Meta Gamer in Equestria: Champion's Folly

by reflective vagrant

The Devil's Due. (Pennance, Part 3)

I sat there in the middle of the castle gardens, basking in the shadows of the night.

"You deceived me."

"I withheld information of my meditations, but what I did share with you wasn't a lie. I actually was in pain and I told a truthful tale."

"You were planning this disgusting act all along."

"It was about two weeks in before I decided I needed to act, but otherwise I had made a plan much like this, yes. I also had multiple other plans in reserve, depending on what happened."

"And then you used me to get the key to it all, while lulling me into not realizing it by giving me such a powerful token of trust."

"You would have stopped me and he would have walked."

"You sat with him, day in and day out, just to wait for the perfect moment to strike."

"All the while, I listened to his mind games and saw the proof he didn't have any intention of living in peace."

"That wasn't justice you performed, Moss."

I stood up and looked to my left, then to my right. Princess Luna and Princess Celestia both were looking at me with their horns alight with magic, ready to blast me.

I turned to Princess Celestia. "I never deluded myself into believing it was."

Turning to the other princess, I inhaled firmly and met her with that same cold stare. "I commend your strength of heart in wanting to give him a fair trial. It truly is what I love about the ponies of Equestria so much. But until his execution, the war will only be over on paper. Had the war not been declared over, I would have gladly signed the papers for his Astral Judgement myself."

I then folded my arms and gave the pony that had comforted me in my darkest hour her bitter glare right back. A tear beaded from my eyes as I held firm to my stare. "Now you realize I was not simply belittling myself when I said it. Now you finally believe me when I tell you that I am a monster. Even the best of my kind need only a nudge in just the wrong way to become a monster. Now you finally see what kind of threat my kind are to your world."

Celestia came up and spoke a mournful, and yet soft and maternal voice. "It's only because of our own belief in our system's sacredness that Luna can not act against you. Even so, the pain is still there, Moss. We will never be able to fully trust you again."

"Good. You finally get it. That was the whole point of what I've been saying for so long. That's another task I set out to do completed. Now either you need to use my true name against me, or I have an old owl to see."

Princess Luna came up to me and looked me in the eyes with a slew of negative emotions. Confusion and anger were definitely among the most prominent. However, through the chaotic storm of emotions that played across her expressions there was an underlying pattern between them that came together to show the feeling that was at the root of them all. Betrayal.

"The most I can do is make a note on your record that you abused my trust to gain an advantage and that you are a potential danger. Due to the high bias around his case and my regular involvement in your dreams, I can't even give testimony on it. But if you ever misuse such power again, I actually just might have to use your true name against you as you suggest. To draw from your world's dialect, I 'pray' to the greater forces that you come to regret these actions and find peace after."

I nodded as I saw her give me a moment to say my final peace too.

"I honestly don't know if I ever will, at least not in this life. But I do wish you well in my parting."

She lifted a foreleg and pointed in the direction that led to the courtyard and castle gate. "Now be gone. I do not ever want to see your face again, Moss."

---

It was a long, lonely train ride back to Ponyville. I didn't really have anywhere in particular to go after my tasks were done, so it wasn't exactly a train ride 'home.' I doubted I'd even be welcomed if knowledge of what I had done was shared beyond the two royal sisters.

The cab was empty, save for myself and Archimedes, whom I had finally picked up.

I could tell he was still sore, as I had lifted my commands and he was able to speak freely to me, and yet he simply stayed quiet and stared away from me, out the window and into the darkness.

We were about half way through the ride when I had reached out for the ump-teenth time to him, only to withdraw my hand again.

"She was beautiful." I finally heard him call to me. His tone wasn't one of anger, or even his usual disdain. Just a painful sadness.

With a shock at both the emotion and the fact that he talked first, I could only say, "What?"

"My beloved back from the first rift war. She was only an average looker, for a just fully grown mortal, but her heart was one of the most beautiful I had ever seen. She was strong, yet kind, and was never afraid to tell me when I was wrong on something despite the difference in our years and level of power. Nothing compared to the inner beauty I saw in her in the centuries before I met her or in the millenniums since."

I paused with a slightly agape mouth and a look of confusion in my eyes.

"My species—that is to say my species as a type of celestial, not owl—are very prone to feeling any emotion strongly and having even stronger ties, once we form them at least. Only a few in the old world or this one could even hold a candle to her inner beauty, your beloved Fluttershy being one of those few. So imagine the bond I've seen in you and Fluttershy, then add romance and times what you would get by a thousand. That is roughly how I could compare the amount of inner beauty I saw in my beloved in crude terms."

He turned around and looked into my eyes.

"Towards the end of the first rift war, she died trying to heal another. I felt a devastation much like your own that night. I wasn't at my full capacity in magic back then, but I was still much stronger than you are currently. She had told me that she would die some day and that I would have to learn to keep moving without her because she believed strongly in not only protecting life, but also protecting the sanctity of it, much like yourself. I thought that might be decades into the future, but that battle proved me wrong."

