Life. I had to live mine, as a second chance. I remembered everything on the day I felt my heart stop at the bottom of the crater, the warmth of the blood around me, but the coldness filling my insides as my life faded. I wish I didn’t have to deal with the nightmares every night, feeling the gripping cold squeeze my heart knowing that if I could only look up I could see the mare that I loved, but being broken as I was, that never happened. Instead, I accept my fate and keep my head down, only trying to breathe and keep my heart going, feeling it sputter and lose pressure from the lack of blood. The pain, the cold, the darkness, the loneliness, it never leaves my senses as I stare out in the darkness of my room.
It had been a two months since the incident in the Everfree, but I wasn’t one to be forgetting what had occurred in those woods. I managed to live somehow, guided by a strange entity that took on the name of an old pony nursery rhyme. Eyn Spyyr, he called himself, a mysterious and blind alicorn that held my entire body still and controlled my voice along with everything around me to insure that I, along with my friends, arrived at the base of the crater, deep in the Everfree, providing them with a theater of my death.
I don’t know why he wanted me there, or why he let me die when he knew full well that I was going to fall. I even question if he even existed, but now I am here and now, bandaged and broken, but alive and kicking.
Vinyl sleeps in my bed every night now, not out of our new found love, but because I wake every few hours, screaming out to her, panicked and afraid. She comforts me and stays by my side. Feeling her warmth and her body pressed against mine provides a degree of security that no other pony could give me. Dying felt much easier than trying to live after death. I find myself losing sleep, and although she doesn’t admit it, I know Vinyl is losing sleep as well, but she puts on a good face.
“Feeling any better, Tavi?” She asks every morning, using her pet name for me. Octavia is my real name, but she reserves it for more serious instances.
“Slightly.” I give the same lie every morning.
I can’t shake the idea that something so powerful, and so angry, could just sit in the woods, and do nothing except humor stubborn adventurers. Nothing makes sense and every night it only seems to bring more questions as my dreams tell me a different story. What did Eyn do to me when he revived me? Was it my dreams, his source of communication and power? Was my whole body still a puppet in his grand designs? I can never shake it, nor can I shake the strange sensations within me. Was it a side effect of death, or was it a fear of losing Vinyl again. Everything lost its simplicity.
“You know I will never believe that…” Vinyl says, hitting my shoulder with her hoof. I stare into those crimson eyes before I can’t bear the weight of my thoughts anymore, dragging my vision to the floor, eyes dazed, brain fuzzy.
“Have anything planned for today?” I ask, trying to mask the initial conversation behind another subject. I hope to find something for Vinyl to enjoy.
I lock eyes with her once more. The initial confusion quickly melts away from her face to that of understanding, one that tells me that she knows I am still avoiding telling her the question. It is a long shot to expect Vinyl of all mares to go with a subject change without question. She changes the subject whenever she feels the desire to change the subject. As I guessed, she grins at me and I know the subject isn’t leaving her mind. Annoyed and letting the feelings of defeat take me, I try to find a better way to approach her prying.
“You can trust me, Tavi.” She speaks with such a degree of love and kindness, soft and understanding, that I question where the spontaneous and blunt Vinyl ran off.
Hearing the white mare that I live with hold so much love behind her words makes my eyes widen as my heart swells. I wouldn’t expect any pony in Ponyville to understand the love that we share, but then again, I knew there was something amiss in my head.
“I know I just…” The thoughts are still caught in my throat as I feel the lump stop me half way. I couldn’t talk about it. What would I tell her? Did I have any good reason as to why I was acting like this? I know I can trust her, but I didn’t want her to see me as over-analyzing it. I know she will tell me to let go before dragging me out to a club, tying glow sticks around my legs and neck and getting me to dance with her. I can’t complain against such dates, but they only take my mind off of those thoughts for the duration of the party. Then I feel them return like they never left.
“…Yes?” Vinyl pries.
“I don’t know.” My words are shallow and I knew she understood it. The glint in her eyes is enough for me to know that she was aware that I knew exactly what was going on, and, with only a simple ambiguous answer, she could piece together the puzzle and figure out my dilemma.
