//------------------------------// // Confrontation // Story: The Banach-Tarski Dragon // by CCC //------------------------------// “Spike? Are you okay?” Twilight's concerned face looked down. “Yeah, m'fine.” mumbled the baby dragon. “You've been shelving fiction in the non-fiction shelves for the past ten minutes.” pointed out Twilight. Spike blinked at the shelf in front of him, then looked up. “Er... right.” “And in those ten minutes,” continued Twilight, “you've actually shelved a total of two books.” She looked again, and then added “In the wrong order.” “...huh. So I have.” “You're clearly not fine, Spike. And it's almost certainly due to the Banach-Tarski spell. Does it hurt anywhere? Are you feeling at all hungry, or thirsty?” Spike yawned. “Just... a little tired, I guess?” he said. “Tired? So you need to take a nap?” “No, not... not that sort of tired. Just kind of... I don't really feel much like doing anything.” Spike shrugged. “So I might as well help with the reshelving.” Twilight gave Spike a calculating look. Then she said “How about this – once you finish that shelf, we'll go out to Sugarcube Corner to get some icecream, okay? I hear they've got a new line in ruby sprinkles...” “Meh.” said Spike, waving a claw. “You go. I'll stay here and reshelve.” Twilight's eyes widened. Spike, refusing rubies? This was clearly a far more serious problem than it appeared. * * * “One strawberry with rainbow sprinkles... one lemon icecream with a slice of apple... one chocolate vanilla with ruby sprinkles... and one vanilla with chocolate sauce.” Pinkie tossed the separate bowls of ice-cream onto the table as she named them. “So, is the other Spike gonna come join you?” she asked. “I'm pretty sure that one of you is new to Ponyville, which means one of you needs a welcome party, only I'm not sure which one. Ooooh! More customers! I'll be back in a minute or two, okay?” And with that, Pinkie dashed off. The three Cutie Mark Crusaders turned, as one, to look at Spike. “Other Spike?” asked Applebloom. “Yeah, a spell of Twilight's went wrong.” said Spike. He picked up his bowl and poured the icecream into his mouth, trying to swallow all three scoops at once. “Spike!” admonished Sweetie Belle. “It's rude to bolt your food!” “Ig ig?” said Spike, trying to speak around the mouth full of frozen ice-cream. He puffed out his cheeks a little and let out a tiny burst of dragonfire, melting the ice-cream almost instantly and swallowing most of it, leaving the rest to dribble out of his mouth, over his scales and onto his chair. “Anyway, yeah, spell went wrong, two of me, so I've got the day off. I was gonna spend it with Rarity, but apparently she doesn't like me, so...” He shrugged. “Here.” said Sweetie, firmly passing Spike a napkin to wipe off the ice-cream with. “Don't mind if I do.” Spike reached out and grabbed Sweetie's ice-cream bowl. A burst of dragonfire melted the contents,and then Spike simply drank it down. With a flick of his tongue, he licked the ice-cream off his face, and then turned to look at Applebloom's and Scootaloo's treats. Both crusaders wrapped their forelegs protectively about their ice-cream bowls. Spike leapt up onto the table. “SPIKE... WANT!” Still holding the napkin out in mid-air, Sweetie blinked. “Buh...” she said. * * * “It's been half an hour, Spike.” said Twilight, firmly, as she trotted towards Sugarcube Corner. “And you shelved four books. I'm really worried about your electrolyte balance.” “Yeah.” murmured Spike, seated on her back. “One of Pinkie's sapphire cupcakes should replace any missing electrolytes.” said Twilight. A twitch of a wing prevented Spike from falling off. “And then you can have some ice-cream, and if you're not recovered after that, then we are going to the doctor.” “Sure, fine. Whatever.” “And we need to find the other Spike, too.” added Twilight. “Whatever's happening, it'll be happening to him as well...” “I don't think so.” said Spike. He pointed ahead, to where Sugarcube Corner had just cracked like an egg hatching. A giant dragon stood over the building's wreckage, ponies fleeing from him in a panic. “SPIKE WANT!” “Ohdear.” said Twilight. “Ohdearohdearohdear.” She took a deep breath, overrode each and every one of the instincts that were telling her this was a bad idea, and marched forward. “SPIKE!” she called out. “What do you think you're doing?” The giant Spike