//------------------------------// // Friend or Fiend // Story: The Villain // by Dashie McCourty //------------------------------// **A/N**: This a parallel chapter to the first chapter of "The Villain". I suggest you read that chapter before reading this. This chapter is told in Twilight's first person perspective. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Quiet, everypony!" I said to the crowd of ponies cramped in the library. "We want this to be a SURPRISE!" It's getting dark outside, I thought. Today is Pinkie Pie's birthday... and no doubt that she probably forgot about it again. I'm not 100% sure that she's oblivious to the idea we're throwing her a surprise party. The last time she forgot her own birthday was the time where she thought my friends and I abandoned her and kicked her out of the group. Oh boy, ponies do NOT want to hear that story. Planning this party wasn't easy, but my friends and I figured we should throw Pinkie Pie a huge party for her birthday just to show we care about her with all our hearts. Hold up, library door's opening... "SURPRISE!!!!!" Everypony cheered. Pinkie Pie looked to be at a loss for words. "Happy birthday, Pinkie Pie!" exclaimed Rarity, one of my closest friends, as all of us pulled her into a group hug. "You`ve done so much for us, and we figured it`s time we repayed you since you`re always putting a smile on our faces." "Oh, you guys!" said Pinkie Pie, jumping up and down. "You guys are the best friends I could ever have!" With that, the party officially started. I gave Pinkie Pie a big smile. Even though planning this whole thing was exhausting, it was definitely worth seeing the Element of Laughter smile heartily. And I owe it most of it to another good friend of mine, Silver Wind. Silver Wind... where should I begin, other than the fact that he's traveled around Equestria and came to Ponyville to find peace, and other than the fact that he has a huge crush on Pinkie Pie? I suppose that's why he decided to throw her a BIG party! Silver's a nice fellow. When he first came to Ponyville, he looked really sad, but I suppose with our help, he's become a lot more social with other folk. According to him, he's never been truly happy in his life. I guess I can see why never had friends before he came here. And I suppose that's why he admires Pinkie Pie so much, because of her bubbly and energetic appearance -- and she loves to make other ponies smile. But there's something else about him that I can't put my hoof onto. Sure, he's nice and all, but I can't help wonder... what has he done all his life? I realize it was bad, but just how bad? Did he get into contact with bad ponies? Now that I think about it, Princess Celestia warned us about a "terrible talent" coming to Ponyville a few months ago. Gee, now that I REALLY think about it, Silver Wind himself looks like he has some dangerous magical abilities... now, I've been taught not to judge ponies based on their talents, but ponies wouldn't believe the amount of talent Silver has. It's unbelievable at times. Just a few weeks ago, my friends and I -- Rarity, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, and of course Pinkie Pie and Silver Wind were rounding up a parasprite invasion that nearly shook Ponyville to its foundation. And what happened next? The parasprites nearly consumed everything in the town. It wasn't until Silver somehow managed to vaporize all of them with a flick of his horn, and out came a wave of black energy. I cleaned up most of the town a while later with my own magic. I had found him with a rage-filled expression on his face after the parasprites were gone, albeit it was for a few seconds. At the least, it was disturbing. My thoughts are quickly interrupted though, as Silver Wind tapped me on the back. "Oh! Hey Silver, I didn't see you there!" I said, surprised. "Enjoying the party?" "Yeah, for sure! I'm glad Pinkie Pie is really happy..." He replied. He looked to be a dreamy daze, probably thinking about a getaway to a remote island with her. I let out a small giggle. "Well, you enjoy yourself now, Silver. Plenty of partying to do tonight." I said. He walked away with a small laugh. He sure is quite the fellow, I thought. Maybe I should just forget about my pondering thoughts about his magic for now and enjoy the party. "Twilight, darling!" Rarity called to me. "Do come over here and play a game of pin the tail on the pony with us! I'm not one for competition, but I bet you 10 bits you cannot beat moi in a best of 3." I complied. I haven't played this game in a long while... I wonder how I'd go up against Rarity? I ended up not doing too well. I ended up getting beaten twice in a row... there goes 10 bits. The party's going on very well! In fact, it's so good, that after a while, people went out to the streets to let the library cool off from all the crammed ponies inside. It wasn't since I first came to Ponyville have I seen so many ponies in one building. I continued to have fun with my friends. Pinkie Pie won most of the games, and Silver even performed some magic tricks. Although they were simple tricks, I was bedazzled at the way Silver approached them with his own magical ability... Ponies began to leave after chatting away the night and having fun. This sure has been a great party, I thought. At the window, I could see Pinkie Pie saying her goodbyes to the folk outside. It truly has been a memorable night for her, and once again, we owe it the most to Silver. "Hey