Repercussions
Jason raked a hoof against his forehead, backing up slowly until he made contact with the wall. He flattened his back against it and slowly slid into a sitting position, his emotions starting to turn from shock to grief. How was he supposed to explain this? He couldn't, because he should've seen this coming.
A tear slid out of his eye and down to his chin, where it dripped off a moment later. It only took him a few seconds to break down the rest of the way, his usual resolve broken down by the fact that he knew he'd screwed up. Maybe this hurt more than Dash's death. That one was arguably not his fault, but this... He had eaten the thing of his own will, and there was no fixing something like this.
It hurt, more than any blade ever did. Not just the idea that he could lose her forever, but the idea that he knew he had to initiate the problem by telling her himself. Maybe it was a failing in this case, but he couldn't keep this from her. He couldn't let this slip out in a way that was even worse.
Jason continued to weep, a small dark spot forming where his tears met in the soil. He'd never known how serious he'd been when he said he didn't deserve her. But on some level, he still had hope that none of what he thought had happened, that maybe he was overreacting.
He froze at that, maybe he was. The drug might not have made him a raging womanizer, although the fact that he had woken up in that mare's bed...wait.
Jason stood up, checking himself over for any sign of stickiness or a sign that something was amiss. He tasted his mouth, a definitely foreign taste still hanging around. His resolve took a hit, a leg beginning to wobble. Maybe this was his greatest fear. Losing Dash through one of his own shortcomings. Like how quickly his need for love had gotten him to eat that flower without a second thought.
But the mare, she didn't even look like a zebra anymore. Jason walked over to the still somehow dozing zebra, pulling the blanket off of her head and jumping backwards in shock. He landed on his back, scrambling back to his feet and taking another look. Just a zebra again, not-
"Jason!" He heard, turning to look at the door. Dash walked inside, looking more angry than he could've imagined. "What's this I hear about you sleeping with some mare?" She asked, her mane and coat flickering between color and greyscale a few times.
"No, I didn't-"
"What's that even supposed to mean!? You know what you did, that even if you didn't go all the way you still had the drive to." She replied, talking a few steps closer as Jason took the same number backwards. He shut his eyes, shaking his head quickly. As he opened them again, the blue mare had disappeared, replaced only by open air. Jason only felt his breathing increase, he knew everything she'd said was right.
"Why are you even fighting with me here?" Came Dash's voice again, this time from behind him. He spun, coming face to face with her. "You know that after what you've done, with that kind of a breach in trust, well..." She grinned, pushing her muzzle only an inch from hishis. "I hope you know that we'll never be together. That you'll never hear me say that I love you ever again."
Jason felt tears run down his face, collecting in the wetness that was already on his chin. "No, Dash, I-"
"And guess what? It's all your fault. There's no nightmare in your head, no circumstances to blame. And the filly that you adopted-"
"No- don't say it!" He protested, trying to put a hoof to her cheek but watching as it went right through.
"She'll hate you. She won't be able to even look at you without the distaste of knowing that at one point you were her father." Jason didn't respond with more than a continuation of his tears, Dash's avatar flickering away and popping up again a few feet backwards.
"Don't even try to touch me, you know you'll never feel my fur, or for that matter anything from me." She spat, her anger surfacing again. "And you know what that includes? Love. You think you're hungry now, just wait. As soon as you confess, and I know you will, you're never getting an ounce from me ever again. You'll die hungry and alone, and I won't even care." She flickered away, and Jason let himself collapse onto the ground.
Dash was right, everything she'd said. He couldn't get out of this one, and he wasn't sure he'd want to. She was correct, he'd confess as soon as he had the chance. And frankly, he felt like he deserved to die for this more than any other thing. All that trust, the link they shared, and he went and threw it in her face like it had never existed.
Yet he didn't feel like he was wallowing over himself, he felt more like he was in this state because of what he had destroyed. He knew he meant a lot to Dash, and he knew that she wouldn't be able to look at him the same way ever again. She- he didn't know how depressed she may become, with one of the only ponies she thought she could rely on actually the most disloyal of them all.
"What's the matter?" He heard, jumping slightly as his eyes met the with those of the zebra.
