//------------------------------// // Chapter 27 - The Circles // Story: The Stereotypical Necromancer // by JinxTJL //------------------------------// Light Flow's throat hurt. As did his ears, and his jaw. It was really his entire face that hurt, which was reasonable given the circumstances. Circumstances which, as he had recently found, were apparently quite dire. Though, if he were somepony else who happened to be watching him at the moment, he would never guess anything was wrong. Just a pony seated quietly at a desk. Nothing wrong at all. He couldn't remember how long he had been sitting there, staring silently at the flickering light inside his worn lantern. He couldn't even do the cliché thing and say whether it felt like an endless eternity or a mere moment, though he had a feeling the actual time was closer to the former. Whatever the actual time, the fire hadn't burnt out, so it was probably still the same day. Same day, same pains, same problems. Maybe if he just sat long enough, and completely wasted the week away, his problems would disappear. Maybe it would all burn itself out while he sat there, staring at a little flame in a jar. His face broke from its placid, blank stare as he swallowed dryly; an almost imperceptible crinkling at the ends of his lips as his ragged and raw throat cried out in protest. Screaming at the top of your lungs for an undefined amount of time tended to cause various levels of pain, as he had recently learned. Those various levels were split somewhat unevenly between different parts of his body, ensuring that no part of him would escape his all-consuming plan to destroy himself; though the lion's share of the ache was centered around his abused throat. Even things that weren't related to screaming hurt. Why on Equestria did his back hurt so much? He idly flexed the muscles in his withers, and internally winced as a dull ache made itself known. A lifetime spent hunching over reading material had left his posture in shambles, and it didn't take much for that familiar pain to flare up. Putting aside his reoccurring problems, most of his current issues and pains stemmed from his previous volume, which had only been exacerbated by the decently small enclosed space around him. Most kinds of noise found a way to bounce off walls and grow in power ad nauseum until they were strong enough to cause significant pain to the dull twit unlucky enough to spawn them in the first place. He did a lot of dull things lately. It really hadn't helped that he hadn't been satisfied with a paltry little regular scream. No, he just had to try and let all of his feelings out at once, hadn't he? A big emotional dump into the world around him, as if there hadn't been enough of that recently. Crying always made him feel somewhat pathetic, which had apparently left a prolonged scream as the only solution. The longer he screamed, the worse the noise got; until his ears had rung with the swirling screams of his own hellish torment, which inevitably would have led to a different kind of screaming. If he hadn't been a strange combination of intelligent and stupid at the same time, he might've continued his combined release and punishment until his throat tore apart and his ears ran bloody. Luckily for him, his screams had tapered off eventually; though not before the exertion took a metaphorical sledgehammer to just about every part of his body. He worked his jaw imperceptibly as one of the many aches became too much to bear, and he felt some of the growing strain bleed off. He couldn't see his face, but he could only imagine what sort of expression he had left there. He had lost track of the movement after the throat pain started tearing its way through his thought processes, and he wasn't quite sure how to go about finding out. He could try to figure it out, but his brain wasn't obeying many of his commands at the moment. His emotions had broken down completely after his vocal cleanse, so the mental side of him was picking up the slack. To the detriment of many lower functions, like facial expressions. Thoughts were racing around his upstairs at near top speed, desperately trying to puzzle out solutions and plans for what was apparently the upcoming apocalypse. So frantic, running around and around and making so much noise. Didn't his head know that hardwood floors weren't very good for muffling sound? Or maybe his head had carpet? He snorted in a laugh as a goofy grin grew across his face at the strange thought. It lingered for a moment before finding better things to do and better faces to haunt. He felt his smile slowly slip from his face, as if it was trying to not hurt his feelings by leaving too soon. What did his smile know anyway? He really always preferred frowning, and it should've been obvious. There wasn't a single pony in all of Ponyville that knew him for his positivity. He and positivity were as two ships in the night, only crossing if ever the fates should conspire for a miracle. Yet no miracle would come upon this eve, for this eve would last forever, or whatever the letter said. His thoughts were getting strange. Maybe it was time to talk to somepony about that? He wasn't sure if he physically shook his head, but his mind certainly felt like he had. The disjointed thoughts and incredibly silly sentences broke apart, before reassembling themselves rather handily into a relatively regular mindset. This was no time to