Axton ran towards town, his eyes still blurred with tears as he passed the multiple market stalls that lined the streets. He did not know where he was going, only that he wanted to run, and never stop. He wanted to get away from the violence, the power, the nightmare that was inevitably eating away at his mind. It moved through his mind, slow and sluggishly crawling into the very depths of his emotions, corrupting his heart. His steps started to slow as fatigue took over his body, limb by limb as the darkness latched into his consciousness, fighting for control.

Finally, he could take it no more as the nightmare took complete. Darkness slowly started to ripple around him, his eyes turning to black pits with red slits for pupils. Shadows danced around his body as he finally lost control of his own body.
Civilians ran for their lives as the now Nightmare Axton caused havoc, destroying stalls with the tendrils of darkness emitting from his horn as he laugh maniacally at the complete chaos.

“I aM tHe DeAtHbRiNgEr! RuN aNd CoWeR, fOoLs!” Nightmare Axton cackled as he dispatched of an apple stall. Axton was trapped inside the recesses of his mind as he fought for control.

Inside Axton’s Mind...

Axton ran full pelt through the cybernetic corridors that were his mind. He knew what was happening outside of his mind, the chaos that was being caused. He knew that it was up to him to stop this madness before it reached a climax. As he looked around his surroundings, trying to find some sort of control point, he came to a central chamber. The chamber was domed and dark tendrils scaled the walls, corrupting the blue veins upon the wall, turning them a sinister pulsing red.

Axton, feeling a presence behind him, looked up to find a face upon what looked like some sort of glass screen. The face resembled his own, but was enveloped by a dark shadowy skin which danced along the features that made it up, occasionally lashing out, licking the air before returning to its dark embodiment. The eyes of the colt that was Nightmare Axton looked down at him maliciously, the red eyes burning with the intensity of hot coals.

“HeLLo AxToN. If YoU dIdN’t KnOw AlReAdY, I AM YoU. BuT bEtTeR tHaN yOu. MoRe PoWeRfUl. AnD wHeN I dOnE wItH yOu I wIlL MuRdEr YoUr FaMiLy AnD aLl ThAt YoU HoLd DeAr To YoU.” The face of Nightmare Axton dissipated on the screen, leaving Axton alone in the room. Or so he thought.

As Axton started to walk away from the room, the corridor was sealed off by a wall of darkness, which oozed slowly, eventually pooling onto the floor in front of Axton, taking shape before him as a bipedal behemoth.

Nightmare Axton’s voice echoed around the chamber as the giant being stood before him, ready to strike “MeEt TiTaN, AxToN. PlAy NiCe...” Nightmare Axton cackled maniacally as his voice slowly faded from the room.

Axton turned to Titan, who bellowed loudly before charging madly at him, murder intent in his glowing red eyes. Axton barely had time to dodge before a humongous arm smashed into the floor beside him, making a large dent in the floor, only a few feet away from where Axton had rolled out of the way.

‘I can’t fight against him this way; this guy is probably too tough and will most likely deflect any spells that I throw at him.’ He thought as he dodged another punch thrown by the Titan. He spotted a glowing red crystal on the beings back, which must’ve been its weak point. ‘I can’t get to that at the moment, there’s only one of me... Eureka! There has to be more of me!’ He smirked as he thought the idea up.

Concentrating immensely, he began to imagine multiple decoys of himself appearing. Looking up at the giant, he ran straight through its legs, confusing it. As he ran through, multiple copies of him began to force themselves out of his body, running into different directions of the room. Of course, this made the giant thrash around madly, trying to hit all of his copies at once. Each time one was destroyed, another would run through his legs and multiply to compensate for the destroyed decoy.

After a few minutes of dodging around with the decoys, he saw his opening. As the decoys were distracting the madly flailing Titan, Axton made a heroic leap onto the creatures back, grappling onto the behemoth with all of his might, encasing himself in a steel skin just in case the Titan threw him off. The giant roared ferociously as Axton clung on for dear life on the giant’s back. Axton encased his hooves to be extra thick before tapping on the Titan’s head.

“Hey big guy!” Axton yelled into the Titan’s ear as the decoys all disappeared; this was going to be risky. “Up here!” Axton continued to shout, bracing to complete the final step of his hastily assembled plan.