"I- I slept with you and I know that my fiancé is- well, we're not going to get married, I know that much." He said, punctuating the end of the sentence with several more tears.
"Did you?" She asked, throwing Jason off slightly. "All I remember is that we kissed for a while and you kept calling me Dash."
"Yeah, that's her name." Jason replied, watching the mare stick a hoof between her legs and pull it back to her face.
"What are you-"
"I'm going to gamble and say we didn't do anything serious." She said.
"Like hell we didn't, at the very least I kissed someone that wasn't my marefriend. How is that not serious?"
"I don't see what you're freaking out about, you were drugged. And you thought I was her anyway, that has to mean something."
"No, just- I need to get some air." He said, stomach grumbling as he left. It wasn't near as bad as last night, but he hardly cared if he fell over and died right now. Even if it was just a kiss, or whatever had happened, wasn't that the same? Sure, it probably was worse if he's actually slept with her, but he hadn't felt any sort of relief after she'd said they probably hadn't had sex. It was the morals of the thing, and either way they weren't good. About the only thing he could take from this was that he'd called her Dash. If he'd really thought it was her, then maybe this didn't count as cheating. But seeing as he didn't remember a thing, the whole night was starting to turn into Schrodinger's cat.
And ironically, he'd come out here to find Eravel and hopefully start back home, to the place where everything would blow up. He didn't want to stay here, so close to the memory of what he'd done. That, and he didn't want Dash to worry. Even if she had been right about everything in the hut. Jason looked up, his eyes meeting Dash's again across the fire pit, which was full of smoldering ashes.
"So what're you going to do afterwards? You know, when you run out of things to live for?" She asked, her eyes feeling like they dug into his skull.
"I-" His voice caught. "I don't know. Maybe hope that she decides to keep me around."
"Good luck." Dash replied. "You know that's a pipe dream anyway."
"So what if it is?!" He yelled back, causing a couple zebras that were actually out and about to turn and stare at him.
"Well, I'm just warning you that you'll be disappointed. But, you know, believe all you want."
Anger bubbled up in Jason. He wanted to tell her how wrong she was, that Dash would accept him no matter what he did. But he couldn't, and he knew it wouldn't be true. He dipped his head, looking up a moment later to see her gone, replaced by a slight breeze that cooled the new tears on his face.
He stood in place for a while, eventually getting himself to move again on the search for Eravel. He tried only three huts before he found the griffin, surrounded by several giggling mares. Jason rolled his eyes, watching the griffin give a nervous chuckle as he extracted himself from the zebras. There was a long silence as they stared, before Eravel noticed Jason's face in the dim light and his own expression became worried. He followed Jason outside without a word, letting the fabric that blocked the door fall back into place.
"Before we get into whatever serious thing, let me just say that I can see what you ponies have going with mares, man."
"You- seriously?"
"Yeah, I guess. Not many griffins around these parts. Plus, they're all fuzzy and kinda small. Ponies are way squishier than a griffin, and-"
"Eravel, we can talk about the ins and outs of mares later, just- what do you remember about anything I did last night?"
The griffin shrugged. "It was kinda strange, I mean, you got high in like five seconds and then went totally apeshit for a few hours before you brought some mare off into a hut. It was like you got an express treatment of that thing. It was supposed to go on for most of the night, but you looked about to crash when I last saw you."
Jason groaned, raking a hoof against his head. "Fuuuuuck."
"I'm guessing you woke up with a mare?"
"Yeah, and I can't remember anything. Not one detail. All she remembers is that we kissed, and I'm hoping that that's when I passed out."
Eravel ground his beak back and forth, making a barely audible grating sound as he thought. "You're not going to keep it a secret, right?"
"No, I would never do that." Jason replied.
"It's either that or loneliness forever." Dash said, appearing behind Eravel. "You know something like this getting out might not blacklist you, but I'm sure you won't find another mare like me." She said, smiling as Scoots appeared next to her and Jason jumped.
"Hey, you okay?" Eravel inquired, sticking a talon over Jason's shoulder.
"Why would you betray mom?" Scoots asked, her eyes filled with tears. "I thought you were a good pony."
"I- I didn't mean to do anything!" He yelled back, knowing that his excuse wasn't completely justified.
