//------------------------------// // Running into an "Old Friend" // Story: Like Something's Missing // by Icecane //------------------------------// A pin could have dropped and the noise created would have sounded off like a crackle of thunder. Everything was silent and still within the tower as Spike's frozen gaze stayed on the journal he had been given, telling him his hopes and dreams for their adventure were nothing but a foolish waste. Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Applejack and Pinkie Pie could only hold their expressions of shock to what they had heard, lacking even the faintest idea to what they could do. Twilight held her head down, looking away from the scene before her, unable to bring herself to look at the crushed dragon. Everypony then flinched suddenly, the all consuming silence around them being shattered by the echoing thud of Typhoon's final journal striking the ground. “So... that's it,” Spike choked, his voice barely above a whisper. “Serilex was nothing but a brute, a monster, no better than any other dragon.” “I-I'm so sorry, Spike,” Twilight murmured, almost coming off as a whimper. Even though she knew it was coming, it was impossible to prepare for the heart wrenching moment. And once again, like so many more occurrences, the unicorn found herself at a loss, unable to help someone she cared for. The young scholar felt a cold chill trace her spine as Spike's tearful eyes locked onto her. “Don't be,” he muttered. “There's nothing to be sorry about. It's not your fault, it's theirs.” The dragon's eyes then fell back to the large mural. “If only Typhoon had made it to Cloudsdale, we wouldn't have needed to waste so much time learning what we already knew.” Twilight shook her head. “It wasn't a waste, Spike,” she said, disagreeing with him. “You set yourself a goal and saw it through. When we started this, you wanted to know how far physical differences went for dragons. Even if Typhoon's journal had said that Serilex was the same as the other dragons, you would have wanted to see for yourself.” With a slow, steady step, she approached the hurting dragon, lowering her head to nuzzle against him comfortingly. “Though he wasn't the kind of dragon you hoped for, you can at least know that it isn't your own lack of wings that makes you different, it's you.” Hoping to have gotten through to him, Twilight met the dragon's gaze with a small smile. But it quickly deflated as Spike turned away from her, sighing in his dejection. “I just want to go home,” he said, turning toward the doorway that led out of the chamber. Releasing her own saddened sighing breath, Twilight looked between her friends and assistant. “It's been a long day,” she said, absentmindedly looking out the windows into the empty caverns, half expecting to see a night sky. “Let's make camp here, we can go home after we've all had a rest.” The other ponies all nodded in agreement, feeling a weight of weakness atop their backs. Their simple camp was set up quickly. They took the chamber two floors down from the mural room, wanting to put the incident behind them and not wanting the two dimensional dragon ancients watching them in their sleep. Several hours passed before the sweet relief of sleep took the exhausted ponies. It wasn't easy, as each of them tossed and turned on the hard stone floor, their minds swirling with all that had happened. But eventually, their eyes closed and their chests began to steadily rise and fall in a rhythmic motion. However, the same could not be said for the single dragon. Spike stayed lying on his side as, one by one, his friends each fell into their rest. He couldn't sleep, even if he wanted to. There was too much on his mind, too much emotion rippling through him. After he was certain that the others were asleep, Spike rose from his makeshift bed and slowly walked toward the rising stairs. It took longer to scale the expansive steps, his small form making certain of that, but he ignored the time spent with each increase in height and kept his gaze forward. Reaching the floor he was searching for, the dragon crossed the chamber. He didn't stop, didn't halt in his step or slow in his speed. It wasn't until he stood before the looming sight of the Mural of the Ancients did he halt on the spot. As he looked at the detestable piece of art, his emerald eyes locked onto the only point of interest to him, the only wingless dragon of the lot. “Why you too?” he asked the painted dragon. The hollow pit inside the assistant's chest grew as he glared at the ancient dragon who remained silent. “All I wanted was to see how far dragons could be different, to see if I truly had to be a unique... freak out of a species. But it's only your bare back that's different, isn't it?” Spike wiped away the few droplets of tears that lined his eyes. His entire body began to tremble with the building emotion inside of him. He wanted to cry, but he was far too angry to do so. “Dragons aren'twild animals,” Spike continued, still venting out his boiling hatred toward a dragon who was long gone. “We talk, we can learn, we make our own games for fun. I learned so much about what dragons can do at the migration. But... but