//------------------------------// // Chapter 3: Therapy with Raiden // Story: A Little Girls Love // by darkmage1997 //------------------------------// Inside the throne room of the castle, the friends from Ponyville, the two Royal Sisters, Raiden, and Cadence were all gathered, "Now then, Raiden, the reason I asked for you specifically is to help Mavis. Of course, you already knew that," Cadence said. "Yes, but if I may ask, why me?" Raiden asked. "Well, it's because I think Mavis should feel more comfortable talking to a human. See, even though she has been more open with Shining Armor and myself, she still seems to harbor some sort of misconception towards us," Cadence explained. "I see. Well, I may not be an expert in psychology therapy, but whatever is troubling Mavis must be deep rooted in her subconscious," Raiden theorized. "You mean like she was bullied for doing something others would view as embarrassing or offensive?" Rainbow Dash asked. "Could be. So, my request for you, Raiden, is to at least try to get through to Mavis," Cadence said. "I will do what I can," Raiden said. "Wait, Princess Luna has that spell that can let others peer into the memories of others, right? So, why not just do it that way?" Rainbow Dash asked. "Because, Rainbow, I can only use that spell when the pony, or in this case, human, is asleep," Luna replied. "Plus, it wouldn't do all that much for Mavis in the way of helping. We need to understand how she views the rest of us, as well as possible allergies or medical conditions she may have, her specific likes and dislikes, etc.," Raiden added. "I think I get the picture now," Rainbow Dash commented. "Princess, if I may ask, could you have the chefs prepare something sweet for Mavis? I want her to feel as comfortable as possible when I talk to her," Raiden asked. "Of course. I'll have the chefs whip up a plate of cookies for you and her," Cadence replied. "Alright, then if you'll show me to the room she was staying in, I'll begin compiling a base set of questions to ask her," Raiden requested. "Of course. As for the rest of you, can you go and find our children? I'd like for Mavis to start her therapy session as soon as possible," Cadence requested politely. "Ok," Twilight said, as they took off to find the kids. Cadence then led Raiden to Mavis' room. "By the way, what did you mean by 'medical conditions'?" Cadence asked. "We don't know anything about Mavis, so we don't know if she has some kind of medical condition that we need to be aware of. I'm talking like asthma, low blood sugar, that sort of thing," Raiden replied, as they arrived. "I'll bring Mavis to you, once she arrives back," Cadence said, leaving the Thunder Teen to begin writing down his questions. To say that Mavis was having an anxiety attack would be an understatement. Being surrounded by the new ponies made her uncomfortable enough, but being surrounded by humans was a scary experience for her, 'I-I'll be alright, as long as they never find out about.... that, I should be safe from them. But that d-doesn't make this any less s-scary!' Mavis thought, as she clutched the three stuffed animals Chris treated her to. They consisted of a duck, a bear, and a puppy dog. Kelly noticed the unrest in Mavis' eyes. She wanted to do something to help Mavis, but chose against it. She felt that Mavis felt scared enough with being in a new world without someone breathing down her neck. Just then, they saw Twilight coming towards them. "Hey Twilight, what's up?" Chris asked. "We're ready back at the castle," Twilight replied. She continued to talk to the kids, but for Mavis, it was all drowned out by fear. 'R-ready? R-ready for what?' Mavis thought, before a fearful thought took over, 'Oh no, did they find out?! Are they going to eat me?! I don't want to die!' Mavis fearfully thought, as she tried in vain to back away, only to be stopped by Melody and Clover. "Hey, don't worry Mavis, Raiden is one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet," Melody said. "Sure, he get's cranky whenever someone interrupts his experiments, but he won't hurt you," Clover added, as they all walked to the castle, dragging the distressed Mavis along with them. To her, they were dragging Mavis to her doom. Inside Mavis' extremely overactive imagination, Mavis was in her mermaid form, and was tied up and gagged. She screamed for help, but was all in vain, as she was taken to the kitchen, and placed on the cutting board. Above her, Chris and Cory were staring with demonic expressions on their faces. Looking around, she saw the other human children, all preparing for a big seafood buffet, and like the two eldest boys, they were all just as demonic, and evil looking. Mavis started to cry, as she was begging to be let go from the rag gagging her. She looked up to see Chris readying to chop up Mavis with a massive butcher knife. Mavis screamed as he brought down the knife. Reality, Mavis was snapped out of her terror vision, as she found herself back in her room, all sweaty from her fearful thoughts, "W-when did I get here?" Mavis questioned. "Just a few moments ago," she turned, and her face paled even further at the sight of Raiden, sitting in a chair, "Allow me to introduce myself. I am Raiden Fujiyama. I came here at the request of the Princess to ask you a few questions," Raiden said in a soothing tone, trying to ease Mavis' fears. He then motioned to the seat opposite of him, "Please, have a seat. This won't take long," Raiden added. "P-please, just d-don't hurt me. I p-promise I'll be g-good," Mavis tearfully begged. "Relax. I am not planning on harming you in anyway. Like I said, I just want to ask a few questions, then I'll leave you alone," Raiden said. Seeing as she had no alternatives, Mavis gave up, and sat in the chair, "Now then, Cadence said that she and her husband found you lost and all alone in the alleys of the Empire, correct?" Raiden asked. "O-oui," Mavis replied, trying not to panic. "Now then, I'm sure you're feeling scared and overwhelmed by being in another world, but I assure you, as long as the princess, or one of her friends is with you, no one will harm you," Raiden said. He then motioned to the plate of cookies on the table in front of them, "Please, help yourself," he offered. Mavis looked at the cookies. Raiden made a point to note a few things. 