34 - I've Come to Talk With You... Once Again
Everything stood still. It was impossible to tell how long the flow of time remained without motion. Yet for the lone werewolf that curiosity held little meaning. All that mattered to him was the image in front of him. His body did not move and his gaze could not waver, but his mind still traced over every detail.
Jim could hardly imagine what the still form of Rainbow Dash felt in that moment. He had grown used to dealing with pain. The feeling always registered to his body, but it never lasted. As the years drifted along he even became aware of his body’s adaptation to pain. In a way it showed just how reckless he had let himself be. To some it might have come off as the fool embracing a sense of masochism, or boldly flirting with death. The sad truth of it was that Jim simply held no fear of such a thing. Pain was temporary and death was too difficult to obtain with how stubborn he was. If he was to find his demise by the hand of another he would accept it, but he was not willing to hand over his life without fighting to keep it; despite how much he felt he deserved to die.
He had experienced many encounters where he swore he could feel Death’s chilling touch. Some times felt as if the unseen specter had embraced him tenderly; as if it had grown fond of his frequent brushes with it. It was in those moments that Jim would recall the faces of those he had once held close to his heart. Though not all of them had died by his fangs, his mind would always remember them. Each one of them captured like a photograph to be immortalized within him. Or rather, they were lessons to have learned from the hard way… failures to never be forgotten.
A phantom feeling of regret began to pour from the depths of Jim’s heart as his mind’s gaze drifted away from Rainbow’s face. He knew how those gnarled fangs felt, but seeing them ripping into her wing was a sensation he could never hope to comprehend. What he could understand, thanks to his younger self’s curiosities, was that even if she did survive through some miracle… that wing could never be used to fly. Ever. Again.
His focus traced along the timber wolf’s head to land upon Scootaloo. A feeling akin to his heart twisting inside of his chest took hold within him. He could see her hatred toward the timber wolf burning in her glowing eyes, but beneath it lingered the bloom of terrible realization. There was little doubt in Jim’s mind that she would soon see two more deaths right in front of her very eyes. If he had been able to shed even a single tear in that moment, Jim knew he would for her. He had made a promise to her that he could no longer keep. In a time when he would have needed to be there for her the most, Scootaloo would have no-one to help her through the loss and pain. She may even take it has her first failure to those who were important to her… to follow the same path that he had walked so long ago.
I should have pushed myself harder…
~~***~~
The faint resonating sound of a single drop landing in a pool of water within the heart of a cave echoed behind Jim. As he tried to react to the sudden sound in what had been utter silence, Jim’s vision was blinded by a flash of light. The next thing he knew, the werewolf found himself standing in front of a framed picture of the scene he had just been seeing through his eyes before. Confusion filled him as he inspected the elaborately carved golden frame. The feeling grew as he spotted movement in his peripheral.
Jim turned his head to see a realm filled with motes of light, all floating in a strikingly familiar aurora of colors. His gaze drifted further to stop on something he had not expected to see. Another picture drifted up from below to stop in front of him. The image within was of his mother’s kind and loving smile.
That’s… that was when I had made my first bow… Jim thought as he remembered that day. It had been one of the few times he had felt happy. A time that he had accomplished something that he could be proud of. The idea of using the tool to hunt had not been as positive as he wanted it to be, but he did take comfort in the idea that he could help feed others in the village. It also helped that it had been a time that Jim had not had to suffer his father’s harsh treatments. A day before his hands had been stained by the blood of those he wanted to help and protect.
A gentle echo of a hoof clop pulled Jim’s attention away from the memory. He instantly spotted the form of Harmony, only this time she was standing at the same height as he was. The sight of the spirit being so small had left Jim feeling speechless and even more confused.
Seeing him so caught off guard, Harmony allowed a smirk to play across her features. The smirk soon faded away behind a sad sigh. “There have been many who have looked back at their mistakes and viewed their efforts as not enough.”
Jim’s ears folded back. He looked back over his shoulder to the scene of his latest failure, fists clenching tightly. “Yes… hindsight leaves most of us to suffer the cruel reality. I just wanted to do more for them with the life I had.” He sighed heavily and closed his eyes. “I still want to.”
