Chapter 13
I surveyed the flooded dreamscape with a cool, detached glare.
Without the storm and the battle agitating it, the sea was a peaceful sight. As far as the eyes could see, clear blue water hauled back and forth. The only black spot on that idyllic painting had to be the giant corpse still afloat. The Serpent's charred remains cut a pitch black line across the ocean. Its head lulled to the rhythm of the waves, its tremendous eyes forever closed.
I hadn't been able to awaken. Some part of me knew deep down that I wouldn't. Small Pond was awake, so it stood to reason that I would have too, if it had been possible. All it meant was that the rumbling of my stomachs would keep growing louder, would grow more demanding.
Dreamon. I hated the word, I really did. The only thing I thought I could hate more was the corpse with the lance sticking out of its lungs.
It robbed me of my life. Of my family, of my friends. I'd never see them again, because of this monster.
Being skewered on the insecurities it fed from seemed too kind a fate. Much too kind. It made my heart sing a dark little song to remember the fiery fate Small Pond had bestowed upon the Serpent.
The whispers were growing. My neck twitched, an itch in my muscles spreading. My wings were flexing, testing my weight, their strength. I raked my right hoof over the blackened scales. From the blackest parts of me, I could feel the urge rise. Luna wasn't here to watch. She'd gone back to the realm of the living with my friends almost as soon as they had disappeared.
Slowly, I ran my tongue over my lips. I was not surprised, nor worried, to find it forked. The cold dancing over my skin was all too familiar. The armour that weighed me down did not emit any sort of radiance. Not this one.
But in this moment, alone, cold and feeling the sting of injustice digging deep through my mind, I did not want to be a great knight in shining armour. I did not feel like any kind of hero. I just... I wanted something to ease that anger.
To lash like a beast until the hurt went away.
To eat.
Scales broke under my bite, flesh and ashes slid down my tongue.
In my guts swelled power. It filled me to the brink, pulsing with every beat of my heart, faster with every gulp of tangy flesh. Not enough, hissed the voices in the back of my head. More! And my fangs ripped greater chunks, even as I drowned in the blood that seeped from the wound.
I feasted with vengeance on my mind, uncaring of the consequences.
The memories came with slithers and hiss, and a world so tall and strong I would hid under the cover of leaves. My coils circled the branches, the bark. I could climb the trunks as I would the legs of great beasts, and hid in the foliage. Shadows mingled with the spots in the pattern of my scales.
A tall prey passed by. Large. Plentiful. But dangerous. An irritated part of me produced another hiss, and the pull of hunger battled with the instinct of safety. There might be another prey soon. An easier one.
There might not be another.
I struck. Fangs outstretched, coils unfolding in a spring. A sharp, loud noise, the prey's howl of anger. Its muscles were hard as stone, resisting my attack. It fought. It buckled.
For a moment, a quick fading moment, I could not feel the earth, the pulses of beating creatures, only the wind, strong. And my trashing found nothing but emptiness.
Then the world broke apart in a flood of rushing water. Cold. Danger. My tail straightened in a futile attempt to grab onto solid ground. The shore grew distant, and my mind clouded. I felt sluggish. Slow.
No, that was bad. Slow meant no prey. Slow meant death.
Death.
The darkness appeared sprinkles with dust of light. The obscurity wasn't all-compassing. And the weight of water on me had disappeared. I was not in the forest, not in the water.
I hesitated. The hunting ground was different. I could no longer feel the wind, taste the scent of leaves in the air, feel the steps of preys. Instead was an unknown tingle. A hint of fear covered it up. Instincts surged through me.
Fear was of preys.
I hungered.
My coils strangled the orb of light. Fangs sunk into the flickering light. Like a ripe fruit, layers peeled off. Beyond its skin, relents of fear and will and denial. Shouts of 'no' and 'leave me alone' resonated, and I recognized the sounds for what they were. Preys.
Preys, and a predator. An instinctive fear flared up in my guts as I sensed the hunting ground ripple, and a prey-looking creature stepped out into the light. Cold crept up on the path. I had to hide away. From the cold. From the dark-blue predator.
There were other preys. So many unsuspecting, fat little preys. Going about their existences without an eye or an ear open for their death.
I slid over the hard ground, and struck.
Ate.
Bones gave out beneath my coils.
Ate.
Shrieks alerted me to fleeing horses.
Ate. Swollen. I should be swollen, instincts said. I was not. No, I wasn't slow and lumbering. I was strong, strong. My coils could snap the little ponies in half without effort. A single bite from my jaws ripped through flesh and bones.
I ate and ate and ate and ate and ateateateateateate.
The preys kept shrinking. I could not find any bigger. I needed more. Things with beaks like the sky predators. Dying by my fangs. Things that stood upright. Things that were scaled like true beings but with limbs and fire in their guts.
Easy.
The predator had disappeared. It never returned.
I lurked beneath the depth. Preys appeared on the near earth when I wanted. The water was a home. An acceptable nest, without need for the sky fire. The cold no longer slowed me down. I could force the cold away by not wishing it here. Wants became true.
The hunt still pulsed in my blood. The need to chase after the preys bore into me. I wanted the hunt. I wanted the preys to know before they were eaten. And they always did. They ran. This one ran.
I wanted it, and around us, the claws that could not be seen gripped the fleeing creature.
But the hunting ground blurred for a moment. The need had fetched farther, through a wall that led outside the balls of light. Vibrations in the ground. Quick ones. Little noises like preys about to die. The thought made my muscle tense in anticipation. Yes. Yes, I wanted the runner.
Another prey then stumbled beyond the surface, drifted like a lazy bird on the waves. It was different, its smell unknown to me, its form strange. I could not see it clearly, but I sensed its presence. My neck stretched as I unhinged my jaw.
But the prey turned into a horse like the others, though with both wings and horn. It blinked out of range.
