1. A Pathetic, Scared Little Filly
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Inner Voice

1. A Pathetic, Scared Little Filly

Author's Note

Warning: Certain aspects or sections may not be for the faint of heart. This is definitely one of the most intense chapters I’ve written for a story before, so be warned. If you’re okay with that, then by all means, proceed. I’ll see you guys in the next chapter for my full breakdown of my creative process.

1. A Pathetic, Scared Little Filly

There are no healthy ways to suppress your insecurities.

Ponies may think that they are easy to deal with, but they aren’t. When not properly processed, they can gnaw at you and eat away at your very being. They tell you everything that you don’t want to hear, but you believe it regardless because you just feel so lost. Insecurity preys on your emotions like a predator and seeks to take away your self-esteem. You try to suppress it, and pretend like it doesn’t exist. But the more you seek to bury it, the more it is determined to overwhelm you. You can’t stop it. It is a force of nature that must be properly dealt with, or else it will manifest itself in ways you can never imagine. I am fortunate enough to have dealt with mine, and I know what it feels like. And let me say that it is something you cannot keep to yourself.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

My name is Misty Brightdawn, and I experienced my own form of insecurity. It’s become a part of me at this point. I’ve felt it for most of my life. You’d think that with everything I’ve been through, from meeting my friends to saving Equestria with them, that I would stop having these negative thoughts. Well…that’s not my case. I know it should be, but a case like mine is hard to treat. The thoughts are omnipresent, attaching themselves to you like a parasite and refusing to let you go until you are as submissive to your own mind as it wants. Eventually, you feel so alone that you start to hear voices in your head, manifestations of those thoughts. They start telling you to do things, feel things, isolate yourself further. They make you feel weak and pathetic, twisting your ordinary fears into something you should be ashamed of. They become a singular sound breaking through the silence of your own subconscious, an entity with the sole intention to harm you. Your inner voice.

I started hearing my inner voice not too many years after I was “rescued” so to speak. I grew up under the evil alicorn Opaline. When I was a filly, she found me outside the boundaries of Equestria, having gotten lost after collecting glopaz crystals. I didn’t know at the time whether she took real pity on me, or just saw in me somepony she could use. But she brought me back to the lair and wasted no time in enforcing her will on me. She constantly made me feel worthless and like I could never do anything right. She yelled at me, scolded me, and never appreciated anything I did. Any time she would get a chance to take her bitterness out on me, she would. I was always the punching bag. I was always the scapegoat. Why wouldn’t I be? She had nopony else to blame, no one else to vent out her frustrations. Leave it to poor Misty to be treated like the scum of the earth for doing nothing wrong.

For a while, I tried to hold strong. I tried to keep it together and hope that one day she would love me, but it never happened. And at such a young age, your mind is impressionable. You tend to listen more to what others tell you because you don’t have the autonomy to think for yourself, and you let yourself be dragged in many different directions, always subject to the whims of those above you. Sometimes that can be a good thing, but other times…it can be a tough cycle to break, and you don’t always succeed.

In my case, Opaline convinced me that I wasn’t good enough, that my best efforts would never be sufficient. I became convinced that I was the problem, and that I should be ashamed for being afraid and vulnerable. She told me that I was nothing more than a pathetic, scared little filly who would never prove herself useful. I believed it. Her words haunted me at night. I cried myself to sleep every night, laying in the small little dog bed in the tiny room she had provided me. I bawled my eyes out, cursing myself for simply existing. I asked myself why I was such a failure in my ‘mother’s” eyes, why she never seemed to acknowledge when I did anything right, and why she appeared to hate me so much.

And one night…I got my answer.

“Ugh! WHY CAN’T YOU DO ANYTHING RIGHT?!!” Opaline screamed at me, stomping her hooves on the ground in rage.

I stood there, a filly who had barely crossed 10 years of age, shivering and trembling under her intense withering gaze. It had been an accident. I had cleaned the West Entertainment quarters as best I possibly could. I thought she only wanted the places that could be cleaned within reason, not the entire room, including the ceiling. But when she had gone to check, she had found that the work was not even close to being finished. There were tables filled with broken decorations I couldn’t reach due to my small stature, and dust still remained on the walls.

