• Published 2nd Nov 2015
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Lateral Movement - Alzrius



Having been granted rulership over the city of Vanhoover, and confessed their feelings for each other, Lex Legis and Sonata Dusk have started a new life together. But the challenges of rulership, and a relationship, are more than they bargained for.

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184 - Hard Truths

Lex was still in his shadow-form when Sonata entered his tent.

She hesitated upon seeing that, frowning in mild confusion as she walked in. “Lex? Is everything okay?” As far as she knew, he never turned into a shadow unless it was in response to a threat, and always turned back to normal as soon as things calmed down. So why was he still that way now? “The doctors are taking care of Spit Polish, and I totes got two of C. Shells’ crew to keep an eye on him while they do. Ocean Spray and-”

“Did you enchant that mare?” he asked abruptly. “The one who came to inform me about Block Party’s body?” His eyes hadn’t been visible when she entered, but they opened now, regarding her darkly.

The question made her wince. “Look…I can explain.”

“So it was you.”

“Wait, you didn’t know for sure?!” Her eyes widened as she realized that he’d tricked her into giving herself away, and for a moment she felt a mixture of anger, exasperation, and amusement. Hadn’t she seen things like this on TV before, back on Earth? For a moment she could have kicked herself for falling for that – briefly recalling how often Aria and Adagio, and Lex himself for that matter, had called her dumb – before deciding it didn’t matter. I mean, I guess I’d be suspicious of a Siren too, if I were him. It wasn’t like Aria could enchant anyone with her voice all messed up, after all.

“I can’t believe you did that, Sonata.” His voice came out as a growl.

“Lex…”

“I can’t believe you did that!

She cringed at his shout, her ears folding back. The edges of the shapeless black mass that was his shadow-self had always flickered and fluttered, but now they roiled and thrashed, telegraphing his anger. “Look, can you change back?”

He ignored her request, his green eyes staring into hers as he continued. “I’ve told you over and over that manipulating somepony else’s mind with magic, outside of very specific circumstances, is hideously immoral!” He floated closer to her then, and in the close confines of the small tent, there was no way for her to back away as he moved his eyes closer to hers. “Altering someone’s thoughts is a violation of egregious proportions! It abrogates the most fundamental aspects of who they are! It’s a power that must be used with the greatest of responsibility, and you abused it! And for what?! So that you could cover up Cozy’s own irresponsible lack of assistance for the ponies here?!” His eyes narrowed then. “Was this her idea? Did she convince you to do this?”

Sonata shook her head. “No, she didn’t,” she sighed. “Aisle did.” She felt a twinge of guilt for admitting that, but the feeling was easy to ignore. Aisle was a nice guy, but as far as Sonata was concerned it was his fault that she was in this position in the first place. Besides, it was bad enough that she’d tried to deceive the stallion she loved; doing it a second time, and for a guy who was only kind of a friend, was too much. “He came to me earlier this morning, all freaked out, and asked if I could do that for him. I wasn’t going to at first, but-”

“I’ve heard enough,” snapped Lex. “Bring them here."

“Huh?” Sonata blinked. “Wait, you don’t want to know why I did it?”

“You’ve made it obvious that there were no exigent circumstances that could possibly justify your actions.” He turned away from her then, his eyes disappearing as he moved back towards his side of the tent, apparently done with her. “Beyond that, I don’t care about whatever excuses you have. Go and bring those two here. Now.”

For a moment Sonata simply gaped at the abrupt dismissal, then she frowned – this time in anger – and stomped her hoof. “I did it because he said that you would punish Cozy if you found out she didn’t help. That you’d put a curse on her or something, like you did with Garden Gate.”

“He was entirely correct, as I’m about to demonstrate,” replied Lex coldly. “Now do as I told you.”

“No!” Sonata wished he was solid so that she could grab him and shake some sense into him. “Lex, you screwed up the thing with Garden Gate really bad! That’s why I tried to help Aisle cover for Cozy!”

“What kind of nonsense is that?!” He turned to look at her again, his eyes filled with outrage at the accusation. “The punishment I gave her was entirely appropriate! It inflicted a serious blow to her quality of life as just desert for the life she took, it places severe limitations on her ability to hurt anypony else, it includes a rehabilitative aspect by making her confront what she did every night in her dreams, and it all happened in public so as to both deter anypony who would dare commit similar offenses while simultaneously reassuring everyone else that I will protect them from anyone who would harm them, even if they are another pony! It was justice by any measure!”

“You scared everypony, Lex.” Sonata stated the words in a flat, resigned tone. “What you did to Garden Gate made them all afraid of you.”

For a moment he was silent, and Sonata saw confusion and disbelief in his eyes, followed by a moment of uncertainty before they narrowed again. “You’re wrong. I saw how everyone was acting in the wake of my sentencing her. They were reassured.”

