blue hair with light blue streaks in it.

Shortly after, Twilight and her friends showed up to do their own part in setting up. Applejack had a concessions stand, Pinkie Pie helped out in the kitchen, Twilight looked over the guest list, Rarity brought dresses of her own design for herself and the others, Rainbow cleared up the sky so everyone could view the night sky, and Fluttershy brought a (and it will puzzle me until the end of time) bird choir. She had actually trained a small group of birds to "sing" a song.

At about six, Celestia gave the order to set up the barrier to keep Vesania out. I watched in awe as a group of Magic Beings fired beams of light into the sky, and they stopped in mid air, and fanned out to create a transluscent dome of pink around all of the castle ground. I was told by Twilight herself that her brother was capable of putting up a barrier that enclosed all of Canterlot.

People started arriving as it was just getting dark, and all of the others changed into their Gala dresses. I gave myself a once-over, and felt bummed out that I had nothing fancy to wear to the occasion.

Rarity came up behind me as I looked up at the barrier and asked me, "More people will be here soon; don't you think you should change into something more... formal?"

I turned around to face her so I could tell her that I didn't have anything formal to wear. But when I turned, I saw her presenting me with a nice-looking tuxedo with a red bow tie.

"Ta-da!" she exclaimed, "I worked on it after I got home yesterday. I wanted to use one of those thin neckties, but Sweetie Belle though a bowtie would look better. Do you like it?"

"Wow. Thanks, Rarity. I love it. I'll go change into it now."

"Glad to see you like it!" she said before I left to change in my room.

Author commentary:

That's right. Our hero gets the full(ish) Equestria experience, complete with the Grand (Galloping) Gala! And yes, the Discord cameo was absolutely necessary.

Chapter 17

When I turned the corner containing my room, I was someone standing at the window at the end. As I got closer, I could see that it was Luna. I found my door, but as I put my hand on the knob, I thought I heard something make a sound; a sort of sniffing sound. I dismissed it as nothing and went inside to change.

When I got back out, I heard the sniff again. I then saw Luna reach up to her face holding a tissue. I made the deduction that she had been crying.

"Luna?" I asked. My question startled her a little.

"Yes? What is it?" She tried to sound okay and avoided looking at me as she replied.

"Are you... alright? You sound like you're-"

She sniffed again and cut me off, "No, no. I'm fine. Why aren't you downstairs enjoying the Gala?"

"Why aren't you?" I countered.

At that point, she turned to look at me. My suspiscions were confirmed: She had been crying earlier. Her eyeliner was running a little, and her eyes were a little red-rimmed.

I did see myself as somewhat of a gentleman, so I approached her and asked earnestly, "What happened? What's wrong?"

"I-I... I don't want to go down there... I didn't want to go down there last year, and I don't want to go down there now..." She wiped her face again with the tissue.

"Why not? You're a Princess; these people love you. What's the problem?"

"They don't love me... You know about what happened so long ago, don't you?"

"Well, yeah, but that was over one thousand years ago. That was the old you. You're not-"

"No, you don't understand. When I came back, I was worse than what I was at the beginning of my banishment. I wasn't as... evil back then. When I was brought back, I hated everyone here more than you can imagine. I was pure evil..." She was beginning to work up even more crying than before, "Everyone was so terrified of me... Even after the Elements of Harmony expelled the evil, people still-"

"Stop saying that."

"W-What?"

"Stop saying that word. Evil."

"B-But I was; I-"

"No, you weren't. Trust me, if anyone knows what evil is, it's me. I've seen evil first-hand, and you are nothing like that.

You were just jealous of your sister. No one could see your night that you worked so hard on, and you were much younger back then, maybe childish. You probably had a jealous tantrum because you didn't know better. The thousand-year banishment was no way to go about reasoning with you and didn't help matters. When you came back, you needed to let off a little steam.

If the people down there don't understand that, it's their fault, not yours. You have nothing to feel bad about. The past is the past, and Nightmare Moon is long gone."

The words that came out of my mouth surprised both Luna and me. I felt odd, like a father trying to comfort a daughter, and it worked. Luna looked up at me, teary-eyed, but the tears were not of sadness or regret. I knew because two and a half inches below her starry eyes was a tiny smile.

She hugged me tightly and pressed mer head into my chest.

"Thank you... I needed that."

Not exactly knowing what to do, I simply hugged her back.

When she let go, she pulled herself together and said, "I'll see you downstairs at the Gala..."

She then left and started down the hall I suspected she came from. I myself decided I should get back downstairs to see how things were going.

Apparently, in the ten minutes I was gone, everything had gotten into full swing.

Nearly all the guests had arrived, music was playing, people were either dancing, talking, or eating, and everyone seemed content.

I couldn't see the others around, so I decided to just explore the events of the Gala.

The string quartet was occupying the stage at the moment, and they were playing a catchy piece full of unique bursts of pizzicato.

The castle grounds smelled of natural freshness, and a harpist played in the background. The harpist actually stopped his/her song, and I saw a crowd starting to form in the distance. I went over to see what was so interesting, and I saw Fluttershy, with her back to the crowd, waving a conductor's baton at a nearly-bare tree. I, confused greatly, got a little closer, and saw she was not trying to conduct the tree, but the birds on its branches.

The birds, in what is still one of the most confounding things I've ever seen, actually produced not random tweets and chirps, but music! There was an organized melody being emitted from their tiny bird throats. I would have expected at the very most random-sounding tweets but on cue, not a literal symphony of chirps!

When they finished, I stood there dumbstruck by what had just occurred before me while the crowd applauded as though this was normal.

I managed to congratulate Fluttershy (and her birds) on the performance. I then heard a throbbing bass sound coming from nearby. I turned to see flashing lights coming from several windows and went over to investigate.

I did not expect to find what I did at such a high-class gathering. Inside was a rave/mosh pit/club with techno music blaring out of gigantic speakers on a stage with a DJ table and the blue-haired DJ from earlier. When I walked in, she must have recognized me, because she pointed at me and then flashed the "rock on" symbol.

"Oh, hey!" someone shouted called to me, "Glad you could make it!" I looked around, but couldn't find out who was talking.

"Up here!"

I looked up, and saw Dash perched on the rafters of the room. She, against my will, swooped down, grabbed me, and flew me up to where she was. It is not easy to sit comfortably on a steel girder. I clung, almost for dear life, and she asked simply, "What's up?"

She had to shout so that I could hear her.

"G-Get me down from here!" I commanded.

"Aw, but this is the best spot!" she teased, "Hah-ha! Fine, I'll put you down!" and before I saw the mischievous look in her eye, she flew me back down onto the ground... face-down.

She snickered as I got back up. I brushed myself off and turned to her, "That really hu-"

I stopped when I saw that she was wearing her dress. I hadn't seen her in it before (in fact I couldn't have even imagined her wearing a dress in the first place), and I stood there for a moment admiring Rarity's handiwork. It actually looked very good on her and sort of reflected her personality with multi-colored streaks and cloudlike, fluffy edging.

"Hmm... It looks good on you!" I shouted over the music.

"What?!"

It still wasn't enough.

"Let's go outside to talk!" I suggested. I then led her back into the gardens.

"I said that the dress looks good on you."

"Oh, yeah. Rarity's, like, the best designer ever."

"Yeah, she's pretty good. Now, why is there a rave at the Gala? I thought this place was supposed to be classy."

"Well, this just got added this year. The Princess thought things should be more exciting. You shoulda seen it last year... Pinkie Pie was- Oh! That's Spitfire! Gotta go!"

And with that, she shot off in Spitfire's direction, hitting me with a blast of air and dust. For the third time.

Spitfire was a member of The Wonderbolts, a famous group of Air Beings that held events that showcased their incredible maneuvers and speed. They were the equivalent of the Blue Angels, but without the jets. Every chance she got, Dash would try to get their attention and become part of their group. She worshipped them, needless to say.

I straightened my tie, and brushed myself off... again. I heard more of the throbbing bass sounds of the music, and left the general area of the rave, but not before seeing Pinkie crowd-surfing in the mass of glow stick-wielding bodies.

Author commentary:

Hey, guys. I'm sorry if I've offended anybody with this interpretation of Luna. I just liked the season one Luna better (you know, the sensitive one that cried a lot), so I decided to use that one in this story. But don't freak out: she is by no means a weak character in this fic.

Chapter 18

Back in the fawyer of the castle, things were calmer. I saw Twilight greeting guests in her sparkling dress with stars all over it (she was quite big on astronomy). Celestia was by her side in her normal, though still fancy, attire.

I stopped to listen to the pianist for a while, enjoying the beautiful tinkling of the keys.

While I was listening, a woman stumbled into me. I quickly turned to face her.

"Oh, I'm so sorry..."

She looked up at me with a flushed face and dazed eyes, and her pink hair was somewhat messy.

"Nah, man. Iss totally my fault... Iss all good, though; I didn't spill mah drink!"

She was apparently very, very, very intoxicated. She took a swig of her beverage, and stumbled onto what she assumed was the dance floor.

I amusedly watched her sway and stumble and trip over herself as she "danced" to her "jam" before she passed out in one confused man's arms.

The music stopped, and everyone's attention was drawn to the main stairway of the fawyer. I looked, and I saw Luna descending the stairs, and I was instantly awestruck.

I had certainly seen her before, and was used to seeing her, but never had I seen her like this.

She had an amazing purple dress on with peacock feathers of dark blue stylishly placed at the bottom, and the front of it was slightly open, revealing just a glimpse of her legs. Her hair was draped over her right shoulder with a light blue flower behind her left ear. She had dark eyeliner and blue lipstick that matched her hair.

As she came down the massive steps, I noticed an odd expression on her face. It was not a happy one, nor a sad one. As I realized that it was worry, people around me began whispering things, incoherent things, but from the sound of them I could tell that they weren't pleasant. The face of worry was soon replaced by one of mixed fear and embarrassment to the point where she stopped walking down the stairs.

I began understanding the whispers.

"Is that Luna?"

"What's she doing here?"

"If you ask me; I don't think she should've left the moon..."

It made me sick that people thought these things about someone as innocent as her.

She scanned the crowd, obviously contemplating leaving. She looked at Celestia and Twilight, who also wore looks of worry on their faces, but she saw me, and stared for a few seconds, and so did I. I gave her a serious look and nodded slowly. She knew exactly what I meant, and so she inhaled deeply and found the resolve to continue down the steps.

When she reached the bottom, people spread out so that she could walk through, and she came in my direction. It was then that I felt the room get warmer. Although, it was not the room, it felt more like an internal heat inside myself. Was I having an allergic reaction to something I ate? No, I had no allergies. What was this? I stared into her eyes as she came toward me, and got warmer. I got warmer whenever she took a step, whenever those eyes got closer. I felt sweat on my lip when she got right next to me. She leaned in a bit and whispered, "Thank you... again," and passed me to enter the gardens.

I let out a deep breath that I didn't realize I was holding.

"What just happened?" I asked myself quietly as the heat subsided. However, I was peculiarly answered.

"What do you mean?" asked Rarity, who was hiding behind me and trying to make herself look small.

"Ah! Oh... You startled me. What are you do-"

"Shhh! Hiding..."

"From whom?" I whispered. She pointed at a man across the room with smooth, blonde hair and bright blue eyes and wearing a clean, white suit.

"Why?" I whispered again.

"Because he might recognize me."

I decided to just humor her and let her hide until he left the area.

"Okay, he's gone," I told her.

"Oh, thank you so much," those two words gave me a flash of mild warmth again, "I know you're wondering whi I was hiding from him, but trust me, it's a long, and filthy story."

The way she practically spat out the word "filthy" made me curious.

"Is he your ex, or something?"

The question nearly made her gag.

"Oh, heavens no! I wouldn't dare soil my good name for him."

Apparently, that man and she have a negative history.

"What's his name?"

"Prince Blueblood," she spat.

"What's his deal?"

"Well, he's arrogant, selfish, greedy, narcissistic, self-absorbed..." and the list went on for longer than expected, but when she was done, I went out into the garden and sat on a bench to enjoy the cool air and watch the people go by.

While I was people-watching, I was two men talking to each other, and couldn't help but overhear their conversation.

"Did you hear about that nurse that died recently?"

"Die? She didn't die; she was killed!"

"Yeah, yeah, I know. That's what I meant. Hey, d'you know about those other six?"

"What do you mean 'others?'"

"Well, six more died just like the nurse: no cuts, no bruising, no signs of suffocation or poisoning, no anything!"

"Oh, yeah. I vaguely remember hearing about them. Hey, I think that the guy from the first one, the nurse, did it."

"You mean that guy they found unconscious at the scene?"

"Yeah, him. I heard he's actually here at the Gala."

"There's no way the Princess would let him in here!"

"I don't know... She's gotten pretty lax lately."

Their words burned inside me. Not only had Vesania killed three more people, which bothered me above all, but they were blaming it on me, which irritated me as well, and questioning the Princess.

One gave me a glance that lasted just a bit too long, and then he turned back to his companion.

"Hey, uh, what'd that guy look like again?"

"Uh, black hair, kinda tall, slim, why?"

The other one then whispered rather loudly, "I think he's looking at us."

Then the second looked at me, and they both speedily walked away with looks of surprise on their faces.

After the small feeling of anger left me, I put my face in my hands and let dread consume me as I thought of the six others he's killed since he left me.

"Oh, God..." I said quietly, "Why is this happening?"

I held back a tear as I noticed footsteps from behind me.

"Do not mind them," Luna said, "They are just ignorant."

She came up and sat next to me on the bench. I tried my best not to look sad and sat up straight, though I knew not why, as I got warm again. Funny: it seems our roles have been reversed.

"Are you enjoying the Gala?" she asked half-heartedly.

"Uh, the Gala: yes. The people: less so."

"I feel the same..." she said before sighing.

I looked down, feeling sympathetic for both of her.

"Well, maybe things would get better, for you I mean, if you would give them more time to get used to you," I said, referring to how she thought the people disliked her.

"I don't think it's that simple."

"Why not?"

"Because I've already been back for two years. If that hasn't been enough time for them, I don't know what is."

Her tone sort of made a transition into a more lighthearted one.

"Well, do you get out and make pulic appearances to give them a chance to see the real you?"

"Yes... Well... Two, really..." she said, a little embarrassed.

"Just two?! It's no wonder they don't take to you very well."

"Yes; one was during Nightmare Night last year, and the other was at my niece's wedding."

"You've got to try harder than that if you want them to li- er -understand you. Where I come from, there's a saying: It's not the amount of hours you put into your work; it's the amount of work you put into the hours."

I could tell this helped her a bit, because she sort of perked up.

"So, if I just show them me more often, they will start to accept me?"

"Couldn't hurt to try."

She breathed a sigh of relief. She looked at me with her starry eyes, and I couldn't help but feel almost deja vu, like I recognized her somehow.

"You're a good person, Nobody. I feel happy finding someone I can talk to other than Tia and some of the castle folk."

"Tia" was her nickname for Celestia.

"Thanks," was all I could manage to say.

"I've, um, heard gossip around the castle. I'm sorry to hear about your... um..."

Apparently, she saw that I didn't want to talk about it, so she changed the subject.

"So, have you enjoyed your time here?"

"Yeah, I have. This place is so... peaceful. Everybody I've met's been so nice to me. Me! A total stranger who just fell out of the sky! Where I come from, they would've thrown me in an asylum"

Whatever this world was, it was more welcoming that anything on Earth. The people were, for the most part, kind, and almost always had a smile on. The whole place was busy and calm at the same time. And the colorful architecture just eminated happy thoughts.

"Good. I am glad you are liking it," she said. She then paused for a few seconds, and then looked up at the night sky. I chose to do the same.