Harmony slowly walked toward Jim. He opened his eyes once her steps turned silent. Surprise jolted through him when he saw her face right in front of his. It quickly dawned on him that in a place such as the one he found himself in, there was nothing for him to smell; much less feel as he had not felt the pain of his claws just prior either. His senses would do him little good in this realm.
The ethereal golden alicorn simply held her steady gaze with his. As the seconds seemed to tick by, Jim’s mind began to turn over some reasons for why she was here. The spirit remained silent as Jim pondered, yet his mind continued to dredge up useless ideas. Harmony’s expression eventually shifted to expectant which only annoyed the werewolf. Giving up on figuring it out on his own, Jim took a single step back.
Jim opened his mouth to inquire an answer but his question died in his throat as a sharp pain blossomed in his chest. An invisible force tossed him backwards. He skid to a stop some distance away and shook his head with a groan. He rolled over and sat up, pausing as he saw his body had changed back to that of his human form. There were no clothes upon his form, but he found a hole through his chest where the spear had struck him. A chain of crimson suddenly slithered out of the bloodless opening.
The chain traveled along, Jim’s eyes watching it intently. He turned his gaze ahead of where it was headed and saw Harmony. She remained motionless as the chain traveled closer to her. Panic struck Jim and he reached for the chain. Just before it could get too close to her, the chain went taught in Jim’s grip and shock filled him from what he saw next.
The end of the chain instantly formed into a shackle and a large wolf made of darkness burst into existence within it. Bright and angry hazel eyes glared back at Jim as the wolf snorted bitterly.
The wolf’s glare melted into a toothy smirk a moment later. “I just wanted a little nibble,” it spoke in a voice that Jim heard within his head and from the wolf at once.
Jim immediately knew what the wolf was. It wasn’t just because it spoke in the same voice as his or because of those eyes. He could feel the wolf through the chain, or more accurately, he felt himself through it. Jim turned an angry glare to Harmony. “What is the meaning of this!?” he demanded, bolting to his feet.
The wolf chuckled and walked between Jim and Harmony. “Come on, you already have an idea. Beings with her strength always do things for a reason. Ever since we came to her world she’s been molding us for her wants,” it replied and sent the spirit a grin, though there was nothing friendly about it.
If Harmony felt anything from the verbal barb there was no sign of it on her visage. Instead she strode forward. Jim’s dark side simply watched her with its unblinking glare as she walked by it.
Jim watched his other half cautiously, though he knew it would not try to do anything again. It was having more fun playing mind games with him than to waste any effort on the being of pure energy between them. Harmony stopped in front of him once more, a more comfortable distance away this time.
Jim sighed and looked her in the eyes. “So you want me to do something. That much is obvious. Everything you’ve done was to give me more awareness. You’ve guided my steps. You helped me to be closer to what I’ve wanted to be to others. You gave me a chance at a better life and offered me new purpose when I lost my way before.” His eyes hardened. “I just can’t figure out why.”
Harmony’s gaze remained impassive. Her horn slowly became enveloped in a rainbow of colors and an orb of light formed between her and Jim. Jim watched as the orb took on different colors until it resembled a planet.
“This world that I was born within rests inside a number of metaphorical crossroads. The only remnants of the original inhabitants rests in the bloodlines of the alicorns of this day and few others that have not ascended yet.”
Harmony’s magic flared and the planet flattened into a screen of sorts. Within the screen Jim witnessed zebras of the past in the middle of a ritual.
“I have only aided my world in subtle ways. My power is too vast. Even the tiny seeds I planted, each no larger than a spec of dust, give off enough power to rid the world of its strongest sources of malice.”
Jim blinked. “You mean the Elements that Twilight and her friends mentioned before?”
Harmony nodded. “The living crystal surrounding my seeds helps to filter the excess magic to form a protective barrier around those who wield them. But that is a discussion for another time. My point is that I cannot manifest myself on the world’s surface. A being such as I would give off far too much magical power and it would rip the land asunder beneath me. What remains would then be incinerated by the condensed aura of my magic.”
“That being said,” she continued and looked back to the glimpse of the past in her screen. “It has certainly hindered my ability to stop the denizens of my world from committing uncountable acts of cruelty. Only in the more recent millennia has the world found balance.”
