“Ugh, why did I drink so much?” I asked myself, supporting my head with my hoof. I took a sip of my glass of water through the straw that Rainbow Dash had generously provided for me, and closed my eyes, trying to subdue the headache that now controlled me.

“Well, maybe you shouldn’t have gotten yourself into a fight, that won’t be helping your headache.” Rainbow Dash retorted across the table, her voice slightly filled with venom. I had taken a verbal barrage when I walked through the door, hung-over, nose still with dried blood caked around the nostrils and a slightly bruised eye.

“Well what was I supposed to do?” I sighed exasperatedly, “The colt was offering me drugs, I told him no, then he started saying stuff about Bryan, and I went off at him. The bouncers then dragged him away and he managed to get one good hit in. I wouldn’t call it a fight.” She just raised an eyebrow and I knew what this meant, “I know, I’ll keep it under control next time.”

I had since cleaned myself up, and told the kids that I had taken a tumble. Rainbow Dancer seemed to buy it, but Scootaloo, being older, obviously knew what had happened, after all this wasn’t the first time and it definitely wasn’t the worst.

I had scared Rainbow Dash half to death when I came home one night. She was heavily pregnant at the time, and I stumbled through the door, bleeding heavily and barely able to stand. She had cleaned me up though, and called Nurse Redheart to come out and stitch up my jaw, which had been torn open in the scuffle. I ran my hoof along the line of my jaw, feeling the smooth area where the scar was still visible and shuddered at the thought of that night. It had been another pony offering me drugs, and I had refused which resulted in him and his friends assaulting me as I walked home.

I moved my mind away from that night and concentrated on my plans for the day. Matt had mentioned hanging out later, and I hadn’t seen Bryan all day. He wasn’t in his room when I went to give him a glass of water, so I assume he went for a walk and would stop by later. My train of thought, however, was interrupted by an abrupt pounding on the door. Groaning I pulled my heavy form to the door and opened it, only to be assaulted with a box.

“This came out today!” Luna excitedly squealed, holding out the new Super Mareo Brothers game for me to admire. I took it from her and admired the box, this one had co-op, so it would be great for the kids.

“Let’s do it then.” I said, giving her the best smile I could muster with my head pounding. Luna and I had become rather good friends after the whole incident in Canterlot, and even more so when the Super Neightendo came out. It turns out that the princess had a great love of gaming, as did I, so we became partners when a new co-op game came out, or took turns if it was single player only.

“I can’t believe this one has co-op, this is going to be so cool! And look,” She said rummaging in the bag she had brought popping up a moment later wearing the signature hat of Mareo himself, “This came with the limited edition!” I laughed at her slightly, and she refused to take it off until we had beaten the game. If the difficulty of the last one was anything to go by, this could take days.

We plugged the game in, plugged in the extra controller and then, our game faces were on. We battled through the first few levels with ease, but then the difficulty stepped up a notch and we began to struggle. 2D scrollers were never my forte in the gaming world, but I enjoyed the time I spent playing. The time passed quickly, as Luna and I were joined by Scoots and Rainbow Dancer, who in turn began to take over the console. I fetched myself another drink while the kids played, and Luna and I got to catching up, which we hadn’t done in a while. Rainbow Dash was no doubt out practicing her routine, so I would have to stay in and watch the kids.

The time passed quickly, with Luna and me gaming our way through the hours. Rainbow Dash arrived home before long and joined us in the living room.

“Hey Robbie, Matt’s outside looking for you.” She said after greeting me, and slightly confusedly I trotted out the door and glided to where he stood.

“Hey man, what’s up?” I asked, seeing the look on his face and his nervous stance.

“Well it would appear that Bryan has done a disappearing act on us. I thought he went out for a walk, but I haven’t seen him all day.” This did worry me slightly, and I immediately began to think of a game plan for finding him. He had probably just gotten lost in the surrounding area, so a quick find would be easy enough if we managed to rope in a few pegasi.

“Right, here’s what we’ll do. You go and fetch Twilight and gather up anyone you can, you guys can search on hoof. Rainbow Dash and I will gather a few pegasi and search from the air.” Matt gave me a quick nod, before galloping off in the direction of the library. I immediately took to the air, landing on the cloud and galloping into the house to fetch Rainbow Dash. After asking Luna to look after the kids, we quickly flew to Fluttershy’s cottage and recruited her. From there I managed to rope in Ditzy and the aerial search began. Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy flew off to scan the Everfree forest area, while Ditzy and I headed out past Sweet Apple Acres, towards the hills on the horizon.

There was no way he could have gone far, and with pegasi in the air and a ground team trying to find him, there was no way he would be lost overnight. There was no sign of him in the direction we had headed, and there was no way he could have made it this far out, so Ditzy and I circled around to try a different direction. The hours dragged by, as we scanned the nearby country-side for any sign of the lost Pegasus. We regrouped with Rainbow Dash shortly after making our third circle around the town, and seeing he was nowhere in sight, we decided to call it a day, even though I was willing to keep searching into the night, but from the air there was no chance we would see him in the dark.