As the giant found his prey, he tried to pluck the young colt off of his back, but failed miserably and thus resorted to the final option. As the giant smashed its great shadowy fists through its own chest, effectively destroying the weak point on its back, Axton jumped to safety on the other side of the room, quickly making a shield spell as the Titan exploded in a mass of dark gelatinous gloop.

Axton emerged from the dust of the battle that had ensued with only a few small cuts to show. He faced the screen once more and looks at it with a glare before speaking.

“Show yourself, Nightmare. Your power can’t last forever and you are most likely using a lot of it to keep me incarcerated in here. Let’s end this here and now.” Axton spoke with confidence, unfazed by the dark nightmarish visage of him as it once more appeared on the screen.

“WhY aRe YoU nOt DeAd?!?! NeVeR mInD, I’lL dEaL wItH yOu MySeLf!” The voice spoke furiously before the terrifying visage of Nightmare Axton made an appearance, grinning viciously with razor sharp teeth.

They circled each other for a moment, before they came forward, metal clashing upon shadowy muscle. They were both driven back each time they clashed with each other, but neither decided to give in.

Axton was soon beginning to tire and before long Nightmare Axton had found an opening in their repetitive combat, striking Axton to the floor with a vicious backhoof. Before long, Axton was being pinned to the floor by Nightmare Axton, who held a sharpened metal hoof to Axton’s throat.

“SeE? YoU aRe WeAk! PaThEtIc! YoU cOuLd NeVeR bEsT mE!” Nightmare Axton hissed into Axton’s face, a triumphant grin upon his gruesome features. Axton lay beneath his cold grip cut and bruised as he tried to think of a way to be released from the merciless beast that was Nightmare Axton.
Axton let loose a light flare from his horn momentarily blinding Nightmare Axton behind the bright illumination that flashed into the Nightmare’s sight, making him drop Axton to the floor, growling in frustration at having to let his prey go so easily. Before long, Axton was seemingly nowhere to be seen, which infuriated Nightmare Axton all the more. He spoke threateningly to Axton, still knowing his more pure counterpart was in the domed room.

“YoU hAvE nOt BeStEd Me YeT, aXtOn... GiVe Up AnD I wIlL kIlL yOu QuIcKlY!” Nightmare Axton hissed to his hidden enemy, determined to strike the final blow “YoUr MiNd Is MiNe!”

Before Nightmare Axton could react, he was struck in the back of the head by a great force, sending him tumbling forward. Axton revealed himself, pulling down the hood of the Hunter’s Robes before speaking.

“This is my mind” Axton declared as he thought ‘That means I can do what I want’. He continued when he retorted to the Nightmare’s claim “I’m simply taking back what’s mine.” He drove forward in a powerful offense, fighting back Nightmare Axton with the Berserker’s Gauntlets. He had the upper hand when he was driven back by a powerful blast from Nightmare Axton’s horn. Now, they were in the same state; cuts plagued their bodies, and blood slowly oozed from them, each of the powerful combatants bruised and beaten, neither ready to give in.

They circled each other once more before coming to a final clash, each of them releasing a beam of energy that could rival Celestia herself. Axton’s beam was a silvery-grey but had veins of light entwining through it, whereas Nightmare Axton’s was a midnight black, with veins of blood red snaking their way through the attack.

Each of the combatants started to sweat as they neared their limit, but the beam of silver light from Axton soon overpowered the beam of Nightmare Axton, driving the beastly colt onto his back, damaged beyond any type of repair. As Axton walked forward to deal the final blast, Nightmare Axton attempted one last attempt for control.

“P-pLeAse... AxToN... YoU aNd I ArE qUiTe AlIKe... YoU aNd I CaN bE aN uNsToPpAbLe FoRcE!” Axton stood over the Nightmare now, looking down upon the sniveling and evil mess below him.

“There’s not room enough in this mind for the two of us. And I am sure as Tartarus not letting you run free.” Axton brought his horn down, emitting a white light which burned away at the shadows of the room, including Nightmare Axton. The Nightmare screamed an unnatural scream as his dark life-force was burned away by the purging white light.

Axton let the light envelope him, thinking ‘That part of me is no more’.

Author's Notes:

Hey all :) I know this may not be my test chapter, and if there is anything you would like to point out, feel free to do so in the comments. Many thanks to the one and only Fluttershy Auditore for proof-reading :D

Signing off for now,
Axton