//------------------------------// // Resolutions // Story: Oneirophobia // by Valorousspectre //------------------------------// It's blurry... I can hear something, but it makes no sense... something's above me. I don't know what it is... the sound is coming from it. Wait... there's another sound... beeping... is something beeping..? I don't understand... my eyes hurt... I don't understand what's... Why does my head hurt... so... much... ~*~ "It's not that simple. We're not entirely certain how this happened. I'm looking into it, I promise, and I swear it will never happen again." "But Miss Sparkle, this destruction and chaos was caused by your magic! How can we know you won't lose control again?" Twilight sighed. The press. The bane of the existence of anypony that has any sort of fame. For Twilight, she'd dealt with it before. Well, kind of. She'd been questioned after a small misuse of magic that had sort of ended up with the translocation of a small amount of the castle wall. "I didn't lose control," She corrected, trying to control her irritation, "I was temporarily possessed by a spiritual being that I didn't know how to fight. He deceived me with illusions in my subconscious that fooled me into giving up my body to him. Using it, he took control of my magic and used it to try and destroy the castle, defeat Princess Celestia and take over or destroy Equestria. He failed. I'm now going to be studying how to prevent such a thing from happening again." "What's going to happen to the Castle now? Canterlot's biggest draw point is in ruins." Finally, a question not about her. "Canterlot Castle will be repaired. It's stood through Dragon Attacks, Discords return and a Changeling invasion. It has stood for over a thousand years now, and it will stand for thousands of years more." Twilight sighed with relief as Luna landed beside her, cutting off the questions on the lips of the other ponies. "Subjects of Equestria," She intoned loudly, "Our people. Today My sister and I and the Royal Guards of Equestria were faced with a grave threat. Many lost their lives, but the intruder was defeated." The silence was deafening as the reporters looked onwards, listening in rapt attention to their monarch. "We are tallying our losses," She continued somberly, "And checking names. We will honour those who have fallen, and remember the dead for the years to come. Those who have lived through the attack will remember them for their lives, and we, my sister and I, will mourn them, as we mourn all those who have perished under circumstances dire and unfair. Those who have given their lives to protect us and our people." Luna swallowed hard. She wasn't used to making these addresses. She normally left this to her sister. But since Celestia was receiving medical attention (more of a formality really, to check that she was okay. She was notoriously difficult to harm, let alone injure for a long term) the job fell to her. "Celestia is fine," She went on after her pause, "As, we are pleased to announce, are the beloved elements of Harmony. As you all know, the Canterlot Castle gardens hold the memories of those passed to each threat Equestria has faced since my sister and I came to power. This is no different. Our sister and I shall be swift to erect a monument to the fallen, and we shall hold a service as soon as we can, to mourn our honored dead properly. Until then, we ask for time. Time to gather ourselves and time to restore ourselves. We shall answer all the questions we can at a later date. please, for now, let us recover and recuperate." Twilight let out a sigh as the crowds left, turning to look gratefully at Luna. "Thank you Princess... You saved me a great deal of trouble." Luna smiled. "That wasn't the true reason I came Twilight Sparkle. I had thought you'd want to know. Talisman, your friend. He's awake. He seems a little dazed, but he's alright, or so the doctors tell me." Twi's eyes went wide and she bolted, ignoring her friend's startled yelps and cries as she went. Luna merely smiled. ~*~ Tal groaned as the doctor who was looking after him removed the IV from his foreleg. Originally feeding painkillers into his system, Tal had fdecided it was a nuisance and was an all round pain in the neck and had demanded it removed. The doctor, deciding that the stallion had had enough of the Morphine anyway, had obliged. "Thanks..." Tal murmured, surprisingly lucid for a drugged unicorn. "You're welcome. Sorry I cannot stay longer, I have a plethora of patients out that I need to treat. If you need anything... well, just yell out, I'm sure somepony will come running." The doctor left. Tal was in a makeshift medical center. In the ruins of the old medbay was the new field hospital. Tents had been erected that held the medical supplies. Beds around the area were separated by white medical curtains erected upon aluminum stands. Basic privacy, best medicine. Well, until Twilight rushed in. "Talisman!?" She demanded, poking her head into sectioned off 'unit'. Tal looked at her in surprise. "Twilight?" He asked back. She sighed in relief. "Oh thank Celestia, it's the right unit. Fifth time's a charm right?" Tal blinked slowly. "Yeah... I suppose so." Five? Five rooms? Twilight took a moment to compose herself before walking into the little area with a forced smile. The smile only lasted a few seconds however before dropping, a troubled look on her face. "What's wrong?" he asked, wincing as he started to feel the pain in his splinted leg, "You're not hurt are you?" Twi couldn't help but giggle sadly. "No," She replied, "But I think that's more a question for you. How bad is it? Are you in pain?" "Oh, no. It's nothing. I barely feel anything." For the moment anyway... She giggled softly again. "Liar," She replied. "Heh... Guilty as charged. What is it? You come here to laugh at me?" He said back with a pained chuckle. Twilight smiled sadly. "No... to thank you. If it wasn't for you... I'd be... I'd still be..." Tal held up his (Good) forehoof to her lips, silencing her. "You'd still be trapped in your subconscious nightmares," He said grimly, "With