Trapped In Canterlot

by TartarusFire

C6 - But It Can't End

This was not Caedes. That filly was not her. She was kind, and generally went along with anything reasonable. She read often. She would share, if it ever was needed. She was a good pony. She held would wait for others before enjoying something. She was a good pony.

This was not Caedes. She had been... she had been not herself. She was everything she should not have been. She had not been good.

Or was this her?

Tracker was unsure if the magic had changed her at all. It was only with how she was before that she.. had.. been.. that way.

He whispered, "We’ve made a horrible mistake." More revelations chilled him to his core. "And we don’t even know who our daughter is."

***

Half an hour. Half a Celestia Damned Hour!

Empathy could only brood.

He couldn’t even feed her.

Well if he can’t, I sure as Tartarus can.

She walked. The sound echoed around her. From her hallway to Caedes’s hallway. There was a deathly silence. Floorboards creaked, moaning under the recent stress.

And her door was open. Empathy stopped, listening to a soft sound. It was crying. Tracker was breathing deeply, sounding stressed.

She peaked, her dark pink fir hidden in the shadowed corridor. He was leaning on the foot of the bed, staring intently at the ceiling. The bowl was still on the ground, with some of it staining the carpet. The sounds were probably from Caedes, wherever she might be, Empathy decided.

So the demon walked in, fiery mane with tips of gold swaying. Her hoof steps were silenced by the carpet. "Having trouble?" Her masked presence filled the room with an unknown dread of what to come.

He straightened up. "No-no. I was just resting a moment."

Annoyance, "Your smiles fool no one. You never planned to feed her did you?"

"Well.." His hoof tensed in anticipation.

Savage anger, "It has occurred to me that you are obstructing her salvation. Do not the sabotage process."

Ire dribbled off of her and clouded the air. They stood in relative silence for a moment. Tracker dared not to move or speak before something regrettable happened. However, Empathy unexpectedly spoke first.

Crooked logic, "It seems like we’re all a bit tense. I think we should all relax a bit."

Regrettably conceding, "...Agreed."

"And we should all relax, a lot." She lit her horn.

"I don’t really think we need magic for this," his words slowed, "I really, realllly don’t—" he yawned "—think that we need the magic."

"We don’t but you do." She stalked toward him.

He wobbled on the carpet. "What are you—"

Tracker fell over from the flick of his horn tip. "Just a little bit of pain, and they’ll pass out."

She managed to step on the gruel stain, so she wiped her hoof off. "Now then. Where might you be, Caedes?" She knew of course, but Empathy didn’t want her to know and run off. She silently grabbed Caedes’s pillow off of her bed with a yellow aura. "Sweetie, you need to take your medicine..."

Empathy ripped the bed off the floor, tossing it over, revealing a filly cowering with amber eyes. "You will eat this."

She didn’t reply, but her darting eyes said otherwise.

"And, here comes the pillow!" She smashed it on Caedes’s muzzle, stuffing it in her mouth and covering her nose with the edge. "Yes, just have a little magic," she cast her muscle tension spell, "and sleep well."

***

Acrid. Vile. Thick and slimy. Her throat was covered in the substance. No ordinary medicine could compare to the hideous nature of whatever was in the concoction. And yet.. it was oddly relaxing. Having eaten it for years, Caedes had acquired only a minor dislike of it.

"Or is it the medicine’s fault?" She openly mused, seeing morning light filter through the window.

She hadn’t slept this well in a long time, ironically by being smothered unconscious and magically abused. She felt angry but the fire left her as rapidly as it came.

Glancing over, she had noticed that her bed was on its side, and a mark of something or some pony being dragged indented the carpet. She guessed Empathy was tired after all of the work, and just did the base minimum effort after forcing the tar-like substance down her throat: placing her on her blanket and dragging the offending things out of the room.

No cake, no books; an ordinary every day.

And it was ordinary except for the bed...

"Is it really still there?" She had jumped up after seeing the corner of something brown sticking out from under the edge of the mattress. Making her way there, she only fell a few times over her front leg which had fallen asleep.

"Yes!" She squeaked, putting her mouth around the corner and pulling at it.

And pulled.

And pulled some more.

It was slow going, getting the thin book unwedged from beneath her mattress. She sat and puffed at the cursed thing, like it was mocking her.

She giggled, "You will be defeated!"

Her miniature war raged: her army of teeth and legs against its mattress and weight. There was no sure victor as both were taking tolls on each other. And then, something miraculous happened. The corner became a side. A side with enough gripping room to make any pony else involved in a mattress/book war envious.

"Took you long enough to get out of there, bookee." She stroked it’s cover. "I’m sorry I had to hurt you with my teeth. But you were being stubborn." She looked to the clock, estimating an hour had been lost to the tides of battle. "Well I suppose it’s time to read you!"

She trotted back to the blanket with the book dangling from her mouth. She dropped it and nuzzled its cover open. "The Int..ro..duck..shon," hehe, duck, "to Magic-al Lines." She stared at it. And breathed on its promising page, letting her mind wonder.

A warm, sunny morning on a Saturday, with nothing to do except reading. With no pony watching, and no rules or work to follow.

No pony. An average day.

A few tears escaped her cringing eyes.