Ever since his mother had died, Fear's eyes had been a ravishing ruby; tainted, violent, and ferocious. Full of untamed fury as out of control as his mane. They glowed softly like low class starlight, beaming uncomfortably at those who stared at him for too long. Seething and ebbing against the soul, causing it to crank to a boil the more time was spent around it. It was a disturbing light that never seemed to fade. And right now those very eyes were adjusting to the blinding white light of the room. Blinking away the spots that formed along his retinas.

Fear took a few steps forward, glancing this way, then that, sweeping his head from side to side in broad motions. Everything felt distorted and empty, like there were so many of him in this one very place. It was a strange sensation; hearing your own soul speak to you, whispering of its traumas; bandages; evils; and glories all at once, echoing around you incessantly, never relenting, and Fear was experiencing that right now as everything began to settle in this boundless alabaster room. Fear's breath hitched in his throat as he tried to focus on something, anything within the limitless expanse that stretched out before him, like walls never existed. He twisted around to look behind him, but there was no door, having long ago disappeared.

Trapped. Isolated. All on his own. No ponies to lead him, no followers to inspire him. He was alone. Alone with his thoughts, with everything that made him who he was and beyond. It was crippling and left the colt kneeling down as he tried to come to grips with this solitary existence, where no family nor friends, not even enemies, existed to keep him company nor pull him out of his reveries. He felt like he was in an oppressive dream, weighing down on him and holding him captive. Such was the overwhelming presence of self.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekPaYGVLifY

As Fear was nearly brought to tears by the burden of his soul, his chest heavy and breathless, a needle point of darkness was summoned beneath him and slowly encroaching outward. It pulsed outward like a ripple on a mirror, leaving perfection completely disrupted. Fear's head was light and his eyes were lolling about as his body shifted. The darkness swallowed up the ground, spanning forever, beginning to swallow up Fear as well. It felt salty, and thick, like sludge melting around his body and pulling him in. A soggy mire of loneliness and animosity. Fear could feel the sensation of hatred needling into him, piercing his flesh, tickling his mind. The sensation of loss in its purest form, shredding apart his brain and leaving him feeling limp and incapable. It was like every time he'd spent in a depressive state magnified by a thousand. He couldn't... couldn't breathe. Couldn't... couldn't move. It was sucking him in, sticking to his body, glorping around him, the abysmal darkness. It stained his body like ink and warped his body and mind. Leaving him a shadow of his former self. Fear cried openly, unable to sniffle due to the pressure on his lungs and body from the quicksand. He wept openly, everything he'd ever experienced crashing down around him. His eyes were frantic, his nerves frayed.

Fear didn't know what to do. He was falling deeper. First his hooves were covered in muck, now his barrel, then his shoulders. It was creeping up to his neck, daring him to make a move and make the process go faster. Panic pierced the fog, digging into the lobes of his brain like a dire headache and scooping out what little motivation there was. Fear's eyes bolted open, his jaw hanging loose. Fear's hooves clawed at the surface of the gunk, trying to tear it away from his body, trying to yank himself out. Struggling to find purchase on something that had no solid form. It just swept around him and pulled him further in. Every muscle in his muzzle tensed up as his face contorted into sheer fright, eyes wild with fear. A second later, he schlupped down under the surface.

Refusing to breathe, refusing to open his mouth, the colt attempted to hold out for as long as he could, squeezing his eyes shut as he sank into space he'd always feared to go. It was crushing, collapsing around every piece of him, not leaving a single trace of will in him. He squirmed and flailed, trying to get back to the surface, trying to swim, but struggle was being pushed out of his body, bubbles leaving his snout as the murky depths pulled him deeper. What am I supposed to do!? He was coming close to... Fear gasped, pulling in the most agonizing substance into his body imaginable. It felt like he was swallowing razor blades into his lungs, cutting him up. He sobbed openly, gargling as he tried to get to the surface. The pain was unbearable, slicing into every single bit inside of him, getting everywhere. His mind couldn't operate, not when it was seeping into his ears as well. Getting into his brain. Cutting it up. Fear just wanted to... to leave it all behind. He wanted it to end.