“I-I-I’m s-sorry, Opaline!” I apologized quickly. “I-I c-couldn’t r-reach t-the t-tables! I d-did m-my best to s-sweep everything! P-please don’t be mad at me-“

“DID YOUR BEST?!” Opaline roared, whirling back towards me. “What do you call those?! Spiders on the wall, dust in the corners of the main stage, the furniture hasn’t been moved, the decorations aren’t washed! I gave you one job and you failed me!! YOU FAILED ME, MISTY!!”

I choked back a sob. I hadn’t meant to fail her. I didn’t mean to miss so many areas. There were only so many things I could see in the dimly lit room while sweeping. Regardless, I felt horrible. I felt like it was my fault, and like I should be shamed for being so useless. As Opaline advanced towards me, I backed up. I was terrified out of my mind. My eyes were wide with fear. I thought she was going to kill me, and it seemed like she genuinely wanted to.

“P-p-please, Opaline!” I begged, my whole body shaking from how scared I was. “I-I’ll do it again! I-I’ll be more careful! I-I don’t care how long it takes, I-I’ll do it right!”

“Do it right?!” Opaline yelled. “Why should I trust you to clean everything properly this time?! I give you simple instructions, and you can’t even do those. You screw up at everything! I don’t know why I even rescued you to begin with! You’ve been no use to me since the very beginning, and you never will!!”

“O-O-Opaline, I-I-I-“

“I DON’T WANT TO HEAR IT!! GO TO YOUR ROOM BEFORE I MAKE YOU PAY FOR FAILING ME!!!”

I ran down the hallway in the direction of my room as fast as I could. I was sobbing. I felt tears pouring out of both eyes. The worst thing that a filly could hear was scolding from her mother, let alone to this extent. I felt like the worst pony in the world. It wasn’t fair. I didn’t deserve to be treated so horribly. It was true that I failed at a lot of things, but I always wanted to make Opaline proud. She was all I had now. The worst thing I could ever do was make her upset, and I always beat myself up over it. I was expected to be the perfect little servant, constantly obedient and getting any job done. Yet I couldn’t even clean one room properly. How could I ever prove myself to her?

The moment I rescued my bedroom, I sprinted inside and slammed the doors close as hard as I could. I lay down on my small little dog bed and cried my eyes out. I wanted to go home. I couldn’t even remember where that was anymore, but anywhere was better than this place. I wasn’t loved. I was just tossed aside and treated horribly every second of my life. I had put up with this for so long, and all I wanted was to do something right for once.

“Why doesn’t she love me…?” I whispered quietly, sniffling as tears streamed down my cheeks. “W-why doesn’t she…ever want me around?”

“It’s because you’ll never be good enough,” a voice whispered back in a sinister tone. “You will never impress her.”

I looked up from my pillow, startled at the sound of my own voice responding back to me. For all I knew, I hadn’t said anything along those lines. Was I hallucinating? Maybe the torment I had endured for the past five years was finally getting to me, and had broken my psyche. But I could still think clearly, and see properly. There was nopony in the room, and Opaline was in the throne room, meticulously studying her targets of interest, and waiting for magic to return.

I was alone, completely lost in my own solitude and depression. Perhaps it was just my mind playing tricks on me out of a desperate desire for genuine company. I was beginning to think that I was going insane. Then the voice came back.

“You know who I am, Misty,” it purred. “You’ve always known who I am.”

I sat up. The urge to sleep had completely gone away, replaced with a sense of morbid curiosity and fear. I had no idea which feeling was stronger, but that didn’t matter. The voice had my attention. I could hear it in my mind. I could not ignore it. I could not block it out. It demanded my attention, and I could not refuse it.

“You’re me…” I replied, my voice shaky from fear. This didn’t seem right. It felt weird talking to myself, and Opaline was not so powerful that she could cast a spell on me. At least not yet. Her magic was limited to basic levitation and small incantations. She had often bemoaned that fact, mostly in front of me, and I was expected to stay quiet during it. The only explanation that was plausible was that I was actually hearing voices in my head. I didn’t understand it at the time. Only later did I realize just how harmful this actually was.

