• Published 12th Nov 2016
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Grief is the Price We Pay - Scyphi



Spike thought he could get them to trust and befriend Thorax. But they didn't.

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The Possibilities

Evening was beginning to fall by the time any new developments arose on Thorax’s situation, and by then the disguised changeling was becoming rather stir-crazy, unable to keep himself from pacing back and forth in his cell. But at the same time he was bored beyond belief, having exhausted every conceivable activity he could do to occupy himself considering the resources presently given him, which were considerably few. He at least didn’t have any real fears anymore of the magicked crystal that was monitoring him and his cell, having by now been quite satisfied with the assumption that, if the crystal had been capable of detecting anything that would give him away as a changeling, the police would have discovered it by now.

His only real remaining fear then was whether or not he was going to be allowed to go free after all, and that depended on what the police decided in regards to him. Considering they already rightly suspected (though Thorax had no wish to give them any sort of confirmation of it) he was involved with the venomous bite one fight member had received was bad enough. But he also tensely worried about how Ragg’s interview was going to go on the matter, considering that he knew Ragg saw him with his disguise partly down revealing the changeling underneath. Ragg knew he was a changeling, and thus Thorax was aware he could very well be at the gang leader’s mercy if so desired. Ragg had indicated he wouldn’t tell just before the police had arrived to arrest them…but would he actually?

But finally word anticlimactically came in the form of Deputy Sheepshank and Officer Dandy arriving at his cell. “Good news Mr. Thornton, after we collect a photo and some hoofprints for our records, you’re free to go,” Dandy announced as the deputy unlocked and opened the door to Thorax’s cell.

Thorax looked at them blankly, surprised at the sudden simplicity of the announcement. “Really?” he asked as Dandy returned his confiscated saddlebags to him. “Just like that?”

“Just like that,” Dandy assured with a grin, motioning for Thorax to step on out. “We’ve finished interviewing the remaining members of the fight, and their stories all seem to collaborate with yours. Mr. Asparagus Stem was especially adamant of your innocence, that you were just a perfectly ordinary pony caught at the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“You mean Ragg?” Thorax asked as he stepped out of the cell, feeling relief washing over him. Ragg had kept his secret and, judging from Dandy’s choice of words, had even gone as far to cover for him so to further dissuade the police from the truth. I owe you Ragg, he thought to himself. “What about the pony with the bite? Did you figure out who did it?”

Dandy shrugged. “Not definitively, but he’s woken up now and able to give his side of the story. His account is a little hazy on details, but what he was able to tell us still seems to match up with everything you and others have told us and he’s otherwise unharmed, so we’re moving the investigation to other areas,” he explained. Thorax inwardly thought to himself that his venom must have clouded the pony’s memories of the event slightly, just enough to thankfully push attention off of himself it seemed. “We’ll keep digging, but either way, with no evidence to the contrary, we have no reason to detain you further at this time,” Dandy continued as the deputy closed the now empty cell and the three started down the hall. “Though I would recommend that you remain in the area for at least the remainder of the week, in case any new developments come up and we feel the need to bring you in for additional questioning.”

He said it in very polite terms but Thorax caught the true meaning of the message. We’re letting you go for now. But don’t leave town. Thorax hoped his luck would hold and the need for any further questioning wouldn’t ever come up. “Yes sir,” he said.

“But for now I wouldn’t worry,” Dandy pressed on. “At the insistence of the higher-ups, we’re still going to give you a citation for participating in an act that ultimately disturbed the peace, but that will only entail a small thirty bit fine. All things considered, no great deal in comparison to some of the alternatives, am I right?”

“I suppose not, sir,” Thorax responded, who was nonetheless not especially thrilled by the citation and the accompanying fine, but then he did have to concede that this was a far better outcome than he had feared. “How will I need to pay the fine? I don’t have enough bits on hoof to do so now, so…”

“That’s the best part,” Sheepshank piped in cheerily as he led Thorax into a back office, no doubt for the record collecting they spoke of earlier. “It’s already been paid for you.”

Thorax blinked, surprised yet again. “It has?”

“It has,” Dandy confirmed as they all filed into the room. “You have friends that are already here and waiting to pick you up. You can go meet with them once we’re done here.”

Thorax perked up at this. “Really?” he said, already suspecting who.

He had to wait to find out if he was right for a few minutes longer though as the police collected a few final things for their records. They already had Thorax’s contact information, but now that he had formally been given a charge of sorts in the terms of the citation, they wanted to collect a mugshot and hoofprints as mentioned to file for their records. It was a relatively painless process, and Thorax didn’t think much of it; considering it was tied to the alias of Thornton only, it was only a tick on his record so long as Thorax continued to wear the face, and it was relatively minor one at that. He was more interested in who his benefactors and friends the officers had mentioned were, and he was proven right in his suspicions when they finally escorted him into the police station’s front office and found a Fly Leaf and Spike standing there calmly waiting for him.

