[Choking's Entry]

Jeez, I've never been one to put words on paper. All this seems like overthinking stuff far too much. I guess some of his habits rubbed off me more than I would dare to admit.

Whose?

Well, there was this one unicorn who came to Canterlot few months after princess Luna's return. I worked in the Nightguard at the time as a shift manager. Nothing fancy, but it paid the bills and I got to meet a lot of hot stallion hunks who wanted a bit of an adventure with a batpony. All that firm rump just ready for plucking, and all just in my reach...

Ehm, back to the important things.

The Nightguard barracks are always cold in winter, so we begged princess Luna over and over to allow us to hire somepony to do the chore of carrying coal from the storehouse in the dungeons to the barracks regularly. How did somepony as insignificant as me get straight to the princess? Well, my friend Sharp Biscuit just happened to be princess Luna's bodyguard and the official head of the Nightguard. She messed it up by requiring that whoever got the job would do the same thing for every inhabited room in the castle. There and then we, Sharpie and I, knew nopony would be stupid enough to do it, definitely not for the money.

Somepony did - a young unicorn going by the name of Blazing Light. He was a bit weird, shy beyond all belief, but hard-working and pretty cute, in a way. Since it was me who pushed the heating agenda up the chain of command to Sharp, I got the job of being Blaze's supervisor, no additional pay included. I...

I...

At the time, things were different... and not nice. I'm not sure how to explain it. Over a year before that, even before princess Luna's return, I had a coltfriend whose name was Valiant Charge. He was charming, hot, and... incredibly possessive, which bit me in the ass really hard when I eventually wanted to split up with him. He was a high-ranked Royal Guard, the son of a noble, and he wanted me all to himself, no matter what I said. He scared away three out of four coltfriends I had over the next year, and the last one...

Let's just say he showed me some pictures. Those, and the documents about the investigation of the poor guy's "accidental" fall from the Canterlot city walls down the mountain. The Royal Guard didn't look too hard for evidence. Weirdly enough, Valiant was fine with me having one night stands with other ponies, probably because he knew that no matter what I wouldn't push the image of him out of my head whenever me and another stalion did it. I didn't.

Even here in Ponyville, so much later, I still thank whatever deity listens that Blaze chose to try to live in Canterlot of all cities.

The awkward guy I'm writing ramblings about worked his ass off night after night carrying coal all over the castle for almost no money, a single empty room in the castle, and some leftovers from the guard cantine. I gotta admit the job made him look pretty good in few weeks, but...

Bad crotch, not now!

Well, as he worked under me... mmmmmm... DAMN IT!

As he worked FOR me, I got to know him, mostly for a dumb reason of having my shower out of order and using his every day. He didn't want much from life, anything really. No plans for the future, no desires, nothing. Still, he helped me whenever I needed it without asking anything in return. As things were, queen Chrysalis was planning her invasion of Canterlot and looking for ponies in positions to help she could mind control. Blaze, with his ability to move unnoticed around the castle was one of her targets, and she cursed him to transform into a changeling.

Even now I'm not sure why, but the spell worked... weirdly.

I had no idea at the time, though, and I kept spending time with him, hoping against hope Valiant wouldn't consider Blaze important enough to bother with. I was wrong. One night, Valiant and his cronies pushed Blaze with bags of coal on his back down one of the long castle staircases. He survived, mostly thanks to him gradually transforming due to Chrysalis' curse and me "feeding" him... friendship and affection. If I loved him then how I do now I think he would have survived the sun dropping onto him.

After the incident I tried to avoid him, but he refused and wanted to learn how to fight to stand up to Valiant. With the help of Sharp Biscuit, both Blaze and I practiced unarmed combat night after night. I knew it would be pointless in case Valiant tried anything, but it was a way to spend time together.

Then Valiant and few of his friends found us during training. They forced me to watch as he beat Blaze up over and over. You see, the Nightguard didn't have the prestige it has now. So shortly after Luna's return we were considered a dead end branch of the Guard. Anything I could have said without any evidence would have just been shrugged off when it faced the word of Royal Guards. When Valiant finally got bored and tried to murder Blaze, the changeling curse took full hold, and Blaze went berserk, nearly killing Valiant and his thugs. As all of them fought him, I flew away to get help.

