Spike wandered amongst the streets of Ponyville. The pegasi really had made quite a snowstorm today.

Ponies of every sort rushed into their homes, slamming the doors shut against the bitter cold and likely getting to a fireplace as quickly as possible. So many families getting together today, so many homes likely full of laughter and warmth.

Spike kept walking, his internal fires keeping the chill from being anything but a minor annoyance. He probably should start heading back to the library. Dusk was going to need someone to help keeping an eye on the kids, at least until Write Off came home from work.

That pony had far too much to do at the Canterlot Bank these days, but it was just the way things were. Dusk had wanted to keep Golden Oaks running, so Write Off had agreed to make the commute so it could remain their home. It wasn’t too hard, so long as the train was working, but it meant he often worked late at night.

Every day was the same routine: Spike would keep the twins entertained for the better portion of the day as Dusk worked about the house, and the twins always insisted on staying up until their father returned home. The instant the poor stallion was through the door, he would find himself taken down by a very excited pair until Dusk was able to pull them away. Write Off would spend a few minutes with the children as he overrode their yawned protests and put them firmly into bed, and then give Dusk a peck before the two would go off to bed. The next day, the never-ending process would repeat itself.

Though Write Off rarely had much time with the twins or Dusk, whenever he had a day off, he shoved every minute he could into it. The holidays were one of those rare occasions when he could come home early, and thankfully today was such a day. Instead of close to ten at night, Write Off would be home around quarter past two today. The twins were literally bouncing off the walls.

Spike smiled a little. It was great that those two had such a great relationship with their father. Write Off had earned his place as Dusk’s husband and as a father. Morning Star had every reason to be proud.

However, that thought sent Spike’s mind wandering, amongst halls he had desired to never visit again, and his pace slowed as the memories leapt unbidden to his mind. Morning Star, Dusk’s father. Eventide, Morning Star’s mother.

He had to stop, or he was going to go someplace he had never wanted to go again. But it was too late, the name leapt unbidden to the front.

Twilight.

Spike couldn’t outrun himself, though that did not stop him from trying.

Grown dragons spent a hundred years awake, and then slept a hundred years in deep hibernation. It was the main reason for their longevity. The hundred years asleep was their time for rejuvenation, a healing of the body from the strains of the physical activity a lifetime could put you through.

It was also a period of mental growth. In a dream state, a dragon had time to contemplate, and find the wisdom throughout his past lives, the number of which depended on their current age. A dragon over a thousand years old would find remembering anything from the beginning of his life difficult when he was awake, due to the sheer number of memories and other such tasks an active mind would require when he needed every function of his brain to keep him moving and alive. However, in the dream state, he could compare and contrast his past lives with his current one at his own leisure, a hundred physical years to learn from his experiences.

However, what Spike had not known, because Twilight had never told him, was that young dragons had a slightly different cycle. Because they were younger, and needed their rest even more than a more mature dragon, they also had to take a hundred year’s rest. But they started it after only fifty years. To learn how to best utilize their time in the dream state, young dragons had to get as much practice as possible while they were still young enough by their species standards to bear being cared for by their elders.

Spike slipped on a slick patch of ice and went to the ground, rolling to a stop. The fall hadn’t hurt, his scales were too thick for that. Yet still he curled into a miserable ball, sobbing uncontrollably as steam clouded the air from the hot tears hissing in the fresh fallen snow.

He hadn’t even been able to say goodbye, or see them all one last time. He’d said goodnight to Twilight and her children one evening, and then gone to the home he’d found for himself. He hadn’t wanted to intrude, and she had the right to her own home when she’d finally found that somepony to settle down with.

Though they had told him he was free to stay, he’d known that it was time to find a place of his own. So he’d made a little cave, dug in the side of a hill near the Ponyville Lake. When he woke up what felt like the next day, he hadn’t known just how much his life had changed, until he went to visit Twilight again.

It was a terrible start to his day. First, everypony had panicked when they saw him, for none of them had ever seen a dragon strolling into Ponyville before. To them, it was just old mares’ stories. Guards had been called, threats issued, and a cry sent to Canterlot for someone to deal with the young dragon invading their peaceful town.

When Spike had tried to explain himself, nopony had wanted to listen. After all, nopony knew him and he knew nopony else. Only a young filly by the name of Dusk had dared approach him, despite the screamed warnings of her neighbors.

“Are you a nice dragon?” she’d asked, her innocent eyes wide with both awe and curiosity. A bit of fear had danced in them as well, though she restrained from screaming her head off like everypony else was.