A dissatisfied rumble shook my insides, but I let my body curl back into the dark. The female prey was running. She'd be rip for eating soon.
Soon.
I fell away from the mountainous corpse, on the sea.
The water surface did not break. It had taken the consistency of glass.
Trembling, I wiped the dark blood from my face, then rose on unsteady legs. So agonizingly slowly, I distanced myself from the charred reptile. How many? The question rung in my head, and terrified faces flashed one after the other. My ears hurt from the screams, going on and on, and on.
How many?
There were voices, and words I could not catch, and dozens of ponies, and zebras and griffons and dogs and bovines and dragons.
How... many...? I glanced at the Serpent, my insides frozen into a block of ice, my heart right up there in my throat.
And I became aware of a watchful presence at my sides.
“Since when have you been here?” I muttered.
Luna didn't miss a beat. “Since I confirmed that all of my subjects had been saved. You are the last living creature in this crumbling dream world.”
Good, I nodded, good. I liked the sound of that. Everypony, safe and sound. Happy ending. We could celebrate with ribbons and confettis, and...
I made a muffled grunt and heaved.
Everypony had been saved. Ah, haha, I was going to be sick.
“You want to know something funny?” I cried out, head hanging in my hooves. “It was not on purpose. The Serpent didn't snatch me up for some grandiose plans or something. I was just having a dream about being chased, and I was thinking of Equestria, and I wanted to be there!”
I felt Luna's eyes narrow in confusion behind my back. That piece of the puzzle, I did not feel like giving right now. It'd be too much like reminiscing, too much like thinking about what I had been robbed of.
“It thought I was Small Pond at first,” I said, not even recognizing my own voice. Was it really me speaking? “It tried to eat me like the rest. I just got lucky. It was a real fucking glutton, that thing. Ate hundreds and thousands.”
Luna flinched as if I had slapped her. I knew I should have considered her feelings a bit. The only words she ever told me were about her duty to her ponies after all. But, that was the thing, she'd never really considered mine.
So, a dark little part of me didn't mind too much letting her stew on the aftermath of the Serpent's existence.
“It was ancient,” the Princess of Dreams acknowledged, pain hidden in her solemn words. “Perhaps the oldest of your kind left. For it to have lived so long... I expected no less. I will always regret not finding out about it sooner, but now that its death is confirmed, there is little else to say.”
I could agree to that. The past seemed a terrible thing to delve on right now. I would rather find a future for myself, thought even that might be something of an ordeal. Patches of the landscape were gone, swallowed by the void. Cracks ran into the red sky, flashes of lightning running between them. And dust seemed to rain from them, as if the fabric of the dream itself had begun to unravel.
Luna followed my gaze and cleared her throat.
“The dream will remain somewhat habitable up until our subject forgets. For the average pony, the memories fade within seconds of awakening. The mind, I find, is often purged of the ideas that clustered it before sleep.” Her words made my heart skip a beat. Would Small Pond forget this? Would she forget about me? Princess Luna, as if reading my thoughts, spoke with a twinkle of amusement in her voice. “In the case of a dreamon's victim, they will remember for quite some time if they realized the danger they had been in.”
I snorted. “I think we have that covered.” With maybe a bit more force than necessary, I stomped down on the Serpent's scale. “I mean, we fought that dreamon together. She...”
A cold feeling washed over my coat at the last look of pain she had sent me. I had to. Those words were a promise she couldn't afford to make. Less so when there remained so many uncertainties about my future.
Yet, I could still smile. I could still cradle that little piece of warmth her radiant memory offered. “Small Pond really amazed me. She did it. She actually killed that monstrosity on her own. I... I feel proud just thinking about it.”
Her gaze slid on the Serpent's carcass, and she nodded. “It is a feat worthy of praise and songs. I will make sure that it is remembered, one way or another.”
I heard the promise for what it was. “...Thank you,” I whispered slowly.
We shared a moment of silence, letting the dust settle, so to speak. My knees felt like jelly, soft squishy jelly, and I sat down. It was finally crashing down on me. The big dreamon was dead, the others were safe. We had done it, through imaginary tears and imaginary blood. And where did that leave me?
“Fear still follows you,” Luna stated mildly.
Of course it does.
“I am tired of fear,” I said, feeling empty inside. My future had slipped through my hands like sand. “Of fear and sadness and shock. No more. Please, if you have any pity in you.”
“Mayhaps if we could afford it,” Luna replied, her glance toward the horizon, away from me. “It is here.”
Almost despite myself, I looked. A spot of black contrasted with the waves of transparent glass.
The silhouette did not move. It remained cut into the red of the sunset by a frame of shadows. And by the time I had blinked, it stood before us. As still as a statue.
I could already hear his taunting words, his groans and moans just over the clicking of mandibles. He'd be amused. After all, wasn't I sitting down next to the mare that had sworn to eradicate me and my kind from existence? All the while throwing his strings at me in the hopes that the puppet would return to its master.
“Is this what you see?” Luna's words brought me out of my thoughts.
“A shadowy figure made of strings and bugs?” I asked. “Yeah. I can't shake it off. I've killed it twice before and look at it now. Good as new.”
What was it going to take to chase him off? What part of me couldn't let go? I refused its orders and its claims! I refused to be a monster in the dark!
If Small Pond, whose fears had had years to take root in her mind, could face the Serpent, why couldn't I throw away my nightmare? I looked at the sand, trying not to snarl. What made me so damn inadequate? I didn't fear him! I didn't!
Luna's voice was faint. “Even I still have nightmares of Eternal Night, young dreamon.”
I snapped my head in her direction, eyes wide. Had she just...? No, there was no way... not to me. She hated my guts!