how are dragons really so different?! All I've ever seen is how selfish and ruthless they are! How they'll hurt anyone they want to just because they can! On my birthday, I even learned how it's natural for us to want to take anything we want and hurt anypony who tries to stop us!” Spike's clawed hands clenched into fists as his burning gaze stayed on the flightless dragon. “I at least wanted to think that there was more to dragons than selfish, ferocious beasts! What makes dragons any better than manticores, or timberwolves, or even hydras?! What makes meany better?!” Again, the ancient dragon was silent, never moving from his fiery attack on the small village. It was then that Spike could no longer take it. “Answer me, Serilex!” Feeling his burning anger boil upward, Spike's maw opened wide as he breathed a large ball of fire. The intense flame sailed through the air with amazing speed and struck at the mural that was causing him such strife. He watched as the fire burned for only a moment, dieing out quickly with nothing left to feed it. For several moments, the young dragon simply stood there. Smoke trailed from his nostrils as his breathing turned haggard, his rage not yet fully dissipated. As his thick, heavy breaths began to slow, his hardened gaze slowly softened. Then, he felt his anger disappearing entirely, being replaced with the same despair he felt when he held Typhoon's journal in his hands. The chamber was once again enveloped in silence. Spike could only stand there and stare sadly at the ground, feeling his eyes beginning to water once again. Thoughts on regrets began to enter his mind as he wished he had never left Ponyville in the first place. But the silence surrounding the dragon was broken as a loud noise reverberated through the chamber, made even worse as its echo doubled its pounding intensity. Spike clamped his hands over his ears as he was overwhelmed by the terrible, grating sound of stone grinding against stone. His head pounded as the most horrible noise he had ever heard continued. Looking for the source, the pained dragon's eyes were stopped on the mural. His eyes widened as he saw the bright, burning light running up the center of the wall. It only stopped as it reached the top and bottom of the massive mural. The sound then became louder, but the awestruck dragon never noticed as he could only stare off at the sight. Then, he saw the surface of the mural begin to shake. Only after moments of the shuddering rumble, the line of light running in the center faded. As it did, the light left behind a thin crevice of space between both halves of the mural. Spike slowly backed away from the scene as it looked like the mural was moving toward him. To his astonishment, he realized it was. Both halves of the mural began to slide across the tiled floor at the center. Like a towering gate to an ancient castle, the mural became a gargantuan door. Then, the earsplitting noises stopped and Spike stared into the opened passageway that was revealed. Still reeling from what had just occurred, Spike took only small, hesitant steps toward the newly discovered tunnel. Entering it, he looked around at the surroundings. Obvious at the first glance, he could clearly see that it was unlike the tower he was at previously. It was much more like the cave that the tower was situated in. The walls were rough and naturally jagged, making the path forward less than straight for any larger creature maneuvering through. A sudden noise coming from the depths within the tunnel forced Spike to stop. He listened in closely as the sound occurred once more, much more closer than before. Sounding like the footstep of a larger creature. The dragon's heart began to race as the unmistakable noise of claws scrapping across stone accompanied it. As the young assistant stood there, rooted in place by his ever growing fear, his breathing stopped as he saw a figure emerging from the darkness. Gasping for air, he could only look up in frightened silence as the creator of the sound approached him, a familiar looking, bronze scaled dragon. Paralyzed, Spike was helpless as the much larger dragon gazed down on him. It's lips curled and parted into a grin, it's flesh rending teeth clearly showing. Twilight and her friends were quickly alerted to what was going on above them. At first, the startled ponies feared that an earthquake was shaking their den to pieces. But, as the grinding of stone sounded, their imaginations went wild with what could be happening. Their fears of the unknown only worsened as they realized that their scaled companion was nowhere to be seen. Panic began to rise between them as the most obvious location came to them. Leaving behind their humble camp, the five ponies raced up the stairs, following the all consuming noise of an ancient doorway being opened. All they could do was question what was happening as they scaled the massive stairway that led them from one chamber to the next. None of them had a clue, nor did they know what part Spike had in it, if any. As they continued to run up the spiraling stairs, the quaking rumble grew louder. Attempts to drown it out by flattening their ears against their