Night after night don't know what it means
Twilight did make sure to check the other room first, just on the off-chance that he’d done this mad thing with the bed sheets and then promptly fallen asleep underneath her bed or something.
He hadn’t, and both rooms had been entirely devoid of human. He had gone out the window and simply disappeared. There were not even any tracks she could see.
Twilight, electric with worry, ported back immediately to the throne room and explained the situation. Or did her best to, at least:
“Anon! Gone! I mean, he’s gone! He - the bedsheets! He made a rope! Out the window! The bed! He’s not there, I checked! I checked both rooms! He’s gone!”
While garbled, it got the message across, and guards were duly deployed to aid in the search. Twilight would have gone out herself - and had wanted to - but was held in check by the princesses mentioning the possibility that, if he just happened to wander back, it would be good were she still there.
So she remained, and the guards looked.
You would have thought that finding a unique and unusual creature in the most guard-infested place in Equestria would have been a cinch. You would have been half-right.
Tracking him proved quite easy. There was no shortage of helpful citizens who had seen Anon go this or that way and following his trail in this way was not difficult. It was just that every time they got to where they thought he was, it turned out that he’d left, and where he was was now where he’d just been.
He’d been to a lot of bars, it turned out. Canterlot had a healthy selection of such places and it seemed as though he had been running a gauntlet of them, of rapidly declining quality and cleanliness and without any real pattern to them.
Twilight - who was highly agitated - had been performing increasingly frantic circuits of her room while waiting for the reports to filter back to the castle and by the time Anon’s trail went cold she was practically beside herself.
“W-what do you mean nothing?” She stammered at the guard who’d just come back empty-hoofed. He’d been the one sent off to follow up on the last direction they’d received, but apparently it had been something of a dead end.
“The route we were pointed in splits up, and there is nopony there we can ask. It looks like he’s slipped through, unless we find somepony else who saw him,” said the guard, shifting uneasily, not the biggest fan of being the bearer of bad news.
Twilight chewed her lip.
If they’d found him in a broken heap at the bottom of the wall that would have been something. She felt guilty having hoped for it, but at least then they could have patched him up.
Having him just disappear was worse. Anything could have happened. Anything could still be happening! Who knew where he might have ended up? Even at the best of times his grasp of where he was and how it worked wasn’t the greatest, and these were not the best of times!
The guard stepping into her line of sight broke up that particular train of thought and brought her back to the moment.
“We’ll continue the search but it would be best if you got some sleep, Miss Sparkle. It’s going to be a brute force search from here on out, it seems like, and I can’t be certain that the reports will be regular,” he said.
“B-but...he’s still out there…” She said, casting her eyes to the window. Maybe he’d climb back in?
He didn’t.
“And we’ll find him, don’t you worry.”
She wanted to go out there herself. There was a burning desire to personally trawl every available inch of the city but she knew this was flatly impossible. It really was going to be brute force. Needed hooves on the ground. She was just one, very tired pony. At this point she’d probably just be getting in the way, even if she did go out to look.
Her shoulders slumped.
“Okay…”
The guard gave her a reassuring, assured smile.
“On my honour we won’t rest until we’ve tracked him down. Don’t worry. He’ll be fine. And you’ll need your energy to yell at him when we come back with him, I expect,” he said with a wink.
That got maybe the vaguest hint of a smile out of her and Twilight’s tail flicked. The touch of levity was much appreciated.
“Yeah…” She said, glancing to the window again.
Anon still did not appear.
-
Twilight did not sleep. She couldn’t sleep. Had she had any thoughts to spare she might have found that ironic given the reason she was there at all, but she didn’t - she was still desperately worried on top of being excruciatingly tired.
In her head she drowsily ran through every possible scenario she could imagine for where he might have gone and what might have happened to him. Most of what she came up with was deeply distressing, which just made her feel even worse. The cycle pulled her ever downwards. She couldn’t help it.
What if he’d fallen off something and hurt himself? Like the walls? It could have happened. What if he’d hurt somepony else by accident? What if they’d hurt him by accident? What if he’d fallen into a moat and drowned? What if he was drowning right now? It could happen.
What if he was stuck in a hole somewhere? He was an odd shape, she could definitely see it happening. Him, trapped, desperate for help but beyond earshot of anyone. The mere thought made her sick to her stomach. She tossed and turned. The covers had long-since been flung from the bed in her agitation.
