//------------------------------//
// Getting Over Your Own Stupidity 
// Story: Cause, Effect, and Consequences 
// by Coltsguy 
//------------------------------//

Here lies Seth's lazy ass. Woe be unto his stupid ass. He's here because he's a giant ass. Still he's in the worst place for an ass. Because heroes know how to kick ass. So let's see how he saves his ass.

Let's try this again... Seth had turned the couch around so that it now angled away from both the door and the two way mirror. He decided to simply lay there, cry for a little bit, and generally just wallow in self-recrimination. They tried calling for him in the beginning, but he simply soundproofed the room. Even if he would've liked to hear some reassuring words he just didn't want to hear them until he had gotten all of this murky crap out of his system.

However, this was taking place on the Watchtower. It's an orbiting space station filled with superheroes and operating personnel. You aren't going to get away from that. It's merely a matter of time until they can work around the problem. What was really surprising was how long it took them to use the intercom to the room to talk to him.

"Seth, are you feeling any better?" he heard Dash ask.

"Somewhat."

"Well a few of the people wanted to know if you took requests."

"Requests? Requests for what?"

"Um, well those songs you were playing before kind of played everywhere around here."

"..."

"...You still there?"

"...Tell them I can only do songs I've heard before."

"Yeah I can do that."

There was a bit of a lull before she spoke up again.

"Did you want to talk now?"

The shield went down long enough for Rainbow Dash to get teleported into the room before going back up. She quickly reoriented herself and hovered up and over the couch to look him in the eyes. Well, in a manner of speaking anyway. His eyes weren't open. He was still vaguely aware of her presence though.

"Come on Seth. Since when are you this moody?"

"Probably whenever I do something bad to my friends. I mean hypnotism was always cool in my head, but I never wanted to do it to people."

"You didn't mean to do it though."

"That just makes things worse," he said opening his eyes; not even surprised at how close her face was. "I have a power that I can't control. What if I used it on someone and they hurt themselves or others like I hurt you?"

"Well why don't you just practice then? You need to practice if you want to get good at anything."

"This shouldn't be something I ought to be practicing!"

"If you don't then you're definitely going to mess things up."

"Who the hell would I even practice this with!?"

"I'll do it," she said firmly.

That poor car. It couldn't brake hard enough to avoid that surprise.

"You'll what?"

"You heard me. You can practice with me."

"This is how this all started-"

"And that's why it would be better for me to do this with you. I know you won't do anything bad because you felt bad about doing it before. You can still undo it anyway, remember? You need to practice. It's like Twilight with her new wings. She's still practicing with them because she needs to. She has to or else it could be a problem later. Just like this is a problem for you now. So go ahead and hit me with that whammy!"

He groaned and sat up on the couch. He knew how stubborn Rainbow Dash could be. Hell he could be just as stubborn if he wanted to. After feeling like crap for the last forty minutes though, and the pony he felt he had wronged was telling him to do it again, his resistance to it was waning considerably. Still, there was a little bit left.

"Why would you even do this after what you saw happened?"

"I'll admit... when I saw that at first I was kind of shocked. Maybe a little hurt too I guess. I don't think I've ever acted quite like that before. But I also saw that you stopped and fixed what you did. You didn't have to do it, but you did. You still feel bad about it even now. If you weren't my friend you wouldn't feel this bad about it at all. Well, you'd still feel bad I guess, but you felt worse because you did it to your friend. Since it was an accident I can let it slide. Especially because you're a friend. And you know what I say about my friends right?"

"You never leave a friend hanging."

"Exactly!"

"Alright fine. I swear if I accidentally regress you to a foal then that is not on me."

"It preeetty much will be, but I get ya."

She flew up a bit and looked into the two way mirror.

"I'm gonna help him with the hypno-thingie okay?"

"I'd like to be present for the attempt if possible," J'onn droned through the intercom.

In response the shield was lowered and the soundproofing was removed. When those went away J'onn phased through the wall and mirror into the room.

"You know it's actually a good thing to have you here. Having a telepath keeping an eye on this can help make sure I don't screw up."

"It doesn't mean we have to like it though," Batman said as he walked into the room. "I'm of the opinion that we should contain you as a threat."

"C'mon Bats," Flash said walking in behind him, "I mean none of us knew how to use our abilities at first either. I bet it took you years to get that scowl just right."

The non-League members in the room had a chuckle over that.

"Yeah, well, my problem seems to be that I keep getting new powers all the time. I got stared at and became self-conscious and my invisibility kicked in. I wanted to show off a bit in front of Twilight and I got my offensive magic beam. I needed to calm down an entire town and I figured out illusions to do it. Even my hypnosis was an effect of needing to get past Rainbow Dash as I couldn't come up with an excuse and that happened instead."

"And now you're pretty good at all that stuff," Dash added. "That's because you practiced with them and got better at using them. Well, not the hypno-thingie yet."