heads did little to muffle the noise. It forced them to struggle through it all as they rushed toward the source of it. It quickly hit them as a bittersweet relief as the noise stopped, the tower once again falling to the still hand of silence. But it didn't slow the progress of the ponies in any way. They galloped onward, higher and higher, passing through the first chamber above them and having only one more separating them from the room of the mural. But as their progress was halted as they made it halfway up the second flight of stairs. Everypony there stopped on the spot as a new sound echoed down toward them from a distance. The five mares all held gasped breaths as a familiar voice let out a frightened cry. “Spike!” Twilight cried out, immediately charging forward, throwing caution to the wind. The scholar's heart was racing just as quickly as her legs. Her friends followed just behind, right on her tail as they ascended the stairs and entered the empty chamber where so much had occurred. There was only a moments worth of hesitation as the five ponies gazed up at the now open doorway of the mural. But their confused questions on what happened were quickly pushed to the back of their minds as they each rushed forward toward the tunnel. The constant echoing of hooves striking against the rocky floor was all that could be heard as the ponies kept their charging gallop forward. Thoughts on the strange tunnel they were in, or what even was going on, were ignored as they only had one task on their minds.. Finding Spike was their only concern now, even as the closer they came to the tunnels end and they could see the outline of a towering creature in the darkness. Only as they neared the dragon did they stop, seeing his scaled face within the darkness of the gloomy cavern. It looked down at them, it's eyes slowly shifting between each of them, one by one. “Where's our friend?!” Twilight demanded, her fears of the ferocious creature being easily outweighed by her concern for her assistant's well being. The dragon eyed the unicorn intently, it's gaze never faltering from her as it gauged her aggressive stance. Then, a deep rumbling sound could be heard coming from the dragon. To the ponies, it sounded like a stunted growl of sorts, sounding off repeatedly in a rhythmic fashion. They each shared expressions of surprise as they realized that the dragon was chuckling. “Your little friend is nearby, unharmed of course,” the dragon replied, in a rough voice of masculinity. The bronze scaled dragon then shifted his weight to the side, opening a continuing path through the tunnel. The path looked to turn to the right, and the ponies could see a shallow light reaching through the overbearing darkness. Twilight led the way past the dragon, taking several short steps as she kept her eyes on the idle dragon, before they returned to a galloping pace to reach the source of the light, and hopefully, their young dragon friend. Soon enough, they could see the end of the tunnel. From their distance to it, they were unable to make out what was on the other side. A bright light flowing from the end blinded their eyes, too used to the darkness of caverns and ruins. But there was one figure they could see at the very edge of the tunnel, the frame of a small baby dragon. Elated breaths of joy escaped the five ponies as they rushed forward to greet their scaled friend. “Oh, Spike,” Twilight called, reaching the dragon's side with the biggest smile she could muster, “I'm so happy you're alright.” But Spike didn't answer, he didn't move, there was no reaction at all as his five pony friends approached him. The dragon's emerald eyes were as wide as dinner plates, locked firmly in place by a thousand yard stare. His mouth hung open just as wide, combining with his eyes to make an expression of utter shock. As their eyes became used to the light that was beyond them, the five ponies followed the dragon's gaze toward where the tunnel had led them. As they looked out into what was before them, five pairs of eyes widened as five mouths gaped at what they saw. Within moments, the mares perfectly matched the expression Spike already held. The tunnel ended at the entrance to a massive chamber, easily twice the size of the room they had just left. To them, the only way they could describe what they saw was as though they had just stepped into an ancient library for giants. But the fixed sights of the six friends barely noticed the inanimate objects that the chamber had to offer. What they noticed was what else filled the room, dragons. Scaled giants of all shapes, sizes and colors. Some flew through the air with ease, removing large tomes from their shelves, or placing new ones. A few silently sat motionless on the masterfully woven rugs that coated the floor, their eyes closed as though they were in a deep sleep. Others simply walked out of the chamber, leaving through one of the few archways that looked to lead toward even more mysterious locations. The greatest detail about the dragons that they noticed however, was how some differed from the others. Their attentive gazes were fixated on the tell-tale fact that several of the dragons were wingless.