There was a hissing sound.
Her ears pricked up. Had she imagined that? Was that exhaustion? Worry? She strained to listen, sitting haflway up on the bed. She listened some more. Birds were singing, somewhere, as the first hint of dawn started filling the sky, but it wasn’t that she was listening for.
Nothing. Twilight’s ears folded back and she started to sink again. Then:
“Psst. Twilight! Psst.”
She had not imagined that.
It was coming from outside.
Dashing to the window and sticking her head out she peered down. There, at the base of the wall and looking up, was Anon. He looked rough, like he’d fallen backwards through a hedge, but other than that he seemed in perfectly rude health.
In fact, looking rough was pretty normal for him, so he looked about as good as could be expected. On seeing Twilight his face lit up.
“Hey! My rope is gone. Could you lower it down or-”
With a pop and a flash he disappeared from the outside and reappeared on the inside.
He had about a second or so of standing and looking confused with his hands still cupped to his mouth before dropping to one knee and clutching his head. There was also groaning.
“Oh man, oh I didn’t need that - that’s what teleporting feels like? Why would anyone do tha-”
Anything further was cut off by Twilight crashing into him and knocking him flat, the two of them tumbling end-over-end, Anon winding up on his back with a very angry pony standing astride his chest.
“Where were you?!” She practically shouted, her face inches from his and a veritable mask of fury. Anon winced at her volume, trying feebly to block her out with just his hands. It did not work. She had the leverage, and he had the stinking hangover.
“An alley. I think? I woke up in one.”
“An alley?!”
Inches became half an inch perhaps, and her muzzle was basically touching his nose.
“Well I wasn’t in an alley the whole time but that’s where I ended up. There was a fair amount of drinking before that point. Like, a lot. Pony stuff is pretty, uh, weak. But there was a lot. Hence the headache. Could be a hangover. Hence the please could you maybe shout less?”
Twilight, breathing hard, noticed the distinct lack of personal space going on and backed up a little. She didn’t let Anon up off the floor yet though, and a shift of her hooves and her weight kept him from trying to wriggle up. He seemed to have got the message that he was in trouble. Which he was.
“You snuck out of here - the castle, where we came to see the princesses, who offered to help you - to go and get drunk?”
This she asked far more levelly and quietly, not that it made it any nicer for him to hear.
Now that he was apparently less sleep-deprived, lying flat on his back in the cold light of day, he could see some of the issues with his plan that he hadn’t picked up on last night when he’d come up with it. At the time it had seemed like genius - he’d have been a fool not to sneak away and get drunk!
Not so much, now, looking at Twilight.
“...were they mad? The big ones?” He asked, completely unable now to look Twilight in the eye, writhing guiltily beneath her.
“They were concerned,” she said, feeling him fidget with his fingers resting on his belly. His eyes flicked up to hers briefly before looking away again.
“...are you mad?”
Twilight sighed.
“Yes. But only because I was worried! You disappeared! You shouldn’t do that! We had the guards looking for you! We still have guards looking! I wanted to look for you! No-one knew where you were! Anything could have happened to you. ”
Anon tried and failed to scoot out from under her by shuffling downwards, Twilight stopping that by putting a hoof onto his stomach. Lightly, but enough for him to get the message.
“...sorry…”
Twilight could feel the ball of rage that had been twisting in her gut starting to uncoil. It was difficult being angry at him at the best of times. WIth him being so out of sorts - and looking so miserable and guilty at he did right at that moment - it was even harder.
Rationally speaking, she could see why he might have made some bad decisions. What with the insomnia and nightmares and all that. Irrationally, she did still rather want to smack him about the face for putting her through that. But that would get her nowhere.
Didn’t stop her thinking about it as she hugged him instead. It was awkward due to him being on the floor and all, but it was heartfelt. Tension released almost immediately.
“It’s fine. Just don’t do it again. Ever. Okay?”
“You have my word,” he said, muffled.
The hug broke, Twilight stood back and Anon rose unsteadily to his feet, still wincing and now squinting anytime he looked towards the windows.
Twilight was unfamiliar with hangovers and knew of them only distantly, so did not really pick up on this. Anon was intimately familiar with hangovers, and had had worse. Not that this was one was like skipping through a meadow, it still sucked. But he was a big boy. He could tough it out.
Then Twilight thought back to what he’d said before, something she’d glossed over in her haste to shake some answers out of him.
