Permanent Vacation

by Apple_Crack

Turmoil

“Permanent Vacation"

Turmoil

The citizens of Ponyville had welcomed my return and recovery with open arms, along with the party Pinkie threw to celebrate. A few days after that, construction started on Trixie’s school. As for what she was naming it, I had no idea. Probably would be something extravagant and grand. Till then, she spent time getting to know some of the ponies around town and spending her nights getting to know her new family. Derpy, for the most part, returned to her daily duties as the mail carrier, but with a newfound sense of glee emanating off of her.

As for me? Well, after seeing everyone again (Sonja, being over affectionate as ever, wouldn’t even let me out of her sight now), I started my studies with Twilight and Trixie. As much as I would have loved to start learning illusion magic, it was decided that I would start learning the basics from Twilight. And while her methods may have been… Boring, they still taught me what I needed to know.

The simplest way I understood her, and can explain it, is that magic is all about visualize and conceptualize. For instance, levitation is picture the object in your mind and visualize it moving to the intended location. But it’s not as simple as see object, lift up. One must see everything there is about the object, even what cannot be seen from you current angle. But it’s not just what it looks like either. Every little minute detail must be factored in as well, such as weight, density, and texture.

My first couple of tries were met with little success, being barely able to lift a simple apple off a table. However, much like Twilight kept telling me, that it gets easier the more you do it. It was through enough dedication that I was able to lift not only one, but multiple objects at a time, even getting to the point where I didn’t have to raise my hand towards the object. From there, I moved on to other common spells, such as teleportation.

After Twilight’s lesson for the day, I would head over to Trixie’s and we would begin our lesson. Unlike Twilight, she showed me how the different schools of magic affected the world around us. My main reason for these lessons, illusion, focused on manipulating the magic around yourself or others to get them to experience whatever you wanted them to experience. From her, I learned some of the more commonly thought of illusion spells, such as invisibility and the ability to muffle the amount of noise I made.

After that, I would spend my own time studying up on spells from books Twilight had lent me to further my studies. The schools they covered varied, though not dark magic, which is to be expected after all. As for what I studied, it started out simple enough. Cast a fireball here, throw a shield up there, bind an object, and so on. You know, simple things any self-respecting mage should know. However, I wanted more. I had started moving on to more advanced stuff and taking a deeper look at how magic works.

As the days went by, I slowly started looking at the world around me, as if truly seeing it for the first time. However, my questions soon stopped being directed at the world around me to something much closer…

---

I wasn’t trying to lead a healthy lifestyle, but now that I got this nice body thanks to Earth pony magic, I may as well try to keep it. As I’m tying my shoes after a light breakfast, I whistle for Sonja. “Come on, girl!” I hear her sprint from her spot on the couch to the front door, glancing up to see her tail wagging as she paws at the door. I chuckle to myself as I finish tying my shoes, grabbing a backpack stashed by the door. In one fluid motion, I open the door to the bright and sunny morning world while slinging the backpack over my shoulders. Sonja’s already out the door, sniffing the ground in fervor.

After shutting the door behind me, I reach into my jacket pocket and pull out a pair of earbuds. Putting them in my ear, I then plug them into my iPod and set it to shuffle. With a whistle for Sonja, I set off on a jog around town, working in a clockwise direction so that I end near the entrance to Sweet Apple Acres. After a short break there to rest up and drink, I continue past the entrance a little further before leaping the fence and heading for the edge of the Everfree. It’s here where I’ve been working out for the past couple of weeks. It’s nice, quiet, and far enough away from town that I won’t be bothered.

Once I get there, I pull the backpack off and set it on the ground close by. I reach in and pull out a water bowl for Sonja, filling it up with some water from one of the bottles I brought. I smile as she laps it up, drinking her fill before going to lie down off to side. At this point, she’s become accustomed to what I’ve been doing out here. Anyway, I move onto the next step of my workout routine, pushups. As I go through the motions, I drown out all other thoughts in the repetition of movement and the music. Once I feel satisfied, and drenched in sweat, I stand up and drink some water.