All of my incredulity must have been written over my face, for Luna took one look to me, and snorted bitterly. “I am not unfamiliar with the fear of oneself. In fact, I have forbidden myself from ever forgetting the consequences of my past follies. During my first month back from the moon, I hid my face from the enormities of my rash actions. Equestria, and the world at large, nearly brought to ruin by my designs.”
I swallowed. “How?” I asked. But did I really need to?
“The truth set me free in the end,” she said, and marched upon the String-Man.
It didn't react. Faint blue shimmers pushed away the oily black. Threads of light sewed together the shredded mouth. The insects that hoped to swarm Luna evaporated as embers fell at her hooves. She marched upon the String-Man with regal strides, and unmade him.
The strings had thickened. Flattened. Each of them seemed akin to rolls of white gauze, hanging from the frozen monster's body.
Bandages. The String-Man was covered in bandages.
I felt a stone fall heavily inside my chest.
His limbs had been cocooned in the tightly roped bandages. An inattentive observer might have thought him an injured man, from afar. The sight, somehow, appeared more gruesome than its bare, skinny arms. As if he had stumbled out of a hospital before being discharged.
The String-Man is a walking corpse. He is not a dreamon.
He was my nightmare. I knew it in my guts. Yet a piece of the puzzle was missing. What did I have a nightmare about?
“Nopony is ever born a dreamon, that's what you said, right?”
Luna glanced back to me, paused in her spellwork.
“Indeed.” She nodded, her attention back to the frozen nightmare. “Dreamons are echoes of much sadder creatures.”
The air around me had become cold. A little voice in the back of my head whispered that I should leave now. There wouldn't be a way to turn back if I stayed. Things would change. I knew. I felt it coming.
In the time it took me to blink, the String-Man had been made to lie down on his back. Its body rested on a plain bed, and Luna's magic surrounded him.
His deformed limbs shrunk. Suddenly, they appeared as normal as any other man's, tucked within the confines of a sharp-cut black suit, hands held together just over his chest.
It had lost the burlap sack. The top of his head was covered only by a turquoise blanket, the exact same shade one found in hospitals. Luna stripped the corpse of that veil with one look. Underneath, the String-Man's features had appeared.
It was no longer a skull, but a normal, perhaps even average human head. He looked paler than a healthy man, for certain, with a cold shade of white for its skin. Even beneath the short brown stubble that marred the man's cheeks, it looked near bone-white. He looked rather peaceful this way. Someone, something, had closed his eyes, for decency's sake, but I did not doubt that they would have been empty, glazed over. Probably as brown as his cropped hair.
The String-Man was a corpse.
I looked back to Luna. “That's my face.”
An incredulous snort escaped me. Oh. So that was the bottom of it. Oh... oh God...
“Dreamons are the last nightmare of the dying. They feed on life, because they exist on stolen time. All those beasts merely delay their natural demise.” The cyan of Luna's eyes seemed cut from ice, and yet I could not find it in me to fear her anymore. Sadness hardened her scowl. “Perhaps they are as lost as other dreamers, never to realize their own evils. But they never stop.”
My hooves had found their place over my ears. A voice like mine sang a childish “lalala” to bury, without any success, the rest of Luna's explanation.
I knew what she was going to say.
“You are dead, William.”
All fell into silence.
I threw up a chunk of serpent meat the size of my own head.
The hoof that found the small of my back surprised me. It traced soothing circles over my fur, nothing of the cold left. There was a gentleness to its touch, a light that glinted in the horseshoe.
The words were quiet. “I cannot return you to your body; no more than I could bring back to life the recently deceased.” Luna's eyes closed, and her voice trembled in disgust. “The most foul arts alone might, but you will not find a living necromancer in all of Equestria. The practice has been long since eradicated. And you would find such an existence vile. Even more than the one you possess now.”
I still don't want to die! sprung from my though in a shrill shout. No, no, that wasn't right. I was already dead, just... like a zombie or a vampire or a lich. I was part of the fucking undead! How?! HOW DID I DIE?!
The glass beneath me blurred. I... What had happened? How did it happen? Did it hurt? Suddenly, I was running my hooves over my chest, over my face, expecting to find a blatant bleeding wound. I would have seen it before, the rational part of me thought of the reflections in the water. But the frantic movements of my legs wouldn't stop. They had a life of their own. Where? Where was the proof that I had died?!
I snapped my head toward the peaceful corpse of the String-Man. My corpse. It was the strangest sight, one that had me dizzy and grasping at the hospital bed he was lying on. My face, eyes forever closed, limbs stuck in rigor mortis. And blood... blood seeping from the pants legs.
“William,” Luna called my name. “It is only a reflection of your fear.”
Which was why it had only taken to calling me a dreamon after I had started having doubts on Luna's words. My brain pushed a few more pieces together. I'd been goofing around in the Serpent's guts, but I had still been afraid. Only a reflection.
“I... I have to let go, right?” I sniffled, rubbed a hoof on my muzzle. “The String-Man is me, dying or dead. I'm just in denial.”
I pulled back the pants and stared at the ankles on that human body. On it, there were a row of puncture wounds, and shreds of flesh missing.
My breathing grew heavier. I still couldn't remember it happening. I had died and I didn't even realize. I had died in my twenties, my studies not even over, without ever getting a real job and a house and a spouse. I had had years in front of me.
No longer, living nowadays was just fantasy and hunger. The two pillars of my existence. I wanted to hurl. Without a sound, I fell on my rump, and wept.
Luna let me. I would be grateful one day, for that little bit of respect. She let my dread, horror and anguish bleed out of me like venom from a wound. She let me curse and spit and rage till I felt nothing.
Till, finally, a single word could be pushed out of my throat, as raw and coarse as my shredded heart. “Why?”