Author commentary:

I am sorry about this. I didn't like this chapter, either. Slow, uneventful, etc. But trust me, it will get better.

Chapter 19

And so we sat there for minutes, just staring at the stars and the moon and the emptiness between them.

I glanced at her, and began staring at her smooth face and entrancing eyes.

She furrowed her brow, as if looking for something, and said, "Hold on..."

"What is it?" I asked.

"Ah," she said in realization, "Missed one."

Her horn began to glow a dark blue and I looked up. Right before my eyes, the third star of Orion's Belt, that I hadn't noticed was missing, suddenly appeared out of nowhere! There was a flash, and the star just materialized in the sky!

"H-How did-" I stammered. This amazed me. I knew she could make the moon rise and fall, but I had never seen it like this, so I was less phazed. But not only did I not know she could make stars, I had just seen it! She created an entire star without so much as blinking! Clearly the science of this world would send Galileo turning in his grave.

"What? You knew I could bring out the stars, didn't you?"

I was speechless, and she was amused by my surprise and giggled with her hand over her mouth. While at my own expense, I couldn't resist the sound of it. It was a stunningly lovely sound.

I grew warm again.

We just strolled around the castle, just talking and enjoying each other's company. She would give me demonstrations of her magic, and I would tell her stories of human accomplishments. She rather enjoyed those. She liked the idea of holding a plastic screen and using it to talk to someone miles away. I liked the idea of teleportation and moving objects with mere thought.

At one point, the warmth was no longer an uncomfortable light sweat; it became an all-around feeling of comfort and safety. One would think that the Princess of the night would have a colder aura, but she didn't.

She made me feel... happy. On very few occasions have I been truly happy. So few I can hardly recall them.

Something about her drew me closer and closer every second. Her mannerisms and voice I adored. But the most captivating thing about her was her eyes; those sparkling, beautiful, familiar eyes. If I could I would stare into them until my own eyes dried out.

I thought about these things as we stood on a balcony overlooking a valley. I thought, and thought, and thought. Why I thought so hard, I didn't know. I felt as if I was trying to piece something together, but what? Why? Why did my temperature rise when I was near her? Why did her eyes seem so familiar?

"So, what is it like?" she asked.

Her question caught me off guard since I was deep in thought. I had to play it back in my head once to understand it.

"What is what like?"

"Your world. I'm curious," she said plainly.

I wanted to say "absolutely horrible," but that would've been exaggerating a bit.

"It's, uh, different."

"How so?" she asked, turning to look at me.

"Well, basically, in every way. For one, the Earth rotates around the sun, and the moon around the Earth. And, there is no such thing as magic. And if a person is born with wings or a horn- actually, there might as well not be an 'if.' It would take millions of years of, albeit strange, evolution for a human to develop wings and horns, not that we need any in the first place. And for that matter, all of this is completely impossible in my world. This whole place would be nothing more than a fantasy land."

As I was talking, I started to wonder to myself "How do I know this isn't some sort of dream? Maybe this is just a fantasy." But I quickly pushed those thoughts out of my head.

"Oh," Luna said, "Well, what of the people there? How are they?"

I paused, thinking about how to describe them.

"Well, I honestly think that the human race is very... imperfect. And they're quite lacking in the intelligence department. In fact, I'm kind of glad to be here and away from it right now."

She had a look of puzzlement on her face.

"Why? What's wrong with them?"

"Well, there's always something going on. It's like they don't know how to get along. There's always a war, or some gang dispute, or a crime going on. There's always some random acts of violence, terrorism, shootings, hate; the list goes on and on. It's like fighting's the only thing the human race knows how to do."

"B-But what about all the things you told me about? They can't be as du- er -unintelligent as you make them out to be."

"Well, they're not all like that. There are some really smart and kind people on Earth, but they are few and far, sadly, and don't make up enough of the population."

I turned to her, and saw disappointment on her face. It would seem she had an optimistic look towards humans, and I had just shot that down.

"Uh, I mean, if you go out in everyday life, the people are nice to you, but that's just common courtesy."

I'm not very good at sugar-coating things.

We stood there for a bit in (awkward) silence before Luna looked up, then at me, and hesitantly asked, "How was your family?"

I looked at her, and whatever expression I had on, it made her mentally wince.

"I'm sorry- I didn't mean to overstep-"

"No, no... It's fine. I'm... over it," I lied. I, sadly, still had not gotten over their deaths. It was so traumatizing for me, to wake up one morning and find them all dead and bloodied.

But perhaps talking to someone about it would make some difference, however small. With all of the things going on, I just needed to vent. Come to think of it, what was my family like? It's been over a decade since I'd lost them, and I tried to think about them as little as possible to minimize the grief.

I had to think for a bit and remember life before that day.

"Jeez... You know, I haven't thought about them in a while.

My father was- oh, what was he? He was a teacher. He taught at a college. Uh, my mother was a stay-at-home mom. My two younger brothers were just your regular kids. They were really close friends, not the kind of brothers that bicker and argue.

My dad was really smart and calm all the time. He used to help me with schoolwork and things like that. He and I would play this game called Trivial Pursuit. It's funny; he was such a know-it-all, and yet I would always beat him.

My mom was nice; she handled most of the food and shopping and housework. She fed us and helped pick out gifts and things for holidays and birthdays..."

As I talked about them, I felt something on my face. I reached up to touch it, and discovered that it was a tear. One single tear on my cheek. It was not a sad tear; it was a happy one. Looking back at my family, I felt happy. All my life I'd been living in fear and regret and lonliness. So long, all by myself. When I was with my family, and I now realize this, it was the absolute happiest time of my life. No memory I have could be happier than the ones of my family.

Smiling, I looked at Luna and wiped the tear. I don't know why, but she was smiling too. We looked at each other with peculiar smiles for a few seconds before I opened my mouth and did something I regretted instantly.

"So, what's your family like?"

The smile left her face after I said this, and she looked saddened.

She turned away from me, and I felt stupid. I'd known she was trapped on the moon for a thousand years, and I'd known she might have lost some family (and most likely some friends) during that time. She probably didn't want to talk about it. Why did I ask her about it? Foolish...

"Oh, God. I didn't mean to- You don't have to tell me if you don't want to. Sorry..." I tried to console her and avoid any unnecessary hurt.

She turned back to look at me.

"M-May I try something?" she asked.

Ignoring the vagueness of this proposition, I said, "Uh, sure."

Whatever it was, it couldn't be worse than the awkward air between us.

She walked towards me, closed her eyes, and made her horn glow. She got much closer to me in an attempt to touch her horn to my head.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. What are you doing? Do you know what happened the last time someone did that?" I said, backing away. I didn't want some other creature coming out of my head again.

"I know. This is differend. Trust me," she said calmly, her horn still glowing.

I took a deep breath through my nose, "Fine."

She got close to me again and I shut my eyes expecting another unpleasant experience like the one with Twilight.

Her horn touched my head, and at first I felt nothing. I opened my eyes, and blushed a little at how close our faces were. Then, I felt uncountable sensations pass through my body. I blinked, and then there was just me and her.

I saw nothing but an endless whiteness and her standing across from me. Then, the white transformed into... into... I don't even know what to call it. It turned into landscapes, and mountains, and people, and everything was moving so fast. I saw and heard and smelled and felt everything going on around me. There was interaction between Earth, Air, Magic and Omni Beings. I saw Equestria form. I saw Canterlot being built. I saw the Omni Beings swiftly fading away due to a plague, leaving just a few remaining. I saw everything happening in matters of seconds. I saw people being born and dying. I heard the laughter of children and the sounds of a town being constructed. I felt endless emotions in my mind. Then there was darkness. There was nothing but darkness and a vast, gray desert for the longest time. There was this horrible feeling of emptiness and sorrow and hate and lonliness. Then the world came back again. I saw Nightmare Moon being defeated by the Elements of Harmony, and Discord unleash chaos on the world. I saw it all.

I had just seen everything from Luna's birth to this exact point in time. I felt everything she had ever felt. I saw everything she had ever seen. I watched her entire life pass before me in the blink of an eye.

Then, the balcony returned. Reality returned. Luna and I were back and standing on the balcony, light-headed and hearts racing. Her eyelids fluttered, and she collapsed, fortunately I managed to catch her before she hit the ground. She looked up at me with her mesmerizing, beautiful, familiar eyes, and I realized that while I watched her life pass before me, she watched mine. We knew each other's pain. We knew each other's joy. We knew what each other had been through.

I finally knew why her eyes looked so familiar to me: I had seen them every time I looked in the mirror. They were the eyes of someone who has known pain and lonliness.

I finally knew why I felt warm when I was near her: I had strong feelings for her. I had known her for two days, and I had developed... affection for her.

I looked at her, and we both smiled.

"Come on," I said, almost tearing up again, "Let's get back to the party."

Author commentary:

Uh... I don't know what to put here. Hmm... Derp?

Chapter 20

After a good amount of cavorting with other people, Luna and I sat at a table and the caterer brought us drinks as I was finishing a joke.

"... And that's why they're green!" I said, and we both burst out in raucous laughter.

As she wiped a laughter tear from her face, the music in the room died down, and everyone's attention was pointed toward the kitchen doors, so I looked too.

Before I even knew what was going on, a line of musicians marched out the door and into the ballroom. Each one of them had an instrument: a harmonica, an accordion, a drum, a trumpet, and a kazoo respectively, and was playing some tune that reminded me of some sort of polka. Then, being wheeled out on some metal cart was an enormous pink cake with extravagant designs and decorations being pushed out by Pinkie, who was wearing an odd pink helmet with four cylinders pointing outward from the top.

"Ladies and gentlemen..." she said loudly, making a grand gesture with her hands, "I give you... The Marzipan Mascarpone Meringue Madness!"

And she yanked on some string that was attached to her headgear, and the cylinders each fired confetti, streamers, and glitter into the air, and almost instantly a conga line formed behind her as upbeat music began playing.

"Come on," Luna said, "Let's go and get some cake. I heard that Pinkie's is the best cake around."

The cake was amazing. Never in my life had I had marzipan on a cake. I didn't even know what mascarpone was, but it was delicious. After I ate about two slices, I sat and relaxed in one of the chairs and watched everyone have a good time. Not to say that I wasn't having one. Luna went off somewhere else in the room to practice showing the people "the real her" like I suggested.

"C'mon, Nobody! Join the conga line!" Rainbow Dash shouted at me from across the room.

I chuckled. "No thanks!"

"Suit yourself!" she said, and resumed conga-ing. I was a little surprised at the amount of people in the line. I saw AJ, Big Mac (who I didn't even know was at the Gala until now), one of the cellists, the DJ, Rarity, and several of the posh-looking guests.

As I recieved another drink, I noticed a stray piece of cake someone had dropped on the floor.

"Aw, that's a shame," I said to myself, "One should never let good cake go to waste."

I looked back at the conga line (still led by Pinkie) and laughed at the sillyness of them and at the fact that so many people had joined it in so little time. I saw AJ, Big Mac (who I didn't even know was at the Gala until now), one of the cellists, the DJ, Rarity, and several of the super-posh-looking guests.

"Uh oh..." I said to myself.

I noticed that the line's trajectory was that in the direction of the piece of cake on the floor. I got up, worried that someone would slip, and shouted, "Pikie Pie! Pinke Pie, watch your step!"

Unfortunately, Pinkie couldn't hear me over whatever song she was playing on her kazoo. I shouted one more time, pointing at the tasty obstruction.

"Pinkie! Watch out! There's cake on the floor!"

She looked at me and took the kazoo out of her mouth.

"What'd you say?"

But it was too late. I tried to get to her in time, but she unwittingly slipped on the cake in such a way that, in an attempt to regain her balance, she landed on one of the catering carts and wheeled into the kitchen that she had previously come out of. I winced as I heard a loud crash and the sound of dishes and pots fall. Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Luna, and Applejack rushed into the kitchen to see if their friend was alright. I followed right behind them.

I came in to see Rainbow pulling Pinkie out from under a pile of pots and pans.

"Oh, my gosh; Pinkie, are you okay?"

Pinkie was limp for a few seconds, and we all held our breath.

Suddenly, her eyelids fluttered, and we all exhaled collectively as she said wearily, "I'm fine, you guys," with a nice smile on her face.

"Whew, thank Celestia!" Applejack said, "No offense, yer highness," she said to Luna.

"None taken."

"Goodness, darling. You shouldn't scare us like that," Rarity said.

Pinkie just scratched the back of her head and smiled guiltily.

"Heh-heh... Sorry. Hey! Let's get back to the party!"

"Are you sure? You took quite a spill. Do you need to go to the infirmary?" I asked.

"No, silly. I'm fine. Just a bump on my noggin'. I've had worse."

In my head I thought, "I'll bet you have."

We all took her word for it after she stood up and dusted herself off. We all turned and headed for the door with Pinkie right behind us all.

Luna got out first and raised her hand as she addressed the crowd.

"It's under control, everyone. She's fine."

As the crowd let out a sigh of relief, I heard wheels behind me, and turned to see Pinkie quickly pull the cart from earlier in front of herself and lift her leg to put her foot on the edge. She looked straight at me and gave a wry smile.

Author commentary:

Warning: the next chapter makes references to a certain fanfic that may disturb some readers. Read with caution.

Chapter 22

And with that, two more guards fled in terror, while the rest stayed clutching there swords, but still trembling with fear.

I backed away in... in... I don't know what emotions were running through my head. It felt like fear, hate, anger, sadness, worry- all of those and more were flying rampant in my head.

I heard a ringing in my ears that just grew louder the longer I looked at him.

The ringing escalated into a continuous, high-pitched whine in my ears that just drowned out all other sounds.

I saw the guards attack Vesania in a hopeless effort. He just swatted them like flies buzzing around him.

When he... defeated them all, he stared at me with a toothy grin on his face.

He charged at me, crawling at me on all fours, jaws agape. I fell backwards and started crawling away myself, still looking at him, still hearing the whine.

He was incredibly close, and when I thought that that was it, a beam of light struck him in the side of his head, sending him flying into the wall, making a massive crater in it, and firing debris and dust into the air. I saw huge chunks of marble and plaster collapse on him, burying him in a pile of sediment.

Luna and Celestia cautiously approached the pile and the mildly irritated Vesania. In unison, they fired blasts of light and energy from their horns into him, not letting up for an instant.

I couldn't hear it, but Celestia shouted something to Luna, causing her to cease fire for a second.

The whining in my ears stopped as Vesania disappeared behind the bright, multi-colored wall of energy. I heard Luna shout something to Celestia -no- to her.

"No! I won't go!"

They both ceased fire on him, and we watched for movement in the cloud of smoke and dust and rubble.

Silence rang out in the ballroom.

Then, a rumbling sound caused vibrations all around us, and Vesania burst out of the pile of debris and let out a roar of frustration.

Normally a regular roar would do no more than irritate my eardrums. But his roar, his scream, with all of those horrible voices in it, was enough to drive someone mad.

It reverberated in my skull and sent shivers all throughout my body.

My vision became blurred, and I felt light-headed, and I couldn't stop hearing his scream.

I collapsed on my side and clutched the sides of my head.

Everything was just blobs of color now. I saw a multi-colored blob converse with a dark blue blob, and then fire a white shape at a giant black shadow.

The blue blob rushed over to me, and I felt hands grab me. I saw a brilliant flash, and then everything went black.

I felt weightless. It felt like I was hovering in an endless nothing. I still had all of my senses, but there was absolutely nothing to sense. There was only a void. Was this death? It's not all it's cracked up to be. No tunnel; no light; nothing. I tried to roll my eyes around under their lids, and found that I was still in control of my physical body. I made small, undetectable movements with my muscles; there was something. I could feel something solid, something underneath me. It was soft, but solid. I heard a distant, vague sound. Crying. Someone was crying. I felt something grab my hand, and hold it tightly for a long time. It let go, and I felt a sharp sting on my cheek, and winced a little. I clenched my fingers, and felt something in my hand again. It clutched me again, and I felt compelled to open my eyes. It took three attempts, but on the third, a slit of light hit my retnas. I opened them further, and looked upon several figures.

