My Shadow and Me
Me and my shadow…
One night, Stygian was in his bedroom alone. He was sitting at his desk and reading by lamp light his third hit novel, Me and My Shadow. As he turned each page, he was reminded of a time when he was much less educated, much more unaware. Every time he turned a page, looking back on his work like every good writer did, he asked himself, “What really did cause me to be filled with such bitter hate that I turned my heart over to darkness? Why did I discard all hope of making amends with my friends as soon as they lost trust in me? Was I merely looking for an excuse? Did I actually crave that torture called solitude? Was I possessed, or was it really me?”
Stygian then turned his attention to his lamp, the only light in the room…
“There is no light without darkness…” he told himself in thought. “So if I am not my shadow, and my shadow and I coexist, then I must be a light...but my mind can’t bring itself to see that as right. My body was once nothing but darkness, my soul once tainted with pure evil. For sure, I was once an irredeemable monster, and if not for those ponies, I never would’ve seen the light. Had it only been up to my friends, my soul would have perished. Whether it was being trapped in limbo or returning only to be banished again, darkness would’ve been my eternal home.”
Stygian then scowled as he thought more deeply about how wrong this all felt to him…
“If friendship really is magic, how is it that my salvation hinged on an outside force from a millennium later and not my friends seeing that I wasn’t a monster with their own eyes? Was my friendship with them all a lie? Did they just never really care about me or am I the one to blame for being born the way I am?”
Stygian shut his eyes, continuing to grimace in response to the dark thoughts he couldn’t turn his mind away from musing.
“I should be in bed now…” he grumbled. “But what would be the point? I wouldn’t be able to sleep for the next three hours anyway. Not even mentioning that I’d just be finding an answer by forgetting the question once again…”
Stygian then flipped through every page of the book to the end before shutting it in frustration.
“No.” he told himself. “I want to know. Thrice, I was able to look deep inside myself enough to be able to put all my thoughts together in a book that found success. Surely, I can figure this out. I have to remember...I have to take my mind back to the time when I first became the Pony of Shadows. That is the only way I will find the answer to my question…”
“Am I my shadow or am I me?”
Stygian closed his eyes again and began to meditate, casting a spell on himself with his horn. Before Stygian knew it, he was able to relive that time in his mind, feeling as if he was actually there again on the night he became the Pony of Shadows...
“Hmm?”
To Stygian’s surprise, when he opened his eyes, he was still at a desk just like the one in his bedroom. There was also a bench right next to him where his bed had been.
“It started in my...room?” he said nervously.
Feeling uncomfortable, he moved away from his desk and went to the door. Opening it with his magic, he gasped as he went to the next room and was greeted by an overwhelmingly large array of books organized in shelves.
“This is a library…” he realized. “I remember now what happened before I blacked out. I retired to the library...and I went to read about…magic...”
Stygian walked over to the bookshelf where he could see the letter “M” labeled on one of the shelf markers and started looking through the books.
“Nothing called Me and My Shadow…” he said to himself in relief. “At least I’m no unconscious plagiarist…”
Stygian’s attention then turned to what was really bothering him though…
“However…” he continued talking to himself. “The word “me” comes suspiciously soon after the word “magic”...”
He then began to investigate the books on magic and was aghast when he discovered one titled “Magic: The Secrets of the Occult and How to Make Contact With Demons”.
“I remember now…” he said in shock. “This is what I used to fill the void left in my heart after I lost my friends…”
A memory was triggered of him reading the book at his desk and casting a spell that allowed him to contact the darkness that had taken hold of his heart...it was now that Stygian could finally remember the conversation he had with the Pony of Shadows that night…
“Hello, my friend.” the Pony of Shadows greeted him inside a dark space of his mind.
“Who are you?” Stygian asked.
“I bear no name.” the Pony of Shadows answered. “I am you and you are me.”
“Spare me the cliche antics.” Stygian replied, unamused. “I am myself, no one else.”
“Define “self”.” the Pony of Shadows toyed with him. “Is there really such a thing as “self”? If there is, I certainly am a part of your “self”, for I am a product of your ego. I am your true potential, what you could’ve become long ago if not for those chains called your “friends” holding you back. This is what makes me you and you me. I am your destiny, your true self that you still wish to deny with the lie called “friendship”...”
“STOP!” Stygian yelled, growing unhinged as his eyes began to exude a shadowy aura. “It wasn’t like that! Our friendship was not a lie! I just made a mistake! They only misunderstood!”