looked down disdainfully at the purple alicorn. “GO AWAY!” He took a deep breath, and emphasised his words with a burst of green fire in her direction. “Eeep!” said Twilight, vanishing with a pop. Spike's dragonfire struck the ground where she had been standing, leaving a circle of lightly burnt grass, at the centre of which sat a baby dragon. “Not cool.” said the tiny Spike, shaking his head. “Not cool at all.” “Cool doesn't work.” boomed the giant Spike. “I've been trying 'cool' for far too long.” He bent over to stand on all fours, his huge foreclaws thumping to the ground on either side of his tiny doppelganger. “Do you want to know what 'cool' gets you? NOTHING!” Big Spike lowered his giant head, to look Little Spike directly in the eye. “'Cool' doesn't get you a date with Rarity. 'Cool' doesn't get you an afternoon spent outside a stuffy library. 'Cool' doesn't get you out of a boring lecture. 'Cool' doesn't get you free ice-cream.” “Free ice-cream made you grow like that?” asked Little Spike. “NO!” Big Spike reared up and roared – several ponies, who had stopped to look back, decided that on the whole it would be smarter to simply keep running instead. “I decided it was time!” boomed Big Spike. “Time to do what I wanted! To take what I needed. To finally do all those little things that you never quite did!” “Fascinating.” said Twilight, from off to one side. A quill pen danced in front of her, writing down notes. “So that's one Spike with no motivation, and one Spike with no restraint?” Big Spike roared another fireball at Twilight. There was a pop as she vanished again. “And?” asked Little Spike, raising an eyebrow. “And they rejected me!” roared Big Spike. “Twilight replaced me. With you. Rarity threw me into the street! The Crusaders ran away from me! YOU were the one who replaced me! I finally started acting like I really am, and everypony HATES me!” Big Spike took a deep breath. “Spike want... acceptance.” Little Spike blinked. “It's there.” he said. “We've got it.” “...What?” “Do you know why Twilight took me out here?” asked Little Spike. “She was worried that something was wrong with me. She wanted me to get a good meal, she wanted to find you, she wanted to get us both to the doctor. I don't know why you think she replaced you... but she wanted to help you.” Big Spike narrowed his eyes, and glared at Little Spike. But even as he glared, he began to shrink slightly, from 'enormous' to merely 'very large'. “There's no proof...” “It's true.” confirmed Twilight, re-appearing again. “I was worried that you might both be suffering from an electrolyte deficiency.” “But... what about Rarity?” asked Spike. “I,” said Rarity, stepping forward, “would have been quite willing to accept a date. It was your other suggestion that went too far.” Very Large Spike shrank down further, to merely Large Spike. “The Crusaders...” he said, in the faintly desperate tones of an angry dragon who's quickly coming to realise that there's not nearly as much reason to be angry as he'd thought. “You took our ice-cream!” called out Scootaloo's voice, from back in the crowd where Pinkie was trying to keep the fillies away from the giant dragon. “And it's not like we didn't get you your own ice-cream!” Spike shrank down to merely teen dragon size. “It doesn't matter.” he rumbled, holding on to the tail end of his anger. “Ponyville doesn't need two dragons.” He lowered his head, to glare at Tiny Spike. “You wouldn't last a minute outside here, without motivation.” he said. “I can go and live elsewhere. Somewhere far away, where there's nopony around for me to hurt with my lack of restraint.” “You don't need to do that.” said Tiny Spike. “I know I don't NEED to!” roared Teen Spike. “But you deserve -” “Twilight can put us together again.” finished Tiny Spike “...what?” “That's what I was going to tell you.” said Twilight. “When you left. It's up to you... the two of you... whether you want to be turned back. The spell isn't difficult.” Teen Spike shrank back down into a baby dragon, and sat down. “Yes, Twilight.” he said. “I want you to turn us back. There's only room for one dragon in Ponyville... and I want that dragon to be both of us.” “And what do you say,” continued Twilight, “um... other Spike?” “Yeah.” said the Spike still sitting in his circle of lightly burnt grass, with a slight smile. “Do it.” Twilight grinned, and her horn glowed.