I found princess Luna herself, she stopped Blaze from killing the Royal Guards, interrogated all of us, and Valiant was kicked out of the Guard and banished out of Canterlot into some fortress on the Equestrian coast. Princess Celestia didn't order his execution or lifetime in prison for political reasons... nobles and all, but said that if Blaze got hurt in any unspecified way or if I said a word against him then he would hang.

Blaze, now a bronze-colored changeling, who somehow retained his mane after the transformation, became a Royal Guard trainer due to a strange old tradition saying that if one beat a trainer in a serious fight then they could become one themselves while the old one stepped down.

Later, much much later we had the chance to talk about the changeling curse, and he said that he looked the way he did because while the changelings we know now are born that way, the spell just gave some basic changeling properties to ponies, such as hard armor, the ability to feed on love as well as real food (although needing both), and the subservience to a changeling queen or king. All in all, he still looked like a unicorn, only with armor instead of a coat, sharp teeth, and saliva which made envenomed ponies lustful and obedient.

We got to know the last part about half a year later, heh.

So, Blaze became a Royal Guard trainer, unarmed combat trainer to be precise. He refused to use weapons, saying they gave power to those who had not enough control over themselves. Oh the irony. During the first few weeks, he became good friends with a recruit called Heavy Hoof, and probably the hottest pony I know. Too bad he's only into stallions. Heavy was being bullied by the other recruits for his orientation. Granted, being a Trottingham Military Academy graduate he could easily beat up anypony who picked on him, but Heavy is peaceful and really nice, so he took it badly at the time.

Remember Sharp Biscuit, the friend I used to spend every holiday with? Wonder why HE spent his holidays and vacations alone? Yeah, he was a colt cuddler as well, and Blaze knew it. Heck, all three of us showered together after night trainings so it was pretty easy to spot. If I had to hazard a guess, I think Blaze was bi-curious as well. Well, Blaze introduced Heavy to Sharp, and they became really close over the next few months. Eventually, their relationship grew to an open love between two ponies who used to be ostracised for being themselves. Let's just say that mare on mare relationships are much better recieved than stallion on stallion ones in Equestria. For batponies it's even worse, that's why I guess Sharp had moved to Canterlot in the first place.

Oh well, Blaze and I had our jobs and things were as good as they could... until I found myself a coltfriend. You see, we were still just friends at the time.

Yes, writing this, I DO have to fight with the desire to punch myself in the face over and over.

Blaze went crazy just like Valiant. He threatened what-was-his-name... wow, I actually can't even remember... well, the coltfriend guy. Don't get me wrong, I liked the guy, but when he ran away so easily after Blaze "talked" to him it bothered me. I mean, Blaze didn't even hurt him and he turned tail and ran.

I'm ranting again.

Soon after, Blaze realized what he did and put me and "the guy whose name I can't and don't really want to remember" back together, but it didn't last. Something around half a year or so. In the meantime, Blaze turned to wine. I'm not sure to what extent it hindered his job, but I stopped watching over his recruit sessions after the incident. After a series of events which I resolved as the acts of a love-starved changeling, we had a talk... and some more things.

Yeah, the thing about changeling saliva.

Then the changeling invasion happened. I'm not sure whether or not I should be proud that Blaze and Chrysalis defeated Shining Armor and Cadance, thus allowing the queen to take the alicorn's place and imprison her under the castle, but I'm sticking with yes. When Chrysalis tried to drain Blaze to death after the deed to get rid of a witness, she underestimated him.

That guy is TOUGH! Well, at least his body refuses to die. He himself... is a bit depressive. I still love him, though, although sometimes it takes a bit, a lot, of work.

With him gone before the wedding, I took over the training of his recruits. Too bad most of them could kick my ass after Blaze was done with them. I'm not too good with weapons, and I definitely can't outmuscle a trained earthpony, but I'm still a challenge. So, Blaze survived Chrysalis' attack and got to us during the changeling offensive. We managed to hold Chrysalis' forces long enough so that the Elements, prince Shining Armor, and princess Cadance could get rid of Chrysalis. On Cadance's behalf, Blaze wasn't imprisoned for treason because he had no way of resisting Chrysalis' long-prepared mind control, and everything was fine for a while.