I arrived back at the house worried, and slightly frustrated that we couldn’t find him, but tomorrow was another day, and I was willing to get up at the break of dawn to continue the search. Ditzy agreed to watch the kids while Rainbow Dash and I went out on another flight to scan further afield than the surrounding countryside.

Matt’s search party hadn’t shown any results either. I could tell he was worried, but he seemed more tired than anything, so I offered him the spare room at my house for the night, which he gratefully accepted. After Twilight had made sure the spell was still binding, I flew him up to the cloud and we immediately began to cook dinner. I barely ate anything, just toying with my food, occasionally taking a bite when I fancied. I hoped he would be alright by himself for the night, but I’m sure he was more than capable of looking after himself. I excused myself from the table, and went to take a shower.

I stood under the stream of hot water, spreading my wings and allowing the heat to soothe my aching muscles. I had a long day of flying ahead of me and I wanted to be on my best form. I dried myself off, and made my way into the bedroom and collapsed onto the bed. I was soon disturbed by a shift in weight, alerting me that I was no longer alone. A cyan hoof reached underneath mine, and around my body and I felt the warmth of Rainbow Dash’s body press against me.

“We’ll find him; after all you have the best young flier in all of Equestria on your side.” I smiled slightly at this and rolled to face her. I planted a gentle peck on her lips and began to fade out of consciousness. I hadn’t realised how tired I was until now, but I soon drifted off, almost ready to begin the next day of searching.

I awoke at the crack of dawn; the sun had barely risen over the horizon as I prepared myself a quick breakfast. Rainbow Dash was raring to go, and Ditzy had turned up to keep an eye on the kids, as promised. We set off into the sky, beginning our search over the Everfree forest and circling around to scan the near areas before we tried further afield. The time dragged by once again, but Rainbow Dash seemed optimistic, which kept me going through the long flight. I was beginning to lose hope, we had flown around for hours now, seeing the occasional pony and asking if they had spotted Bryan, but no luck so far.

Matt had dispatched the ground team to continue searching this morning, we would occasionally see them trotting along in a line, spread out to cover as much area as possible. They were having no more luck than we were though; the few times we did stop to speak to them were just filling me with false hope for a brief moment, then squashing it in an instant.

It began to drag into the afternoon; Rainbow Dash and I were drawing close to the mountains North of Ponyville, where she said there are some caves he might be taking shelter in. I wasn’t convinced he would have made it this far, unless he had been practicing his flying, but I was willing to explore any option. We circled the mountains, making passes down low to avoid leaving any spot unsearched. At this altitude it was freezing, the bone chilling wind made it difficult to sustain flight for long. We landed at the mouth of a cave, to take a short break before heading back towards Ponyville. The view was beautiful, although I would have been able to appreciate it more if I hadn’t been worrying to myself for the past few hours.

I let out a sigh, and Rainbow Dash hugged me into her slightly. I rested my head on hers, taking a moment to enjoy the shared warmth. Hoofsteps from behind made me slightly wary and I turned quickly to face whoever was trying to sneak up on us.

“Well, well, well. Who do we have here?” The familiar voice resounded from the darkness of the cave, “It would appear to be Rainbow Dash, and her fiancé, Robbie.” The shape of a large Pegasus loomed from the darkness, as Bryan stepped from the shadows, but something seemed different about him. He was flanked by two other ponies, one a unicorn, and the other was the pony from the night club. Upon seeing the second pony, I became very defensive, stepping in front of Rainbow Dash to ensure her safety.

“What’s wrong Robbie? Do you think we mean you harm?” Bryan spoke again, exciting a malicious looking grin from the earth pony, which I was staring daggers towards. “You really do amuse me, why would I want to do you harm? After all, I need you more than you think.”

“What are you talking about, what happened to you?” I almost snarled, keeping my eyes on all three of them as they approached us, now beginning to flank Rainbow and me from either side.

“Well, you see, I started speaking to this fine gent here,” He motioned to the earth pony who gave a simple wave and a smile, “At the night club the other night, he enlightened me to an old legend, one that you all thought was just an old mares tale. You see, everyone is now aware of the existence of the Elements of Harmony, but you have to remember that harmony is nothing without a little disharmony.”

I was taken aback by what my friend was now saying to me. Did he honestly believe in all the stuff that colt had told him?
“So, you’re telling me that there are Elements of Disharmony too?” Bryan gave out a simple laugh at my question, before walking over and stopping a couple of feet short of me.

“I thought I made that obvious in my last statement, but then again you never were the brightest bulb in the shop, were you?”
I turned to Rainbow Dash now, and whispered for her to fly and alert Twilight, and to bring them here. Reluctantly she flew away, back towards Ponyville.

