Trixie quickly ran over to James’ prone form. She quickly started looking for a pulse and her voice was caught in her throat. She could feel his pulse but it was slowly fading. She turned him over and saw the hole that was in his abdomen. Trixie’s hands glowed as she used the first aid magic that she learned. She has only learned the basics of healing and has been trying very hard to learn the advanced healing spells. Trixie was fighting back all the tears that were trying to come out. She didn’t need the distraction of crying to block her concentration at the task at hand. When the wound had stopped bleeding Trixie took her hands away and checked his pulse. The pulse was still slowly fading and Trixie was getting worried.

“We need to get James to the hospital. I was able to slow the bleeding but only by so much. He has already lost a lot of blood and his pulse is still fading. If we don’t move fast he is not going to make it.”

“Spitfire, Rainbow Dash come help me get James to the hospital. We don’t have much time to argue and we need to get this done.” Lightning Dust asked for help while she put James over her shoulder. Rainbow took the other shoulder as Spitfire took the legs. The three mares spread their wings and took flight towards the hospital. The others ran towards the hospital to meet up with the other three. Twilight couldn’t teleport to the hospital because they were too far away from the hospital and she could only teleport so many ponies at one time. Twilight felt ashamed that her magic wasn’t strong enough at this moment to be helpful.

James could feel himself being pulled into the darkness. His past began flashing before his eyes. He saw his family, his friends, loved ones, his comrades, and then he saw black. As the memories flooded his vision he couldn’t help the tears that were coming. James could blame it on the wind that was whipping at his face but he knew that was not the reason. James let everyone down and brought nothing but sorrow to those that he cared for. James wanted to make everypony happy but just couldn’t live with the burden. After hearing all their heart felt feelings for him he finally broke. He never knew what drew him to do the act because he just planned on walking out the door and making a run for it. As he stood there outside he looked at his gun and thought about the single bullet. James’ mind went blank when he touched the gun and couldn’t remember what happened. James let the darkness take him over as he was taken away by the three mares to god knows where at this moment.

Dream Realm

Shadow was almost free of his confinement and decided to have some fun. With half of his power restored he went to mess with James. Shadow attached himself to the cerebral cortex and took control. Shadow could see everything and hear everything that James could. Shadow listened to the mares as they gave their little speeches about how much they loved him. Shadow couldn’t help but gag at the sappiness of the mares. Once they finished Shadow made James leave the hut and go outside. As Shadow had James looked over his body he noticed the gun that James forced him to bring out of his mind. Shadow snickered as he brought James hand to the gun and pulled it out. Shadow turned it to his abdomen and pulled the trigger. James gave a slight grunt and fell to the ground.

“Heh heh heh. That James a little thank you for all the problems you have caused me. Don’t worry though as I won’t let that be the end of you. I want to continue to torturing you until you finally fall.”

“Must you always enjoy your little sick fantasies with James?” Nightmare Moon appeared into the deep part of the mind to get some of her power restored. She walked over to where Shadow was standing and put her hand on the brain. She had been feeding on his fears and worries enjoying the taste that they had. When she was living inside Luna feeding off of all her fears and that jealousy that she had was more than satisfying. Though with James the taste was different and she was quickly gaining her powers back faster than she had hoped.

During their time together Shadow and Nightmare were able to share their reasons for their hate. Nightmare wanted revenge on Luna for always fighting back against her. If Luna didn’t fight back and try to gain control then she could have easily taken over Equestria and ruled with an endless night. After she returned from her banishment her victory was short lived. The six mares that James had gotten close to over the time made Nightmare very angry. She wanted to destroy them for separating her from Luna. Shadow wanted his revenge for several reasons but the main was to take James down. Shadow would have everything that he wanted when James was under his control and he destroyed his mind.

The two of them agreed that when they were freed they were going to rule Equestria. Before they could do that though they needed to wait for their mysterious friend to bring them back. So as they waited they did as instructed and just kept recharging their powers. Nightmare was able to help Shadow by combining her magic with him so that he could move freely of his bonds. He was still chained but was able to move around so he could continue to cause as much damage as he could. He laughed as he caused little damage that wasn’t too noticeable but enough that it caused James to act differently. As they enjoyed the torment of James’ mind they smiled at each other as they laughed at everything.

Hospital

The mares sat in the waiting room as James was rushed to the emergency room. They were all worried for James safety because it has been two hours since he was put in the room. The doctor that took him hasn’t shown up either to give them any news. Twilight looked over at Spitfire as she was sitting in one of the chairs with her arms wrapped around her legs. Rainbow Dash and Lightning Dust sat next to Spitfire holding to keep her under control. As they were beginning to lose all hope that James might not pull through the doctor came out of the doors.

