//------------------------------//
// Restless Soul. 
// Story: Equestrian Eeveelution. 
// by Symphonicdysonince 
//------------------------------//

The demented Shadow Eevee tilted its head and laughed. "You wanna try summoning something? In here?! You must have some screws loose yourself if you think you can get any-" A midnight blue hoof snapped its jaw off as Luna sailed past. "Oh. That fish." The mist growled as it reformed its jaw. A ball of black energy started to form over the things head.

Only to disperse as a smaller ball blasted a hole through the Shadow. "Sonuva BITCH!"

"Yes?" Abes asked, sliding to a stop beside me. "What have we got, Alpha?"

I leaned over to him as Luna kept flying through the Shadow Eevee. "No clue. It might be The Claw, it could be something else. But it mentioned being trapped in here, so..."

"Got it. What do you need us to do."

"Keep it occupied. I need to do a deeper dive."

"Got it." Abes nodded, balls of purple energy forming around him. He bolted away from me, yelling all the while. "Look, a distraction!"

I fell through the ground as Abes threw his balls, and rose up into a room in disarray.

I glanced at the clothes and knickknacks strewn around. Are these Leo's memories? Tentatively, I reached out and poked at a random fork.

"It appears," A deep male voice boomed out, "that you have knocked out-" I couldn't understand the word. "Using the most shameful of all magic. A-" A higher pitched voice cut in "Victory Screech!"

The memory faded at that point. I frowned, finding it odd that there were no visuals to go with it. I placed a paw on a soup bowl.

I sat at a wooden table, my food half eaten in front of me. An older male, someone I recognized as Leo's father, sat in a recliner, glaring at me. I knew that he had just finished a tirade at me for being let go from my old job. Please stop making me feel three inches tall... Leo's voice echoed in my head.

I shook my head, throwing off the melancholy sadness the memory left me with. I remembered hearing something about that. Leo had been let go from a well paying job because of her depression. That began her couple year long stint of drifting from job to job.

She had crashed on my couch a few times during that time. I never knew it was because of her old man.

I shook my head again. I picked my way across the mess towards the door. A rumble from above knocked a plushy under my foot as I tried to steady myself.

"I saw him in my head." A purple muppet stated. "I saw Morgan in my head."

"I don't have time for this." I growled.

"Fuck you, Hemingway!"

I sighed as the memory faded away. Finally reaching the door, I shoved against it hard. I bounced back with a sore shoulder, and barely stopped myself from falling into the memories. I looked at the side of the door and groaned when I saw the hinges on my side.

Pulling the door open, I looked out into a large, grayscale room. Bookshelves fought for space against gaming systems along the walls, while broken furniture lay scattered around an aquarium in the center. A typewriter and parchment floated in the water in place of fish. Laying on her side, Leo stared blankly at the tank.

"Hey, Leo...?" I softly called, letting the door close behind me.

"Come to gloat some more." Leo monotoned, not looking away from the tank.

"No, Leo," I almost whispered, "it's me, Yomega."

"Uh-huh." She glanced at me. "That trick won't work any more. First time you bothered adding in color."

I took a quick look at myself, surprised to see that she was right. I was the only lime green spot of brightness in a sea of grays. Even Leo was looking like a shiny Eevee here. "No, Leo. This is the real me. Abes and Luna are busy fighting that thing a layer up."

"Why?" Leo sighed. A piece of parchment dissolved in front of us. "I'm not worth it. I'm just dragging the Pack down." Another slip vanished.

I glanced in the tank, and choked back a cry. I saw the ideas that Leo used to say she wanted to write, D'n'D campaigns she wanted to run, floating in the tank.

"Wha...?" I swallowed the lump in my throat. "What are you doing?"

"Removing these." Leo rolled onto her back to look at me, her dull, half lidded eyes causing me to shudder. "I don't deserve to have good things. You showed me that..."

"I didn't show you anything like that!"

"Oh, yeah?" Leo fully rolled over. "What did you show me?"

"This." I pulled her into a hug. I focused on my friendship with her. I focused on everything we accomplished together. I focused on the love we shared as a Pack. I focused on all the good things Leo brought to us. "You are family, Leo. We all care for you."

"I don't deserve you." Leo recited into my chest. "You deserve better than me. Just let me-"

"Don't finish that." I tightened my hug.

"Just let me fade." The Leo in my arms flickered out like an old T.V. "Let me die in peace."

"Damnit!" I swore. I sat down, trying to feel where Leo truly was. I ignored the commotion in the upper layers, focusing on sending mental feelers further down. "C'mon, c'mon. Where is she?" I paused as something new joined into the fight above me. 

"Yes, that will work." I returned to the room I had first entered, and began looking for the gaps. In the eternal moment between one heart beat and the next, I had found not missing memories, but tainted ones. I tapped one of them-

I sat in the scanner's bowl, propped up by my casts. I sent an exasperated look back at the gathering behind me. I don't want to be here...

Sadly, everyone else did. Of course no one cared what I thought. No one cares about monsters. Moon Dancer and Twilight were working together to fine tune the scanner. Eventually, Twilight turned to address the assembled group. "Alright, everything is set up and ready to go. We'll power up the Spetro-Thaumic Scanner, set it to continuous print, let it create the baseline, then have that bitch use her new ability."

Twilight cried with almost maniacal glee. The subsequent button push seemed almost anticlimactic. I leaned against the bowl's edge as the tines spun slowly around me. I wasn't sure what I was expecting, but the horrid screeching that sounded from the machine behind me wasn't it. I cringed into myself, regretting the fact that I couldn't cover my ears. None of the others seemed to hear it, all of them giving me evil grins. This wasn't an experiment, was it?

I finally snapped out of the memory, I frowned, before placing my paw on it again, focusing on my own memory of that day. Slowly, it regained its color. Another quick peek at it showed that the memory had been completely cleansed. The shuddering of the mindscape and the roar of rage up above was another confirmation.

But I felt another, smaller shudder. I latched onto the feeling, and dove deeper. I immediately threw my telekinesis back up, to grab the only thing that could help Leo here.