no idea what was going on around you in reality. It's not. Your. Fault." "I should have seen the illusions for what they were!" She burst out, tears in her eyes, "I've studied them extensively, they should have been so easy for me to identify!" "In your mind," He countered quietly, "Illusion is reality. The only limit to the imagination is whatever constraints placed upon it. There was no way you could have known." "But Celestia... Applejack..." "Are fine," He cur her off firmly now, "All of us are fine. You aren't responsible for this Twilight, and I won't have you blaming yourself." The pair went silent, Twilight wrestling with her guilt, Talisman mulling over the events that were slowly swimming back to his fatigued mind past the haze of nightmares. "Hey... Twilight," He began curiously, "In the dreamscape, you called that creature a Destro. What's a Destro?" Twilight sniffled and shrugged. "Some... creature I studied..." she answered evasively. Talisman smiled. "I want to know," He replied simply. Twi sighed and straightened a little, some of her normal glow coming back as she began. "Destros are... well, equine shaped creatures that reside in the most dangerous areas of the Badlands. In fact, these areas are the most dangerous simply because of the Destros. A Destro has no fear, no pain and no thought for its own survival. Studies into their anatomy and biology have revealed a complete lack of pain receptors, and a lack of brain capacity to identify it either way. Their skin is waxy and quite vulnerable to physical attacks, but most magical strikes or spells simply roll off of them. Of course, Destros don't actually use magic. That must have been a factor akin only to whatever that thing inside me was... A Destro with magic would be possibly one of the most dangerous things in Equestria. In any case, Destros have one thought. To hunt and feed. I don't think they even sleep. They're fiercely territorial and mating habits are unknown. Their eyes are almost always black, although some survivors swear that theirs was a rotted green colour, and their mouths are sealed over with a thin layer of skin and flesh, resealed very quickly as they close their mouth to eat." She paused here and frowned. "No, wait. A fact's not true here... They do have pain receptors. But, only in the flesh over their maw. I don't really understand why their physiology would even allow for that, but we can only imagine the agony that it must cause them to open their mouths. I think that's what makes their screams so bone chilling. There's not just rabid hunger in them, there's heart stopping agony in there as well. They have no mane and no tail and don't seem to be capable of rational thought. And before you ask, no, they're not even distantly related to our kind." Talisman took a moment to absorb all of this new information. Twilight seemed much better, he noted to his satisfaction, but now she looked about ready to ask him something. "Question for a question," She said slyly, "What's the stone. I mean really, what is it?" Tal felt his heart drop. She had to ask that. "Well," He said, almost swallowing his tongue, "I suppose you answered mine, I'll have to answer yours." He made himself a little more comfortable in the makeshift bed, wincing as his splinted leg moved a little. "This is a soul stone," He explained, stroking the polished, etched surface of the stone, "It's a magical artifact that is common in Zebrica for its luck, although it has a much more useful function. Using this stone, and a series of spells designed by some obscure unicorn researcher whose name was lost, I'm capable of taking the essence of a being, or their soul, and bind it to the stone, effectively ensnaring them within." He ignored Twilight's intrigued face as he continued. "I've had it for years now. I collected it off of an... an old friend who died. Drowned in a pond one day when he went to fetch water. He never was a good swimmer. In any case, he taught me the uses of the stone before he got himself drowned. I used it to scrape by a living, helping ponies who claimed their houses were haunted or their loved ones possessed. Some of them were right, others just imagining things. As I used it, I noted an unintended but useful side effect. The souls I managed to snare in there were forced to give me their power." He held the stone up with a wry smile. "Every symbol has lent me power. Some of them gave me something other than their magical strength. One of them gave me a shield, defending me from harm. His skill saved my life when you were possessed, and as a result, his soul was depleted." He paused before chuckling. "Oh yes, and my curious talent for reading minds? That's also an interesting ability I picked up from a creature's soul I took from a two story home in Manehatten. He meant no real harm. He was simply a mischievous soul." Twilight took all this in and smiled. "Why don't we have more like you? Doing what you're doing?" Talisman laughed, wincing at the pain in his leg. "Because it's dangerous," He replied, "In order to do what I do, you have to draw the spirit into you, and then channel it into the stone. That's how I knew the personality of each spirit. But that creature... It's the worst I've felt. I didn't think, for a moment, that I could contain him." "But you did," Twilight reminded him with a smile, "And I can't thank you enough for that. Without you... I'd still be rampaging." There was a pregnant pause between the two before Twilight blushed lightly. "So... When this is over and finished... You want to come by the Library and tell me about this magic? I haven't heard about it before." Tal smiled back at her. "I'd like that, sure." Twi giggled happily and, before she lost her nerve, leaned down and pressed a light and quick kiss on Tal's cheek before skittering out of the unit. Tal's eyes went wide in surprise and he touched his cheek lightly, looking up as Demon's smug face poked into the unit. "Not a damn word," Tal said to him fiercely. Demon merely chuckled and made a motion of zipping his lips before leaving. Tal had a lot to think about.