“James is a very lucky man. A couple more inches to the left and he would have died. The blood loss was also no help in trying to help him. He barely had any blood left in his system when he got here. If you took even two minutes longer then he wouldn’t have made it. He is currently stabilized but we need to keep an eye on him. He is asleep right now and if you want you can visit him if you want.” The doctor opened the doors and let the mares through so they could see James. James was attached to a life support system and a heart monitor. They all sat around James and looked at the sleeping man waiting for him to wake up.

“I also need to ask a favor for some of you.” The doctor came in a little down in his expression that he had to ask for something from the broken mares.

“What exactly is it that you need from us doctor?” Rarity asked as she just let the tears fall down her face not caring that it was ruining her make-up.

“Well when I looked at his I.D. card to see what his blood type was I was quite surprised. He is one of the few rare types that exist. His blood type is AB+ and we were lucky to have enough for a transfusion. Though we have ran out and we need to do a few more transfusions so his body can adapt to some of their properties. Since James isn’t a pegasus, unicorn, or earth pony he isn’t able to properly channel magic. So for his body to be able to keep up with the surging magic we need to keep it circulating around his body so it can accept it. From my records there are four of you that have the same blood type as him. Sure that he can get any blood type but we feel that if we stay with what he has then he will accept it more quickly.” The doctor looked at the mares waiting for some kind of response. There was a pregnant pause for a few seconds before Octavia broke the silence.

“So out of the eleven of us who has the blood type that can help him?” Octavia didn’t take her eyes off of James, as she was afraid that if she looked away then he would disappear.

“Well the four that have his blood type are Ms. Spitfire, Ms. Rainbow Dash, Ms. Vinyl, and Ms. Pinkie Pie. Now none of you have to agree to this but we would like your help in this matter. We could find somepony else to help if you don’t want to help out and it is completely understandable.” The doctor looked at them with pleading eyes as he didn’t want to go looking for another donor because he feared that if he went looking James might not make it.

“I’ll do it if it means that James can continue to live.” Pinkie Pie spoke up looking at the doctor nodding her head that she was willing to help.

“Count us in too doc. If this is able to keep James alive then we are willing to help.” Vinyl volunteered herself and Rainbow who didn’t have any problem with it. Spitfire wasn’t able to speak as she just looked at James from her seat and let the tears fall freely from her eyes. The doctor let out a little sigh of relief that he didn’t have to go out and find a donor. He left the mares to stay with James as he saw that they weren’t going to leave him anytime soon. Visiting hours were over but the doctor allowed the mares to stay for as long as they wanted so they could keep an eye on the man.

Fours days have passed and James was slowly regaining his consciousness and looked around the room to see the sleeping mares all around. James heard the door creak open and looked over at the guest. The doctor came in and gave a smile to see James awake. The doctor came over and checked his blood pressure and heart rate to make sure that nothing is wrong with him. The doctor gave a nod of approval as he left James alone with the mares in the room. James could hear the sound of slight sniffling from his left. James turned over and saw that Spitfire was crying and shaking. Her eyes were closed so James guessed that she was having a bad dream about him. James tried to lift his arm but could only get it up so high before he couldn’t go any further. James looked around at the machines and saw that one of them kept track of his physical strength. The machine read that he was only at sixty percent of his actual strength.

“Fucking hell. I’m back at being low strength again. I hate it when I have to deal with regaining all that strength so I can stop going to physical therapy.” James whispered angrily that he was going to go to more sessions of physical therapy. James never liked going to those because he was so stubborn about how they want him to exercise. They tell him to not over do any work and take it easy. James was more than once subject to a nagging session from a nurse when he pushed himself farther than they wanted him to do. James just pushed himself because the more that he tried then the faster he would heal. As James reminisced from his old memories he was drawn back as the mares were stirring awake. When all the mares were awake they looked at James as he looked back at them.

“Hey there everypony. Did you all have a nice nap?” James asked with a slight smile hoping to keep them calm and not flip out on him.

“Oh you know we slept around for four days crying our eyes out. Spitfire over there has been a complete mess. Then you wake up and act like everything is okay as we suffered nightmares of losing. So yeah we all had a good nights rest.” Lyra answered sarcastically as she looked at James with a mixture of sadness and a little anger. James looked over back at Spitfire and when he did he saw how she truly looked.

Spitfire’s mane was completely an utter mess. Her eyes were bloodshot and she was muttering something that James couldn’t hear. James could see that her ears were drooped down and her tail was frazzled and slightly twitching. When James turned his head back to look at the others Spitfire spoke up.