The sudden exposure to light was too quick, and I had to squint to get a better look at things. I was in a room with lit candles on the walls, and I was laying on a bed, with Luna kneeling at my side, sobbing into the bedsheets. Twilight, Rainbow Dash, Big Macintosh, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, and Fluttershy were also in the room, with either expressions of shock, sorrow, or solemnity.

"L-Luna?" I managed to peep out.

She instantly gasped and looked up at me. She forced me up slightly so she could embrace me and let out another good sob. The others in the room also reacted with a sudden start.

"W-What's... going on?" I said. "Where's Vesania?!" I said as I shot straight up in the bed.

Luna released another sob at the mention of his name. I looked over at the others, who were in just as much of a state as I was if not more. Big Mac being there was unexpected for me. Where were Applejack and Celestia? I looked out the window of the room, and saw Canterlot in the distance.

I gently pushed Luna away from me as I got up and out of the bed and moved toward the window. The castle still had the protective barrier up from what I could tell, and I could vaguely see people being evacuated from the entire mountainside.

"Oh, God..." I muttered. "What's... What happened?"

She looked at me and tried to regain her composure as best she could, which wasn't very much at all.

"After you... passed out, I- Celestia told me to get everyone out, so I got you first while she... she held him off. I took us all to the other castle... I tried to grab all of you as fast as I could, but..." she hesitated for a long time. "I couldn't get Applejack! He grabbed her and... and..." she burst into tears again.

I looked at the other six in the room and noticed that Big Mac was clenching his fists so tightly that bruising was visible on the inside of his palms. When she said Applejack's name, the others cringed a little. I put a hand up to my mouth. She found me. She let me stay with her in her home. She let me borrow Big Mac's clothes. She introduced me to all these wonderful people. And now she was... gone.

I felt a pit in my stomach and almost doubled over. I fought back this feeling as I asked her another question. "What- What about Celestia?"

I dreaded the answer.

In a feeble voice that was almost hidden under her sobs and muffled by the bedsheets she was crying into, she told me, "He... killed her, too..."

It felt like getting kicked in the stomach a thousand times over. I gasped, and my eyes teared up. But that wasn't the worst part. The worst part was when Luna kept going.

"He... He picked her up. I-I tried to stop him, but he... he put her horn in his mouth and... drank her. He drank her! He sucked her dry, like a straw! Like a damn straw!"

There was disgust. I felt genuine disgust in my gut. The nurse, those six others that I never knew, all those guards, Applejack, and now Celestia. They were all dead now, and it was all my fault. Most of them never even knew who I was, and I had been the cause of their doom. If I just hadn't come here... none of this madness would be happening.

My face took on the appearance of anger, and I clenched my fists as I looked at my feet.

"This is all my fault..." I muttered angrily under my breath.

The others looked at me curiously.

"If I hadn't come here... none of this would've happened."

Twilight erected herself and addressed me. "It is not your fault. You had no idea that any of this would happen. You can't blame yourself for what's happening here-"

"Yes I can," I nearly shouted. "If I had just left well enough alone, just let the voi- Vesania stay quiet in my head, and hadn't bothered with that stupid ritual, I wouldn't be here, and no one would have-"

Luna slapped me. Hard. I stood there, silent and still, shocked by her action.

"No! You can't just accept the blame for all of this. You didn't kill your family; he did. You didn't kill Nurse Redheart, Applejack, or... my sister; he did. You didn't even mean to come here; that part was all fate's fault. You are not to blame. He is; the bastard monster that sits in the castle right now. I don't want to hear you mope about how you're just a victim of circumstance anymore!"

She stared me in the eye, and she stared deeply. I saw that she wasn't sad anymore; she was tired. She was tired of pain; tired of sadness; tired of all this moping; and tired of dealing with him and everything he's stirred up since he got here. I was too, and she probably knew that.

We kept looking at each other, and the room was silent. It was silent for the longest time, and then I saw the corner of her mouth turn upwards, then the other corner, and then her mouth was a full-fledged smile. She chuckled, and then we both found ourselves laughing at absolutely nothing. We were still sad, we were still injured, but we were not broken. We stood there, laughing at and with each other, while the others looked at us puzzledly. I'm sure they understood eventually, considering the entire mood in the room lifted.

When we'd let the laughter run its course, the mood, sadly, became morbid and solemn again. Hours passed, and sirens were heard from the distant city hanging off of the mountainside. I sat in the library of the small castle; it wasn't as large as the one in Canterlot, but that didn't matter. I sat in front of the unlit fireplace in a wingback chair and thought. I looked out the window again and saw that the castle still had the protective bubble around it, though this time, I saw beams of energy being directed at it from the surrounding area, rather than coming inside the castle, leading me to believe that the bubble was now being sustained from the outside now. He must have gotten to the magic beings holding it up from the inside by now. I silently grieved for anyone that couldn't get out of the castle in time.

I leaned back in the chair, and felt something on my chest. I reached into the inside pocket of my jacket from the tuxedo and felt around. My hand grabbed hold of something solid, small, and rectangular. I pulled out the pocket Necromancy book that I'd forgotten I'd taken as I was changing. I lazily flipped through the pages, scanning the words on the old paper. I flipped and flipped and flipped, but as I passed a page, some random words stuck out that caught my attention. I turned back to it and read out of curiosity. My face lit up as I discovered what this page was about. My heart leapt and I frantically read through.

It was a ritual that would return any stray demons back to the Underworld. This made me ecstatic. All it took was a spell, and a mystic symbol drawn on the ground... in blood. This part made me uneasy, but I kept reading. For it to take affect, the target demon had to be led over the symbol and it would automatically activate, hurling the said demon back to its rightful place in the Underworld.

I was almost overjoyed at this discovery! I took the next few minutes to memorize the words that would set the trap, and the design of the symbol. It was very similar to the one I drew that landed me in this world, but larger and less complex. Where I could get the blood proved a challenge for me, though; but I'd cross that bridge when I came to it.

I was just about to exit the library to tell the others when Luna came in. She opened the door carefully thinking she shouldn't disturb me too much.

"Nobody?" she asked.

"Oh, Luna... I think I've just come across something that can solve... everything!" I told her giddily.

"What?" her face beamed.

"Yes! It's right here in my pocket spellbook! I forgot I put it in my suit when I was changing. I think I can get rid of Vesania for good!"

She put her hands to her mouth and her eyes watered as she smiled. "R-Really?" She seemed happier to hear this than I was, but then her expression became solemn again. "But..."

"But what?" I asked, not sure what she was thinking.

"But... it won't bring her back. It won't bring them back... will it?"

I became solemn as well. I realized that it wouldn't actually solve anything, just prevent more terrible things from happening. It wouldn't return Celestia, Applejack, Nurse Redheart, or anyone else for that matter.

"No, I... I can't say that it will," I told her seriously. "But, it will still stop more people from dying because of him. It's gotta be worth a try."

She looked down at the floor and rubbed her upper arm, no doubt mourning the loss of her sister again. She looked at me bashfully. "How does the spell work?"

"It says that the target demon, Vesania, has to step on the symbol that sends him back to the Underworld..."

She looked at me with worry as she asked me a question she feared the answer to. "But, doesn't that mean that... that you..."

"I have to go into the castle and... confront him..."

Author commentary:

Hey, there! I'm sorry I had to make you wait so long for this chapter, I just had other stuff to do, what with school being back in and all that jazz. Next chapter: Big Mac in an epic fight scene! Can our hero successfully defeat the one who killed everything he'd ever loved?

Chapter 23

"What?!" they all said in unison, save for Big Mac, who was sitting in a chair in the corner of the room, deep in thought and still clenching his fists. "Y-You're going in there?! With him?" Rainbow Dash said.

I stood there in the doorway of the bedroom I woke up in. They were all there, save for Luna, who was behind me. They all had looks of shock on their faces, some still with residual tear marks.

"Yes. I have to," I told them. "I've got to. No one else knows how to perform Necromancy but me, and besides... He's my demon. I can't have any of you getting hurt for me anymore."

Twilight stepped towards me and placed a hand on my shoulder. "Nobody, I know that you think you have to face Vesania alone, and you have good reason to think that, but... we don't want to see you get hurt, either."

I looked at them, and the look in their eyes showed me that Twilight spoke for all of them. I could see that they either didn't want me to go alone, or that they... they themselves wanted to...

"No, I can't have you come with me. I don't want to be responsible for more people getting killed."

"You and I both know that you stand little to no chance of defeating him on your own," Luna said.

I began growing frustrated. I sat down in a chair and closed my eyes, thinking hard on what to do. I couldn't have them all get hurt because of me, but, I knew, and I wasn't going to fool myself, that the chances of me stopping him by myself were between slim and none, and slim was on its way out of the building. What am I to do?

I looked up at them; I couldn't stand the responsibility of seven more lives. I almost said something, but stopped myself. Big Mac stood up from the chair and calmly walked over to me, no longer clenching his fists. I stood up too, though I knew not why. He looked me in the eyes, his face nearly clean of any emotion. The silent man spoke. "Nobody, I understand that you don't want to carry the burden of more lives, and I respect that. But if you go alone, you know there's a good chance you'll die. And if you fail, then all is lost, and he wins. If we go with you, you just might have a shot at sending him back to where he belongs; even if you lose us, it'll be so you can live to avenge us; to avenge everyone else; to avenge... my sister. So please, do it for us; for them. Let us come with you."

I was... struck dumb by his words of wisdom. The first time I hear him speak, and it gives me the push I needed to make a decision that would determine the outcome of all of our lives. I looked around the room at all of them, one by one.

We teleported to the front of the castle--the teleportation made me queasy, but it was painless and quick--standing just outside the pink translucent barrier. I could see magic beings standing atop turret buildings and casting the spell that held up the shield. One glanced over at us, and did a double take.

"You there! What do you think you're doing! The city's been evacuated! Get outta-" He stopped himself abruptly. "Princess? Princess! You shouldn't be here; it isn't safe!"

She shot him a cold, determined look. "Let us pass." Her voice wasn't loud, but it carried well.

The guard looked confused. "Come again? You know what's in there, don't you?"

"Let us pass. I'm fully aware of what is contained in this barrier. We are here to banish it from the castle." Her voice was stunningly strict and influential.

The guard was silent. He made a gesture to another guard standing near himself and spoke to him, no doubt mentioning us and the princess' orders. The other one came over to look at us. He looked much older than his companion, and looked as tough as nails with his serious, rugged face.

"Princess... Am I to believe that you wish passage into this quarantined area?"

"You are, General," was the answer.

After several seconds of her and the general looking at each other, conveying wordless messages that may have been developed over years of loyal service, he nodded to Luna, and then his companion. The other man was struck dumb, but reluctantly obeyed the order.

A small gap appeared in the shield in front of us.

"I hope you understand, Princess, that after you all go through, for the safety of everyone else I must close it indefinitely," said the general.

"I do, General."

We all looked through the hole and at the pristine castle behind it. We stood there in a single file line, joined hands instinctively, and I looked at Luna. She looked at me, and a miniscule smile broke out on her face, the bottom lip quivering ever so slightly. "Are you ready to do this?" I asked her.

She nodded. I looked at everyone else, and then back at the opening. "Are you all ready to do this?"

Though there was no audible answer, we each stepped through the gap in the wall as one. After seconds that might have been hours, we passed into the enclosed realm of horror, and the gap sealed itself after us. The air itself felt different from when we were outside; the flow, the temperature, everything.

I looked back up at the turret, and at the general. He gave me a stern look and a salute. I nodded to him in return.

"So... What's the plan now?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"We go in," I said plainly.

We wandered through the silent halls that were full of the signs of struggle and loss of one. Pictures were askew, a window was broken, and a curtain lay on the floor. We were pressed close together going down the hall out of a sense of fear. We rounded a corner, and Rarity gasped as she saw the body of some poor boy sprawled about on the floor. His arms and legs were in an odd position; it looked so unnatural, and his head was turned to the side, eyes wide open.

I stifled disgust and went over to him. I knelt down to him and closed his eyes out of respect. He was just a boy! I saw him catering tables just earlier in the night. He must have been no older than his early twenties! It's clear that Vesania wouldn't spare anyone.

"Come on; we knew we would see things like this," I said, trying to encourage them to keep moving.

We drew nearer to where the ballroom was. We finally reached the scene where most of the awful carnage of that night took place; the doors were closed.

I cautiously approached them with an outstretched hand, and the others all held their breath. I pressed my fingers against the door and pushed it open so slowly that the hinges squeaked. I looked through the gap with one eye, looking for any possible dangers that may be inside. My gaze fell upon the massive crater in the wall that Celestia and Luna had made while fighting Vesania. I pushed the door open just enought so that my head could fit through, but pulled it back in after seeing a dozen of the dead guards lying strew about on the floor.

"Ugh... There's nothing there," I told the others, trying not to gag.

We continued down the empty halls, nothing to hear but our own footsteps and an eerie echo coming from an indistinguishable source.

"Wait, what's that sound?" Pinkie asked. We all silenced and listened for what she had heard.

There was a slurping sound followed by a thud in the distance. I looked down the corridor it seemed to come from. Luna peered down it with me and said quietly, "That sounds like it's coming from the throne room..."

We all lined up again as we looked down the daunting tunnel of marble and plaster. I heard Big Mac crack his knuckles as he looked at me. I grabbed my breast pocket and felt the spellbook sitting there against my chest.

My heart lept as a voice called down the hall--his voice. "Oh, do come in, will you? I can hear you breathing in there."

We all froze and some gasped in fear. Big Macintosh growled so quietly that I almost didn't hear him.

Tired of his taunting, I began to take a step down the hall. Luna grabbed my hand, "Wait... Don't-" She silenced as I shot her a look with an emotion that seemed like a cross between determination and anger.

After several long seconds, I continued down the hall, and was surprised to hear more footsteps behind me. I turned my head and saw that all of them were advancing with me. Together. We walked down the hall together. We walked into the throne room together, and we witnessed the horror inside... together.

Author commentary:

Sorry; I thought I could fit the fight scene into this chapter, but I was sadly mistaken. But I assure you, the next chapter will be full of spell-casting, demon-fighting, soul-sucking, statue-throwing awesomeness.

Chapter 24

We all passed through the marble archway, and witnessed the horrors within the throne room. Bodies were littered here and there, and one dangled from between Vesania's index and middle finger like a cigar. He was slouched in the golden throne, though his size was breaking the armrests. The stained-glass windows behind him were either shattered or severely cracked, compromising their beauty. The statues of guards and historical figures had been defiled with crude slashes and hateful grafitti. One was toppled and on its side next to Big Macintosh. It was of a proud warrior wielding a spear.

"Welcome, my little treats!" he called to us in a hateful tone.

I could feel the hatred and disgust between all of us. Their feelings for him were so strong that I felt their shakes of anger and heat of resentment.

He smiled at us as he picked a shoe out of his teeth and looked at it as though he didn't know how it got there. "What? Aren't you happy to see me?" He chuckled.

"Shut up!" I shouted to him.

He merely snickered at my outburst. "I take that as a 'no,' then? What about you, Luna? Do you like how I redesigned the-"

"Silence!" she yelled as she stepped forward.

He was surprised by her tenacity. "Hmm. I guess that's a 'no' from you to-"

"I said silence! You have no right to speak to me after what you've done!"

He grinned and tossed his snack to the floor with a gross "thunk." He leaned back in the chair and propped his legs up on a small pile of bodies lying at his feet like an ottoman. My heart sank as I noticed that the one on top of that pile was Celestia.

