Emerald Flame
Dear Princess Celestia,
Seeing the Great Dragon Migration made me wonder what it meant to be a dragon, but now I realize that who I am is not the same as what I am. I may have been born a dragon, but Equestria and my pony friends have taught me how to be kind, loyal, and true! I'm proud to call Ponyville my home and to have my pony friends, as my family.
Yours truly, Spike.
Twilight read the letter again. It had been a couple of years since the incident that prompted her dear assistant to write this letter to the Princess. The same incident that now saw her researching dragon culture in the Canterlot libraries. Ever since Twilight secretly followed her draconic familiar to the volcano that was the destination of thousands of dragons, she had begun to see a slight deterioration in Spike's mental health. It began subtly, with Spike working even harder in the library, finding the simplest of excuses to socialize with just about anypony, doubling his effort to win the heart of his beloved Rarity, and occasionally withdrawing from society entirely. refusing even the simplest of greetings. Of course the last one was the least subtle of hints that something had changed. But everypony was granted off days. Even baby dragons. So no one really thought much of it. He was usually back to his old self again within days anyway.
But as the months dragged on his behavior had became noticeably different. The periods of withdrawal more frequent and prolonged. When ponies brought up his dragon nature he became upset and lashed out. His appetite decreased, even going so far as to refuse the consumption of gems. Once when begged to eat he had tried to digest hay, and this ended him up in Ponyville General getting his stomach pumped. On his last birthday he refused every last gift he got. Even Twilight's traditional book! She had even bothered to go the fiction route that year. Thankfully he hadn't done so publicly, but Twilight noticed when he thought he was being sneaky and returned or buried the gifts.
These were many of the symptoms that Twilight, being both highly observant and living partner to the young dragon, had picked up on quite clearly. She attempted to bring him to a psychologist but the doctor had said that she could not confidently treat a dragon. Of course that didn't go over well with her dear Spike. Who had then physically assaulted the mare, using his growing claws to gouge out her eye. Luckily Twilight had intervened before any serious damage could be done bit the doctor was sporting a trio of scars on her face for about a month. But that was the final straw for the lavender unicorn.
"What is going on Spike?! You've never been that violent before!"
"Nothing's wrong, okay? I'm perfectly fine!"
"Like Tartarus you're not. If you were fine, you'd eat. If you were fine, the Cutie Mark Crusaders wouldn't be afraid of you. If you were fine YOU WOULDN'T HAVE TRIED TO KILL THAT NICE DOCTOR!"
"I didn't try to kill her! I only tried to take her eyes!"
"Is that supposed to make me feel better? Why would you even want to do that to somepony?"
"She called me a dragon!"
"But.. you are a dragon."
"I AM A PONY. Dragons are mean, dragons are killers, dragons are evil. And when they're not, they're stupid. I am kind, loyal, and true! I am sweet, I am generous, I am honest, and I am funny. Dragons aren't! But ponies are! I am a pony, not some evil lizard."
Dumbfounded, Twilight could only blink as her brain tried to understand what she had just heard "Spike..."
"Don't call me that. My name is.... is..... Emerald Flame! Yeah, that's a good pony name, Emerald Flame."
Twilight tossed the memory aside as she did the letter. Returning her focus to the books on dragon biology and culture in front of her. She was happy that the area of the library she was currently in was used so infrequently, as her own body and the myriad of texts around her effectively blocked any attempts anypony might have otherwise made. Twilight grunted yet again as her search ended up fruitless. Every single attempt to understand the mind of the infant dragon was met with astounding failure, Each tome mocked her as though the authors of the books in front of her had all been clairvoyant and had a deep seated hatred for the mare. Each time she stumbled across instances of the infant and toddler stage of a dragon's lifecycle they each had the same thing to say. Dragons were infants for roughly twenty years, and during that time they acted the way any infant of any other species under the phylum chordata. They were mewling, barely sentient creatures that completely relied on thier parents to provide. According to these same books the were toddlers for the next forty years, once again acting in no way dissimilar to any other sentient children. But her Spike clearly proved these books wrong simply by existing, she had hatched him herself when she was ten years old. Meaning he'd only been alive for thirteen years now. Even if he had only started to speak yesterday he'd still be way ahead of schedule that these infuriating books put forth. But he had been having full conversations since she was thirteen. And walking since she was eleven. How could they all be so wrong?
"Hello, dear student. Do you require any help?"