Fear transformed his hoof into a blade out of desperation, intending to pierce it through his heart and end it all. Save himself from the pain by bringing himself to paradise. Right now numbness could only be considered paradise. Fear hesitated though as tears fell down his face. He didn't... didn't want to do it. No matter how bad it got. He needed... needed to just... find someone else. Fear opened his eyes, peeling back the lids, staring upward. It hurt his corneas, stabbing into them. It was the worst thing ever. The tears just made it harder. The whole experience felt like he was losing everything.

Then came the hate. A pure, unadulterated hate for anything and everything. Bubbling, broiling acrimony affecting every pore in his body. Fear tried to fight against it, tried to pretend he was happy, that it wasn't as bad as he was making it out to be. Even as he shuddered in his prison of pain. A forced smile crept onto his face as he suffered, trying to push it all out, attempting to hold back his tears. He couldn't, wouldn't feel this way. The waves of malignancy were smothering him though, nearly destroying him. He couldn't keep up much longer.

In desperation, Fear relented. He closed his eyes and admitted what he was feeling. This is the worst thing in the world. There is nothing worse than this. I hate EVERYTHING and that will NEVER change. I'm gonna be here forever! But... but I don't have to act on it. I just need to... come to peace with it. If I don't, my flailing will just hurt others. Fear ceased his struggling as he fell deeper. His bladed hoof morphed back to normal. I will come out the other side. Always. I will overcome. It will hurt. It will tear me to pieces. But I will win. Fear's body was shaking violently from all the pain, gradually becoming accustomed to it.

It felt like an eternity in the depths, but as he gave up, let the feelings wash over him, and found peace, things began to speed up. He was descending far more swiftly. It impacted him less. Fear filtered it out, his eyes eventually opening and staring downward.

Eventually he hit the bottom of the sea of enmity, his hooves touching the ground. He found inner strength as the pain subsided. He rolled his neck a few times and looked around, everything around him darker than vantablack, yet he could see so clearly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6MKHn3oddk

Fear saw something approaching in the distance. A figure lacerated to Tartarus and back, with all sorts of incisions lining their body, bleeding freely all over the ground, leaving a snail trail of crimson iron along it. Its head was pointed toward the ground, a long, loud, murderous groan escaping its trembling lips as it drew closer. When it got to about twenty feet from Fear it slowly looked up, a nightmarish vision the likes of which made Fear back up and fall onto his ass in shock. “Hahaha! I remember you. Do you remember me?” The figure, which Fear recognized as himself, started to turn around at the neck, the bones popping and reconfiguring as, like an owl, it turned upside down, staring at Fear with a thirsty, cruel smile spread across the muzzle, the flesh rippling along the neck where it was twisted unnaturally. Then it crackled back into place. “We told Mother that we'd make the wasteland a better place. Don't you remember Fear? We were so sure of ourselves. So certain we were capable. But we're not. Are we?” Its voice was stilted like a puppet being controlled by invisible strings, asking the question like an innocent foal.

Fear hesitated, rearing back. “I don't...” Fear knew exactly what this was. It gave off a demented aura of murderlust. It was familiar to him, he recognized it clearly like the information was engraved in his soul. “I meant what I said!” There was an uncomfortable shiver in his voice, full of reluctance.

“Oh? Is that right, Fearei Shatter? Well, I know how we can go about it. If you're willing to follow me.” The monstrous colt crept closer, seeming to slide along the ground toward his host. “Just... just listen to my voice. And everything will be okay.”

Fear didn't want to accept this was part of him. It made him so skeeved out it was incomprehensible. It caused his whole body to shift and cavort as he tried to move away. “Get away from me! I don't want anything to do with you!”

The monster didn't relent. “Oh come on, we're just going to make the wasteland a better place.” The calmness in his voice was unnerving as more blood spilled off his body. “We're going to be the downfall of everypony, of course, but it'll bring peace and happiness to those who are in pain. You were going to bring peace to your suffering self just a few minutes ago after all, weren't you?”

Fear flinched back, remembering his idea to kill himself. “Get away from me!” Fear lunged forward and threw a hoof, slamming into the monster's face. The bone snapped and crunched as the head bent at an odd, lethal angle.