“So you think you’re an Element of Disharmony?” I laughed slightly, “So what are you, annoyance? Because that’s all you seem to be good at.”

“I, am the element of Antagonism. I can easily get under ponies, or should I say, people’s skins.” My mouth dropped at the mention of people in front of the ponies that were standing around. “They already know the whole story, and I must ask, how did you feel when you heard me mention Rainbow Dash’s name? I bet now it’s boiling your blood. I can see it in your face.” He smirked, but he wasn’t going to get a rise from me.

“So if there are Elements of disharmony, which for arguments sake we’ll say there are, you only have three here. You need six surely.” My plan was to keep him talking, until the others arrived. Rainbow Dash would be almost there by now, flying at full speed.

“Actually we have five now, the two you see here are Dishonesty,” He motioned to the unicorn who waved at me, exciting a snarl from my throat, “And this here, is Greed.” The earth pony smiled once more, every muscle in my body was screaming at me to hit him, but I had to resist. It would do no good to flip out at this moment, while everyone was so far away.
“You see,” Bryan continued, turning his back to me, “We have five, but one still remains lost. It is an elusive trait in this world, so I had to think outside the box. Then I realised, it was you.” With the last statement he turned to face me, a malicious glint in his eyes.

“Me? You have to be joking right? What element could I possibly be?” I began to pace slightly now, hoping to stop myself from pouncing at him for these ridiculous allegations.

“I believe, you are the element of anger.” I stopped dead in my tracks; I knew his game plan now. Get under my skin; aggravate the hell out of me and when I burst, that’s when he would be shown as correct in finding the last element. “So what do you think? Care to join us and become the new rulers of Equestria?”

“Never with you. I’m staying loyal to my friends, and my future wife.” I hissed back, and he smiled, knowing that his plan was working. I was startled then by a blinding flash, as the Elements of Harmony appeared before me. Obviously wasting no time and using Twilights teleportation spell, they had arrived quicker than expected.

“Oh excellent, the elements of harmony, and what’s this?” He glanced to the side, where Matt stood, “Oh it would appear Matt has joined the party as well, isn’t this lovely. Say, Robbie, speaking of your future wife, I might want to have a go at that, if you know what I mean.”

He smiled, looking directly into my eyes, he knew he was pushing the right buttons, and I was close to snapping. Rage was beginning to fill every pore of my being, telling me to lash out and strike him. I had to control myself though, if I snapped, he won.

“You just gonna take that?” Matt shouted at me from across the cave, “Come on man, and stand up for you and Rainbow.”

“I can’t, he thinks I’m the element of anger, so if I let the anger take over me, he wins!” I hissed back through clenched teeth.
“Well you have to do something! You can’t just stand there and take this abuse.” Matt had trotted over now, nudging me forward, but I wasn’t going to do anything.

“What’s wrong Robbie? Learned to control your temper since school?” Bryan chimed in, goading me into flipping out. Rainbow Dash threw me a confused look, which I returned with an apologetic look in my eyes. “Oh, does she not know?”
My head snapped up now, he wouldn’t dare go down that road, but then again I had never seen him like this before. He was truly evil now, and I needed to do something.

“Rainbow Dash, your fiancé here, used to be quite the violent one back in his school days. He would get into fights most days, he was bullied, and he developed anger issues due to that, interesting story isn’t it?” I felt my muscles tense; he was getting too close to revealing the secret that I had kept for so long now. He was smiling at me now, as if he had a hidden ace up his sleeve, which I suppose he did.

“Did you also know that he isn’t from here?” I froze, my eyes widened and I almost pounced right there and then, but I restrained myself. “You see, you may have thought he was just from a different city, or different country, but the truth is he isn’t even from this universe.”

Final straw, I began to charge, but felt something hold me. I tried to move with all my might, but was completely restricted. The unicorn to Bryan’s right was holding me in place, her horn aglow and my head was forced down. To my horror, I was standing in my human form, fully revealed to my friends and my fiancé. Then I was freed, falling to my knees in my pony form once more. Tears brimmed in my eyes, as I looked over the faces of all the ponies I had come to accept as a large part of my life. Most wore expressions of shock, although my eyes focused on Rainbow Dash the longest. Her eyes were betraying her also, as tears streamed down her face, the magnitude of this lie finally hitting all of them, and only Twilight cast me a sympathetic glance.

Rainbow Dash took off, soaring away into the sky, away from Ponyville, and away from me. I couldn’t take this anymore, I had been pushed beyond anger and rage, I was now simply broken. Leaping to my hooves I galloped out from the mouth of the cave, and took off into the sky. I didn’t know where I was going, or if I would ever come back. I just needed to get away.

Author's Note

Sorry for the long wait guys! Didn't realize that I had written this chapter until now. Derp on my part.

Hope you enjoyed though! :D