Eravel looked over his shoulder, staring at open space. "What the hell? There's no one there, Jason!"
"I thought you loved me." The filly said, continuing to stare at him.
Jason could hardly take it, between the constant grief that they were providing and the fact that he still had all the usual stuff to worry about. More tears dripped from his chin, his gaze not breaking from the filly as Eravel shook him around. "I'm sorry, I'm just so sorry." He said, letting himself go the rest of the way as Eravel stopped shaking him and put his arms around the stallion, trying instead to comfort the guy in his hallucination as opposed to bringing him out of it.
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Dash shook her head, trying to rid it of the tinges of despair and grief that seemed to be popping up in her head. Not that she really knew why, she was still worried about Jason but she knew he was alright. She hadn't seen him in her dreams last night, but that was far from an anomaly. That's not to say it wasn't a little worrying by itself, but she was sure he was okay. After all, he was the one that could seem to take just about anything and keep going.
"Dash! Do you know how to work this?!" Scoots yelled from downstairs, jarring the mare from her thoughts. She pulled the toothbrush out of her mouth and spat, sticking it into a holder as she trotted out of the room. Even if she wasn't all that worried about Jason not coming back, she knew she already missed him a whole lot. That was for damn sure.
"What is it squirt?" She asked, messing up the filly's mane as she joined her on the couch.
"How does Jason get this box thing started?"
"The Xbox?"
"Sure."
"He uses magic to power it, I think. I'm not sure how exactly, he told me he would teach me sometime."
"So we can't play it?" She asked, looking up with a pleading expression.
"No, but if you want we could go into town, get some hot cocoa or something. You want to do that?"
"I guess." She replied. "I'm not sure if I can reach these spring thingies with my wings anyway." Scoots said, tossing down the controller in distaste.
"Your wings will grow, you don't really have a lot to worry about."
"But what if they don't, Dash? What if I don't grow?" she asked, her eyes wide.
Dash giggled, putting an arm around the filly's neck. "I used to think that I would never grow, cuz I was like you and ended up being smaller than all my friends. But you know what? I grew, and all those worries went away. I'm bigger than most of my friends now, and I have to say I like looking down on them, even if it is just an inch."
"Yeah, but-"
"Stop worrying Scoots. Like Jason always says, once your childhood is gone, it's gone. You don't have hardly any worries, a roof over your head and three meals a day. Enjoy the fact that all you have to do is go to school and look for a cutie mark."
"Yeah, but I'm never going to find my cutie mark if all you do is give me riddles about it."
"Please, if you looked at your entire life you'd find that it's staring you in the face, Scoots. Plus, if I told you what it was, what fun would that be?"
"But I'd have it, I mean-"
"You're good at your talent, I've seen you excel at it before. The fact that you don't have an emblem bragging about what it is is hardly something to look forward to. It doesn't come with power, it hardly comes with any answers. When I got my cutie mark, I already knew what my talent was. That's when it appeared."
"Dash, come on!"
"No, you'll know when you get it, because you won't have to look at your flank for confirmation. You just know."
"Does Jason get that without the mark? Like, the feeling?"
"I dunno Scoots, but from what Jason tells me he doubts that all humans find their special talent. There're just too many things to try, I guess."
"Yeah, with all the stuff we've done, it's kinda crazy that we'll actually find them at some point. I mean, there are only so many things, right?"
"You'll have to narrow it down a little there, Scoots."
"That's fine, I don't have to do anything girly. I can just, you know, do something awesome like you."
"Whatever you say, kiddo." Dash replied with a laugh, picking the filly up with her hooves and holding her in the air above her head. "Now what do you say we get that cocoa?"
"Depends." Scoots said, trying to make a serious face even though Dash's hooves were tickling her somewhat. "Candy cane, or no candy cane?"
"Oh, a trick question. I believe the correct answer is, only if they're of that straw variety?"
Scoots giggled, response enough by itself.
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"Returning home, I assume?" Zan asked, meeting up with the griffin and still slightly emotional changeling just outside of the blob of huts.
"Yeah," Eravel answered. "We're going back home. Or, at least, he is." He said, pointing to Jason. "Hopefully I'm arriving at my new home."
