Chapter VII
Edward woke up, the shards of that horrible nightmare floating in his head. That… the details were hazy, and they were slipping away from him even now, but he remembered getting out the house using those mysterious powers, going in search of Rarity to kill her and then ended up torturing and killing her cat. It had all felt so… real. So vivid. Even as things were now, it felt more vivid than that mess in the Everfree Forest.
He sat up, one hand on his stomach. But there was nothing. No sudden dizziness, no nausea. What hurt was the pain inside. He couldn't believe he was even remotely considering such a thing. Even a world where talking animals ruled the earth, killing people in your dreams wasn't something that belonged in reality, but in a horror movie.
Of course, he couldn't and wouldn't rule out a spell to control people. But… he looked towards the door. It was locked. When he had gone out in his dream, he distinctly remembered making the lock fall. And now it was there again, without even a scratch. So that dream couldn't have be real.
He let out a breath he didn't even know he had be holding. Of course. Of course it wasn't real. He had done something like that once before, back in the forest, with that large black dog. But he had only done so because it had be about to kill him. Nobody couldn't blame him for defending himself, for enjoying that he had turned the tables on that thing. And the thoughts he had after… it had only be because he thought it was dream, it had felt like a dream at least, and he angry, frustrated and nearing his breaking point. That was all there was to it.
No, not at all.
The power he had pulled from inside himself. What was that? He, of course, had never done such a thing before. He couldn't have. But on that moment, on the verge of his death, it had come so easily. He had destroyed that dog so easily. He was tempted to dismiss it as a stress induced hallucination, but something held it back from it. Something. He couldn't dismiss it out of hand, not in this world. Though, of course, it wasn't like he could go to Fluttershy or, really, any of the others and ask them to search for the mutilated corpse of a large black dog inside that forest.
He got out of the bed. He didn't feel any better that yesterday, but he needed to go to the bathroom and, in any case, he felt like if he spend even one more second on that bed he would go crazy for real. The birds chirping could be heard from the outside. He just wished they would shut up, for once.
He found the bathroom, eventually. Needless to say, it wasn't a human bathroom. Aside from being a big strange, it wasn't so different nor difficult. Besides, if he didn't do in the bathroom he would have to go to the forest, and he couldn't really see himself do something like that even though he was the only human around. Not like he had any choice, then.
He went looking for Fluttershy, to beg her for food. She gave a whole plate of vegetables. He hated them, obviously. But he ate them, anyway. In world when lots of animals were sentient it only made sense that they would eat lots of vegetables and stuff like that, and, besides, he didn't have any right to complain. This wasn't his home. This wasn't even his world, which was something he was trying hard not too think about.
When he finished, he washed the dishes. Fluttershy tried to insist otherwise, but he felt like he needed to do something, if only to distract him from his own thoughts, so he did so. He had learned to do so since a young age. The fat slob he had for a father could hardly be brothered to do anything, so he had to do everything. He had never liked it doing it, but it was easy, quick and simple and it let him put his mind on autopilot and not worry for a few minutes. He also washed yesterday's dishes.
Then, not having anything to do, he went back to bed. He considered trying to sleep, but after yesterday's nightmare… he wasn't quite in the mood for it. Fluttershy had informed him that Twilight had sent regular, scheduled visits to him, so he at least had that to look forward to, even though he knew she wasn't doing out of the kindness of her heart.
And she came. An hour later that she was supposed to, but she came. The smile in her face was shaky, obviously fake and she was rather ragged looking. It was a big difference from yesterday.
"A-are you okay?" he tentatively asked, feeling awkward. "What happened?"
"No, I'm not okay." she said, after a small pause. He could see in her tone and body language that she was desperately trying to kept her composure. "Op… Rarity's pet cat was brutalized, and killed. There was so much blood..."
Those words stopped him cold. Suddenly, the dream came back to him with stark clarity. Only, it was clearly not a dream. The lock had be there even though it wasn't supposed to be there, but it hadn't be a dream. Shaving away the skin, ripping off the flesh, dislocating the bones. And that last push, leaving its blood all over the wall and something that was more a badly made sculpture that something that had once had be alive.
So it meant it was real.
He had killed for real.
"I'm sorry about that," he shuttered out, not even really sure of what he was saying, still reeling for the shock of that realization.
"Its not your fault." she said, forcing her smile to widen. Just a little bit. That made him felt even worse. "Anyway. Can we start were we left off yesterday? You told me much about human society, but you never really told me much about yourself."
Of course he hadn't. There were some things that couldn't just be told. He had told her the general stuff, but omitted a few details. The crucial details. He hadn't wanted to lie, and lying by omission was still lying, but it didn't make him felt as bad.
"I don't like talking about myself." he admitted, with perhaps a hint of bitterness in his voice. "I'm not a great conversation topic."
"Well," she shrugged. "Perhaps not in your world, but as for me, I'm hearing about another world. How could that not excite me?"
"I guess. But sorry, I still don't like talking about myself."
"Why? Did something happen to you?"
"...No."
"That doesn't sound very convincing, you know?"
"Maybe." he sighed, laid back down on the bed and fixed his gaze at the ceiling. "Nothing happened, is just that I really don't like talking about myself. I find it hard to do it, and it would come across as self important. So let's just leave that aside, okay?"