“Dreamons have plagued the world since the first minds opened to the fear of death.” She never looked more vulnerable, nothing like the furious mistress of dreams and storms. Nothing like the demanding ruler wishing for her subjects' safe return. She... she looked tired, to the depth of her soul. “I have fought many, so many. Countless. When I was younger, I did try to parlay, to help the deceased pass into the shadowlands and everything that is beyond.”
The sentiment might have been noble, but I knew that it would be doomed to failure. Even a thinking dreamon would reject that offer. Choosing death was the unnatural path. “You tried...”
“Yes, I tried.” She clung to those words. “If only to honour the ones they had been in life. I tried even in the face of refusal and battle. I tried. Until a stallion named Fickle Heart paid the price of my mistake.” Her eyes misted over. “Then... then I could never again take the risk of being deceived. It felt too terrible to open up my mind to the concept of mercy and suffer the betrayal again.”
Somehow, my hoof found its way to her shoulder, gentle, though Luna flinched regardless. Her eyes looked at me with something new within, almost curious.
Her voice was but a whisper. “I wonder... if I had given you a chance... if I had been less abrasive...”
“If I had been less lecherously obnoxious,” I added with a sly grin.
To my great amusement, Luna let out a snort. “Aye. That might have helped. I truly believed you wanted to bargain their lives for sexual favours.”
Chuckling, I ran a hoof through my mane. “Not my finest moment. Still, you were ready to put my ass on fire last time. What changed?”
There was a moment when it seemed she wouldn't reply.
Her eyes were misty. “I was asked to choose. What mattered more? That I had been right all along, or that I might have stumbled into a way to save those that needed me?”
For a moment, I was struck silent. They must have loved or hated her a great deal to ask this of her. I had trouble imagining any pony demanding this of her, the Night Princess and diarch of Equestria. Only her equal might.
And, remembering the blaze that had taken Pond over, I knew there could only be one. “I think we know what mattered to you in the end.”
Luna nearly smiled. Her sharp nod hid any curve on her lips. “I had help, but in the end, I decided I would try. It was not the wrong choice, it seems.” Her eyes bore into me, no longer of harshness, no longer of ice or fire. She looked at me with regret and gratitude dancing on a glint of azure. “You... you helped free my subjects. You helped her shed the shadows weighing her down. So, yes, I believe I own some blame for how this went down. For that, and for how I ended up treating you, I apologize. You did not deserve such scorn.”
And Luna did one thing I had not expected to see of any alicorn ever. She bowed. One knee to the ground, head dipped in respect, and wings outstretched to her left.
It shocked the words out of me. “I... Princess... don't.” I bid her to rise. “Please, it's okay. It was a weird situation for everyone.” Red coloured my cheeks as she remained formally bowed. I racked the corners of my brain for a way to get her to stop, until it slapped me in the face. “You're forgiven, Princess Luna!”
Now, she smirked, mirth very obvious on her whole demeanour. “I never thought the night would come that I would beg for a dreamon's forgiveness, and do it sincerely.”
I chuckled. “Well, I never thought” – I would die – “I would talk to the real one. So I guess we're even.”
It was meant as a joke, but the twinkle in Luna's gaze told me she had taken it otherwise.
“Even?” she mulled the word over. “I would like that.”
A rare smile showed on her face. Not a sarcastic or grim one. One with a certain beauty, that transformed her whole face into that of a truly striking mare. I surprised myself to feel my tail flick aside nervously.
I wanted to smile back. The corners of my mouth rose too. Even with the Princess of the Night. Maybe her equal, in some ways. She had certainly begun treating me as such.
No lie, no complacency, no condescension.
I trusted her enough to be truly honest.
So, I asked, half of me screaming to bite my tongue, “What's going to happen next?”
“I... I do not know.” Luna hung her head. “I have been convinced of my infallibility on the dreamscape for so long now. It is... disorientating to admit ignorance of any kind.”
And that's when it sank in. Dreamons weren't meant to linger. Equestrian magic had never managed to save one. Luna had never done it before. This was unknown territory for us both.
Moments passed, the silence growing heavy between us. It seemed to buzz in my ears, to drill into my head as if to cover my thoughts in a blurring outline. With so much stolen from me, I truly stood on the edge of a precipice. My future had crumbled, everything I ever thought I knew about it gone. What would there be for a dreamon?
One glance to the String-Man, and I knew.
Perhaps Luna knew as well. An insidious thought had wormed its way in her mind. It was written all over her face. “Were you the one that consumed one Sea Orchid's life?”
I choked. If I had been drinking anything, it would have sprayed all over the glass.
“Yes. Accidentally.” Because I could not lie about that. Granny hadn't deserved to be lied about. She left gently, and my hooves did the deed. “...Are you going to kill me now?”
Luna hid her face in her hooves, a slight trembling shaking her body. Through this, she mumbled, “It couldn't have been easy...”
“Has it ever been?” I asked with a poor imitation of a smile.
She refused to look at me. “I cannot allow you to roam free through the dreams of subjects I have sworn to protect. You have proven as valuable an ally as I could have hoped, but not even you trust yourself with the instincts of the undead.”
Despite a small grimace, I nodded. She had a point there, and we both knew it. The fangs and the leather wings came without resistance, if I asked.
“I am unsure on how to proceed from this point forth.” Slowly, she rose to her hooves, testing her muscles as she did. Her wings extended fully with a few tentative flaps. “I... I need to consult with my sister and her student.”
Don't leave me alone! I thought desperately, but I held my tongue. Luna only received a nod from me. I didn't trust my voice not to betray me.
So I sat, and waited as the cracks on the landscape spread further while my only companion disappeared in a flash of blue light.
~~
What fished her out of the abyss of her own mind was a sound. A beeping. A persistent, repetitive little noise, that came and came back, with clockwork regularity. A beeping, like her own heartbeat. And that struck her as odd. How could one still have a heartbeat with a broken heart?
