//------------------------------//
// Into the dark. 
// Story: Changing perspectives 
// by Coronet the lesser 
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Spike had entered the Everfree forest with determined bravery. The endless trees filled with seemingly brutish malcontent. It had not fazed him. As a eleven foot tall teenaged dragon, little bar his own kind could cause him great fear.  Even then the goal he had in mind was far more important than the base instinct of fear. Though an old memory of a certain green dragon popped into his head and had managed to shake him a little but he pressed on regardless.

Despite this he still felt a great sense of unease. The forest was old and angry. Discord had always told Spike that the forest had a mind of its own. Discord said the forest had been there since before he had arrived on the planet and from what Spike had heard Discord was old. Like prehistoric old.

It had never changed from since he had first arrived in Ponyville almost ten years ago. It just grew and bulged on the edge of the town like a corrupt spider or a dormant giant. It was a threat but only to those who disturbed its sanctuary. The trees gave the illusion that the path within the forest was smaller than it really was and due to his height, Spike felt oddly claustrophobic. With that, something began kicking at the back of his mind. A primal instinct to avoid the forest pulled at his forethoughts. How had that old serpent in the cave lived here? How did any creature of logical or least contemporary thought lived here? But they did and the creatures within seemed bound to its borders.

It reminded him of another thing Discord said, something about how his magic never really worked within the vicinity of the forest. Old magic was the primary conclusion that Twilight had reached.  For some reason the idea that there was magic beyond the normal comprehension of modern unicorns or even Twilight herself made his stomach churn.

He still pressed on. This was a something of personal importance towards him. It had involved the instinct that was currently bothering him. It had become regular problem of recent.

Despite having a larger room due to the extensive construction of the palace for Twilight, he still felt cumbersome around his smaller companions. His size was also becoming a problem for security reasons. Guards were becoming more and more irritated by Spikes constant presence and he had begun to notice a creeping contempt for him, radiating off them. Whisperings about how he had wasted court time through a recurring series of accidents that required Twilight to see him.

It wasn’t his fault usually. As mentioned most cases were accidents. Carts knocked over by a stray tail, damage to windows by his passing and occasinally a market stall set on fire. There was a growing concern about the welfare of children around a local dragon and had almost forced Spike into a not so much of a self-exile. He was at home but he knew, excluding a few, that he was not welcome. He knew also he was of limited use practically. He could no longer send letters for his claws had grown far too large to hold a quill. His fire breath was now a serious hazard and the work he had once been so committed  to within Twilight’s personal library had been taken over by a flurry of attendants and scholars much to Spike’s contempt.

Twilight had always been light hearted about it. In truth she ignored the issue at hoof. All she saw was a slightly larger, clumsier version of her younger brother. She held him high regard and dismissed any ideas that her brother could be a liability or a threat towards the residents of Ponyville or her staff within the town. Of course his friends had backed him up, standing by his side whatever the incident may be. Luckily for Spike during the more serious forms of accidental property damage there were advantages to having a princess for a sister.

But he knew she couldn’t sweep everything under the carpet. There would come a time when she couldn’t fix everything and keep smiling as if nothing happened. There would come a time when he could no longer function within normal society.

The tell-tale signs were beginning to form as he matured sexually. While he had always held a great deal of self-control in regards to his maturity, his senses were becoming more primal. Things nowadays got him more angry or offended. He struggled to control his greed or to prevent himself from stealing. The court irritated him more. His paranoia about protecting the rapidly expanding town had grown tenfold.

The worst part was his protectiveness. He disliked new ponies around his friends. He began to uncomfortably think of them as his possessions and that new ponies were trying to steal from him. It sickened him. They were his friends, not property. It was at its worst around Twilight and Rarity.

He loved Twilight deeply but his agitation about constant guests had made Twilight's social interaction whether it be to court officials or petitioners made her job unnecessarily more difficult. She was still blind to it but the other princesses were not. The fact that he had once hissed at Luna for hugging Twilight unexpectedly was unacceptable.

Of course there had always been Rarity. In truth he was even more love with her than ever before. He just couldn’t accept natural facts. Even though she had often dropped hints towards the fact that she was not interested in him and saw him more as a friend. It had never sat right with him. Instead he persisted with denial and fantasy even beyond the point where anything consisting of a normal relationship was no longer possible.

He had consulted, who had admittedly become something of a budding uncle to him, Discord, about the possibility of reducing his size to a more manageable level. Discord declined to go ahead with such a procedure. It was according to him an almost impossible process to survive through and even if Spike did, he would be in excruciating pain for the rest of his days. Plus he would require additional magical procedure to maintain his size, once again enduring a very painful process. Discord also claimed that it would be too similar to the old days when he had a more twisted sense of personality.

He told Spike he would not go down that road again. But in truth Spike was already pressing down that road. A creature that burned down buildings, plundered castles and terrorized the country side. He was raised to think better but the pounding in his skull told him otherwise. He was a dragon no matter how long he had lived amongst ponies, a creature of greed and brimstone not the shining knight that Rarity wanted. The pony Rarity had wanted was the type of pony that killed creatures like Spike.

Spike was desperate. He began to travel under the pretence that he needed a short break. He hated lying to Twilight’s face but it was the only way to escape her surveillance. He visited great peaks filled with those of his kin, consulted amongst the greatest and oldest of them. He travelled to far off lands filled with strange creatures. He even took Zecora’s advice and visited the shamans of her homeland. The answer had always been the same no matter what. They could not help him. No one could have helped him they said. As a last resort he begged the Princesses. It had not boded well. The conversation rapidly turned into an argument that Spike regretted deeply. Words were exchanged that should not have been within hallowed halls. Spike had snapped at Celestia’s pragmatic and realist views. She had told him to move on from Rarity and look for a compatible mate.

He sat still in denial. He raged against the inevitable. He returned a defeated drake. But he put on a smile for Twilight and the others. He didn’t want them to know that he was at his breaking point. The love of his life was slipping through his claws. Rarity would find that special somepony soon. It wasn’t to be him.

The thought of her being with somepony else drove him to madness. He just wanted this one thing. He had never asked for much. He had been modest most of his life. He always strived to please even when his intensions were more than questionable. Yet fate had ignored him, left him to the side-lines. He had always been the third wheel, the surplus requirement, just the assistant to a greater pony. It was hard not to keep down his growing resentment.

A glimmer of hope had appeared before his return. A traveling magician had come by Ponyville. Unlike Trixie, Spike had heard that the being who had performed before the town was an extraordinary individual.  Apparently a creature of many talents, rumours gave great acclaim to whoever it was. Twilight still held him as a trickster but the town was less sure. Many claimed he was a gifted wizard from a faraway land, or a spirit wrapped in black cloth. Discord, in a rare moment of seriousness, warned those in the town and Twilight herself, that he got a weird feeling from this individual. That rang alarm bells for Spike. For a being as old as Discord to feel at discomfort around what was just supposed to be a simple traveling magician gave Spike some desperate hope.

That was why he had taken the path to the forest. He was deep within its hold. That was in itself an oddity. Few were insane enough to even contemplate entering the deepest reaches of the forest. Had it been anything else Spike would have waited until a more suitable time to visit. It was winter and the forest seemed to react more violently towards the cold weather but Spike was in a hurry. The magician would be gone soon if the stories were true. Spike needed to change; he needed to become what he had always desired to be.

He needed to become a pony or at least something within the realms of normality. Not a hunkering death machince. He would change. He'd have his happily ever after. Damned be the consequences.