The monstrous form just laughed sourly as he sat back on his haunches and brought his forelegs up, snapping his head back into place to look back at his host. “You cannot get rid of me Fearei Shatter. We are bound for life from now on.”

Fear immediately spun around and started sprinting away, occasionally looking back to see the monster was right on his heels.

“You can't escape Fearei Shatter! I am always with you! We are one and the same. And I will achieve dominance over you. Because I am you!”

Fear stopped in his tracks, leaning forward, rearing onto his forelegs and slamming his hindlegs back, bucking the monster with all his might in the face, splattering the muzzle into gore, the skull breaking apart from the force like a rotten tomato. But it quickly started to remerge as laughter echoed. And as Fear stared with wide eyes, the monster shoved Fear to the ground, pinning him against the abyss, leaning in close.

“We... are... one. Fearei Shatter.”

Desperation came to the surface once more as Fear looked with unhinged horror at his desecrated self, mouth agape, eyes wide, pupils dilated. He couldn't comprehend what he was doing, what he was supposed to do, or anything. I could... I could kill myself so he's never unleashed! But... that would be the easy way out. So how...? The monster opened its wide mouth as if to start biting into Fear's face, some strange form of autocannibalism.

Fear didn't know what to do. He couldn't struggle anymore. I'll run out of strength if I just push him away. He's part of me. He can't die if I don't die but... Fear wrapped his forelegs around his monstrous self and yanked him in for a brilliant bear hug. “Just because you're part of me doesn't mean I have to listen to you! We can be together! And still do the right thing! I don't... I don't love you but you're part of me, and I want to love me. I can't fight you, but I can't also feed you all the time. You need to learn to go without, just like me.”

A bright light surrounded the two of them as surprise crossed the monstrous Fear's face. He tried to pull back and away as the dominant side initiated the merge. It was like fairies floating off of them as the monster struggled, flailing around, being pulled into the dominant side slowly but surely as Fear accepted himself.

“I created you, I accept you, but we need to lay some ground rules!”

An unholy screech filled the air.

“Just listen to me!”

It took a long time, but the rage died off, tapering down as only the monster's head stuck up out of Fear's chest.

“We're going to do the right thing, but we can't kill all the time! Time and a place for everything!” Fear gave the monster a little smile. “We'll get there. Eventually.”

The monster plunged into Fear's chest. And suddenly the dominant side was all alone once more.

==========================================================================================

Fear had been traveling the abyss for what felt like days. When was he ever going to wake up from this nightmare? All he could remember was that he wanted out, wanted to escape. But there was something holding him here. Eventually, with all strength leaving him, he just flopped to the ground, unable to continue going. He rolled around on the ground, trying to wake up, wanting Amelio, wanting his mother, wanting his father, wanting anypony who would listen to what he'd had to deal with. It was harsh and unfair. Why did he...? Fear shivered, feeling cold all of a sudden, and wet. Water was starting to congeal around his body. Fear stood up on all fours, looking around at the blue liquid converging on him. He lifted up a hoof in fright, and when the water rose up over his body to subsume him, Fear let out a frightened whinny and stood up on his hind legs. Trying to fall back and away, the water only latched onto his body. It pulled his forelegs away from him at a perpendicular angle, and then flash froze to the back of his body, wrapping around his limbs and sticking to the fur with the coldest ice imaginable. The sudden drop in temperature felt like pins and needles were poking at his flesh, with a numbing frostbite tickling at the frogs of his hooves and the tips of his snout and ears. The ice stung on his body, and caused frost to gather on his fur. His breath came out in cloudy bursts of steam as he tried to move, struggling against his binds, yanking on his T-pose structure, limbs shuddering from the strain.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=no1OqDrzuNM

Blinking once, Fear was suddenly face to face with a very angry looking lanky colt. The same colt he'd killed... what? Two years ago? Fear wished he could remember. He tried to lean backwards in his bonds, but only succeeded in flattening himself. Fear's entire face twisted up into a look of concern as he stared at him.

Though, it'd probably be a little more comfortable if the colt's face wasn't covered with a scold's bridle. Fear could see the spike inside of Dusk's maw, which he bit down on actively despite how painful it looked, causing the guilty colt to flinch away at the sight. The way the straps wrapped around Dusk's head and held him in place, it was all sorts of disturbing.

