//------------------------------// // Chapter 15 // Story: The Siren // by McPoodle //------------------------------// In his dream that night, Spike was skipping through a meadow with Rarity, gathering rubies into a wicker basket. Rarity looked upon Spike with love, because in the dream Spike was a pony. Well…he knew that he was a pony in the dream, but he didn’t exactly know what he looked like as a pony. He was sort of an amorphous pony-shaped blob, but somehow that blob was labeled “Spike the Pony”, and so that was what Rarity saw him as. Oh, and apparently, he was a pony who ate rubies. At some point Spike’s worries from the waking world began to affect the dream. Now the pair of them were not looking for gems for Spike to eat, but rather a gem to fill the hole in Twilight Sparkle’s head and so wake her up from her thousand-year sleep. Suddenly there was a rippling of reality, and a cobalt-blue filly stepped into the meadow. Her mane was a lighter blue, and she had a cutie mark of the moon and stars. “Good even, Young Spike!” the filly exclaimed in an archaic accent. “I crave thy pardon for mine interruption of thy dream. Fare thee well?” Spike shook his head as he came to full awareness, and the world around him flickered for a while. “Who are you?” he asked. “And why do you talk so funny?” The filly twisted her lips as she tried to puzzle out what the dragon was saying. “I do not speak funny, Sir Dragon. Rather it is thee! Is this the modern manner of speaking? Yours is most confusing. And I am Luna, Princess of the Night.” “Luna!” Spike exclaimed. “The same,” Luna confirmed. “An it pleases thee, wouldst thou know what manner of malady doth plague thy mistress, Twilight?” Spike worked his way through Luna’s utterance. He had the advantage of spending a lot of time with old manuscripts as part of his job. “Twilight is not my ‘mistress’,” he did find himself forced to say. “Ew.” Luna rolled her eyes. “Twilight Sparkle. My savior. The one who doth care for thee.” “Yes.” Suddenly he remembered. “Twilight! You saw what she’s going through?” “Nay,” said Luna sadly. “She didst deny me entry unto her dream, but I did sense her torment from the Castle Canterlot.” “Wait, you visit dreams?” Luna sighed at being forced to repeat herself. “Ay, I did visit her dream this even, and even now am visiting thine.” “But…how?” Luna laughed bitterly. “Oh, didst thou not know? The cognomen 'Nightmare Moon' was not given me by flight of fancy but based upon the Creator's truth.” She gestured at her cutie mark. “Oh,” Spike said in realization. “It’s one of your powers.” “Yea, verily.” Spike looked over at the frozen cow-eyed form of his crush. Literally cow eyed. With a shudder, Spike stuck his arms into Rarity’s form and shook them to make her turn back into dream stuff. “That’s really creepy, you know,” he commented. “I’m not sure if privacy actually existed in your time, but it’s kinda big in ours.” He turned back to see Luna shrug—she probably failed to understand any of that. Spike thought for a moment. He eventually figured out that Luna somehow sensed Twilight’s distress and was here to help. But Twilight wasn’t letting her do that, so it was up to him. “Twilight’s in trouble, all right. I think she’s…” And here he stopped to really think. He initially wanted to come out and say that Twilight was a Siren, and her powers had finally fully manifested. But that would be to dismiss her utterly in Spike’s mind, to say that she could never be his mother. Because no Siren could love her children. But Twilight did love him. Sometimes. And so, Spike said that Twilight was “…part siren. She lost control of that part of herself, and made some ponies and buffalo want to go to war with each other!” Luna found parts of Spike’s speech confusing, particularly the part about Twilight both being in control of herself but also not. “What can I do for thee?” she asked. “Tell me about Sirens. You knew one. She was your best friend. Tell me how they think. So I can convince Twilight to undo what she did.” “I…I cannot,” she said. “Dost thou seek a means to stop her from feeding upon the hate of the innocent? For that is impossible.” “I dost…I mean, I want her to undo her feeding,” Spike replied. “I want her to…put her food back.” “But…but that is more than impossible!” Luna protested. “Thou wouldst be better to appeal to the pony side of her. At least a pony can be reasonable.” “I’ll try that first, but I’m not sure that will be enough,” said Spike. “What more can I say?” Luna said in frustration. “Thou dost see before thee a filly, a swaddling babe! I have the mind of a newly-cutied—although I have had this mark since my rebirth, verily it doth feel brand new! The fully-grown Luna would have the strong mind that thou dost require, but thou shall not see it for a fortnight or more! No further help can I offer thee, Young