get hung up on his psychological abnormities, this was a time for action! This was the time where he stood up, and proved himself to be the hero that Equestria, and the letter, believed him to be! He would stand up from his chair, immediately sit back down, and read some books! Or maybe he would keep sitting and uselessly spinning his wheels forever until the world ended. It would probably be more productive than anything he could accomplish, anyway. He didn't really expect anything else from himself. A villain by complicity at his very best. Again, he wasn't really sure how long he had been sitting there, staring into the eyes of his unassuming doom. Time tended to lose a bit of meaning when cut off from any indication of it, especially when that unknown time period is spent on panicking. It couldn't have been too long, though. His glassy eyes flicked towards the dying lantern for a moment before quickly returning to staring ahead. His eyes kind of hurt too now that he thought about it. Had he been blinking? He couldn't remember. He forced his eyelids shut, and allowed himself to relish in the small feeling of peace the darkness brought him. Pretending to exist in some sort of large expanse of nothingness made the prospect of the end of the world so much easier to deal with. He could almost imagine there was no terrible moon demon poised to strike down the sun and cast the world into a complete and endless voi- Screams. Sudden and enormous. Filling his ears with their intensity, and ringing through his head in an fractal pattern of rising pitch. Deafening and terrible, echoing with promises and memories of sorrows yet to come. Louder and louder, rising and rising as they reached a crescendo; their overlapping voices colliding and smashing together in uneven words and shouts. He was lost. Lost in the never ending depths of the wailing howls as the room around him fell away. He couldn't feel the chair under him anymore, or the warmth of the fire on his pallid cheeks. The noise drove all hints of sensation from his body in an almost territorial display of dominance, leaving him unable to feel anything but what he could hear. The emptiness enveloped him gently, as the air sucked itself out of his lungs to flee into the encroaching darkness. Alone, always alone, but now there was something else. The voices, suffocating him with their ragged cries. With their horrible voices begging for help and companionship, drowning his senses with feelings colored blue and dark and grey and... A message, they were trying to deliver a message. But for who? Who? Who? The voices, they were becoming clearer. There was less overlap, though more unification. He could hear them now, through the blood, and the gore, and the agony, their message was almost decipherable. The din disappeared, though replaced with substance. A single voice; yet impossibly many. Incomprehensible, but intelligible. The Night is coming. His eyes quickly flew open as he shakily gasped for air, as if he had been trapped under a thick sheet of ice. He could feel his heart beating heavily against his chest, and his hoof moved from its static supporting position to tightly hold itself against his ribs. He felt the warm and frenzied pump of blood beneath his touch, comforting in its regularity; while his revitalized eyes stared unblinkingly forward, as if afraid to close again. He sucked cold, stale air into his lungs, which felt heavy in his chest. Two frigid lumps of coal in his body that hadn't quite recovered from his ill-advised shouting match with himself. Nothing made sense, nothing lined up correctly in his head. He couldn't remember why he was suddenly so afraid! He had closed his eyes, and... He needed to back up, take a look at what led to the situation. He had been sitting, yes. He was staring at the fire, thinking about the apocalypse, as was so horribly atypical of his life. There was something about blinking, wasn't there? He hated when this happened. Stepping carefully through his mind like the floor was covered with shards of glass was so tedious, yet so recently necessary. He wasn't sure what was wrong with him, but his memory had recently been getting even worse than what it usually was. Activities, hours, even entire days were often just blank in his head. Long stretches of memories that just weren't there anymore. It... was somewhat disconcerting. That wasn't really a problem he could tackle at the moment, no matter how much it upset him. All he could really do was focus on the present, and the recently forgotten. He hadn't been blinking for a while, right? He couldn't remember if he had been blinking, so he had taken a moment to close his eyes. And that was it. He had closed his eyes, and suddenly he 'woke up', feeling as if he had just undergone some sort of terrible trial. Like his life was in horrible danger, and he had only just escaped. So many emotions, all at once and with no cause. There had been no warning, or build-up, or sign; just the overwhelming, mind-numbing fear. And the loneliness. Crushing and crashing into his mind, like a tidal wave of misfortune. Deep and dark and blue, as he struggled for breath against its weight. What had happened? He continued to hold his chest as his entire being gradually stabilized. His breathing would steady someday, while he was sure he could eventually find the courage to blink again. As his heartrate gently eased from its