“Miss Fly, Spark,” Thorax remarked as he stepped towards the pair, leaving the police’s custody at last.

“Thank you for your cooperation Mr. Thornton,” Dandy said in parting as he turned to get back to work, giving a wave with one hoof. “Have a good evening.”

“Yeah, you too,” Thorax replied distractedly and on automatic. He approached his employer and coworker slowly, studying the pair to get a feel on where the two presently stood. Fly simply seemed relieved, and was giving Thorax a warm grin as he approached. Spike’s face, however, was more unreadable, wearing a fairly neutral expression that was made somewhat ominous no thanks to the shadow being cast over most of his face by the fedora Spike typically wore whenever he was out of the shop. Emotionally speaking however, Spike was a flurry of feelings, so much so it was difficult for Thorax to accurately pick out which was the most predominate from the swirling storm within the dragon. Knowing that Spike was taking a risk coming here like he did considering that any policer officer who had seen his wanted poster (ironically posted on the wall not far from where Spike stood, and perhaps for that very reason, Spike seemed quick to avoid eye contact with any passersby) could potentially recognize him though, Thorax guessed he was likely in deep trouble with the dragon. “Um…hello,” he greeted the pair sheepishly.

“Are you okay?” Spike asked immediately. “You haven’t been harmed, have you?”

“No Spark,” Thorax assured calmly, leaning his head down slightly so to look the troubled dragon in the eye.

Spike glanced about cautiously. “So as far as the police is concerned, you’re still just the ordinary innocent pony everybody knows you to be…right?” he asked, which Thorax realized was Spike’s subtle way of discreetly checking Thorax hadn’t needed to give himself away.

“That’s right,” Thorax said, nodding his head and giving his friend a comforting grin.

Spike returned the grin. “Good,” he said. He then slapped Thorax across the face as hard as he could, suddenly furious. “You nearly gave me a HEARTATTACK!” he bellowed, drawing looks of surprise from several of the other ponies in the room. It immediately alarmed Thorax, as he knew Spike shouldn’t be drawing attention to himself here of all places. But before Thorax could even finish recovering from just the slap, Spike rushed forward and grabbed him about the forelegs in what was partly a hug and partly an attempt to half-heartedly continue to beat upon Thorax’s chest. “Don’t you ever do that to me again!”

Thorax numbly put a hoof about Spike, trying to comfort him as he worked to recollect himself from the dragon’s muddled outburst. “Sorry,” was all he could think to say. He looked around warily but noticed everyone’s focus had already gone back to their respective tasks and weren’t paying them any more attention.

Spike made a noise that was partly a laugh and partly a snort of contempt. He pulled away from the changeling suddenly, but Thorax caught sight of the dragon trying to suppress a grin, and couldn’t help but smile again too.

“So,” Fly Leaf remarked to Thorax, amused by all of this. “Had an interesting afternoon then?”

“Yes,” Thorax replied with a sigh.

“Ready to go home?”

Thorax nodded in exasperation. “Hours ago,” he admitted.

So they eagerly walked out of the police station and out into the dimming streets as evening continued to settle upon the city, heading back for the shop. As they went, Thorax was gotten back up to speed on Fly and Spike’s side of the story.

“Your message was late getting to us, so we didn’t get it until relatively late in the afternoon, as business had started to slow for the evening,” Fly Leaf was explaining as they walked. “Once we did and we understood what had happened, we urged the remaining customers out of the store as quickly as we could, closed up early, and hurried on down to the station. Once there, the police explained everything that had happened.”

“Everything?” Thorax repeated, wondering if that actually included as much as he thought.

Everything,” Spike repeated darkly, folding his arms. Thorax realized he was still very much upset with him and suspected the only reason he wasn’t giving Thorax the berating of his life right now was because Fly Leaf was present and within earshot.

“After we knew what was going on,” Fly continued undeterred, “we set about seeing what we could do to get you freed. We even offered to post bail for your release.”

“Bail?” Thorax repeated, unfamiliar with the term.

“Basically a process where you give the authorities money in exchange for your release from jail until such time a more proper ruling can be made,” Spike explained flatly.

Thorax winced. “How much money are we talking about?” he asked.

“One hundred bits,” Spike replied in the same tone.

Thorax’s wince deepened.