I could only stand in front of her, feeling my knees want to kick out from under me and send me back into the bed or onto the floor so I could just relax my muscles, but I knew I would cry out of both embarrassment and pain from the dreams that haunt me. I just want her to be safe and to never cause her the grief of losing me again. I try to hold myself together right up to the point that my back legs gave out and my flank hit the floor. I am a mess as I sit on the floor, head sunk in shame as my heart opened up, letting the visions that I am seeing out into the open.
“He’s out of the forest, Vinyl." I say, tears beginning to fall from my eyes. “I think I know what he wants too.” I can only guess from the feelings that I feel.
Sometimes I think that I am inside his mind, only along for the ride. I saw him climb along the path to Canterlot, his breathing heavy, his body in more pain than anypony could imagine. The sensation of dragging a fake leg, the biting cold, the wetness of the rain, I felt all within my dreams, an un-waking nightmare. Was that how Eyn lived his entire life? Was he constantly living in his own personal nightmare? I could hear his thoughts as he continued. He had only repeated Celestia’s name sixty times before saying Luna once. The intentions were still fuzzy, but I could guess that they weren’t good.
“What do you mean? What does he want?" Vinyl asks.
Her emotions and face take on a whole new appearance as she sees that I am finally letting go after so long.
I try to take a deep breath to steady my breathing, but the bandages around my waist from where my side blew out stops the breath part way through, leaving only half the air I need. “I don’t know… I’m just afraid.” I still feel like that afraid pony in the forest, cringing and hoping her friends will save her. It makes me sick to think of how pathetic I must look in Vinyl’s eyes. Instead, I feel her head brush against mine, resting against my shoulder, our cheeks touching.
“Tavi…” Her words trail as she lets her face and her embrace tell me the rest.
I can only imagine how hard it is for her to hold herself together while I am the mess that I am. A stab of pain causes my ears to jerk as Vinyl presses my shoulder down. It isn’t her fault. I know that I am supposed to be taking it easy on my sore ribs and not to tear my stitches amid her taking me to clubs, but having that much fun normally wipes the pain I feel now off the grid.
“Now get your flank back in bed. I will bring you some soup.”
“I’m not sick, Vinyl. I’m just in pain…” I manage to coherently yell at her through the sobs and pain. “I get my stitches out tomorrow anyway…” I fade, knowing she can no longer hear me.
The cuts on my flanks had taken longer than expected to heal forcing the doctors to keep the stitches in for months. Luckily, I was able to attend the Nightmare Night Celebration as a scarecrow to hide them. It was Vinyl’s idea. At least tomorrow will hold some normalcy again. I crawl back into the soft linens on the bed and huddle in the cavity that Vinyl left behind when she jumped out of bed. It is still warm and makes me smile as I curl into it mimicking how she lays, smelling her scent on the pillow. I will never forget the smell of sweat and electronic music.
I climb back into the bed with barely another thought on the subject, using the blankets and the pillows to dry off my face. I collected myself and stared out the window of the bedroom. Snow is blanketing over the land. I heard of the play that was being given at Canterlot over the origins of Ponyville. I want to go, but Vinyl had already spouted her claims of being told the same story hundreds of times. I think she is more in my boat when I say that I now think that the history the play represents is false. The blankets provide enough support and comfort to ease my troubled mind. Seeing the scars on my body only opens up more unpleasant memories.
“Here is your soup, Tavi.” Vinyl strolls in with her usual cheer, though seeing her have her glasses dropped over her eyes only make me suspicious of if she had been crying while getting the soup. Nothing is more depressing than seeing such a strong mare as Vinyl falling under the pressure of it all, but time had slowly sealed our wounds and only the rare occasions bring back our old sadness of loss and fear. “Eat up.”
I open my mouth to try and counter her attempts to make me eat soup when I am able enough to move without her help anymore, but she jumps into the bed beside me. She places her head on my shoulder, which only sends shivers down my spine as I breathe in the warm steam from the soup that Vinyl has surprisingly not burned. I couldn’t help but slowly rub my head against hers softly, glad to have her in my life.
“Getting all affectionate now. Maybe I should bring you soup more often.” Vinyl chimes.
