Earning Freedom

by Daxisle

Preoccupied Possessions

Preoccupied Possessions

"Ughh." Groaned Spike as he slowly came from the realms of unconsciousness to hazy reality. His head hurt, and though he lifted a claw to nurse the numbed throb in his eye, he felt a hoof stop his hand's advance.

"Take it easy, son." He heard a soft voice say. "You're going to need to rest for a bit."

Rest? Why? He wanted to ask, but the area of his brain responsible for forming coherent sentences wasn't as aware as the part for comprehension. What was meant to be asking about why the need for rest, devolved into unintelligible grumbles and grunts.

Luckily, the voice seemed to understand his inquiry and explained that the anesthetics were still in effect, the glass eye would be initially rejected by the body for a time, the rejection causing on and off bouts of throbbing pain, but would subside in time eventually. "The orb holder will feel strange for a while, but you'll soon be used to it." The stallion assured him.

Spike attempted to open his remaining eye, but the bright light of the room was too much for him and he quickly slammed it shut.

"Tw-Twiligh?" He groaned, finally able to form a word that made sense.

"Your guardian still hasn't returned, I'm afraid." The voice replied, sounding apologetic. "But don't worry, she said she would return as soon as possible."

A small sliver of concern crept up the drake's spine. Twilight knew how scared he was about the operation, something big must be happening to keep her away now. Gripping what little he could find of his resolve, Spike slowly pushed himself up right in a painfully slow show of will, though his efforts were met with another gentle hoof pushing him back down and a small lecture about maintaining bed rest. "Twiligh-"

"Is fine, I'm sure. You've only been under for four hours and will need a full night's rest to recover." The doctor commanded with the kind of authority that only a medical pony could demonstrate. After a few more shot down protests, Spike resigned himself to his bed prison and lay still in a show of submission. The doctor bid him good night and said he'd be checking on him periodically throughout the evening.

Once alone with his thoughts, rest was the last thing on the young dragon's mind. The anesthesia was wearing off more and more as minutes turned into hours, and the sliver of concern he felt grew in intensity. It wasn't just for the sake of his mother, but also for his own selfish need for comfort. Where was she? Why wasn't she here? Had something happened to here?

He shivered and weakly pulled the blankets up as far as his weakened body could. He felt cold, cold, worried and alone. His concern started to shift into anger as more and more of his thought processes cleared from their drug haze. Twilight should have been there, she promised she'd be there! He'd finally given up the guard, finally allowed himself to be open and vulnerable to her, and this was how she repaid him?

'Wow, seriously dude? You really think after what happened earlier, she'd just up and abandon you?'

Is she here?

'No, no she isn't. That doesn't mean she doesn't want to be, though. Celestia said she needed Twilight for something, right? It must have been important if it's keeping her this long.'

That much may have been true. Spike sighed, he had no right to be so short, Twilight would be here if she could.

'Yea, maybe it would be who of you to ask questions before jumping to conclusions.'

Again, that was true, but it didn't stop him from feeling a little abandoned, good reason or not. Regardless, he was awake now, awake and alone. Worrying and thinking on the matter would serve no other purpose than rile himself up and it was next to impossible to think about anything else. So, he resigned himself to sleep, hoping that he'd feel better come morning.

---

"NOW TWILIGHT!" Celestia cried as sweat poured from her brow, a bright orb of raw amber growing at the tip of her horn hummed as it charged a new spell.

A final spell.

Luna lay before her, a maniacal grin of daring and madness twisting her face, her eyes wide and full of disturbing yearning.

Twilight hesitated, she was exhausted, both from the mana usage and the mental bombardment coming from the Nightmare before her.

"Yes, Twilight." Luna's voice said, her head cocking to an unnatural angle to look at the unicorn, the sounds of bones popping out of place echoing through out the chamber as the Alicorn's head twisted almost 180 degrees. "Show your princess how you will fail to destroy me again! Show her how weak and incapable you are!" Her grin grew wider.

"How much of a failure you are."

Lavender eyes shrinking to pinpricks, Twilight's mind swarmed with thousands of possibilities for how her surging Celestia's magic could backfire. Discharge that could hurt or maybe even kill her mentor, putting too much magic and obliterating Luna, putting not enough and rendering their last attempt utterly useless. It was more than her own neurosis, there was mind altering magic in the air, magic that cultivated and preyed upon the worst of emotions.

Seeing her psychologically cutting words having effect, Nightmare Moon turned her head back to Celestia to really push her advantage. "Your student, dear sister, how disappointing she is."

Twilight's self doubt magnified ten fold at the accusation. The mana she was charging began to fade as the uncertainty quickly overpowered her resolve. "Don't listen to her, Twilight!" Celestia boomed, casting her gaze to her student. "You've bested every test I've thrown at you, I feel nothing but pride for you and your achievements." She offered a gentle smile as the amber spell began to grow in intensity, it's comforting light and warmth pushing away the damning, fear praying magic. "I need your help, let us vanquish this darkness once and for all!"

