It takes a full minute before his lungs begin to scream for air.

He exhales the carbon dioxide that's built up in them, though it's barely a relief.

He sucks in a breath through his teeth, before remembering that he was supposed to be playing dead.

He can hear hair shifting above him. (It might not be his own.)

Maybe he can just pretend to be asleep.

Maybe they'll lose interest if he can fake it well enough.

(A memory of faking sleep whenever the matron checked in on their room, before going right back to the discussion they were having after she left.)

He keeps his eyes closed, though his brows knit together.

Something touches his back, and he can't suppress the shiver of fear that goes through him, which re-triggers the pins and needles yet again.

The thing touching his back is cold.

His breath catches in his throat, briefly, before he resumes the measured breathing that a sleeping stallion might have.

A huff from above.

Then, speech.

"I know you aren't asleep."

Shit.

The creaking, then splintering as a ward breaks down.

He opens his eyes, looking at a purple and golden blur.

He looks upwards, not bothering to incline his head with the motion of his eyes. The perpetual numbness that has been his constant companion since he initially awoke is still alive and well.

There's light coming from somebody's horn. Given that he doesn't feel any drain on his magical reserves, he's going to hazard a guess and say it isn't his horn that's glowing.

Besides, purple isn't his magic colour.

(Neither was red, once upon a time.)

"I've more or less been raising a baby dragon. I can tell when someone is faking sleep, Sombra."

A... baby dragon?

He remembers one, from a past defeat.

(Falling towards the Crystal Heart that he so badly wanted to steal and destroy.)

Sombra huffs out a snort. A forced exhalation of air through his nostrils.

(The whelp being saved by a pink blur, much to his shock.)

He glares up at the Princess. Daggers. Glaring daggers.

(The realization that he was breaking apart.)

Were those two related, somehow?

(His screaming, before it all went white.)

His lip curls up in a snarl, before he huffs again and rolls his eyes.

"Don't you roll your eyes at me." A sigh from above. He can't quite see her face. "I'm doing what's best for you."

By what, keeping him in a cell after pulling him out of his great reward for a tortured existence?

He rolls his eyes again, the glare turning harsher as his pupils shrink into slits.

A whoosh of magic. He feels his forearm being lifted, and he hisses with the pins and needles coming back in full force, squeezing his eyes shut again.

Then there's a bit of poking and prodding, before something is inserted into a vein.

He grimaces, opening one of his eyes and trying to move his head to see what's going on with his foreleg.

It's an uncomfortable feeling, having something inserted into a vein. And he really doesn't wish to repeat it.

"This will keep you hydrated." Her voice is soft, but it's not like sunshine.

(Not like Hope's voice.)

His spine pops as he moves his head, and he lets out a sigh in relief, before he finally looks up at her properly.

Purple. Mane in a fringe. Two long, collected strands of hair framing her face. An apathetic look that conceals emotions. Violet eyes.

His eyes flit to and fro as he studies her.

A pinkish- no, magenta streak through her hair. A harsher purple streak through her hair, next to the reddish-pink streak.

(The colour of her fur is darker than Hope's.)

A minor huff of irritation from him is all she gets.

Her horn fades to her magic colour, and is decorated with jewelry. Two rings, a trail of beads connecting them.

(Far too familiar to that stupid pink prick that initially ruled the Empire.)

He lets his head drop to the floor in a despondent huff, lower eyelid twitching slightly. His throat is fair too raw with dryness to even bother with formulating words.

"...I'll also need to start you off on broth."

Of course.

There's a small grunt of acknowledgement from him. She's treating him like a damn foal.

(Another memory of being out in the Northern Wastes as a child, and being brought back to the Empire. Having to be practically coddled and fed spoonfuls of watery broth.)

He tries to turn his head away, so that he's not facing the monarch.

(Petulant, but if she's going to treat him like a child...)

She simply steps in front of him.

"While I will care for you as best as I can until you're in better health, you *will* have to answer for your crimes against equines eventually."

She speaks solemnly, and with a natural Canterlot accent. The royal intonations are definitely there, though, especially with how prim and proper she pronounces things. Each 'T' is enunciated.

"I aim to speak to you more on this subject when the time comes. For now, just rest. And heal."

