My Life on a Cassette Tape

I slowly woke up, blinking away the sleep from my eyes. I couldn't recall falling asleep, come to think of it there was a lot I seemed to be missing. Looking around, I found myself in a room I didn't recognize immediately. Glancing around it seemed to be just a regular room I could find in half a dozen homes in every town across Equestria. The set up was distinctly that of a guest room, with noncommittal arrangement of less than personal decorations. It had a vanity dresser that had seen better days in one corner, a small off-white desk with a second hand makeup mirror sitting on it, and the walls were plastered with wallpaper that gave the aura of never having been replaced. The tiny ships, seagulls, and lighthouses gave the feeling that if I were to go back to the beginning of time when Equestria was a sea of magma, I could stumble upon this room and find the exact same wallpaper plastered on its walls.

Shifting up from the bed, I looked around a bit more. Nothing really seemed out of or in place in this nebulous room. It just seemed to be a set of items just sitting about the room, never truly having been placed exactly, but more having just been set here on there way to someplace else. The room felt... odd. Standing up from the bed, which gave an awful screech as I left it, I took a few steps towards the door. The door, much to my surprise, opened on its own, but no pony walked in to the room.

Slowly a shadow moved across the far wall, tracing across the tacky wall paper in slow, deliberate movements. Taking a step back, I toppled into a chair, freezing in confusion as ropes flung themselves around me, tying me to the chair without a magical field around them or any other sign of how they moved around me. Coming to a stop as they gave one final tightening, I found myself tilting backwards faster than I should've. My head was engulfed in water as I came splashing down. I thrashed about for a few seconds, feeling the world slip away from me as I struggled, unable to breathe.

Just as I felt myself reaching the edge of unconsciousness, I was pulled forcefully back up, the world whipping around me in a blur as I tried to reorient myself. Looking to where I'd see what was grabbing me, I saw nothing - the room was completely empty. No... no the room wasn't empty, the world was empty. I felt myself pulled forward into another unseen tub of water. I tried to struggle, but my arms were stilled pinned to my sides.

Once more as I almost fell away, I was pulled up, my blurry eyes darting about as my burning lungs took what fleeting breaths in that they could. Suddenly I was thrown to the ground. I heaved several times, my body falling to pieces as I tried to reorient myself in the dark void that was my life now. I suddenly realized my arms and the rest of me was free, and took the moment to turn about for a possible glimpse at my attacker.

In the dark void, silver teeth curled into a menacing smile while a vague glint off of the eyes of this thing bore down on me. I struggled away, trying to increase the distance between me and whatever it was that hounded me, but it simply stooped down, grabbing me by the collar, bringing it's Cheshire smile ever closer to me, before turning me about and thrusting me into another pool of water. Even as I thrashed about, I heard its voice, clear despite the water that I felt myself drowning in.

"This can all end." It said in what felt both a soothing and terrifyingly menacing tone. "Just give back what you took from us and I can let you be. You can go back to your little life and not have to worry about the eyes in the dark." I was thrown out of the water, giving me an unexpected moment of rest that was made that bit less restful as I opened my eyes and saw more and more eyes opening in the darkness of the void. "Give it back and this can be all over..."

I blinked a few times, my breathing ragged, my body sore, my mind racing. What was happening? I tried to get up, to fight away the sensations, but almost as soon as they had appeared, the eyes blinked closed and left me. Slowly, the face I couldn't see turned away, hiding that horrid smile and those piercing eyes, but even as it left, those eyes - those eyes that gleamed with malice and an unrelenting enjoyment of my pain - gave me one final wink, and then... I was alone.

I sat there, breathing frantically. What had just happened? As I stayed still, curled up in a little ball, feeling as small as an ant, I felt two arms wrap around me in a gentle hug, accompanied by two feathery wings. They wrapped around me, giving me their comforting warmth that I eagerly leaned into, crying the tears of all my hurt and fear. All that I had been hiding, all that I had been running from, it all came out in a torrent as I enjoyed the simple embrace. I wasn't Cress, the stallion who was somewhat in control; I was little RouRou, the colt scared of the dark, who hate going to his violin class because his teacher was scary looking. I was that little colt who had to be sent to school with his blanket because otherwise he'd spend the whole day trembling in fear.

Rousing Crescendo... the little colt that showed some promise, but had more fear than anything else - so much so that what little talent he had was hidden away beneath layers and layers of insecurities. The little colt who'd hug his mom for minutes on end when she finally came to pick him up at the end of the day, crying the same tears I cried now. It felt... good - liberating. The warmth of a hug, untainted with anything but motherly affection. How long had it been?

I stayed there, ignoring the wings that wrapped about me like a blanket, focusing on the warm hug the arms gave, the feel of the body behind my own lending me its strength so that I could cry my pain away. It vaguely reminded me of my mother. The mother that had been lost to me. The mother I couldn't ask for comfort from because I had to give it to her. The mare who I could never be fearful in front of - not since the diagnosis. The mother who might now live, but would never truly be the same. I cried tears from the depths of my soul. There were no words, no gentle shushings, just warmth and calm acceptance as waters poured forth from my breaking heart.

I don't know how long I stayed that way, crying in the void, nestled in the warmth of that divine hug. It could've been hours or minutes, but I wasn't going to be the one that sent them away. So much fear that I had hidden, so much pain that I had suffered, so much hurt that I had endured, and all without flinching - because if I flinched, if I showed weakness, there wouldn't be a pony around that I wanted to cry on. I was the rock to cry on. I was the firm face and the gentle arms that would comfort. I was the one who would set the wrongs right for everypony I loved... but what about me?

Who would heal my wounds when I hid them? Who was going to remove that pain when I hid it? No pony. I would stand firm... but now... now I crumbled, if only for a moment. Tears that had built behind a dam of years of repressed anguish, from years where I had to be the pony that wouldn't break, now spilled forth. I had shown Berry and Periwinkle this broken face once, maybe twice, but even then, I had to be strong the next moment. Everypony had their pains, and I wasn't going to take the time to show mine when others had so much that they needed healed. I didn't matter more than them, so I wouldn't let their pain be overshadowed by my own. But that was then... the past... now? Now I just cried.

I trembled, Holding the arms close, even as I faded. I cried out the years of pain, even as the arms seemed to vanish. Slowly... it stopped.

I blinked my eyes open, flicking them about the room. It was a tacky bedroom, different in many ways to the one I had woken up in... a dream? Had it all been a dream? But it felt beyond real, even now. I could feel the pain in my chest from struggling to breathe... and the warmth. The bed as empty except for me, but I could still feel the warmth of that hug. Touching a hand to my cheek, I felt tears like those I had cried what felt like mere moments ago. Looking out the nearby window, I saw the distant horizon lit up in Celestia's sun. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. A lot of the pain that had been gnawing at me was... lifted. I felt better, even if I didn't know how. It was a new day like all those that had come before... and yet... so much better than all the rest.