//------------------------------// // Chapter 10 // Story: Sands of Time // by Amaranthine Thought //------------------------------// I wake suddenly from a sleep like no other. It was almost as if I had just blinked, and time has passed. My anger burns hot in me. It is strong, demanding, and I find it hard to deny it. What had been done to me demands vengeance. A chill makes me hesitate, however. A cold feeling in the air. It reminds me of the time with Mirage the first. It feels like fall, or even winter, is approaching. I hate the cold, but… It isn’t important. Smart is not here. An oddity, but her absence gives me an opportunity. I reach, and feel the collar around my neck. It is not made of metal. I can cut it. I hear the door open as I latch a claw on it. “Big Guy?” I hear Smart murmur, her tone sad, and then suddenly, “Wait, don’t!” The moment I try to cut the collar I am filled with agony, and collapse again. The pain almost like the lightning that had hurt me so, but far less. The pain is gone in a second, but it had been strong, and stolen all my strength from me, somehow. “You can’t remove the collar.” Smart tells me, walking around to where I can see her. She seems concerned. “It can’t be, ah!” I snap at her and growl dangerously, though I do not intend to actually harm her. A little part of me wants to, but I won’t. She seems afraid, but there’s something more there. “Hold still!” I feel myself freeze, almost as though I am stone once again, and I see Chancellor again. Any attempt to move is met with pain until I cease trying. “Smart, we talked about this!” Chancellor says, frowning at Smart. “Commanding!” She sighs, and tells her, “Get his food ready. Now, follow me, Big Guy!” she finishes, brightly smiling at me. I get up and turn, following her, not in command of myself anymore. I cannot resist her call. I do not know if I can be angrier at Smart. She is the cause of this. She found me in weakness and has crippled me with this… cursed collar. So that I might serve them as labor. I try to resist, but I cannot. Chancellor orders, and I must obey her. Others order, and I must obey. My resistance is nothing save in my mind, and in the pain until I obey. It is Chancellor by my side most often, controlling me. It is she who orders me to work, she who orders me to eat, she who orders me back to my barn, she who once again orders me to sleep. Smart is nowhere to be seen. A different pony delivered me the pellets. They taste better. Am I doomed to this? Unable to battle the command of the collar? To spend who knows how many years tapped under its influence, listening to orders? I can only hope that Mirage and the girls are alright. I sleep, struggling to think of some way to break the collar. I am back in the barn, listening to the rain outside. Three days have passed. The collar remains firmly on me, and nothing seems to make it break or even weaken. The moment I attempt to cut it, agony and weakness remains until I stop trying. Everything else will not get under it; the trees bend away when it nears, and the collar will not catch on anything. It seems impossible for me to remove it. And maybe impossible for anything or anypony to remove it as well. Worse: Somepony got it into his head that he could order me to answer. And he was right. He could, and did. He asked me if I ever ate a pony. And then he asked me if I had killed Quick Call. So, I am lying here, listening to the rain outside, paralyzed by the collar, waiting for them to come back and almost certainly killing me. Or maybe they could be inventive and just order me to die or something. This seems my end. Ordered to remain here, and wait. Wait for my execution. Leaving my ponies behind. No one to rescue the girls. No one to help them in this time so before their own. No one to ever return them to their proper places, to their families. A tragedy of two times, their own, where they are gone, and now, where they will be for the rest of their lives. Here, to struggle on their own, amongst the strange ponies who live now, amongst the ponies who have proven to be a threat to them. There, their families mourning their loss. Mirage, alone. Just how I almost lost her, she is going to lose me. I care little for my passing, if not for the pain I know will come from it. I hear hoofsteps coming closer. Running hoofsteps, oddly enough. I suppose that is my end. The door opens suddenly, and I see Smart enter, to my mild interest; I have not seen her since three days past. Is she to be my end? Fitting, considering she is why I am here, and why the collar is upon me. She looks to me. Her eyes are determined and red. I can see that she had been crying, despite the rain obscuring that, and her mane is unkempt. She just stares at me, silent, and I wonder what she waits for. I hear other ponies approaching. Distant yet. “Big Guy…” Smart says, her voice cracking slightly. She looks like she wants to cry, but she firms herself. “Ordo.” she says, in a strong and clear voice, and I feel the collar jolt at the word, and I feel myself focusing on her intently. “Listen to me, and