"Wakey-wakey, Mr. Dreamer!"

I can't be sure if it was the fall, or the half a dozen 'White Russians' that set him off. Needless to say, the human's failure to stand upon quivering legs was swiftly followed by a hasty evacuation of his stomach. All over the floor.

Because don't all great stories start out that way?

In a way, I almost pitied the poor fool. Hastily spitting bile into a pool of vodka and possibly expired cream. We've all been there. But, I had a job to do, and that job didn't involve him... At least, not anymore.

Imagine his surprise, wearily rising on those bamboo stilts he calls 'legs' as he clutched his throbbing head, only to be greeted by my glorious grinning visage. I mean, there are worse sights to see after a drunken night on the town. Believe me, I know. Though the fact that I was several feet above him beyond a square hole in the ceiling, grinning down through the darkness, was probably what threw him through a loop.

"Ah, you're awake finally. That's good, that's very good. Buddies like us shouldn't part on such sour terms."

It was, amusing to say the least, to watch the dawn of bitter-realization spread across his monkey face as he took in his new 'accommodations'.

"'Come into my parlor' said the Spider..."

The scene calls to mind visions of my squandered youth; I recall an especially merry morning during an unseasonably warm fall. It was our first day back after a somewhat uneventful summer of sibling-bonding and unwarranted petty-vandalism; my class was due to showcase our 'Personal Project Presentations' before our peers. Something about 'raising self-confidence' and supporting our fellow ponies, and all that other sugarcoated drivle.
Now, this class was hardly what one would consider special, that is if you don't count Princess Celestia's niece being a member of the student body as 'special'. Except perhaps, for one minor detail. Our teacher, 'Ms. Summer Songheim', a learned and greying Pegasus from a bygone era, never traveled without the company of a special somepony. A small yellow canary named 'Winthorp', whose penchant for tweeting at decibels that could shatter glass, had long become the bane for many a struggling student around exam time.

It was the beginning of our final year, and as one would imagine, extra emphasis on 'succeeding' was hammered down the throats of every student. And suffice it to say, it was an added degree of stress that most could do without.

My project was positively inspired in its simplicity. A day by day report of the rising crime rate within Canterlot's residential neighborhoods. Nothing newsworthy like, for instance, an illegal Red Nector den. Or a magic shootout between several disturbed individuals and the Royal Guard. Meer trivialities, easily overlooked by the ignorant masses. Vandalism, break-ins, the occasional pick-pocketing, real hard-hitting journalism to be sure.

Was it vain to report on my own sinful deeds? Stupid even? Oh Celestia, yes. But by that point, I'd already received the full extent of my Royal court-mandated psychiatrists, 'Help'. And had reached that beautiful threshold between suicidal pessimism, and the flourishing misanthrope that would one day blossom into the happy-go-lucky psychopath you know today. If only they'd paid attention and seen the signs.
As one would imagine given such a subject matter, even one as tame as this was met with fear and vocal outrage by the class proper. So coddled had Celestia's subjects become, that the merest suggestion of urban upheaval had the students in a panic. Imagine, students, fearing the end times because somepony had differed from 'the status quo'.
'Sheltered' would be another descriptive. A trait ingrained into the core of everypony nowadays taught to believe that 'bad things' in general, were a rarity, that the powers of love and friendship would thwart.

As one would imagine, the teacher was quick to reprimand your humble narrator. Subject matters of a criminal nature, no matter how petty the offense, are deemed 'illicit'. A big no-no for the impressionable student body. Gag.

Oy vey.

And so, with bitter disdain and grim dignity, it fell upon yours truly to pay his dues and cleanse the classroom that I had dared sully with my 'disgusting words', as teacher dearest did say.

Had they know the perpetrator of such dastardly deeds stood in their midst, no doubt more punitive measures would've been applied, yet as it stood, the dullards were none the wiser.