Hoping against hope, and praying that someone here could explain how the whole world had gone mad in a single night, he’d held out a claw. “I’m Spike,” he’d said. “Who are you?”

Dusk had looked to his outstretched hand. Then put her hoof in it, looking up and smiling at him.

“My name’s Dusk,” she’d answered. Then she’d taken him home to introduce him to her mother Gem Stone and her father, Morning Star.

At first, they’d reacted as any sane parent might if their daughter brought home a dragon. However, after some quick explanation, Spike was allowed to stay in near the house until Celestia should arrive and verify his truthfulness. Only after the alicorn had been summoned, had everyone learned of his honesty.

And that Spike learned of his terrible, terrible curse.

The very thought nearly made him heave. Young dragons didn’t have only one shortened cycle. They had four: two-hundred years awake, four-hundred asleep.

How many years did he have left before this vicious cycle began again? He’d already spent a couple dozen watching Dusk grow up, find love, and have her own family. He’d been there when Morning Star had finally met his time, and when Dusk’s mother had followed not long after.

So, at best, another couple dozen and spare change, and then it’d start all over again. He’d go to bed, and awaken to find everything he’d started caring for gone once more. He’d never get to be there for Dusk in her final years, or for her children, or her children’s children.

A hundred years. Over a hundred years since he’d seen his first friends, among them his own adopted mother. It felt shorter sometimes, like only yesterday he’d been talking with them: joking with Pinkie Pie, working with Applejack and hanging around with Rainbow Dash; trying to find someway to tell Rarity he’d loved her with a passion greater than a thousand suns, or just helping Fluttershy with the critters; and, of course, being with Twilight, working as her helper and acting as her friend.

Spike curled up all the tighter, clinging to his scarf. It wasn’t fair. Why hadn’t anyone told him about this? Why hadn’t Twilight warned him? Told him that he’d never even be there to hold her hoof when that day came? Why he couldn’t have been there for them when they’d needed him most?

A bubbly giggle echoed over his weeping, and Spike sat up in shock. The storm had only grown worse, and it was already getting dark out. He could barely make out the orange blur standing a few feet away.

“Who’s there?!” he shouted, trying to wipe his face with a scaly arm. But it only got wet slushy snow in his face, and he sputtered as the orange blur laughed all the louder. Spike shook of a hand and wiped at his face with his slightly less soggy scarf. “Stop it!” he snapped.

The orange blur just giggled, and Spike heard a lilting female voice dance through the screaming winds.

“Hey!” she chimed. “Can you play with me?” Then it dashed off, into the howling storm.

Spike stumbled to his feet. “Hold on!” he yelled after it. “You don’t want to be outside right now! It’s too dangerous! Come back here!”

“Then you better catch me, silly!” came the sing-song reply.

With a growl, Spike tore off after the orange blur. Holy cats, did it move fast. Like a snake, the blur slithered easily over the thick snow, while he just plowed through it like a tiny tank. Stupid filly, her parents would likely be worried sick, and playing a game of tag in the snow was going to get her frozen into a dunce-icle.

But she just kept giggling madly, laughing all the louder every time he let out a puff of emerald flame and roared, “Get back here!”

She just kept running, and he kept chasing. Soon, they were no longer in Ponyville. Then, they were no longer even near Ponyville. Spike followed in close pursuit. Over the hours of chasing, and with a bit of practice, he’d found he could move faster if he swam through the snow, instead of bulling through it. He laid on his stomach, whipping his tail back and forth to propel him like a scaly ship up the ancient, long forgotten paths along its side.

The little twerp led him all the way to a familiar lone mountain, jutting like a silent sentinel of times immemorial. She streaked towards the top. The orange blur shrieked in delight as he kept following her, and moved even faster, recklessly so, up the treacherous paths.

Up the mountain, higher and higher they went, over small gorges and around recent rockslides, climbing higher and higher and higher. Before he even knew it, the orange blur was dashing towards a deep cave. If she made it in there, there was no way he could find her again. It’d be too dark, and she probably knew this place even better than he did if it was someplace she knew well enough to make her way up a mountain in the middle of a blizzard at night.

He gave an especially powerful stroke and launched himself through the air, tackling the orange blur and sending them both sailing into the cave. She screamed loudly, and Spike clapped a hand over her mouth.

“Okay, fun’s o–”

A snarl shook the whole cave, and his blood froze. Spike slowly lifted his head, bringing him snout to teeth with a very angry looking dragon, whose golden eyes shone like a pair of gigantic spotlights.

She was certainly an interesting breed. Her head was the triangular wedge one would normally associate with a viper, two fangs the size of a good footstool each jutting down from her lips. A greenish-hued fluid ran down them in deadly rivulets as she exposed the rows of sharp, serrated teeth they were nestled in.

