//------------------------------// // A Question of Intent // Story: A Disparate Bond // by the7Saviors //------------------------------// “Again.” Twilight flinched at the pitiless tone in the command, but she pressed on just as ordered. Sweat beading down her face and tears streaking down her cheeks, she closed her eyes and tried once more to center herself. She tried to shut out all external distractions and instead look within. She tried to calm her mind but only found herself lost amidst her own roiling emotions. Her horn sparked dangerously, a sign that she was quickly losing control, just like last time... but no, not again. Not this time. The filly gritted her teeth and viciously clamped down on her magic as it tried to slip out of her grasp. At the same time she gathered every ounce of willpower she could muster to mentally shove her stormy thoughts down. She continued to wrestle with her emotions for another few moments before her mind finally calmed to what she felt was an acceptable degree. Even then, she took a few more calming breaths in preparation for what was to come. She tried to still her shaking limbs, but they refused to listen. Twilight Sparkle gave a mental sigh, knowing full well that nothing she could do would prepare her for what came next. Not really. “A-Alright,” she called out, hating how shaky her voice was but unable to help it, “I'm... I'm ready—” Twilight had barely gotten the words out when she felt a powerful presence slam into her mind. The force of it was so strong that it physically drove the breath from her lungs. In an instant, her thoughts were overtaken, her head flooding with horrific memories of terrified screams, brutal slaughter, and sadistic cackles. Her not-so-distant past pressed down on her, crushing the filly beneath its prodigious weight. She tried to hold on, tried to keep herself apart from the pain and anguish. She had to. Twilight couldn't let her affinity run wild again. She wouldn't. She refused to. A horrendous wail ripped itself from the filly's throat as she was assaulted again and again by memories so vivid and visceral that she felt as if she'd stepped right back into the past. Right back into that moment. Right back to a time when all she could was watch from within the depths of her own closet as her family perished. She could hear the screams of her mother as her father was crushed beneath massive claws of living shadow. She felt the weight of her older brother's rage and grief as he abandoned her and his promise to stay by her side. Lost to vengeance and foalish bravado, he pushed his little sister aside and charged out of the closet... but what could he do? Twilight and her mother could only look on, the former too weak and scared to stop him and the latter too slow to react. In what felt like a blink, he was gone, his small frame pierced through by more deadly shadows and his body dragged down into a bubbling mire of inky darkness, never to be seen again. Her mother, sliced apart by some unseen force even as she choked out her son's name. And then came the laughter, loud and brimming with sadistic glee. It was too much. Far too much. Twilight couldn't hold it back anymore. She screamed and fell back, scrambling away, pressing herself deeper into the back of the closet. Head shaking in denial, tears streaming in rivulets, her mind tried and failed to comprehend it all. Separate herself. She had to separate herself from the pain. She tried. She failed. She screamed again and the laughter stopped. She'd given herself away, brought their attention down on her. Their eyes, like emerald green coals burning bright with the light of violent madness, fell upon the small, quaking filly. She had to separate herself. Had to push back against— They approached, those two monsters. Fiends. Demons in equine skin. They came closer and closer, prowling like predators with matching grins that promised a slow, agonizing end. They enjoyed this, the filly realized belatedly. They reveled in the slaughter. They were eager for more, these twisted creatures. They'd killed, and they would kill again. They would kill her, and there was nothing she could do about it. Nothing... Nothing... Nothing. Twilight howled, the fear and pain scoured from her mind by a sudden and violent rage. Her eyes snapped wide open, incandescent with sickly green light and trailing purple vapor. Her horn bubbled and sparked with barely restrained dark magic. Power surged and roiled within the filly's small body, greater than anything she'd felt before. Greater even than what she'd unleashed against the manticore in the Fortress' depths. Just like back then, she wanted to release that power. Twilight wanted a target, something to direct her fury at. She needed to rend asunder, to demolish, to prove she wasn't afraid, to do what she couldn't back then. She had the power now. She could feel it in every fiber of her being. She was strong. She was deadly. She was— Twilight gasped in sudden shock as an aura far greater than her own seized at something vague and ethereal within her. It closed around that nebulous thing inside her like vicious