only to me.” she begins. “Forget everything you’ve been ordered.” I feel a change in the magic constricting me; a sudden increase in strength swiftly follows it. “Get up.” she says, and I do so, both forced and willing. What is she doing? What is she planning? I can hear the rest nearing, but I do not take my eyes from her. Just as the barn door begins moving, Smart yells, “Fly! Break the barn and fly!” My strength surges. I crouch and leap, smashing through the roof, and flap, somehow catching the air with a mastery I do not possess and take flight. I hear shouting below me. They scream for me to return, but their words mean nothing, now. “Go far!” I hear Smart scream up at me. “To a peak so far they’ll never reach you!” I feel Smart’s ability to command, but she commands what I desire. I can hear the outrage below, the anger of the ponies. I turn in the air, and look down, to see the anger shift towards Smart. I see her confronting Chancellor, defiant and angry in the pouring rain. I see her say something that has the rest shocked, and suddenly silent. Then I see several move forward, with dark intent. …She has saved me. And she seems fit to take my place for it. They will kill her for what she has done. …She is the sole one left controlling me. If she dies, what would that mean for the collar around my neck? Would it fail, or break? It might. Perhaps it even should. …I know what I must do. I flap in the air, bracing myself for the pain I know will come, and then drop back down. I feel the collar trying to make me ascend again, but I manage to keep my wings faltering. Break the barn, she said… I focus on the walls still upright, and the pain weakens. I keep dropping. I slam back into the earth, and I only just manage to snag Smart in my jaws before I am driven to break what is left of the barn. The walls falling, ponies screaming, wood shattering, I leap back into the air, letting the collar guide me. I grip Smart with all I can, and hope I do not drop her as I go. Into the storm I fly with her. I keep going for a long time, as she commanded me, until the urge finally fades. The rain has slowed, thankfully, and I find myself far into the peaks, lost amongst them. I slow, and land on a nearby ledge, and finally drop Smart in front of me. She is shocked, dazed, and wet, falling over and shaking before she starts to try and recover. I see I have ruined her outfit, but she seems unharmed. “B, Big Guy?” she quavers, confused, shaken, afraid. “Wha, what…?” “You.” I breath, sighing, very unhappy about my being wet, but it matters… not too much right now. “You, Smart Cookie, are the first pony who has earned both my gratitude and my wrath, and remain an enigma to me.” I tell her, water dripping from me. “You drew me back from death to condemn me to servitude, yet now, you have set me free from the same. I need to know. Why have you chosen to set me free? Why have you chosen to go against what you first sought of me?” She looks up at me, shock still primary, but I see many things now. Confusion, fear, sadness, regret, and more. She seems paralyzed from them all. “…Start from the beginning, Smart.” I encourage her, watching. I see her nod, and take a slightly shuddering breath. “It… it started when Chancellor brought ya back.” she began, trying to stop shaking quite so much. “She dragged ya inta town and told me to help you get better. She thought… she thought that you were gonna be th solution ta all our problems. I told her that she was nuts, that you were… were jus a big monster, but Chancellor insisted.” “I thought that you were… I thought you were somethin horrible.” she tells me, regret etched into her words. “As I cared for you those first few days, I kept fearing what would happen when ya got better. So I talked to Chancellor, and eventually convinced her to let me put th collar on ya.” “I found it when we were comin here. An I figured out it could control things, make them listen. I convinced Chancellor to let me put it on you, so that when ya did wake up… so you wouldn’t be th beast that haunted my nightmares.” Her eyes fill with tears as she continues, “But as ya started gettin better, ya started ta mutter; dreamin. I heard ya talkin ta others. I heard that ya were happy. I saw ya smilin, I kept on hearin you being… being kind an good.” She shook her head, “Eventually, I decided I had messed up, sticking th collar on ya, and tried ta get it off. But nothing I tried worked. It wouldn’t cut, it wouldn’t loosen, it wouldn’t even really move.” “I… I convinced myself that it was still a good thing, that you were… that you were still a monster, no matter what ya said in your dreams. But… but I kept worrying that you weren’t, hopin that you weren’t, an tryin to tell myself that ya were…” She shakes her head, tears flowing. “An then Quick Call tried ta kill you an you killed him. I almost thought that I had been right all along, but… but he’d been trying to kill you, and… and you were so upset over him! You were whimpering in pain and regret and I saw that! But… but if anypony else saw, if anypony else found out…” “…I