Spike. And for that, my heart is overfull with regrets.” She began to fade away. “Wait!” exclaimed Spike, causing Princess Luna to return to a solid form. “Doesn’t a Siren have even a speck of pity?” “Nay, Spike,” Luna said sadly. “For a pony, a Siren doth feel only contempt. And a sense of lofty superiority to their pony victims. From that rule, only Sonata was the exception.” “Hmm…superiority,” Spike said, stroking his chin. “I might be able to use that. Tell me more…” The next morning Spike suddenly sat up. It took him a moment to realize that he was sitting in front of an abandoned hut outside Appleoosa, with a tragic battle only hours from starting. And after that he remembered his dream, and desperately hoped that he had in fact spoken with the real Luna, and not just a vain figment of his imagination. And with that he started carrying out the plan he had devised based on Luna’s words in the dream, utilizing the only weapon at his disposal: his sarcasm. “So have you tried applying reason to the problem?” He asked her through the wall of the cabin. “You’re generally pretty good with that. “Seriously. Your talent is analyzing magic. Analyze what you did and devise a counter-spell.” The window opened, and Twilight poked her head out. She opened her mouth, thought better of it, and summoned some text instead: MY SPECIAL TALENT DOESN’T INCLUDE ‘DEVISING COUNTER SPELLS’, DUMMY. I HAVE TO ACTUALLY SEE SOMEPONY CAST A COUNTER SPELL TO LEARN IT. Spike saw that Twilight’s eyes were cold and uncaring, like she got during one of her “spells”. He decided to keep trying anyway. “Well, figure out how to turn it off,” Spike pleaded. “You gave a great speech to Nightmare Moon that didn’t make her mad, so you know you’re capable of it. Go ahead and use me as a guinea pig.” He looked around him at the desolate landscape and sighed on thinking of what to say next. “It’s not like I can hurt you or anything if you set me off. I’m just a pathetic little dragon. The worst I’ll do is set the cabin on fire, and I know you know how to deal with that.” She looked blankly down at him. Nothing. There was no way that he would be able to get through to her. Spike sighed again. “Close your eyes.” Twilight furrowed her brow and opened her mouth to ask a question. “Close your eyes,” Spike repeated, keeping his voice calm. Twilight did as she was told. Spike put on a Bittish accent. (It wasn’t very good, but then again, neither was the accent of the pony he was imitating.) “Now imagine me as Pipsqueak, that cute colt that you wanted to make into your personal student.” Twilight’s cold expression faded. “…And I’m standing next to Princess Celestia, who saw everything.” Twilight suddenly teleported next to Spike. She wrapped her hooves around him and started shaking in fear. “W…what do I do?” she whispered. “You’ve got a near-photographic memory, Twilight,” Spike said simply. “Go back to what I suggested two minutes ago.” Twilight picked Spike up with her hooves and rested him on the windowsill, which in her sitting position was above her. “I can’t, Spike. When I’m like this, when I’m…normal…I can’t access that awful power I used. And the other me is…” “A Siren,” Spike said coldly. Twilight nodded sadly. “Then be a better Siren,” Spike said. “Sonata was a better Siren. It took her a few hundred years to reform, but I think you can do it faster than her.” Twilight shrunk in on herself. “I’m scared,” she admitted. “Now that I know that I have different parts to me…I slip into Siren Mode so easily.” Spike stood up on the windowsill and smiled down at the unicorn. “That was the old Twilight. The one who only wanted to be a big-shot monster hunter. The new Twilight knows how good it is to have friends. You’d never want your friends to fight each other…” “Never!” Twilight exclaimed, rising to her hooves so she could look Spike straight in the eye. “Twisting Applejack and especially Rainbow Dash like that was the worst thing imaginable.” “You also saw them after—you saw how they felt about what you did to them.” “I take it back—that part was definitely the worst. And they weren’t even mad at me, like they should have been. They just looked…violated…and shocked that I was the one who did that to them.” Spike scratched his head. “I’m actually going to have to teach you empathy, aren’t I?” he asked himself under his breath. “Now imagine all of the other ponies and buffalo, the ones you didn’t even know existed before today. They’re going to feel the same way after their fight today.” “I know, Spike!” Twilight cried out, closing her eyes in agony. “I know they will feel the same way. And if they remember that I did this to them, they’re going to hate me. And maybe I’ll deserve whatever they do to me, for being unable to stop myself.” Her head slumped in defeat. “So, stop it.” “I can’t! Siren Me has to do it, and she doesn’t