Imagination Is Everything

For Our Sake

"No! Don't!" I cried, taking a step back. "Don't come any closer."

"I don't blame you, Ammo. Really," he tried again, taking another step towards me. "Those people. Those things. Those spirits used you. It wasn't your fault."

"I almost turned into another Pitch Black, Bunny. I could've killed them all."

"But you didn't," he said. "You came to your own senses and stopped it all. You saved them."

"But I couldn't save the rest," I choked back on a sob.

"Ammo," he murmured softly, his eyes softening, his ears folding themselves against the back of his head. And in three long, wide-placed strides, he gathered up the mess I was turning into. Every wall I've ever built with my own two paws, crumbling to the ground.

"Shh," he hushed me, tightening his arms around me protectively, keeping me from falling apart. The glue I'd used to keep myself together for all these years was starting to lose its grip on me. I was a snivelling, crying, unrepairable mess. I didn't care how matted his fur was going to be anymore.

I just want to be free.

"You have to let go, Ammo. You can't keep beating yourself up like this. You can't keep torturing yourself. You can't keep hurting yourself."

"But it's only fair if I hurt myself," I whimpered softly, sobbing even harder with every word I spoke. "It's the only way I can ever pay back for all the pain I've caused."

"Ammo, it's not your fault. My father told me about the crazy story you told the chief in your village. Everyone knew. But it wasn't your fault no one believed you. We all loved and adored Pitch. Kozmotis Pitchiner was a hero to us all. Everyone refused to believe in your warning. We all thought he was strong enough. That he was smart enough."

"I thought I was strong enough too," I muttered.

"But as you said, it wasn't his fault. It wasn't his fault to turn the Golden Age into the Dark Ages. It wasn't his fault he mistook the Fearlings' for his daughter," he continued murmured softly into my ear, nuzzling at me ever so often.

"The Fearlings knew his weakness and used it against him. Something he cared for. Something he loved. Something that kept him going and gave him hope. Just like how War and Violence used you."

"I thought they had my family," I cried softly. "They seemed so real. They felt so real. And the lies they told me."

"Those lies were only the fire to an entire pile of firewood. Lies to get you to destroy an entire planet, just like how Pitch destroyed our Pooka Brotherhood and Lunar Lamas."

Pookas. My entire race. Only being privileged to mate once every millenium. The only beings that are able to stop time travellers from disturbing the past. The only ones able to shape planets and create continents.Skilled in martial arts, every one of us. Once said to be able to gain extraordinary abilities with a bite of special chocolate, abilities different every time one uses it.

The Lunar Lamas. Secretive and cautious. A group of the most serene, most holy men on Earth. A group who dedicated themselves into servicing the Man In Moon. And no amount of arguing could get them to hurry. One who could directly converse with Manny himself, but only under the most extraordinary of circumstances.

Anyone who's ever heard of those two stories would blame Pitch in a heartbeat. But it wasn't his fault he was possessed by ten thousand Fearlings. I was just surprised he survived it. No one has ever been known to survive a Fearling, let alone ten thousand of them.

But the both of them gone. The Pookas. The Lunar Lamas. Just like that.

And to think planet Earth almost ended up in a similar fate.

"You know Nightlight right?" I asked softly once my sobs had subsided.

"Of course. Manny's bodyguard. He prevented him from almost transforming from Tsar Lunar, the Lunanoff Prince and into a Prince of Darkness. While Manny's parents were killed, Pitch and Nightlight both disappeared without a trace."

"You know about Manny releasing the both of them from that cave near a village called Tanglewood?"I asked, pulling away to look at him.

He only stared at me, surprised.

"Manny released Pitch? I thought he only released Nightlight," he exclaimed, baffled.

I nodded.

"Do you," I started softly. "Do you think I'll actually end up like that? That all those poor souls I killed will end up imprisoning me one day?"

"They will if you keep blaming yourself," he stated firmly.

"Please don't blame yourself anymore. For your own sake."

"For my sake."

I never realized how much I missed his lips. Especially when I'm doing it without regrets.