"Princess Celestia!" Twilight, clearly surprised launched herself first several feet in the air and then into a deep bow.
"Rise, my student. You need not bow to me. Tell me, what brings you to Canterlot? What's so important that you can't make a quick trip to visit your mentor?" Celestia's warm smile washed away the stress Twilight had been under and belied the serious tone of her words.
"Oh, it's nothing really Princess. Spike's been having problems lately. I'm just trying to understand him better. But these books are just frustratingly inaccurate!" The smile on the princesses face vanished. Though her lips remained curved upwards, it no longer reached her eyes. A professional mask she had mastered through the millennium, few ponies could see through it. Unbeknownst to her, Twilight Sparkle was one of those ponies, having obsessed with her princess during her first years as Celestia's protegé. As mentioned before, Twilight was a very observant pony. Of course she knew that the mask was both on, and on for a reason, so it would do no good to outright ask about the sudden shift in moods.
"What, exactly, is wrong with Spike?" The Princesses tone barely changed, to the casual observer there was no change at all. But Twilight could detect a certain level of coldness. Though that was not nearly enough to change Twilight's answers.
"He's not eating, he rarely socializes and when he does he tries far too hard. A month ago he assaulted a psychiatrist simply for calling him a dragon. He also appears to be delusional, believing himself to be a pony. I'm quite worried." The smile returned to the eyes of the princess.
"I see. Do not fret, Twilight. I have the utmost faith in your abilities to guide young Spike back to health. You a very capable young mare. When you are done please do visit me in the castle, I'm afraid Luna's birthday party celebrations have left me a little... larger... to comfortably remain in this cramped library. Good luck." true to her words Celestia did indeed appear too large for the bookshelf made hallway, and had to back up unceremoniously before she could turn around walk forwards once more. Twilight, suppressing a giggle at the sight, promised her mentor that she would indeed visit before returning to Ponyville.
Returning her gaze once again to the books she read a single sentence that simply lead into another dull and uninformative paragraph when she understood that not one of the books on dragons in this library, or likely any library given the current one she occupied, would be of any use to her. Groaning, she levitated each tome expertly back into thier correct positions and followed her mentor out of the library.
"Princess, wait. I have a question." she called out before Celestia could exit the library proper.
"Oh, what is it Twilight?" asked the Princess, raising an eyebrow.
"Where.... where did you get Spike's egg?"
14 years ago
"Princess, we have the object you requested. Two of your guards died killing its mother and only one egg survived the beast's fall."
"Did you dispose of the bodies? I'd rather not start a conflict with the dragons. At least, not until we're ready."
"We made it look like natural gas leaking from the cave floor was ignited by her breath, they won't know it was Equestrian influence.
"Good." Princess Celestia's horn glows softly, a field of golden magic surround the head of each of the guards present. "If you so much as attempt to speak of what has transpired, the aneurysm I have just placed in each of your brains will instantly kill you. You have been warned."
"Princess, we have finished spelling the egg as you have requested. When the dragon hatches the changes you wanted will come into effect. It will be perfect."
"Good. When will it hatch?"
"Within the year, your highness."
"Anyway to speed up the process? I am eager to see results."
"Yes, but it's not very possible."
"Just tell me, mage."
"It would take a very special magic to hatch it before it's time with altering the changes we've made. It would require the gentle touch only a foal's magic could produce, but the raw power of a master mage."
Celestia pondered this for only a moment. I guess I can wait a year, but just in case, have hatching the egg be a test at my school for gifted unicorns. Who knows, maybe we'll get lucky."
"Yes, your highness." the mage bowed and made to leave the room.
"Oh, and Spell Cast?"
"Yes?"
Celestia lowered her horn and put her favorite security measure in her subjects head, "You will speak of this to one, else the clot I just put in your brain will kill you. Am I understood?"
Eyes wide, Spell Cast showed she understood, and went to put the egg on the cart where it would undoubtedly sit for the next year.
"It was a gift from its mother who had been down on her luck."
"Do you know anything about her?"
"She is dead, Twilight Sparkle. I'm sorry, but when I said she was down on her luck, I meant that she was gravely ill. She hadn't but a year left. I'm sorry."
"Oh." Twilight hung her head at the news and walked silently beside her mentor through the castle hallways, having exited the library once Twilight had caught up to the Princess. Minutes of heavy silence later they arrived at Celestia's personal bedchambers.