Small Pond's mind felt like swimming through a vat of ink. Her limbs were glued to her sides, unable to help her fight through the molasse-like substance pinning her on her back. She drifted, lost.
“The dream is over.”
Her eyelids fluttered. Rays of light pierced through the abyss.
“Wake up.”
Her back arched, sensations flooding her mind all at once. The light had become a sting and a blur, her head was sunken in a soft surface while her hind legs pressed against cool metal bars, the air smelled of antiseptics and something familiar.
She was at the height of her senses, assaulted in every direction possible, her eyes wide and grasping for any information. She was at the height, and her back winced and trembled, and at once she crashed down on a comfortable mattress.
Oh, she thought as her mind made the connection. She was in the hospital, and somepony's hoof was holding hers.
“Finally,” said her brother as he rubbed at his eyes. “You took your time little sister. I was afraid you would not wake up after all!”
“Fr... Fry?” Her voice felt so weak. It tore from disuse. How long... how long had she been asleep?
“It's just like you to oversleep after staying in bed for days.” He laughed, a little too heartily. Small Fry's laughter had always been a more subdued thing than that. “Typical Puddle. Making me worry like that after burning a giant snake to death. You just can't do things in the right order, huh?”
A feeble giggle pulled at her throat. Her poor big brother must have been worried to death if he was rambling like that.
But laughing did more than strained her abused vocal chords. With a blush, Small Pond shrunk on herself. Her hind legs crossed as she suddenly realized the sharp pressure on her bladder.
“...I really need to pee, Fry.”
Her brother blinked, then facehoofed.
“Right, right, of course,” Small Fry fumbled, “let me call the nurses. They said they'd be around to help with you waking up. Shouldn't be hard to get one. There's a couple of things they need to take care of real quick. Something about stretching so you don't get cramps all over.”
True to his words, a nurse with her red mane in a bun and a spectacular grin entered not a minute later. Nurse Lucky Star swiftly took in Small Pond's appearances, her mouth running so fast neither sibling quite processed what she said. At least, she agreed to help find a bathroom for her patient. Small Pond filtered the inane chatter, the cries and exclamations over her miraculous recovery. Truly, Princess Luna had surpassed herself, just as everypony was starting to lose hope. What a load of drivel. Instead, she left her mind wander back to him.
She had been convinced he was about to say the words. Right up until the moment he had stopped, looking like a deer in a headlight. Her heart had skipped a beat. She knew the doubt and the regret then etched on his face. He... he had...
With a steadying breath, Small Pond swallowed back her tears. Her brother was still watching like a hawk, and she knew the nurse would drop the meaningless talk in a second if she cried.
Celestia, she needed to get to that bathroom.
Ahead, next to her chamber's door, Fry was frowning, trying to read her thoughts and emotions. He paused just as he was about to open the door for them, blinking then turning back. “Do you want me to accompany you?”
“No,” she instantly replied, then regretted. Her brother's wince made a string tighten around her heart. “I... Fry, I really do not need you to help me to the bathroom. I will die of embarrassment if you try.”
For a split second, her brother looked like he wanted to fight her on that.
“Okay...” He nodded quickly, taking deep breathes. “I'll be waiting here. We have a lot to talk about, don't we?”
Small Pond returned his shy smile, squashing the uncertainty that lingered in her chest. He knew. They'd even talk about it in the dream, but the miles-long serpent fighting a princess and threatening their lives had made things a little more hectic and abridged than they ought to be.
“Yes. I promise, Fry; there's so many things we need to clear out.”
The happiness in his gaze was tentative, cautious. She understood the feeling well. She would talk, that much she promised to herself as much as to her brother. William... William had been right about this.
The thought made her flinch, then urge the nurse to get going.
However, trotting was harder than she had thought it would be. A minute into it, and she could readily admit that the nurse's steady hooves might be the only things keeping her from falling over.
One leg, in front of the other. Four steps before she felt dizzy. The nurse's soothing words ringing in her ears. She could do it. Just a little more effort, and she would be able to go back and rest.
Rest was the last thing on her mind however.
Voices caught her attention from a door they passed by. “He remains trapped in that place for now. He didn't seem to want to escape when I left.”
He? she wondered through the haze of her thoughts.
When the nurse told her they had reached the bathroom, Small Pond nearly didn't hear her. The words were ringing to her ears, painfully so. He. He. He. Like a puppet, she stepped into the damp little bathroom, and, with a surprisingly strong kick, slammed the door shut before the nurse could follow. She was not that far gone.
And her bladder needed serious relief.
When her body had cleared that ordeal, when that pressing order disappeared from the urges directing her, part of the haze seemed to lift. And comprehension struck her like thunder. He was trapped. Left behind.
“The dream is over,” she muttered and shot a few frantic looks to her surroundings. What could she do?
The magnificent thing about Horseshoe Bay's hospital (more like a clinic, to be honest) was the size of it. Namely, two floors, at most, and even if she had been on the highest floor, most ponies in town learned how to safely land on piles of sand.
The window sill creaked as loud as a bird's squawk, and Small Pond's companion knocked at the door. “Miss Pond? Is everything alright in there?”
“Yes!” she scrambled to reply.
Galloping full speed despite her screaming legs, Small Pond repeated the words. “He remains trapped.”
They had been talking about William.
The haze of her slow awakening had fully disappeared, but in its place were dozens of inquiries fired at her mind. Where was he trapped? She was awake. He'd made sure that she woke up, first. She had to get to him. One way or another. He had helped her and her brother. He had done everything that could be done. And he lo–
Didn't say the words.
He regretted. With all the charm of a coltish stallion, so terribly earnest in all he did, yet bringer of a pain like none before it. You can't, he said with his eyes. Don't say it, you won't be able to take it back once you do.
Small Pond charged through the hospital's doors, cutting a straight line through the lobby with her heart pounding like a mad beast trapped within.
