The Riddler ？Edward Nygma (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
unriddling) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
heyfreemagic2015-07-17 02:37 pm
unriddling) wrote in heyfreemagic2015-07-17 02:37 pm
Entry tags:
¿? a new riddle
{backdated: early July.}
[There's something different in the back of Riddler's mind, now. Where his sense of technology had been (the feeling of static, of wires, of code that was almost like noise), there's a shifting chill. It reminds him of sand, of clay, of ashes.]
[With it, can create anything he likes, but the first thing he shapes is his familiar cane. Familiar enough, anyway--it's jet black rather than gold with green accents, but it's good enough. It's weighted perfectly in his hands no matter if he uses it as a scepter, as a blunt weapon, or merely only to show off how well he can spin. Being able to twirl it is surprisingly calming after going a few months without.]
[Or maybe that's everything else. He's noticed there's no hollowness to suppress and ignore; the Nox seem to have told him the truth.]
[It's dusk, and he's stalking the back streets of the slums alone, cane in hand. There aren't as many Freesia citizens here, but the ones there to watch him pass look and act a tad rougher than most. He offers the ones who stare too long smart remarks, punctuated by unpleasantly toothy grins.]
[Before long, he practically has an entourage of irate men surrounding him.]
[And not long after that, those irate men are screaming as he lets the darkness pool around him, spill over the sidewalk, and sink into the ground. He hopes they enjoy the sewers--or, more likely, the subways.]
[Riddler pauses. He can tell there's someone else in the darkness.]
Ah. One of our dear Lux's.
[This truly was a good night to test his newfound abilities.]
Tell me--what is a follower in light, but invisible at night?
[There's something different in the back of Riddler's mind, now. Where his sense of technology had been (the feeling of static, of wires, of code that was almost like noise), there's a shifting chill. It reminds him of sand, of clay, of ashes.]
[With it, can create anything he likes, but the first thing he shapes is his familiar cane. Familiar enough, anyway--it's jet black rather than gold with green accents, but it's good enough. It's weighted perfectly in his hands no matter if he uses it as a scepter, as a blunt weapon, or merely only to show off how well he can spin. Being able to twirl it is surprisingly calming after going a few months without.]
[Or maybe that's everything else. He's noticed there's no hollowness to suppress and ignore; the Nox seem to have told him the truth.]
[It's dusk, and he's stalking the back streets of the slums alone, cane in hand. There aren't as many Freesia citizens here, but the ones there to watch him pass look and act a tad rougher than most. He offers the ones who stare too long smart remarks, punctuated by unpleasantly toothy grins.]
[Before long, he practically has an entourage of irate men surrounding him.]
[And not long after that, those irate men are screaming as he lets the darkness pool around him, spill over the sidewalk, and sink into the ground. He hopes they enjoy the sewers--or, more likely, the subways.]
[Riddler pauses. He can tell there's someone else in the darkness.]
Ah. One of our dear Lux's.
[This truly was a good night to test his newfound abilities.]
Tell me--what is a follower in light, but invisible at night?
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[Celestia steps towards his darkness with a serious look completely unlike any the pony has worn here before, her wings spread and her attention entirely on him.]
Tell me -- what has no mass, yet when placed upon a pony, bears down on its wearer with the weight of an entire country?
[As his riddle is obvious, so is hers, particularly given the crown she wears.]
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[It doesn't faze him in the slightest. Riddler turns slowly, spinning his dark cane like a baton.]
Responsibility, no doubt.
[The darkness still pools beneath him, though it stays in a five-foot perimeter around his feet, staying even as he takes a casual step or two closer. The edge of the pool nearest to her roil and twitch, as if eager to take her out. But Riddler's still in control; that can wait.]
Is Freesia a taste of freedom, then? Not having to rule with such crushing weight on your wings.
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[Celestia holds her own magic in reserve - she has that luxury, since it has no form or shape, it merely shines.]
And that includes friends as well as a nation. Tell me, why?
[The question is so obvious as to need no elucidation.]
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[It doesn't even occur to him she might include him as a friend, even potentially. His own heady belief that the Nox stopped him from caring about that sort of thing blocks it out even further than his suspicion without a Deal would.]
Why? [Riddler cants his head to the side.] I don't owe Lux anything. I don't owe the people of this city anything. I don't owe anyone here anything.
Perhaps our abductor should've thought a bit harder about his choices. [He smirks.] I am one of the bad guys, after all.
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I suppose it was foolish of me to ask. You have changed less on the outside than the last person I saw give herself to darkness, and yet I still cannot trust whether your words are truly yours.
[She looks up at him, slightly, pain hidden in the back of her eyes.] Can you?
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Can I? Of course. All my words are mine, even moreso than they were before.
You would know if you were from Gotham, but allow me to inform you--I'm one of the worst people that city has to offer. Everyone knows that of the Riddler. I took the darkness in long ago. The Nox and I only negotiated terms for a tool to properly harness it.
[He holds his hand out, black bubbling on his palm. It spikes upwards to form into a pony--not Princess Luna, it can't be, though the resemblance has to be similar. A shadow pony, but it's Celestia, shadowy mane rippling like her own. A perfect replica, if not for the color. It even moves like her, at least when it walks--which it does, right off Riddler's hand and into the pool below.]
[Seemingly sucking in the shadows around Riddler by its hooves, the shadow Celestia grows.]
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[She regards him evenly, challenging him -- not to deny it, because words are cheap, but to admit it, because everything she said is pure truth. Perhaps she views it more charitably than he intended to present himself, but that did not change what had happened.]
Those are not the actions of somepony who has embraced the darkness.
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It was an exchange of information. But...