"Dear Student, how about we have that visit now, get your mind off things. Do you think you might have gotten good enough to defeat me in a game of Chess? I know that always brightened your mood." and indeed, it did. This time with some effort on Twilight's part, she shoved Spike to the back of her mind to make room for all the advance techniques required to even attempt to play the game against the master strategist who had had more than a millennium to hone her skills.
A week had passed since Twilight had gone out of her way to find those absolutely useless books. Spike had completely withdrawn, refusing to answer to anything but 'Emerald Flame'. The one time the dragon did manage to come out of his room he had been met with violence. Twilight Sparkle had pinned him to the floor and attempted to force feed him a fire ruby. It came as a shock to find that he hadn't wanted to eat it. Rarity herself had aged it and given to him specifically TO eat. And yet he had refused, once again attempting to eat hay. This was why he wound up on the floor, rendered immobile by a purple unicorn's magic as his face was pounded by a fire ruby, as Twilight's desperation made the speed at which the ruby was moving far faster than it need've been. And that was why Twilight was sporting a new mane-do. One eerily reminiscent of a week she had spent freaking out about a warning she had sent herself from the future. Now, Spike was strapped a couch in the local veterinarian's home. Fluttershy's home, to be exact. Though it had little to with any injuries he might've suffered at the hooves of his surrogate mother/big sister. His hard scaly face could withstand far more damage than that. No, Spike was here because the lack of minerals in his body had caused organs to fail. It wasn't too serious, as the introduction of those minerals would prevent complete failure. But Spike had refused right up until he blacked out from the pain. So now he was hooked up a kind of IV. A machine pumped powdered gems intravenously into his blood stream.
"He'll be unconscious for about another week. But I think that's a good thing. It'll take that long to get his counts high enough and his intestines and kidneys to start working properly again." Fluttershy said softly to the two ponies that were sitting with worried expressions on thier faces, Twilight and Rarity.
"I wonder what's gotten into the poor dear? Did he really refuse to eat the fire gem I gave him? Why, that's so unlike him, I can't fathom what could 'cause him to do such a thing! And just look at him! I don't think I've ever seen a creature so skinny. And his scales have become such a dreadful color."
"I thought you were mad at him Rarity." Twilight asked.
"I was when he nearly burnt my sister to a crisp, but that was months ago, and now look at him! Do you think this might be guilt?"
"I don't know. This is just the last in a long line of odd behaviours. Spike's little 'accident' with your sister and her friends was not the beginning, either."
"Oh, I do hope he'll be all right. When he does visit he's such the perfect little helper. Honestly, it's like he was bred to serve."
"....What was that?" something clicked in Twilight's brain.
'What was what, dear?"
"What you said, just now."
"I said, 'I hope he'll be all right'?"
"No, no. After that."
"Um... perfect little helper?"
"After that."
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean anything by it, I swear. Really honey please don't be-"
"RARITY! Just... say it again. Please. I need to hear it again."
Rarity gulped, certain she was about to be on the receiving end of an angry, and very powerful, unicorn's magic. "I said, ahem, that it was like he was bred to serve." Rarity closed her eyes and stiffened her muscles in anticipation of being blasted through Fluttershy's thin walls. But when no attack came, she dared open a single eye. To find Twilight was no longer there. "Where did she go?"
"I don't know, she just looked really scared and ran out. She probably went home."
"I.. should probably follow her. Thank you, Fluttershy for helping Spike, er, I mean Emerald." Rarity embraced her animal loving friend in a quick hug before heading out to the local library.
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Interesting.
Cazy spike kool
Wow Celestia is pretty dark in this story. Murdered Spike's mother and all his siblings for a dragon egg and placed spells on everypony involved that would kill them if they spoke any kind of word about what happened.
This is a very interesting story. I liked it.
Oh boy...I think Twilight's got an idea.
Hmm. Bred to serve...
Celestia is clearly more warlike. Or at least more willing to go into battle. Either she wants to take over dragonkind. Or have personal draconic soldiers.
Tyrrolestia strikes back.
Anurism *Zap* ANURISM *ZAP* HAHAHA I Am YOUR GOD
Trollestia is at it again.
I've been on FIMfiction most of the night (working as a security guard, I prefer to study other things, but staying awake takes precedence) and this has probably been one of the best stories I read tonight. Can't wait to move onto the other chapters.
1961375cuz she's Roman Celestia or.should I say solaristua
Looks nice so far. A few recommendations:
Its mother
Your highness
Again, its mother
4218442 Thanks man. I feel like a dumb-ass now, but thanks.