Rebirth

Disclaimer: I do not own My Little Pony, nor am I profiting off this literary venture.

----

Purple hooves brushed against the fur on his face.

Hooves.

Fur.

This was (Everything he dreamed of!) wrong!

He was a (Pony) dragon! He was supposed to have claws and scales and spines!

Not (Yes!) hooves or fur or... Or...

A horn.

He needed answers. He needed answers to questions he didn't even know how to ask.

He had to hope that this (Was) wasn't permanent. That this could (Not) be reverted.

His emerald eyes went wide as he stared at his reflection in the store front window. He placed his hooves over his ears and whimpered, a low, keening noise.

He could hear something (Himself) whispering in his mind. It wasn't the greed. He knew the greed. It wasn't a subtle little thing, begging him to take.

More and more, never satisfied. (Envious and brutish. Undignified.)

He struggled to his hooves, his legs shaking. (First the back, then the front. I've got this!) One hoof before the other, he started moving. He managed a few paces before spotting something glinting brass in a mixed puddle of red and yellowgreen.

The smell was nauseating. (Blood and sick.) His key was in the middle of it though. He carefully tried to pick it up a few times, futiley poking it around the mess before he felt something click and he managed to grasp the little piece of metal.

It was a start, he could work with this. (He had to.)

----

Not a single glance was spared for him as he travelled back to the bakery. It was unsettling, he was used to furtive glances and curious stares. Not even in Ponyville had that aspect of his existence faded.

He wasn't sure if it was nice (It is. I can be another face in the crowd now.) or not.

Letting that thought fade to the back of his mind, he stood to the side of the line in the bakery. He made an act of browsing the menu (The blueberry muffins look better today, for some reason.) while he waited for the last patron to leave.

"You gonna pick somethin' kid, or you gonna get out?" He hadn't even noticed the pegasus leave.

"Actually Mr.Lemon, I need to get some stuff out of my room." The other unicorn wore a bemused look, gazing over the new unicorn in front of him.

"You're gonna have to refresh my memory kid. I don't know any half-grown blank-flank colts anymore."

"Mr.Lemon, it's me, Spike." The elder unicorn stepped out from behind the counter. Spike backed up to the wall as his employer fixed him him with a frigid, searching stare until their noses were practically touching.

The open sign flipped over to closed.

"I want an explanation. Now. In the kitchen." Mr.Lemon spun on a hoof, marching into the back room. Spike took a moment longer, he needed to compose himself. He'd noticed there was something...

Hard. Cold wasn't the right word.

Inside the old unicorn. He hadn't thought it to be so frightening, before.

"At least you're no coward, boy." Spike wished he was. The unicorn was sitting, perfectly calm while the bakery around him worked through magic alone. It was chaos. (It was beautiful)

"So what's the story, huh. Some lost changeling, I'm guessing?" He seated himself across from the baker, marvelling at the work around him.

"N-no, I'm a dragon! I was a dragon. I('m a unicorn!) don't know. I got in a fight with some other dragons last night and this..." Spike stopped talking.

He started trembling.

He didn't know why he was crying.

He nearly jumped when he felt the a hoof moving up and down his back.

"Garble threw me at this thing. It just showed up and smelled like blood. It had me before I knew what was happening. It was pulling me into it and it didn't matter how hard I fought. I- there was green light inside of it. That's all I remember of it."

The crushing pressure, the smell of burning flesh and stale rot, the slick pain where it grabbed him. He didn't want to remember that.

"Then I woke up, like, a block away. I started freaking out actually." A trifle was placed in front of Spike, just a little tart really. Grabbing it was an afterthought. He was barely aware he was biting it.

"Whoah. Mr.Lemon, this is really good." He'd finished before he knew it and looked up, his boss sitting across from him again. He wore a pensive look.

"What were you planning to do, Spike?" The dra-Unicorn hesitated. He didn't want to sound ungrateful.

"I was going to get my bits from upstairs, whatever else I could carry and get a train ticket to Ponyville. I know Princess Twilight Sparkle, she's-"

"The princess of Friendship and the Element of Magic of the mythical Elements of Harmony. If you know her, I suppose that makes you that Spike, the one who did those things up north."

"You knew?"

"I suspected. You didn't bring it up and I didn't figure it was my job to drag up your history. Do you know how many dragons here are named Spike? Counting you, I've met five. Get on up there, I can at least see my favorite employee off." The harmony of the kitchen paused for a moment as Spike rushed around the table to hug the gruff old pony before running out to trip up the stairs.

----

Two ponies stepped off the first class train car, Alicorns the both of them. At Luna's request there had been no service, merely silence as she had dozed for the entirety of the trip.

Twilight hadn't minded in the slightest, she'd been busy compiling notes of the scant few observations she'd made in the dream the night before.

Further back, at a coach car, one unicorn with saddlebags loaded with books and pastries got on while an older unicorn waved him off with a few brief words of encouragement.