“Fortunately your case was such that we were able to avoid having to do that, thanks to the police deciding to only cite you for disturbing the peace and were otherwise technically only detaining you for questioning,” Fly explained quickly for Thorax’s benefit. “So instead we volunteered to pay the accompanying fine that came with that citation for you, which the police graciously accepted once they confirmed our relation to you.”

Thorax glanced over at Fly. “I’m sorry you had to do that, Miss Fly,” he apologized. “I’ll do everything I can to pay you back as soon as possible.”

“Much appreciated, Thornton,” Fly said. “But at Spike’s insistence, I didn’t pay a bit of it.”

Thorax glanced down at Spike again, and saw the dragon’s eyes had narrowed slightly and he realized the significance of this. “Oh.”

You owe me,” Spike stated firmly for clarification.

Thorax thought to himself that his funds were technically Spike’s too, and neither of them had ever claimed sole ownership of said funds, preferring instead to share them between them, and therefore thought he technically already had repaid him…but he also thought that now probably wasn’t the time to argue semantics. “I suppose I should thank you for that then,” he said, before continuing on in a more sheepish tone. “Either way, I get how that would make you pretty upset at me, Spike,” he mumbled softly. Spike didn’t reply, so Thorax gazed up at Fly Leaf, silently imploring for help.

But Fly Leaf, still amused by the whole spat between her two employees, only shook her head. “Nope,” she told the disguised changeling. “I’m staying out of it.”

So Thorax turned his attention back to Spike and hazarded an attempt on his own. “Look, I truly am sorry for all of this. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, really. I’m sorry it made you all worry for my benefit.”

Spike was silent for long moment, but then he sighed. “It’s okay,” he said, his tone finally softening some. “It’s really just how much this all put me on edge, so…I guess it’s left me a little…temperamental.”

“And I think you have every right to be,” Thorax added, thinking this was all only fair considering the stress he put his friends through.

Spike was a little quick to smugly agree to this though. “True,” he said, then jabbed a claw at Thorax. “So don’t think we aren’t still going to talk about it further at the shop.”

And he meant it too. The moment they stepped through the door of the shop and Fly retreated to the kitchen to start working on a late dinner, Spike motioned for Thorax to follow him to their room, marching the changeling on up the stairs.

The moment Spike closed their room’s door behind him, ensuring their privacy, he whipped around onto Thorax. “You BIT someone?

“I was cornered, momentarily unable to use my magic!” Thorax argued in his defense, letting his disguise drop with a whoosh of magical flames. “I acted on instinct! Trust me, I regret doing it just as much as you do, but it was all just in self-defense!”

“But you nearly got yourself caught doing it!” Spike argued back. “The police were onto you, Thorax, it’s only a stroke of dumb luck that they weren’t able to put two with two with what they had!”

“Well, that, and a good testimony in my defense,” Thorax mumbled, averting his gaze.

Spike put his claws on his hips. “And just what is that supposed to mean?”

Thorax hesitated for a moment, debating how to explain. “…you remember Ragg, right?”

“You mean that gangmember pony who was one of the things that helped get you into this mess?” Spike asked with some contempt. “I knew your associating with him was going to cause trouble.”

“On the contrary,” Thorax interjected, making use of the opportunity. “It seems he’s on our side now, because…well…he was the one who not only helped convince the police that I was innocent, but also that there was nothing special about me, and that I was the ordinary pony I claimed to be.”

“Well, to be fair, as far as he knows, that’s all you really are, so…”

“He knows, Spike.”

This brought Spike up short, and for a moment alarm overshadowed his anger on his features. “He what?” he asked, eyes widening as the implications settled upon his mind. “How?

Thorax winced, biting his lip. “Well, see…” he began awkwardly. “In the fight, I took a blow to the horn that numbed it and I couldn’t use my magic for a moment, as I explained, and so…during the fight…one pony managed to strike me a hard enough blow that it tore a hole in my disguise and, well, Ragg was the last one other than me still standing by the end of the fight, so…”

Spike’s panic grew. “He knows you’re a changeling?” he declared.

“Well…yes,” Thorax admitted, realizing how that sounded and decided to just admit it. But then he pressed on. “And he chose to defend and keep my secret, regardless.”

Spike was silent for a long moment. “Why?” he asked, looking like he genuinely couldn’t comprehend it.

Thorax didn’t really have an answer either though. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “Maybe Ragg just understands the need for some to have secrets and respects that. Maybe his respect for me is much greater than you would give him credit for. Maybe he has some other reason I can’t think of off hoof. But the fact of the matter Spike is that he covered for me, even when he had little reason or cause to. And I owe him greatly for it. We owe him greatly for it.”

