//------------------------------// // The Madness Revealed // Story: The Monster in Me // by Scarves //------------------------------// I once had a name... I can’t remember it any more... I wish I could... By they don’t let me... I have many names now... Such as Freak... The Creature Abomination Thing It Alien MONSTER. Monster was the worst. I know the definition of monster. It says that a monster is an imaginary creature that is typically large, ugly, and frightening. I'm large, I don’t think I’m ugly and I didn’t ever think I was frightening. But I guess that to ponies I must be a monster. I fit the description. I am different, taller and frightening to them so therefore I must be a monster. But I don’t want to be. When I came here I thought maybe Celestia might have understood, despite the many failed attempts before. She did not, she thought I was a monster. I don’t want to be a monster. I am now condemned. Dammed Cursed Cast out Banished Exiled Branded Named Out of all of those, being named is the worst. I was named a monster. Not even a proper name. But I already had a name, I've forgotten it now. It pains me deeply that I have forgotten my own name. They replaced it with Monster. I used to have a life. I was once a human. I was once a person. There was a time, I wasn’t a monster. But that time is now dead. It died with my name. It is a life I am starting to forget, a life that is being replaced with the life of a monster. I am now just fading away, slowly becoming a myth, a legend and an old bedtime story. It pains me to think that they ignored me. They could have helped, but they chose not to listen to my pleas. I try to think that they knew they couldn’t send me home and just didn’t want to tell me. So they shunned me and told me to go away so they didn’t have to deal with me. But I know that’s not true. How could they help a monster? Soon I won’t be a monster, I won’t be alive. They won’t care, they never did and so they never will. I am not dying from disease. I wish I was, but magic doesn’t allow that to happen. I am not dying from age. I am still only around 25 years old, I can’t remember, even though I've only lived here for a few years. I am dying because I am going to ask if I can be turned to stone. I'm going to ask the Elements of Harmony to kill me. I am a monster after all. And monsters are not allowed to have a life. But monster do have powers, mine is that I can choose. And I choose to end my life. That makes me a monster. That makes me different. But it is also what makes me human. And ponies don’t like humans, they don’t like me and they don’t like monsters. I walk out of my home I had made in the Everfree, the place of monsters, the place I called Home. I walk to the outskirts of Ponyville and wait. I wait for my executioners, I wait for death. My death. As I stood out side of Ponyville, I fiddled with my survival knife. It was one of the few tools I actually possessed, I mean if someone throws something at you that means they don't want it right? It wasn't a real survival knife, just a kitchen one. But after getting it stuck between my shoulder blades I figured I might as well use it for something other than pointless violence or an angry mob tool. Half the time I think they are ignorant of the damage they do to me, the other half don't even care. I can never tell anyway so what does it matter? I didn't have to wait long before I heard a battle-cry coming towards me with increasing speed. I wait until it gets loudest before I quickly side step a prismatic missile, which blows past and crash lands behind me. "Alright chump! You're in for a world of hurt now!" I scoff at her choice of words. "I am in pain every second I exist. What more can you do to me?" My words cause her to pause for a moment, until she hears her friends calling her name as they come to the 'rescue'. "Rainbow Dash! Has it hurt anypony? What is it up to this time?" I hear the sound of her flying over my head to regroup with her friends. "I was waiting for you." At this a quick look of confusion passes over their faces before it is quickly replaced by suspicion and anger. "Well, whatever you're up to it won't work!" I let out a short laugh. "No it won't. Why would it? The universe loves me too much. It enjoys seeing me suffer. I am it's torture doll after all." Confusion crosses their features once again before Twilight Sparkle speaks up. "Stop talking in riddles and tell us what it is you want or just go away before we make you!" I laugh again, "But of course Princess! You have already done that so many times, sent me back to that little place of hell in that forest of horrors. But, yes, there is something that I want. I have wanted it for the better part of year. I want to die." I can start to see the uncertainty and doubt in their eyes. "Why should we trust you? For all we know you brought us here to kill us with that knife!" I flick the into the air and balance its point on the tip of my finger. "What, this little pocket knife? I only brought it for a demonstration." The six ponies seem to be getting either restless or nervous now. This time it's Rarity that speaks up. "What demonstration?" "I was waiting for that. You see I can't die." Twilight speaks up again, "But you just said that you wanted to die. So why come here saying you can't?" "Why, that's what the knife is for!" Without warning I grab the knife by its handle and stab it into my chest up to the hilt so it's tip is in the center of my heart. All they can do is gasp in surprise and revulsion at my action, that is before I slowly pull it out again. Twilight and Rarity can only stare in horror and morbid fascination. A straight haired Pinkie Pie is consoling a puking Fluttershy. Rainbow Dash is trying to look away while Applejack is trying to do the same without puking as well. With small grunt I finally get the blade out and toss it to the ground where my blood begins to drip off and stain the ground a dark crimson. "You see! I have tried so many times to do it myself! But my body repairs itself every time! I have the ultimate curse!" I nearly laugh again but I am interrupted by Twilight. "You're a monster!" She spat. I give a deep chuckle that made them all shiver. Perhaps I was getting a little too caught up in this roll of evil monster. A small voice was shouting, telling me