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// Twilights Decent 
// Story: Magic Corrupted 
// by BookWyrm 
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sorry about the delay, the chapter was obliterated in a bug... i had to re write it all.

Canterlot

Twilights Decent

Canterlot is much the same as it ever was.  The castle is almost completely repaired.  Cynics say that the princess fixing their home before some of the more damaged arias is entirely self-serving.  Personally, I find it a little comforting to see the capital bounce back.  It took me a while to find Twilight Sparkles pet baby dragon Spike.  The princesses explained to me that Twilight did horrible things to him to keep him from alerting them to the danger.  I ended up finding him living in a fashion boutique near the castle with an elegant unicorn mare called Rarity.  Spike looks everything except healthy.  His scales are greyish purple and his eyes have heavy bags under them.  He is shaky and stutters, often looking to Rarity for reassurance during the interview.  Spike only agrees to speak with me if Rarity is in the room.

T-T-Twilight was always a great g-guardian.  I considered her something between a mother and a sister.  B-But I took just as much care of her as much as she did of me.  T-Twilight was a genius, but sometimes she could be forgetful.  She couldn’t cook at all; she actually set water on fire once when she tried to make pasta.  Can you believe that?  

(Spike brightens a little, but his attempt at laughter set off a horrible fit of coughing.  Rarity patted him on the back and gave him a glass of water to get them to subside.)  

Anyways, Twilight and I were family. 

“What can you tell me about the day that Twilight brought home the Alicorn Amulet?”

(Spike cringes at the mention of that magic tool, but he answers)

I was actually not their when she brought it home.  I was out helping rarity gather gems for her dresses.  

(Rarity is a fashion designer, since the crisis she has become popular in Canterlot for her incorporation of cut stones in almost all of her designs.)

But when I came home to make dinner, Twilight was downstairs in the laboratory running experiments.  She asked for her meal on a tray so that she wouldn’t get distracted.  

“A laboratory? Didn’t you live in a library?” 

Oh right, the Library was actually inside a living tree.  The princess arranged for us to live their when we first came to Ponyville.  T-Twilight used her magic to change the inside of the place almost once a week.  It was a little confusing sometimes.  I would leave something in a room and the next day the room wouldn’t exist anymore.  So whenever Twilight had an experiment she wanted to run, we had a lab.  

“Wow… did you know what experiments she was running?”

I asked her when I brought down her dinner.  She… she said that she was experimenting on the… well you know. 

(Spike fidgets a little bit; I nod to let him know I understand.)

She had it in a blast chamber, attached to a bunch of sensors and wires that fed into an analysis computer.  She kept looking at the reams of paper that where being spat out, and saying how the things power was scientifically impossible.  

“Did she give any indication that she would put it on?”

Not at first.  But she was down there for days running test.  T-Twilight always threw herself into her research.  She had me really worried.  But then, on the fifth day she came upstairs for breakfasts. 

“What had happened?”

She said that her tests had yielded results.  She said that the amulet doubled any ponies natural magic every day it was worn, and that the personality corruption only happened form long term use.  She told me that… that… 

(Spike trails off, his eyes glaze over and his breath becomes labored.  Rarity rushes forward and catches him just before he falls from his chair.  I am stunned and confused.  The following is an interview with Rarity.)  

I’m sorry about that, Spike suffers from fits.  It’s always the worst when he speaks of his time during the crisis.  

“What exactly happened to him?”  

-sighs- Spike… was… tortured. He tried to come to us when Twilight started wearing the amulet.  Twilight didn’t like that.  So she cast some kind of dark magic on his mind and locked him in a closet.  It was so barbaric; she just left him there for almost two weeks.  We didn’t find him until after the town was destroyed.  

(Rarity begins to tear up.)

He was just standing there in the wreckage with a blank look on his face.  When we finally shook him out of it…

(Spike stirred. Rarity whispered the last bit)

What Twilight did to him was unforgivable, I don’t care what Spike says.  

(Spike walks over and we continue our interview)

Sorry about that…um…Where were we?

“Twilights experiment results.”  

Oh right… of course.  (inhales)  Twilight said that she could wear the a-amulet as long as she took it off in between spells.  I told her it sounded dangerous.  She told me not to worry, that she would be careful.

“What went wrong?”

At first everything was fine.  She would put the amulet on, cast a spell, and then take it off again.  She…She did amazing things; things that made Trixie’s time with it look like foal spells.  I remember, she used an age spell on me to turn me into a hatching again.  On another day, she turned led into gold.  But then she kept trying to push it farther wearing the thing longer, and she wanted me to act as her test subject.  Now I never minded when it was little stuff.  But…but some of it hurt!

(Spike glanced over to Rarity.  She walked over and sat and put a hoof on his shoulder to comfort him.)

Twilight started getting more and more unreasonable.  She would keep me up all night telling me that she needed me to help her, but then if I talked or tried to help her she would scream at me.  Then she wanted to see if she could fix broken bones.  

(Spike cringes)  

She insisted that it wasn’t a big deal… because she healed them so quickly I mean.  But after that I was scared.  I…I knew that she was being effected.  But when I told her about my concerns she insisted that it was all in my head.  
Then… Then the princess’s letter came.  

“What happened?”

Well occasionally Princess Celestia would send Twilight little assignments, and whenever that happened Twilight	 would freak out about it.  This time Twilight was supposed to give a small presentation on the true meaning of friendship at a trade summit in the crystal kingdom.  

“You mean the…”

…Yeah, the fright.  But back then it was just supposed to be another trade summit.  Twilight though, she… she freaked out.  She started wearing the amulet for days on end.  She insisted that she thought clearer with it.
I was scared.  Twilight was becoming even crazier than the smarty pants incident.

(Not: During a panic attack, Twilight put a want-it -need-it spell on a doll, causing a small riot in her town.)

I decided to sneak out and talk to the girls.  Maybe get some help.  I should have sent a letter to the princess, but even then I…I didn’t want to get Twilight in trouble.  

“What happened?”

Twilight caught me…

(Spike begins to shiver uncontrollably.  Rarity gives me a look that said. “This interview is over.”  But I needed to know.)

“Spike, what did Twilight do to you?”

(Spike begins to cry.  His breathing becomes frantic and soon he is hyperventilating. In his hysteria, I manage to discern the name “Sombra”.  Rarity tells me to go.  I do not argue.)

I immediately feel guilty about Spike.  I think that I pushed too hard.  But Sombra is a name known well to anyone familiar to the newly rediscovered Crystal kingdom.  I must go there next.