So, there I am. A young-ish school pony of eighteen whittling away at his dwindling youth and precious afternoon, clapping erasers together out a second story window. All the while my activities were serenaded by the whimsical octaves of the delightful seed-necking bastard who's ower had condemned yours truly to this afternoon of fun and frivolity. Whistling its limited existence away, blissfully unaware of the cruel world that stretched beyond the bars of its gilded cage. Stopping every so often to admire itself in its little mirror, before returning to its little swing and reciting another rousing chorus for its audience of one.

Hardly a punishment, I hear you say... damn voices. Oh, but if only the headmistress had been so inclined. Far from it actually; My month of newly acquainted responsibilities ranged from taxing afterschool detentions of slapping erasers and sweeping floors to polishing windows, all four floors of the building I might add. And just when my hooves couldn't take the strain, it fell upon me to feed the class pets of every homeroom.
An ornery old Owl for the newbies, who refused to eat unless he was fed between the oddly specific hours of five-past-five and eight-past-five.
A Chameleon for the following year, and believe me, his escape record dwarfs our own to this day.
A Tarantula for the middle sect... a massive orange monster with a mean streak equaled only by its insatiable appetite.
A Giant Snail for the penultimate grade; after all, what screams responsibility more than a mollusk too fat for its own shell?
And finally, our Canary yellow... Canary. Oh, what a whimsical managery our school budget did yield.

Lucky simpletons, there would be no meal awaiting me at home. Such is the deserved life of a worthless failure, as my mother would say before she struck me a chancing blow on my way up the stairs, back down into firey cauldron of alcohol-fueled rage and moral degradation that was my father. A battering awaited me, of that there was no doubt. What sort of world ignored the cries of children in need as an implausibility, what manner of self-proclaimed guardspony disregarded the pleads of two frightened foals as 'immature stories'. Children should sleep on their beds not under them... How vain to view the world through Celestia's oh so perfect lense, at what cost?!

Damn them, damn them all.

It had to have been at least six-thirty in the afternoon by the time the pet feedings came and suffice it to say, the owl would be going hungry that day. The chameleon tried and failed to make a mad dash for the math-room door, but the little weasel had yet to contend with the likes of an overworked earth-pony with a temper thinner than our headmistress's hairpiece. I'd already tossed the snail a slice of lettuce, and that was all he'd be getting from me until he shook off those unsightly pounds, a snail should not weight more than a pissed off adolescent.

Which just left the spider, and my yellow whistling tormentor.

I remember exactly what finished me that day; beyond the back-breaking labor whilst the easily amused school janitor looked on, momentarily breaking away from counting his pay and joking at my expense to point out that I'd missed a spot, before indulging in a 'well-deserved' nap. And the teachers, can't forget the teachers, riding my toned ass for hours at a time with diatribes of how I would forever be a failure to my peers and all those who'd ever been foolish enough to waste their time with a lost-cause such as myself.

No, what finally set me off, the very last straw that broke the proverbial camels back... was when, as I placed the little plastic container of birdseed inside the cage... it bit me.

The selfish little chirping, squawking. whistling, exam ruining, attention seeking, son-of-a-jewel-encrusted-whorse... bit me.

Was it red? The blood on my hoof. It was all I could see. My favorite color. I looked down and felt it wash over me like a cold shower. A balloon filled with water bursting, so much trapped inside, finally became more than its limitations could contain.
The feeling was indescribable, it was as though a part of me had been set free.
As the chameleon did change shades so too did I change. My colors washed away like water over wet paint, revealing something new beneath... What had I become?

Then the frantic chirping and flapping returned. My eyes peered beyond the cage at the tiny pest inside, knowing it had seen me... I mean, really 'seen'...

Us.

And we knew what we had to do.

It's a funny thing really, the awakening, as we'd once called it. We'd opened our eyes for what felt like the first time, we saw the world and the world stared back. Only this time it all seemed, so very very small. The world shrank and withdrew, it was the worlds turn to be afraid.

We returned to 'Winthrop' momentarily, with a gift.

Such a curious name... the Goliath Birdeater.

A brand new friend, oh wouldn't Celestia be proud? We were spreading friendship and harmony; for the first time, it all made sense. A sigh we'd been holding in for what felt like a lifetime escaped our lips, accompanied by a single tear running ice cold down our cheek.