that something wasn't right, that I shouldn't be acting like this. A shake of my head and a monster I was once again. "Yes I am, after all, you made me that way! So, here's what will happen, I will wait here for one day, you will come back with the infamous Elements of Harmony. Then you will use them to destroy me and you get to go on with your merry little lives all happy and carefree now that you killed the monster. It's a win win situation for every one!" Twilight looked back at her friends as if searching for an answer, after they nodded back to her she turned around and gave me their answer. "No. We won't do it. The Elements of Harmony aren't meant to be used like that." I let out the breath I had been holding as a sigh. Time to do this the hard way. I wasn't comfortable with what I had to say to make them do it, but I think I moved past any point of redemption with the knife trick. "Alright, you don't think you have a reason to use the Elements? Let me give you one! Every time an angry mob comes at me I have run away. But I can't die, so next time I won't run. When ponies see that I can pull a knife out of my chest like it was nothing then it will be their turn to run away! And after they are in their little homes, they will listen as I try to kill myself in as many ways I know how. They can't get me and I can't die. Oh think of the foals! Do you want to expose them to that? Having me walk into each city proclaiming in a loud voice 'Princess Twilight Sparkle refused to kill me, so I came here to see if you could!' So again I ask, kill me with the Elements this time tomorrow and everyone wins." Fury, anger and sickness was blended into their expressions as they considered my words. They seemed hesitant to make up their minds so I helped them along. "I might start by slicing my throat open, perhaps at a school yard." I felt myself cringe on the inside, I wasn't expecting myself to say something quite that cruel. Applejack was unable to keep holding her lunch down and let it loose over the ground, Rainbow Dash was looking at me with genuine fear in hers eyes, perhaps for the first time, having only ever seen me as a nuisance than a real monster. Rarity and Pinkie were both trying to look after Fluttershy who had fainted at some point. And then there was Twilight, trying so hard to make the right decision. "You have until this time tomorrow before I start. Go home and think about it. I'll be waiting, right here." As they turned and walked slowly back to Ponyvville I was once again left alone with nothing but my own thoughts, as the weight of what I had said finally came crashing down I broke out into tears. That night nopony slept well, the monsters fearsome howls kept many ponies from sleeping at all. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________ When they returned the next day there was no fan fair, no noise, no grand announcements or trumpets. Just a group of ponies marching towards me as if ready for war. "Well look who it is! High and mighty Princess Celestia! Come to make sure the big bad monster doesn't hurt her little ponies." I mocked in childish voice. "Your mockery is hardly insulting foul creature." She deadpanned. "Ouch." I deadpanned back. In the background Discord looked like he was having a hard time containing his laughter. I turned my attention to my other visitors. "Ah, Princess Luna! Here to guard against the terrors of the night and all the things that go bump! Tell me, how many foals have had nightmares of me?" I asked with as sinister a grin as I could muster. She returned a look of disgust and replied "Far to many for the likes of a creature as bald as you appear." "Oh! Burn! She got you good monkey boy!" Exclaimed Discord. I let small chuckle escape my lips while Discord received glares from every pony present. "What? She did." I moved on, directing my attention to the Prince and Princess of the Crystal Empire. "Excuse me, Prince Shinning Armour, as former Captain of the royal guard, perhaps you might help me answer a question I had." He eyed me sharply before replying, "You are remarkably well informed for some freak living in the Everfree Forrest." "And quite right you are! But my question Captain, or should I say Prince? Will you answer it?" He looked at Princess Cadence and upon receiving a nod he in turn nodded to me. "How do you kill something that can't die?" If he was at all surprised by my question he failed to show it. "You erase it from existence captain! But tell me, are any of the collective creatures here capable of such a feat?" Still refraining from giving me any type of emotional reaction that I was fishing for, he simply nodded once. "But are any of them willing?" There it was, even all that training couldn't stop that small shift in his body language. Holding his head a little higher, hooves shuffled a little closer and his eyes narrowed. "See, that's the thing. In order to get warranted a blast with the Elements you gotta be bad, not small time just brushed away bad, you have to be Equestria threatening bad." I walked over to where I had left my knife and began to twirl it between my fingers as I spoke. "Now I realize that you are all having a little trouble visualizing me as a villain, the Equestria threateningly bad type. So let me make a very clear point of how much worse I could choose to be." I stop fiddling with the knife a throw it at Celestia, which she stops before it even reaches the halfway point from me to her chest. "I cannot die from a wide variety of wounds, I have knowledge of weapons and tactics beyond your comprehension and I have a lot of time to myself. Instead of asking and pleading for help I could have disappeared like you wanted me to and plotted my revenge. You never would have cared where I went until I showed up again with some horrible plan. But I would not stand there and talk about it, if it was my aim to kill ponies then they would be dead. So this is your last warning. Kill me and make Equestria safe again or I will strip this land of its innocence like a Manticore that once tried to devour me alive. I say that it tried because it never finished eating me, it's easy to crush a creatures heart when you're on the inside of one." By this point most of the guards had taken a step back and lost their stoic demeanor emotions ranging from fear to