The voice laughed, but it was one without humor. It was almost as if it was mocking me. “No. I am not you. I’m not a pathetic, scared little filly who can’t stop messing up the simplest of things. I’m not a total screwup and a nuisance.”

“That’s not true!” I protested, but I could feel my conviction wavering. Everything my inner voice was saying were things that I had heard before from Opaline. It was like I was hearing my own memories played back like a recording. I should’ve been stronger, but the words still cut deep like a sword’s blade straight through the heart. I would never get used to it. “Y-you a-are the nuisance.”

I couldn’t be mean. I wasn’t like her. I wasn’t assertive, even if I tried my best to make it seem like I was. I had never been taught to properly stand up for myself, so the words coming out of my mouth felt wrong. I wanted to apologize, but I couldn’t bring myself to. I didn’t know what to do, and my inner voice knew this. It knew it all too well. It was me after all; my own thoughts, and my own feelings.

“Ooh?” My inner voice replied in a cruel manner. “Well, isn’t that ironic? Calling me what you think of yourself? And you know I’m right about it too.”

I hesitated for a moment. “N-no. I-I don’t deserve to be treated like this…”

“After all this time…you still believe these lies that you tell yourself? That you can actually make Opaline proud of you? Are you seriously that stupid?!”

“I-“

“You want her to love you and appreciate your efforts. But always feel sorry for yourself when she doesn’t.”

“What do…w-what do you want from me?” I demanded, trying my best to make my small and meek voice sound intimidating. It didn’t work. I was scared. I felt isolated and here was this thing only adding to the torture I experienced on a daily basis.

“Oh, Misty,” the voice taunted me, its words continuing to cut through my soul. The air grew colder and more constricting, as I felt myself pulled further from reality. I blinked and suddenly, I saw what this demon looked like. She was almost an exact copy of me, but instead of a physical body, her body was made of transparent smoke. There was a ghostly aura to her, and where green eyes should have been, blood red irises stared back at me in their place.

The shadow Misty hovered above me, reveling in my confusion and fear. “You are many things, but assertive is not one of them. You want to be useful so badly, but can never prove yourself to dear Opaline. She clearly doesn’t want you around. You will never be of any help to her plans. Me? I want to help you, Misty. I want to be there for you the way you’ve always wanted.”

My eyes stung. It was true. All I wanted was somepony who would actually talk and be there for me, and my own inner voice was doing just that. I thought that was all friendship amounted to, just ponies working together to accomplish things, even if it was evil. That was how Opaline described it after all, and at my age, I didn’t know any better. Little did I know, I should not have let this demon into my life. Once it enters, it never truly goes away.

“You…do…?” I asked weakly.

“I like you, Misty,” she affirmed, smiling devilishly. “And that’s why I think I’ll play with you some more.” Her maniacal expression faded, being replaced by one of pure disdain. “I need to make you realize just how completely and utterly pathetic you are, and therefore…how much you need me.”

I was about to reply when I heard the sound of the door to my room slamming open. The voice vanished from my head in an instant. I blinked again, quickly realizing that I could no longer see my ghastly reflection. It was like she had never been there at all and it was all in my head. At my young age, I couldn’t tell what was real and what wasn’t. I didn’t want to know. All I knew was that I was shaken. Sweat beaded down my forehead and my body was trembling erratically. My thoughts were jumbled in my mind and I couldn’t speak for a solid minute. I couldn’t hear anything, not even the sound of Opaline screaming her head off at me, demanding that I come back out to the throne room. I was frozen in my own fear, staring out at the single window like I could still see that evil shadow taunting me from within my own mind.

It was only when my senses finally cleared that I noticed her there. I hadn’t even noticed the fact that she had come in, and I couldn’t think of a good apology. All I could do was break down and cry, begging her not to leave me alone with that thing. In my panicked state, I couldn’t describe what it was, but I knew it was out to get me. I sobbed uncontrollably, silently hoping that Opaline would take pity on me for once and banish my shadowy counterpart the way she had supposedly done to that diabolical Twilight Sparkle all those moons ago according to her.