1. Mavis seemed to be on the verge of mental collapse, as made evident by the tears in her eyes. 2. even though he said she could have some cookies, she seemed unwilling to even take one. in fact, she seemed to try to scoot away from the plate, 'Hmm, how curious,' he thought. He then proceeded to try and ask the rest of his questions. 1 1/2 hours later, "So, even with the stuffed animals you gave her, she still seemed to be scared of you guys?" Twilight asked. "Yeah. But I don't understand why. She was eyeing them in the toy store, but she seemed dead set on not getting them when we offered to get them for her," Chris replied. Just then, the doors to the throne room opened up. Entering was a very perplexed Raiden. "Well, how did it go?" Cadence asked. "Well, it took a bit longer than I originally intended, but I was able to gather up some bits and pieces of Mavis' mind set," Raiden replied with a frown, "Although, I wonder about her mental state, and what could have gotten her in such a shape as she is now," Raiden said. "Well, what did you find out?" Rainbow Dash asked. "Well, I was able to confirm a few things. First and foremost, she has a slight case of pantophobia. That much, I can say for certain on a piece of paper, but the rest of these details are a bit of the delicate nature, extremely difficult to put on paper," Raiden stated. "What kind of details?" Celestia asked. "Well, for starters, she appears to have some kind of aversion to food items with processed sugar in them. I offered her the cookies I requested, but she seemed to be absolutely terrified of them," Raiden replied. "Why on Earth would she choose willingly to ignore something like that?" Crystal asked. "No doubt the sugars would make her way to hyper, and she would be able to go racing around the world!" Rainbow Dash theorized, as an image of Mavis racing around at lightspeeds entered their minds. "She doesn't want to be fat, so she makes it a point to avoid as much sugar based products as possible," Raiden corrected. Everyone did an anime style trip and fall. "REALLY?! What is she, Rarity?!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed. "HEY!" Rarity yelled, sounding offended. "Apparently, she saw an episode of a TV show called 'Rugrats' that traumatized her from eating anymore sweets. She said she doesn't even try going Trick or Treating on Halloween. But according to what I gather, she can have sugar, but it has to be in extremely small amounts. Anything that's naturally sweet, such as honey is exempt from this," Raiden clarified. "Ok, I guess that would be rather difficult to put on paper," Cadence said. "While we're on the topic of her diet, she also seems to have an extremely low metabolism, much lower than that of any child her age. This is why she doesn't eat much. I did offer her a way to help regulate her metabolism to make equal to that of Heaven's metabolism, but she immediately declined," Raiden continued. "Now why did she do that then?" Applejack questioned. "No doubt the medicine would unlock some kind of godly power, resting deep within her! She'd go on a blood rampage!" Nathan exclaimed, as an image of Mavis being surrounded by a golden energy, her normally black hair turning yellow, entered their minds. "Actually, she hates needles, and the medicine has to be injected into her bloodstream to work," Raiden corrected, "Though, I have been working an ingestible tablet version of the medicine, but it's still in the testing stage," he explained further. He then turned to Cadence, "Shall I continue?" he asked. "I see no reason to stop now," Cadence solemnly replied. "Next up, she has an aversion to receiving presents, such as toys and the like," Raiden stated. "You know, now that I think about it, Mavis seemed absolutely unwilling to accept the toys we got for her," Kelly commented. "So, what's the deal with this? Is she like some kind of voodoo witch doctor in training or something?" Vibrant Sky questioned, an image of Mavis cackling like a witch, stirring a cauldron entered their minds. "The latter. Apparently, her dislike of getting presents stems from another trauma she had in her home town. Apparently, she saw some kids getting scolded and punished for throwing tantrums inside toy stores. She now fears getting yelled at, so she tries her best to not want any toys. The same goes for sugary foods," Raiden explained. "Well, kids don't like getting punished for being bad, but does Mavis really think she's bad?" Pinkie Pie asked. "It would appear so. Before we began the session, she promised that she would be good if I didn't hurt her," Raiden replied. "Hmm, so Mavis isn't the like any of the children we took in. Unlike the rest of you, Mavis doesn't seem to trusting of us," Twilight said. "Did you find anything else out, Raiden?" Cadence asked. "Afraid not. About halfway through my questions, she started nodding off. So, I let her crawl into bed to take a nap," Raiden replied, turning to Princess Luna, "I take it you can handle things from this point?" he asked. "I will. I just hope we get to the bottom of whatever makes her act so timidly," Luna replied, as she lit up her horn, and disappeared.