“Why did you do it James? Why did you try to take your own life and make us all feel terrible?” Spitfire stared into James’ eyes as she waited for an answer and James could see that she was about to cry out all the tears that she had to shed. James took a deep breath as he didn’t want to explain himself and his actions to everypony but since there was no way out this time he had to face the music.

“I just couldn’t handle all the love that you were giving me. You all gave your heart to me when you told me your true feelings and I couldn’t take it. When I walked outside the hut I planned on running away. Then as I thought about it I remembered that I had something else that could help.” Before James could continue his story he was interrupted by Twilight.

“Are you talking about this?” Twilight asked as she levitated his gun up and in front of his face.

“So what exactly is it?” Twilight asked a little worried of why James was carrying something so dangerous.

“That is a gun from my world. It is a weapon that is meant to immobilize or kill anyone that would stand in my way. Sadly now though I have no more ammo for it since my magazines went missing and I used the last bullet on myself.” James answered not showing any form of emotion on the weapon that he possessed. Twilight just looked at him stunned and fearful of the weapon in her magic. Twilight sent it away to God knows where with her magic and sat back down.

“As I was saying though going back to the previous question is that when I looked at my gun everything went blank. I don’t remember anything until I was barely holding on to life and knew that I shot myself. The only reason why I shot myself is that I couldn’t let you all get hurt for my sake. This was a better alternative than letting you all worry about me if I just ran away.” Once James was finished explaining his reasons Spitfire quickly got out of her seat noisily. James looked over as she walked towards him. Spitfire pulled her arm back and gave James a firm slap across the face. Before James could react or say anything Spitfire wrapped him into an embrace and cried her heart out on his shoulder.

“You’re just a complete dumbass you know that. What makes you think that this could possibly make us feel better? We gave you our reasons that we love you and you act like it is nothing. There are things that you may have done that were terrible. You may be afraid that we may reject you or even avoid you if we learned of your dark past. But you’re wrong in everyway that you think about us. No matter what you did or what you can do we will always be by your side and help you through this. We won’t let anything happen to you ever again.” Spitfire continued to embrace James as she just cried in his shoulder. James did the only thing that he could think of and just return the embrace.

James could feel himself well up with sadness, as he didn’t know what to do anymore. He tried to keep everypony from being hurt by just leaving but that just seemed to cause them more pain. James just didn’t know what to do now that he was going to face them about everything. James once dreamed of a peaceful life but abandoned it long ago when he lost everything that he held dear. He never wanted to lose those dear to him but he also didn’t want them to suffer so he just decided that it would be best to leave. James could see from the mares around him that was not the choice of action that he can take. After a several minutes of crying the doctor came back in to check on James.

“I can see that everypony is up and moving though there is some problems. After his attempted suicide we need to put him on suicide watch as just a precaution. He may not need any pony watching him because he may not attempt it again but it is better to be safe than sorry. So I will come some of the nurses that will be watching you and we can let you out.” The doctor turned to leave but was stopped as Spitfire called towards him.

“We can watch him doctor. There is no need to have any nurses to watch over him. We are more than capable of watching him and we have the most experience with dealing with him.” Spitfire offered the doctor as she wiped away the last of the tears.

“Well if you are going to watch him then you are going to need this. These are a list of exercises to help him regain his strength. There are also a few drinks that you can mix that can help with his magic intake that he now has.” The doctor handed over a slip of paper to Spitfire and she took it. She looked it over a couple of times and passed it to the others so they could look it over. Spitfire walked over to James and when she reached him he was just paralyzed. He wasn’t moving but he was awake. It was just that James was being unresponsive. Spitfire held him close as she stroked his hair. She sung him a lullaby as she just ran her fingers through his hair.

“Don’t worry James we will keep watch over you and help you get better.”

Dream Realm

Shadow and Nightmare Moon laughed at how easy it was to mess with the mares. Everything was going as planned and nothing could stop them. They enjoyed his suffering as the suffering of the mares. Shadow was now held in place with only five chains left. These five were the strongest and would take longer to break free from. His arms, legs, and back were the last to be chained but Shadow could wait. As the mares were turned around Shadow stuck his hand inside James mind and sent a pulse through it making James become hollow. When Shadow pulled out his hand inside it was an essence that would come in handy. The essence was the thing that drove James to protect and fight no matter the cost. Without it he would just be a hollow shell of a man that could be toyed with. Shadow placed the essence inside of him and sat down waiting for the days to come.

“This is going to be fun when the time comes James. Just you wait and see. Everything that you care for will be destroyed.”

Author's Notes:

Thanks to ErikTheSoulReaper for the idea of this chapter.