Luna's eyes got wide at the gesture and she gasped aloud. Then the anger returned, and she ground her teeth.

"Hmm? Oh, this! Do you like it? I made it out of the ones who thought that they could outrun me. I think it matches my scarf nicely..." He produced one more body off of the floor next to the throne and draped its limp form around his neck and shoulders. His "scarf" was wearing cowboy boots and a curious orange and green dress with apple designs on the skirt... and a brown stetson.

Big Macintosh's eyes eyes filled with a rage that I didn't imagine attainable by a normal man, and his knuckles cracked once again as a vein appeared going up his left arm. He clenched his teeth so hard that the wheat stem in his mouth was severed and fell to the floor.

Vesania nuzzled Applejack's body tauntingly, "She put up quite a fight--I actually thought she might have lasted a few more minutes. Oh, you should have seen how much she called for help, Big Mac. She was on the verge of tears when I finally g-"

A long, slender, pipe-like object was flung at his face, piercing through his cheek and planting itself firmly in the wall behind him, pinning him to it, and silencing his hateful words. I looked, shocked, to see Big Macintosh striking a pose that suggested that he threw the much-wanted spear into Vesania's face. He had actually broken the hand off of the statue next to him to use the weapon. He continued to amaze me.

A single, lone tear slid down the side of his face as he breathed heavily. "Don't you dare talk about her like that..." he said in a frighteningly stern voice.

Vesania was silent for a few seconds, stunned by what had just happened. He looked at the spear protuding from his face, before apathetically grabbing onto the end and pulling it out. We were mortified at the act, though none of us expected it to really be effective. He exhaled through his nose-holes loudly. "It's rude to interrupt someone when they're talking." He tossed the stone weapon to the ground with a "clunk."

He got up from his broken seat, setting Applejack on the ground with an unexpected softness, but carelessly slid the ottoman-pile across the floor with his foot. He now towered over us higher than before, and his lower abdomen was bulging, further expressing his morbid gluttony.

He held his hands behind his back and bent over us, and spoke with a condescending tone in his disturbing multi-voice. "And just, what exactly did you plan to do after you made it here? Were you kindly going to ask me to leave?" He looked directly at Fluttershy, making her quiver as he licked his lips, "Or were you going to attempt to giggle at me until I fade away?" He now looked at Pinkie Pie. "Maybe you were going to use brute force to get me out," Rainbow Dash, "Use your magic abilities to blast me," Twilight, "Or... bedazzle me out? Hahaha!" He cackled at Rarity.

He then moved over to the remaining three: me, Luna, and Big Macintosh. "And then there's you three. The lonely princess, the depressed Necromancer, and the redneck muscle. Honestly, though, what did you hope to accomplish by coming here?"

We were all silent, not wanting to dignify that with a response. All, except Rarity.

"We will not be intimidated by the filthy likes of you! What do you hope to accomplish by... by..." She quieted down as he got uncomfortably close to her.

He leaned in closer still, and whispered to her, "Absolutely nothing..."

"W-What?" she said.

"I have absolutely no goals or hopes for this place. I merely wish to gorge myself until I suck this world dry. And after that, I'll just move on to another one."

This time Luna spoke up. "Y-You'll just... move on?"

"Yep! That's the kind of guy I am: I just do things. I don't plan very far ahead for anything."

Rainbow Dash flew out of line and hovered near him, though kept her distance. "You mean that... all of this is just, a meal for you?! None of these lives mean anything to you?!"

He turned to her and pointed a finger. "Bingo!"

Rainbow Dash now had her turn to be furious with him, and took it. She looked at him, wide-eyed, then, without warning, she darted forward and landed a hard blow to his head, then followed up with several punches and kicks in rapid succession, causing him to lose his balance and fall on his side. I called for her to stop and to fly away from him, but she didn't listen. When he fell, she hovered for a few more seconds, breathing loudly through her nose and gritting her teeth.

Fluttershy went up to calm her friend and bring her back down to the ground. Vesania was regaining his balance as we all backed away. He wiped some unearthly drool from the corner of his mouth and looked at us. He cackled grimly. His cackle erupted into an insane laughter that reverberated in the room. When he settled down, he turned to us once again.

"Eh-heh-heh-heh... Now I'm angry... I'll give you a running start, though..."

Chapter 25

He stood, towering over us, as shadows branched out across the room behind him. His form grew subtly but intimidatingly.

"Ten... nine... eight..." he counted, filling us all with a strange fear. Though we all wanted to sprint out of there and get as far away from him as possible, the fear gripped us and paralyzed us.

Most of the others turned from the gruesome sight and towards me, urging me to run away and prepare the spell. I clutched at the book in my breast pocket and took several steps for the doorway; planning to use my knowledge of the castle to evade him until the time was right.

"...Seven... six..."

With one shout from one of them, Rainbow, "GO!" I made a mad dash for the marble corridors.

The others all ran off after me, save for Big Macintosh. I glanced at him, pleading for him to follow us, but he responded with a stern, fierce glare. "I'll hold him off; just go!"

Vesania snickered before continuing with his countdown.

"...Five... four..."

We all, save for Big Mac, resumed running down the halls before pausing briefly before a large portrait of the Princesses, where the hall branched off in separate directions. We made haste in discussing the (pressed) plan for keeping me safe from him until I could draw the symbol on the ground to send him back to his hell.

We agreed that if we paired up and took random paths, we'd have a better chance of success. The issue with that plan was, there being seven of us, one of us would have to go alone. They begged for one of them to come with me, but I was more worried for their safety than for mine. I reasoned that he would want to come after me first, and save them for last, so it was better if I went by myself. Before the decision became unanimous, a crash was heard from the throne room.

Big Macintosh was flung into the wall loudly, shaking dust from the ceiling. He collapsed to the ground on his knees, very winded. He turned his head to face us angrily.

"GO!! JUST GO!! RUN!!"

Vesania stepped through the door, glaring down at the injured man. A pitiful smile appeared on his face. He stooped down to lift him up and bring him to eye-level. Big Macintosh lifted his arms and clasped his hands, and swiftly brought them down like a muscular hammer on Vesania's head twice. Vesania became irritated with him and flung him down the hall away from us and strutted after him.

We took that instant to heed his command and flee down different paths; Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie going towards the library, Twilight and Fluttershy heading for the gardens, Luna and Rarity for the observatory, and me going up to the level where my temporary room was located.

As we ran, Luna and I looked at each other one more time, expecting this to be the last time we'd see each other. Her lips moved to say something, though the sound was cut off by Vesania doing some explicit, loud, unseen thing around the corner to our strong friend.

"What?" I called to her, hoping not to hinder our ability to escape him.

Her chance to repeat the message was interrupted by Vesania poking his head around the corner and staring me in the eye, grinning evilly.

"...One..."

I sped up at the sight of him, fearing him now more than usual. I fully expected him to start lumbering after me. But no, he was too cruel for that. He went off after the others, Rainbow and Pinkie, to be exact. He winked at me as he did so; he wanted me to know that he was going to torment the others before coming after me. He was a sadist, and he knew that the most effective torture for me in this context was to kill all of the others before coming for me. I wanted to stop and do... something to stop him and keep him away from them, but I knew that that would be a fruitless effort.

I kept running fearfully and desperately as he stomped off down one of the corridors.

The path to my room was long and windy, and the stained-glass windows in the halls were large and overlooking most of the castle, it being so high up. I didn't bother taking in all the untouched beauty of this region of the castle, no matter how reassuring it may have felt. I was nearly out of breath, and stopped by a window to regain my strength; I knew that my room wasn't far from this point.

A gut-wrenching scream echoed through the hall behind me. Rainbow Dash. I looked back down the hall with the petrifying knowledge that one-- Another scream-- two of them had been...

I kept down vomit at the thought of what horrible things he might have done before finally silencing them. I glanced out the window at my side and saw the castle gardens under the moonlight with Fluttershy cowering and crying under a tree and Twilight trying to console her. Something suddenly startled Twilight, causing her to pull Fluttershy away and hide in the thick bushes.

To my horror, Vesania came waltzing boldly out into the gardens. His multi-voice was incoherent from the distance, but it rumbled the colorful glass in front of me. He uprooted trees with ease as he went through the paths of lush green and terrified animals. He came upon an arrangement of topiary art, and admired it a bit before tearing them to bits with swift movements of his claws.

After seeing him walk around more and speak no doubt hateful words to the two, Twilight angrily rushed out from behind her hiding place and shouted something at him before blasting him with a bright blast of magic. He absorbed the blow without any visible signs of pain. She hit him several more times; each time he got one step closer to her, making her shrink back a bit. Eventually, he was practically touching her with his face he was so close. I pounded on the glass and screamed for the scene to end, for this all to stop, but oh, did it ever stop.

It stopped in the least favorable way imaginable. He killed Twilight. He opened his jaws as wide as they could go, and slowly engulfed her in that damned red-orange void, and pulled back, letting her body collapse indignantly on the grass. I then saw Fluttershy trip and expose her position behind the bushes, crying as she did so. She, mortified, scrambled away and tried to gain some height to separate her from the black nightmare. Just as she made it to the treeline, Vesania reached up and grabbed one of her wings and pinned it to the ground with his index finger. She flailed and cried, and wriggled out from under his finger and rolled onto her back. I could see that she had given up. She crawled slowly away from him, completely abandoning the idea of escape, and escaped my sight under a group of trees, but Vesania didn't.

He heard me screaming and screaming and pleading, and looked me dead in the eye, and shot me that damnable grin of his before turning back to Fluttershy. He lunged at her, disappearing under the canopy of trees, and making her release one last shriek of fear and sadness.

It was then that the complete gravity of the situation hit me like a megaton of lead. With her death, I saw innocence die right before me. I saw the embodiment of all that was good, and pure, and innocent being slaughtered in front of my own eyes by a beast that wanted no more than to cause suffering and fear and satisfy his sadistic hunger. Absolutely nothing was safe or sacred anymore. The only hope for this world was me completing my task, even though we all might die in the process.

I collapsed to my knees and vomited there on the floor, almost on the verge of suicidal thoughts. But now, now I had resolve. I had total resolve: the resolve to remove him from existence, to avenge all those who died for nothing at his hand, to save this entire world from any further harm. He would be defeated by my hand, and I will ensure that it happens.

Author commentary:

Yes. That just happened. What you just read was not an illusion, it is actually there on your screen.

Chapter 26

I had spent I don't know how long drawing the archaic symbol in ink all around the wing of the castle, setting the traps dozens of times over wherever I could -- around corners, on the walls, anywhere I saw fit. The drawing was now in place everywhere I thought necessary; I had already spoken the enchanting spell that set the trap, now all that was left was to have that awful monster step on it.

I hadn't heard anymore screams since the last few, but I didn't keep my hopes up that the others were safe.

As I set the traps, I kept thinking about what Luna said as we split up. Or rather, what she might have said. I played the scene over and over in my head, trying to re-read her lips, but with no success. Thinking so hard about it helped me drown out some of the harsh reality around me.

Unfortunately, that small, happy ignorance was ended quickly after I heard large, heavy footsteps echoing through the hall in front of me. I came back to Earth as the sound reverberated through the marble floors.

I stopped drawing the symbol I was working on to glare down the corridor, dried tears stinging my eyes and the aftertaste of vomit in my mouth. I clutched the book tightly in my hand before putting it back in my shirt.

Another step. The anger in my gut got stronger. Another. It grew stronger again. With each thunderous thud my absolute hatred for the loathsome creature grew bigger and more powerful.

He poked his head around the corner, a thin stream of unearthly drool hanging off of his chin.

"Ah! Finally; I found you," he said nonchalantly. He reached up to wipe the drool from his face. "Thanks for luring all your close friends straight into their deaths. Really, you saved me so much trouble..."

I said nothing, breathing heavily and angrily. He said "all." That meant that I was the only one left. The only one who could give him what he deserves.

He looked at me curiously. "What? No outburst of rage? No 'Don't you talk about them like that!' or something along those lines?" He snickered before leaning closer to me. "She loved you..." he whispered in my ear, and a tremendous weight landed in my stomach as my breath caught in my throat, though I dared not show him that his scare tactics were working.

"As you all split up after I killed that 'Big Macintosh' fellow--quite the strong one, by the way--she shouted something to you, didn't she?"

I remained motionless, but he knew that it was true.

"That's what she said to you as you turned your back on all of them. 'Nobody, I love you!' She yelled that at you before you ran away, leaving them there for me to pick off, one by one..." He chuckled throatily.

I rounded on him, the anger fully burning through to my skin, and punched him with the strength only born from deep hatred and fury.

He stumbled and lost his balance and landed on the floor as I glared at him, the tears stinging my eyes again. I stood over him now, feeling powerful for a micro-instant as he lay winded on the floor in front of me. That feeling was crushed as he got back up, taller than before, and looking angry.

He inhaled through his nose-holes and looked down on me pitifully. He chuckled again.

"How many times have I struck a nerve with you now; five? It feels like five. Let's see how many more I can fit in before you die..."

His statement and sensually sadistic tone scared me. What more could had he to say?

"Did you know that I can read some of the thoughts and memories of the people that I've killed?" He advanced on me a step. "I like to watch people's lives and thoughts to pass the time; let's see if I can find something from some of your friends...

"Twilight was questioning listening to you in her last moments. Hold on--is that 'blame' in there? Ho-ho, that doesn't sound like something Twilight would think; let's see how Fluttershy thought of this little excursion you planned out. Hmm, she didn't like it either. She just wanted to go home, but was too worried of how you'd think of her if she told you that. Rarity--let's see. She wanted to actually end her own life before I got to her... tsk, tsk, too bad for her, eh? And now for the coup de grace... Luna..."

"NO!" I shouted as I clapped my hands over my ears, not wanting to hear any more of his lies. That's all they were, right? Lies? Just horrid lies to mess with my sanity, right?

He reached down and grabbed my arms and lifted me up to eye-level, also preventing me from blocking out his blasphemy.

"I know what you're thinking; and no, I can assure you that these are all very, very true, Mr. Denial. She just thought the world of you! She was infatuated with you the moment you met in the hallway! She- Don't try to ignore it, Nobody! Embrace the thoughts of the woman you let die! Ha Ha Ha Ha!!"

I shook free of his hold and dropped to the floor. I scrambled to get away from him and dashed down the hall going full-speed. He leisurely followed me at a steady but threatening pace. I spun around, instantly remembering the symbol I had drawn in that spot. I welled up with confidence that he was about to be sent straight back to his Hell and pay for all the suffering and pain he had caused.

"Come on... just one more step... one more... Yes!!" I thought to myself as his grotesque foot landed on the black symbol on the ground. Nothing.

He saw the expression on my face and pondered what it meant for a moment. He then saw what I was looking at and lifted his foot to spot the little mark on the ground. He stared at it for a second, puzzled, then bent down and sniffed it. He came back up and threw his head back as he laughed hysterically.

"Ah ha ha ha ha! You- You tried to- with the symbol- Bah ha ha!!"

Why wasn't it working? I could swear on my life that the symbol was drawn exactly as it was in the book and the spell uttered perfectly. What was wrong! Could it have been the wrong spell or something? No- that doesn't make sense... I...

"You idiot!" he shouted at me, still laughing. "You went through all the trouble of drawing this symbol--and probably more than just this one--and casting that dumb spell, and you completely forgot all about the blood!"

I wanted to kick my own nose in at my stupidity. How could I have forgotten that it was supposed to be drawn in blood?! Stupid! All that time wasted, and for nothing! Stupid, stupid, stupid!

He quickly recovered from his laughing fit, and took on a dark and menacing appearance as he glared at me again.

"Shall I go on about her?"

