//------------------------------//
// Chapter Fifteen: The Timely Pardon 
// Story: Bizarre Happenings 
// by Art Inspired 
//------------------------------//

Cozy Glow sat at her desk staring motionlessly into her mirror. Her eyes were focused, and her brows were furrowed. she slowly opened her mouth slightly, and then wider, but soon, she closed it again. One eye closed itself, and the other one looked very, very closely at its reflection. She backed away, and stopped investigating her facial features so much. For a time, she even tried checking her ears, and then, she said, "Wooziness... It must be a side effect of Thorax's spell."

Cozy writhed, and gagged for a few seconds as she remembered him using his magic on her. She had to take a drink of her water in order to calm herself down, and once she did, she'd return to herself. "Okay," she said with a pant. "Next time I see Thorax, I'm telling him to go see Twilight about perfecting his..." Another terrible shake overcame Cozy Glow. "Magic..."

Her hooves were brought up to shield her greenish face, and she said, "If you could even call it that! I feel like I'm inside of a washer machine!"

Cozy breathed for a couple of seconds after her tantrum, and then, she heard her door being knocked on from the other side. "Cozy?" Rarity asked. "Is everything alright in there?"

Cozy looked away from her mirror, and said, "Yep! I'm fine, Rarity!"

She waited until she heard Rarity wandering off, and then looking back at the mirror, Cozy said, "It's going... away now... and I was just about to go see how Tirek's doing, too. It's been a few days..." She rubbed her cheek lazily, but then said, "As much as I would rather be hanging out with Sweetie, or Ocellus today, I had better go check on him and make sure he hasn't tried anything already."

After grabbing her skates, and once she managed to find the rest of her gear laying around, she left her room without hardly looking back. The only thing that she double checked, however, was her mirror. She seemed fine in her reflection, and didn't feel nearly as dizzy anymore, so without another thought towards yesterday, Cozy headed out of the Boutique.



Riding down the street, and feeling her mane being swept by the winds as she sped up, Cozy soon approached the Castle of Friendship. Entering, she felt a sudden, and overwhelming feeling of unsteadiness. Tirek's banners were lying on the ground as if the centaur meant to move them elsewhere, but he never did. Coming into the throne room, Cozy recalled the last time she had come to visit, but this time, she half expected to come to find out that Tirek had skipped town or something, but there he sat amongst all of his dumbbells and weights.

Cozy took her chances, and as she came up next to him, she slowly began to see what it was that he held. Gently resting upon his palm was a story book. He flipped the page, and huffed. He didn't sound upset to Cozy Glow, either. "Look," he said softly. "This one has pictures..."

Cozy glared at the drawing represented on the piece of literature, and just smiled. "Y-yes, it is.... Uhm..."

"How'd you do it?" Tirek asked her, catching Cozy off guard. "How did you... release Queen Chrysalis that is?"

Cozy blinked, and sighed before deciding to allow her focus to be momentarily redirected. "Oh, that," she merely stated at first. "I had Thorax cast a spell on her statue before we left. He made sure that if she could somehow love somepony, and could change, then she'd be released."

Cozy looked up, and into Tirek's distracted eyes. Catching his attention, she asked him, "What about you?"

Tirek tried to avert her question. "I don't know what you're talking about," he lied.

"Are you sure?" Cozy asked this with her all too cynical tone. "Tirek...? Are you ready at last... to start taking friendship seriously? Because if you're not... I'll know."

He only made the swift moment to close his book peacefully, and then said to Cozy Glow, "I've been... reading a lot lately in between working out, and whenever I go out... to get something to eat, or to drink..."

Cozy asks, "What's wrong?"

"It's just..." Tirek's eyes squinted, and he said to Cozy Glow, "They all look at me... and avoid me, and..." Cozy remained unsurprised by this. "They're scared of me, obviously, but even when I try to..." This caught Cozy's attention. "Even as I tried to help somepony the other day, they reacted so sourly..."

His somewhat wrinkled arm raised, and he scratched away at the gray hairs on the back of his head while Cozy asked him, "You've... been trying to make new friends?"

Tirek stared at Cozy Glow for a few moments, and then he looked left, and then right. "I, umm..." He seemed at a loss for words, but soon, he said, "I don't... need new friends. I just..."

Cozy shook her head at him, and said exactly what she had told Queen Chrysalis. "Stop it with this game." She said it so simply, too. "Talk to me... the way you really want to, Tirek..."

She was now holding onto his right claw with both of her forehooves, and even though Tirek still hadn't fully recovered from the darkness that had previously, and thoroughly snared his heart and mind, he was finally making an effort to put the past behind him. "Cozy," he started just before stopping for a moment longer. "I..." He began to grip one of Cozy's hooves back softly, and in doing so, found the true strength that he'd been needing all this time. "I'm just... sorry."

Cozy saw his lips trembling while speaking these words, but then, something else came over Tirek. The sudden, and chilling feeling on Cozy's hoof made her feel completely cold, but all tingly inside, too. It was one of Tirek's salty tears, and looking up from it, Cozy saw even more leaving his beastly yet despaired eyes. "T-Tirek?" Cozy asked him with concern.

He sobbed just a little bit longer while gritting his teeth, and roughly telling her, "It's no longer about... the power..." He then breathed in deeply before resuming, "I-if you ponies are capable of just... granting power through your vehemence... your friendship, then... doesn't that make me... such a fool? Scorpan figured it out... and it took me so long... I h-had to be turned to stone just to settle down enough, Cozy... and it was just so that I could consider something so simple. Now, I feel like it might be too late for me to come back from this."

Cozy asked him, "What makes you say that?"

Tirek blinked, and allowed a few more tears to escape. "Because... I'll never really be forgiven for what I put this land through, will I? Twilight might say that she's willing to give me a second chance, but I've done... such terrible things." Cozy blinked, and looking away, she rested her chin on Tirek's knuckle while listening to him finish saying, "I should probably just... go somewhere else so that you ponies can move on with your peaceful lives... Who was I to disturb that?"

This was when Cozy Glow had forgiven Tirek for his earlier transgressions, and as she renewed her friendship with him, Cozy slowly spoke, "So long as you really are sorry, Tirek... in time... we'll forgive. I can't necessarily speak for every single pony and creature that's out there, but you're not a lost cause... at least, you're not to me." Looking back at Tirek's rejuvenated, and youthful face, Cozy told him, "To me... you're just a misguided centaur... You're a creature that needed just a little bit more assistance, and a lot more direction in his long life."