claws and squeezed. Twilight cried out as a pain she couldn't quite describe washed over her. It only lasted a brief moment, but it was enough to leave her feeling frail and shaken. She fell to the ground, her body going completely limp. She tried to get back up, but moving her legs was like trying to move a mountain. All she could manage was a slight tilt of her head, looking up just enough to watch as a certain armored stallion approached her. The dark grey unicorn stopped just before the filly and stared down at her, piercing her with his ruby red eyes. Twilight flinched again and looked away, unable to bear the pressure of his gaze. The judgment. It burned, but the filly knew she had nopony to blame but herself. She'd failed. Again. She'd thought she'd finally made some progress, but in the end, she'd just found a new way to disappoint her current mentor. The cold stone floor of the open pavilion that was her current training ground did nothing to help her misery either. There was a beat of silence between the two, a quiet moment that made Twilight more and more nervous as it went on. Then King Sombra spoke, fixing the filly with a reproachful frown. Yet, despite his severe expression, the stallion's next words surprised the filly. “This was a step above your previous attempts, if a small one,” he commended, though his expression didn't change, “that said, unlike your last few attempts, you pushed too far in the opposite direction. There is power within you, Twilight Sparkle, but your actions here are those of a foal lashing out—a mere filly who thinks herself strong while knowing nothing.” Twilight said nothing in response, knowing full well that he was right. In the beginning, she'd been too afraid to even attempt any kind of control over herself. She'd failed to master her own emotions time and again and each time her affinity would flare uncontrollably, her dark magic wrested from her magical grasp. She'd spent the last few days reading up on the basics of dark magic and the first step was to master oneself. She needed to gain mastery over her negative emotions—learn to wield them as a tool. If she couldn't do that, then even the most basic of the dark arts would be beyond her reach. Yes, she'd flung herself across Equestria using her own magical strength. Yes, she'd killed a manticore. None of that mattered. Those feats were closer to an uncontrolled magic surge than anything else, nothing even remotely close to true skill. Twilight knew she had such a long way to go, and yet... “You are making progress, do not doubt that,” Sombra continued, a bit of the edge slipping from his harsh tone, “you turned your fear and despair into rage and that will in no way avail you. That said, I could feel the barest hint of intent beneath the fury, and that is what's important here. Intent. Willpower. Do you understand, Twilight?” “I... yeah, I do,” Twilight licked her dry lips and nodded. She could feel strength coming back into her limbs. With a grunt of effort, she slowly picked herself back up and continued. “Negativity bias makes it easier to give in to darker emotions, which is why dark magic is both dangerous and hard to learn. All magic requires intent, but dark magic demands more than most. That's why it's important to build up your mental fortitude before learning even the most basic of dark magic spells.” “Spoken word for word from Alamino Coltley's Art of the Dark Mind,” Sombra nodded in approval, “a fine treatise to memorize certainly, but I trust you now realize that knowledge alone isn't enough?” “Yes, Magister,” Twilight replied, using a title Sombra had evidently taken at some point in his long life, “I know what I need to do, but...” She trailed off as shame and frustration threatened to consume her. Sombra chuckled deep in his throat at Twilight's bitter expression, “Roam was not built in a day, youngling. You possess a prodigious mind and a font of magical power I've not seen in ages—especically for a foal, but the dark arts aren't so easily conquered.” With those words, he stepped past the exhausted filly and out of the open pavilion within the Crystal Castle's inner garden. He paused after a few paces and turned to look back at Twilight over his shoulder, “Take this opportunity to rest and reflect on your failures and how best to strengthen your will. We will begin your training anew two hour hence.” And just like that, the stallion turned back around, took another few steps forward, and vanished in a whirl of black smoke. Twilight found herself entirely alone in the snow covered garden. Alone, with nothing but her thoughts and the deafening silence to keep her company. Twilight shivered. It had been roughly a week since she'd been tossed unconscious back into the strange realm that housed King Sombra's entire empire. She'd hoped to get used to the place, but the unnatural silence that enveloped the world still unnerved her—and that was to say nothing of the King's 'subjects'. Twilight would see them around the castle occasionally, eerie pony shaped shadows that flickered in and out of focus. They wandered both the streets of the empire and the