“Wait, you said you woke up in an alley, does that mean you got some sleep?” She asked.
This clearly hadn’t occurred to him. He blinked.
“Oh yeah, I guess it does” he said, face splitting into a grin. “Hey! My plan worked!”
“Plan?”
“Yeah. Figured if I got drunk enough I wouldn’t have any nightmares and, hey, since I don’t remember anything after a certain point I guess it must have worked.”
He looked very proud of himself.
“That’s a terrible plan,” Twilight said flatly.
This did much to puncture his pride. Now he just looked sheepish.
“Well yes, but like I say it did work. I got some sleep! I feel - well I feel terrible, but I’m well-rested-ish. Which is something. Right?”
The look Twilight gave him said more than words ever could have. It could have stripped paint. Anon took a step back.
On the one hoof she was still low-key apoplectic with rage at him for disappearing, getting wasted and now - in all likelihood - writing off a whole day to being hungover. On the other she was overjoyed that he was okay and also happy that he’d finally got some sleep. Not in the way she would have liked, obviously, but still.
You took what you got.
He then doubled over, groaned, and ran for the attached bathroom facilities and was promptly and loudly sick. Twilight was torn between concern and disgust and settled somewhere in the middle at the vague impression that he probably deserved to suffer a little bit for what he did, but that she should probably also comfort him at least a tiny bit.
That said, the noise of him being sick was horrifying. She approached cautiously and saw him clinging to the plumbing.
“Oh why did it have to be cider…I don’t even like cider that much!”
He groaned again and wrapped himself more tightly around the toilet.
“Just gonna stay here for a bit, I think…”
“There there,” Twilight said, patting him on the back, face screwing up in distaste as he vomited some more.
“Oh God it’s Old Rosie all over again…” he wretched.
Friendship. Glamourous.
-
The guards were duly informed that Anon had shown up of his own accord. They took it with good grace. They were, after all, professionals.
By this point hours had passed and the sun was already up and Luna and Celestia were both indisposed and unavailable, so the day was wasted for all intents and purposes. Twilight made sure to make Anon feel guilty about this while also forcing water down his throat and marching him out into the sunshine to sober up.
His protests that he was already sober and that a hangover was the painful absence of intoxication fell on deaf ears.
“It’s like Lemmy said: if you never stop drinking you’ll never be hungover,” he tried to explain, shielded his eyes from sunshine that seemed to glare at him from every available angle.
“I don’t know who that is,” Twilight said,
“Bet there’s a pony version of him somewhere…unless he’s dead here, too...urgh…”
He adjusted the sheet he’d wrapped himself in while he grumbled. Twilight had insisted on him showering, sealing the door to the guest bathroom shut until he had and sending his clothes off for washing. In lieu of anything else to put on - and before she’d been able to stop him - he’d stripped off a bedsheet and wrapped it around himself.
It wasn’t like he wasn’t going to be getting odd looks anyway. That was his argument at least. Twilight hadn’t had the energy to press him on it, and watching him struggle with the thing as he walked along was strangely soothing. Made it look more like he was suffering for his poor choices and actions. Some degree of penitence seemed important.
Anon, mainly, was trying to remember how to fashion a toga, ignoring the nagging suspicion that he didn’t actually know how to do it in the first place. It was harder than it looked. His respect for the ancient Greeks increased.
Dimly, he recalled, that a toga should be longer. But he worked with what he had to hand.
“I am really sorry, you know. For disappearing. Must have made sense to me at the time,” he said. Apologies had been bubbling out of him fairly regularly at this point.
“The important thing is you’re back and safe. And that you got some sleep, which is good. Even if you did it in an alley. Feel better?”
“I feel awful. But I’m not that tired and I can actually think straight now. So it balances out.”
Not long after that they found somewhere for breakfast. Or rather, Twilight did. She knew the place better than Anon.
Anon was fairly confident that he would not be able to keep anything other than water down, and even the water was dicey. He kept his eyes averted from her plate when it arrived and did his best to close his ears to the sound of her eating.
“You’re shure you don’t want anyhthing?” She asked, mouth only partly full. She’d learned a little of proper table manners, but sometimes she forgot the finer details. Anon put it down to being an absent-minded scholar type of a pony. It tended to indicate that there was something on her mind, at least in his experience.
“I’m good,” he said, sparing a glance in her direction and watching as more hay bacon disappeared. Who knew hay was so adaptable?