Fear was assaulted with a sudden wave of guilt. He would have collapsed if he wasn't being held up by ice, closing his eyes and venting his sadness through tears. Was it sadness or was it relief? He couldn't tell. The tears swiftly froze into icicles that nipped his cheeks. Was this colt a ghost? It would explain the drop in temperature. Fear opened his eyes, having to really pull on them due to almost being fused together by frozen tears, and looked into Dusk's eyes. “I... I'm sorry.” He gasped out. “I was hurting... I, I couldn't control myself.”

“Excuses.” The speech was distorted due to the bridle, and it clearly hurt the colt to talk, to even be there, to be in front of Fear, but he was anyway. “You are a murderer! Murderer!” The colt leaned back and shoved a hoof into Fear's chest, making his ribs tremor. Fear coughed and hacked, weeping as he felt his sins crawl up his back. Or was that the ice? “You deserve to die by another's hoof just like me! I didn't deserve what you did to me! I didn't deserve to be hunted down and murdered! But you did it anyway! You depraved inequine monster!”

Fear sighed, looking away, still teary. He gave a shake of his head. “You're... you're right. I've known for a long time that I deserve to die, that I deserve to have everything taken from me. That I deserve to suffer untold amounts of pain, and it'll still never be enough for the trauma I have inflicted.” The words came out, some alien to Fear's young voice. As if his feelings were being manifested by their location. “But I can't... can't die yet. I can't let myself die before I've done what I can with my life. Before I've tried to make amends. But when my life comes to an end, when it's finally my time to go, I want to go to your mother and have her kill me in return. It will never be enough if she can't hurt me the way I've hurt her and you, and your father. But I just... nopony else deserves to suffer for my sins.”

“But you... you deserve to lose everything!” The colt petulantly exclaimed.

“I do. But I've learned there are ponies who love me, and they'd be hurt if I was taken away before it was time. When the time comes for me to die I can suffer for eternity, I accept that. But in order to break the cycle...” Fear sounded uncertain. “I have to forgive myself until it's time to reap what I've sown.”

The lanky colt pushed his hooves against his eyes and sobbed. “But you... you...”

“I do. But I can't. Not yet.” Fear felt his guilt alleviate, even if only a bit, or at least he felt like he was capable of moving again. The ice began to melt around him, as if his body heat was warming it up. Fear fell to all fours and gave the colt a smile. “Punishment later, not now.”

Dusk huffed. “Fine! But I'm holding you to this promise! If you don't stick to it I'm coming for you and everyone you love and who loves you!”

Fear nodded once. “You have my guarantee.”

And with that Duskshine dispersed into motes of light, fluttering away into the abyss, Fear watching the flakes drift off. What he was left with was a name: Dim Nova. The colt's mother.

Fear was left alone after that, just looking around, wanting desperately to find an exit but not seeing any within sight. The expanse was mind numbing and exhausting. He didn't want to wander anymore. He was so sick and tired of traveling, just going wherever his heart took him. He was almost ready to die. He couldn't find the source of his agony, and he couldn't find his destination no matter how hard he tried.

Luckily for the colt, his destination was coming to him.

On the horizon were a pair of figures that Fear recognized. It caused a fountain of excitement to well up inside of him upon seeing them. His sister, as healthy and young as could be, and his mother, without a bullet wound in her head. He immediately started prancing toward them, hopping and skipping in the air as he took it at face value. Maybe this was his reward for coming to terms with so much?

Only it wasn't meant to last. The two figures stopped in their tracks and stared at him. Fear halted too, and watched them. “Mom? Ame? What's wrong?” He took a step forward, as if trying to coax them into speaking. Their cheeks puffed out and it looked like they were about to puke. Then Fear, closeby, saw their bodies ripple and squirm like something was undulating under their flesh, using their bodies as puppets. It grossed Fear out beyond belief, nearly throwing up at the sight of his loved ones contorting wildly. He turned away for a moment, suddenly hearing the tearing of flesh and cracking of bones, the ripping of sinew and snapping of joints. He looked back in curiosity and horror.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSTklkYAcdw

Both his mother and sister's bodies were turning into something bestial, long spindly spider legs made out of ebony carapace jutting out of the sides of their barrels and holding them up multiple feet in the air. Their original legs dangled under them lifelessly, twisted and broken apart. Their necks were shattered at the base, their heads lolling limply as their mouths gaped open, giant teal eyeballs with slitted pupils bulging out of them, staring at Fear. Their tails morphed into bulbous scorpion stingers that flailed around in the air for something to pierce.