dragged him into th woods and hid him in a bush and some leaves. I washed th whole barn, burned th bloody hay, an covered everythin in pine till I couldn’t smell anything else. I told everypony that I didn’t know where he had gone an that you had just dropped a rake on yer head; that ya didn’t eat meat, so they wouldn’t even suspect. An then… an then ya woke up after so long, an… an you weren’t th beast I was afraid ya were. Ya even offered ta help! Ya never even noticed th collar cause ya wanted to help us!” She sobs, and trudges forward to press her head against my leg. “You… you trusted me then.” she sobs. “Ya even told me that you’d listen to what I asked cause I had helped ya and I felt like so much dirt. Ya even came to help me when they figured out I was lying to em.” “An then ya asked me ta be honest.” she says, her voice suddenly tight. “An I told ya that Quick Call had died in th woods. Because I… Because I was still afraid of you. I was afraid of what you’d do or say if I told you that you had killed him. You got so, so mad, and I, I was so, so afraid… But you didn’t hurt me! You didn’t become what I thought you might be! You proved that you were nothing like my fears, that I never had any reason ta fear you!” “But I didn’t do anythin about it!” she yells, looking up at me, her tears blurred by the rain. “I couldn’t face you an I couldn’t face them, an I jus let Chancellor an all th rest order you around while I jus hid from everypony!” “But, but then, then they figured out that you had killed Quick Call.” Smart continue, her voice softening, her tears worsening. “An, an then they got together and they decided to kill you. I tried ta convince em not ta, but they... I… I couldn’t let them do it.” “Cause I had put th collar on ya. Cause I was why they could hurt ya, an why they could kill you. Cause I was th one who had done that to you, an I was th one keeping you from th ponies you cared about so much… I… I…” She stops for a moment, trying to regain control of her voice. “…I slipped out, an ran ta you. An I did th only thing I could do. I ordered you to listen ta me an only me, freed you from the orders I told you to keep you weak, an then I ordered you to get away afore they could get you.” For a few moments, she remains silent, softly crying. Then she suddenly looks up at me, and yells, “They wouldn’t listen to me! They couldn’t see you as anything but a monster! I finally got th courage ta stand up ta them an try an tell em that you weren’t what they thought ya were, but they wouldn’t listen! I, I’d broken their trust, but in savin you, I’d broke something more! They thought I had betrayed them!” “An now, I’ve lost everything!” she screams in near despair. “All cause I lied ta you an them! All cause I couldn’t face my fears! All cause I was scared of nothin! All cause of what I did!” She wails suddenly, unable to continue, screaming wordlessly into the rain. She collapses as it fades away, and her form heaves with sobs. I slowly lower myself, giving a slow sigh. I reach out, and gently pull her closer to me, Smart not resisting at all. When she is close enough, she simply seizes onto me, still sobbing with all she has. I think she does so from simple instinct. She has lost all she cares about. She likely imagines that she has still lost me; that I have just dragged her away to find answers. She does not know it yet, but that is no longer true. I flap a wing out, and drape it over her, protecting her from the drizzle. It feels a little stronger, as if the rain echoed her own tears. I don’t really care about how wet I am. I now know her reasons. I now understand her. I forgive her what she has done, and I trust her anew. Her pain was true, her regret etched into her words. My heart beats in empathy, and my eyes are wet for her sorrow. I am determined. She has not lost everything. She may have lost her place, the ponies she knows and loves, but she has regained me. I will give her a new place, one by my side. Together, we will go back to Mirage, together, we will find the fillies, and thus reunited, she will remain with us. I will count her amongst my ponies. I want to see her tears slow and stop. I want to heal her hurting heart. I want to see her renewed in spirit and being. I want to see her as I once did. I hear her sobs slowing, her grip slowly fading, slowly starting to relax against my side. The rain grows harder, the winds blows cold and wet over me, but my wing is over her, and keeps her warm and dry. “…I forgive you, Smart.” I say, unsure if she can hear me. “I understand you, I know your pain. And if I can, I will ease your aching heart. By my side, you are welcome. Rest. I am here for you.” I feel her shift slightly under my wing, her tears no longer audible. I sigh faintly, the rain growing harder. This is no good place, but… I can tolerate this for her. She gave all she had for me. I can put up with some rain for her. I remain awake, until the rain finally slows and stops. As the skies grow dark and a cold wind blows through the peaks, I shiver as I drift to sleep. But a part of me is warm.