Author's Note
Most great ideas happen in the shower. This one was no exception.
A most unexpected (at least on my part) look into the brain of our favorite Draconequus and a certain Pegasus pony.
Enjoy.
No One Mourns The Wicked
No one mourns the wicked.
A phrase as old as time, and one he had become accustomed to hearing. He’d long since accepted Equestria’s resentment of him. He’d felt, absolutely, that because he was a creature of chaos, one amalgamation of many creatures, that he couldn’t fit in anywhere. He’d become trapped in stone for one thousand years, thanks to the efforts of Celestia and Luna, and after he’d caused some chaos after his freedom from his prison, Celestia had decided to send one pony to reform him.
Fluttershy.
She’d become the only friend he’d ever had. The only one who might like him for him. And slowly, he’d done the one thing he’d sworn he’d never do: get attached. He knew that caring for a creature other than himself was the way to get yourself into trouble. When you start caring about someone, you get involved in their lives, and their problems interest you, and you’re suddenly so busy trying to help them or fix them that you don’t do what you were meant to do. No, no, no. He hadn’t ever wanted to live that way. But when Fluttershy came along, he’d found that once clearly drawn line between himself and attachment growing less and less clear. Before he knew it, without his consent, he’d crossed over, and found himself caring about her.
Still, he was a creature of habit, a creature of chaos, and simply giving up his old life for one pony was not plausible, especially when those habits were ground in for well over one thousand years. So, when Princess Celestia sent him to find the source of a magical imbalance, and it led him to Lord Tirek, who offered him his freedom, he wasn’t going to refuse it. To have freedom to cause chaos as he pleased was something he’d longed for since before his imprisonment. Still, a tiny sliver of doubt crept inside of him, because of his friendship to Fluttershy. The one pony who had shown him goodness. Still, old habits died hard, and he’d accepted. But in moments of doubt, her voice came to his mind, speaking of her friendship to him, and guilt would follow.
When Tirek gave him the pendant, he took it as a sign of friendship and devotion. Trading one friend up for another with greater benefits to him, and never seeing the fallacy of his ways. Blinded by his hunger for power, he did not see the true gift she had given him, and wouldn’t until he was there with her, and caged her himself to help Tirek take her magic, and that of her friends.
Her tears were what gave him great pause.
No one mourns the wicked.
He’d heard it time and again. The wicked only reap what they sow, the wicked are spurned, hated, rejected, and isolated. No creature had ever cried for him before. He’d never seen such a display of emotion directed toward him. He’d seen disgust and hate and panic directed at him, certainly, but never tears. But he didn’t have time to react to them in the moment. Because almost the next instant, his own magic was being drained away.
In that moment, just what he’d done, and how badly he’d been cheated in turn washed over him.
The wicked reap only what they’ve sown.
In that moment, it all became crystal clear. The tales of this day would be told in history, and he would be the villain yet again. It had never bothered him before, but now it did. Ponies would tell tale of him, scorning his existence, his claw in this matter. He would be forever despised, and for the rest of his existence he would be damned by all.
All but her.
The only one who dared to believe the best of him. The only pony, only creature in existence who had cared for him enough to weep for him. The true depth of his emotions was now clear to him. Where there once was a puddle, there now was an ocean. The amount that he cared about her could now plunge to the deepest depths of the ocean. There was nothing he wouldn’t do to make this right.
I never wanted what I couldn’t have until you gave it all to me.
“I’m sorry.” The words left a bitter taste in his mouth, but because of his honest guilt, not because of his lying tongue.
“I know.” She’d said, heartbroken.
He was locked into a bubble, as Tirek made an attempt to barter with Princess Twilight Sparkle. Her magic for her friends. The entire time that was happening, he was recriminating himself over and over again.
You will never know friendship. You will never know love. You will never know trust. You will never know forgiveness or second chances. All because you were wicked.
And then, the most amazing thing happened. Something he could have never imagined in his most chaotic dreams.
Twilight demanded his release, along with the rest of her friends. His shock, his gratitude, and the depth of his contrition nearly made him weep. The medallion that had been around his neck was taken off, and slipped around Twilight’s, a sign of what he hoped would be another true friendship.
He’d raced alongside all of them, and watched Tirek be defeated, and magic be returned to Equestria. And in that moment, for the first time, he felt hope. Perhaps he wasn’t wicked after all. Perhaps, maybe, he too could be redeemed.
And when he hugged Fluttershy again, at long last, his guilt and self hatred vanished almost instantaneously, and his hope, sprung anew, coursed through him like wildfire. He could be forgiven, and he could know friendship. At the end of the day, he could be a better draconequus. He could stop being an outcast, stop believing himself to be a reject, because someone had done the once unthinkable, and believed in him.
No one mourned the wicked. But she had.