To either side of her head were a great pair of large frills, splayed wide to make her face even more imposing than it already was. Her deep crimson body was long and snake-like, with a large frill which ran along her spine like a sail right to the tip of her thin, whiplike tail.

She wasn’t all that large by dragon standards, maybe the size of a small apartment or two, and her serpentine body wasn’t much thicker than a couple ponies standing side by side. Three pairs of batwings, the “thumbs” all bearing a hooked claw, served as her legs. They jutted awkwardly all over the place, bending at strange angles as she loomed over him, and Spike found himself wondering how exactly such a creature could move, much less stand on the frail looking appendages.

“You have ten seconds to let go of my daughter,” she snarled.

Spike looked down, finding himself on top of a much smaller version of the titanic beast threatening him.

The only real difference she had to her mother was her coloring. She was a deep shade of ruddy orange, with a peachy underbelly covered in black dots. Black streaks adorned her spine and sides, and a pair of bright yellow eyes shone happily as she squirmed beneath him, still trying to get loose and run again.

He swiftly leapt off, landing unceremoniously on his backside a couple feet away, and the little dragon looked up at her mother almost disappointedly.

“Aww, momma… ”

Her mother glared down at her. “Get behind me, Lily.”

“We were just–”

“Now!”

In a flash, the little dragonling was up and hiding behind her mother’s rearmost set of wings. The mother glared at Spike once more.

“Leave her alone, walker,” she growled, though her voice was surprisingly high-pitched, almost a musical sound really, for such a large creature. “Or I will end you.”

Spike held up his claws. “I-I just thought s-she might be someone from town. It isn’t s-safe to be wandering around at night. E-especially tonight.”

The dragon’s snout was in his face again, her hot breath bearing a scent that was almost sickeningly sweet, like rotten fruit. “Get out.”

Spike slowly got to his feet, and started backing out of the caves while doing his best to keep his hands up and maintain eye contact.

Lily glared up at her mother. “No, momma! Don’t chase this one away too!”

Looking down at her daughter again, the dragon frowned. “Don’t start with me. I’ve been worried sick, and now you’ve shown someone our hiding place. Now we’ll have to leave.” She sighed, smoke pouring from her nostrils. “Again.”

“I don’t wanna go!” insisted Lily.

Her mother roared, the whole cave trembling beneath the mighty din. “We have to! I’m not having this argument again!”

In a flash, Lily darted out from behind her mother’s legs and tackled Spike. “No! I’m staying here with my new boyfriend!”

“What?!” shouted both the mother and Spike at the same time.

“You heard me!”

Spike desperately tried to pry her off, especially when he noticed the murderous gleam in the mother’s eyes, but Lily was rather clingy to say the least. It was worse than trying to peel glue off carpet. There should be no way she should be this strong with such delicate looking wings.

When he finally had to give up, any rougher and he’d have to risk hurting the little nutcase, Spike just threw up his hands. “I didn’t do anything! I swear!” he insisted.

The mother stalked towards them, body slung low and the tip of her tail twitching. “Let go of the walker right now, Lily; I’m not going to ask again.”

Lily just tightened her grip, and Spike felt some of the wind leave his lungs. “No! You always do this! I never have anyone to play with because you keep chasing them away!” Spike almost thought one of his ribs was going to snap. “But this one’s mine! I even picked a dragon this time, so leave us alone!”

“Lily… ” started the mother, the murderous gleam growing ever brighter as she glared at Spike.

“I didn’t ask for this!” Spike snapped, giving a light shove against the tiny dragon glued to his stomach to prove it. “I don’t want to be her boyfriend! But, unless you want me to start breaking things, you’re the one that’s gonna have to make her let go!”

Only when he looked down, did Spike find the depth of his mistake. Lily was looking up at him, tears welling in her yellow eyes.

“Y-you don’t wanna be my boyfriend?” she asked, lower lip quivering. He didn’t say anything, but she must have seen the struggle in his eyes because Spike found himself on his behind for the second time in as many minutes as she shoved him down and screamed, “Fine, then I hope I never see you again, you meanie!”

Lily ran for the deeper part of the cave at a weird hobbling gait, bawling at the top of her lungs and leaving trails of tears in her wake.

Spike stood up, brushed off his scales with a grumble, and then stormed towards the mouth of the cave. A titanic claw rested on his shoulder, stopping him in his tracks.

“Hold on,” came a quiet command.