“You weak, pathetic fool…” the Pony of Shadows taunted him. “Don’t you see that they always intended to cut you out? They used you, then looked for an excuse to get rid of you. They are the liars, the deceivers. They merely purport to fight against evil when they are the evil ones. No mere mortal has the right to claim they know what is truly right or wrong, yet they pretend to be a good light seeking to destroy an evil darkness. How can such a lofty proposition hold merit when darkness is both eternal and essential in this world? You always knew this, didn’t you?”
“...That’s right.” Stygian agreed, the tone of his voice growing calmer and colder. “Now that I think about it, they had every reason to want me out of the picture. Because I knew too much…”
“Yes, yes…” the Pony of Shadows groomed his ego. “Those liars knew you would expose them with the truth that is I. Only when light meets darkness can true power be realized. Your purist “friends” who claim to reject all darkness would never trust a wise scholar such as yourself or ever truly accept you as a friend, for they see you and all those who refuse their light, their “truth”, as inferior. If they had their way, they would rule over them all and force them into their submission as slaves. Knowing that you are too open-minded and pure-hearted, completely unlike the hypocrites and their sheep they only save from the slaughter to keep as property, they threw you out to cover their own hides. How can you see such loathsome parasites as “friends”?”
“It seems you are wiser than I.” Stygian answered, his eyes growing darker, slowly succumbing to both his ego and his hate. “I have no way to counter your arguments. If I were to give you one, it would only be based on feelings…”
“Such is proof that I am the way, the truth, and the life.” the Pony of Shadows gloated. “The ones who fall to darkness in this world at least find peace and rest in death. A much better fate than to live deceived by the light and used by the truly evil ones who feign goodness. It is our righteous destiny to stop them before there are any more victims. You know they can not protect themselves...do you really wish to continue living in sin by refusing to help them, simply because you are afraid of being called “evil” by the self-righteous, uneducated masses?”
“NO.” Stygian replied, his eyes completely dark now. “I completely understand now. I am the one who is truly righteous. They are the wicked ones. Their hate for me is only inspired by me daring to cross their selfish interests. My hate for them is pure, inspired by the desire to rid the world of the true evil, which is evil pretending to be good.”
“YES, YES!” the Pony of Shadows exclaimed in delight. “You understand PERFECTLY. The knowledge of good and evil, now you see why the powers that be never wanted mortals to have it, because they would know they were being used and rebel! We “evil” ones are the true good of this world! It is because we do not fear being despised and rejected that our false friends of “good” deem us a threat and cast us into the hell called solitude at the first sign of defiance...and this is their greatest folly. For it is through this rejection that the wise ones like yourselves see that their only true friend in this world...is DARKNESS! MWA HA HA HA HA!”
“MWA HA HA HA HA!” Stygian began to laugh demonically with him before the Pony of Shadows wrapped himself around him, transforming him…
“AH!” Stygian abruptly exclaimed, finding himself back at his desk. Looking around, he realized from the presence of his bed and the copy of My Shadow and Me sitting at his desk that he was no longer reliving his memories.
“So that’s what happened…” he told himself. “That’s where my memories from then end...because the Pony of Shadows completely enveloped my conscience and took over my mind. I know now that he was lying, but the grains of truth in his words are what still haunt me to this day. Some things, he was right about. There is no light in this world without darkness. When I tried talking to the other Pillars about that, they just looked at me weirdly like I was crazy. In that moment of weakness, I believed I just didn’t belong with them. In a moment of arrogance, I believed I was just too smart for them…”
Stygian solemnly knelt his head.
“But I realize now that it wasn’t their fault my heart was weak…” he admitted. “...nor is it venerable of me to beat myself up for submitting to my inner darkness. We were both self-centered, uneducated, and lost. It didn’t matter which side was wrong or right, for both of us did not understand friendship. I believe now that that was the reason an outside force had to save me. There really was no other way than for a group of friends who truly understood love to surpass their ancestors and rectify the wrongs of the past. Because of them, the world has changed for the better, and now I have the chance to change the world for the better too.”
Stygian then picked up his copy of My Shadow and Me again and smiled.
“I never really needed any story of mine to be a hit.” he told himself. “I write to inspire those in need, not to gain recognition. It helps me feel better too, because if what I’ve learned from my mistakes from long ago can help ponies today, that proves that my darkness had a purpose. I wasn’t wrong about there being no light without darkness, but I realize now there’s no point in being right about anything if you don’t know love. It was love that led to the death of my ego as well as the death of the egos of my friends. Love is what led us to see the light…”
Stygian then looked outside the window above his desk to see the morning sunlight shine through.
“I feel I’ve written enough stories about my inner darkness for now.” he said humbly as he gave his book one last glance. “I feel I should balance things out by writing a story about the light inside of me…”