I can’t help but smile at her joke. “You just have to be here.” I whisper into her ear.
I never would have imagined Vinyl and I would get together. Most of Ponyville equally didn’t see it coming, though from our old prank of saying that we were together, some were only confused wondering if it was still a joke. Slowly, but surely, our coupling became known across Ponyville, though not in the regard of parades or angry mobs. It worked its way more like a whisper. The larger issue that spread through the rumor network was the causes of my life threatening injuries. Some of my fans had even arrived at the hospital while I was still under heavy sedation to give their best wishes. I can still remember each of their blurry unrecognizable faces before I passed out, free from pain.
I bet that everyone thought I look completely peaceful in the bed as I slept, but the harsh reality of it was an unending nightmare that I couldn’t escape. With the drugs to remove the pain making me feel better when I was awake, no one seemed to notice my nights. The moment when I couldn’t hold my eyes open any longer, the nightmares arrived in full force. The first nightmare I had repeated more than any other of the nightmares.
I saw what Eyn was seeing, though I don’t know if he could see out of those blind eyes like I could. The rain pelted the ground around him as he dragged himself through the mud, through the muck and the grime toward Canterlot. The scene snapped and I saw a guard approaching me, staring at me suspiciously. I could feel everything that Eyn felt including the smile across his face and the vibration of his voice as he answered the guard. In just a short moment, I knew how magic felt. The ability to feel the world around me as if there were feelers radiating off of my body, holding and caressing the world, a sensation beyond anything that I could even describe.
I brought up the sensations to Vinyl when I could speak more coherently. The pause in her actions and the look in her eyes told me that I must have been the only earth pony that could accurately describe the feeling of magic, but as she described her field of sensation, I knew there was something far more powerful within Eyn.
I watched the guard behind Eyn’s eyes, feeling the entire city of Canterlot in my field, knowing full well that if I had so desired, I could lift the entire city of Canterlot from its mountain foundations and send it toppling to the ground. The power was beyond anything that any unicorn or alicorn could hope for. As I let the sensation of the magic flood around me, almost feeling as if this was a good dream, I felt the pulse of energy grab the above cloud of the storm. As the words left my mouth, an explosion of sensation permeated through me as if power had exploded from within. When I focused on the guard in front of me, there was nothing left. Murder was something that I thought would never exist in Equestria, nor did I think I would get a front row seat to it.
When I woke up that night, I could hear the crying of babies and the sound of doctors galloping down the hallways trying to ease the hearts and minds of the other patients. Could such a disturbance be felt even from here that everyone would have known of the life lost that day? As I listened to the ponies outside converse, I learned that there had been some sort of flood of light that had exploded into the hallway, shaking the hospital. Being unable to move only provided me a chance to listen to the rumors outside of my door as the hours passed. Some witnesses had said that the light had come from my room. I didn’t believe them.
Eventually I was asked questions, though I blamed it on the medicine, saying I must have slept through the whole thing, which was a truth in my eyes. The suspicion in their eyes confirmed that it had been me, causing only more worry to course through my veins. What did Eyn do to me? Were we now connected in not just mind but body? Did he intend it that way or was it some sort of side effect? Locked to the bed behind the binds of pain and fear of ripping open the stitches, I reflected on the thoughts.
“You need to try and eat something.” Vinyl coos into my ear before she softly chews on it.
“Hey…” I try to brush her off. “I can’t eat the soup if you are trying to eat me.”
Vinyl can easily disarm any situation, though I’ve awakened at night and listened to her talk in her sleep. How she calls out to me as she lies there, kicking her legs, her face contorting. She calls out to me in only a mumble in this world, but it must be a full-blown scream in her dream. The pain and fear, the desperation is too much and I must embrace her, let her nerves calm before the soft breathing returns to her body. I am always there for her as she is there for me. Without the other, I feel that sleep would be impossible.
“Sorry, Octavia.” Vinyl’s cuddling had only increased after I escaped the cold hands of the hospital staff.