The life-delusion was lifted, and in waking, we were reborn.

Our thoughts strayed beyond the immaculately polished windows, across the city skyline to where our heart lies. Our baby sister, safe and content in a castle baring all the accouterments one could ever need to make it in this very nasty world.

Sunset.

Our sister, our only family worth a damn. The one thing our parents gave us that didn't hurt us. The one soul to look upon us with nothing but love and kindness, and see somepony... something more than what our parents, my teachers, Celestia, or society expected. Something worthwhile.

We would gift to her the world on a silver tray.

But first, we would have to seize the world. And we couldn't do that in Canterlot.

Money would be an issue, how fortunate then that our esteemed educators had the foresight to predict our rebirth, and wisely saw fit to turn a blind eye to our idol hooves. Leaving a delinquent alone in a school with naught but an apathetic codger for supervision. As a wise pony once said, you reap what you sow.

In our darkest moments; when the quiet becomes too much to bear, and the voices deigned to grant us but a moments peace. We will forever remember the moment the panicked shrieks fell silent. And that unholy 'HISS~' as our final breath escaped. A life in a gilded cage brought to a horrifying conclusion. Blissful ignorance died to feed a monster set free. Ripped down from its pedestal into the waiting, smiling jaws of reality.

We didn't close the cage during or after. At the time, we floated, adrift in a tempest of emotions, the weight of the world abandoning me... There was no caging the beast, we see that now.

...

In our nightmares, we are the canary.

We gaze down into the many waiting eyes of the beast, its limbs reaching, beckoning us closer, its jaws wide and hungry... we feel the world as we knew it, the great lie falling away, our eyes are open... And we scream.

...

In our nightmares, I am the beast.

I gaze up and see... hope? I reach out with everything I have, to see it, to touch it, to... taste it.
It sees me, I smile and it screams. So delicious. Its a part of me; I will carry the life it's bestowed upon me, upon us, with thanks for the rest of our days. Our eyes are open... and we cry.

...

Whatever shambles passed for our life could not continue. We'd peered beyond the veil and something was staring back. We could see Celestia's great lie spread out before us like some twisted tapestry, and knew what we had to do.

We stole whatever might earn us so much as a hoofful of bits, and either pawned or sold the lot over the remainder of the evening. There was little the janitor could do; by a most fortuitous of happenstances, the unfortunate custodian fell victim to an unexpected spider bite, and in his resulting fright, took a tumble down a particularly tall flight of stairs.

We escaped our gilded cage aboard the ironically titled 'Friendship Express' that very night, but as somepony... something, far different than anything we could have possibly imagined. We were free. But at what cost?

In the end, it doesn't really matter.

What matters is... We're free! And we're back. Back for good.

And you.

You're here to see it all through with us.

"We breathed in the musty, dank, mildewy essence of our trap... our lair... our web."

"Peering down into the darkness we see our prey, the first of many."

"A sigh escapes our parched lips; sometimes the memories, the dark moments leave us drained and broken, but at that moment... this moment... wherever it is we're telling this story from... we are so renewed with purpose, and so very very happy to share this, our story, with you, Mr. Dreamer."

"He cowers like the canary. He screams for help at a world that will not listen. Shouts empty threats at the lunatic narrating to himself... he calls us insane."

"We call it, the beast."

"But dear Mr. Dreamer. You're probably wondering why your lovely narrator brought you here, and what series of events lead you... to us?"

"Well, then we shall tell you, dear listener."

"But first, permit us a moment to collect ourselves. It is quite rare that we find ourselves with such a captive audience, especially one so literal, our story tends to leave us rather emotionally taxed."

"I cry for what I once was. We scream at what we have become."

Author's Notes:

Back... Back in black.
Where's he been? What's he been up too?
Personal stuff (Surprise-Surprise)
"I'm tired of partying." {Obligatory Joke}
(Narrative use of 'our' and 'we' as a descriptive is moment exclusive, bouts of madness and all that.)