Fearing more guilty truths from him, I turned and dashed down the hall, not daring to look back even for a second.

I spent an hour running through the endless maze of marble and glass corridors, compelled only by the constant sound of deep thumping too close behind me for comfort. I thought I lost him several times after hearing silence, though the thumping quickly picked back up. I finally found myself in the royal library. I decided to hide in there, lost among the rows of shelves to catch my breath.

I made myself small behind a shelf and listened for the thumping. It grew closer, at that steady pace with which it had somehow kept up with me. It then grew closer, and closer, and then it passed, and I let out a quiet sigh of relief. It continued to move farther away from me until it was nearly silent, save for my tired breathing.

I let the muscles in my weak legs stop twitching before I got up and moved around some more. I sat in one of the chairs and took deep breaths, trying to clear my mind. After I felt calmer and more focused, a sound startled me, causing me to seize up and listen closely again. A thump. Another thump. Another. Another.

I dashed deeper into the maze of shelves and sat silently.

I peeked through a gap between some books and observed the area through them. For a few seconds, I saw nothing as the thumping grew louder. Then a large black mass passed in front of me, causing me to jump back, startled. I cupped my hand around my mouth to keep from gasping as I shuffled away quietly through the rows of books, escaping discovery.

He sniffed the air through his nose-holes deeply, then sighed. "Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum... I smell human blood, hmm-hm-hm..." he said in a deep voice.

I cautiously kept moving through the books, crawling on my hands and knees.

"I know you're in here, Nobody... It's no use trying to hide; I'll find you eventually." He paused, as if thinking some devious thought. "Would you like to know what these Earth, Magic, Air and Omni beings taste like? Hmm? Or maybe you'd like to talk about Luna some more; eh?"

I kept moving as he talked, ignoring the urge to burst with anger.

"Hmm; let's see... The first time she saw you, she thought you were just so handsome. She may not have looked it, but she got all warm and fuzzy inside--like a little schoolgirl who'd gotten her first crush! And that night, after her shift was over, she went to bed and just couldn't get you out of her head--Heh-heh-hmm...

"Let's see--what else? She thought about you all the time since then, she- Hold on, what's this? Oh-ho! A fantasy?! Ha-Ha! And a dirty one at that--Oh Luna, you bad, bad girl... Oh. Um... That one's a bit odd even for me... Hmm..."

His voice kept being distorted and echoed by the acoustics of the room, making it difficult to discern his position. I had to just have faith in my luck after his form vanished behind the rows as we moved. I looked diligently around myself as I crawled stealthily.

I had just made it into the history section when my hand brushed by something soft and cold. I looked down and felt that awful feeling of fear and shock form in the pit of my stomach. Rainbow Dash's body lay there in front of me, her now-dull magenta eyes staring at the ceiling, but seeing nothing; her limbs splayed out in every direction. But the most horrific part was her face: It had an expression of terror and awe forever engraved on her head.

I jumped back, my hand tingling with the feeling of death, and let out a sharp cry that echoed within the marble and wood. I looked to my side, and saw a pair of glowing, red-orange eyes peering at me between encyclopedias about Equestrian literature.

"Peek-a-boo..."

Chapter 27

He punched his hands through the thick mahogany, sending paper and leather and wood splinters flying through the air. I dashed away from the burst and avoided his grasp, but was surprised again as he pulled his arms back through and proceeded to shove the entire case on top of me. I scrambled away from the toppling obelisk of knowledge, and made a dive for the floor before it crashed down loudly behind me. I looked back and saw him dusting off his hands as he looked at me evilly. I frantically tried to get back on my feet to start running yet again, but was surprised at the resistance I felt pulling at my leg. I flailed it wildly, thinking I could shake him off me. A wave of sharp pain surged up my leg and into my body. I turned around, and screamed at the sight of a large chunk of the bookcase branching off of the main part and impaling straight through my shin.

"AAAAAAAHHHH!!!" The pain was unbearable. It felt as if my leg was being attacked by salt-and-lemon-juice-covered fire ants with flaming chainsaws for pincers.

Vesania looked down at my injured leg humorously, giggling at my agony. He bent down over me, examining it like a doctor who enjoyed his job just a little bit too much. "Hmm... Looks like someone got a little splinter in his leg. Heh-heh. You know, if you cover a splinter with a dab of Elmer's glue, let it dry and then peel it off, it makes for easy removal. Now if only we could find some glue... Bah-ha-ha!"

He reached down for the injured leg, and I wanted to beg him not to touch it, but I know no amount of begging would keep him from playing with the toy sitting in front of him, bleeding out on the floor. He grabbed the chunk of wood protruding from my flesh daintily. "And one, two..." He snapped the wood shard off of the bookcase, sending more of those malicious fire ants into my nervous system. "...three..."

I scrambled clumsily away from him, gripping my leg and leaving a trail of blood on the semi-clean floor. He ran a long, gross finger through the long puddle of crimson and sucked on its savoriness. A shiver visibly ran down his spine, and he caressed himself sensually. "Oohh... that's some good stuff. Come to think of it, I don't think I've ever tasted you yet, have I?"

I got to my feet--correction: foot--and hobbled quickly away from him, knowing that I couldn't outrun him should he give chase.

"Oh, come now; you're smarter than that, aren't you? You know that all I have to do is kill you with a swipe of my hand, don't you?"

"Then why don't you do it?!" I yelled.

"Because it's more fun this way! I like to play with my food before I eat it. And you know what, I think I'll play with you just a teeny bit more..."

More chasing ensued. This time he was kind enough to give me a full five-minute head start, considering my injured leg. He believed the chase wouldn't be as fun if his catch would be so easy. I made it into the infirmary I had woken up in earlier, and breathed a gigantic sigh of relief.

Then began the tedious task of tending to my hideously injured leg. Reluctantly, I tapped the shard, timidly testing the pain and calculating how much it would hurt to remove it. (It hadn't hit any arteries, suggesting that I wouldn't bleed out, if I treated it properly.) My initial guess was somewhere between " A Hell of a Lot" and "Good God, Let this Agony End."

The moment I touched it, that pain alone was out of the ball park with both of those guesses. But I had to get it out; I couldn't just limp around with a chunk of wood clawing at my nerves the whole time.

I steeled myself for the deed which had to be done. I grabbed some items lying around the room: some gauze, rags, and a bedpan to collect the blood. I cut off the circulation with a rag tied tightly around my leg just above the wound, and put one in my mouth to bite down on.I tenderly took hold of the shard, firmed my grip, closed my eyes... 1...2... 3!

Out came the wood, along with a long, thin streak of blood that it flung through the air. My cries were muffled by the rag, but that didn't do anything to impede the pain. I sat there for a bit, blood dripping into the pan and quietly screaming, then I worked up the courage to finish the job.

I soaked up most of the blood with some surgical sponges and more rags, and then wrapped some rolls of gauze around my shin. I didn't bother with any antibacterial spray or anything, due to time. I looked around the room for a crutch, or at least something I could use for one. As I limped over to one sitting in a corner by a sink, I noticed several small jars of powerful medical numbing agents, and I said quietly to myself, "You've got to be kidding me..."

I hung my head in embarrassment at my nonobservant mistake of not applying a numbing agent to my leg before that dreadful "operation." As a consolation to myself, I irritably grabbed a handful of painkillers and downed them with some water.

I looked back at the bedpan that had collected all the blood, and my determination and resolve filled me up again.

"Okay: We're gonna do it right this time..."

After one more round of setting up traps, (the right way) I pulled up a chair and sat in the wide corridor, awaiting Vesania with irritation, resentment, and a dash of overconfidence. I had been so clever this time, drawing the symbol, that I felt positive that this time would work, and he'd be returned to his hell with his demons, and all he'd ever destroyed would be avenged. Here, now; I would win for the sake of everything I'd loved, and everyone I'd ever loved.

I slouched in the chair that I'd dragged across the tiled floor, leaving various scratches across the shiny white surface, and waited. And waited. And waited. I stared down that hall until my eyes hurt, listening and watching for the tiniest thing: a creak, a low rumble, a minuscule shadow, et cetera. Finally, his thumping footsteps resounded around me, but I could discern that they were coming from directly in front of me.

My stomach had butterflies, and I could swear I was losing my mind, for I almost felt... giddy as I waited for him to show his face. I began thinking that maybe his bloodlust had worn off on me somehow, and shook off the feeling, not wanting to be like him. At last, he emerged around the corner, and He had a look of boredom on his face.

"Oh, there you are. Listen, this whole running around business is rather taxing, don't you agree? I think I'll just end it here and kill you now, whaddaya say?"

I tried to play it cool and stayed motionless in my chair, though inside I was a mass of nerves.

He scanned over the floor between him and me and raised an eyebrow.

"Hmm? No traps? No Necromancy symbols to avenge your girlfriend and everybody else?" He moved closer to me, still examining the ground everywhere. He shot me a look. "Given up, have we? That doesn't seem like you, Nobody..." I said nothing, but glared at him with a look of utter defeat. "Well! That just makes my job easier, doesn't it?"

He arched his back menacingly with his claws outstretched, and he salivated as he tiptoed towards me. I could barely contain myself; the moment was so close. He was going to fall straight into my trap! Just one more step...

He froze. No! Take one more step! Come closer to me, you disgusting monster!

He looked directly at his feet and stepped back. My heartbeat accelerated with frustration and worry. He examined the tiles at his feet and dragged a sharp fingertip along the grout, knowing that something was amiss. The dry grout came off in cracked, long chips around the tile, and when it was all removed, he stuck that fingertip under the tile and pried it up gingerly, revealing the small, ancient symbol drawn in blood underneath. It was blown. there was no chance of him falling for it now.

"Under the tiles; very clever, I must say, but you really should've done a better job of hiding the grout-work."

He picked up the tile and flung it over his shoulder, smashing a stained-glass window. I cringed at the tinkling sound of the glass on the floor. My heart was beating so loudly that he could no doubt hear it. He eyed me sarcastically as he removed more white tiles, one by one, revealing the symbols under them. I had set a whole line of them in the hall as sort of a minefield that he had to step on in order to get to me. But that plan had failed, awfully. He cackled at my dismay as I shuffled in my chair uncomfortably.

We stared at each other for a few seconds, him smug that he'd foiled my plan so easily, me terrified and angry at the failure. I thought quickly of what I should do next, and was ashamed at what my immediate plan of action was.

I flung the chair aside and ran--more like limped swiftly--away from him, panting with fear. I heard an animal-like roar from behind me, and shortly after felt a massive weight slam into my back and knock me onto the ground. I flailed my arms desperately as he rolled me over onto my back to probably get a look at my terrified expression. Some of his saliva dripped down onto my jacket as he hovered over me.

"Parting is such sweet sorrow. You know, I think I might actually miss you... Nah!" He opened his mouth wide and theatrically lowered himself on me. "Any last words?"

I immediately dropped the act of fear and desperation and put on a cool, smug demeanor.

"Yeah: Shove it up your ass you son of a bitch!!" I ripped open the front of my shirt to reveal the blood-drawn symbol I had put on my chest.

He instantly went wide-eyed and his jaw dropped. He tried to jump back and scramble away from me, but before he could barely make a move, the symbol glowed white for an instant, and a giant disc of swirling, pulsating reddish light appeared hovering just a few inches above my chest. I heard his panicked and struggling noises as I slid on my back from under the bright disc.

I finally got out and stood up to see Vesania looking at the disc with fear in his eye-holes. I watched the strange light as well, but not with fear, with curiosity. It just stayed there, motionless aside from its pulsing and swirling, and yet Vesania looked as though he was staring at a doomsday device that was about to go off.

But it stayed there, still, and I found myself captivated by the sight. My eyes were fixated on the supernatural anomaly of demonic wonder. I thought that if I stared much longer, I'd get sucked in. But then a strange, indescribable sound erupted from it, a sound that grew louder and louder and louder until the windows all shattered at once, and my ears started to bleed. From the center of the light a form emerged, a tall, thin form. It was dark, and had long, white deer-like horns on its head which rested on its broad shoulders. (The first thing I thought was that I screwed up yet again and summoned another demon that would cause more problems. I don't think I could bear the guilt of making that mistake.)

It was facing Vesania so I couldn't see its face, which was probably for the better.

Vesania looked at the figure, and the fear in his eyes grew immeasurably.

The figure stared at him for a good long while before speaking. The very first thing out of his mouth was some unrepeatable garble of made-up letters and sounds, reminding me of the first time I saw Vesania possess my body and try to say his name. The figure's voice was booming, and yet subtle, smooth and calm.

"(Vesania's name), I have found you..." At this point, Vesania sort of shuffled backwards cowardly.

"Eh-heh-heh... U-um, listen; I know you're probably kind of steamed, what with me being gone for a little while-"

"Six hundred years."

"Y-yeah, about that, I-I, uh, I tried to get back to you, b-but something went wrong! I-I was trapped in some selfish human's body, and then another, and then I realized that I couldn't survive in this world without a host body! Yeah, that's it! I-I sincerely wanted to return to you, M-Master, really! But there was-"

"Enough of your lies, (Vesania). You never were good at lying. It's in your eyes. You left the Underworld when I was conversing with Faust, and you did not desire to return. That is all there is to it. But now you will have to be punished for your abandonment of your fellow demons..."

Vesania was no longer the sadistic, uncaring, cool monstrosity that I knew him as; he was a disgusting creature filled with fear and panic.

"No!! Please, no! I-I didn't do anything wrong! I-I was just having some fun on the surface! Please, I-I-I-"

"ENOUGH," boomed the figure. He silenced Vesania instantly, and then swiveled on his intangible perch of the disc to look me in the eye. His body was solid black, with a line of small flames poking through here and there, as though the blackness was a cloak over a flaming body. His head was a pure white deer skull with orange blazing fireballs in the eye-holes. "You."

I froze with fear.

"Are you the one who summoned me?"

I nodded hesitantly and slowly as a bead of sweat trickled down the side of my face.

He leaned down to get eye-level with me, making my face warm with the heat of his eyes.

"Thank you for contacting me. This demon shall be punished for his insubordination." He turned to look back at Vesania, who was on the verge of wetting himself. "You have killed over two hundred humans and consumed their souls without authorization. I must confiscate all the human souls you have consumed. I will leave the other souls here; I have no jurisdiction over them." He raised a dark, gnarled hand and gestured at him with an open palm, and a spot on the ground near Vesania exploded, and a dark chain shot out of it and impaled his left hand and implanted itself in the ceiling. He cried out not in pain, but in fear. The figure rotated his hand palm-up and twitched his index finger upwards a bit, and another chain burst from the floor and through Vesania's other hand and into the ceiling. He twitched another finger, and another chain shot through his shin, another finger, another chain, until eventually Vesania was strung up by his limbs on the dark chains and suspended above the floor while he bled (or leaked) odd yellowish blood.

I was filled with a sense of disgust, and equal pleasure: I felt delectation at seeing this monster feel pain. Though nothing would be as satisfying as seeing him feel the emotional and mental pain that he's put me through, physical pain would have to suffice.

He hung there, bleeding and whimpering softly. The figure turned to me and looked at me with its piercing fiery eyes, making me freeze with fear.

"I thank you again for returning this insubordinate to me. Is there anything you wish in return?"

I thought about asking for my family back, both, in fact, but somehow he read my mind.

"I cannot return you family to the world of the living; it is outside my power to resurrect human life." He paused. "However, I may be able to set free the souls of the people he's killed from this world."

I lit up instantly. "Yes!! Please, that! Bring back everyone here!"

He raised up a fiery hand to silence me. "They will not be alive when I set them free. They will merely be mindless souls wandering the world."

I felt a weight crash down on my feelings. I looked down at the ground defeated.

"Is there... Is there any way you can bring them back?" Tears began subtly welling up in my eyes.