care.” Spike inwardly sighed. He had hoped it wouldn’t come to this. Spike reached out his claw and lifted Twilight’s head, giving her a sweet smile when she looked at him. Twilight responded with a scowl. Siren mode unlocked. “You’re pathetic!” Spike snarled. “What?” Twilight asked in confusion. “You over did it!” Spike exclaimed. “Turning all of the ponies and all of the buffalo against each other.” Spike was drawing on a dark part of himself at this moment that he usually suppressed—the side of him that held anything without a bit value attached as worthless. “They’re going to wipe each other out to the last pony and last buffalo. There’ll be nothing left to feed on, and your friends will all abandon you. You will starve.” “No!” Twilight cried out, clutching at her belly. “Look!” Spike cried out, pointing at the distant ridge. A line of buffalo was running down towards the battlements of the town, where ponies were prepared to defend themselves by any means necessary. Twilight Sparkle, both sides of her mind united in the need to undo her magic of hate, sent out a countervailing wave of magic against both parties in the conflict. And then one part of her stared at the other part to learn the new spell she had just seen herself cast. At this distance, the magic couldn’t affect everybody. About half of the buffalo tripped over their hooves, many of them taking out ponies that were still infected with rage. The cured ponies simply stood there, blinking in confusion. As these tended to be the ponies at the front lines of defense, that meant that most of the buffalo made it into the town unharmed. The remainder of the settler ponies then put down their conventional ranged weapons and turned to their weapons of last resort: the apple pies. It turned out that apple pies were the solution to the conflict. The buffalo liked the taste so much that they were now open to compromise. And the ponies, led by Sheriff Silverstar, were finally willing to hear them out. Ponyville. The Golden Oaks Library. Later that evening. Twilight’s eventual Friendship Report was unprecedented in its brutality and self-accusing tone and was frankly unintelligible. As a result, Princess Celestia teleported straight to her and Spike in order to teleport them both to Canterlot for a full debriefing. Canterlot Castle. “…And that’s everything,” Twilight said in private audience with Princess Celestia after the Princess had dragged the whole story—and what she had put Spike through all these years—out of her. “Do you hate me?” she squeaked out afterwards. Celestia sighed inwardly. It wasn’t the first time that Twilight had asked her that particular question, although this was the first time that she had actually had to think for even a microsecond upon the answer. “I don’t hate you. “I’m not perfect, Twilight. The story of my sister’s fall is permanent proof of that fact. Neither are my ponies perfect, nor do I want them to be. “I love my ponies because they try to be the best ponies they can be, and they are sorry when they fail to do so. Both of those things are true for you. You learned that spell…” “Yes!” Twilight exclaimed. “I know what to cast the next time that…part of me…tries to feed on hatred again.” "Now Spike,” Celestia said, turning to him. “You know that Twilight is not the only mother-figure in your life. For the first few months after you were hatched, I was the one who raised you. I could take up that duty again. Together, we can try to work out your dragon heritage, and do our best to try and help you to achieve it.” Spike looked thoughtfully between Celestia and Twilight. “If you don’t mind,” he said at last, “I’d like to stay in Ponyville. Not to dump on Canterlot, but Ponyville is a lot nicer to dragons. And I have more ponies I’d like to visit…if Twilight ever…” Twilight turned to face him, a little frown upon her face. “I’ll keep trying, like I’ve always said I would. But you know how bad I am at it, spell or no spell.” “Do you still want to stay with Twilight after hearing that, Spike?” Celestia asked. Spike nodded somberly. “I want to think that we’ve reached a turning point in our relationship,” he said. Celestia sighed, audibly this time, which caused Twilight to sink her head between her shoulder blades in shame. “Very well. Do not hesitate to contact me if things go badly for you. And be sure to lean on friends, both yours and Twilight’s, for help.” “Will do,” said Spike. “Would you like to stay the night?” “No, I think we should head back home,” Twilight said, turning towards the doors. “Give my regards…and thanks…to Princess Luna. Tell her that I haven’t stopped trying to free her friend.” “I’ll be sure to let her know.” “And stop using Middle Ponish with her,” Spike added as he turned to follow Twilight out the door. “She needs to learn to speak like the rest of us if she ever wants to fit in.”