//------------------------------// // A Fate Deserved // Story: The Odd One // by theOwtcast //------------------------------// The hours stretched long with nothing happening. The guard had barely moved except to breathe and blink, no sounds came from the rooms above, and the pony in the cell opposite to mine snored blissfully on his cot. Surprisingly, there weren’t even any rats scurrying about and pestering me. Hadn’t the rumors I’d heard in the hive about pony prisons mentioned hundreds if not thousands of rats infesting every nook and crevice? Not that I minded the rumors being false, even if only in this prison! I remained sprawled dismally on the floor, barely moving, lost in thought. How much time had passed since I was brought here? I didn’t know; it was long enough to assume that night had fallen long ago, but beyond that, I couldn’t tell. Did it matter? Probably not. I didn’t have any definite knowledge about the ponies’ judicial system, but I doubted that they would simply let me go after a certain amount of time as if nothing had happened. They were probably keeping me here until they decided on appropriate punishment, whatever that would include. And I had accumulated quite a list of charges for them to have fun with! Assaulting a pony and feeding on her. Illegal presence in Equestria. False pretences. Disturbing the public order, probably, or however they called it. Harassment of the Royal Family? Resisting capture in Canterlot. In Manehattan, too. Banishment from buffalo territory. Was that even in Equestria? Stowaway on a train. Apple theft. How laughable that seemed now, compared to the rest of the list! And I wasn’t even guilty of that one, not really! It had been a misunderstanding! But even if that misunderstanding did eventually get sorted out and written off, I would still be in a lot of trouble for everything else on that list. Most of it had been acts of self-preservation, but would the ponies in charge of punishing me believe it? Would it help me if they did? It could make things worse; apparently changelings weren’t even allowed to legally exist in Equestria! This was only logical, though; my kind had never brought ponies anything good, only fear and destruction! As unfair as it may sound to make someone illegal in a country just because of which species he or she belonged to, what other choice did the ponies have? I didn’t like that decision, but part of me was, in a way, supportive of it, even if I was about to suffer its consequences; how else were ponies supposed to defend themselves from my kind if not by making every effort to keep us away from themselves? But what would the punishment for that be? Simpy sending or escorting us away from their territory wouldn’t do much, as they couldn’t keep us from coming back, therefore, that probably wasn’t done, at least I’d never heard of it having happened. A lifetime in prison seemed like a more likely solution to their problem with us… unless… Did ponies practice death penalty? Did their law allow for it even if ponies hardly ever resorted to such extreme measures? Goodness, I hoped not! Chrysalis may have sentenced me to death for betraying the hive, but she was so far away now, and I’d started to believe that she might not find me and exact that punishment by now! If the ponies sentenced me to death too… I didn’t want to die, not now when I finally had a few friends! Did I still have friends, actually? Would Spike and the others still want to call me their friend upon finding out what I’d done to that mare? And they would find out, I was sure of it! Flashbacks of that horrible night flooded my mind again. Frustration and emotional exhaustion… Lost in an unknown land… Hungry… so unbearably hungry… A moonlit city… a mare strolling in an empty street… That desperate hunger! A mare in the street… enjoying the night… Love… sweet, tasty love… Control yourself! Love… hunger… Hunger screaming, demanding its due! Mare… love… hunger… so much hunger… Restraints falling down… A vow betrayed… a lifetime of integrity, gone! And the mare’s empty eyes as the black monster drained the love out of her. The mare’s empty eyes haunted me still, refused to leave me alone after all this time, tormented me insufferably in this cold, dark prison cell that I was barely aware of anymore. All my existence drowned in those neverending purple eyes, shriveled under their severe, empty gaze. Why did you do this to me? they screamed. Why did you sentence me to a cursed shadow of a life? I used to be happy! they screamed. I used to love life, you monster, and because of you, I’ll never be happy again! How will I ever love again, they pleaded, when you robbed me of all the love there was in my heart? Burning tears filled my eyes and flowed down my face; a lifetime of tears waited yet to be unleashed… and I knew with my whole being that all the tears in the world couldn’t begin to repay my debt, undo the horrors I’d committed! I’m sorry, I begged the sad, purple eyes to understand. I’m so deeply, unbearably sorry! If I could turn back time, I would… believe me, I would… I would rip my own heart out sooner than allow myself to harm you! But the eyes burned me still with their unforgiving gaze. I may have had the strength of character to confess my sins, and I intended to have the same strength to accept whatever punishment was deemed necessary. But I didn’t deserve forgiveness, I knew that too well! I deserved to be in this cell, to remain locked in it forever, to wither and rot away in its cold darkness, safely away from the sight and love of any pony who might become the next victim of my malignant urges that I’d failed to restrain once and might fail to restrain again if something pushed me over the edge like it had in that awful, cursed moment! For the sake of all the ponies around me, I had to be locked away in the most isolated corner of the world, where I could do no possible harm to any creature! Either that, or to be killed immediately, before I had the chance to even try something I shouldn’t! I didn’t want to die, but if that was the price I had to pay to keep the ponies safe from my uncontrollable rampaging… so be it. But even if they decided it was necessary to prevent any further incidents, I knew that nothing in the world could compensate for what I’d done to that mare, let alone undo the damage. There was no pain, no weapon, no torture spell they could unleash on me that would come close to matching the horrors that mare had suffered - and probably still did suffer if she was alive - at the mercy of the darkness that had overtaken my mind! Death wouldn’t be a punishment. It would be letting me off easy, showing me the mercy I didn’t deserve! Oh, how I wished, how I desperately wished I could go back in time and stop myself before succumbing to the worst instincts within me! I wouldn’t have died without feeding on the mare’s love, I knew that now: I’d been even hungrier since, while hiding in that cave on the outskirts of the Crystal Empire, and survived nevertheless! And that was one of the worst parts of the whole incident: that I’d violated and destroyed the poor mare when it hadn’t even been necessary for my own survival! My tears had died down at some point, but now they started pouring out all over again. I let them; for whatever it was worth, they would be a pathetic testament to my immeasurable remorse, even if they couldn’t make it lie any easier on my heart. The rivers of tears drained me out eventually and the burden of guilt tortured me into exhaustion. I fell asleep right where I was, on the cold, wet floor of my prison cell.