//------------------------------// // Chapter 3: A Walk Home // Story: What Lies Behind Green Eyes // by Sky Feather //------------------------------// Chapter 3: A Walk Home I turn to him and ask when his parents would be coming home. “They won’t be here until Thursday. They’re on a cruise”, the gray pegasus replies. Ironically there was a calendar across the room. It was Monday. “Okay, well I better get going. It’s getting late”, I say, trying to get out of the house. I wasn’t scared, it was just awkward being in a stranger’s house. He stops me with a gentle hoof. “You are in no condition to walk outside in the freezing cold by yourself.” I look at him sternly. “Okay, fine. But at least let me walk you home.” I nod in agreement; it sounded like a good idea.                 As we exited his cabin, we walked down the path he must’ve taken to bring me to his house. There seemed to be hoof prints in the snow, except going the opposite way. Oliver was right, it is pretty cold out here. My vision began to blur. Oh no, not now… Did you miss me, Emma? Ignore her, she’s just trying to get on your nerves. Oh no, I would never do that! I can’t believe you think I’d do that. So rude.  “Shut up, Abby” I say aloud. Crap… To my horror, he turns to me in confusion. “Who’s Abby?” He asks. I try to play it off like I’m still light-headed. “Ah, I see the rainbows…” I mutter, hoping it would work. He gives me a hysterical look. “Uh, Emma, what rainbows?” “Right there….” I point to his face with an attempted drunken look. It seemed to work, but not the way I wanted. “I think I should watch over you for the night. One more time can’t hurt”, he says. ]I think he’s got a liking for you… You better shut up before I make you. What are you gonna do? You can’t keep breaking that precious magic source of yours. What a waste. Abby, not now. Oh no, I’m so scared! What will I ever do?! Sigh… You know, I couldn’t help but laugh when you started hitting your horn on that tree. It hurt you and you know it did. No, I’m stronger than you and you know that. Only I can change my form, and that horn of yours isn’t going to continue growing back. Those things only have so much magic to heal themselves. I’m just infesting your life to make it your nightmare. All your family is gone, you have no friends, you’re dangerous, it’s fun toying with you and testing your sanity. I stumbled to the left, ironically right by that same scratched up tree. Oliver attempted to help me up, but my horn somehow managed to gather enough magic to send him flying backwards. “Nooo!” I scream, tears falling down my face from utter shock, fear, and something else I’m not quite sure about. “Abby, this isn’t right!! You need to STOP!!!” I cry out. I run into the tree countless times cursing her name. Oliver gets up again and charges towards me in an attempt to help me out. Unfortunately, Abby makes me dodge his leap and he softly crashes into the snow.                 Knowing that he landed safely in the soft snow, I quickly ran inside my cabin with just enough time to grab a saw and began to end the chaos. Sawing through the horn, I picked up the pace. Oliver barged in and began to fight with me for the saw. My next move was pure luck. I let go of the saw, immediately making him fall backwards. With just enough bone to hold on to my head, I swung my head against the wall, breaking the last part of the horn I had left. “Ha…ha, I got it that time”, I stuttered, blood dripping down my face. When he gets back up, his face only shows pure heartbreak and distress. He runs to me and begins to cry. “Why did you do that?! That’s not okay!” He screams. I flinch at the tone of his morbid voice, even though it wasn’t to threaten me; it was merely a frightened voice. “Oliver, you don’t understand, I’m dangerous… There is a creature that infests my horn every day that taunts me, hurts anypony I know, and pushes my sanity to its limit. Please know that this is not your fault and there was nothing you could do…” I rest my crimson-stained forehead on his shaky shoulder. “I’m sorry Oliver, I’m so sorry…” He hugs me tighter. “Don’t be, it’s only the parasite to blame. I wish it would go away too, but you would have to ask one of higher class to break the curse.” I look into his luring eyes and kept that gaze for a while. He chuckled softly, and said “Hey, how about I watch over you tonight, then in the morning we can go for a nice morning walk?” I guess he didn’t know about my “morning walks”. “How about we could watch the stars come out and then head back inside?” I ask, which didn’t seem like that bad of an idea. “Sure”, he said, smiling as I wiped his tears away.