The image in the screen played out to show the way Jim’s curse had originally come into existence. For those found guilty, they would be forced to eat a sedative paste of some kind. While under its effects their body would be cut with the tip of a thin thorn, leaving behind a pattern that Jim could not recognize. Black stones that resembled smooth obsidian were then painstakingly ground into a fine power. The resulting powder would be rubbed into the cut patterns, though some of it was saved for later use. The process continued over the course of an entire day; the guilty being forced to eat three more different pastes and bite down on a chip of the obsidian before his muzzle was tied shut. The ritual would complete itself in the evening when the light of the moon hit the pattern upon the body. Jim pitied the poor zebra as it was turned into something resembling a cross between a wolf and a bear. His eyes widened as another memory drifted up from below to float in front of him, as if it was called forth by this recollection of the past.
“The old geezer used to tell us stories of our history,” Jim’s dark half spoke as it padded up beside him.
Jim glanced to his alter self briefly, nodding.
Harmony’s magic gently brushed the memory to the side and her screen changed to show what looked to be a tear in reality. “There were a few of the cursed ones that refused to end their own lives over what had been forced upon them. Some vowed to have their revenge, others took a liking to the feelings that came from their changes, a few simply desired a chance to create a cure away from a world that had seemingly turned its back on them. Regardless of their reasons, they stepped through the temporary bridges that had connected my world to another,” she said, the scene unfolding in the screen.
“So it was true,” Jim said slowly and he sat down. He ran a hand through his hair as he remembered the tales. “The Elder said that we were descendants of a great wolf. The beast was said to have been massive and had protected our forests until the end of its days. We were ‘gifted’ with the power of its blood when it had fallen in love with a maiden and shrank itself down to live along side her. Their union had supposedly been so wondrous that the gods above blessed their first born son with the wings of an angel. Our pack had since continued to keep the forest safe and maintain the balance of life and death throughout. We even extended our reach further out into the world when ‘evil’ tried to taint the lands.”
Jim sighed and shook his head. “How much of that is true though?”
Harmony’s magic faded away. “The happenings of other worlds are difficult for me to witness. I am bound to this world after all.” She paused and gained a distant look in her eyes. “But it is not impossible for those tales to be true. The magic of my world has had more than enough time to be shaped and changed by the spirits of your world. They may have even aided in leading you here to begin with…”
Those words tugged at something inside of Jim and he stared off into the distance. He silently thought, memories slowly drifting up one by one. There was nothing truly common about them. Each one was just a random point in time for him, but they shared a single similarity in them. In every framed memory Jim had had a single thought.
Why am I still alive?
A flash of shadow was all the warning Jim had before he found himself lifted above Harmony. Looking down revealed a massive furred hand wrapped around him. The appendage spun him roughly and he came face to face with his larger werewolf appearance. Baleful glowing yellow eyes stared into his own.
“To fulfill our purpose!” his other self’s voice rumbled in his skull.
Jim struggled to move, but suddenly found himself being drug along as his dark half sprinted in a seemingly random direction. As they traveled along Jim saw more memories flash in front of his face.
“We are alive because nothing was smart enough to outwit us yet! We are alive because none could fight with as much determination as we have! We stayed alive in spite of all our pain, all our suffering, through the hell of childhood, through the betrayal of that worthless husk of a pack, through all the ones that hunted for our head, through all of the lies and treachery in our pursuits!!!”
A firm yank brought Jim to a hard stop. There, floating in front of him, was yet another memory. Only this time it was a glimpse of a much more recent time. Scootaloo’s tired, smiling face looked back at him through that image of just after her transformation.
“And WE! Will CONTINUE to live… for this one…”
The large hand vanished from around Jim in a soft burst of shadow, reforming as a mirror image of his human form in front of him. Firm glowing eyes glared into Jim’s.
Jim grit his teeth, a retort about how they were already dead on the tip of his tongue.
“You used to wonder why we were so different from everyone else when we were younger.”
Jim paused at those words and a soft golden wing wrapped around him from behind. For a brief moment, everything inside of Jim simply stopped. A feeling so old that he had nearly forgotten it trickled up from his core as warmth radiated into him from Harmony. The crimson chain connecting him to his other self glowed brightly for an instant and gently shattered.
Harmony nuzzled the top of Jim’s head as he watched his freed half fill with life and color, until he was looking at a true mirror image of his self.