After a short break, I move on to the last part of my routine, boxing against a scarecrow that I… Borrowed from Applejack. It’s not like she’d miss it, she has like four more stashed in the barn anyway. Reaching into the backpack, I pull out a roll of boxing tape I picked up when I first started this workout and a portable Bluetooth speaker. I take the earbuds out and swap the music over to the speaker, tossing the earbuds into the backpack. Afterwards, I wrap the boxing tape around my hands. Tossing the tape into the bag too, I take a deep breath and drop into a combat stance. I punch at the scarecrow, trying to stay light on my feet and hitting imaginable weak points it. Granted, a stationary target is nothing compared to the real thing, but it’s better than nothing. The music is there just for background noise at this point, all I need to focus on is my punches.

I stumble after overextending a punch. I bounce back and shake my head. Goddamn it, not good enough. I’m gonna get myself killed out there like this. I can’t screw up like this, not again… Not ever again. I crack my neck. “What do you want?”

“…You’re swinging that right hook out too far, leaving yourself open.” I didn’t need to see or hear Rainbow to know she was there, or to know she wasn’t alone.

I take another swing, keeping it nice and tight this time. “Thanks. But critiquing my boxing isn’t the only reason you’re here, along with the rest of you. So, I ask again, what do you want?”

“Oh, he’s good,” Pinkie says.

“Can you please turn off the music so we can talk, Blake?” Twilight asks.

As I keep throwing punches, I spare the barest of thoughts to levitate my iPod over to me. I found out that touch screens don’t work with magic, so I have to resort to reaching out and actually touching it to pause it. Afterwards, I levitate the iPod back to rest on the speaker. “There, go ahead.”

“Can you turn around now, please?”

I lower my hands and turn around, quickly glancing over the girls, Trixie, and Derpy. “Alright, what’s this about?”

“Well… Is everything… Alright with you, dearie?”

I raise an eyebrow. “Yeah, Rarity, it is. What brought this on?”

“It’s just that we haven’t seen much of you lately,” Fluttershy says.

“Almost like you’ve been avoiding us.”

Ah, and there lies the reason for them being here. Truth be told, I’m not avoiding them, just… Not making an effort to go out of my way to see them. But to answer their question… I shake my head. “Is that what this is about? Don’t worry, I’ve just been busy, that’s all.”

Trixie shakes her head. “No, there’s more to it than that. I’ve noticed you haven’t been as outgoing as everypony in town makes you out to be. There’s definitely something wrong with you.”

I roll my eyes. “Okay, I got a lot on my mind. Don’t worry about it, everything’s fine. Now, I gotta get back to my workout. Have a nice day.” I turn my back to them and return to punching the scarecrow.

“You know, we are your family. You can talk to us about anything,” Derpy says.

I mentally sigh. Of course they couldn’t just leave me alone, and now it’s starting to irk me. “Some things you would never understand.”

“Then make us understand,” Twilight says as I gut punch the scarecrow.

“I don’t have to.”

“But wouldn’t it be better to get it off your chest?”

“No, Rarity.” I wrap the scarecrow in a headlock and punch at its head three times before stepping back from it.

“Look sugarcube, ah get there’s some things ya don’t want to talk about. But whatever it is, ya can’t let it bring you down. It’s better ta talk it out with friends and family rather than let it stew by yourself.”

A part of me wants to twist her words around to talk about her parents, but I refrain. “There’s absolutely nothing that needs talked about.” I uppercut the scarecrow and follow up with an elbow strike to the head.

“Okay, this is just getting pointless! What is it that you’re hiding from us?! Why won’t you talk about it?!” I clench my fists harder as Rainbow keeps talking. “Something is obviously wrong, and we’re here to try and help, but you won’t let us! Why?!"