She wanted to say the words. She had never... it had always been part of the dream. To meet a nice stallion under the moonlight, to dance with him in an exotic bar, and whisper it to one another with only the night as a witness. She had dreamed of it for years, like everything else. She had always wanted to have that.
She needed to say it. He would do with it as he chose, but Small Pond knew she could not rest until then.
Fat droplets of sweat rolled on her brow, even as she swept the hallway with her gaze. Where had it been? Between her room and the bathroom, ponies had been talking about her stallion. She needed to find her room first, and avoid Fry. He'd never let her out of his sight if he knew she had ditched the nurse behind. And just as well, she would have to make sure the nurse wouldn't be seeing her outside that bathroom.
Easier said than done, when every other step made her dizzy. When her legs were made of lead. But if she gave up now, there would be no other chance.
And eventually, she did stumble upon the right door, the same dark green bamboo wooden door, hiding the same voices and the same topic. Refusing to listen to the voice of reason and propriety, she flattened her ear against the hospital door, just in time to catch a regal, poised voice.
“-- is dangerous, certainly, but not more so than a changeling. Is he?”
Another voice, this one far more familiar, replied with a perfect deadpan delivery. “Need I remind you what happened the last time you underestimated a changeling, sister?”
There was a moment of pause then, and she could imagine that the previous voice's owner was composing herself.
“Princess Twilight has reported that Ponyville has successfully integrated a changeling to its population. There has been no incident reported so far, and most of the citizens have completely adapted to its presence.”
To this strange revelation, another voice, younger, nicer if Small Pond could comment, added, “It attended the wedding of Mr. Cranky and Mrs. Mathilda. Did you notice it?”
Instead of words, she heard a rasp grunt of annoyance. That certainly answered the inquiry.
“Dreamons can feed on each other, correct?” the younger voice asked. “I speculated as much when you revealed that the weak ones fear their superior. Would that be possible for him?”
Why were they talking about ways for a dreamon to feed? Fatigue was catching up on her again, now that she had ceased her mad run for this place. And her addled mind refused to process the information. Would it be possible for William to feed on weaker dreamons?
The oldest, most mature voice chimed in, and Small Pond pictured the pony as frowning. “I am somewhat concerned about the moral implications of this course of action. If we gave this dreamon the benefit of doubt, I would also offer the chance to others, not make them fuel for one.”
“You need not worry, sister. That solution would not be practical regardless. Dreamons might be naturally spawned undead, but that does not make them common. They are created through specific circumstances. Happenstance.” No, the word could not be right to Small Pond's ears. They hadn't met through coincidence. Fate had a much truer ring. “I have seen many in my days, but I also have centuries of experience to draw upon. Today was a rare event. Two dreamons chasing the same prey.”
Small Pond felt a white hot fury fill her veins. That monstrous snake would never compare to William! How dare she?! Her hooves trembled. They itched, and she felt a bloodlust like never before.
Her hooves trembled over the door, and she could not imagine it being from her weakness. Anger had built a dam in her mind, it would only take that one drop too many, then it would burst and she would break down that door with her own two hooves.
The voices continued, unaware of Small Pond grinding her teeth a few ponies length away.
“He will be content for a time, but this shan't last. Dreamons' existences depends on those they feast upon. He has eaten some of the greater dreamon's remains, so he might last some time, but eventually, he will have to hunt again or let himself perish.”
Her heart stopped beating.
Somepony close by shouted, “Hey! What do you think you're doing over there?!”
The words beyond the door pierced through the veil of cold on her body. “He is different, undeserving of our scorn. I admit that. It would be a kinder fate to give him a clean death now than let him fall to starvation or madness later.”
Small Pond's legs moved before she had even time to think.
The door slammed open, shocking all three of the mares in the room. And her tired brain vaguely took notice that she had jumped in on the alicorn princesses of Equestria during a private meeting.
“Don't.” She could not say more than that. She could not think more than that. Whatever they meant to do to William, they couldn't. Small Pond knew it to the deepest corners of her soul. “Don't.”
They stared at her. Princess Twilight, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna. Through the absolute blank she was drawing upon, her mind still noticed a few things. The reasonable voice had to have been Princess Twilight, and she stood nearer to Princess Celestia than to Princess Luna.
The Night Princess had trouble staying awake. She seemed so different than from within her dream. She had fought the Serpent with all the grace and prowess of a warrior queen, but here, the bags under her eyes looked heavier than her body could bear. For however long Small Pond had been asleep, she understood the opposite had been true of her saviour.
“Mrs Pond, you ought to rest,” Princess Celestia reminded her with a gentle reprimand.
“Buck that, I've been sleeping long enough!”
If she still had her filters, Small Pond would have likely strangled herself for the blatant disrespect toward Princess Celestia. Perhaps she would have imitated Princess Twilight and shoved both hooves in front of her impertinent mouth. Perhaps she would be like the unconscious nurse. Yes, perhaps, but the memory of William's smile as he lifted the lance stayed with her. She had never remembered her dreams or nightmares before. Now they were all she could think of.
His coltish astonishment, painted clear on his face, when his wings gave away his thoughts of their kiss.
His boastful charge toward the giant crabs, shrimps, lobsters and other associated shellfishes.
His desperate pleas for the truth that stifled her.
His words. His voice. His tender looks and his strong legs around her shoulders.
Him.
May Celestia forgive her, Small Pond knew the meaning of her fluttering heartbeat.
“I was rather told that dreamon infested sleep did not help rejuvenate the mind and body much,” Princess Celestia mused, and Small Pond could have cried in relief at the lack of anger she perceived. “But perhaps you are to be the best judge of that, my little pony.”
“I... thank you.” She bowed her head, taking care to dip extra low to make up for her previous outburst.