“I do not know why you were guided to my world, Jim,” the spirit spoke softly, her voice resonating with something inside of Jim. “You carry the curse inside you that once devoured so many of this world, but you’ve done something with it that so many others have failed to.”
Harmony’s touch slowly left Jim’s body as she moved to stand beside him. She gestured to his other self.
Jim looked to her curiously. His other half mirrored his action. He looked back at it again and it did the same. Jim stared at his self for a moment before he raised his hand toward it. Just as it would have been in a mirror his hand met perfectly with his twin’s, but rather than feel a cold flat surface he felt the soft squish of flesh.
“You have made this power your own,” Harmony said as she walked around Jim’s other self. “One way or another, your days spent here have given you something that finally made the curse adapt to you. Its core is a spell matrix designed for continuous change. You know just how that has affected you after all this time…”
Jim could not deny that. For werewolves the term ‘what doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger’ was quite literal. They were a living embodiment of change and adaptation.
“But what sets you apart from the others is that you have not been changed by it. Despite everything you have endured, who you are has never been consumed by what was designed for change. Stripped of control, filled with your darkest emotions, and molded into a form vastly different than what you knew you should be, you always fought to remain unchanged. You never truly caved in to become something different, even as the curse did its best to shape you otherwise.”
Anger and regret began to seep into both of Jim’s selves. “So you mean that I could have prevented all those deaths… I could have stopped myself from killing Marcus back then?”
Harmony sighed softly. “No.”
Confusion joined Jim’s emotions as he looked to her. “But you just said-”
“Such changes need time, Jim. It took dozens of times being bitten by venomous snakes and more before poisons no longer fazed you,” she interrupted. Her wing moved to rest upon Jim’s back. “It took every single day of your struggle, pushing through every experience, problem and injury, until the day you stopped yourself from killing young Scootaloo, for you to make that crucial difference and tip your inner balance into your favor. I greatly underestimated you at first, Jim. Had I known just how much you had suffered and persevered, then maybe I could have offered more adequate help to you.”
Harmony gently moved her wing to Jim’s cheek and a kind smile graced her muzzle. “But had I done so I doubt you would have come this far.” She looked to the realm around them. “You have proven more capable than I could have ever imagined. I have learned so much about you that I could have never known. This space in which we speak is proof for that.”
Jim briefly looked around. “Why is this so special? It’s your realm.”
A little coy smile flashed across Harmony’s face before she shook her head. “This place belongs to you, Jim.”
Jim stared at her, both skeptical and annoyed.
Harmony sighed lightly as an old memory danced behind her blue eyes. “This space is not unique exclusively to me. Though I have blessed two with it in the past, this is more like an inherited ability. One you carry with you because of your ancestor. There are quite a few living on my world that have no idea that they are part of my lineage.”
Jim held his stare with her for a long moment before he let out a resigned sigh. “That’s a can of worms I don’t feel like opening right now,” he said, shaking his head slowly.
Harmony chuckled lightly and placed her hoof on Jim’s chest. “Good, because you have something more important to do,” she replied and gently tapped his chest a few times.
Jim looked down and his eyes widened. He looked to his other half to make sure, only to look back down. The hole was still present in his chest. He had not realized it was still there as it did not appear on his other self.
“In this place that pays no attention to the passage of time and blurs the lines between the mind and reality, you are now faced with a choice.” Harmony stepped away from Jim. “I can help you no further than this.”
Jim looked to Harmony then back to his other self.
“I need to choose?”
“We need to choose."
Both Jim and his other self flinched in surprise.
Harmony simply looked on from the side.
The two sides of Jim stared at one another for a long moment before the darker half deviated from the reflection. His other self smirked and his hazel gaze turned red.
“We’ve always fought for control, you and I. Neither one of us have ever yielded to the other.”
Jim frowned silently.
“We were always stubborn. We always wanted something done differently.”
A frown replaced the smirk beneath the red eyes. Both Jim’s turned their heads to look at the frozen image that had started this whole experience in the realm of memory. Though he could not see it directly, Jim knew he was looking at the same place in the picture as his other side.
“You have always tried to ignore me. You always kept me at bay with your pride and hatred, holding me away as if I were something separate from you. But we’ve always been part of a whole.”
Both bodies reached out and touched the image of Scootaloo, their fingers caressing along her mane.