Spike screamed in frustration and wheeled on the large dragon. “For the love of Celestia, make up your mind!” He slapped the claw away. “I got her off of me, didn’t I? And now she wouldn’t come near me again even if I was made of tourmaline! So you’re freaking welcome! I’m getting off this crazy train!”

When he turned to leave, a tail wrapped about his waist and lifted him from the ground. He glared at her, legs still pumping.

“I’ll bring you home,” the large dragon sighed.

Spike kept glaring at her. “Am I even being given a choice?”

“Yes.” He lifted a scaly ridge curiously, and for the first time, the dragon smiled a little. “It’s rather dark out tonight, and I don’t think you want to get lost in a blizzard.”

“I–”

The dragon’s tail set him on her spine. “My kind lives for the cold, walker. The ice is our father, the wind our mother, and it is a rare breed that can outrace a Serpent of the North.”

Spike didn’t really know what to say. Maybe she was being truthful, or maybe she just wanted to get him away from where Lily could see what she really had in mind for him. He’d just made her daughter cry, after all.

Still, it didn’t seem like he really had a lot of options. This dragon could just as likely past him here as anywhere, if she really wanted to. Besides, she was right to some extent. It was pitch-black outside, and while he was tougher than most ponies, he was still capable of being frozen solid if he got lost. Or fell off the mountain and sprained an ankle, keeping him from finding shelter in any timely manner.

“Okay,” he sighed, settling on her back and grasping one of the spines that jutted from her now flat-lying frill. “Let’s go.”

She took off, shooting into the darkness like a bolt of lightning. The dragon practically skated over the snow on her belly, slithering serpent-like down the mountain in a manner Spike knew he’d never be able to truly duplicate with such sinuous grace.

“Listen,” started Spike. “I–”

“There is no need to apologize, walker,” said the dragon, not looking at him. “What was done had to be done. But thank you for not hurting her in any other manner. I would have likely ripped your eyes out through your leg stumps.”

Spike gulped. “N-no problem, um… ”

“My name is Amaryllis.”

“Amaryllis.” He looked about the darkness. Only Amaryllis’ eyes provided any light to the black murk. “Um, where are you taking me?”

“To Ponyville.”

He lifted an eye ridge again. “How’d you kn–”

Amaryllis hissed in distaste. “Because you are a walker. Dragon’s hatched of pony magic develop no wings, because they adopt a few characteristics of their surrogate mothers. Plus, I could smell the stench of them upon you from miles away.”

“Hey!”

A shiver ran through her spine, threatening to send Spike sailing off. “How can you stand yourself? Subservience should beneath an old-kin. You’re an abomination of nature, destined only for pain.” Another shiver. “Destroying you would be a kindness, both to yourself and to our race.”

Spike opened his mouth to protest again, but could force no protest through his lips. He tried again, but no luck. He heard Amaryllis sigh.

“You’ve gone through first cycle, haven’t you?”

A wave of pain rushed through him. “Yes,” he croaked, tears threatening to fall once more.

“Is it worth it?”

Spike looked up, arching an eyebrow ridge. “What do you mean?”

“Is being with any of the lesser beings worth knowing that you shall outlive almost every single one of them? Is this a cycle you could bear to repeat, time and again, until even your own life should eventually ebb away?”

Silence.

“I-I don’t know… ”

“So why do you stay? Why have you chosen to remain amongst them, instead of finding solace amongst your own kind?”

Spike snorted bitterly. “Because I’m a freak. I don’t have a place among ‘our’ kind. I don’t have a place with any kind.”

“Would you like me to grant you mercy, then?”

Spike sat bolt upright, and tried to leap off so he could run, but Amaryllis’ tail coiled about his body, and he couldn’t budge a muscle. Her fangs were drooling again, whatever that fluid was hissing angrily as it touched fresh snow.

Her head swiveled in place and no emotion flavored her voice as she spoke. “I can give you peace, child. I can make it all stop.”

“W-why are y-you doing th-this,” gasped Spike, her coils crushing him even as her fangs drew ever closer.

Amaryllis cocked her head. “Because, child, you need it.”

Spike felt the tears coming again. “You’ll just take what you want anyways.”

His face smashed into the ground. The world spun as she brought him an inch from her fangs.

“Don’t try my patience, walker. I am merciful only because of Lily: it would likely upset her if she learned that you are hurting and I could have helped. But your delirium is contagious, and my daughter shall not find herself in your fate, trapped in endless heartbreaks. She is dragon, an old-kin, and is above the petty needs of lesser beings.”

“So why are you still with her then? Why not let her join one of the flocks and grow up by herself?” snarled Spike.

Amaryllis frowned. “Because she is my daughter.”