Spike remained silent, going blank as his mind worked to process this. Unable to form a follow-up comment, he walked past Thorax to the window seat and sat himself on it. Thorax turned himself to watch him.

“You know, it does get me thinking,” Thorax continued, heartened by this line of thought. “Maybe the hope of Equestrians accepting me for who I am isn’t so impossible and unlikely as we had first thought.”

Spike glanced up at the changeling, puzzled. “How do you mean?”

“Well, think about it; there are two ponies that know our secret and are actively supporting and defending us, Fluttershy and Ragg. Both really didn’t have any reason to, but they have anyway.”

“You don’t know if Ragg isn’t just going to use this for his own advantage though, like blackmail or something,” Spike argued gently, still not holding the gang leader in high regard.

Thorax rolled his pupiless blue eyes. “You don’t know if he will either,” he reminded, matching Spike’s gentle tone. “I don’t think he will, but that’s because I know Ragg a bit better than you do. Much like how you know Fluttershy better than I do, and thus were better able to trust her to keep our secret than I was.” He stepped closer to the dragon. “But whatever their reasons, they have, and think about the possibilities of that for a second, Spike!” Thorax began to grin. “We were banished because no pony was willing to see me as anything but a foe…but what if that’s not as universal a stance as we’ve been led to believe in Equestria? What if all ponies need is enough of a chance to learn that a changeling can be a friend too?” Spike again turned blank and didn’t immediately answer, so Thorax pressed on. “Look, all I’m saying is that I’m seeing what could be the start of a pattern, that the longer we stay in Vanhoover living as normal a life as we can, the more ponies seem to become more and more accepting of us. If that continues, surely you can see that it suggests that, in time, they can become more accepting of who I am, and that I mean no harm, that we both can be welcomed back into Equestrian society at large. Maybe, they just need time to warm up to the idea of a friendly changeling like me, and realize that, despite having ample opportunity to do it, I’ve done nothing to harm ponies, and am continuing to do nothing…except work to try and earn their trust.”

“Thorax…” Spike began half-heartedly.

But Thorax was on a roll now, enthralled by the possibilities now that he had begun thinking about them. “Spike, one day we might reach the point that we won’t need to be outcasts anymore, that the peaceful solution to all of this we’ve both been longing for is still in reach after all!” he said excitedly, grinning. “At the very least, I’m curious to see how far this will continue, about where this pattern might take us.”

Spike couldn’t help but share the grin a little, but he very much still had his misgivings. “Thorax, let’s not get ahead of ourselves on this,” he pressured. “Two ponies may have been willing to keep our secret, but that’s not necessarily the start of the trend. For all we know, Fluttershy and Ragg are merely the two exceptions to the rule.”

“True,” Thorax conceded. “But shouldn’t we still be trying to promote it on the off chance that it’s not, and that it is a start of a trend of acceptance?”

Spike’s grin grew a little, pleased to see Thorax so eager, with so important a cause to work towards. And as before, he certainly didn’t want to do anything to stand in the way of Thorax and his desires as much as possible. “All right,” he said, straightening. “On the grounds that we still don’t do anything to deliberately reveal our true identities to anyone as much as we can like we’ve been doing and that we still be on guard for it all going awry and trouble arising. Trend or not, it doesn’t mean that we should be reckless about it.”

Thorax nodded. “Agreed,” he said immediately, not opposing this. “Obviously, despite the pattern, it doesn’t mean we should be letting ourselves become complacent and lower our guard. The danger of discovery by the wrong types of ponies certainly still exists, and don’t think I don’t know that still, or that I don’t fear it.”

Spike couldn’t help but let out a brief sigh of relief. “Good to know, Thorax,” he said. “Because I very much still fear what would happen if we’re discovered.”

Thorax nodded seriously. “And of course, I don’t want to do anything that might risk myself or you especially. I owe you that much.” He trotted over and joined Spike sitting on the window seat. “After all, it’s the Equestrian royal family that we have to fear the most…and unfortunately, they are the ones that are in power still.”

Spike hung his head slightly, twiddling his claws. “…yeah,” he said with a depressed sigh.

Thorax nudged him a little in encouragement. “But I’m going to hold out for them too,” he continued. “I have hope that even they could be swayed now, if given time.”

Spike very much did not share in that hope, believing it would never happen now, but he chose to keep that thought to himself. “Guess we’ll have to see.”

They sat there on the window seat for a long moment, processing the discussion and everything that had happened today.

“It’s been a crazy day today,” Thorax remarked aloud finally.

Spike snorted. “It really has.”

“I’m sorry for giving you such a scare with my getting detained briefly by the police,” Thorax apologized again. “I got pretty scared myself a few times during all of that.”

