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// Ch - 5 - Schemes Begin After Dreams End 
// Story: A Fatal Error Has Occurred 
// by Orderly Disassembly 
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Sleep is one of the rarest treasures in Tartarus, peaceful sleep even more so. I had the unfortunate luxury of falling into the false protection of that cold comforting void. My dream self stood on a solid black surface that stretched out to the horizon in every direction. 

I looked down, only to find that my body was gone, no ribcage, no legs, not even a pair of hands greeted my gaze. I scanned my surroundings but nothing marred the perfect black horizon. With nowhere else to stare, I looked up. I regretted the first time that I did so, but now, it’s just another reason to enjoy what I have instead of worrying about what lies ahead. I looked up and up and up. Far in the sky, I saw a single pinprick of light pierce the void. Then another, then another, and soon enough, the entire sky was speckled with minuscule white dots.

Those dots grew and grew to a size three times that of what they were before. Each dot became a ball, and each ball became a disk of immense size. A moment later I noticed that each of the disks held an infinitesimally small black dot within. A black sky speckled with white disks that themselves held holes of void.

I stared up into infinity and watched the abyss blink. The entire sky shifted as every last eye that had opened turned to stare at me. One thought dominated my mind, a thought borne of fear, a thought caused by the primal instinct to hide.

It saw me!

A million voices whispered, spoke, and screamed in a thousand different languages that all seemed to dip in and out of this plane of reality. Each word mixed with a thousand others before melting into the background static that began to build in my head.

A pressure made itself known by pushing the insides of my skull out. I could feel the knowledge that was given to me fill up my head and I heard my skull crack under the crushing weight of understanding.

I know it and it knows me.

With a small cry, I shot upright in my hammock of red wires. A couple of moments of calm silence were all it took for me to settle down. The dream wasn’t just a dream, it was a glimpse into eternity. I’ve spent years digging through the code of this world, of this reality, and some of my findings made the creature I saw appear minuscule in comparison. 

However, it didn’t matter. None of them mattered, because for all their power, they didn’t change  a single thing. Whether the reason for their inactivity was a matter of inability or of lethargy was beyond me. 

But that didn’t matter either. 

I couldn’t change anything about them, so why should I worry? 

I was stuck in Tartarus and nothing was going to change that anytime soon.

But nothing lasts forever.

Why worry about eventualities?

Why worry about impossibilities?

The only thing that should worry me is the possibility that I would fail!

But I won’t.

I let confidence dance through the shards of my soul as I lay back on my hammock.

I won’t fail… but what happens when I succeed?

My idle musings were cut short by the familiar sound of cracking rock. I tore my gaze from the prison’s ceiling and peeked over the edge of the dense web of my strings. The red lines now formed a mat that hung over the cage like a second roof with more reaching down all the way to the floor.

A question for another time I suppose.

I prodded the shard of the parasite’s soul for a moment and got quite a venomous response.

‘Not now you oaf!’

With a mental shrug, I returned my attention to my visitors.

The two princesses dragged a manacled, snarling, centaur between them. They strolled down the little pathway devoid of strings like it was a little jaunt through a park. They didn’t glance at the forest of wires around them, they didn’t ask me the purpose of my constructs, and they didn’t even glance in my direction. 

Perfect.

The centaur gritted his teeth before shouting in a hoarse voice.

“What is this place? Where have you two fools taken me?”

To the deepest pit of Hell, my friend.

They continued as if the silence remained unbroken.

“Answer me!”

Luna spared him a glare before responding.

“You are in Tartarus, and for your crimes, we have deemed you worthy of solitary confinement.”

Tirek growled.

“You fools think that locking me up is going to help? Ha, I’ll be out in a week and have your country on its knees in another! I-”

Tirek’s threats were cut short by the grating squeal of metal on metal. 

My eternal grin widened as I heard a violent burst of scrapes and growls that told me of Tirek’s latest futile effort at escape. The sounds went quiet as the cage slammed shut with the prisoner safely secured within. I heard him snarl once more before he spoke.

“You will regret this, Princesses!”

My chuckle echoed through the prison and my voice ground against the rocky walls as the royals turned to go.

“I’m sure they will, I’m sure they will indeed.”

Another short burst of laughter followed my statement but Tirek failed to see the humor.

“What is the meaning of this? I thought you said this was solitary, you idiots!”

Celestia stopped to look over her shoulder with a raised eyebrow.

“It is, what of it?”

Tirek’s shout would’ve left my ears ringing if I had them.

“Then why is there some idiot laughing in here?”

Celestia frowned.

“I do not know what you are talking about Tirek, I heard no laughter.”

“What do you mean you didn’t hear it? It was clear as day you deaf goats!”

Celestia’s frown deepened.

“If you are just going to insult us, then staying here serves no further purpose. We shall be back in a month or two to allow you to reconsider.”

Tirek shouted at them until the tips of their tails passed through the portal. A moment of silence strangled the air, but Tirek’s patience had worn thin.

“Alright, who are you, and why are you here?”

I could feel his scowl fix upon my hiding place as his words betrayed his hate.

“Me?”

It hurt to smile that wide, but I couldn’t help myself.

“I’m nobody, everybody, and everyone between.”

Tirek snorted.

“Enough with the stupid riddles, who are you, and why are you here?”

I laughed before responding, though my mirth bled into the words.

“No riddles, I only speak facts. I am madness, I am truth, I am your fatal error.”

I heard a growl before a thud echoed through the cave.

“Fine, I suppose I don’t need a moron like you to get out of this dump anyway.”

I heard more shifting so I cast my senses into my strings. My perspective shifted as my personal vision failed and a new image opened up in my head. I saw Tirek, well not exactly. My strings saw him, all of them, but I could only focus on one image at a time. I flipped through numerous perspectives like a security guard through his camera feeds for a time. Eventually, I got a good look at Tirek's face.

The red-skinned and black-furred centaur had one of the ugliest baboon's faces imaginable, tiny horns stuck out of his head, and void-like eyes with glowing bits of gold for pupils darted around to examine his new home.

Welcome to Tartarus, my demonic friend.

My smile maintained its near-painful status as I saw him close his eyes.

Sleepy already, are we?

I began to hum my favorite little tune. No two notes harmonized and every piece of the melody managed to clash with every other\. The song made everyone I’ve ever met think that music had gained sentience and was on a quest for vengeance. 

Tirek’s chest continued its rhythmic rise and fall.

Am I boring you now?

Then the chorus of madness worsened as the notes began to echo off of the prison’s walls causing a musical war to begin. Each line collided with another, each progression grinding against the grain of its fellows, and every single bit of the song seemed to fall into further disarray. 

At first, he shifted. Then his eyes snapped open, he growled, and finally…

“Silence! I demand that you stop with that horrid racket!”

So I did and Tirek returned to sleep grumbling about how ‘he at least knows his place’ or some other nonsense like that. I kept my peace for an entire minute, waiting for the final traces of the previous masterpiece to die, before beginning again with a new song.

Tirek stirred once more and repeated his demands for silence.

So I was quiet.

Then I was not.

Then Tirek shouted.

Then I was quiet.

And so the cycle continued.

One minor inconvenience left on repeat, one tiny grating detail to wear away at the mind, one of the smallest of my tools, and those were all that I ever needed.

The smallest of tools, always comes back to them, doesn’t it?

Tirek’s screams of rage must’ve been heard throughout all of Tartarus.

And I smiled. Oh, how I smiled.