Hay bacon. Haycon.
He chuckled.
“What’s funny?” Twilight asked, cheeks bulging.
“Nothing, nothing. Uh, by the way, I know you said that the big ones were ‘concerned’ about me, but you didn’t actually say whether they were going to be mad at me or not. So...do you reckon they’ll be mad?”
She swallowed, levitating a serviette over to dab her mouth with before replying.
“The princesses will understand, don’t worry. They’re very nice. I don’t get why you’re so nervous about them,” she said.
“Because they’re so big.”
This he said while trying to shrink into his seat. Given that the seat had been made for those much smaller than him - indeed, he’d had to pull up two and awkwardly spread himself across both - this did not really work. Twilight frowned.
“You’re bigger than they are!”
Not by a huge amount, but still enough to be noticeable. Anon didn’t really have an answer to this and shrugged helplessly.
“Well, yeah...but they’ve got that hair. It makes my eyes water.”
“Their manes? Really?”
Anon grasped at the air, as though he might pluck better words out of it. He couldn’t, but he tried his hardest.
“It’s just that, you know, it’s not something I’m used to. None of this is, really. But for most of it - you, say - I can kind of just about skirt around it. But they’re these...alien...goddess...ladies...with magic hair...moving celestial bodies...and I’m just a guy. I can barely move my own body.”
“You’re intimidated,” Twilight said flatly, catching on. Anon nodded dolefully.
“And what if something’s really wrong with me because of this? The sleep thing? Some weird magic thing I don’t know about? I don’t know anything about this. It could be something really bad. Maybe it’s the worst.”
He tapped his fingers together nervously. A waiter came to take Twilight’s empty plate away and she waited until they’d gone before leaning across the table to put a hoof onto his hands.
“I doubt it’s the worst, Anon. And even if it is they’ll still help you. And I’ll still be there.”
He looked up, smiled.
“Thanks. Guess I should relax, huh?”
She smiled too. Supportively, like.
“It couldn’t hurt. And you should probably not call them aliens to their face, either. Just a suggestion.”
“True. They might take it the wrong way,” he said, stroking his chin thoughtfully. “I’m the alien, really, if you think about it.”
“Shush, you. You’re a guest and my friend.”
Even he couldn’t come up with anything snarky to say to that.
At least not off the top of his head.
-
The day wore on. Twilight and Anon burned more daylight wandering and shooting the shit mostly because, until later, they literally had nothing useful they could do.
Twilight showed him some of the sights, given that the last time Anon had been in Canterlot he hadn’t really been in any fit state to sightsee having just fallen through a universe or two, but that was about it as far as activities went.
As the time drew closer though they wandered back up to the castle.
“So it’s going to be the same idea as yesterday?” Anon asked.
“Yes. Only this time you are going to actually talk to them yourself.”
Twilight had deemed him sufficiently clean and coherent enough for this. That, and this way he was less likely to climb out of any windows. Anon could accept this. Really, he’d brought it on himself.
First though, he was to change out of his bedsheet.
The joke had worn thin at this point, and besides his clothes had been cleaned and returned to the room by then - that’s royal efficiency for you. He found them folded and laid out on the bed for him. They’d even folded his shirt into a swan, for some reason.
“Sweet, trousers! Swan shirt!” He exclaimed, delighted.
It almost seemed a shame to ruin their good work, but Anon was tired of the sheet and so, after a moment’s hesitation, was upon them.
“I’ll never get what it is with you and clothes,” Twilight said.
“It’s a societal-rift thing. I’m the alien, yo, like I said,” he said, clumsily managing to put his trousers back on without taking the sheet off first. Twilight shook her head and was all set on turning to look away as he shucked the sheet away when something caught her eye.
She double-took and goggled, a hoof jabbing out to point at his chest where there was a large, blotchy, mark. It pulsed, and spidery veins of it stretched off away from the centre of its mass, where there was a rather alarming dip.
The thing did not look healthy.
“What’s that?!”
Anon paused, shirt halfway on, and looked down.
“Oh, that’s got bigger,” he said, frowning.
“You knew about that already?!”
“Well I kind of saw it earlier when I showered but it was smaller. Figured it was from sleeping in that alley, thought it’d go away. Guess not. Doesn’t look good, does it? Is this normal?”
He let the shirt dangle from one arm and poked the weird, throbbing lump and was about to put his finger into the depression in the middle of it before Twilight interrupted him.
