Minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years? How long was I with Fluttershy? How much time did I spend just sitting on her couch making a mess of her sweatshirt? I don't think I care about that any more. For the first time, someone was there for me. They didn't need anything from me, they were just there to hear my troubles, to listen to me and not get paid to do so. I guess that's something I've always craved, just someone who was there for me. I was always there for others, Twilight, Rarity, Tia, but no one was there for me. Quick is too new in my life to really count as being there for me always, and I'm a pillar of strength for her. I can't really decide to be weak and break down in front of her, Celestia was always too distant and Twilight is Twilight. I thought none of them ever saw me as a person who needs others; I was just always there.
In the conclusion of my breakdown, I couldn't help but feel one thing. Dread, I dreaded about how the same cycle of abuse would start all over again and I would just drag Quick along with me. There's some part of me that just wants to stay here in Ponyville, and I'm thinking that it's going to win out if I don't do something soon. Fluttershy could feel me tensing up and she rubbed my back, "Spike, please talk to me. I swear I'll listen."
I cracked my eyes open and looked up at her, "Do you promise?" was all I asked.
"I promise." She replied.
"Well it started a few weeks after Twilight and I moved to Ponyville..." I started off and continued to tell her the story of how I went into a slow descent into loneliness and brief bouts of schizophrenia. The voices started after I had 'saved' the Crystal Empire. I had finally gotten my moment and then everyone burst into song about how Twilight passed her test, taking my moment from me. I was devastated, I finally got to live up to the long shadows that I had spent so many cold nights under. And I wasn't even mentioned at all, no one said congratulations, I didn't get a song or moment of harmony. It was immediately about Twilight again. Then a voice in my head spoke up, and I knew it wasn't my inner voice it told me. After all that, they show their true colors. They never cared about you.
There were other moments, like the time we got sucked into that enchanted comic book and even though I was just as important as anyone else, what happened the day after that? It was back to Spike doing all the chores, and Twilight gets to go out and be with her friends. That's another time that the other voice spoke up, Just as important as everyone else huh? I never dained to give the other voice a name, as it came and went. It only picked at the things I already knew, that at that moment...I was no one. I just faded away into my work, helping Rarity and Twilight. Barely ever go out with everyone else, and certainly never get noticed. After all I had done, I was still ignored.
Then came the breaking point, the day Applejack kissed Rarity. At first, I ran home to my bedroom. I locked the windows, I moved my bed in front of the door; then I packed my things and left. Where was Twilight during all of this? Busy in Canterlot, because Princess Celestia needed help with organizing the library and there was NO ONE better than Twilight to do so. When she knew full fucking well she had almost a hundred librarians at any given time in said library and barely used ANY of them. She just wanted to be close to the daughter she wished she had, but instead she got me. The uncrowned dragon prince, and she couldn't even be bothered to raise me! Just pawn me off to Twilight the moment I could walk and talk! I guess that's also part of the reason I left, I had no family or friends in the world. Just acquaintances, my own mother rarely spoke a word to me and I didn’t truly feel like family to her.
The person that reached out to me was Luna, she found me in my dreams. Eventually she convinced me to talk to Tia, not like I could escape her if I wanted to, I said my piece and everything was set up for me. A new identity, a business, my disguise. For a while I was very happy. Then I got visited by Twilight, I had spent so many years underneath her wing, in her shadow. That when the time came for her to have MY back; she wasn’t there. She never was, and you have no idea how hard it was for me not to say anything. I held my tongue however, I was the ever diligent assistant. I still loved her, in a round a bout way.
I still loved Rarity too, it hurt that I could never truly escape from them no matter how hard I tried to run the Elements of Harmony were always going to be to haunt me, to hurt me. I could not escape their shadows, but yet I don't blame them. They don't even know that they were doing it.
Fluttershy couldn't help but stare at me after I exposited how I felt. "You, you were schizophrenic?" She stuttered.
"Turns out it was stress induced auditory hallucinations." I sighed, and looked up at her.
"I'm so sorry." Fluttershy said.
"Stop apologizing, there's a lot of stuff to unpack. It's not entirely your fault. I'm just at a crossroads, and I don't know what to do."
"Well...What do you want to do?" Fluttershy asked.
I paused, looked down then looked back at her. "I think that's the first time that anyone has asked me that." I grabbed a tissue from the tissue box on the coffee table. I wiped my eyes and blew my nose. I threw the tissue away straightened my back and looked at her, "I know what I want to do, but I'm going to have to lie at least for a little while."
"If you're sure, then I've got your back." Fluttershy stood up, then walked over to her coat rack, grabbing my hat and jacket. Handing them to me she gave me a reassuring smile. For once I finally felt her kindness, and it felt so warm.
It was so comforting, I put on my jacket and held my hat, "Are you sure that you want to help me lie?" I asked her.
"Applejack is the element of honesty, not me." She smiled.
"I guess so."