Twilight," a voice called out to me. It was none other than Silver. "I'm gonna go check up on Pinkie Pie..." He had a blush on his cheeks. Deductively, I could only come up with the idea that he's going to tell Pinkie how he feels about her. He trotted away. Maybe if Pinkie accepts him, she'll throw another party right now just to celebrate the occasion. What am I thinking, she's PINKIE! Of course she will if it does happen... I spent the next minute pondering about what to do tomorrow, when suddenly Pinkie came into the library, and locked the door with a slam. She looked like she had seen a ghost. "Howdy Pinkie!" said Applejack. "Did y'all enjoy the party? That Silver sure did throw you one hay of a celebration!" Upon hearing Silver's name, Pinkie scowled at Applejack. I was confused, but then, somehow, I experienced a sudden flash of anger and anxiety. "Hey, what gives Pink?" asked Rainbow, in an angry tone. Suddenly however, Rainbow's voice was calm again. "I mean... huh? Pinkie, what's wrong?" All of us suddenly looked at Pinkie angrily, as if she did something bad to us. Immediately, the feeling subsided. "Sugarcube... you mind tellin' us what's wrong? An' how come we're all feeling a bit peppy all of a sudden?" Inquired Applejack. As Pinkie hung her head down, I knew something was wrong. "Girls... Silver kissed me... and he told me he loves me..." Pinkie said. That's all? Strange, I thought she would react much differently than this. "Darling, a stallion loves you!" said Rarity, with a confused look. "I suppose I can understand you being upset, but why this mu--" Rarity was about to finish when Rainbow interrupted her. "I kinda don't blame her. If Silver tried to kiss me I'd probably punt his flank into next Tuesday..." said Rainbow. "... but he kissed Pinkie Pie of all the mares." However, Pinkie let out another scowl as soon as Rainbow finished. "That's not the point." Pinkie said. "He's... something else. He... filled my head with bad images... it... was just horrible!" She's shuddering and trembling with fear. The gang and I looked at her with very concerned looks. "Pinkie, what exactly did you see?" I asked her, hoping not to make her even more upset. "I saw..." she started. "...ponies get... MURDERED... but not just murdered... they were getting mutilated... and it wasn't just some freak thought, I could FEEL the ponies get mutilated..." I shot her an incredulous look. While trying to analyze what she just said, I had a lot of doubts. For one, ponies? Being mutilated? Even for the most powerful unicorn, it takes a lot of magical effort to rip a pony's body parts to pieces. Even Princess Celestia would have trouble doing so. She could tell I doubted her story. "Pinkie, if this is some sort of a joke, cut it out!" Rainbow exclaimed. "Whatever it is you're trying to do, it's not funny!" Pinkie didn't say anything. She just sat there, trembling. "Um, Dash?" asked Fluttershy. "I don't think Pinkie is joking about this one..." Pinkie spoke up again, this time sounding more willing to tell us more. "Girls..." she started, tears welling up in her eyes. "I'm afraid this isn't some prank I'm pulling. I did see ponies being killed and torn to ponies. I saw the most horrifying things in my head as soon as he kissed me, which was on the nose... he even looked like he enjoyed killing those ponies..." "How exactly were they killed?" I asked, curiously. "Whatever it was though, it had to be a form of very dark magic..." That's when I realized what I just said. Silver Wind -- his magic -- his ability, and his talent -- came to light. "No..." I said. "Girls, we must write a letter to the princess... the terrible talent she warned us about a few months ago... was partying with us, with our very vague awareness. We have to tell her what happened just now, otherwise we may be jeopardizing all of Ponyville." The girls' facial expressions all turned into ones of anger. I could feel that they were none too happy about Silver. Even Fluttershy, the kind-hearted pony, looked like she was about to scream with rage. Without any more thinking, I started writing the letter. I couldn't wake up Spike right now. I would have to save him this kind of trouble. Dear Princess Celestia, It is with my great bitterness that I am writing you this letter. Do you remember the time where you warned us about a terrible talent coming to Ponyville looking to wreak havoc? Well... he is here, and he just showed us his true colors. And he is none other than Silver Wind... according to Pinkie Pie, he kissed her and it brought forth a surge of "negative" thoughts against her. Right now, she is struck with fear, and I don't know what we're to do now. Must we confront him? Or must we do something else? Sincerely, your faithful student, Twilight Sparkle. I sent the letter off to the Princess with a transportation spell. Part of me wanted to go outside and talk about this with Silver in peace, but I knew this wouldn't be possible. Not after what Pinkie Pie had told me. Not after what she told all of us... About a minute later, a letter popped up. It was from none other than Princess Celestia. "Here we go..." said Applejack. With a gulp, I opened the letter and read aloud. Dear Twilight Sparkle, It is with great sadness that I must ask you to forbid Silver Wind from Ponyville forever. Although I had given him a chance to see if his dormant dark emotions would dissipate from making friends here in Ponyville, I see it has not worked out entirely. Pinkie's