With a yell, I conjure a bubble with flames dancing around the inside of it around my right hand. I charge the scarecrow and deliver a punch straight to its chest. The bubble sticks to its chest, and some scorching already starts to appear. I jump back and raise my fist in the air. When I open my fist, the bubble bursts, releasing the flame spell trapped inside to swiftly engulf the scarecrow and burn it to ashes.

I round on the girls. “You want to know what’s wrong?! Fine, have it your way! Why I haven’t gone out of my way to see you or talk to you?! It’s because seeing you reminds me how horribly I failed to protect you, and the only way to do that job right is to give up part of my fucking humanity to do so! I can do things no normal human can do now, but I can’t call myself a human anymore! I’m becoming a fucking freak of humanity, a science experiment gone wrong! And how much more of my humanity needs to be lost along the way?! I’m the last of my kind alive, but I can’t preserve my species if I’m forced to change everything about me to protect what matters!”

At their silence, I continue, some of my anger having been vented. “None of you will ever get what it’s like to lose a part of you, watching as it’s slowly stripped from your essence, your identity. None of you will ever get what that’s like.” I sigh. “We’re done here.”

“No, we’re not. We want to help you, and the only way to do that is by letting us.”

I glare at Twilight. “No, we are done. You need to leave me alone right now. I’m going to leave here, and be left alone for a while.” I whistle as I head over to my bag and start packing stuff in it. “Sonja, go with Fluttershy.” Once everything is packed, I mentally prepare myself for a long distance teleport to the Castle of the Two Sisters. Since I’ve never actually been there, I have to go by what I’ve seen in the show.

“Agent, some help here?”

“Of course, but you aren’t gonna avoid them forever.”

“I know. I just need… Time alone to work this out.”

“Whatever you say.”

An image of the main entrance hall of the castle enters my mind, and I focus on as many details as I can while mentally picturing myself there. I close my eyes and release the spell, feeling the slight pull I’ve come to associate with teleportation too. When I open my eyes, I’m standing exactly where I pictured myself. I take just a moment to look around at the dilapidated ruins, and then go in search of somewhere to reflect on everything today. I somehow manage to make my way into the throne room, where the fateful battle between Celestia and Nightmare Moon took place.

Celestia’s old throne still stands here, albeit with one of arms blasted off, but it still suits my needs. I head over to it, setting my bag down beside it before sitting on it. With a sigh, I lean back and close my eyes. While a bit comfortable, it’s still cold, unforgiving, and broken… Much like I am now. Day in and day out, it only served for one purpose alone, and that was to serve someone else. But even though it had that one job, it did it dutifully and happily. But even now, after it’s been altered, it still is ready to perform its job, just in a different capacity. But how many times will it need to break before it is replaced? You can only patch something so many times…

I open my eyes and glance at the throne. Okay, maybe I’m going a tiny bit stir crazy if I’m comparing myself to a throne. I shake my head. Instead, I lean back and casually try out some spells. I found out early on in my studies that it is possible to combine spells for new results, much like I did with my fire bubble. That was simply trapping a fireball inside a shield with a sticky exterior. When the shield bursts, the spell inside explodes violently, engulfing the target in flames. While usable in combat, I had initially thought of it with the intent of creating a pseudo trip mine.

Spell after spell, I try out various combinations that either worked or failed miserably. I lose track of time for a bit, solely focusing on practicing these spells. By the time it occurs to me to even check the time, I see it’s about one. It’s just as I’m about to stand up and teleport home that I hear the clip clop of hooves. I have to smile a bit. At least they respected my wishes of letting me alone for a while. So, who’d they send?

From a doorway on the left side of the room comes the last pony I’d expect. “Pinkie?”

She smiles up at me. “Wow, Twilight was right!”

I raise an eyebrow. “She knew I was here?”

She nods her head. “Yeah, something about magical signature and output. I don’t really understand it, but she knew what she was talking about.”

I frown at that. Being able to track a magical signature is both a help and a hindrance. I need to look into a way to mask or hide it, or even misdirect anyone tracking it. I shake my head and levitate Luna’s old throne, tossed into the corner, to sit in front of Celestia’s. I motion for Pinkie to come up. “You know, I didn’t expect you to be the one to talk to me.”