"You do claim to be a necromancer, correct?"

"Y-Yes."

He stayed silent for just over a second. "A necromancer may be able to guide lost souls back into their host bodies. But it takes a massive amount of power and concentration; you do not seem to-"

"Do it!" I demanded. "I don't care what it takes; I'll bring them back!"

He looked surprised at my outburst, but then regained his composure as the tears made their passionate way down my cheeks. "Very well..."

He looked back at Vesania, and the flames in his eye sockets turned blue and roared immensely. Vesania began convulsing, and his red-orange insides also turned to a dark shade of blue. He moaned and groaned in what seemed like incredible pain, and white liquid began dripping from the corners of his mouth and onto the floor. With suddenness a large blob formed in his throat and moved up towards his mouth, causing him to tear up. Funny: I could never in a million years imagine him crying, and here it was before me.

The blob sent powerful, thin beams of white light out of his facial orifices before it fully emerged from his jaws, making him scream, and split up into fast-moving threads of light that arced downward and outward and stopped at the floor. I was temporarily blinded by the brilliance as the figure stared at the sight, unblinking (assuming he could blink). I opened my eyes again to see over a dozen blue, transparent shapes hovering around slowly and aimlessly. I looked at the shapes more closely, and recognized them as the bodies--no--souls of all the people I've met here. I saw Fluttershy, Twilight, AJ, Nurse Redheart, and... Luna!

I ran over to her and tried to embrace her, but foolishly ran straight through her form, reminding me that they were completely intangible. However, I still felt the urge to paw at her and grasp at her ghostly hands in vain attempts to feel her smooth skin once again as my tears flowed.

I immediately turned back to the dark figure. "How do I put them back in their bodies?"

"...As a necromancer, you-"

"Tell me how! How?!"

He merely stared at me, and though his face was incapable of expression, I felt something like pity emanating from his flaming eyes.

"...Please..." I pleaded once more.

At this, he spoke. "I cannot tell you the means to bring back the dead; doing so would be against my code and out of my jurisdiction. You must perform this feat yourself, with no assistance from any demonic or otherwise force other than yourself. This is absolute, and no leniency will be granted."

"B-But I do-"

"Enough!" he boomed. "I have delayed here too long as it is, and there are other matters I must attend to currently. Good day, sir..." And with that he vanished back into the fiery portal that hovered above the ground, making it close swiftly with a boom.

I looked around at all the souls that I didn't know what to do with, and then my eyes fell upon the now-withered, weak, and bleeding Vesania, still chained up in the corridor. What about him? I thought the figure was supposed to take him back to the Underworld where he belonged. What now?

Before I could ask another question, the chains quickly loosened themselves from the ceiling and floor, dropping his frail body to the ground with a thud. He groaned again and tried to right himself and stand. But before he could barely raise his head off the ground, the chains came alive and wrapped around him like bloody, rust-covered snakes. They constricted him tightly as he writhed violently and screamed some more.

"No! I-I don't want to go back! Please!! I beg you! Don't make me go back!!"

From down the hall a ways, a large crack split the clean marble, and unearthly red light burst through it. The crack grew in length and width as it snaked its way toward Vesania. He saw it and his fear grew several more unimaginable degrees.

He looked at me pleadingly, and I felt a knot in my stomach at seeing his dismay. "Nobody! Do something! Please! Don't let him take me back! I'll do anything, just-- Please! Help me!!"

The crack finally made it to his feet, and he sunk into it a bit. He struggled more and more in his chains, sending his arm free just as he fell into the crack completely and catching himself on the edge near me. He pleaded over and over again for me to do something to save him, and I just couldn't take it.

I turned away from the horrifying sight. I looked at Luna's dead eyes. They no longer had the stars in them that I fell in love with. I could not feel her soft skin, could not hold her hand, nothing. As I stared into her eyes that look at me and saw nothing, I remembered something: This bastard deserved it. He deserved everything that was coming to him in that hell waiting for his arrival.

I looked back at him, and heard him gasp with hope that I was going to do something to save him.

"No," I said coldly with hate in my eyes

The hope left his face.

"W-What?!"

"I said 'no.'" I stomped on his pinkie finger as... emphasis. "This is for my family..." his ring finger this time, "...both of them..." middle, "... For my friends..." thumb. I savored the index finger.

"... And for Luna..."

I watched him fall into that flaming hot abyss of evil, screaming all the way, with nothing but hate on my face. His cries echoed through the halls for a long time.

I turned around as the heat from the crack heated my spine. I looked at Luna one more time, longingly.

"Now... let's bring you back" I said as a smile broke out on my face with more tears on the side. I raised my hand to caress her untouchable cheek, but was halted by a sudden pressure on my shin.

"I'M NOT LEAVING UNLESS YOU'RE COMING WITH ME!!" cried a loud, angry voice from behind me.

I looked down to see Vesania hanging on to my leg with his other hand, and then the next thing I knew we were both plummeting down into the fiery abyss...

Chapter 28

We plummeted straight down into the fiery abyss as he still clung to my leg. I looked up at the crack through which we had fallen, and with fear noted that it was growing significantly smaller and smaller. I turned back to him; he was screaming with rage and madness at me. The abyss beyond him was getting closer and closer to both of us, and I struggled to break free of his hold. The chains had fallen off of him, become lax, and now fell along with us as limp, demonic noodles.

He scratched and clawed at me with his gnarled hands, but I managed to block most of them with my hands. I noticed that around us the red light had begun to dim, and the walls of the chasm began turning black. I tried to swim through the air away from him, but could not succeed. The light had grown almost nonexistent, and we quickly descended into complete darkness. I looked up, but could not see the crack. And yet, strangely, I could see him. I could see him, I could see myself, and yet everything else had become completely dark. I became disoriented by this lack of surroundings, and could not tell which way was up, down, left, right, forward or back. But then I spotted a tiny, minuscule dot of light in the distance under (at least what seemed like under) us that was quickly approaching. No sooner had I seen it that the light exploded and encompassed the both of us in its otherworldly unholiness.

I was shielded my eyes from the luminescence, and opened them again to see... to see...

It was a sight that was never meant to be seen by mortal eyes, ever! There were creatures, at least I think they were creatures, that were beyond comprehension, beyond imagination! Beasts of immeasurable horror were... yelling? Screaming? Laughing? I could not tell, but they did it as they danced, or writhed, around ungodly idols of awful obscenity. And the landscape--oh, god, the landscape! It seemed infinite, and was bathed in blood and pain and bodies and savagery, and my eyes and mind burned at the sight!

The only familiarity of the whole scenario was the feeling of me attached to Vesania and falling through clouds of not smoke, but things. They were floating, writhing bodies of... of... birds? Small flying demons? I almost vomited at the feeling of them touching me with their slimy hide, and when we broke through them, we did not continue descending at a rapid speed, but floated down slowly, as though gravity was different here. He continued to assail me with his claws. The blood did not drip off of me, but rather floated off of my body and away into the monstrous clouds.

The indescribable things scattered in a wild frenzy as my blood touched them; they swarmed around us and chewed and scratched at the both of us, and sometimes each other, not able to distinguish, either that or they didn't care. My body was covered in the insane creatures as they dug into my flesh and sucked at my wounds in malicious hunger; they attacked Vesania as well, though he didn't seem as affected as I was.

I felt light-headed, and the world started fogging up as my eyes glazed over. I almost descended into total unconsciousness, but the pain kept me awake the whole time, that and the adrenaline coursing through my body. Suddenly, the flitting monsters scattered, ceasing their torment of my flesh, as a shadow passed over all of us. I strained my eyes to see the source of the shadow, and saw the fear on Vesania's face again.

The figure was looming over us, except this time he was massive! He was taller than a skyscraper, and though his face still was incapable of visible expression, I could feel detestation and anger aimed directly at the two of us. His deer's skull head as well as his cloak of blackness cast a demonic shadow over miles of the blasphemous, bloody land.

"I HAVE TOLERATED YOU FOR THE FINAL TIME," his voice boomed like a rocket's thrusters at us.

The blackness that was his cloak split apart down the middle and spread out like a set of shadowy wings with a mile-long wingspan. His body underneath was made of millions of burning, blackened human skeletons bunched together tightly and screaming as they writhed in pain and pawed at the air for salvation and freedom. The flames grew brighter, and the screaming grew louder as he reached outward for us.

The fear of death gripped me as his hand of more of the burning skeletons loomed over us, and my body froze as my life flashed before my eyes. I had never believed that myth, until now. I clenched my eyes shut as his hand was a mere meter above my head and waited for the end. Nothing.

I reluctantly opened my eyes, and saw the hand-shaped cluster of flaming bodies hanging over me. Several of the skeletons branched out of the main mass and reached desperately for Vesania; their hands clawing savagely at his black skin and clutched him tightly.

He screamed as they pulled him up into their flaming mass; the heat from their bodies singed my eyebrows and hurt my face. They carried him along (as though he was crowd-surfing through hell) and drew him closer to the massive figure's torso, and as I stared at the horrific sight and at the demon looming over me, I came to a realization: I was watching Mephistopheles himself destroy Vesania. I felt a bit... giddy at the thought that not only had I successfully beaten Vesania, but I had gotten Mephisto to assist me in doing it!

He thrashed helplessly in the mass of bodies, but was no match for their savagery; I watched him reach Mephisto's chest and slowly get consumed by them, sinking deeper into the cluster of evil and demonic horror. All that was left was an extended arm, reaching out but touching nothing, before even that was hidden by the painful wickedness.

After an instant of silence, Mephisto looked at me with detestation and quickly hid his body back under the cloak of blackness and shadows.

"LEAVE NOW," he boomed once again, and instantaneously I felt tremendous G-forces as I rocketed upwards, away from that indescribable nightmare of Lovecraftian abhorrence. The red land from below me shrunk and I found myself in darkness once more before the familiar crack became visible through the thin veil of water leaking from my eyes due to the force.

I was soon back in the familiar hallway of the castle, with the hovering souls of people I knew lingering close by. The force launched me in the air after passing through the crack, and it closed under me as I crashed back to the ground.

I lay there for a time, recollecting my senses and thoughts before I weakly stood in the midst of the translucent figures. I gazed around at their faces, picking out the ones that I recognized. I came back to Luna again, and felt happiness just faintly tickle my senses.

I looked around for my book, believing that I'd dropped it somewhere nearby. I patted my jacket and pants down, and chuckled at myself for forgetting that it still remained in my breast pocket.

I flipped through the pages and scanned the material for anything to do with souls and their bodies. I searched fruitlessly for a while, and became worried and frustrated. I looked through the book several times, and could only manage to find one measly tidbit about resurrecting the dead. I focused on just Luna as I studied the page carefully. I cleared my mind and concentrated on the symbols on the paper, holding them clearly in my head as I absentmindedly lifted my hand towards her.

There was a tingle in my fingers, a tingle that grew and quickly became a burning sensation, and I winced before I accomplished my goal. I felt something; a definite sense that it was working. But no matter how hard I tried, the burning always cut the process short. I soon became angry and frustrated, and the fury caused me to toss the book at a window and shatter the glass before landing on the grass outside.

I collapsed on my knees in defeat and let depression consume me. No. No I wasn't going to quit. Not now; not after all this. I had to deal with the loss of both of my families, a sadistic demon wreaking havoc on everything, I literally went to hell and back to end all this madness going on around me, and I was about to give up just because I couldn't perform a simple resurrection spell!

I literally smacked myself in the face several times at my resolution to just quit like that. I stood up and strutted angrily towards Luna's soul and raised my hand again. I took deep breaths and cleared my mind save for the ancient symbols from the page. I concentrated hard on what I wanted: I wanted them back; I wanted her back...

"...Luna..."

I opened my eyes a crack, and nearly jumped back when I saw her raise her head from its limp position and stare off into space before turning in a definite direction. She glided smoothly over the floor in the direction she faced, and I found myself following her without thinking about it.

She phased through a wall at one point, and I frantically looked for a route around so I could catch up. We ended up in the ballroom where this whole incident started, and I saw her dead body laying splayed out on the clean floor. While her soul still slowly glided over to it, I rushed over and cradled her head lovingly. I looked up at her soul and said, jokingly and with tears in my eyes, "Come on, hurry up, Luna! Don't keep me waiting!"

When her soul reached her body, it (the soul) became completely horizontal and assumed the exact position of the body as it sunk slowly into the cold husk in my hands. I waited anxiously for a sign, a response, something! And finally, her closed eyelids fluttered lightly, until they snapped open and saw me instantly. I saw her star-filled eyes and tears dripped from my face and on to hers as we both smiled widely. She suddenly lifted herself up and kissed me passionately and for a long period of time. I almost didn't know what to do; I hadn't ever really kissed a girl before. I have certainly kissed a girl before, but not like this. This one meant something; it felt wonderful. I held her head against mine as we kissed, emotions completely in control of both of us.

When the passion subsided, we looked at each other as I helped her up. She looked around worriedly, and then back at me.

"Is it... Is he..." she asked.

"Yes. It's over now," I answered reassuringly.

"Then the others-" she started, with a touch of happiness in her eyes.

I felt slightly awful at having to tell her the bad news that they were dead, but quickly brought back her spirits when telling her that I had the solution. I felt a sharp pain surge through my body, and she quickly noticed the scars riddling my body from my neck to my ankles, and examined me like a mother who's son has fallen off of his bike. I kindly brushed her off and told her what needed to be done.

We then took to the gruesome and morbid task of gathering the bodies of the others, including Celestia, in the grassy area outside the hallway containing the souls and bringing them near the spot where the emotionless souls hovered. I reunited them with their respective bodies one by one, and noted each of their surprised reactions to being alive again. I had to work through the pain that resurrecting them invoked in my body. Applejack was the most confused, since she knew less than the rest of us about what had occurred that night. I gave as best an explanation as I could to her, and yet she still looked distant and flabbergasted.

There were many hugs, tears and consolations that ensued. Everyone was brought back up to speed, and we were just about to set out to resurrect the remaining victims of Vesania's wickedness.

Then I noticed the pain again. This time it was not on the outside, caused by the scratches and bruises, but on the inside, in my heart and in my gut. I collapsed on the ground, clutching my gut as the pain grew to immense magnitude. The others huddled over me and, although I could understand none of what they were saying, I could distinguish sorrow and fear in their tones. Luna, seemed most shaken by this sudden occurrence, and knelt down by my side, but I, strangely, was not interested in her currently; I saw the small notebook I had thrown through the window lying just a few meters away. I, with great difficulty, dragged myself across the ground, doubtlessly worrying them even more, and reached desperately for the notebook, and held it weakly open in front of me on the page about the resurrections. I, like a fool, like the biggest fool in the universe, failed to read the fine print: "Should a necromancer implicate the resurrection spell on multiple persons, they will succumb to a painful death, as it decimates his/her own life force."

My eyes glazed over slowly, and as the agony and coldness of death consumed me slowly, I could only turn to look at them all, let my eyes fall on Luna, and utter weakly, "...D-Damn it... So close..."

Then it all went black...

Chapter 29

There was blackness and silence; quite a perfect pair, really. I could feel nothing, I could see nothing, hear nothing, taste nothing, only think. I analyzed my situation, and decided that this must have been it. This was the end. This was death.

It wasn't as glamorous as people made it out to be, and I felt a bit disappointed. I was expecting either flames and eternal agony or golden gates and angelic music. Neither met me in my unfortunate end. I had time to think; about, well, everything.

I thought about life back on regular old Earth, and life on Equestria, and compared them both, just to pass the time. I became angry at the fact that I couldn't even feel sad about dying; there was just thought, no feeling. I knew that I would miss Luna, Twilight, Applejack, Celestia, all of them, in fact. Even the DJ from the party!