death grip on the pedal, his hoof dared to venture downward. It came to rest upon the spot just above where he knew a soul would lie on a normal pony, and he took a moment to evaluate his thoughts. Following his total breakdown due to the colliding forces of stress, fear, and some other odd feeling that something in his head told him not to think about, he had retreated into his mind. He had immaculately crafted an insane daydream to drift on until his life wasn't terrifying anymore, though it seemed to have backfired. Which he had never seen coming, really. Allowing himself to temporarily detach from reality following a great shock couldn't have been anything but healthy. His existing difficulties had mixed badly with his created insanity, and caused some sort of... implosion? His feelings must have rallied against him, and staged some sort of rebellion. That... almost made sense? He licked his lips gently, relishing the dry taste of dust in the air; as his eyes slowly drifted shut. He didn't understand why he was so afraid of blinking all of the sudden, but the fear was there. It was strangely separate from the colder, more distant and frantic fear that had hit him earlier; but it was still recognizable as the same basic feeling. It was more personal, more heated. It pumped through his veins along the same paths as his blood, coming directly from his heart. If this was his fear, then what was the other fear? His eyes closed, and he breathed deeply through his nose. There, now everything was fine again. His 'personal' fear was conquered, and he would feel better soon. Closing his eyes couldn't hurt him, and he had invariably proven it to himself. His eyes drifted open to the familiar sight of flickering fire, and he allowed a small sigh to slip into the air. He could never be too careful. He had been hurt by stranger things, like choking on his own spit. What an embarrassing thing to do, choking on his own spit. It was truly the lowest point in any speaking creature's conversational life. It had happened in the middle of a hilarious joke, too. 'Did you ever hear the one about the yak and the- hurk!' Applejack never let him live it down, even if she had yet to mention it. He knew she was biding her time to bring up the horrible blunder. She would probably take her chance during some very important part of his life, like his wedding. Applejack.... and his wedding.... He slapped a hoof over his cheek as he felt a very familiar, yet very strange sensation grow in his face. It felt exactly like concentrated embarrassment. He huffed out a mumbled groan between his clenched teeth, and swung his head around behind him. His eyes fell upon the complete shadowy emptiness in the room, and he quickly swung his head back around to his desk. He knew it would be completely insane to assume that anything would magically be there to make fun of him for the inexcusable crime of having feelings, but he couldn't really help his fears. Even when he was alone, he just felt... awkward. Maybe that was from some sort of confidence issue, he didn't know. It sort of felt like it went beyond his irrational issues with himself, though. His head dipped down, and his hoof slid off his cheek and onto the surface of the chair as his hooded eyes searched the floor. There was just... something that... That told him... .... Nothing... He was being paranoid about nothing again. Like always, he was being bothered by the complete and total presence of nothing. There wasn't anything in the room with him, and he was sure of that. To think otherwise would just be.. Crazy. Absolutely crazy. He was doing it again. He was getting all worked up over nothing, like always. He could never relax, or take it easy, because the looming lack of anything was always peeking just over his shoulder. He turned his head, and flicked his eyes about the room once more. There was nothing. It was just an empty room, albeit one only barely lit by a flickering flame. The faint orange light didn't leave any room for anything to obscure itself, imaginary or otherwise. He growled softly into the shadows, before roughly swinging his head back to his desk. His short hair swished briefly into view, before he promptly brushed the errant strands out of his vision. He glared at the cardboard container in front of him, faintly hoping that it would catch fire. It would certainly make his life easier, at least for the moment. Images of a large tantrum flashed through his mind, intoxicating in their juvenile simplicity. He could stand up right then, and throw the box onto the floor. Just sweep it off the desk, along with all of his problems. He could go back upstairs, and leave the contents to rot on the cold stone floor. He could take a nap, or go see Applejack. Any number of delightful activities awaited him if he could just stoke the flames of his rage. It would be easy, he was pretty angry. What right did that letter have to dictate his future, especially one so... tragic? What if he didn't want that kind of burden? What if he didn't want to be the hero? What if he didn't want to be the villain? The burning heat in his chest that had accompanied his entire insane breakdown began to cool, leaving his body cold with contempt. Freezing guilt and frosty uncertainty filled his veins in equal measure, spreading outwards from the ashes of anger that had raged in his heart. His focused stare slowly softened from its intensity, and