“They were terrified,” countered Sonata. “I spoke to a bunch of them right after it happened, Lex. They all said the same thing: ‘I can’t believe he did something so awful.’ That was everypony’s reaction.” Her anger was completely gone now, replaced with a sick sense of weariness. She knew him well enough to know that this would be a blow to his confidence, and she hated that she had to do this to him. But there’s no other way, she knew. She’d been able to stop him from going all curse-happy on Spit Polish right in front of everyone with some quick thinking, but this was all she could think of to keep him from doing that to Aisle and Cozy. “If you do something like that again, you’ll, like, totes ruin any chance of being seen as a hero. And you are a hero, Lex. You just…you have to let me help you make that clear to everyone.”

“This is preposterous!” His voice was still angry, but Sonata could hear the desperation underneath it. “Garden Gate killed Pillowcase, and everypony is scared of me for punishing her for it?! What kind of sense does that make?!”

“Look…why don’t you just, just turn back to normal and we can talk about it, okay? We need to talk anyway…” The memory of what had happened earlier that morning, when she’d lost her temper over Lex’s treatment of Nosey, was enough to make Sonata shift in place, uncomfortable with the knowledge of how she’d acted back then, even if Lex had been horrible too. Maybe we’ll be able to call that one a draw or something. Just say that we were both wrong and let it go. But, somehow, she couldn’t bring herself to seriously believe there was any chance of that happening. “We’ll talk, and then-”

“No. I refuse to accept this.” His voice had hardened by then, solidifying in that controlled rage that he seemed to spend so much time in. “I just spoke to Cloudbank and Thermal Draft this morning, and they were not afraid of me. Your analysis is flawed.”

Sonata rolled her eyes. That’s because Cloudbank wants to be like you, and Drafty just likes you period. “That’s because they’ve gotten to know you. How many other people here can say that?”

“They don’t need to know me! They just need to know that I did the right thing!”

“Well they don’t!” Sonata was reaching the end of her patience. “They don’t know that because you won’t let me do my job and explain it to them! For the last twenty-four hours you’ve just been ignoring everyone or talking to them on your own or saying you’ll let Aria do it for you! What part about me being your spokespony do you not get?! I keep trying to help you and you won’t let me!”

“If you’re so unhappy with the state of our relationship, then leave.” His eyes, as he looked at her then, were completely full of spite. “Just leave me, the way you did before. You had no problem abandoning me then, so why should now be any different? You think I care about how my ideas sound to everypony? I care about the fact that they’re what need to be done to secure the safety and prosperity of everyone here! I don’t care if these ponies afraid of me, and I don’t care if they think I’m a hero or not! I’ve lived my entire life with everypony thinking the worst of me no matter what I said or what I did even when I was trying to help them! I didn’t care then and I don’t care now because I’m right!” His eyes were blazing then, and his shadowy form was churning so heavily it looked like he was going to tear himself apart. “I don’t need you anyway! You’re a burden more often than you’re helpful, so if you don’t like how I’m doing things here then YOU SHOULD JUST LEAVE!”

As his last angry shout died away, Sonata just looked at him in silence. Long seconds passed before she finally spoke again. “No.”

Fireflower.

Sonata had thought, when she saw Lex lashing out at Spit Polish a few minutes ago, that it was going to be Garden Gate all over again. But the reason she’d thought that was because she was worried about what everypony else would think. But from Lex’s point of view, she was suddenly certain, the sight of her jumping between him and his enemy followed by her chastising him now had seemed like something else. He thinks that this is going to be like what happened when he tried to kill Fireflower and I stopped him. That was ridiculous, of course, but with everything that had happened today – with Block Party’s weird death, her fighting with Lex this morning, his injuring himself, and now that attempt on his life – was it really so hard to believe that he wasn’t at his best, and so was anticipating the worst?

“No,” she said again, shaking her head slightly. “I’m not going anywhere.” She forced a smile onto her face then, even though she felt guilty and sad for how awful she knew he felt right then. “I know I’m dumb. I mean, my sisters told me all the time, like when I tried to microwave my underpants or put our toothbrushes in the washing machine or stuff. But the dumbest thing I ever did was leave you, and I’m totes not making that mistake again.”

He didn’t answer, and she kept speaking, letting the words pour out of their own accord. “You’re the love of my life, Lex. I know you care a whole lot about everypony here, but the one I care about is you, first and foremost. That’s why I want you to succeed at what you’re doing, and I want everypony else to appreciate you as much as I do. But I can’t think up all those super-detailed plans like you can, and I can’t use such incredible magic either. So this is all I can do. Talking to people, getting them to understand what you’re saying and realize why it’s good and being impressed that you thought of so much stuff and can make it all happen…that’s what I can do.” She held out a hoof toward him imploringly. “I love you, and I’m not leaving, so please, just…change back to normal, okay?”

When he did a moment later, she knew that they were going to be alright.

Author's Note:

Lex and Sonata begin to patch things up between them.

Does this mean that Aisle and Cozy have been given a reprieve?

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