She bounces over and sits in Luna’s throne. She shrugs her shoulders “Honestly? I didn’t either! But the story called for it, so here I am!”

“Story? What are you—” I sigh and shake my head. “You know what, nevermind. So, what are you gonna say to me that grants me a revelation in how to cope with my current emotional instability?”

She giggles. “Silly, you already figured that out yourself. I’m just here to make you realize it.”

I raise an eyebrow. “And what would that be?”

She points at the throne. “You said that the throne is broken, but still able to do its job. And mostly any broken object can be fixed with enough patching!”

I nod my head. “Yep, that is true. But eventually, the original object will be entirely replaced with something else, all of its original parts gone.”

She leans forward and pokes me in the chest. “But as long as a single piece remains, no matter how small or insignificant, it’ll still be there. As long as a single piece remains, it can never truly be gone. You may not be a pure human anymore, but you’re still more human than everypony else in Equestria.”

I blink my eyes a couple of times. Huh… When she puts it like that, it brings a whole new light on the situation. This world may be able to change me, but as long as I cling tightly to my humanity, it can never be taken away. I never expected her to be so insightful. I smile at her. “You know, you’re right. I may be different now from when I came to this world, but that doesn’t mean I have to lose everything about me.”

“See?! Now you’re getting it!” She stands up. “Now come on! Everypony’s been worried about you!”

I grab my bag and stand up as well. “But I did say some pretty… Rude things back there to you guys.”

She rolls her eyes. “Pfft, nopony is holding that against you. You were emotional and said things you didn’t mean. It happens to everypony, even me!”

I smile. “At least you all understand where I’m coming from.”

She nods her head. “Oh believe me, I do. I used to be a rock farmer, and then I got my Cutie Mark! After my Cutie Mark, I lost most of my ability to grow rocks, but gained some pretty sweet party skills!”

I blink my eyes a few times. “You… Used to be good at rock farming, yet your cutie mark suppressed that ability? That’s… Strange.”

She shrugs her shoulders. “Yeah, I know. But I’m happy about it! Otherwise, I wouldn’t have made so many friends!”

“…Are you willing to tell me exactly what happened?”

She giggles. “Nope! That’s a story for another time!”

I smile at her. “As long as you’re happy with what you have now.” But it disturbs me that something like that is possible. Who’s to say she didn’t want to be a rock farmer and throw parties? Or this could be another case of Pinkie Pie logic.

She nods her head. “Yep! Now come on, I know a shortcut to get us back to Ponyville lickety-split!”

I look back at Celestia’s throne. Somehow, I just picture Celestia sitting up in the castle, slyly smiling, as if she knew I’d gleam some revelation from it. I shake my head. Impossible… But this is a master manipulator I’m taking about. I turn back to Pinkie. “Alright, and what shortcut are you talking about?”

“This one!” She bounces over to a door and opens it, quickly stepping through and shutting it behind her. I just stare at the door. How can it be a shortcut? It just leads to another room or hallway! The door opens and she peeks her head out. “Come on! Everypony is waiting for you!” She slams the door shut again.

…Okay then. I walk to the door and open it. On the other side is… My living room? …That can’t be right. I shut the door and open it again. Nope, still my living room. “Uh… Agent, you got any—”

“Nope. Don’t understand it and don’t even want to know. May as well just… Go through it, I guess.”

I slowly step through the door and look around. Yeah, this is my living room alright. I turn around to look at the door, only to find it gone and replaced with a window. Like, it never existed in the first place. Uh… Okay, this is a new one for me. Teleporting doors are apparently a thing, or Pinkie Pie again. Probably best to err on the side of Pinkie Pie, much easier to understand that way.

“Blake?”

I shake my head and turn to the kitchen. Gathered around the table are the girls. I chuckle, reaching down to pet Sonja as she nuzzles up against my leg. “Well, you’re all here. Glad I don’t have to run around town to find you all.”