Opaline did no such thing. Instead, she laughed in my face for a solid minute before scolding me. She said that I was fine, that I was getting worked up over nothing. She told me to grow up and be tougher before informing me that I wouldn’t be having any dinner tonight. I didn’t argue with her. How could I? I wasn’t good enough. I wasn’t worth having a decent meal. I should’ve known better not to let my feelings out to her. It was pointless.

Instead, I waited until she left, holding fresh tears in for as long as I could. Then I sobbed into my small pillow, feeling the weight of everything finally crash down on me.

I wish I could say that was the only time I heard it. I wish I could say that my inner voice had decided to stop torturing me and move on. Unfortunately for me, she came right back the next day.

It was morning. Opaline was again looking through her special projection screen overlooking Maretime Bay. She had become particularly interested in the town’s everyday routine out of nowhere in the past few weeks. I couldn’t understand what was so special about it at the time. It looked like an ordinary cluster of buildings with nothing special about it. But she was monitoring it a lot closer now. She later mentioned to me the day after that her interest was peaked because of one filly, one earth pony who was different from the rest, and carried the Magic of Friendship in her heart.

I had a lot of questions, but I didn’t dare pose them. Opaline had her reasons for watching specific ponies, and I assumed this was another one of her so-called “chosen ones” who she thought would bring back magic, but would eventually turn out to be a false lead. We both knew how the last intrepid explorer (a mare named Stella) had turned out: gone, having vanished without a trace. I had no reason to believe her daughter would be any different, and frankly, neither did Opaline.

If only I knew how special this filly would one day become in helping me see the light in later years.

I was sitting right next to Opaline’s throne as she went on and on about her plans for world domination should this filly grow up someday and decide to restore magic. She was going into tangent after tangent and I did my best to block it out. However, it was when I was finally distracted that a certain someone decide to return.

“You can’t say anything to her, can you?” Masky whispered into my ear, a visible smile of pleasure on her face. Masky was the nickname I had decided to call her (due to her essentially being the mask she wanted me to hide under), but she didn’t know that yet. “Hm, a shame. Her raving is driving me crazy. But I suppose you know the consequences if you step out of line.”

“You know I can’t,” I replied as softly as I could. “She hates it when I interrupt for anything. I’ve learned to just stay quiet and take it by this point…”

Masky smirked. “You’ve learned your place. Hm, fitting. I didn’t think you had it in you to just take her scolding. Perhaps you aren’t as half-witted as I thought.”

“What else can I do…?” I asked desperately. “She hates me. No matter what I do, she’ll always think I’m not worth her love…”

“And she is right,” my ghostly counterpart answered as the smirk vanished off her face, being replaced by one of pure disgust. “You think you can prove yourself a good friend to somepony like her? Somepony who already has everything she could ever want? She’s only keeping you around until she conquers Equestria. After that…well, where do you think a societal reject like you belongs? No home, no family…no cutie mark. You’d be lucky if the worst orphanage takes you in.”

“Stop it!” I cried. My hooves reacted subconsciously and I swatted the apparition in front of me, but none of my attempts made contact, only passing straight through the smoky texture. “I’ll prove myself to her! I’m not weak!!”

“Hmm,” Masky said in response, smiling sinisterly again. “We’ll see about that, now will we?” That is when she vanished into thin air, leaving me to fall flat on my stomach as I tried to lunge at her. The attempt didn’t work, and only then did Opaline notice that I was no longer paying attention to her evil monologue.

She stood up from her throne, glaring at me. “What are you doing, Misty?! Playing catch with the air?!”

I looked back at her, tears in my eyes. “I-I’m s-sorry, Opaline! I-I didn’t m-mean to-“

“DID I SAY YOU COULD LEAVE?!!!” Opaline screamed angrily. “DID I?! COME BACK HERE RIGHT NOW!!”

I walked back over to her, my whole body trembling. I felt the hoof hit my side even before I reached the throne and I fell over. It wasn’t the first time Opaline had hit me. She’d done it many times before, and I was supposed to be used to it by now. So why did I still feel pain?