Spike found that his anger for all of that had cooled dramatically during their conversation, and simply shrugged. “It’s okay,” he admitted. “I get you didn’t deliberately get yourself arrested, detained, or whatever, and really, it’s the fact that you were able to walk away with it okay, undiscovered, and with no real charges pressed that’s more important in the end.”

“Yeah,” Thorax agreed.

“You still owe me thirty bits, though.”

“Right…I’ll see what I can do about that when we get our next paycheck.”

Another brief moment passed, but then Spike had another thought.

“You say you owe Ragg now,” he remarked to the changeling aloud. “So how do you plan to pay him back?”

“Hmm,” Thorax hummed, considering the dilemma. “I’ll have to think of something.”

However, as it turned out, Thorax found out a couple days later that he already had returned the favor to Ragg by also giving a favorable testimony for him to the police. This, in accompaniment with other evidence gathered concerning the fight, allowed the police to decide that Ragg and his gang did not instigate the gang fight, and that Ragg had attempted to prevent it. As a result, the police did not press charges for the fight on Ragg and his friends either.

Nonetheless, Ragg and his gang didn’t get off scott-free either; while the police had them in custody, they pinned the gang for minor vandalism charges due to their “tagging” in the past, which the police had been trying to convict the gang of for the past couple of weeks. The penalties were kept light; two days in jail then a two-hundred bit fine and a hundred hours of community service. It was thanks to the latter penalty that Thorax found out about all of this, coming across Ragg and a large part of the gang working to clean a city street as part of their community service, and Ragg was graciously permitted time to speak briefly with the disguised changeling. Thorax felt bad that he got out of the situation without charges when Ragg and the rest didn’t, but Ragg was largely dismissive of it.

“This ain’t your fault, Thorny,” Ragg assured Thorax with a grin, seeming perfectly okay with how events played out. “All this is really more on me and the rest of the guys anyway, and I ain’t surprised the cops pinned it on us when they had the chance. So don’t you go worryin’ yourself for my sake.”

“Still…” Thorax persisted. “…if there’s anything I can do to help…”

“Thorny, as far as I’m concerned, you done did all ya needed already by puttin’ in a good word for me to the police like you did,” Ragg pressed. He shrugged. “You don’t need to sweat about owin’ me anything.”

“But I do owe you,” Thorax insisted, not wanting to just let it go. He glanced around quickly to make sure none of Ragg’s other gang members or the authority supervising the group as they did the community service weren’t listening in. “You covered for me, after all, hiding from the police my…secret.” He tilted his head at the lanky teen. “A friend of mine is wondering why you would do that anyway.”

Ragg chuckled and gently rapped Thorax on the shoulder with one hoof. “Because friends look out for each other, Thorny,” he answered simply. “And we don’t need nothin’ return for it.” He was stopped from speaking further as the supervisor called Ragg to rejoin the group. “Listen, I gotta get back at it. You keep out of trouble, you hear? And keep out of any more fights.” He winked at Thorax as he walked off. “That half-and-half, two-face, look didn’t suit you too much.”

Thorax chuckled, watching as Ragg walked off, before turning and heading off himself, feeling in good spirits.

Author's Note:

You know, even I have to admit that, after all that build-up, it feels like a bit of a let down for Thorax to get away free like this, and that the matter was resolved a little too cleanly. I had actually considered several different ways I could possibly change that, but the fact of the matter was that it would either hinder my plans for future chapters greatly, or be of shakey legality, neither of which I wanted. For example, I had originally wanted Thorax to only get out of jail because Spike paid bail for him, so he'd at least have that conflict with Spike having to sort out the mess for him, but upon reading up on how bail works to ensure I was portraying it correctly, I found it brought up a lot of issues, like court appearances, criminal charges, and so on, and I felt it put the two in too much risk of discovery...so much so not even I saw a good way out of it once going that route. Furthermore, I realized that if I didn't want the police to accuse Thorax of being guilty of starting a fight anyway, and they really didn't have evidence to do so either, it didn't make sense for bail to even have to come into the matter in the first place. So I dropped it, and almost went without anything to replace it, until I came up with the citation fee of thirty bits that became something of a replacement.

Basically, what I'm getting at is that for the purposes of what I have planned ahead, the best way to resolve the matter was for Thorax to get away with it like this.

Besides, the point of all this was really more to show a pony like Ragg could not just trust a changeling, but trust a changeling rather blindly and defend that same changeling, and restore at least Thorax's faith that perhaps ponies are more willing and ready to trust changelings that the story has thus far lead everyone to believe. I think I was able to convey that much at least. :twilightsmile:

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