Forcing the last of her energy and self confidence, Twilight smirked and cast her eyes back to the Nightmare Moon possessed Luna. She silently wished and hoped that the spell would work and leave the lunar princess the gentle spirit she once was. The unicorn's horn flared a brilliant purple and channeled her last into her mentor. With a cry, the amber spell's bright light grew too intense to behold and Twilight collapsed away from it.

The last thing she heard before exhausted unconsciousness took her was an equally powerful scream from Luna and then everything went black.

---

The ride back to Canterlot was a quite time of reflection for Sin. He'd seen Uppity off of the train and walked her back to the castle proper, she invited him in for tea, but he declined. He wasn't in his right mind, if he could be called "in his mind" at all.

The oaken pony couldn't think, any time he'd try, his mind would just blank itself out. It was strange, living in the here and now. He'd spent so much time living in the future. Most of his thoughts were dedicated to planning, running scenarios about future events, how things could go wrong and how he could make them go right. Consequences and results of actions rendered and precautionary contingencies for events he couldn't control. Either that, or trying to take lessons from the past.

Yet here, he was unable to do either. All he could do was stare out at the stars of the night. Funny, he'd stared at them a million times before, but they seemed so beautiful and captivating right now.

'You alright?'

He didn't reply, he wouldn't know how to even if he could. Sin wasn't not okay, but he was certainly out of sorts. His muscles weren't as tense as they typically were, his paranoia and worry were naught but faint shadows in the back of his mind. All seemed well with the world, problems didn't seem so significant, hell even Celestial's upcoming visit seemed like such a trivial matter right now.

And in all honesty, that did scare him a little bit.

'The powers of the feminine whiles, huh?'

...

'Ok dude, you're starting to freak me out a bit... C'mon, say something! A witty retort? An Acknowledgement? Anything?' No response. 'Not even a chauvinistic comment huh? Well I'll leave you to it then.'

His mind returned to the blank bliss it was before, and Sin wished it hadn't. It was wrong, but it felt so right. He knew he had responsibilities, he had cares that required his attention, but he just couldn't find it in himself to take any of it seriously.

Was this happiness? Was this what it felt like to finally be content? To let the worries of the world fade to nothing and just exist as a being who was okay with life?

The train finally arrived at the station and the stallion exited on auto-pilot. His conscious mind continually shifting from trying to force himself to think about matters of importance to succumbing to the recent memory of affection and the confusion it wrought. It bothered him, not just not being able to think straight, but the contentment it brought. Something about another individual having the power over him to make him feel this way made him almost sick, but that was the point, wasn't it? Romantic relationships?

Rhyme and Reason had their place, but emotion and intimacy were seldom creatures of logic, hence his aversion. Now here he was, caught between the desires for logical grounding and emotional release/escape.

As he slowly made his way home, Sin locked the door behind him and methodically made his way to bed. He laid down and forced himself to resign to slumber, hopefully things would make more sense in the morning.

---

Floating within the blackened dreamscape, the Nightmare infused Tantibus lashed out in star sparkled irritation. It had been vanquished from Luna's mind, taking the memory of Nightmare Moon with it. The spell had the potential to utterly obliterate the dream spell, but it fled the mind of the lunar Alicorn as soon as she'd lost consciousness.

The Tantibus watched through a small viewing portal as Celestia huffed and prodded her sister's form, trying to pull the younger alicorn from slumber.

"We must go."

The Tantibus hesitated for a moment, but decided to adhere to the memory's plea. It wanted to be free, and it had come so close with Nightmare's help, but it dared not stay. It's creator's dreamwalkers must have been close, and while they may not have had the means of completely destroying the Tantibus, it didn't know if they had the means to detain it until Luna's eventual recovery.

"Damn Celestia and her meddlesome foal." Nightmare Moon cursed as they sailed through the abyss, she was so close to consuming her host but her control fractured, just for a second, but it was more than long enough for Luna to figure out how baseless her shame was and immediately run to her sister for help.

The Tantibus replied with hollow sounding gusts and groans that sounded no where near equine in nature, nore animal in general, but to Nightmare Moon, the message was quite clear. "Yes, I am aware that she'll find us. I shall need time to think." Unfortunately, time to think wasn't a luxury the demons could afford.

"THERE THEY ARE!" A voice echoed, a Lunar pegasus pointed a hoof. "Halt fiend!"

"Dammit all! Move!" Nightmare commanded, sending the polymorph of stars and magic into a scurry across the void. It was a futile attempt however, the dream walkers were closing in at a break neck pace. Nightmare wasn't sure what would happen when they'd caught her new quasi-vessel, but she wasn't interested in finding out.