I looked up at her pleadingly, shivering underneath the intense stare. I didn’t dare say anything back. I just stared silently and squeezed my eyes shut as she pummeled me over and over. I didn’t move, nor did I try and fight back. I wasn’t worth that. I deserved everything I received for being such a bad pony.

The moment Opaline let me go, I crawled back to my room as fast as I could. I didn’t give her time to change her mind, and I couldn’t muster any words in response. I was exhausted. My whole body ached from the beating, and my ears were still pounding from when she had screamed in my ear. I collapsed on the small bed, sniffling. There were no tears left in my system. I couldn’t cry anymore that day. I had spent them all during the abuse session.

I wish I felt more emotions, but all I could feel was apathy and numbness. The surface of the bed was relatively soft, but it could have easily been the same marble floor. It didn’t feel any different. I didn’t have any energy left in my system. All I wanted to do was go to sleep and never wake up the next day. I just wanted to be left alone.

If only it were that easy.

“Go on,” Masky stated condescendingly, materializing into the room from the other side of the window. She hovered above me like a stern master, looking down upon the servant who had failed her. “Tell me your sob story as to why you don’t deserve this treatment. Oh poor Misty, woe is me. It’s not fair! Opaline doesn’t treat me nice, waaa, waaa! Do you really think you deserve anything less?!”

I forced myself to look up and shake my head. “N-no. You wouldn’t want to hear it anyway. Can you just leave me alone now…?”

Masky chuckled darkly. “Oh, Misty. Haven’t you learned by now? I cannot leave. I never did. I have always been here with you. I am everything you want to be, but could never become because you’re just so pitiful. That part of you never leaves, which means I will never leave.I’m here to help you like I said, help you accept the harsh truth.”

“You constantly get me into trouble with Opaline!” I accused her. Even if you asked me now, I could not tell you where that sudden burst of anger had come from. I think I was just so done, so fed up with everything going wrong in my life that I wanted somepony to blame. And who else could I blame for my own screwups but…myself? I had no one else to vent my frustrations towards. “You always lie to me! You’re wrong! She would love me if it wasn’t for you! She would see that I’m worth her time! S-she would…s-s-she…” my voice trailed off as the rest of the words died on my tongue.

Masky floated down and lifted my chin up, staring deep into my sad eyes with those blood red irises of hers. “Now you’re getting it, aren’t you? You are worth nothing, Misty. You aren’t even worth living. You’re just a sad, pathetic, annoying little screwup who will always be beneath the hooves of the pony you call ‘mother.’ You constantly vie for your appreciation, but never do anything to earn it! It’s your fault she’s mad at you! Everything is your fault! You are a disgrace to her, and you shouldn’t even exist!!”

“N-no!! P-p-please-“

“Now how about we stop daydreaming and actually face reality for a change, hm? You’re getting too old for these childish fantasies.”

I looked away from her, refusing to say anything back. How could I? She was right. She was right about everything. I had no purpose in life. The only reason Opaline had even taken me in to begin with was so I could fix her stupid tree. And I couldn’t even do that. I had tried over and over to make myself useful regardless, but she never appreciated any of it. What was I even good for?

The truth was that I had no answer.

Time took its course, and so did the torture I received by my own inner voice. Months passed, and nothing changed. She followed me wherever I went, always trying to get me to break. That was her goal. She wanted me to completely mentally snap, and embrace being alone and miserable. No matter what I tried, I could not get rid of her. It was as if she was a parasite who could not leave its host.

She would enter my dreams every night and attempt to psychologically torment me. I sometimes dreamed of being scolded and beaten by Opaline, and they always ended once the crushing blow came down on my head. Other times, I dreamt that Opaline would tear up the pictures that I had colored right in front of me before morphing into Masky and flying out the bedroom window. And every morning, I would wake up in a cold sweat and a loud scream. These sleepless nights would always result in me having bags under my eyes the next morning and enduring more scolding for being late.