I almost hated myself for not only bringing them all into this, but forming bonds with them and taking that all away. They must be weeping over my body this moment, and Luna, I'm so sorry Luna... I'm so sorry.

I stared (I think that would be the term) into the blackness, and floated in this ethereal prison consumed by the misery of my own misfortune. I had gone through so much, suffered so greatly, and induced suffering upon others, and this was my reward for trying to set things right. The universe is cold and cruel; it doesn't care one way or the other what happens to you and couldn't care less about your deeds or misdeeds. Fairness is a lie.

Suddenly, my spirits lifted as I saw a faint glimmer in the distance. It grew slowly, and cast rays of comforting radiance over me. Heaven? Perhaps, but before I could make any assumptions, the light erupted into an explosion and enveloped me in luminescent wonder.

Before me there stood a massive figure, larger than Mephistopheles, and much more pleasant to look at. It was a tall, thin, equine-shaped being, with a long, flowing, dark red mane and tail, and possessing a horn and wings like the Omni-beings. It had kind, blue eyes that looked down at me gently, but sternly, and Its coat was a pale golden hue. This magnificent being was an Alicorn, one of the beings that created this universe.

It and I stood in front of a backdrop of the entire universe, with all its vastness and nebulae and galaxies pleasing my eyes.

It spoke to me in its gentle yet powerful voice. The voice hinted to me that the figure was female.

"I know of you, human. Your history is a sad one, and I am sorry for you. We have watched you. We have been watching you since your arrival in my universe, and We have watched the events unfold after that time..."

As she spoke, several more tall, godlike beings fell in line beside her and formed a semicircle around me. I felt nervous, as if this was some sort of astrological courtroom where I would be sentenced to some punishment for causing so much trouble in this world.

"W-Who's we?" I asked nervously.

"We are the Alicorns: the creators, the destroyers, the omnipotent rulers of this world. We were disturbed by the presence of an outer-world force interfering with our rule. We tracked the presence to you, and were... disturbed.

"You were a human; We have dealt with a human interference more than once, but you were... different. We sensed evil hiding within you, and endeavored to snuff it out, but another presence was blocking our power. This "Mephistopheles," the demon in you belonged to him, correct?"

I agreed quietly.

"It being his jurisdiction, We had no power over it. Our inability to remove the evil was the reason for the unfortunate events that followed after. Do not blame yourself; you are innocent. All that has occurred was totally out of your power."

I breathed a sigh of relief.

"This is why We found Ourselves surprised at your actions; you did not yield to the demon, you fought back. You protected others, and you banished the wickedness from this world entirely, protecting everyone you could. No human we have ever observed has been up to the challenges that you have. You have showed Us great displays of kindness and heroism, and We thank you deeply."

I found that I was no longer disembodied thought as my cheeks began to flush. I reached up to touch them, and was happily surprised to see that my entire body has been re-materialized.

"And, after thoughtful delegation, We have decided to reward you for your acts of strength and goodness."

My eyes lit up at this. My mind raced with the possibilities of what they had in mind with their no doubt unlimited powers.

"We have analyzed your dark, traumatizing history, and your thoughts and emotions about everything in your life. We have agreed on two options for you to choose from. Keep in mind that they are options, not two separate gifts. From Our observations, We have found that the two things in the universes, Ours and yours, that have made you the most content in your entire life: the time spent with your original family, and with my daughter, Luna, and her friends. It is up to you to decide which of these you desire the most. Should you choose your family, you and they will both be returned to your world, where you and they will live out the rest of your existence. Should you choose my daughter, you will be restored to life and will remain in Our world. The choice is yours; take time to think it over..."

I was torn. Now I understood what people meant when they said they had to make "Sophie's Choice." The other Alicorns faded away slowly, and left me and the female alone in the vast universal viewpoint we had. I looked solemnly down into the blackness as I thought about it.

I thought about my family first. They loved me, took care of me, and I really was the very happy when I still had them. I thought about what it would be like if I had them back again. I'd get to see them again, but, they would see me after all these years, all grown up, traumatized more than once, and permanently scarred emotionally. They'd see me and think I was a wreck. They'd also be shocked at the dark things I did while in all those different cults. All the dark things that I've done, and then there was how they'd react to the how the world had changed while they were gone. All the things they've missed out on, all the people they knew who'd died since then; I couldn't do that to them. They would certainly be overjoyed to see me again, but overall, it would be awful.

Then there was Luna; she was perfect, as was her world. No crime, no problems, no troubles, nothing like that. I had formed such wonderful bonds with everyone I met there, especially her. I also caused so many problems for them all; more deaths than they could count, and so much panic as an addition. I was also so close to fixing everything. I just had to return the souls to everyone else, and after that, everything would be back to normal. But there would be so much I would miss on Earth; the friendships I had there, however few, all the things I've done, and, however shallow it may make me seem, all of my material possessions.

I glanced up at the female briefly, and then began scanning the many stars and constellations.

"Which one's Equestria?" I asked somberly.

She took a step towards me, and shrunk as she did so. She came down to the size of a regular horse and came over to my side. She leaned her head down and her horn lit up like a candle as she pointed at a small galaxy in the distant. It grew in size and closeness and eventually the view was zoomed in to the exact spot where my body lay.

I saw everyone sobbing over my cold, disheveled corpse, and Luna holding me and staring at my face, begging me to come back. I wanted to reach out to the image and touch her, comfort her somehow, but I knew that wouldn't do anything.

I turned to the female Alicorn. "What's your name?" I asked.

She looked at me with her bright blue eyes. "I go by many names, but you may call me Faust."

I chuckled at the similarity between the ancient story of the man named Faust who sold his soul to Mephistopheles and the mystical god-horse sitting next to me.

"How did you say you and Luna were related, again?" I asked.

"She and her sister are my daughters. They were the first beings in this world. Since I myself created them, I considered them my daughters. They used their own abilities to forge beings of their own; the Air, Magic, and Earth beings."

"And... Why did you use the image of a human to make this race?"

"Because I knew that humans were capable of great good, as you have proven well."

I turned back to the saddening image, still thinking about the immensity of this choice.

Then I made my choice.

"Faust, I... I want to stay here; in this world."

She looked me in the eyes. "Understand that there is no turning back from this choice."

"I understand," I snapped.

"And, when I put you back into your body, know that you must no longer be a human. You shall become one of the Beings."

"I don't care. Just put me back, please..."

She stood back up and stood in front of me, looking me in the eye. Her horn lit up and she brought it slowly towards my forehead.

"Wait-" I stopped her. "Before I go back, can you do something for me?"

Her horn dimmed. "What is your request?"

"I... Can you just tell my family, wherever they are, that I love them?"

She smiled kindly. "You have my word."

I closed my eyes as she resumed her work. My body felt warm, and I became disoriented as it worked. The light from her horn illuminated the inside of my eyelids, blinding me with warm light. Just before the light consumed me, she spoke to me.

"I will indeed tell them, Alexander..."

Then feeling came over me again. I felt arms around me, and my face was moist in certain spots. I slowly tried opening my eyes. The moon still shone down on the world, and bathed everything in a pretty silvery white light.

I moved my limbs, trying to regain control of my new-ish body. I wonder what kind of Being she made me: Magic? Air? If it turned out to be Earth I would have been a bit disappointed. I heard Luna and the others gasp at my motion. I slowly but surely pulled myself up off of the cold ground. I sat there as they all stared at me with awe and surprise. I rubbed my eyes and turned to Luna and smirked at her surprise.

"Did I miss anything?"

She stared at me a bit more; I was expecting her to lunge at me and we embrace tenderly, but she didn't. I reached up to rub my head again, and pulled back when my fingers touched something jutting out of my forehead. It felt like bone, but at the same time it didn't. I saw my reflection in one of the nearby windows, and reeled with shock at the strange new horn loudly presenting itself on the top of my head. I chuckled at the somewhat pleasant surprise. I stood and faced the others, and saw another odd thing in my shadow on the ground. Two large wings spread out behind me. I turned around, expecting to see an Air Being or something, but instead noticed the two massive, black, feathered wings attached to my back. I felt them, just to make sure that they were real, and laughed giddily at my unexpected transformation.

An Omni Being! Faust had turned me into an Omni Being! I remembered hearing Twilight tell me that Omni Beings were immortal, either that or they lived unnaturally long. I realized that I could live the rest of my now-extended life with Luna, and that thought filled me with immeasurable joy.

Before I could loudly and proudly state the obvious and wonderful fact to the rest of them, she lunged at me as I imagined and we embraced tightly and kissed again, this time much longer and more passionate than the last. I heard Rainbow Dash snicker warmly, "Get a room, you two."

After a recovery from the recent trauma, we set forth to reclaim all the lives that were taken abruptly. For all the other victims who were not in the castle and killed by Vesania, like Nurse Redheart and the other few, Celestia issued that letters signed by her be sent out to all the families of the deceased to bring the bodies to the castle to properly revive them with my new-found powers brought about by my new body. It took a considerable amount of time to get used to using my new mode of magic-using and extra appendages poking out of my back. In time, peace was restored and things reverted back to normal in Equestria, and the people went back about their

My and Luna's wedding took place several months after the recovery from the unfortunate events that brought us together. I became one of the Royals after that, and took some of the responsibility for running Equestria. It was fun; I got to spend time with everyone I met and made new friends. We had a kid some time later, a boy; he was just the most perfect child one could ever lay eyes on. I eventually had an entire life in Equestria; a job, a home, a family; a life that was fantastic. I couldn't ask for anything more.

And I spent time with the six women who took me in under their wonderful care when I arrived here. When certain problems and evils appeared and threatened the well-being of everyone, such as the reappearance of Discord, we often fought together as an unstoppable force for good.

I often thought back to the time when Faust told me my name as she gave me my new body. It was Alexander. I remember the kind gesture well. And it makes me think about my old life and my one here in Equestria. I felt bad to think this, but, I came to the idea that I didn't need to know my name now. I had a new life, with a new beginning, and a new story to tell. I came into this world a Nobody, and I will stay in this world a Nobody; plain and simple. Alexander was a poor, unfortunate man in a world full of wickedness, but Nobody is a happy, content man in a world of beauty, a man who had people that he loved, and people who loved him back, a man who had seen and experienced things of incredible wonder and horror, and a man who went to hell and back to protect this fantastic world.

I am Nobody, and this concludes my story...

~Finis~

Chapter 1

"Salam, Sala'eh Mayalo ala Kan'aa!"

I chanted faster and faster as I realized it was working. The six symbols i drew on the transmutation circle began glowing one by one in a clockwise fashion.

"Salam, Sala'eh Mayalo ala Kan'aa!"

The outer ring of the circle lit up around me, trapping me in a cage of supernatural brilliance. The world outside the circle faded behind the light wall. The ground beneath me looked to have cracks slithering through it, each one also glowing the same white-purple of the rest of the circle.

"Salam, Sala'eh Mayalo ala Kan'aa! Salam, Sala'eh Mayalo ala Kan'aa!"

The ancient words eventually became a rapid blob of odd sounds. Everything started vibrating and emitting a whining sound that was quickly rising in pitch. And with one last and loud burst, "SALAM, SALA'EH MAYALO ALA KAN'AA!!"

The solid ground beneath me shattered into a thousand glass-like shards. I looked down, expecting to see demons and gargoyles dancing around the fires of the Underworld and all its legions of the undead. But what i say was a vast and green forest, but more shocking was the fact that my viewpoint was at least one hundredand twenty-five feet above ground. Before I could even wonder what went wrong, I began descending very quickly.

I didn't hit the ground directly, but instead took a detour through a few branches and leaves. I heard snapping and felt the twigs and leaves brush past me, and then I hit the ground with a painful thud. My left leg sent a shock of pain through my body, and there was another sharp pain in my side. I mustered up the strength to turn my body onto its back and look at the sky where i ought to have fallen from. I saw a thin ring of whitish-purple light that was filled with black start to shrink until it was but a bright dot in the sky and was gone

"What... happened...?" I said just before I lost consciousness.

My name is... long forgotten, I am 26 years old, I am an orphan, and I am a Necromancer.

I was born on April 10, 1997. I was a happy, friendly, and very intelligent child. I had lots of friends, two younger brothers, and my parents were together. I lost all of that on June 17, 2011, when my family was murdered. A killer had snuck into the house while we all slept, and had stabbed them all. I survived miraculously, but was quickly taken in by a family of three (father, mother, and daughter of nine years of age), when i was fourteen. From then on, I was homeschooled until I was seventeen. On October 4, 2014, they were all killed when their car brakes failed and they veered off the road and flipped over. That's when I ran away and bought an isolated house in the middle of nowhere. That's when the voices started.

I began hearing voices in my head, almost non-stop. They made me paranoid and kept me from sleeping. They would whisper things like, "It's your fault they died," or, "You should have been in the car." They assailed me with threats and blame and words of hate. They would sometimes sneak up on me and shout things in unison when I was about to fall asleep. And even if they did let me sleep, I would have terrifying nightmares about this gigantic, pitch black, evil figure chasing me down and eventually catching me, though the shock always woke me up before i could see what he did to me after cathing me.

I tried going to a psychiatrist, a doctor, and even a priest (I wasn't a religious person, but I was a desperate one). Although, I did feel something when religion was brought into the picture. It felt like the voices recoiled and hissed in, disgust? Fear? Either way, they cowered in the prescence of supernatural or holy entities. I heard them hiss and shrink away at the sight of a rosary. After I found this salvation from them, I began going to church and carrying a crucifix with me wherever I went. For the first time in years, I couldn't hear the voices. For the first time in years, I got a good night's sleep. For the first time in years, I felt sane.

This continued for several months, but eventually, just as a small part of me knew, the voices returned. It seems turning to God didn't work, and scientific means did nothing. It looked like I was out of options. I was desperate, more desperate than I had ever been before. I even tried illegal hallucinagens, but all those did were make the voices shout incoherent syllables for a few hours at a time.

I knew that only divine acts and objects had any effects on the voices, but i've already tried Shintoism, Buddhism, Taoism, Judaism, Islam, and whatever else I could think of. I tried avoiding one more option just because I feared what it would entail, but I eventually gave in to the world of Necromancy.

I loved it. I even became part of a small group (cult, perhaps?) of Necromancers, not because it would help soothe and quiet the voices, but because I wanted to. I took joy in the macabre rituals with skulls and corpses. I even went so far as to partake in the age-old practice of communicating with the thoughts of the dead. Although the first time I tried it, I panicked because they sounded too much like the voices for comfort.

But other than that, the voices had never been so silent. I read about one specific ritual that would grant me an entrance to the Underworld to speak directly with Mephisto. If this ritual worked, then maybe I could ask Mephisto to take the voices away and grant me awesome peace and sanity.

That was what I was trying to perform before ending up in this alien forest. I could have sworn I'd performed the ceremony exactly like I was supposed to; but if that's the case, then how did I end up in a forest? Was this the Underworld? I did not know either of the answers, but I had to find out something about my situation.

Author Commentary:

This is my first story, so please be nice and forgive any-FALCON PUNCH- NO! I won't be like that. Just give your honest opinion. It's already pre-written, so I can't really change anything. I can take negative comments. Don't hold back.

Chapter 3

Silence. I broke out in a nervous sweat. Then, I heard a chuckle. An attempt was made to try and stifle it, but failed. The chuckle turned into an amused laugh.

I looked up, and the woman was the source of the laughter. She held her hand up to her mouth to try and cover it up.

"Hoo, hoo, buddy! I don't know what yer sayin,' but it sure sounds funny."

Suspicion confirmed: she thought I was a loon.

She held out a hand to me

"C'mon, get up," she said kindly.

I took her hand and got back up to her level. Now from this angle, I could see that she was a very attractive young woman, not much over twenty.

