The Wander Through Lands Unknown

by Tomas Lutwig

Chapter 8; How Long is a Thousand Moons?

“How long have I been here” the words rang out, echoing as though through miles of crevices and canyons.

Memories played before my eyes of events that had unfolded, bringing me to this place, events even before, of a loving family with a Dad who worked hard to keep food on the table. High school, people I cared little about beyond a few teachers and even fewer of my fellow students.

A strange jingle rang out again making me look up from my position on the 'ground'. A dragonequiss wearing a jester's uniform stood before me, dancing like a fool. Ponies started to join in, but with a thought they were gone.

Joviality seemed so trivial anymore, I simply wished for something to do, something that could continue even after my release from captivity.

How long had it been? Days? Months? Possibly even years? I shook my head. Years ha. As if I could be so lucky.

Princess Luna would drop in periodically, or at least a large glowing moon would. The visits would be more common if my mind tried to drive me insane with guilt, or other such emotions. A simple command of “Silence” or “Begone” would banish the apparitions.

Amusingly, I still felt my sanity slipping, whether or not from my mind. The only thing to talk to worth two cents were myself, even sometimes making a mirror image of myself, sometimes clothed in the wanderer's garb.

He was a great listener, even if the moon would show up sometimes to banish him. After one time when the moon showed up and banished him, he came back on his own accord, it frightened me a little, but he started to tell me things. How to banish the moon before it could interfere, how to better control my mind so I wouldn't need it's help.

It didn't take long for me to accept, the moon becoming more a burden than a help quite quickly.

“You see, that is why she interferes. She fears the power we hold in our mind.” He said causing me to blink and put a hand to my chin. After a second he was behind me a reassuring hand on my shoulder “I mean you trust me don't you?” He said making me nod.

“Of course I do, I mean you're me” I said turning around. To look at him only for him to not be there.

“Then focus, remember that you simply need to will them and her away, we are in your mind, you are the king here” His voice echoed from somewhere in my mind.

After a few moments, strange creatures appeared around me. Looking closer they were corrupt versions of people, or ponies that I knew. “Bret” they all seemed to call as they approached.

After a moment of fear, the Moon appeared. Shining it's light on me and the group surrounding me.

I looked up at it for a moment and focused. “I don't need you anymore” I shouted willing the orb away. A stuttered and faint reply came, but went unheard as the noise from the creatures around me became louder.

I looked around unafraid, I tried willing them away as well, but laughter echoed in my ears. “Ohh so simple” it said before laughing again. “So gullible as well! Did you truly not wonder if being trapped in your mind for this long would cause some kind of effect? Almost as if they were meaning to make another Spirit of Chaos” My reflection said.

The creatures closed in before I felt something tearing me from where I was standing.

Sound! Oh dear, lovely sound! That rhythmic thumping in my ears. My heartbeat. The sound of gravel crunching was once again sounding in my ears as my stone prison crumbled around me.

I opened my eyes to find myself kneeling on a stone surface, spear still clutched in my hands as a babe would hold to his mother's hand.

Looking up I saw the Lunar and Solar diarches and a smile came to my face as the spear fell to the ground quickly followed by my body as I attempted to get up.

The impact gave the feeling of pain, something that overjoyed me as I hadn't felt it in too long. I looked back at them who stood there shock on their faces at my action. “Princesses!” I said trying and failing to rise to my feet, the need to hug them almost overpowering before something snapped in my head.

'they imprisoned you, watched you as you puttered around in your mind.' A familiar voice said making me calm down for a moment before looking at the two again.

The looks on their faces translated to pity, and near disgust in my head. Anger grew inside me, but I kept it reigned in the the best of my abilities.

“What have you released me for” I asked, managing to rise leaning on the tall stone base next to me.

“There was a disturbance, we feared that while being trapped within your mind, it had caused itself to cave in and attempt to destroy itself” Princess Luna said, trying to keep a stoic expression.

I could see it in her eyes though, the disgust. 'She's been in my head, that moon was her' I thought trying to remember all the things she no doubt saw.

“We wanted to make sure your mind was healthy enough to finish you sentence” Princess Celestia said.

My eyes darted between the two before they shared a glance. 'they plan to destroy you! stop them before they can do any more damage!' The voice said.

Something in my head wanted me to destroy these two before me, while something else, wanted me to stop and listen.

Still leaning against the stone. I walked to the other side to find my spear tip stuck in the ground. Taking it out took a few tries as my muscles didn't seem to want to work with me after so long of being petrified. I yanked the spear from the ground stumbling for a moment before falling back onto my backside.

I heard something behind me and turned to see the two of them staring down at me with blank expressions. It took me a moment to get back onto my feet leaning heavily on my weapon. “Alright, so...” I said making sure of my footing. “if you don't mind me asking, how long have I been in there?” I asked before looking up at their expressionless faces.

Luna put a hoof to her chin face contorted in thought. “If the moons do not lie, you've been trapped for two years, or ten moons” she said nodding.

I was taken aback at this. “Two years? And you said one thousand moons? Well son of a bitch I'm going to lose my mind if it's only been ten moons!” I said anger building inside me once more.