I walked out of the hospital expecting maybe a crowd or something of those that enjoyed my music and would be happy to see that I lived, but barely anypony was outside. I guessed that I was just lost in the background of everyone’s minds. In fact more ponies talked to Vinyl than me. It made me jealous slightly, but feeling the pain in my ribs at each breath, only made me want to limp back into the hospital and hook myself back to the pain medications. The doctors said that I needed to let it heal naturally now, and to clear my body of the chemicals. I guess they already had Vinyl in on their plan since she has been cooking soup, the same soup, at every moment that she could. Her cooking skills were always sub-par, somehow catching everything on fire or burning water; she wasn’t the most graceful of ponies when dealing with the patience needed to cook anything that wasn’t instant. There must be some soup guru that had his work cut out for him.
“This is pretty good.” It actually is really good this time around, surprisingly good, unnaturally good. “Who helped you?”
“What? Somepony helping me? I didn’t need any help…” She can tell I know she is bluffing. “Bonbon and Lyra are here.” She lifts her glasses up revealing excited eyes. I was wrong as to why she had them on.
“Hello, Octavia. How are you faring?” Bonbon trots into the room, Lyra close on her hooves.
“Hello Bonbon, Lyra.” I nod at them respectfully.
The few words that Lyra and I exchanged during our time in the Everfree Forest were enough for me to come and respect her. As for Bonbon, I had never met her truly face to face except whenever I stood at their wedding, playing some of the best romantic classical pieces that I knew. It felt awkward being there considering the questionable nature of the whole union, but the joys of being deft with the bow allowed me to keep my eyes closed most of the time. Strange enough, from what I saw during that time, I tried to picture myself in their place, looking into my special somepony’s eyes.
“I am improving slowly, though I don’t see why Vinyl insists on making me soup. I’m completely capable of moving without being babied.” I say, turning my attention to Vinyl to see that she is stifling a laugh, success.
“I brought some candies over just in case you were, they are in the kitchen.” Bonbon says, smiling softly at me. I manage to catch a glimpse of Lyra to see her staring at Bonbon, a smile reflecting her heart.
I question if my eyes share in the softness that shimmered brilliantly from those gold eyes. Over the months, my friendship with Lyra had blossomed into something that I never knew could exist. In instances, we sat in the windowsill harmonizing my violin to her lyre. I attempted to stand on my hind legs to play my cello a few days after that, hoping to add my signature sound to the harmony, but a sudden pop in my ribs told me that it wasn’t a bright idea, at least not right now.
“You never make me any candy…” Lyra groans playfully.
“I give you the ones that aren’t suited for sale. We have to keep our business afloat.” Bonbon takes on a more authoritative stand making me question which of the two held the power in the house, if either of them. Maybe it is mutual like Vinyl and I.
“Yes, dear.” Lyra says, defeated.
I realize that I am smiling at the whole scene. Reflexes cause my hoof to raise and cover my mouth to hide my enjoyment of the situation. I was never one for the enjoying of other pony’s love, but feeling the body beside me and causing warmth to fill every area of my body, I truly knew what it meant.
“I’m sure there is some sugar that we can find.” Bonbon teases, grabbing even my attention as I see her touch noses with Lyra, their heads turning just enough, their lips coming together for only a second.
It is one of those moments where my old life still kicks in. I am in a relationship with Vinyl, though to be honest, we only kissed once or twice and that was when I was about to die or under heavy drugs in the hospital. Seeing two mares kiss is still foreign to me, but I can still draw the memories of the warmth of Vinyl’s lips and how the warmth satiated through my body. It made me feel free and complete before I fell into the void and lost everything. Sometimes I feel myself desiring to feel her lips on mine again, but we had only just begun to officially date and our romantic amendment to our living is only in its infancy. Sleeping in the same bed has only proven to be our means of getting to sleep without the nightmares that haunt us both of an adventure gone wrong.
The soft tickling of hot breath on my neck breaks me from my thoughts as Vinyl hugs my body from the back, her head resting between my face and on my shoulder. Her eyes are closed as she enjoys my heat and I hers. Did one simple romantic act influence Vinyl to be this soft hearted? Living with Vinyl for most of my life has only proven, on almost every occasion, that Vinyl is not soft like how she is acting. Is that the power of love? Can it truly move a pony to act completely unlike their regular selves? It is only in that time that I feel that my smile has only intensified.