Using what little magic her memory itself still had, she cast an illusion spell that created ten clones of the Tantibus and sent them scattering in a attempt to confuse their pursuers. Their pursuers hesitated for a moment from the trick, but as luck would have it, they split off after three of the clones, leaving enough time for her to think.

She could escape into another pony's mind, but Luna's dream walkers were everywhere, they'd find her eventually. The dreamscape itself was vast, almost infinitely so, but how long would they survive out here? Her magic couldn't keep the walkers at bay forever.

A silent wisp graced her mind and Nightmare would have smiled in pure delight if she had a body to do so with. "That's perfect! Take us to him!" Another silent gust and her confidence and relief were sullied, but not broken. "I know it shall be difficult, but it's the best option we have currently. He may not have magical properties, but he can stop her from finding us. We must remain hidden!"

Silently, the Tantibus obeyed and darted full speed to where Nightmare told it to go. After dodging multiple patrols and shaking a second sighting, the two finally found their prize. A screen depicting a lone brown stallion laying in bed. "Prepare yourself." The memory warned. "This is going to be quite painful for both of us."

---

Jutting awake with a sudden flash of terror, sin bolted into a sitting position and stared around his room with labored breathing. His eyes darted around, looking for what he felt was stalking him. His eyes continued to scan every nook, ever cranny, every last crack or gap that his bedroom had to offer.

Nothing. There was nothing in the room with him, but he felt like something was. Something that was ready to pounce and devour him from the inside out.

After a full hour of inexplicably induced paranoia, the stallion started to calm down. With a sigh, he laid back down and blamed the days affairs. His mind had been numbed for so long, all of the stress had probably just come back to him in one foul, spine freezing swoop. Something outside had probably woken him up, the stress hit him all at once and he was spooked by it.

Everything was fine, he was worked up over nothing.

He chuckled to himself at his own foolishness, for a second, he could have almost sworn he had seen the boogie pony. There was no such thing, of course, it was just an old tale meant to keep young foals in line or offer a good scare. Funny thing was, though, he'd never been told a rendition of it where the boogie pony had teal and serpentine eyes.

Author's Note:

Ahhh, feels good to be back on a computer again.

Feedback is always appreciated.

Comments

[RadicalDishonesty]

Did... did NMM just somehow possess Sin?

Who is currently resistant to magic and unable to have his mind read?

... Good job making sure nothing can get to you, Sin. Except for that one thing which will have a very hard time leaving.

[Daxisle]

6556617 Different types of magic, all I can say for that. And as far as his mind goes, his brain was far more relaxed than it usually was.

Now, if he was possessed or not? That's yet to be determined.

[Godiswithus3]

"Ughh." Groaned Spike as he slowly came from the realms of unconsciousness to hazy reality. His head hurt, and though he lifted a claw to nurse the numbed throb in his eye, he felt a hoof stop his hand's advance.
"Take it easy, son." He heard a soft voice say. "You're going to need to rest for a bit."

Oh good. Spike is back.

A small sliver of concern crept up the drake's spine. Twilight knew how scared he was about the operation, something big must be happening to keep her away now.

Good deduction on his part.

His concern started to shift into anger as more and more of his thought processes cleared from their drug haze. Twilight should have been there, she promised she'd be there!

Spike, calm the hell down, you don't know what happened yet.

'No, no she isn't. That doesn't mean she doesn't want to be, though. Celestia said she needed Twilight for something, right? It must have been important if it's keeping her this long.'
That much may have been true. Spike sighed, he had no right to be so short, Twilight would be here if she could.

So glad the voice of reason calmed him down.

Luna's voice said, her head cocking to an unnatural angle to look at the unicorn, the sounds of bones popping out of place echoing through out the chamber as the Alicorn's head twisted almost 180 degrees.

Aw that just made me cringe.

With a cry, the amber spell's bright light grew too intense to behold and Twilight collapsed away from it.
The last thing she heard before exhausted unconsciousness took her was an equally powerful scream from Luna and then everything went black.

Jeez, that sounded mentally intense.

He wasn't in his right mind, if he could be called "in his mind" at all.

And in all honesty, that did scare him a little bit.
'The powers of the feminine whiles, huh?'
...

That voice is such a troll.

Rhyme and Reason had their place, but emotion and intimacy were seldom creatures of logic, hence his aversion. Now here he was, caught between the desires for logical grounding and emotional release/escape.

....very deep.

He laid down and forced himself to resign to slumber, hopefully things would make more sense in the morning.

I hope so.

A screen depicting a lone brown stallion laying in bed. "Prepare yourself." The memory warned. "This is going to be quite painful for both of us."

Oh crap.

He chuckled to himself at his own foolishness, for a second, he could have almost sworn he had seen the boogie pony. There was no such thing, of course, it was just an old tale meant to keep young foals in line or offer a good scare. Funny thing was, though, he'd never been told a rendition of it where the boogie pony had teal and serpentine eyes.

This is not going to end well.