I never understood why Masky had it out for me, and I could never tell Opaline. She would never believe me. She kept insisting it was all in my head, and that I should grow up. All Masky was to her was an “imaginary friend” that I had made up. Perhaps it was, and I did not discount that. Maybe she really was simply an unhealthy ponification of my anxieties meant to destroy me from the inside. But she seemed very real to me, and I was scared to death of her.

To Opaline’s credit, she did comment on my change of demeanor a couple of times. I used to be more terrified and eager to please around her, but now I carried myself with more despondency, my head constantly hanging low. I talked to myself a lot according to her, though that was really me talking to Masky whenever she whispered into my ear. Only I could see her. Opaline couldn’t. I guess I couldn’t really blame her for thinking I was crazy.

As the weeks passed, the torture became more intense. Every time I was alone, that demon would return and tempt me towards harming myself, or better yet, just ending my life completely. I can’t say that I didn’t consider it, especially since my life wasn’t improving. I tried to stay as strong as a then-10-year old could, continuing on and doing my best to prove her wrong.

But I could only take so much. The more abuse I took from Opaline, whether that be because I was late to the throne room, didn’t pay attention to her at all times, or asked to go back to my room, the thoughts started to pile up in my head. Everything she would say to me, I would internalize and I felt my resolve slowly crumbling. Masky would feed into these thoughts and tell me that I would do the world a great favor if I just drank poison and died. Opaline added onto this sentiment every time she said that she wished she never took me in. She said this so often to the point where I would repeat it right in front of her.

Worthless.

Screwup.

Brat.

Annoying.

Useless.

After a while, I began to believe these words. I began to agree, despising myself more and more. I wished that I was never born. During these formative years of your life, you believe anything ponies tell you. I felt like I shouldn’t even exist, and that my life would never amount to anything. I was too meek to offer anything of value. What use would Opaline ever have for me? I was a burden on her, and I would never be able to help her conquer Equestria like she wanted. I was just a stupid unicorn filly with no cutie mark. I had nothing to offer.

These sentiments kept building inside me…until one day, when they all boiled over.

I ran inside my room as fast as I could and slammed the door shut. Tears were pouring down my face and scars were all over my body. I had done the unthinkable; talking back to Opaline when she yelled at me for the billionth time. Something inside me had snapped that day. I was not normally this assertive. Maybe it was the constant abuse I had suffered with no reprieve, both physically and within my own mind. Or maybe the lack of sleep had made me irritable. It could have been a combination of both now that I think about it, but I didn’t think that far at the time.

The moment I collapsed onto my bed again, the parasite was already there waiting for me. She had her trademark sinister expression, and she was licking her lips, almost like she was savoring this moment. She floated down towards me and wasted no time in taking advantage of my vulnerability.

“Once again,” she sneered. “You fail to impress dear ‘ol mommy. I thought you would have gotten it through your head by now. You can’t please her. You can’t please anypony.”

“Please…” I pleaded with her, sniffling and blinking back fresh tears. “Just don’t torture me today…I’ve had enough…”

“You’ve taken so much hurting, my dear,” Masky continued, seemingly not phased by my begging for her to stop. In fact, she appeared to relish in my pain more than anything else. “You’ve taken so much of the blame all for a pony who will never love you. How could she? The way I see it, there isn’t anything to love. Just a poor scared little filly who can’t do anything right.”

Once again, she was right and I could not argue with her. The feeling of isolation really is a powerful thing. It tears at your flesh and devours your bones. I had long since realized that there was no escape from the horrors of my everyday existence. Each day, it was the same old thing. I would fail miserably at something and either be shouted at or beaten. Opaline had no other mode than mean. She was not capable of compassion, and I would never be considered her friend.

And all I wanted to do was end it all. I wanted a quick way to end my suffering, so that I would never experience these feelings again. A young filly like me should never have known what death even was, let alone yearn for it. But I was just tired of it all, and wanted that horrible voice to stop.

“Fine…you win…” I replied in a choked voice. “I’ll never be good enough for her…will I? No matter how hard I try…she’ll never…she’ll never love me…”

“That is correct.”

“I-I’m s-sorry…for being s-such a f-failure…”

“You always will be. There’s no changing that. So why fight it? Wouldn’t it feel great to just…let it go?”