"With these measly supplies?" He asked, looking at the understaffed saddlebags and rabbit hanging from Eravel. "At least come with me to see the elders, I'm sure they'd me more than happy to give you some extra sustenance."
"Alright." Eravel said, before Jason could deny the offer. "They don't like it when you refuse." He informed the changeling. They walked for a short while, arriving at a much larger hut. Walking inside, they could see that it was not only devoid of windows, but it was also surprisingly well lit.
"It is not polite to simply go away, without staying with us for a short foray."
"Yeah, sorry." Eravel answered, watching Jason's eyes nervously. He seemed focused on one side of the hut, his fin-mane on end.
"We know you are rushed and we won't delay, so at least take some supplies before you leave, okay?"
Eravel's mouth turned up into a slightly forced grin, still letting his eyes flick over to Jason every so often as a few zebras walked up with some platters of food and drink, along with some rather primitive looking blades. "Thank you."
The zebra smiled and nodded, turning his attention to the changeling. "He does not seem completely right, what do you think is the cause of his blight?"
"Shut up!" Jason yelled, taking a few steps backwards as if to prove the need for concern.
"He's having side effects. From the lotus, I think." Eravel replied, quickly packing away some pieces of food. "He thinks he might have slept with a zebra last night, and now all he can see is his fiancé and kid. Obviously they're not happy." The zebras only stared wide eyed back, as if such a thing had never happened before. "Can you fix it?"
One shook his head. "Our medicines only serve the things we know, outside of our race progress is quite slow."
"Well shit." Eravel said shortly, hoisting a few things into Jason's saddlebag and pulling him away from whatever he was looking at. "Thanks, we'll be sure to visit sometime." He waved and turned to leave, stopping in his tracks and turning around once more. "Hey, real quick, if he can figure out a way to get that black stuff out of your streams, would you let ponies over here to do it?"
"I don't-"
"Oh yeah, ponies with wings like him can move clouds around. Maybe not as many at a time, but-"
"Yes." The zebra replied quickly, his one word answer apparently not requiring a rhyme. He nodded his head a few more times to affirm his point.
"Alright, cool. Talk to you later, I suppose." He said, pulling Jason towards the door.
"Take care and goodbye, may your lives be long and your bodies stay spry."
Eravel saluted in response, dragging Jason outside with a few attempts at calming words. "Why are you still helping me?" Jason asked, turning towards the griffin after he'd lost sight of his hallucinations. "You know what I did, I'm not trustworthy in the slightest! Even my own daughter thinks so, and-"
"Jason, they're not real! That's not Dash, and she will never be Dash! You've been tormented all day by these- these things! You probably didn't sleep with that mare, and you couldn't control your actions in the slightest!"
"But you could, couldn't you Jason?" The sky blue mare asked, trotting up from behind Eravel. "You chose to take that drug, didn't you? You knew what drugs from your world could do, and you hardly gave one from here a second thought. Pathetic."
"No, I-"
"Jason, she's not real, you have to ignore her!" Eravel yelled, gripping the sides of Jason's head and forcing him to look the griffin in the eye. "She's not going to leave you, you'll be fine."
"Really?" He asked, hoping for only the slightest bit of a pick-me-up.
"No, of course not." Dash objected. "He's a griffin, they probably have multiple partners. What's one more to them anyway?"
"Jason, ignore her!" Eravel yelled.
"But then again, you're not a pony anyway, you're just some scum species inhabiting a body that you don't even deserve, isn't that right? And now it'a all about love, huh? So even after all this time, when I thought maybe you were different, you're still exactly the same as the pieces of shit that attacked Canterlot."
"No." He said, his voice low. "I am nothing like them!" Jason yelled, taking a step forward.
"Oh really? Pretending to be a messenger of god to get some free love and a babe?"
"I was going to die, Dash! I didn't have a choice, can't you see?!" He asked, the rivulets on his face increasing again.
"Sound's pretty self centered to me."
"I don't give a fuck what you think! Until I get home, your stupid opinions don't mean a thing!" He took in a breath. "Dash will understand, even if I did sleep with that zebra. She's not shallow like you, she knows me better than anyone!"
"How sure are you of that?" Dash asked, smirking.
"Sure enough." He replied, turning away and sprinting off as fast as his injured leg could carry him.