"Hypnotism Dash, hypnotism."

"Right, that."

"You're not helping Dash."

"Um, yeah I am."

A quick sigh escaped his mouth before he began to simply stare at Rainbow Dash.

"So are you-"

He held up a hand to keep her from talking. He thought back to the first time that he hypnotized Dash. Oh it wasn't that he couldn't remember what events transpired that day. The problem he had was that his memory spell only worked on his episodic memory. He could recall events flawlessly, but he couldn't remember his thoughts while the events were occurring. It made the process of figuring out how to repeat his ability harder.

And then, he was struck by an epiphany. Why did he think he couldn't control it? Why did he think it would be hard to do so? Every time he did gain an ability it felt like second nature for him to be able to use it again. Invisibility, teleportation, illusions, shields, and magic beams all became second nature to him almost immediately after his initial use. Why would it be any different for this?

Using that reasoning he tried applying what he knew about hypnosis to make it actively work. Hypnotism was about imposing your will over another into a submissive state without physically dominating them. Sure you can use physical triggers like touching them but you don't need to be physically imposing to be good at hypnotism. Hypnotism was kind of like martial arts in that manner as martial arts were made for people who were physically weaker to fend off large attackers. In this endeavor it meant that he had to mentally suppress his intended target's will and instill his own in it's place. Not something you'd want to try on a green lantern I bet. With that thought process in his head he focused on mentally dominating his willing target.

It didn't take long to get results.

"It seems that you have suppressed young Rainbow Dash's conscious thoughts," J'onn spoke up. "There doesn't seem to be any invading influences as of yet."

He noticed the change as well. Her eyes were dilated quite massively and yet somehow there seemed to be no light reflecting off of them. A very odd appearance indeed.

"So what exactly is happening right now?" Batman asked.

"It seems as though while her conscious thoughts are being suppressed her subconscious mind has not taken over. Her mind seems to be balanced between the two. It doesn't feel like mind control either. Normally when a mind is invaded there is a struggle between the two conscious minds for dominance. In this case it seems that he caused... harmony between the subject's mental states and let her fall into this altered state naturally. It is quite an interesting ability."

"And he did it in like three minutes," Flash commented. "Not something for a fight, but pretty quick from what J'onn told me once."

"Actually I wasn't trying for most of that. I was thinking about how to do it."

"He is correct. From when he began until she was completely suppressed, the time it took was only twenty-two seconds."

Flash let out an impressed whistle.

"The fact that she was a willing participant may have been a factor. However, it seems that the process requires eye contact to perform."

"Physical contact with their head might work too," he said off-handedly.

"How would you know?" Batman asked pointedly.

"Well something sort of similar happened while Rarity, one of her friends, and I were tracking down a rift in the previous world. We were hiding during a small firefight in a parallel version of her home. I was holding her by her he- well, her horn actually."

"Her horn?" Flash interrupted.

"She's a unicorn. It's a subspecies of the pony race. Anyway I was holding her horn to keep her in place so that she wouldn't get involved and some of my magic seeped into her that way. I pulled my hand away almost instantly, but her eyes glowed white for about five seconds afterwards. When she came around she somehow knew things that I had known that she hadn't. I did a check to make sure nothing else was wrong and when I did I found the same issue I found in Rainbow Dash. We removed the magic quickly afterwards."

"It sounds like a memory transference more than your hypnotism," J'onn stated.

"It kind of does sound like that now that you mention it. That would be a new spell. I swear this magic is just making new stuff out of my imagination whenever the correct stimulus comes calling."

"It kind of sounds like it from what you said," Flash commented.

"It's dangerous is what it is," added Batman.

"It's chaos is what it is. Though in a weird way that actually does make sense that it would do that. That's something to think of for another time. Should I test to see if she'll obey commands or should I wake her up?"

"We simply wished to make sure you were capable of freely using your power. I am certain she does not want you to abuse any trust she has placed in you."

"Very, very good point."

A small shake and Rainbow Dash was once again aware.

"Why'd ya shake me? Aren't you going to try and hypnotize me?"

"The attempt has already succeeded," J'onn commented helpfully. "You were simply unaware of it."

"I was?"

"Yep. You shouldn't be able to either or it wouldn't work anyway."

"So that means you can do it when you want to now?"

"Other than the conditions it requires I think so."

"You didn't mess with me right?"

"I was thinking about it as a test, but J'onn was right in that I shouldn't abuse the trust you just gave me."

"I don't know if I would've been okay with that or not, buuuut I guess it doesn't matter. What matters is that you know how to do it and you won't do it by accident. Right?"

"I highly doubt it now that I'm more sure about it. Thanks for helping me out."

"No problem. Now let's go and fix that rift thing!"

After hearing her, there was only one thing to think: I felt like myself again.