Spike spat, even as the edges of his vision went black. “That doesn’t sound very dragon-like.”

In a rush of air, he could breathe again. Amaryllis tossed him to the side like a used napkin, and slithered a few feet away. Spike stood, massaging his ribs as he walked after her, groping blindly until he felt her scaly side beneath his claws.

“Who was the pony?” he asked.

She glared at him. “I am not–”

“You weren’t hatched by ponies, but you knew one, didn’t you?”

Amaryllis looked away. However, her wings sagged low, and he heard a new hiss, though this was of the tears now falling to the ground. “I hatched, joined a flock, and fought and struggled like any other youngling. However, my breed are not known for their fighting prowess, so I was defeated by my superior opponent. As is tradition, I was left to fend for myself afterwards. My first cycle had already passed, and so the flock had no reason to protect me anymore.”

She set Spike on her back again, and continued to slither towards Ponyville, as if to outrun her memories.

“A stranger found me, alone and wounded in the wilderness one day. Though merely a unicorn, still he cared for me, bringing me to his own home despite my raging. It was my first experience with–” She almost had to spit the word out. “Kindness.”

Spike nearly asked a question, but Amaryllis was already speaking again.

“Though I naturally fought to free myself at every opportunity, he made sure I could go nowhere until I had healed. Only after I was strong once more did he take me back and let me go. My first instinct was to attack the creature that had dared try to tame me.” She chuckled bleakly. “Which I did. And yet, he did not fight back. No matter how I hurt him, no matter how a bit and clawed, he would not strike at me. It… it did something. I couldn’t end him, and I felt only shame when I left, him standing there covered in injuries I had inflicted.” She hunched up, as if the cold had somehow gotten to her. “Now I’m tainted. And Lily has been tainted as well, by merely being my daughter. But I cannot claim even your excuse of being forced into this perversion of nature.”

In a swift turn about, her tail lashed about Spike’s waste and smashed him roughly on her spine. Then it struck loudly against the snowy ground, shattering some of the dirt, and she lithered as fast as she could, as if to outrun the memories. “Why did that fool do this to me?!” she screamed. “How can he have dirtied one of the old-kin in this manner?!” Her keen split the sky. “And I cannot even tell this to him anymore! But why does it hurt?! Why do I care?!”

The lights of nearby Ponyville glowed softly, and Amaryllis hurried towards them. Soon, she was slithering amongst the buildings, a red ghost in the middle of the storm, even as her tears still hissed upon the ground.

“Why?” she sobbed in mantra, every utterance marking a push of her body herself through the empty streets.

Thankfully, because of the lateness of the hour and viciousness of the storm, they made it to the library without incident. Lights burned brightly, even though the ponies within should have long been in bed. Spike felt an odd sense of warmth as he looked at the old treehouse. Amaryllis turned her head.

“Get off, walker,” she snarled, the coldness slicing through the joy.

Spike slid from her back, and Amaryllis lifted her head, trying to keep her face turned so she could try and hide her reddened eyes. As she turned to leave, Spike set a hand upon her side. She hissed at him, exposing her teeth, but he just smiled sadly.

“Can you tell me something?” he asked, patting her side absently as he looked towards the library. The twins were likely asleep by now, but maybe Dusk and Write Off were still up. “Do you love Lily?”

“Yes,” said Amaryllis, a scaly ridge lifting a bit and a scowl creasing her lips. “I do, with all my heart. And I would ask you to never question that again if you don’t want to know the color of your innards.”

Spike smiled, scraping a foot against the ground. “You asked me if living with ponies is worth the pain. And I have an answer. Yes.” She made to speak, but he chuckled. “For the same reason you should think it’s worth it too. Because, what they offer is something the old-kin have always been missing: loyalty, generosity, kindness, honesty, and laughter.” He chuckled again. “They give us friendship, which closes a hole we have always tried to fill with useless trinkets.”

Amaryllis frowned, looking away, and Spike patted her side once more before heading towards the library.

“Even though they don’t live as long as we do, what they give us lasts longer than any hoard. Old friends give rise to new friends, creating joy where there once was pain.” He reached for the knob, twisting gently. “It isn’t a taint, Amaryllis; it’s a gift. And one you shouldn’t be afraid to let both yourself and Lily enjoy. For, no matter how many friends we lose as the years pass... ”

With a creak, Spike opened the door, smiling at the sound of the excitable twins piling down the stairs to greet him. He turned to Amaryllis, still at the edge of the candlelight, as Dusk, Write Off, and the twins rushed to hold him. “There’s always someone there for you, if only you look in the right places.”