“Well you were told that you'd be taking Tirek's place for ending his life, as someone would need to be punished for what happened” Celestia said. “It is only fair to-”

I held up a hand stopping her. “Fair? Don't talk to me about fairness princess. When you have to make a friend to talk to simply because you're that alone, that's not fair. Fairness is not serving someone else's sentence. Fairness would be putting me in a dungeon for a few years if not celebrating me for killing an enemy of the country, if not the world” I said, the anger seeping into my voice. “You wish to be fair. Strike me down. Where I come from, that is fair”

A frown found it's way onto Celestia's face and anger burned in her eyes. “Fairness by definition is a judgment free from discrimination of any kind. You serving part of the time that Tirek put upon himself is fair in our eyes. Unfair would be giving you the life sentence he had” she said. “Unfair would be letting you get away with murder when some of my ponies spent years in the dungeon serving time for their crimes”

I laughed causing the rage on Celestia's face grow and some of it to pass to her sister. “Fairness is as everything relative isn't it? I have proper reasoning for killing Tirek, yet you call me a murderer, I regret having to end his life, but answer me this Princess of the Sun. Did he care? Discord was willing to reform, Tirek on the other hand simply believed the magic belonging to him and took it upon himself to steal it from ponies and hurt others by doing so”

“Am I not justified for wanting to fix myself as well as end the life of an individual who had malicious intent had he ever escaped again?” I asked.

As if on cue, Celestia's horn lit up a bright gold and I was shoved up against the stone I sat upon as a statue not long ago.

“How can you say you know that? None of us knew Tirek, or cared too after he started taking pony's magic” The white alicorn said getting in my face. “You don't know what was right, just as I don't”

I stared at the Princess for a moment before sighing. “you who ruled a land of safety and peace wouldn't know.” A voice deeper than my own said catching the princess off guard. “perhaps if you lived in a land of chaos and evil as we have for all our lives, you would share my view... pardon me, our view” the voice laughed for a moment before the princess released me and I fell to the ground.

It took a moment for me to rise from the ground with the help of my spear “From where I come, murder is common, death is inevitable and crime runs rampant. Worse yet, Princesses, I have a bit of a hero complex I want to help people, or ponies” I said “I am sorry I disobeyed you, but perhaps, teaching would be better than imprisoning?”

I looked up at the two shocked at my sudden change of face. 'teaching??' The voice called out in my head 'are you a fool?! They imprisoned you, caused you to slowly lose your mind! lash out and make an attempt at their lives!' The vocie said anger growing in it's voice.

I was torn, while I my love for both princesses due to their depiction had weakened with my dealings with them, they only wanted to help their subjects. The voice in my head though, while violent and nearly senseless, had stuck by me through my imprisonment.

I looked up at Princess Celestia, “Well, what happens now, diarches?” I asked. I felt my eyelid start twitching, I tried to close my eye and make it stop, but it continued. Due to my mask this went unseen by the sisters until my left arm did the same giving strange muscle spasms that made it flex and stop, my fingers buzzed on the shaft of the staff.

“i won't let you hurt us” The voice said again as visions of a painful death or torture flooded my mind that made me scream, though they went unheard as my reflection spoke.

Comments

[Tomas Lutwig]

5988631
A similar thought was going through my head since he seemed like he truly believed that the magic belonged to him and the whole idea that he deserved to rule the land. So since centaurs are similar enough to human, half human though in MLP universe I think he was half minotaur or something strange, I used him for my own devices! Muhahaha! I didn't like Tirek much anyways, devolved too quickly into the stereotype of villains. First be smart, work your way in, then when you have power, be stupid and get *blank* (destroyed, imprisoned, etc.) Too easy of a character to write.

[Tomas Lutwig]

5988769
An interesting idea, and he, or someone else who has a very prominent role, may very well do just that. For now though I have found that Guilt can cause some people to believe they are in the wrong and after stewing over things for long enough no doubt that can make things worse. Perhaps I may not be taking the best route, but in the stories I have written, I'm fairly known to go off the normal road.
We'll all have to see what happens! Though at this point I'm kind of curious myself!

[Tomas Lutwig]

5991740
More good ideas. It surprises me that you have no stories uploaded here with the number of ideas you have, but that's beside the point.
I've always found that world to be strangely trusting, as for instance imprisonment and basically torture instead of death as you said, while a harsh fate they stupidly trust that the threat won't escape and seemingly forget about said threat. True it's a little kid's show, but so was the original, and while we don't know EXACTLY happened to that variation of Tirek, due to the giant explosion and his howls of pain we can assume that he was destroyed.
Kids these days play video games about death and destruction all the time so what does it matter if after the rainbow hits him he's just gone. maybe a few butterflies or some bull like that, but seriously, 'lets imprison him again in this place he already escaped' Yeaa, no.
My route that I've taken, while seemingly insane, I believe emphasizes their tendencies to be too motherly and trusting.

[Snow]

... I'm left with the feeling that you lose track of what you're writing several times per chapter.

[Tomas Lutwig]

8542926
Admittedly most of the time I have to write in spurts due to writer's block or the story taking a turn that I cannot allow it, as I wouldn't know what to do with it if I allowed it on that turn. If I'm brutally honest that's what happened with a lot of situations in this story. I like trying to write, however I have a bunch of interesting ideas and thoughts of 'Oh hey that would cause a conflict that could do X for this character' or 'That would be interesting to write and see what my brain puts in for the gaps'. Only issue is I don't know how to get to those interesting situations and normally have to scrap them for something more coherent to a story like this. It's just how my brain works.
I like to think the more recent chapters are much more coherent than the older ones, but unfortunately in the end it's like a lot of those shows on TV. You gotta drudge through the slime to find anything good.
Either way, thank you for looking into the story, even if you didn't like it all that much.