castle's halls without aim or purpose. They were just as hauntingly quiet as everything else, and Twilight did her best to avoid them all as much as possible. The garden was beautiful, that much she could admit. Twilight had always liked the winter season and the snowfall it brought. Everything in the garden, from the tallest trees to the smallest flowers, was perpetually covered in ice and snow. It made for a beautiful aesthetic... but that was it. The snow, for all of its sparkling beauty, wasn't cold. There was no pleasant chill in the air, no frosty breath or stinging eyes. There was no wind, but the atmosphere was never stifling, nor was it ever too hot or too cold. Twilight wasn't sure how it was possible, but the sensation was so at odds with the winter wonderland before her that it almost gave her a headache. It was all so... uncanny. The filly shivered again and quickly hurried out of the garden and back into the castle. As she made her way to the private quarters Sombra had prepared for her, Twilight wondered how her crimson-eyed mentor had been able to live in such a place for so long without going completely insane. The only reason Twilight still maintained her own sanity was because she had something to focus on. She had books to read and training with Sombra. It also helped that she didnt mind being alone for long periods of time all that much. In short, she could bear King Sombra's creepy empire realm because she kept herself busy. Even now, the long walk she was forced to endure down the empty, twisting corridors of the Crystal Castle was wearing on her nerves. The world around her was too quiet. Too still. Her hurried hoofsteps were strangely muted and with each corner she took she was afraid one of those eerie shadow ponies would walk past and scare her half to death. It had happened before and she had no doubt it would happen again. And, even putting all of that aside, Twilight just didn't want to be alone with her thoughts. Not right now. Normally it wasn't an issue, but her training was making her more prone to introspection lately. In some ways, that was kind of the point, but the filly didn't like where her mind was taking her. She found herself losing focus during her studies, her thoughts wandering in troubling directions. It wasn't just memories of her family and their deaths either. She worried about her place in the world, about her future, about Starlight and what she was doing right now. She wondered what Aeon was up to and what her plans were for her and Starlight. She thought about the demons and found that she was just as curious about them as she was terrified of their existence. She ruminated on her lack of a cutie mark and what it might be once she finally got one. The filly still remembered Aeon's words, how she said that her cutie mark would be something special. Twilight was beginning to realize that 'special' didn't necessarily mean 'good'. She thought about all of these things, and she worried. She realized that she didn't really have much to look forward to in her life other than her studies. Even then, she could tell that all of her teachers weren't exactly the kind and upstanding sort. She thought about the future, and she feared for it. Feared what it would bring. Not once did she forget what she and Starlight saw in that crystal ball. The more she dwelled on that vision, the heavier it weighed on her soul. But what could she do except move forward? What else was there but to survive? She and Starlight, as exceptional as they both were, were still just fillies at the end of the day. Despite what she'd told herself during her rage-fueled power trip earlier, she didn't have the strength to live in a world like this. Not yet. No, she and Starlight would have to build up their own personal power, and they would. They had to. As painful as her existence was right now, Twilight didn't want to die. She didn't want Starlight to die. Starlight Glimmer was the only pony she could truly call a friend. Maybe even family. She wasn't sure how Starlight felt, but to Twilight, the filly was beginning to feel like a sister in more than name. It was a warm feeling, but that scared her too. It scared her because she didn't want to lose that warmth. She refused the idea outright. The sheer weight of her own denial surprised Twilight. It lit a fire in her, and as she finally reached her room and flopped down onto her generously provided bed, Twilight's worries began to fade, if just a little. She felt the flames of conviction flicker to life in her chest. It was just a small ember at the moment, but that was fine for now. A sense of purpose was beginning to form within the small unicorn—a budding intent, just like Sombra said. Twilight, utterly worn out, smiled nevertheless as she closed her eyes and prepared to nap her short break away. Confidence was the last thing she felt before her consciousness fled. Confidence that next time, she would not fail. And as she dreamed of the past—dreamed of better times, an old presence within that ethereal realm of slumber watched on, smug satisfaction writ plain across its void black features.