“Don’t poke it! That isn’t normal!” She squealed
She considered this. He was, as he’d said, an alien. Maybe this was normal. Maybe strange, near-black nodules did just sprout from them at time-to-time and it was nothing to worry about.
Stranger things had happened, albeit not often.
“Is it normal?” She asked, eyes narrowed.
“No, not really,” Anon said, jabbing it again and wincing. Why he’d expected anything other than pain was unclear.
“Then don’t poke it! Stop poking it!” Twilight snapped.
A tinkling sounded accompanied the magic that promptly yanked his hand away and his other hand for good measure, hoiking Anon backwards with a yelp.
“I hate it when you do that…” He grumbled.
“It’s not something I enjoy doing, I assure you. Just…stop touching things when we don’t know what they are. Please? Promise?”
She gave him The Eyes, though it was unnecessary. She’d said ‘please’ in the way that Anon had never been able to properly refuse. Unintentionally, of course, she didn’t know it worked so well. But it did.
“...okay,” he said, and she let him go. He rubbed his wrists.
“That magic stuff is still so weird,” he said, peering down at the throbbing mark. “Think this thing is related to the whole ‘not wanting to go to sleep because I’m terrified of the stuff I see’ thing? I mean, I want to say yes but in my experience dreams don’t normally manifest like this. In my experience.”
Twilight eyed the growth - nodule? - whatever it was on his chest warily. She did not like the look of it one bit. In fact, even just seeing it was making her feel uncomfortable. For one thing it was distinctly unpleasant looking just on its own. Mainly though it being on Anon just made it so much worse. It had no right being there.
Hissing quietly to herself she turned away and folded something. A towel. Didn’t matter what. Just needed to do something to be doing something.
“We’ll ask after you show the princesses,” she said.
Anon, midway through doing his shirt up again, paused.
“I’m going to have to take my shirt off in front of the big ones? Great.”
“It’ll be fine.”
“Says you. You don’t even wear shirts.”
He wasn’t wrong.
-
“How long have you been having these dreams for?”
“Uh, not long. Guess they only really started getting bad a few days ago.”
Luna was the one asking the questions. Anon was just stood with his eyes down, body turned in on itself as though trying to draw as little attention as possible. Celestia sat back, watching closely. Twilight provided moral support, or at least that was her intention, catching his eye and giving supportive smiles anytime he glanced her way.
Anon appreciated her presence, even if he still felt extremely uncomfortable being the centre of one of the big ones’ attentions.
“‘Started getting bad’?” Luna repeated. Anon shrugged.
“Well, one or two nightmares is normal, isn’t it? Here and there? They just didn’t make feel like...that...before now.”
“And always about the same thing? Even then?”
He shuffled his feet and kept his eyes down. Clearly he’d somehow hoped that this particular detail would have been glossed over or avoided, but now he was there, pinned, and given no real choice. He didn’t think that lying about it would get him very far.
“...yes,” he said, quietly.
“And this is only after your arrival here? You’d never had a dream like this prior to that?”
“...not like this, no. This was only after I came here.”
Anon squirmed, though he was clearly trying his best not to. He actually looked up at Luna then, probably properly for the first time. He even made eye-contact.
“T-this is the sort of thing you’ve run into before, right? Not a big deal?”
“I cannot say I have dealt with anything quite like this, no,” Luna said with perhaps a touch less tact and delicacy than she should have. “I have been respecting your privacy as an outsider and a visitor and so have not paid any particular attention to your dreams, though I must also admit that - on reflection - I saw no sign of you in the first place. There is the possibility your dreams function differently and exist outside of my realm of influence.”
This wasn’t exactly what Anon had wanted to hear. Somehow his shoulders managed to slump even further.
“Oh.”
“But as we learn more we’ll be able to use Princess Luna’s expertise, I’m sure,” Twilight said with only slightly forced optimism.
“As we learn more,” Luna said by way of agreement, inclining her head slightly.
It was better than nothing.
This wasn’t going exactly as Twilight had planned, either, and she felt she had to try and steer things in a more productive direction. Luna had proven detached from the problem and Celestia hadn’t even said a word since they’d entered. If the Princesses wanted more to go on, then she would provide it.
Twilight nudged Anon.
“Show them,” she whispered, though at the right level of volume to ensure that anyone who’d want to hear would have been able to. Anon frowned.