Some guardian spirit might have been looking out for her, as none of the princesses appeared particularly offended.
Strangely enough, Princess Luna only regarded her with an amused interest. “Speak your mind, subject. You have the attention of your princesses.”
“I...” Do it for him. And that was all it took for her courage to return. “I came to beg you to save him. William is not in any way evil. He has been a beacon for me to follow, and without him, I would not be awake here to tell you about it.”
In the corner of her eye, as she pleaded to Luna, mostly, Pond saw Princess Twilight nod in approval.
Unfortunately, the dire look didn't fade from the Night Princess' traits. They had simply gained a hint of sorrow to them.“No matter our personal feelings on the stallion himself, we cannot ignore that he is akin to any other undead. He cannot survive without sustenance for long and the only food he can properly absorb is the life of dreamers.”
“There must be something that can be done!”
Luna's starry mane shook as the princess dug her hooves into the floor's tiles. “No power in this land or the next can change a dreamon's nature. Even the Elements of Harmony would merely purify the lost soul and make them pass on to the other side.”
In the corner of her eyes, Small Pond noticed a glint of purple light coming from Twilight Sparkle's crown.
“No powers, no magic. But what about him?” The junior princess came to Pond's rescue with inquisitive and thought-out words. “This William can control himself, Princess Luna. He freed the foals of his own free will, remember?”
And it was the strangest thing then. Small Pond swore she had seen some hope in the gaze of the dark princess.
Strange, for it was gone the next moment, killed in a bitter haze.“Aye, but he consumed the life of Sea Orchid in exchange.”
Granny... thought Small Pond with a hoof to her chest. The old mare had been childless, but that didn't stop her from treating most ponies Pond's age as her own. Briefly, she wondered how she had reacted to William, who bore a striking resemblance to her late husband...
“Granny Orchid is gone. It's my fault.”
Gone, kissed by a ghost of her former husband, gone and grateful.
Ache was spreading through her body like wildfire. She understood. She... she understood. William was out there, nearly gone, and the pain was already unbearable.
Gone with a kiss.
Small Pond felt as if the future unfolded ahead of her. There was a shift in the younger princess' demeanour. A disappointment, a sadness. Twilight Sparkle did not rise to plead again.
“She thanked him,” Small Pond ground out through fresh tears. That could not be how it ended. She refused. She refused! “Granny told him that he had been kind. He hated that.”
Princess Celestia spoke softly. “Enough to let himself perish instead of doing it again?”
With a choked sob, Small Pond hung her head and clenched her jaw to survive the pain of her heart shattering. How could she tell them? He had been casually dismissive, when nothing mattered. Childish, focused on his own amusement and gratification. And then he had returned to save her, looking like a true pony, asking her why and bringing down the fear shackling her. He had changed. She knew why and she couldn't say it.
Yes, she wanted to scream. Yes, a thousand times yes! He would let himself die instead, and that's why he shouldn't!
“Don't say it,” his eyes had pleaded. “Don't shackle your heart to me. I won't be around much longer.”
“Please, Princess...” The exhaustion brought her crumbling down. There was no strength left in her limbs. They rushed to her, but she barely even noticed. Trembling, her hoof reached for the gem-encrusted plate adorning Princess Celestia's neck. “I beg of you... don't let the stallion that led to the turning point of my life be nothing more than a dream.”
A shaking blue wing brushed her tears away. “We cannot offer our ponies as meals to him. We do not have that right over their lives. Least of all to prolong a life already ended.”
“I don't care!” she shouted at them all, her voice so raw it broke. “I don't care what you believe is right or wrong! I... I love him. Save him. Whatever it takes, save him. There has to be a way! You don't have the right to offer somepony else's life, but you can use mine!”
Her words struck like thunder. She almost saw them rippled through the air as if they were still in the dream world. Shock painted on their faces, from the mild to the aghast.
Princess Twilight Sparkle had gone a pale shade of violet. “Small Pond, we can't–!”
With a flash of light, Princess Celestia extended her left wing to silence the others. Small Pond wasn't sure what to make of that, a frown slipping on her face as she noticed the scowls on the alicorns' faces. Princess Celestia seemed to exchange a moment of silent communication with her sister, to which the dark princess responded with a simple nod.
Once more, Small Pond was pinned by the sheer presence of the Princess of the Sun, but now glittered a new sentiment in her wise old eyes. “How far are you truly ready to go for his survival, my little pony?”
“He saved me,” growled Small Pond. It was so obvious. She felt transparent, but somehow they needed to ask. “I'll save him. How far do you need me to go?”
This time, the words were Luna's. And they were as harsh as uncompromising. “To the brink. What you sacrifice today will not return to you.”
~~
“I'm sorry. It's little comfort, but I can't do more than that,” I said as I patted Luke and Lisa in the back. Their tears didn't stop coming. “Hey Luke, you can always brag that you know an alicorn now, sorta.”
He didn't crack a smile. Nor did Isabella, Grant or Ted. My friends were gathered in a semi-circle, wearing casual clothes instead of the black suits they should have worn for the occasion. I just didn't want to see them in mourning clothes.
“I'm sorry. I love you all.”
“We love you too,” they replied through whispers. The strongest two, from the only adults I had been able to conjure.
Mom and Dad were on their knees, the same way I had seen them when my uncle had died.
It wasn't them, but that was the closest to them I would ever get. Lifeless images, bland cutout cardboard copies that would never deviate from what I could imagine, or wanted to hear. By now, my real mother would have slapped me upside the head for having the audacity to die on her.
Mom's arms were around me, gentle, hugging me for what it was worth. My wings did the same to her and to Dad. Their voices were as I remembered, though with an echo that resembled my own voice. Everything they had said had been tainted by this little detail.
I had never realized how lonely lucid dreams were before.