shock and even some hate. Luna and Celestia were looking at each with mixed expressions talking out a silent battle that would decide my fate. Discord was looking puzzled, which honestly surprised me, as I never expected him to show up in the first place, but also considering my words. What had I said that had him looking puzzled in the first place? The Elements reactions were pretty much the same as my last encounter except this time with sadness, regret and shame. With a nod from Luna, Celestia walked towards me then looked me in the eye. It said everything she needed to say to me. I could see those thousand years of regret and pain. I could see the pain of loss and suffering of astounding old age. I could see her sadness at having to take my life. I could see that she was telling me to reconsider. "Please reconsider what you ask us to do. Please understand that we can help you. You don't have to do this." I did. I had to. I was a monster. I had asked six innocent ponies to end my life. And they had too. "No. You had your chance to help me in other ways and you threw it back in face in the form of anger mobs and witch hunts! You kill me here and now or you will regret it." I focused my glare on Celestia. "I consider myself a man of my word Celestia. Are you sure you want to risk it?" With a look of resignation, Celestia nodded towards Twilight and her friends and they started to move into formation. "I had a sister. I can't remember her name though. She was 6 years younger than I. I only just realized that I'll never see her again." They paused, wondering what I was doing. I started walking closer. A few guards took a battle stance but most remained confused. "I had a life and it was taken from so I could be beaten, maimed, tortured and for what?!" I was screaming at his point and walking a little faster. "It's all your fault isn't it?! You brought me here somehow and you just never cared enough to send me back! Well now I've changed my mind. I'll just have to kill you all instead!" I broke out into a run but I was swiftly stopped by a golden aura. I maintained a glare at Celestia as she kept me held tight within her grip. Then ever so slowly I began to move again. When Celestia grabbed me I hadn't stopped trying to run towards her, so when she grabbed me I had expected to be lifted into the air. Instead she held me in place and against all odds I was resisting her. With a collective gasp of shock I kept moving. Was it the rage? Was it the urge to kill? Was it the pain? I didn't know what it was but it was driving me to move against an impossibly strong force. As she poured more and more strength into the spell it became harder to move again, but the feeling would pass after a few agonizingly long seconds. When Celestia started to show strain Luna joined in and by then I was a few meters away from them. "Why do you hate us so much? What have we done to you? Surely you knew how you got here?" "I don't care! I don't need your pitiful explanations! Either you kill me here and now or I make life in Equestria so unbearable you will have no choice but do it anyway! You took my life away from me!" In one last deperate attempt to get me to change my mind she brought up a topic she never should have. "What about your sister? If you do this then you will never see her again!" My mind snapped and all emotion drained away from my face. "She died 4 years ago as of when I left. I visited her grave every day so that I wouldn't forget her and how much she meant to me." For a moment as her face and heart softened, the spell weakened for a moment. I took that opportunity to get right up close and slowly raise my arms in a futile effort to choke her. "But now your the ones responsible for this! Her memory has slowly slipped away and all that she was with it! You can imprison me! You can chain me up! But it wont stop me! Not unless you kill me it will! Never! Stop!" The Princesses looked at each other and nodded with sad expressions and mentioned for all the ponies present to move back. With faces set in grim determination the six elements took formation and started the spell. The rainbow launched high into the air, looking somewhat dull, and was just about to arc down, when Celestia said a final goodbye that almost made me change my mind with the sincerity with which she said it. “For what little it might be worth, I am sorry.” The rainbow was coming closer and was almost near impact. I looked her in the eye and said my last words. They were by far the hardest and most sincere words that I had ever said. “I forgive you.” Impact, and then excruciating pain. As I was not of godlike status I could feel every second of it. My skin slowly changing and solidifying. My blood turning cold and freezing bit by bit until it finally reached my already cold heart. I felt my heart stop and crack as it turned to stone. The last part to turn was my face. I was turned with an expression of pain and agony and small tear on my cheek. When it was over they cried. They mourned the loss of a monster. The guards resumed their passive expressions but underneath their emotions were in turmoil. Desperately trying to understand what they had witnessed. Cadence who had remained silent throughout the whole ordeal broke down in tears and fell upon her husband for support. Discord remained silent, watching and thinking about all that had transpired. Princess Luna looked conflicted, torn between seeing a monster getting what it deserved and a humble creature just trying to find peace. "Perhaps we were wrong. Perhaps the creature that brought you here was the that had been lying. And if that is the case, just how terrible must we seem?" With those words Celestia watched emotionless as the guards began preparing the statue for transport to the Canterlot Gardens. She did not move from were she stood for the entire time that the statue was loaded up and flown away. All the while her emotions ran wild but she still remained emotionless. Finally, as she sensed it was time to set the sun, she made ready to fly back to Canterlot. As she flew back to Canterlot a thought ran rampant through her mind, almost mocking her, 'Which of us was really the monster in the first place.' It was a question that would taunt her for days, weeks and even months to come. Perhaps even longer than that. The End.