mind being invaded with extremely dark thoughts, inadvertently or not, is enough proof of this. This letter does not end here, I'm afraid. After doing some more research, I have found out that this Silver Wind has a dark emotion cutie mark, meaning it can change with his feelings and emotions, but only if they're powerful enough. In his case, any negative emotion powerful enough to trigger his true power and potential. And in any case, these emotions can spread over to other ponies very easily. I'm afraid I cannot allow you to give him a second chance. I can already feel the negative emotion building up within him as you read this. Twilight Sparkle, The Element of Magic -- you and the rest of the elements must banish him from Ponyville and into somewhere else... anywhere except your immediate location. I cannot have the bearers of the elements be in danger with this powerful presence at hand. Sincerely, Princess Celestia "This... this is just too sudden for words..." said Applejack, in a sad tone. "Say, the princess said that those emotions can spread over, right? That kind of does explain why we were acting a lil' feisty a while ago though, randomly feeling angry." "So... we have to banish him from Ponyville forever, huh? Let's make sure he FEELS the banishment." said Pinkie Pie, suddenly. There wasn't any doubt in my mind that she was feeling hatred towards Silver. This definitely wasn't like her at all... but I complied to her idea. We have to make Silver suffer. We have to flat out tell him to leave... harshly. The other girls looked like they too agreed with Pinkie's idea of banishment. "OK, Pinkie." I said, the rising feeling of hate towards Silver growing in me. "Let's go tell him off. Come on girls, we have to do this." We stepped outside of the library where we found Silver hanging around. He could see that we didn't look too happy to see him. Upon further inspection of him, and with the feeling of hatred towards Silver, I began to speak. "Hey." I started. "Get lost. We don`t want to see you ever again." Silver jolted his back in shock. What I just said obviously took him by surprise, as his jaw hung open. "Earth to idiot, do you copy?" said Rainbow Dash, in a harsh tone. "She told you to GET. LOST." A million questions must be going through inside Silver's head right now, but I couldn't care less. Finally however, Pinkie Pie spoke up. "You." She began. "I'd never love a guy like you. Ever, in my life. If only I had known earlier that you would corrupt us with your dark emotions - which is what your cutie mark represents - I would have also rejected you." Tears began to form and fall from Silver's eyes. Once again, I couldn't care less... in fact, at this point, I want him to feel bad. I want him to suffer. "I now know why you're a loser." Pinkie continued. "Nobody in your life will ever love you. Not me, not my friends, and not your past friends. You can`t control us because that`s exactly what you are and what you always will be. A loser. And for the record, I never thought of you anything but a friend... which I can`t even call you anymore." This must be very sudden for him, having your friends tell you off like this. But we're not his friends anymore... he's just a piece of trash. "Your kiss on Pinkie`s nose brought out your true colors." I told him, letting the harshness of my tone overtake my words. "A form of black magic erupted within Pinkie's mind when you did this... not only did she become highly unsettled, but you had just shown her that you have a very dark heart. Princess Celestia always warned us that ponies with dark emotion cutie marks spell very bad news. It took us a while for us to look past your image of false bravado." It was a little strange for me to be telling someone all this. I continued to let this uncharacteristic hatred take me over, though. "But..." Silver started to say, in choked sobs. "I only wanted to be your friends...!" Before I could tell him off again, Pinkie Pie cut in. "No! Get out of my face, and get out of my life!" Pinkie shouted. "And don`t ever come back here again! I hate you!" Silver let out a big sob. As he turned in the other direction to run, tears started to drop which left a tiny trail of water along the ground. "And I hope you never come back here again..." I muttered under my breath. Strange, how easily negative emotions can overtake a sentient being. We had to do this for our sake, however... for Pinkie's sake. At this point, we all looked to be flushed with emotion. We all looked like we were about to cry, but it wasn't worth it. Not after what just happened, because after all, we essentially rejected somebody and banished them from the town. "Well... I guess that's that, y'all." said Applejack. "Let's just go home... and hope somepony like this never shows up ever in our lives again." And with that, everypony started to head home. For once, Pinkie didn't bounce away this time. I know this would affect her for a long time. As I stand outside the library for a short while, I wonder what tomorrow will be like. We were so happy before all this... and to experience this is quite the life changer. But going up against dark hearts takes more than just your mind and soul. You have to be willing to outright say "NO" to it. I returned to the library, feeling distressed. I suppose I'll be ready for whatever lies ahead of me and my friends... but I just hope whatever we did tonight, doesn't come back to haunt us for the rest of our lives.