he could feel his entire face dragging itself down. The box was now probably just as likely to catch a cold, rather than catch fire. What was he doing to himself? Was he really going to uproot his entire worldview, just because of a stupid letter? Sure, the letter was from someone who he simultaneously admired and feared greatly; but was that really important? The world was going to end. Did it really matter where he was standing? Here he was, completely falling apart over a vague prophecy in an equally vague letter. Was the threat of extinction all it took to shake his convictions? What did that say about him? His head lowered to the floor, and he raised his hoof to bring the hem of his cloak into view. He stared into the blank eyes of one of the many little skulls sewn into the border. When was the last time he had thought about what he really wanted? What did he want? He let the fabric fall out of his grasp, though he continued to stare deeply into his frog. A single, simple desire rose out of the remains of the structures of his psyche. It spoke to him, loud and clear. He wanted to read. His head turned back towards the box, and he allowed his horn to glow with a soft light. The cardboard container rose from its long-standing position on the desk, and floated towards him. He could smell that strange scent again, though he still had no idea what it could be. Time hadn't given him any answers, and neither had smelling the subtle traces of it for an extended period. It was the kind of scent that was immediately off-putting, yet extremely tempting. He could almost bring himself to vomit in disgust, while he was just as likely to hum in delight. If he spent enough time around it, he would almost certainly swing towards liking it, but he wasn't quite sure how to feel about that. He didn't know why, but something told him that he shouldn't like the smell. Like it was taboo, or something. He tilted the edge of the box towards him, just enough to see the small sliver of a clean, dark brown surface. The moment felt strangely grand, for some odd reason. Like the first glimpse of his new books was something he had been waiting to see for days. He didn't know why, since it wasn't as if he had taken an especially long time in getting around to this. Sure, he had dallied for a while once he got into his cellar, but the journey before that was quite quick and concise. He blew an exasperated breath through his nose, and tipped the box fully towards him. His eyes were greeted by a simple, brown book, titled with golden lettering. A familiar sight, though the subtitle seemed to be quite a bit longer than his usual reading material. 'Flesh and Fear: A Necromancer's Theorum and Thoughts on Spells Concerning the Body and Mind' His face slowly scrunched as he made his way through the literary mess of a description. Subtitles were typically quite a bit shorter, though he supposed there wasn't anything inherently wrong with being thorough. It was just a bit unusual, that's all. Nopony really wanted to begin a book with a ten-second preamble. Actually, what did it matter to him? This kind of book was never meant for the public's eyes anyway, so why was he comparing it to something like a light novel? He shook his head, and grasped the book in his magic. He hefted the tome out of the box, and took a moment to look over its fully revealed appearance. His eyes roved over the smooth cover broken apart by the verbose golden lettering, which made for a strange contrast with the rough-looking texture of the spine. He brought his hoof up to rest upon it, and shivered slightly at the cool, bumpy feeling against his frog. The book was... a bit odd? He couldn't tell what material it was bound in, but it definitely wasn't something he had seen before. It was far colder than regular paper or cloth bound books, as well as being just vaguely off-putting. And now that he had in right in front of his face, he could confirm that the weird smell was coming from the book. It oozed from the cover in hard chunks, and forced itself uncomfortably through his senses. He instinctively sniffed deeply as his nose wrinkled, and he tried to fan the confusing scent away with a hoof; but the smell was persistent, and it resisted his attempts to clear the air. He supposed he would have to learn to love it. He turned the book around in the air a couple times, before taking another look inside the box. There seemed to be two more books inside, which was a pleasant surprise. It hadn't taken him long to exhaust the knowledge of two tomes the first time around, so an added third tome would hopefully provide a longer experience. He set the box down on the desk before turning his attention back to his current focus. He didn't really want to spoil himself on the other books, though they were likely more of the same. It was important to savor moments like these, especially considering his limited time. Or, would that be a bad thing? Would it make more sense to absorb as much information as possible, as quickly as possible, so he would be better prepared for the end of the world? Or should he enjoy these last moments of peace, since there was no telling what his future was like? Enjoy himself, or prepare for the future? He turned the book over in his magic again, watching as it spun in the air at his whim. Totally at his control, unlike his situation. What to do, what to do? Decisions, decisions....