Twilight stands up from her seat. “Blake, we’re—”

I motion for her to sit back down. “Save it. None of you have anything to apologize for. You were worried about me, and I appreciate that, but you no longer need to worry. I’ve come to terms with what has happened to me and I’m ready to move forward with my life.”

“Are… Are you sure you’re gonna be alright?”

I smile and walk into the kitchen, leaning against the counter. “Positive. I had my own revelation, just needed somebody to make me realize it.”

“Oh, you’re talking about me!”

I roll my eyes. “Who else, Pinkie?”

“Would you… Care to discuss what that revelation was?”

I shake my head. “No,Rarity. As much as you think it would help me, I don’t think it would have the positive impact you’re expecting. You are my friends and family, yes, but some things need to be dealt with solo. In time, maybe, but for now, no.” I smile at them. “However, some things are better expressed in song, and I’ve been dying to get a new album out…”

“You’re making another album?! Awesome! When’s it coming out?”

I hold my hands up. “Woah, easy there, Rainbow. I’m planning on it, but I got to coordinate with everybody’s schedule to actually make it work. I can’t say for certain if and when it’ll be out.” I only expect a little resistance from Mac, but everybody else should be down for it. I jerk my head to the front door. “Why don’t you all head home for the day? I’ll figure out something we can do together in the meantime and put this day behind us.”

Trixie slowly stands up. “I may be new to this whole family thing and being there for others, but even I know ponies need somepony to talk to from time to time.” With nothing else to say, she leaves, everybody else following suit after her.

Once I hear the front door shut, I close my eyes. That went better than expected. They didn’t push for more info, but what Trixie had said obviously states they’re concerned about my well-being and maybe want to know more. She does have a point though… I shake my head. Whatever their intentions, it’s only for the best. However, I now need to come up with a suitable activity we could all enjoy.

“We haven’t done a movie night for a while.”

“Yeah, but I was hoping to do something different with them for a change. You know, be unique and different.”

“But movie night is kinda our thing, if you think about it. It’s all we’ve really done with them since you got here, to be honest.”

“Then it looks like that’s what I’m doing again.” For now though, I need to draft up some of the logistics for the album. Tomorrow, I’ll hit the band up and see what their schedules are. The sooner I get this off my chest, the better.

Author's Note:

Took me long enough to get this one out, right?

Comments

[Ravatar]

7870868 Whadda y'all mean by "Self insert"?

[ADFX-NightRaven414]

Like it!

[Apple_Crack]

8052300 As in, take yourself and put into pony land. Not sure what else you mean with your question.

[Echoniner]

No matter how long it takes between chapters I never feel the need to re-read the older ones, I just remember where I left off, that's how much I'm enjoying this. Keep up the great work.

[Ravatar]

8052431 Yeah, that's what I thought it meant. Just that for some reason my brain up and suicided for a bit when I asked that question; So, sorry for the inconveniences.

[Apple_Crack]

8052747 No trouble mate. We all have those moments.

[deathphoenix]

Love it

[ynfiltra]

nice~!
more please!!!!

[Razjel]

And took me long enough to read this chapter. All good and well, but one thing disappoints in almost every HiE story. Humans placed I need Eq don't have strong will. I mean, each time they have some problems, be it mental or physical, and when ponies come talk about them, all it takes are few words and they spill it all. God damn it, I hate that. Every other time, when faced with a challenge, they have enough willpower to do anything, and yet, all that takes to share their problems are ponies concerned about his well being. Enough rambling. See you all next time

[camoblackhawk]

8052747 "my brain up and suicided for a bit" i am so going to have to use that line for when i can't think.

[Ravatar]

8127048 You're very much welcome, my jolly-good-fellow of a friend!

[jonathanLR]

When is the new chapter coming out?

[starship55]

I can see where Blake was coming from. He's trying to deal with some major changes in his very humanity.