“It’s fine, they really don’t need to see,” he whispered back, but he made the mistake of being quiet.
“You need to show them,” Twilight said, not even bothering to keep her voice down now, her stare concerned but mildly disapproving. Anon withered beneath it.
“Show us what?” Celestia asked, leaning forward and making the human flinch a little.
“Just a, you know, little thing. It’s really not that important,” he said, shrugging and looking helplessly at Twilight for relief, finding only pitiless, driving compassion. He looked to the princesses and saw only regal curiosity. There wasn’t any getting out of this.
It was for his own good, after all.
“Fine…”
His shirt was duly unbuttoned and shucked off halfway. The mark was worse looking than it had been before, darker and now shot through with livid red. Twilight couldn’t tell whether it had got bigger or not, but at this point that hardly seemed to matter. Both Princesses sat forwards.
“Would you mind coming closer please,” Celestia said, beckoning politely with a hoof.
Sparing one last glance to Twilight - who shooed him forward - Anon did as he was told, clearly struggling with his intense desire to put his shirt back on. He stood still while the alicorns looked him over.
“That doesn’t look good, does it?” Celestia said, voice hushed, leaning towards her sister.
“No. I have seen examples of nightmares manifesting physically, though it is very rare. Vanishingly so.”
“What is the most common cause?”
“It varies. Without better access to his nightmares I could not say.”
Anon did his best to pretend he could not hear any of this.
“Does it hurt?” Luna asked, and Anon was still doing his best to pretend not to hear any of this so only noticed this question had come his way when she waved a hoof in front of his face, snapping him out of it.
“Hmm? Oh, no. Not unless I poke it but other than that, no. Weirdly. I mean, looking at it you’d think it would, wouldn’t you?” He asked, moving to poke it again only to remember Twilight’s telling him not to. His hands remained by his sides, where they fidgeted.
Luna’s horn flared into life and Anon flinched, taking a step back. Nothing else happened though, and a few moments later the magic disappated.
“Strange,” Luna said, looking honestly perplexed. “It is like a void of sorts. Or an absence. Certainly, there is no magical trace I can detect. No trace of anything, in fact.”
“That sounds bad,” Anon said.
“It may simply be that we do not know what to look for,” Celestia said, quickly. That helped him feel a smidgen better.
“Could you describe your nightmare to me? In as much detail as possible,” Luna said.
“Sure…?” Anon said, scratching his cheek.
Anon did his best, bless him, but his best wasn’t very good. Portions of the nightmare were simply beyond his grasp and what parts he could remember - the parts that Twilight knew about and heard him repeated - obviously made him uncomfortable to talk about. He seemed to know he wasn’t being helpful and trailed off with a sad shrug.
“Sorry,” he said.
The princesses exchanged what appeared to be a meaningful look.
“That wasn’t much use, was it?” Anon asked.
“No, it was not,” Luna said, not unkindly but bluntly, and Anon appeared even more displeased with himself.
“There is something else you can do for us that would be helpful, however,” Celestia said, and he looked up again.
“I don’t need to show you anything else, do I?” He asked, some desperation creeping into his voice, glancing back at Twilight without really thinking about it. She gave him a smile and a little wave and he couldn’t help but wave back.
For some reason, the prospect of having to strip down with her in the room was infinitely more uncomfortable than the thought of just having to do it for the big ones.
Celestia noticed his distress and smiled one of those motherly smiles of her. This had the desired calming effect, much to Anon’s surprised.
“Not for this, no. This is not so much the physical. We will be looking into your mind.”
That put the wind up him. He blinked.
“...I’m sorry?”
“We will be looking into your mind,” she repeated, adding: “With your permission, of course.”
“No, I heard that first part. I’m just - you can do that?”
This was news to Anon, and not exactly what he would consider good news, either. He’d been scared enough of the big ones without knowing that they were able to do anything like that.
“We can. It might show us something important, assuming you allow us to do it. Certainly, it will give us a clearer picture of your nightmare You are under no obligation, of course,” said Luna.
Anon swallowed.
Having to take his shirt off was one thing, this was something else entirely.
Like any sane individual Anon had often wondered what it might be like if others could take a look inside his head and - like any sane individual - he had concluded that, really, it was a good thing no-one could.
Being confronted with the reality that actually someone might able to was leaving him feeling as though his gut had been filled with icy water.