Now comes the part I'm not too sure about, mostly because Blaze didn't talk about it much. I know the most from reading the journal he started writing on his arrival in Canterlot.

One Nightmare Night, Luna and newly ascended princess Twilight got attacked by a unicorn version of Twilight, who would have killed both of them had Blaze not intercepted a spell aimed at them. Here comes the confusing part - it wasn't MY Blaze, as I later got to know. Due to my stupidity, Blaze got hanged for attacking prince Blueblood, and his public execution in the castle gardens released a being called Void, the alicorn of Death who had been imprisoned in Tartarus ages ago.

Cool guy, actually. Really nice.

Void wanted to flee Canterlot, but Luna somehow knew this would happen. As it turned out, on Nightmare Night, the new Blaze wrote two letters Sharp Biscuit, escorting Luna to the festivities, was supposed to give to me and Luna two days later. After I got him hanged, yes, yes, but he didn't mention that part.

Well, Blaze knew he would be resurrected by an alicorn of Lust called Scream who would send him someplace called the mirror world to stop Sombra. When we met again after I got Blaze hanged, I couldn't believe my eyes, and later my ears when he explained everything.

The new Blaze told the princesses about an invasion coming from the mirror world under the rule of king Sombra who was defeated in our Equestria. This Blaze knew of a way to get to the mirror world, and said he knew how to prevent the invasion from happening. He didn't want anything from us other than helping Void in regaining his power and gathering as many soldiers as we could in the Crystal Empire where king Sombra would use the power of the Crystal Heart to link both worlds together. Only one question remained - what happened to my Blaze.

The new Blaze killed him on Nightmare Night in order to stay in this reality.

New Blaze explained he had gone through everything that happened between Nightmare Night and the invasion itself, and that he didn't want it to happen again. He said that dying quickly and painlessly was mercy inc comparison to what Blaze would have gone through, and what the new Blaze HAD gone through.

You can imagine how well I took that.

Still, upon the princesses' orders Void and I went to Tartarus to help him regain power. We got to the Crystal Empire right in the middle of the invasion. We thought we failed when Blaze appeared to be on Sombra's side and the alicorn who had revived him, Scream, was the one behind the entire deal. As it turned out, Scream was Void's eternal marefriend who was super pissed when Celestia lured Void to Tartarus and imprisoned him there eons ago. Over time, she went mad and concocted a plan which would give rise to the most brutal and dark ruler who would come from the mirror world, where he was safe from intervention, here and kill everypony in front of Celestia and then make her kill herself out of misery.

Well, the new Blaze came to this world not to save us, but to prevent Scream from dying and to get her and Void back together.

With enough of Void's power returned thanks to Blaze's early warning, he was able to stop Scream from ruining everything. When everypony was distracted, Blaze, posing as Sombra's guard, damaged the Crystal Heart belonging to the mirror world and the spell binding the two worlds together failed. Blaze, Scream, and Void remained here while the bad guys returned back to their part of the twin worlds. Void protected Scream from Celestia and Luna's retribution, and they both disappeared. Blaze, having nowhere to go and nopony to trust...

...I still remember the moment he just sat down after it was all over and looked at the sky.

I couldn't leave him be. Deep down I knew he was my Blaze, just one who had been through much more, and I offered to keep an eye on him. Well, I demanded it as a reward for my role in saving Equestria (hanging around for few hours with the alicorn of Death). I think I got lucky on that one.

With the first invasion over, yeah FIRST, Blaze and I took the train from the Crystal Empire back to Canterlot.

It got attacked. Color me surprised...

It wasn't all bad. It appears that during Blaze's jumping between dimensions (before he reached mine and killed my... nevermind) he got into a lot of trouble and some of it followed him here. Our train, full of soldiers, got hijacked by about thirty strange changelings led by a queen who proclaimed herself to be Blaze's daughter. He explained that in one reality he was forced by Nightmare Moon to create a breed of changelings who could wipe out the entire world. According to those who followed Blaze here, they had succeeded... and starved to death. Out of some cosmic sense of humor, Blaze's daughter is a pretty decent mage and she was able to reconstruct the spell which sent Blaze through realities, trace him, and appear here. When it turned out the ten (the fight on the train wasn't that easy for them) remaining Nightmare changelings (yes, probably the worst name for public relations EVER!) just wanted some place where they wouldn't starve, and that they were willing to accept literally any terms, the princesses allowed them to stay in Canterlot and learn about Equestria. Since they were treated as things by Nightmare Moon, they had no names or anything, so Blaze named their queen Guiding Light. He didn't name the rest because he couldn't come up with ten more on the spot.