When they disappeared, gone as morning dew in the sun, I felt no different. I had hoped... maybe... There hadn't been any relief. Any freed feeling within. The wait wasn't any easier. Each pulse of my blood was a tick of a clock, and each brought me closer to what I knew was going to be my final fate.
How long has it been?
Maybe I could try and break the wall again. I'd almost done it once, hadn't I? I had smelled the antiseptics in the air, the clean, sterile scent of a hospital room. I had heard ponies trot around and the cries of seagulls over the beach. It had felt real in a way the dream could never quite replicate. I could try again...
And then what? asked a cold voice in my head. Gallop through the field of stars and jump inside another dream? Wait it out until the hunger returns and then rip a star to pieces?
The screams burst into my mind, each more desperate and terrified than the next. My eyes rolling back, I stumbled against a mound of glass and fell against the frozen sea. Panting breaths fogged the surface, until the reflection within was a blur of black and red. If I looked from just the right angle, with the light of the sunset piercing through, the image of me appeared bathed in blood.
“I can't live like that.”
The dream shivered in its entirety. It had been witness to that promise.
Sighing, I let myself lie down on my back. Before me, the sky in the dream world. In all its twisted glory, with streaks of red and green and yellow battling in the firmament. The constellations ran around, Ursa Minors cuddling Ursa Majors, draconequus waving cotton candy in front of a crocodile, alicorns shielding ponies with their wings. And here and there, broken pieces, holes that let through a glimpse of nothingness, and beyond that, dreams.
There was something of beauty to it, and I decided to feel glad about having that much with me in the end.
Maybe it was the last piece of Small Pond's mind remaining. The sky and the stars, just as she had dreamed them. Perhaps, the way they were in Equestria and over the oceans she would visit soon. If the rainbow whale from before had been anything like the real thing, then she would truly live something worth all the hell before. She'd be happy.
Growling, I ignored the tears sliding down my cheeks.
A knight in a golden armour. A friend. A lover. The words flickered to the front of my mind, so persistent, travelling through my wings and my horn. Can you imagine a greater rush than being an alicorn?
At once, my chest panged with the sheer burning desire within. The phantom sensation of her lips brushing against mine had me shivering. Could I imagine a greater rush?
“Yes,” I whispered to the bleeding sky and the breaking world, “a thousand times, yes. Kissing Small Pond had been.”
She had been about to say it. She had been about to tell me, and she would have never been able to leave. I wouldn't have let her.
“I don't want to die yet,” I begged the unfeeling world. “Let me just be with her, at least a little longer. I won't hurt anyone. I'll leave when my time is up, but... please...”
In response, the very fabric of the skies trembled with an ominous wince. The few clouds left overhead curved, caved as if an unnameable pressure had been put upon them. And they were torn apart, exploding with a rush of pink radiance that bathed the whole world with a warmth unlike any other.
Within the light was the lone figure of a unicorn mare and my heart, that traitor, fluttered. Hope surged inside me, strong enough to eclipse anything else, and I shot upward like a rocket. Near me, empty air cracked, rifts opening and tearing through the landscape. But all I knew and thought with such frenzy whipping my blood was a mixture of disbelief and blazing, illuminating affection.
And when I came within reach, my wings locked into place. I hovered, the pink glow shining on my fur gently, the mare finally distinct. A mobious salmon was swimming on her flank, its smile as true as the mare that bore it.
“William,” Small Pond called out, spearing through the blaze of light, “take my hoof!”
It couldn't be real. Why would she even be here?! We'd worked so hard on getting her to escape. It was all for her sake. To let her leave the nightmare. To make her--
Happy.
“You came back...” My mind must have been playing tricks on me. A last desperate ditch to make the coming doom bearable. “You were free! The world's right in front of you. Why... why did you come back?”
“You didn't let me say it!” Her voice broke. “Did... did you think that would change something? That I wouldn't want to say it if you stopped me?!”
And all those pretty little words of selflessness unravelled. Their sway on me broke. The only thing left was a staggering, dizzying happiness that I couldn't even fathom. “But... what about being free and travelling on your own and meeting all sorts of exotic stallions on the way?”
“My dreams changed! I've had enough pinning after the unattainable and refusing to take what could be mine. I love you! I want to see the world with you!” Her hoof lingered just inside my reach. “So what do you say?”
Oh, I knew the words, and they came as easy as breathing when my hoof settled in hers.
“Yes, God yes. I love you, Small Pond.”
From the pink light flew a red chain that bound us together.
We were one.
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huh...
Close enough I guess...
I'm proud to say I suspected nothing!
I can say I'm not foreign to the idea, and actually have work out some thoughts on the idea of 'echoes' of the dead and dying existing on within dreams and in the dreamscape, eventually turning to drawing on life through nightmares to sustain themselves. Pretty sure I found a greek/roman critter that does that in my reading into the concept...
Either way, nicely done and played. Totally didn't expect that the String Man was William's dead. I knew it was some major fear of his, but didn't expect that.
And you go, Small Pond! Fight for your dream stallion! So what if he can't move a few couches? He's your prince! Ignore what they say! Kick reason to the curb! FIGHT THE POWAH!
Actually, did they bring Cadance in on this? Seems like her kind of ending.
Noo we need more!
this actually drew tears good job you are one of a few
Wow, this easily goes to the best fanfics i've ever read, you sir deserve the true Kudos.
I'm hoping to see a sequel.
Also, just chked your other fics, you sir just got my favorite author badge, ten trips to equestria, it's sequel and the last one were incredibly done as well.
Aw, what a sweet ending.
Now let's see if William has to give up any of his appendages in the process
Well done. You actually managed to make me care for a character I hated in the beginning. I have no idea why I kept reading, but I did, and now I actually feel for William. I'm honestly shocked.
Now that I think about it, dream-demons reminds me of the hollows in bleach!