I open my eyes to only find that the peck of their lips lasted as long as Vinyl’s embrace. It is fleeting at best, yet in my mind, it felt like minutes of having her near me. The peace at mind, the clearing of thought, the cleansing of ruined emotions, all ailments, escaped from my body, but as she left from behind me, getting back onto the floor and walking out the door, I felt a longing to be with her again. Is this what love can do to a mare? Is that the power of love?
I look down at the bow tied comfortably around my neck, a treble cleft with Vinyl’s Cutie Mark secured to the side. It dangled by the small chain, a roommate anniversary gift. I can only look back at those days with a degree of humor. I think we both knew that we loved the other, but deep down something stopped us, and I believe it is still stopping us now. We had seen the backlash that Lyra and Bonbon received as many questioned their union and the practicality of it. They would never have little fillies and colts, but I didn’t see the issue with it. As I stared at Vinyl, I knew that children were not a possibility. I could not see it, and I don’t think that Vinyl could handle it.
“Have you two ever thought of having children?” I ask before my lips could muffle my words.
It breaks the peace of the situation and catches the couple off guard as they turn their attention on me. Lyra’s eyes widen at the thought of the question, and the answer that she wishes to give if any. Bonbon is surprised at first, but quickly controls herself.
“We have already discussed our plans for children.” She smiles coyly before continuing. “We feel it is a private matter.”
My curiosity still gets the better of me as my mouth opens again. “Who will mother the baby?”
The initial shock had already cleared the room as Bonbon continued. “I will as Lyra runs the candy store. And might I ask, have you and Vinyl thought about such?” Bonbon’s words hits both of us with such a strange force that Vinyl almost falls over. If I weren’t already lying down, I probably would have. Now I felt guilty for asking Lyra and Bonbon
“We aren’t at that level of intimacy yet.” I choke, my eyes darting to Vinyl’s. I said ‘yet’. Did I want it to be on our minds eventually? Lying in bed with her, not out of necessity, but out of love, embraced and discussing children, how we would approach such a situation. Who would the biological father be?
As she turns toward me, a flash from her glasses sets something off within me. I feel it slowly creep around my heart as if a nightmare was taking over my dreams except I was awake. Everything around me goes silent leaving only my breathing and my heart. To further the blindness, I close my eyes until a different image emerges. I can feel myself walking, a heavy limp in my leg with pain throughout. The sensation of everything fills me.
I find myself standing in Canterlot, walking through the streets at night, another time than what I left while I was in my room. I look around, not because I am curious, but because my head is moving without my permission. I manage to catch a reflection from one of the windows and observe the tattered cloak resting around my body, the metal wings glinting in the moonlight. The eyes stare back at me, white as the moon, blind as the night.
Eyn walks himself through the narrow back streets of Canterlot, avoiding the lights of windows and guards as if he is aware of all their presences, but as I feel what he feels, I know that no guard could ever catch him. He can feel every guard, every filly, colt, mare, and stallion. More disturbing is his attention on the large sensation that Eyn’s thoughts recognize as Princess Celestia with another sensation referred to as Luna. The focus that Eyn was giving to the two princesses only made me worry more, wondering what this damaged alicorn was up to.
As if to answer my questions, his voice fills my head. “She needs to remember the pain in which she caused. To both of us.” His thoughts speak with his strength and power that I felt the first time that he spoke directly into my head.
“She didn’t cause me any pain. Why are you doing this?” I ask, or rather think in this case.
“I am righting a wrong that should have never occurred. I am getting what should rightfully be mine.” I cannot read his emotion, hidden behind a wall of cold logic and thought.
I can only sit idly as his body persists through the city. He must have been limping around in the back streets for months, hiding, and barely eating, though it seems that he didn’t need to eat. Instead, I would enter his mind to see him sitting in the sun, eyes closed, the focus on the whole city of Canterlot, scanning it carefully.