He stopped, and shifted his posture as if nearly choking on something while swallowing, then steadied his breathing.

"And then I did the same thing you did, Moss. I tried to bring her back. I tried multiple times and failed every time. At first I thought something had trapped her soul."

He put his head against my shoulder from his spot on the cushion and continued in a tone of utter shame.

"I tried to search for anything that might have kept her from coming back, as I had brought other fighters back on occasion when we had the resources for such a spell. This was one of the few tricks I could do that would aid the war that my rival, Discord as you call him, could not. Had we been in the old world, I could have sought her out in the plane her soul went to, but such a luxury does not exist in this world's planes. The veil does not allow the living to travel across it here in any manner, nor draw any information. It barely allows us to call out to it, allowing the dead to return."

I finally was able to bring my hand up to comfort him. Against his usual nature, he leaned into the embrace of my hand as if he needed it like he needed air.

"I wanted to deny it, but the evidence I gathered between missions was too overwhelming. There was nothing keeping her from coming back. Her devotion to the sanctity of life was simply so strong that she was refusing to answer my call and come back to me."

Pressing in so hard I had to actually support his weight, he continued.

"I was so devastated when I finally admitted it to myself that I almost planned on giving up in that last battle and letting myself be killed. But then something happened. Something amazing and terrifying at the same time. I had a dream."

I pulled my hand away and let him suddenly tip over and fall into the seat.

"You had a dream? What's so amazing about that?"

After getting himself set straight again, he explained. "It's amazing because my kind do not dream like mortals. We rest, yes, at least when needed. We even become attuned to the astral realm and meditate to clear our minds in a similar manner to what your minds do while sleeping, albeit a good deal more organized. What we do not do, however, is simply visualize random things that buzz around our minds like mortals. We do not visualize anything. When we do have a dream it is of utmost importance. Great sages of celestials past can guide us in our lifelong training or other entities such as ghosts or trapped souls can call to us to avenge their deaths. Sometimes it is even a clairvoyant prophecy in the most devote of us to our masters, though that has long since stopped applying to me. Though they are a different kind of celestial that have a different purpose to their dreams, the couatl are able to be forewarned of their own deaths a full century in advance in their dreams and make preparations for their passing."

He looked up to me to indicate he was getting back to his point.

"When I slept on the eve of that battle, I dreamt of her. The words of the ancient tongue do not translate well to your tongue, but their equivalent meaning would have been, 'If you love me, then redeem your greed to keep me by extending that passion to the world I love. You're journey will be long and you will have to sacrifice being with me many times over to see it through to its end, but some day you will join me here. Until then, I will wait for you. Do not give up.'"

After that, silence filled the cab for several minutes. I reflected on his words, how his sacrifices made a bit more sense and how long he had been holding on. Eventually, I had the courage to speak.

"No wonder you always have disdain in your voice. Does the path to redemption ever get any easier? What kept you going after all this time?"

He shook his head gently. "No, it doesn't. It's a long, lonely and unrewarding path of penance, poetically so I suppose. As for what keeps me going? Hope. Not the feel good kind that a child or a pair of lovebirds might have. That has failed me time and time again. No. Now all that drives me is a cold, bitter on the tongue like medicine, hope. It was that kind of faith fueled bitter hope that gave me the strength to jump through that portal and let the one bonded to Discord seal myself and the others away from her to protect the world she loved, as she asked of me."

He then hopped onto my lap and cocked his head. His tone finally lost its melancholy and perked up a little. "So I do not blame you for acting rashly against me. If I had such a bond at your age, I would have just as easily done the same. As a thank you for listening to my tale, partner, I will reward you with a little information. I can tell you do not know the ramifications of the spell you cast. Few your age would.

"I understand you believe in an entity beyond all things. I am not well versed in such theology or what ramifications that would bring to your moral code, and thus that might change the formula a little, but within the realms of the magics I am familiar with I can tell you this. All knowledge and research in regards to spells that properly bring back the dead to a living state, including the one you cast, does indeed bring back the soul, and the entire soul back. You are a heavy thinker, so you will have your doubts regardless, but I believe it is her. She's not a copy, nor some fragment. All of her is there, at least according to every last bit of evidence I have ever heard of."

---

I had only gotten a moderate cat nap on the train, partially due to my nerves, and partially from the short remaining distance.

I hurried off the platform as the rest of the train was promptly moved down the line to drop off and pick up cargo further down the line. The royal sisters had ordered my prompt expulsion from the city of Canterlot. Once I told them my desired destination, the train yard had simply put a single passenger cab onto an appropriate cargo train to accommodate me.

By the time I had reached the cottage, the sun was just about finished rising and the morning light was a sight to behold on the old place.

This was it. The moment I both strived for, yet feared. My next task. I finally took a breath and knocked on the door.

After a few moments, Tempest answered, toothbrush still in her mouth. She and I simply stared into each others eyes. I oddly didn't sense any anger from her, but I also didn't see a welcoming smile, just surprise.

"Who is at the door this early Tempest?" I heard an angelic voice call out, "Do we have a guest for breakfast... Moss!?"