Still, things went back to normal-ish. I mean, minus the little detail that I now lived with my friend's murderer who was actually the same friend and... yeah, lover. As I said, I don't like overthinking stuff.

Unfortunately, there is thing thing called the Tree of Harmony deep in the Everfree forest, which is the reason I'm writing this. Equus consists of two worlds, our one and the mirror one, which are not naturally connected. Ponies can temporarily visit the other world using sufficiently strong magic, but their time there is limited to days at most. However, there are landmarks in each world which are the same and hold enough power, or 'unchangeability', that they can be catalysts for linking the worlds permanently.

You get it, Crystal Heart and Tree of Harmony.

Mirror Sombra wasn't sleeping after his failure, and with his Crystal Heart damaged, he found another way to invade. Why? I have no idea. Scream was out of the picture and, loosely speaking, on our side for helping Void, so Sombra had to have his own agenda. First, he sent assassins who attacked me and Blaze in my Canterlot apartment. Blaze got badly hurt and ended up in the castle infirmary. He wasn't hurt badly enough to stop him from defending princess Celestia when she got attacked, but one of the assassins took him back to the mirror world. All he said was: "Don't look her in the eyes."

Only I know this part, nopony else. That's why I am here in Ponyville and not back in Canterlot. You see, Blaze led the second invasion under Sombra's command, and I am sure he was being under some sort of spell. Unfortunately, that doesn't matter anymore.

During the attack coming from the Everfree portal Blaze killed Sharp Biscuit who was trying to defend queen Chrysalis (who was reluctantly pondering whether or not to accept the peace offering from princess Cadance). Before Luna's and Chrysalis' forces had to retreat from a losing fight, Luna cursed Blaze with her alicorn power, banishing him from the realm of sleep.

Blaze had at most two weeks before going insane or dying from sleep deprivation.

Sombra's forces took over Canterlot where I met Blaze and found out that Sombra had no intention of turning the second invasion into a massacre like the first one was supposed to be. When Blaze, even under Sombra's control, promised me that neither I nor anypony who wasn't resisting would be hurt on his watch I knew that deep down it was still him. I promised myself I would stay by his side as long as I could.

It wasn't much. In a few days Canterlot fell completely and the princesses retreated to the Crystal Empire, leaving Canterlot with Sombra's garrison. Last thing I know was that the Crystal Empire fell, Sombra got the Crystal Heart, and with his new power linked the portal between the worlds to himself.  

Without any warning, all of Sombra's soldiers disappeared. According to princess Twilight's research it is impossible for things to remain permanently in a world where they didn't come from, and they can last only as long as either a spell, or a stable point of connection exists.

Do you get it, or are you like everypony else, like Luna, like Heavy?

SOMETHING happened to Sombra, and I know Blaze was the cause. Who else would be able to get rid of him?

The other thing that supports my theory is that all the things on the wrong side of the portal appear at their original world at the place of connection. When the invaders mysteriously disappeared, all the stolen belongings and loot appeared scattered around the Everfree portal.

Swords, jewels, gold...

...one weird unicorn.

REAL unicorn, not a changeling, looking exactly like Blaze used to, just without a cutie mark. He couldn't talk or didn't seem to react to anything that was going on around him, he just followed two guards patrolling the place back to Ponyville, where they dropped him off at the asylum, assuming he was just some guy who couldn't mentally handle the attack and broke down. I might just be feeding my misery by taking care of a poor sod who only looks similar, or it might be him and he'll never be more than a scared, drooling, colt again, but I have to know.

So here I am, in a small town, having left my job out of fear that coming here often would leave a trace which Luna could follow and finish her job. All he did was for them, and when he was vulnerable they declared him an enemy.

Luna, Heavy, Celestia, Twilight, everypony, if you as much as look at him the wrong way then you will pay!

[End Entry]