We proceed through the dark streets; his intentions are completely hidden except for the reoccurring voice that spoke “Soon”, causing me to only worry more. I want to yell out to the princesses, warn the royal guards that something bad is about to happen, but how can I make them believe that an ancient alicorn that has been locked inside of the Everfree Forest has escaped. He holds some vendetta against the princesses; I can feel it though I don’t know why he feels this way. Even more troubling is the shear fact that no pony would even remember that this alicorn exists. I would sound insane. How far had he planned this? There is no way for anypony to believe me except Vinyl.
Trying to imagine him planning this in his thousand-year exile only skips off my head as things don’t add up. If Eyn planned everything before our group even entered the Everfree, why did he help is in the forest? Did he have a heart for the dismayed that would have died in the woods, or were we chess pieces in some grand design? If we were the pieces, what role were we going to play, what did he expect?
“I expect you to help me if you like it or not.” This voice is callous and unfeeling. If I had my own heart, it would be frozen amid my own cold logic.
Help him if I like it or not? The words echoed in my head as the world around me dissolved and I found myself back in the room. Nothing seems to have changed; including, it appears, that time had just picked up immediately after a blink of my eyes. My brain barely misses a beat as it states the thought I had before I lost my grip on reality and fell into the complexity of a deranged alicorn.
“Though I would very much like that.” Vinyl stares at me, a half smile cracking on her face. I didn’t know if I answering the previous question and statements or I was answering Eyn.
“Aw yeah!” She gives her usual big smile as she leaves the room, bobbing her head to some music that has filled her head at my mention of continuing our love. I figure that Vinyl has some thought that once we had each other for a few days that the feeling would fade away, maybe kiss once and know that maybe two mares loving each other isn’t our thing. I couldn’t lie to myself, I know our relationship will last as illogical as that sounds.
A bigger question that permeates my thoughts now is if Eyn would let anypony live after he has ‘righted the wrong’ that he mentioned to me. Then my thoughts snap back to my paranoia. If he is the master puppeteer then what does him telling me his plans cause? Maybe he wants me to run to her, try to warn the castle of the possible threat, but why would he want that? Maybe he knows that I am thinking this way and that showing me would cause doubt and therefore forcing me to tell no pony. My mind blanks out.
“I’m glad to see that you two are getting along so well.” Bonbon smiles as she begins to leave the room. “My best of wishes to you, Octavia. Give us a heads up when your next concert is, and we will come along to give our most heartfelt cheers.”
“I’ll be sure to bring some roses so that we can throw them on the stage after you are done.” Lyra winks.
Vinyl walks back into the room. I guess she forgot why she was even leaving in the first place and had to return seeing as there was no pony to talk to outside of this room.
“Then you should bring two roses because Vinyl will be on stage as well.” I smile as my plans are revealed. Vinyl stares at me with a confusion that brightens my day, outshining the tears of the morning.
“Say what, Tavi?” She peers over her glasses.
“For my concert in Canterlot, my masterpiece that I’ve written to play for Celestia and Luna. I want to harmonize our skills and create something that will move the crowd.” I wink.
“I get to play for the prettied up coattails of Canterlot? I’m guessing they won’t need any glow-sticks or fluorescent paint thrown on them?”
“It would be best to stay behind your turntables and equipment. This is important to me.”
“Nothing like watching a bunch of stiffs try and dance…” Vinyl lacks any enthusiasm in her tone, but I can tell a degree of excitement fills in the gaps in her eyes.
“It won’t be like the raves you take me to. This will have to have some elegance to it, however. Trance.” I nod as my expectations replay in my head.
Vinyl only smiles, letting off a half chuckle. “Then we will show them something that they’ve never heard before.”
Vinyl and I laugh at the thought. Bonbon and Lyra look between the two of us, smiling and seeing what makes our relationship function. The power of music is a strong connecting force, especially when two forces find common ground and meet in harmony. Love at first note, two hearts as one as the pin in my bow symbolized for us. I clouded out the thoughts against Eyn for now, feeling as this concert was my redeeming show, and a show that I could reveal my own secret, my own locked box sitting under my bed that I will deny the key to when I give it to Vinyl. The thought only made me grin wider to the point that I thought that even Eyn was grinning, though I couldn’t quite place why.