Afraid Of My Shadow

by Deyeaz

II - Late Night Escapades (Praxis)

Afraid Of My Shadow

Written by CraimerX and ShadowWeaver

II - Late Night Escapades (Praxis)

Almost... Alllllmooooossssst... C’mon, damn it!....

*CR-CR-CR-CR-CRACK!*

Yes! Got it! Finally, I’m free!

The stone prison around me started to fall off like chipped paint on a wall. After multiple minutes of struggling, the stone that imprisoned me finally gave way, revealing....

“Guess who’s back, bitches!?”

...yours truly.

I inhaled the afternoon air as deeply as I could, my nostrils finally glad to be placed in an environment with fresh oxygen. Now, let me tell you, I actually feel BAD for Discord: having to be locked up in an airtight petrified version of yourself for thousands of years has to take its toll on someone.

I went to take my first step off of the pedestal and onto the grass. The only sad thing was...

… was that my legs were in entropy.

“Oh, fuck....”

*TRIP!*

“BAA-AA-AA!!!” I bleated in surprise at my legs’ failure to function as I leaned forward precariously and started windmilling my arms in an attempt to regain my balance. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case here. Instead, I landed face-first in the dirt and concrete rubble that littered the ground, my back almost being thrown out in the process. “Oww... my everything....” I pinched the bridge of my nose and sighed in frustration.

“Please, God, let this be a shitty joke,” I said to the Man Upstairs. I used my arms and upper body strength to get me into a sitting position on the pedestal. I twisted my torso and popped my back. The sound of joints cracking was music to my ears. Loud, machine-gun-like, painful music. I whimpered from the immense pain of my back finally being realigned. I take a look at my right hand and grimaced.

The hand, all the way to the middle of my bicep, was pitch-black, with the dark hue transitioning to my tan skin at the shoulder. The fingertips ended in sharp points like claws. While the hand was black, the details remained: I could see where my fingers were supposed to bend and the wrinkles in my palm. My elbow had a flat, yet sharp, spike on it, and every time I bent and straightened my arm, the elbow spike would either make itself known by sticking out or resting on my tricep. I turned my hand over and winced. The back of the hand sported a draconian eye, sky blue in color. Gold lines rimmed the eye, giving it a dark, Egyptian feel. I shuddered when the eye’s pupil shrunk and grew before it blinked, two separate sets of fleshy lids snapping at the speed of a train.

“Ergh.” I shuddered again as the eye focused on me. I tried to get my legs out of entropy, a difficult feat indeed. I tried doing what Uma Thurman did in Kill Bill: wiggle my hooves.

“Wiggle your big hoof...” I idiotically coaxed my leg. “Wiggle your big hoof... wiggle your big hoof....”

---

TEN HOURS LATER

---

Night had already fallen a long time ago. I stood up from off of the pedestal and walked around the pagoda, happy that my legs were now functioning. Now that walking was out of the way... how about running?

I stepped out of the pagoda and towards Canterlot. I better tell Princess Celestia that I was back: I felt like it would be important. Plus, I didn’t have to worry about being spotted, especially since it’s nighttime... however, I may have to watch out for Princess Luna and her nocturnal guards.

I turned to the pagoda and looked at the little moat that Applebloom had also added on over the years. Even in the darkness, I still saw my reflection. Large horns, white shoulder-length hair that lay flat on my head, magenta eyes, a more tanned skin. I blinked a bit, surprised by what I looked like. So that was what became of me when Insanity took over? Strange....

But what’s past is past. I need not care for what happened back then. I tensed my legs again and took a deep breath before setting off for Canterlot.

Ahh, to run at near the speed of sound again... it’s so BEAUTIFUL. The wind whipping my ears and hair, the blur of my hooves. It’s been awhile since I’ve done this. And I’ve never felt so free.

It was good to see that the landscape around me was once again an immense blur as I sped through the fields of Equestria. Arms behind me, slightly leaning forward, long and rapid strides; it was nice to be in such a position again.

After a few minutes of speedy traveling I finally reach the base of Canterlot and started running up the mountain towards the pristine city like before.