[He smiles tightly. The shadow Celestia throws back her head, and he does as she wished. He admits it.]
I wasn't completely corrupt, not in this way. It was still enough for me to feel regret. To feel alone, in fact, and you were the first being that I could stand the company of for even a few minutes in this place. [Or any place, really.]
[He leans on his cane, though it looks rather strange--it's more the size of a scepter than any sort of walking stick.]
You aren't worth it, Princess. A few polite words sent my way would never have been enough to eradicate that weakness.
[And with that the shadow charges forward, swinging its horn downward at its original like an axe.]
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[Celestia still misunderstands her own power. She still believes her magic to be a limited form of her own, not a completely new gift. If she knew better, she could shape forms and illusions in much the same way he is doing now, to match him pace for pace.]
[But when it comes to simply discharging all her light in a wicked blast, such misapprehensions mean nothing. The technique is the same either way, and Celestia's skill and ability shine forth in the column she discharges to sweep away Riddler's mockery of her without so much as a blink of the eye in its direction.]
You have traded strength for weakness. All you are doing is hiding what you felt before, telling yourself it is no longer there. You are begging the darkness to tell you lies so you can believe them over the truth.
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[Riddler straightens, grip turning vicelike on his cane.]
It isn't. I've discarded it, like anything else unnecessary. I do not beg.
[The ribbons of shadow suddenly change, catching the light of the far-away streetlamps. That's the only warning the Princess would get before they hurtled down at her, a hundred pitch-black scythes.]
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[...That isn't right. She'd reflexively attempted to cast a shield spell, forgetting that she had lost most of her magic in coming here, and yet something had come out nonetheless? That makes little sense.]
[But now is not the time to think about it. She spreads her wings, sweeping the entwined magics aside with the gesture.]
You have discarded your own self. Your own free will, the person who you were. Was that unnecessary?
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I have my will, no matter how much you want to deny it! [His voice was distorted, hard to pinpoint.] And the person I was had always been nothing but dead weight.
[Behind her, the darkness attempted to slip under her hooves as a few extra-tarry tendrils from above descended to try and wrap around her horn.]
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If I cast a spell on you to make you feel love or fear or happiness -- if I used magic to change your behavior and your emotions, even if you asked me to, I would be taking your will way. Why is this different?
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My will is my own no matter how you want to convince me otherwise. It only sliced away the useless parts of myself--my will is better exercised without those things in the way. It's not the same!
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[Not every battle needs to be fought with magic. But the way this fight is progressing, she will have to strike hard to win -- so she brings a weapon she has thus far hesitated to use to her mind, readying it with a question.]
You value your intelligence, do you not, Riddler?
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[The only response she gets is cold, waiting silence.]
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Intelligence... can be such a burden, can it not? You see so much. Four sides to every problem. Dozens of paths to your solution, and the potential perils on each one. Ramifications you never considered. So many possible answers to a riddle.
Even now, your intelligence is holding you back. You want to harm me, but you know I am skilled, so you think and think about using this attack, and if it doesn't work, that motion. I can read it in your shadows, Riddler -- you are hesitating, trying to find the perfect answers and failing because you cannot find one that is good enough.
How much simpler it would be to stop thinking. How much purer your expressions of will would be if you only acted by it, without that intellect interfering! If expressing your will by excising the parts of you that get in the way of it was truly what you cared about, you would banish all that intelligence as well and simply act!
But you wouldn't surrender that aspect of yourself. It means too much to you.
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My intelligence is everything I am. It holds nothing back. That is what the lonliness and emotion did.
[The shadows aren't working with the light? Fine.]
[The darkness retreats--for a moment. Then they scatter into dust and reform into a giant crooked hand around a nearby trashcan that flings it at her. Not the most graceful of plans, but he doesn't care.]
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The intelligent course of action would not be to attack me without cause. Only emotion could inspire such a desire to see me hurt. And intelligence would have addressed your loneliness by accepting my friendship, rather than making an enemy!
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...Perhaps your world is kinder than my own.
[The tendrils gather more objects--a long-broken streetlight, a splintering but massive wooden crate, the remains of a bedframe resting in the road, for some reason.]
You would have come to see me as an enemy regardless. [He sounds very matter-of-fact.]
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On that note, I apologize for this. [Without further warming, Celestia unleashes a corona of light around her, illuminating the surroundings brilliantly. She had hesitated to do this, fearing that it would harm Riddler, but now he has pushed the issue and she has no real choice but to vaporize those shadow tendrils in their entirety before they can hurl anything more at her.]
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[The shadows are gone in an instant, objects smashing to the ground. The light shatters, scattering little bits of plastic and glass around.]
[Despite his lack of wings, Riddler's perched on top of a small porch roof, arms thrown up to block his facefrom the light. Fortunately, he isn't hurt more than he's startled; though his skin tingles and his eyes seem to be far more sensitive, enough that he can't see.]
[He staggers back to press himself against the wall.]
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I've heard the anger, and the darkness, growing in you, Riddler. You are losing yourself. You are hurting yourself.
Please... think. Think about what is happening.
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Were you listening? [His voice is back to normal now that he isn't buried within the shadows.] I thought enough. And no matter how much you talk, I don't care! There isn't a reason to!
[His hand catches on the edge of a window. It only takes a flick of a wrist before his own shadow stretches, forcing it open with a nasty screech. It wouldn't be the most graceful of exits, but that doesn't matter. He needs to gather himself elsewhere.]
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I care, Riddler. That can be a reason, if you let it.
[Ugh. This is no good. She needs to get home, get into cover before the Nox can catch her.]
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[Riddler shakes his head and slips into the shadows. He'll watch her go from the window before he does himself.]
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