Fear was aghast, his whole face screwed up in terror at the sight of what had once been his kind, beloved family turned into something grotesque. And then they lashed out at him. Fear felt it coming, jumping to the side, then hopping back as two stingers plowed into the ground where he'd once been. The two creatures lunged at him, banging their heads together as Fear tried to escape.

“I'm not gonna fight you! Stop it! Mom! Ame! Please!”

They didn't listen, their legs skittering toward him, the eyeballs firing red searing lasers at the colt who was trying desperately to get away. They scorched the ground, leaving steam rising off where they'd hit. Fear was dodging and weaving again and again, winding around lashing tails and beams of light.

“STOP!” He shouted despairingly.

Death rattles were all that greeted the colt as the monstrous amalgamations bum rushed him. Fear could feel their intent to end his life, to take him from everything he loved.

Fear fought back, jumping forward and spinning in the air, transforming his tail into something draconic, slamming the brunt of the limb into his sister's face, causing her to scuttle to the side and ram into his mother, their extremities tangling up together. Fear hit the ground, tail forming back to normal as he watched them come back at him. The waltz beginning anew.

The monsters' movements were growing sickeningly accurate, working together to try and hit Fear when he was cornered. Fear responded by fighting back passionately, realizing it was kill or be killed. He lashed out at them, his will and emotions turning into psychokinetic energy that lanced off his horn and crackled along his hooves. Fear danced over the ground and struck back randomly, trying to hit them, the monster's body's getting burned the more he pounded those energy-coated hooves. Slamming into the joints of the legs and batting the tails away with a variety of animalistic transformations, using what his father had taught him, and the power of dreams to shield his body.

Fear kept at it, striking roughly, attacking harshly, just as violently as the creatures were coming at him. Eventually he leaped into the air at his sister, spreading his forelegs apart as webs of psychic lightning arced between them and his horn, traversing the short distance and searing across the air. “I won't let you have your way with me!” Fear leaned back while soaring and threw his body forward, bringing the electricity to bear against his sister's body. The thunder pulsed through her, creating varicose veins along her body that erupted outward before bursting into gore, blood and guts rupturing outward and coating Fear in grime. The colt fell to the ground in a heap as his sister laid dying.

“B... Brother...” An alien voice called to Fear from Amelio's gagged mouth. The eyeball inside of it swelled up and exploded in even more disgusting juices, causing Fear to look away as he heard the monstrous screams of his mother next to him.

Abominable sounds filled the air as the bestial Breinstorm shifted and squirmed, increasing in size, her forehead splitting apart and forming a colossal mouth as sharpened teeth filled the new maw. Fear blanched at the sight, able to see his mother's brain within the mouth, and psychic energy erupting from the maw. “FEEEEEEEEEEEEAR!” The scream was demonic and full of anguish, his mother's body growing to behemoth proportions, far bigger than Fear could ever imagine. It paralyzed his entire body. Fear couldn't move no matter how hard he tried. “WHYYYYY DOOOO YOOOOOU FIIIIIIGHT?” The scream was drawn out and as ungodly as Breinstorm was enormous, it shuddered through Fear's body and left him a mess of mush on the ground. The creature roared despondently, as if it couldn't understand. “WHYYYYY DOOOO YOOOOU FIIIIGHT MEEEE!?”