“Uh,” he said, grasping for the right words an coming back with nothing. Celestia seemed to get the hint that he wasn’t brimming with enthusiasm.
“We could have Twilight do it, if that would make you feel more comfortable. I have covered the rudiments of the technique with her before,” she said.
Twilight looked about as uncomfortable with the suggestion as Anon felt, but nodded anyway when he turned her way for confirmation. It had come up once or twice in her studies, and while she’d never actually really done it outside the context of a lesson per se the theory of it was rock-solid in her head. Anon swallowed.
“N-no, no that’s f-fine. Sh- Twilight doesn’t - she doesn’t have to do that. Does it - do we have to do this? The nightmares aren’t so bad. I can just go. I-I’ll be fine, r-really,” he mumbled, half-stumbling over the words, brain popping as it hurried to come up with solutions, preferably solutions that resulted in him leaving without having had his mind read.
The thought of the big ones having a poke around was scary, because they were scary. The thought of Twilight having a look around was terrifying.
Not that Anon had ever thought anything particularly untoward that he wouldn’t want Twilight knowing about, it was just that he didn’t trust his brain not to cook up something horrible on the spot just to make her horrified. His brain was like that. Or at least he thought it was.
He liked Twilight! She was great! What if she saw something she didn’t like? What if there was stuff in there he’d forgotten about but would change how she thought about him?
What if she stopped being friends with him afterwards?
Anon had the distinct impression that feeling he was noticing building up from the pit of stomach and seizing every organ in his body was raw panic. He wasn’t a fan.
But even as he thought all this, the cold, rational wheels that ran forever in the background of his more scattershot thoughts were throwing facts at him he simply couldn’t ignore.
The sooner the princesses had as much information as possible the sooner they could fix what was wrong and the sooner Anon could go back to Ponyville, get some proper sleep and never have to think about this whole episode ever again.
Grin and bear it. Bite the bullet. Get it done. Stiff upper lip. Etcetera.
Given the choice between a stranger plumbing the depths of your mind and a friend who you’d have to ride the train back with, pick the stranger. You wouldn’t have to have awkward conversation with the stranger. At least in theory.
“Fine…” He said, shoulders sagging. “If it’ll help. But c-can you do it?”
This he said while pointing a shaking finger at Celestia.
He didn’t want to outright say he was scared of the big ones, Luna in particular, but they could probably figure that out on their own. Still, it seemed to be his best option, going with Celestia, even if a big part of him just wanted to run screaming. Twilight put a comforting hoof against his leg, making him jump. He hadn’t heard her closing in.
“It’s not invasive,” she said, but he just raised an eyebrow. “It’s not! Honest! They wouldn’t do it otherwise! No-one would. That’d be horrible.”
Anon still wasn’t wholly sure, but did find himself feeling a smidgen better about it, having heard this from Twilight herself. Before he could fully consider the appropriateness of it he reached down and gave her mane a ruffle, and even though she quickly fought his hand off she couldn’t keep the smile off her face.
“Okay, so what do I do?” He asked, turning back to Celestia.
“I shall need to touch your head with my horn. Other than that you just need to relax. Normally I’d have to bend for this.”
“Well, glad I could be at least a little helpful,” Anon said, closing his eyes and doing his best to relax. It wasn’t easy, knowing what was about to happen, and part of him was still expecting this to be a joke.
They couldn’t really go into people’s minds, could they? That’d be crazy.
Then again, the slightly-smaller big one could go into dreams, apparently, and that was pretty close already, right?
He could feel something tingly approaching his head. Getting closer. Anon gritted his teeth.
At which point the doors to the throne room burst open. Everyone looked.
There, out of breath, was a guard. He flinched on seeing the attention of both princess, Twilight and Anon focused his way, and then straightened up.
“Apologies, your Highness, but it is an -” the guard’s eyes flicked to Anon, just for a moment. “An urgent matter.”
“I trust it urgent enough to warrant interrupting royal business?” Luna asked.
But the guard’s tone had been serious, serious enough that Celestia bade them approach. Whatever news they’d brought was whispered hurriedly and the guard left, shutting the door behind them.
Anon had stood to one side with Twilight to let them get on with it, and the looks they’d shot him once or twice during the exchange made the hairs stand on the back of his neck.
“Uh...everything alright?” He asked.
“A pony was attacked and injured last night, quite severely. The attacker was not clearly seen but was stated by several witnesses near the scene to be bipedal and at least twice the height of the victim,” said Celestia, sitting up very straight.