"Okay. But more general questions are good, right?"
"Shot." he bit his lip. "I meant, of course."
"That's a really strange expression."
"I guess." though, if you asked him, the similarity between their expression was stranger to him. And that they said everypony, like they were only species on the planet, was also pretty strange. But well. It wasn't his world. It wasn't like he could judge them, when he had be here for only one day and a few hours and he hadn't really seen much about the place.
So they ended up talking about irrelevant things, and, truthfully, somewhere along the way he forgot he was talking to a pony and he was out of his own world. He felt at peace, and almost like he was just talking to an old fried. That illusion got shattered every time he had to explain things which would be common knowledge to any human, but still, it was a nice feeling. He could get used to this.
The one thing that remained in his mind after she left, at nightfall, was a question. Why? No matter how he thought about it, he couldn't see what was she getting out of those little talks. They hadn't never had contact with humans before, which meant that they didn't have some sort of portal to his world or something, so he didn't seriously consider that they could be planning on invading his world or something. Also, he couldn't see how talking with him helped her investigate whatever happened to cause an anomaly in that forest.
He wasn't stupid. It was clear to him that his appearance had be that anomaly, or at least the results of it, but if they suspected it was so, he had expected them to tie them down to a table and poke around inside his body to see what made him tick, what made happen what had happen, no matter how pure of a society they say they were. A saccharine dystopia was still a dystopia, in the end. That things looked like they said they were didn't necessarily meant anything.
But he hadn't be treated like that. What did she hope to gain by just merely asking him questions… oh. He had never really considered it before, but those questions might be just what was going on in the surface. Meanwhile, she could easily e poking around in his brain using magic. No, wait. Shouldn't she have found about yesterday, then? Even assuming she could only read surface thoughts, he had thought about it while she was there. She should have done something about it.
Maybe she was about to do it, and all of this was to lull him into a false sense of security. Of course, considering he was trying to think around literal magic and that he didn't know the rules and limits of it, if any, or the list of spells, literally anything could be possible. Running himself ragged over things he couldn't control was pointless.
He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, released it. What could he do about this? Fucking around because of not entirely unjustified paranoia might save him, but it could as easily just fuck everything up for him. So that was a no. The only thing he could really do was live his life, react if anything bad happen, and just survive. As for what happened yesterday… it had only be some cat, but today it might well be an actual sentient being.
He had see enough horror movies to know that not sleeping wouldn't work, not as a long term solution, but that was all he really had. That and trying to stop it for happening, if it ever started again. It could happen. Last night he had just let himself go with his 'dream', so he maybe he could actually change it. Maybe. That was all he had.
He could have told them about it, but there was as much of a chance of the helping him get control of whatever was happening to him as that they would kill him outright to save themselves the trouble. And the end of the day, he was just a boy. He was powerless, and he just wanted to live his life. He would do everything he could to prevent any victims, but he just kill himself for the sake of others. Nobody could call him evil for that.
For now, he had to think about the present. He stayed awake, with the lights turned off. The moonlight drifting through the window gave more that enough illumination. It was really so strange, to think that it was being moved by some unicorn princess instead of naturally. Alicorn princess. Whatever.
He suddenly woke up. That meant he had fallen asleep somewhere along the way, but he didn't have time to dwell on that. Pain assaulted. A burning heat coming from inside of it. Gasping in pain, he clawed at his chest, as if trying to stop it. He knew this feeling. That heat from when he had pulled out that power, and tore the dog apart. It was coming out. Whatever was inside of him was coming out, threatening to control him.
He screamed in pain, unable to bear it any more, and curled up into a ball. Control it, control it. If he was able to let it out, he should be able to kept it inside. Easier said that done, of course. Damn. He could felt it… fading. His consciousness was fading. He couldn't think, no matter how hard he tried.
There was a knock on the door.
"What's wrong?" Fluttershy's voice. He couldn't let her open that door. He would lose it if she opened that door.
"Get away!" Edward screamed, the panic bringing him back to full consciousness. "Get away from me!"
"W-what… I-I'm opening the door."
"I told you!" he barked. "Don't do that."
He had forgot to close it from the inside. How he could he forget such a thing, now of all times? He closed his eyes tightly. Then, alarmed, he opened them again. His arms were being coated by a dark, viscous substance that was almost like smoke.
ITS NOT ENOUGH
Tears of pain started streaming down his face.
I KILL I HAVE TO KILL THEM
He concentrated, and pushed it back. Somehow, after a lot of effort, the black smoke that had enveloped his arms started fading. It burned. It burned like hell. It was the worst pain he had experienced in his whole life, and if he knew about something, it was about pain. But it passed. It was two long, agonizing minutes spend biting the sheets to try to kept to muffle his screaming.
When it was over, he looked at his arms. Fuck, fuck, fuck. He almost stopped breathing at the sight. His arms were covered with second degree burns. Or so he thought, anyway. He wasn't exactly an expert on this, and he couldn't think straight. Not after everything. And it still hurt a lot, just not as much.
"Edward?" Fluttershy called out, sounding terrified. The door was still closed. He let out a shaky breath.
"Please," he pleaded, his voice ragged. "Help me."