Fear held his head, trying to think past the moment. Why AM I fighting? To survive? Why do I want to survive? Because others are counting on me, sure, but... Fear was broken out of his reverie when he felt a burst of intent blast against his brain. Fear rolled backwards and started running as spears of psychic energy jutted out of the creature's mouth and started jabbing into the ground, creating powerful explosions that nearly rocked Fear off his hooves. The colt was panicking, not knowing how he could possibly... why was he...? It clearly wanted to kill him! Why was it getting more powerful? The answer came as if on a breeze, flowing into Fear's mind and creating a source of strength. Because she's all I have left! But she's... Fear dodged another explosion, just barely, his entire body singed. He couldn't feel that side of his body anymore, everything was tingling, and he was pretty sure he had a concussion. It was difficult to move, his legs nearly giving out on him as he ran. She's not all I have left! I still have so much more! I need to move on!

It was as if the flood gates had been let loose. Willpower and mental strength surged through Fear's entire body, his cerebral cortex brimming with vigor, more psychic energy than he'd ever imagined spawning deep inside of his brain. His eyes fizzled out, becoming completely white washed as magical energy surged through him, his intuition taking the power of his reasoning, the power of his epiphany, and directing it toward a spell that was his namesake. Spectral energy gushed from his body as he twisted around in the air. A spider leg slammed down onto where he was, attempting to crush him, but was blocked by a sphere of ether with nary a crack in it. Fear's jaw hung open as he stared up at his mother, everything becoming more clear than it ever had before. I have to move on. Fear lashed out with a jagged wire of rainbow energy, plunging into his mother's form and scattering throughout it.

And then Fear saw his mother, the construct of her, explode right before his eyes. Everything faded to white.

==========================================================================================

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=POpHpg_JY_M

Amelio and Luna had been waiting at the Celestial door for only a short time, everything within proceeding over what felt to them to be the course of an instant. Both of them expected an exhausted, if not destroyed Fear to come out of that room, but what they did not expect was for the door to open and...

Fearei Shatter stood proudly, chest heaved out and head held high, determination and newfound purpose and strength reflecting prominently in his... sapphire? Eyes. They were a beaming, brilliant aqua blue that pierced the darkness and tore it away. They were the most glorious, precious glowing gems in the wasteland, full of innocence and love, a gentle calmness permeating the starlight irises. There was a golden resplendence to Fear's body that didn't seem to let up in the colt's defiant posture, a smile the likes of which could never exist in the wastes split across his face, teeming with happiness and relief. “HAH! That wasn't so bad!” There was a certain repose about him, like the tranquility of an undisrupted pond. “You should've seen me! I was all like pow pow kapow! Get wrecked!” He was shadow boxing the air while standing on his hindlegs, his countenance in a word: success. “I took on everything and came out on top!” He fell to all fours and looked up at them.

Amelio grinned like a filly. “Everything you exhibited in there was a manifestation of your thoughts and willpower, Fear. You won't be able to recreate it very easily, if at all, in the world of the waking.”

“What!? Really? Too bad.” Fear kicked at the floor, pouting, clearly disappointed.

Luna meanwhile was staring at Fear with newfound consideration. The weight on her shoulders was heavy, looking as if she was about to collapse from the revelation displayed before her. “Are you not... tired?”

Fear shrugged. “I mean sure yeah, but it's not that big a deal. I feel better than I have in a long time!” The colt was all happy-go-lucky peppiness.

Luna gave a firm, curt nod with a grimace on her face, her soul heavy with wonder. “I am... not sure I can do what you have done, Fearei.”

Fear narrowed his eyes at her. “Well, it was hard, I don't blame you! But you promised! You have to.”

Amelio turned to Luna, her grin one of superiority. “Indeed you do, Princess Luna. It is your turn now.”

Fear thought to himself, realization forming over his features. If Mom hadn't died I probably would never have gotten this chance to prove myself and my ideals. I don't know if it's enough, but it's something.

Luna's horn lit up as a smile crossed her face, and in front of her a ring of black cord focused into existence, and on the end of it was a small, finely polished silver screw with a supernatural navy blue shimmer to it. She floated it down and over Fear's head. “Ad astra per aspera. I think this will be a fine symbol of your ability to fix things, Fearei.”

Fear grunted. “You're not backing out on your deal are you?”

“Not at all, my dear Fearei.” Luna's voice had a lingering air of peace and weariness to it, clearly knowing what she had to do.

Author's Notes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0KZMH3NtSo

Sorry if "Fear" doesn't feel like a word anymore. :P