It was Diddy's second week at the Institution and so far everything had been rather run-of-the-mill. Everything had become, as the doctors and nurses wanted, routine. There was nothing exciting or new to come. No new ponies were going to show up and make everything different to the patients. It wouldn't matter anyway. Everything abnormal was as normal to the patients as harmony was to the ponies on the outside. As Petie later put it, the hospital forced harmony into a place that could never be harmonious. That was the simplest, truest fact of NEMI. Diddy understood this now just as much as Silas did.
Silas himself had remained subdued during the few days after Diddy had been introduced to his friends. Diddy didn't disturb his thinking, even if he believed it was strange for anypony to have such a serious face for so long. It reminded him of his marefriend's face when she was performing her royal duties. And by marefriend he, of course, meant a mare that was his friend. There wasn't any other underlying meaning to that phrase, despite what Siren and Petie seemed to suggest. Silas said nothing about their taunting, despite Diddy asking him if he believed what they were saying. After three attempts at getting his attention Siren pulled his hoof away and told him it was best to leave him alone. Silas would be back to normal soon, he knew. Diddy didn't quite understand how he could know that, but accepted it. There was a lot of stranger things in this place than Silas thinking after all. The pony in the corner was still beating his head against the wall, and now he was yelling as well.
It took five days before Silas fully came round, and when he did it wasn't something that Diddy was expecting. Silas was just returning from a therapy session with Doctor Ward and his face was darker than it had ever been before. His eyes were glassed over, and as Diddy went towards him to greet him Siren and Petie pulled him back. Both the colt and gryphon had noticed the red tint inside Silas' eyes, and knew that it meant trouble. Bow Wow howled miserably inside a corner, and Nana whispered nonsensical words into her ear to calm her down. The other patients fell silent and slid as fast as they could back into their holes. Each of them could feel the tension building up around the black colt's hooves and were terrified of it. The nurses and doctors weren't as adept at spotting the signs. Only ponies who were suffering through the same seclusion could understand what was about to come. Diddy would soon learn this.
Silas shook his head miserably and his barely tinted eyes streamed smoke into the air. His cutie mark, blue crystals signifying the importance of his background, turned a dark black colour. The soft tones that usually came from his throat turned a rhaspy, deep voice. He searched around the floor whispering for crystals. Diddy could barely hear him. He wanted to step forward and get closer but Petie's firm grip prevented him for moving. Silas looked so miserable and conflicted; Diddy wanted to help. He'd seen that face before. It was the same face he'd had when Blankety had died. When Blankety, his best friend, had been killed-- by him. Silas had told him it wasn't his fault, but he knew it was. Silas' face was reminding him of the pain he felt. It reminded him of how much he deserved to be here, suffering through the long nights alone.
But Silas didn't deserve the same. Silas was nice. Silas deserved to be free from punishment. He did, he did. Diddy knew it. He had to help him. Blasting Petie with a bright light Diddy slipped out of his grasp and ran forward. He grabbed a hold of Silas' hoof and looked him firmly in the eyes, but what he saw was not something he had first expected. The nice, honest Silas had completely transformed. With one push of dark magic Diddy was flung to the other side of the room. It all happened so fast, he couldn't even retaliate with his own magic. Thankfully the walls were so soft he wasn't badly hurt, and quickly got to his feet. He opened his fingers to act but Nana pulled him back down to the floor, shaking her head.
'Crystals,' Silas cried, running towards a crowd of ponies who'd stuffed themselves in a corner. Diddy heard hooves running frantically from the corridor and the nurses station. Silas was pulled away from the patient he was pummelling and stabbed in the side with a large needle. He cried and hissed, his magic dimming as Enderstorm and the nurses dragged him out of the room. His voice could be heard crying outside, and then nothing. It all stopped. Crysi, the patient he'd attacked, wiped the blood off of her face and joked:
"Well, I've heard of tough love, but even changelings aren't that bad."
Everypony laughed, awkwardly. All except Diddy. He couldn't understand what was funny about what had happened. Silas looked as if he was about to kill the young mare. If she had died, would they still have laughed? He said much the same to the others.
"Don't know. Maybe,' Petie said with a shrug. "You have to laugh, don't you?"
"If we didn't we'd be breaking the rules. We can't admit to sadness," Siren told him. "Just smile and wave, they always say. Smile and wave."
"But Silas--" Diddy stuttered.
Nana put her hoof over his lips and shook her head. "Eena petra ma Sombra, noee las Silas."
"She's right," Siren said. "It wasn't Silas. It was Sombra. You can't blame Silas for it."
Diddy scratched his head. "But that was Silas, wasn't it? He was the one who did it."
"Where you the one who did what you did, Diddy?," Petie asked him. "Because you might be a bad pony, but I certainly didn't want to do what I did."
"Why? What did you do?"
Petie shrugged. "Doesn't matter. It wasn't me." And with that he walked away, his head held up high, to see if Chrisi needed any medical help with her cuts. Not that he could help much, but he didn't want to carry on with the conversation.
"Don't mind him. He doesn't like to remember what happened," Siren told him. Bow Wow rolled on her back underneath him, and he scratched on her stomach, watching as her leg shook as he did. Diddy laughed.
"It's multiple-personality disorder," Siren continued. "That's what Silas has. Sombra's like another pony sharing his body-- and not a nice pony either. Oh yes, and Diddy--"
"Yes?" Diddy asked.
"You have feathers in your mane from the wall. Remove them, or I will."
Diddy quickly removed the feathers. Silas wasn't seen again that day, or the next day, or the next day.