“Mother’s death broke the bonds we once shared with others. Our pack ceased to be and we became alone... but this one is of our blood. She is our bond. She is family. We are alone no longer.”
Jim looked to Rainbow Dash and his hand moved with his twin’s to tenderly touch beneath her bitten wing.
“This one has felt fear toward us, yet she has become the first to fight for us. Our betrothed left us to save her own hide. The fickle lover tried to have us killed. Yet this one stayed and fought by our side.”
The image shifted to show Fluttershy as she stared at the scene unfolding in front of her. The devastated yellow pegasus seemed heart wrenchingly torn in an unknown number of directions. Jim could see it clear as day that she wanted so badly to run in to help Jim’s pathetic form as he laid upon the ground, reaching out to Rainbow and Scootaloo. But there was something great holding her back, something even larger than the injured teacher draped over her back. As Jim inspected the image more, he began to realize there was far more to the timid mare than he could have ever guessed. The traces were faint, but there were places where it seemed as if her body was not completely in focus. It was like trying to spot a blemish hidden beneath the makeup of someone with years of experience in its application.
“And this one struggles with her own burdens. Despite her inability to help us, the clear desire to help still burns brightly within her. We want to keep them safe because they are the first ones that we know are worth our sacrifice. Marcus was not truly our friend. His people came for us before the rising of the sun that night. He had not kept his word and you know this to be true or they never would have searched in that location. He revealed to them the place that we trusted him to keep secret.”
Jim turned a glare to his other self, receiving one in return. “He was still the closets thing to a real friend we had ever found. I know he wanted to help us.”
“Yet they still preach of all the good intentions that pave the path to Hell.”
Jim sighed and closed his eyes, clenching his jaw.
“You know what you must choose.”
Jim’s frustration faded slowly and he turned his gaze back to the floating memory beside him. This time it showed the entire street around his body. He stared at the scene for what felt like a long time before he felt a hand lightly press against his chest.
Jim sighed slowly through his nose, only realizing then how superficial the act was in that place. He chuckled and closed his eyes. “I guess ‘we’ already know what I’ve chosen,” he said softly. “I’m going to protect what’s mine and keep it that way. I’ll tear apart anything that tries to stop me from doing that.”
The hand slid into the hole in his chest and he smirked as a thought crept to the forefront of his mind.
I wonder... this world has seen my Jekyll, but is it ready to face my Hyde?
So this chapter was... actually made up on the spot over the course of a day. The end of the last chapter planted a seed in my mind and it just bloomed from there. Yet again I feel that this was a better outcome compared to my original idea. I'm also really enjoying writing again. Who knows, maybe I'll eventually become better at it.
In any case I hope you enjoyed the read. 
It's been a while so drop a comment and let me know your thoughts if you don't mind. I'm always open to constructive critique. Well... it's more like a morbid curiosity I have. 
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leaving the story at this point, it's evil
,... i want more!!!
I'll be waiting for next chapter.
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More is on the way. I do apologize for the monthly release dates, but it's the only consistent timeframe I can work with. You can expect the next chapter by the 12th of June.
I am thou, thou art I
Thou hath seen the power of change
With the birth of the Fool arcana thou hath seen what that power may bring forth
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Oh wow... I never even thought about that, but you're brilliant. Nice Persona reference by the way.
10239794
Thanks. I'm watching a P5R playthrough and I'm working on P4G, not to mention having my head steeped in fanfics.
10257114
It's been a while since I've had someone so active in the comment section lol. A lot of your queries will be answered further in the story. The only one that I haven't touched on completely yet would be why Jim never let himself die. However, that point is still being answered bit by bit in my more recent chapters.
Hopefully you continue to like the story enough to read up to the latest chapters. :)
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bing.com/th/id/OGC.430baf1cbeed968d75725953480a4802?pid=1.7&rurl=http%3a%2f%2f33.media.tumblr.com%2ftumblr_lskru2nJ0u1qd7bw2o1_500.gif&ehk=EXaP5RqnidaKdl7%2bkBVVfE6%2bd3Qek2J9nMaal4Sf9Mg%3d
I MEANT TO SAY I HATE THE ARCHMAGE!
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I like this.
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Glad to hear it. I hope I can continue to write something you like. :)
It's 4 in the morning and I can't stop here.