Once I reached the top and traverse through the town until I reached the castle, I stopped and hid in a nearby bush before a Royal Guard sentry passed through. How was I going to get in, especially with all these guards roaming around? I couldn’t just simply run up the walls, they’d hear my hoofsteps on the stone.

If I had a cardboard box, this task would be much easier.

Sadly, no such container is at my disposal, so I had to do what I did best: improvise...

Unfortunately, that was also out of the window.

“Darn... I should’ve thought this one through....” I whispered grouchily as I threw my arms up in frustration, yet I did a double take when I saw the right arm.

The arm simply... lengthened... like it was some sort of rubber band, until it was about ten, twenty, even thirty feet, then it descended. The claw, having nothing to grab or latch onto, simply retracted until my arm and hand reverted to their normal length.

I’m glad my arm was black, otherwise I’d already be up Shit Creek with the guards and without a paddle... however, that didn’t stop me from freaking out at what had transpired. To prevent screaming into the night in surprise and giving away my position, I shouted into my hand, “What the FFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU-!”

...Yeah, I guess the general consensus can be made off of that statement alone.

Regardless, I still tried to find someway to maintain whatever cool I had just decimated in the process. Once I’m returned to normal, I look back at my hand. How did I get it to stretch like that? Just tossing it aside like that?

I looked at the peak of the castle wall, which was about twenty feet taller than me, then back at my hand... then back at the wall... then back at my hand.

Sadly, the wall wasn’t my hand... Aww... Wait...

IDEEEEAAAA~!

I cocked my right arm back and swung it high. The arm stretched to the height of the wall, and my hand latched onto the ledge, the claws clinging onto the stone.

“Monkey D. Luffy, step aside, please!” I leaned back towards the ground, my arm getting as taut as elastic under strain. I took a deep breath and adjusted my aim until I was RIGHT where I wanted to be: Celestia’s tower.

I jumped, my arm retracting quickly as I let go of the wall at the peak of my jump. I shot through the air like a cork in water, arching through the sky like a rainbow. I spun, twisted, and flipped, adding grace and badassery to my flight. However, I only landed on the wall of Celestia’s tower and not on the balcony itself. Had it not been for my sharp claws and the slightly jutting stones of the tower, I would’ve kissed my ass goodbye.

I looked back at the balcony, gritting my teeth from the brunt force of the impact with the wall. The balcony was sticking out a few feet behind me. In the position I was in, I couldn’t exactly climb to it. I wanted to run, but I would need momentum from the ground to do it.

What I did next was a bit sketchy, but I was confident it would work.

I tensed my legs and arms before I jumped off of the wall backwards. I launched my arm at the balcony as I started to fall. My hand clutched onto the rail of the balcony, yet just barely. I winced as my clawed fingers hardly clung to the edge. I swung back and forth, slowly gaining momentum so that I can jump and land on the balcony. After some moments of continuous swinging, I did just that, backflipping multiple times in a curled ball before landing precariously on the rail.

I stepped into Celestia’s room, with dawn being only in about a few more minutes left. It was my internal clock that told me so. I perched myself on one of the wooden posters of the bed like a ninja and waited until Celestia had to get up.

Sure enough, after many minutes of waiting, the alarm clock on her bedside drawer went off like a bomb. Celestia, in a fit of sleepy rage, punched the alarm clock off of the table. The clock went sailing out of the room and past the balcony, finally coming to a destructive halt at one of the castle’s walls with a sickening sound of destroyed machinery and broken glass. Celestia moaned tiredly as she got up and magically removed the sleeping mask around her eyes.

When the mask came free, she went slack-jawed and wide-eyed at the sight of me.

I give her a big smile as I sat there on the bed poster. “Mornin’, toots!”

Comments

[kragor]

ahaha, dat ending.

[lolz anonymous]

i wounder how often that happens to celestia?

[the other sans]

was black as pitch
However, I only land on the wall of Celestia’s tower and not on the balcony itself

1. Was pitch black.
2. Landed.

[dragenfire68]

1021570 not often enough

[kitsuneito]

ONE PIECE REFERENCE!!!!