“H-h-how…?”

“Opaline’s study. We’ve been there a couple times, you and I. There are several vials of potions sitting on the counter. You only need to consume one and you’ll drop dead in an instant.”

“A-and y-you’ll stop torturing me…?”

“Of course. I am a part of you, Misty. Once you die, so will I.”

I knew Opaline didn’t care about me. She would not miss me if I had suddenly disappeared without a trace. She would be happier with me gone. My own mind didn’t care about me either. It just wanted to remind me of my own shortcomings every moment of the day. I couldn’t do anything right. All I would ever be was a disappointment and a total screwup. So I made my decision.

I waited until the alicorn was fast asleep on her throne before heading upstairs as quietly as I could. My small hooves made soft sounds as they headed up the makeshift tree ramp. My heart was beating heavier with each passing step. Fresh tears stung in my eyes. I was truly alone. There was no other way out. I wanted to be free of it all. I wanted to die so that I would never be subject to abuse ever again. I felt worthless and like the world only wanted to see me suffer. If I was going to do anything right, it would be not giving it the satisfaction of seeing me in pain.

The door to Opaline’s private library/study was open like it always was. I never understood why she kept it open constantly. Maybe she didn’t think I would ever go in there. I had only been there a couple of times with Opaline when she was researching forbidden spells. It wasn’t anything I was ever interested in, and the words spoken would frequently get lost on me. But here I was now, heading in here for what seemed like the last time, seeking the sweet release of death.

The potions were on the counter as Masky had said, untouched and filled with strange, bubbling fluid. I approached the counter and began to shake it. I wasn’t tall enough yet to just grab one with my hooves, so this was the next best thing. A vial fell from the top and I barely caught it before it hit the ground and caused an explosion. I had no idea what this spell was, nor what would happen if I actually drank it. I didn’t even know I had magic at the time. But there was no time to waste thinking about the consequences. I had to act now. Soon I would no longer suffer. I would be free.

“Drink it! DRINK IT!!” Masky spoke in my mind, her voice rising above my other thoughts. The temptation was getting stronger and blocking out everything else. She wanted me dead. She wanted me to finally end it all. She had been a part of me for as long as I could remember. She was a product of the anxiety I had built up for years since being kidnapped by Opaline. Every thought I had suppressed, every emotion I tried to keep to myself for fear of being yelled at. My futile attempts to be the perfect little servant. It was all a manifestation of my own fear. She was me, whether she wanted to admit that or not.

I held the potion in my hooves and brought it close to my lips. My short life flashed before my eyes. I thought of my early life in Bridlewood for the first time in years. I thought of Dad, slam poetry, the playground, and our food fight tradition. I thought of the day I had gotten lost and how terrified I was to be so far away from home. It would be the last time I ever experienced those memories for a long while.

Without another moment of hesitation, I drank the potion in its entirety and braced for the worst. But instead I felt nothing. No more pain. No more sorrow. The voice had vanished in its entirety. The nightmare was over. The effects were instant. I collapsed to the floor just as Opaline burst into the study and gazed upon my fallen form. My vision became blurry and the last thing I heard was her scream of anguish before everything went black.

To this day, I still can’t tell you whether the screams were for me or for the precious potion that I had just wasted on myself. It could have been either. At least I was finally free.

It didn’t last long.

My eyes snapped open and I took a huge breath. The warm embrace of death was suddenly ripped away and I found myself violently thrust back into the world of the living. The color returned to my face. My heart rate was gradually steadying with each beat. I had no idea what had just happened, nor where I even was. I looked around at my surroundings as my vision cleared. The room I was in was a lot more spacious than mine, and I was laying on a bigger bed. It didn’t take me long to realize that I was in Opaline’s chambers. Sure enough, as my eyes darted to the right, the Fire Alicorn was standing right there, an expression of contained anger on her face.

I didn’t want to face her. Now was the worst time for me to be subject to her wrath. I wanted to scream, cry, and beg Opaline to just let me die. But my tongue was as dry as sandpaper. I was too weak to rise, and I wanted to be left alone. I knew she would not grant me that right though. She was most likely furious with me for destroying one of her precious potion vials.