Before I could say something, a shadow quickly passed over us. I looked up and saw a multi-colored speck flying at extremely high (nearly impossible) speeds through the sky, literally punching holes through the clouds until they dissipated into a thin mist and then vanished. The speck stopped and hovered there for a moment, as if admiring its work, and started descending. But more than descending, it was getting closer to us!

From my and its position it was silhouetted against the sun, but I could make out the shape: a human form, distinctly female, and with an enormous pair of feathered wings!

"Look out!" I shouted, "It's a succubus!"

I snapped the girl out of her light laughter. She looked at me, wiping away a laugh-tear, and asked, "Aha, heh... What?"

She looked at where I was pointing behind her and saw what had terrified me so severely and said, "Oh, that ain't no succuh- sucha- ah, whatever. It's just Ra-" She was cut short by the winged creature suddenly hitting the ground near us, rolling and bouncing a few feet, and crashing into a large, wooden wagon toting several bags of seeds. I was torn between snickering at the comedic failure and staying fearful and aware.

The winged creature spoke.

"Owwww... Okay, if anyone asks, I stuck the landing, got it? Ow..."

I finally got a good look at the thing. It -she- was wearing a pair of bronze-colored goggles, which were askew from the crash, a cyan hoodie with a white t-shirt underneath, skinny jeans, and rainbow-striped sneakers. But the most striking feature about her (aside from the obvious blue, feathered wings) was that she had short, medium-length, rainbow-colored hair. The entire ROYGBIV was streaked evenly through her hair. I stood there just staring at her, wondering how such a genetic malfunction was possible. She couldn't have just been born that way, but it looked just so... natural. Before I could ask, she said something.

"Who's this guy?" she asked while taking off her goggles, revealing her violet eyes.

"Oh, he's Nobody," the blonde girl stated before I could answer.

"What kind of name is that?"

"A temporary one..." I defended.

"Pfft... What's with that ridiculous getup?" she asked, not caring enough to try and hide her laughter. It seems my choice of clothing was illiciting an abundance of humorous reactions today.

"It is my ceremonial robe and body paint, thank you very much," I answered spitefully and somewhat offended.

"This feller says he can use magic, even though he doesn't have a horn," the blonde said, half-whispering the last part. She then put her index finger near her temple and whirled it as if to silently say, "He's crazy." Which, again, isn't entirely false.

"I saw that," I scolded, "Wait, who are you people and where am I?" It struck me as odd that I hadn't bothered to ask that question earlier.

"Oh, right. Ah'm Applejack, and this here's Rainbow Dash, and you, uh, already know Big Macintosh."

Applejack? Rainbow Dash? What kind of names are those? "Nobody" makes more sense than that. I'm pretty sure Applejack is the name of a cereal where I come from. Perhaps those are just their nicknames. That makes much more sense.

"No, I meant what are your real names," I restated.

Rainbow Dash raised an eybrow at me and Applejack just looked at me blankly before saying, "Whaddya mean? Those are our real names. Where did you say you were from again?"

"I didn't." Then I remembered something else that caught my attention earlier. "Now, did you say 'horn' earlier? What do you mean 'horn?' Are you saying that there are others like you with horns?"

"Yeah," Rainbow Dash answered, "The magic beings. They have horns. You must be from waaaayyy out of town..."

Although, considering that the woman I was talking to had a gigantic pair of wings, horns seem like a downgrade to me.

"Shoot, you really ain't from around here, are ya? Maybe if we take ya to Twilight, she can help sort things out with you. Besides, Ah gotta return a book to her anyways."

Twilight?

"Although, you should probably fix, uh, this mess before you go," Rainbow Dash suggested, gesturing to my entire body. Which was probably a good idea. I knew I would certainly turn some heads if we had to go through town while I was wearing this.

Chapter 21

Her hair no longer had its normal curls and bounciness. It hung depressingly and straight. And her eyes weren't the normal glassy, bright blue ones. The pupils had contracted, and the eyes themselves had a disturbing, sadistic look in them.

Before I could think to do anything, she kicked the cart as hard as she could, and I watched it barrel into Luna hard, knocking her on the ground outside the kitchen.

"Luna!" I shouted as I rushed over to her.

"Pinkie! What're ya-" Applejack was cut off as Pinkie Pie grabbed a pan and whacked her in the head, causing her to collapse to the floor, unconscious.

Rarity cowered as Pinkie pulled a large knife from a drawer and tried to visciously stab Rainbow Dash. Dash saw it coming and quickly dodged out of the way, using her wings to boost her speed.

"What are you doing, Pinkie?!" she asked, panicked.

"Oh, you think you're sooo fast with those wings of yours, don't you?" Pinkie asked, ignoring the question, "Let's see how fast you are when I cut them off!"

She lunged at Dash once more, and missed again.

I saw people fleeing the area and I heard Luna whispering to me.

"Go... help them..." she said weakly before passing out.

"Luna? Luna, c'mon. Wake up," I said, trying to shake her back to consciousness. When I failed to do so, I ran back into the kitchen to try and subdue Pinkie Pie.

I returned as Pinkie knocked Rainbow Dash onto her back and sat on her chest, pinning her down completely.

Rainbow Dash had tears of fear and panic running down her face as Pinkie raised the knife high above her head.

"Pinkie, please! Don't do this!" Rarity shouted in terror.

"Shut it! Or do you want me to come over there and chop that horn off?"

Venom was dripping off of every word. I shivered at the sadistic, evil tone in her voice.

She shot me a sideways glance, and in her eyes I saw a deep, red-orange color in the pupils. A deep, red-orange color.

"Oh, God..." I muttered. To which Pi- Vesania -replied.

"... And we have a winner," he said before bringing the knife down on Rainbow Dash.

"No!" she screamed, and I shut my eyes and waited for the disgusting sound of flesh being torn, and the choking sound of life leaving the body.

Instead, I heard a "clang" and a lack of choking. I dared to open my eyes, but when I did, I did not see a bloody mess; I saw Rainbow Dash, unharmed and hyperventilating, with a transparent, light-purple, parabolic shield hovering a couple of inches above her body, covering her upper torso and head area. I turned my head to see Rarity's horn glowing the same color as the shield. I looked back to see Vesania, looking dumbstruck at the barrier.

"Hmm..." he said, before stabbing it three more times, frightening Dash and making Rarity flinch each time. He then shot an irritated glare at Rarity.

"That's it; the horn comes off!"

He got up and lunged at Rarity inhumanly fast.

Thanks to my close proximity to her, I ran over and blocked a potential slash to her face with my forearm, catching his own arm just in time.

Vesania grabbed at my throat, and I grabbed his other arm so that he and I were locked together for a few seconds.

I managed to force a few words out to Rarity.

"R... Rarity... Help... hngh! Others..."

She quickly rushed over to Dash and helped her up. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Big Mac rush into the room. He was just about to attack Vesania to aid me, but I made a swift gesture for him to rush and help move Applejack out of the room.

As my eyes began to glaze over, I saw four blurs of white, blue, orange, and red run out the door of the kitchen, the red one carrying the orange one.

In a near-blind rage, I kicked Vesania across the room and heard him hit the counter.

When my vision recovered, I grabbed him by the top of Pinkie's dress and threw him against the back wall, still holding him, and pulled back a fist.

"Ah, ah, ah..." he said, wagging his finger at me.

"And why the hell not?!" I yelled, wanting to tear him apart.

"This is still Pinkie Pie's body, isn't it?" he said matter-of-factly.

But in truth, in all the confusion of the moment, plus my own personal turmoil and hatred, I had forgotten that Pinkie was being possessed, and was still present.

"What did you do with her?!"

"Oh, just the same thing I did to you. She's just floating around in here, watching everything unfold. Ya got a front row seat to all the carnage, sweetie!" he said to the invisible, intangible Pinkie, "You can't see her right now, but I'd like to let you know that she's bawling her eyes out over by the sink. Isn't that right, girlie?"

"Shut up!"

I lost my senses and threw him out the door and into the ballroom.

The normal partygoers had all either left or were evacuated from the area. Now, it was only Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Luna (semi-conscious), several royal guards, Big Mac, and Applejack, still unconscious.

As Vesania flew out of the kitchen, all of them (the awake ones, at least) jumped in surprise. Rainbow actually backed away a few feet.

The guards all drew their swords in a defensive pose and backed everyone closer to the walls of the ballroom. One edged closer to him with an outstretched hand as he got back on his feet.

"Ma'am, I'm gonna have to ask you to give me the knife... Just hand me the knife."

I saw the guard get closer to him than I would've liked.

"Wait, stop! Don't get near hi-I mean-her!" I shouted as I stepped out of the kitchen towards them.

Just then, Vesania looked back at me and gave me a disgusting smile that none of the others could see. Then he looked back at the guard.

"H-He tried to kill me!" he said to the guard, beginning to sound fearful and panicked, and crying uncontrollably, "I-I got the knife away from him, but th-then he threw me against the wall and tried to hit me! Please, please don't let him kill me!" he shouted, throwing himself against the guard and crying into his chest.

Out of context, I would've applauded such fantastic thespianism.

"That's not what happened!" I warned, "She-"

"Stay back!" the guard said, pointing his sword at me and holding Vesania's head to his chest.

"Don't worry, ma'am. This guy's not gonna hurt you."

"Don't listen to her! That's not what happened!" Rarity shouted.

Just then, I heard Vesania say something to the guard; totally dropping the helpless woman act.

"Y'know, it's funny how a man will do anything for a pretty young woman..."

He raised the knife that he was still holding above his head.

"Watch out!!" someone yelled, though I couldn't tell who.

The guard looked at Vesania, and he brought the knife down quickly, aiming for the guard's neck.

Rarity shrieked, and I tried to tackle Vesania, but then we saw a transparent, dark blue orb materialize around Vesania's hand, holding it suspended in mid-air.

He looked at it, and then at Rarity, very angry now.

"What did I say?! No interference, you prissy little-"

"It's not her..." a voice said.

It wasn't loud, but it echoed through the room, catching everyone's attention.

Luna.

She was awake now, and she was angry.

Her horn was glowing, and she quickly levitated the fear-stricken guard away before restraining Vesania's other hand, then positioning him with his hands above his head and his feet dangling.

"Oh dear... It seems you've caught me..." he said sarcastically.

She stood up and looked at him with resentment in her eyes.

And then, without a word, a blast of energy shot from her horn and was heading for Vesania.

In under half a second, I thought of two things:

If she was trying to injure Vesania physically with the blast, it would only end up damaging Pinkie.
If the blast was meant to expel Vesania from her body, then he would be free to devour everyone in the room.

"No, Luna don't-"

But it was too late. The blast had passed through Vesania and dissipated behind him.

He hung limp for a good ten seconds before his foot twitched. Then his entire- no -Pinkie's body began convulsing, and a thick, black liquid began dripping from her mouth.

"Oh no..." Luna said, "I-I didn't mean to- I was trying to get him out of her... What's happening?"

I ran over to Pinkie's front and examined her.

"Luna, stay calm. Get rid of these... uh, restraints," I said, referring to the blue orbs around Pinkie's hands.

When they were gone, I gently set Pinkie on the ground.

The same black smoke from earlier came rolling out of her facial orifices, and her eyes filled up with pitch blackness.

Vesania was getting out again.

"What's happening to her?" Luna asked.

"Vesania is getting out. He's escaping Pinkie's body," I answered.

The guards all stood frozen with terror as the smoke spread out over the ceiling of the room, and that jack-o-lantern face started to take shape in the center of it.

My attention was firmly on Pinkie; I had to make sure that she was alright. She had to be alright. She had to.

The smoke stopped emerging from her face, and remained mostly static on the ceiling.

I was then accompanied by Rarity, Dash, the newly conscious and terribly confused Applejack, and Luna.
"Would someone mind fillin' me in on what's goin' on here?!" AJ asked.

"Vesania possessed Pinkie and tried to kill you all," I said with incredible bluntness.

"Oh," was all she could say to that.

Rainbow Dash leaned over Pinkie and dripped tears on her face.

"P-Pinkie? A-Are you there?" she asked, stroking her friend's face, "You're gonna come out alright. You're gonna be fine, okay?"

Pinkie's face twitched, and she started to open her eyes.

Rainbow Dash gasped.

"Pinkie?!"

Pinkie's eyes snapped open, and after looking around frantically at her friends, her eyes welled up with tears as she shot up and hugged Rainbow Dash and intensely.

"I'm (sob) so... sorry! He made me do it! (sob) I couldn't... stop him!"

"It's okay, Pinkie. No one's blaming you for this," I tried to console her. It was an absolute shower of tears, which I completely understood, but I was more concerned with the problem that was looming over us right now.

"What's going on here- Aaahh!"

A familiar voice shouted from behind a line of guards.

Twilight.

I looked over and saw Twilight, accompanied by Celestia and Fluttershy. Fluttershy was hiding behind a barricade of her hair, preceded by the Princess. They all looked up in fear of the evil cloud hovering over them.

"Stay back!" I warned. I then turned to the others, "Okay, I know you're all sad, but we have to get away from here as fast as possible okay? I don't know what's gonna happen and I don't want to find out."

Just then, Twilight rushed over to the scene.

"What's going on?!"

"I'll explain later, just stay away. This isn't safe."

Once they all got the message, I rushed them out of the vicinity. Pinkie had to be carried by Dash.

"Awww... Leaving so soon?" Vesania taunted, "But things are just getting good..."

He said the last word with disturbing sensuality.

When all the others were outside, I noticed that Luna wasn't there with us. I turned around and saw her still in the ballroom, conversing with Celestia. Celestia saw me and gestured for me to come over.

I told the others to stay put, and obeyed the order.

"What is it?" I asked.

"Is that... Is that-"

"Vesania? Yeah, that's him," I said bluntly.

Celestia had lost her calm, and was now just nerves and confusion.

"Yep! The one and only!" Vesania said.

Just then, we all heard a deep rumbling coming from him, "Ugh, all that sugar left a bad taste in my mouth. That pink one should watch her diet.

Blech... I need something to wash this out."

I noticed him eyeing the guard that he nearly stabbed earlier.

"I suppose you'll do..."

"Wait, don't!" I shouted. But in an instant, a massive black smoke-pillar shot down from Vesania's smoky mass and landed on the helpless guard, slamming him to the ground. Just as quickly, the pillar retracted back into Vesania's cloud, with the guard attached to the end, prying at black, wispy fingers.

The cloud morphed and enveloped the guard on the ceiling, and we heard screams of fear and agony and pain echo in the ballroom. We saw limbs flail and writhe within the spastic and convulsing cloud.

Then there was silence.

There was horrible, mocking silence. Silence that may have been worse to hear than the screaming.

The cloud stopped moving, and we held our breaths.

Then, a gray-and-gold object hit the floor disgustingly. The guard.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a guard drop his sword and run away as fast as he could.

Black liquid began hitting the floor, and I saw something moving within the cloud.

The dripping grew more and more insistent as a wet-looking black mass started- I don't even know if there's a word for it. Oozing? Slinking? Emerging from the cloud and moving towards the floor.

The blob of matter had moving bulges on it, and from one of them an arm, a massive, black, disgusting arm resembling the cross between dead wood and stone, shot out and eased the rest of the blob to the ground.

From the other bulges, limbs of the same substance emerged, creating a roughly humanoid, headless creature of lanky, gargantuan stature.

I saw visible vertebrae rise out of where the neck should've been. That black liquid started practically crawling up the exposed vertebrae and took the shape of Vesania's angular head with the horny crown and jack-o-lantern face.

He stood erect, towering over all of us. He opened his red eyes and surveyed the line of guards, and licked his lips.

"Boo."

Author commentary:

Good god... A lot of crazy sh(yay) happened in this chapter. I hope I didn't overload your crazy sh(yay) detectors