Sombra rolls his eyes again, not even bothering to look up at her.

(He's already very much aware of his crimes, thank you very much.)

"What you've done is very serious." He does detect some mild irritation in her voice, and he laps that right up to sate the other hunger.

It's enough to sustain him. For now, anyways.

He shuts his eyes, one of his ears flicking. An expression of complete and utter nonchalance on his face.

She doesn't bother commenting, and he can't see the expression on Her Purple Plotted Majesty's face with his eyes closed. Not that he'd want to.

The Purple Princess steps back, her hooves clippity-clopping against the floor. There's the sound of a tail swish, the hair travelling through the air as she whips her tail about in the way that mares like to do.

And then, the familiar sound of her horn flaring.

He opens his eyes and turns his head to glare directly at her.

"This is for your own safety. And, for that matter, my safety." She explains, her voice still as bland as ever.

Sombra scoffs, before his attention is directed to runes being written in magic, within two circles.

He tries to move his foreleg to get himself up and into a better position to look at them.

There is decent certainty that this is a ward being created.

He manages to prop his upper body up for a moment, before his leg gives out and he collapses to the dungeon's floor, disturbing some dust. He coughs to try and rid the irritant from his windpipe and lungs.

A shimmer of a half-bubble.

She's completed it, and he's no closer to getting out.

He breathes in and out in a haggard wheeze, ears lowering as he regards the crowned one from over his shoulder.

The pins and needles are really pissing him off.

"It is aerated. You won't have any trouble with oxygen intake, provided you don't disturb the dust."

He looks back up at the shield spell again, one of his ears perking.

No, wait, this is a ward. It's the type of spell one can 'set and forget'.

(He used plenty of these.)

"There are also healing and magical regeneration wards within that bubble that I've placed you in. These should keep you stable."

Suicide was off the table in the first place, given his complete and utter lack of magic. While his reserves might have somewhat regenerated by now, to have such a lack of power after being full of it...

He tilts his head upwards in annoyance, giving another irate huff as a response.

"We cannot rush things. There are preparations to be made, Sombra."

He rests his head on the dirty floor again, ears pinning back, before lowering.

"I'll be seeing you soon."

(That's not a comfort.)

Clip. Clop.

Her hoofsteps are measured as they beat against the tiled floor of the dungeon cell.

Clip. Clop.

There is the whoosh of magic as her horn opens the door for her.

And there's the scrape of the door against the floor.

Too much- too much-

He outright snarls and growls, bristling and whipping his head to stare angrily at the monarch for the ungodly noise.

"I'm sorry. I can't dampen the noise very well within the shield ward without it potentially cutting off oxygen."

(Her voice isn't even apologetic!)

His jaw hurts from how much he's gritting it. The door scrapes across the ground again.

There's the sound of the door clicking into place with a rattle of the rusted bars, and then the key turns in the lock.

Everything involving that was too loud. Too much.

His heart hammers in his chest.

Barely restrained growls rumble from his throat.

(It's not even lubricated enough, he's probably buggering a few things involving that area up.)

It takes him a while to manage to calm himself down, rubbing at his head with the hoof that isn't currently restrained by an IV.

The pins and needles feeling feels like it's going away on that hoof specifically. It keeps threatening to come back.

He huffs out a shaky breath, ears lowering. He doesn't know why he felt like the door scraping against the tile was painful. It had to be stopped by any means necessary, even if he had to act like a wild animal...

But why would such a thing make him utterly lose it?

He used to have more composure.

...Maybe it's the amount of time without sensory input aside from his own breathing and bodily noises?

Or maybe it's being revived. The things in his ear might be very new. Undamaged, fresh.

His tail flicks, earning him another round of pins and needles.

Maybe it's too much sensory input? The pins and needles, as well as the feeling of an IV in a vein didn't help. The light didn't help.

(He's decently certain he always had trouble with sunlight and light in general, even when he was a filly.)

Now calmer, the once-king Sombra huffs out a sigh, and rests his head on the stone floor of the dungeon cell.

Nothing more to do than dream.

Author's Note

Not entirely satisfied with this chapter, but don't want to scrap it either as it continues directly from the previous one.