“You thought I didn’t notice you go upstairs, did you?” Opaline asked in a steely tone. She was upset, but even she appeared to know that this wasn’t the right moment for her to be her normally angry self. It was taking everything for her to keep that fury back, and I could tell that she was on the brink of snapping at me.

I said nothing.

“I’ll admit, you gave me quite a shock the moment I saw you passed out on the floor,” she continued. “I was beginning to think that I had lost the only pony I consider to be a friend. Fortunately, resuscitating you wasn’t hard, even with my magic being so limited.”

A friend. Opaline had never called me that before, not out of sincerity anyway. I shuddered to think what her definition of the term was, but I didn’t dare challenge her on it. I was already on very thin ice as it was, and the last thing I wanted to do was make her upset.

“Well?! Don’t you have anything to say?!”

I fought back the sudden rush of tears and did my best to speak. “I wanted to die, Opaline…” My throat was scratchy and parched. I could barely talk, yet I did my best to obey her. It was all I was good for after all.

“Wanted to die?!” Opaline demanded. “Don’t be stupid.” When I didn’t say anything more, she glared at me. She must have realized that I was being serious. “Pathetic little girl. You thought you could try and kill yourself with one of my potions. What in Skyros were you thinking?!!”

“S-s-she told me to…”

“The imaginary friend.”

I nodded, whimpering.

Opaline groaned. “Fillies at this age. You think they’d be old enough not to believe in these sorts of hocus-pocus fake voodoo…” She shook her head. “Whatever. You are in so much trouble, young filly. Do you realize that?! I spent years studying that spell AND YOU DESTROYED IT!!”

I flinched at the tone of her voice. It wasn’t fair for her to dump everything on me. It was because of her that I even thought to kill myself in the first place. She had no right to call me the problem after everything she did. She wanted my unwavering loyalty, yet she had done nothing to earn it. She didn’t care about me. She never believed in me. She didn’t even love me. All I was to her was a lowly slave, never being able to prove myself useful no matter how hard I tried.

As if reading my mind, Opaline nodded slowly. “I admit I haven’t been giving you the most hard of tasks. The only reason you feel useless is because I have not tested you enough. Very well. I’d like to offer you a conditional reward, providing you continue to serve me. I think giving you an incentive to work would be the best way to motivate you, and stop you from pulling something like this again.”

I blinked, not quite understanding what she was saying.

“You see your flank? It’s looking rather blank, isn’t it?”

I nodded again, starting to see where she was going. “You said that I should have a cutie mark now. But I don’t. I don’t know why.”

“That’s because you haven’t discovered your special talent yet, that’s all. But I can speed up that process for you. You help me conquer Equestria, and I will give you your cutie mark…all in exchange for your continued loyalty. We wait until magic returns and then we strike at the very heart of the source. You will be special, Misty. You just don’t know it yet.”

“Really?!” I asked eagerly, sitting up in bed and staring back at her with renewed optimism. “You mean it?! You’ll give me a cutie mark?!”

“Yes,” Opaline answered. She smiled, but it did not reach her eyes. “I am so sorry for not recognizing your full potential sooner. It was my fault that you tried to take your own life. Help me, Misty. Help me reclaim my greatness. And you will know happiness. You will know what it is like to have a cutie mark, to fit in. You will have friends, more than you could ever dream of.”

“Thank you, Opaline! Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

I remember how happy I was to be heard, how naïve I was to trust her. I remember how I embraced her and thought she had finally accepted me as her equal. Little did I know at the time, this was just another one of her attempts to manipulate me. She had realized that constantly calling me worthless and saying that I would never be useful to her had almost cost me my life. She needed another way to keep me submissive.

And the most unfortunate part about it all was…it worked. I didn’t hear Masky enticing me with the sweet thoughts of death and self-loathing since. The growing doubt I felt over my place with Opaline had completely disappeared. For many years, I did not doubt my loyalty to her. I was committed. She had completely won me over.

The cycle of abuse continued.