All this she said very properly and flatly, without any intonation or feeling. Just delivering news.
Anon’s eyes widened and his stomach turned and he very nearly fell off the dais as he stumbled backward
“Oh God,” he gasped. “Oh God did I do that while I was blacked out? What did I do?”
“Anon, you-” Twilight tried to interrupt, to try and calm him down, but he didn’t appear to hear her, his knees giving out as he collapsed to sit on one of the steps, clutching his head.
“I can’t remember! What did I do? Oh God, I thought I just fell asleep, but I blacked out first. What did I do?”
“Anon, calm-”
“Last time I blacked out I punched my friend in the face! And tried to climb over razorwire. I tore my trousers open! My leg, too, kind of. Oh God what did I do? Did I hit someone? You’re all only little! Oh God, no no.”
Anon was rapidly going to pieces, which Twilight found incredibly distressing to watch. He’d never done anything like this and she couldn’t understand fully why he was doing it now. The utter impassiveness of Celestia and Luna - watching over the whole thing - did not help, and Twilight felt rather cast-adrift.
The doors opened again, both of them this time, and more guards entered. Four this time, and moving as one. Twilight thought that might be a bit much, but wasn’t going to say it out loud.
“Could you please escort Anon to the secure accommodation and ensure he has everything he needs while my sister and I consider this,” Celestia said and the most-senior guard - marked out by having the most and most shiny bits and pieces on his uniform - nodded to her before nodding to the others. As a group they moved to surround Anon, who was still sitting.
“But - what?” Twilight said, looking around helplessly.
This had to be a joke. Or a mistake. Or something. It didn’t make sense.
“Come on, son,” said the most-senior guard, his commanding tones finally seeming to puncture the bubble that Anon had been inside for the last minute or so. He looked up, eyes reddened, and then noticed the guards. He rose without a word.
Head hanging, Anon was led away.
“Wha-? He-? You just-?” Twilight blathered, but answers came there none as she watched the throne room doors close once more.
The cool, calm and rational part of Twilight - similar in a surprising number of ways to the cool, calm rational part of Anon, not that either of them really knew this - wondered if maybe continuing on with having a look into Anon’s mind would have been a good idea, given what happened.
Maybe shed some immediate light on the situation?
But she wasn’t the one in charge of things, and she didn’t feel especially cool, calm or rational at that moment anyway.
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Please, make more of this, it's amazing!
Well at least he didn't get poked in the head....
i.ytimg.com/vi/3DXyRsOQ9Is/hqdefault.jpg
9457528
I'm pretty sure mental contact with a god-queen can have no drawbacks or risks involved.
66.media.tumblr.com/15da7f3d65a8bc392d982978e054c52f/tumblr_n2gz0feoHF1tvfheeo3_250.gif
Woohoo! New chapter!
Oh! Good chapter.
-Ru
9457579
Oh, I didn't even realize you wrote this story too. Cool, keep it up man.
9480426
I'M EVERYWHERE.
So let's see: eldritch beings possibly and a somewhere else, fear of the floating hair, this seems somewhat familiar all of a sudden...
Wait... what?!? You gotta finish!
9501603
Haha. Hahaha! HAHAHAHAHA!
9501257
Your guess is as good as mine.
9501609
Is it bad that I immediately heard Mandark?
I recently found that I've read a random story or two f yours previously, and liked them, so am now going through them all!
But, there were a few after this one. You do plan on continuing it? Right?
9501610
Xenophilia had similar elements as those I mentioned with Eldritch beings having been the ones to transport the Human to Equestria. I'm probably reading too much into it of course, but it reminded me of that story. Wasn't sure if it was an allusion or not.
9502908
Can't say I've read it...
9502908
Xenophilia was really good but I don't think this story is too similar. The way Bellerophone got there wasn't the main part of the story. More it was about the cultural differences.
This story is more existential dread and a bit of cosmic horror. Something beyond knowing is happening and the Human is suffering for it.
This story is really good though so far.
From bad to worse it seems.
So glad my friends and I don’t drink.
10073310
I'm drinking right now!
Also Old Rosie is a real thing and if you get the right spot in the box it comes out like varnish. Amazing.
This was kind of a stretch.
10186352
The whole story in a nutshell, really.
9457579
¿Angron? ¿Perdurado?