Detained and pained

Renaultar laid in his bed, staring at the ceiling. He wasn't asleep. He couldn't sleep. If he tried, he would see them. The ponies on the ground, dead, in his dreams. He would see her. The little filly that he failed. But he shed no tears. He didn't feel the sorrow. Not now. He knew what he did.

He was guilty. He knew it. Ponies are dead, and him being there made it happen. Last time he barely was able to handle it. This time though...

He didn't even hear the nurse tell him that visiting hours were open. His attention was hardly on anypony else. Not the nurse, the guard at the door. It wasn't like he could leave with a hoof cuff keeping him attached to the bed.

Life was walking down the hallway when suddenly a nurse stopped him.
NURSE: "I need you to take this one..."
Life received a chart with a black sheet on top so nopony could read it.
NURSE: "The last doctor quit after this case. Good luck"
She walked away. He lifted the black sheet with his wing to see his file. All he saw at that time was the room number. He decided to give him a visit.

He was down the hallway from the room, and he saw a guard standing outside the door. I wonder why they need that there... He thought. He was about to walk through the door when suddenly the guard stooped him with his hoof.
GUARD: ID...
Then the guard grabbed the case files and shined a light at the black paper and a strange symbol came up on it. He then gave the files back to life and stepped out of the way.

Life walked into the room confused, then saw a colt lying in the bed with nearly to no energy.

"Uhhh... So what is the problem?" He asked with a smile, not knowing the patient's problem.

The chart at the bottom of the bed should have said it all. Many bruises, broken ribs, several stabs wounds and various other injuries. History would show that he had been here several times before, and in worse condition, but he had proven to be robust enough to survive when he was thought to perish. His eye patch showed how bad it had gotten before.

Renaultar did not offer any reply. He kept staring toward the window, out at the stormy looking sky.

Life just sat there looking at him. He grew tired of waiting for a reply. He trotted angrily toward the colt, stomping a little and was pretty much hovering above him.

"Listen here, I don't know what you did, or have done, but honestly, I don't care and there is nothing than I hate worse than others not listening. Do you want help? Because I am taking the time out of my day to help you, now... Tell me what is wrong."

He said completely ignoring the chart. Life didn't really enjoy reading charts, he always wanted to know the patient, and for them to say. He always thought that acceptance was key to a patient.

Renaultar couldn't be bothered to hear him. He didn't care. Everything he knew was done for. He didn't care because he didn't deserve it. He did the one most extreme thing he wished to prevent in his line of work. The thing his cutie mark was for.

No response was given. His eye stared off into space toward the window. Comatose.

Life gave up, he started to walk out of the room and suddenly stopped in the door way. He took a glance at the chart he was holding to see what he had. He laughed to himself. He was still facing out the room but he turning his head so only his left side of his face was visible.

"So I guess you don't want me to heal you, because.... I know how..." He threw a small vile of green liquid at him so it landed on his lap. "Take it and have sweet dreams, but, the nurses and other doctors cannot know, alright?" He looked serious then walked out of the room to come back to see him tomorrow.

The slow and meticulous clopping that only comes from an older pony echoes from down the hall. They gradually get louder until they come to a stop outside Renaultar's room. After a brief exchange of words Blue slowly walks in, his open chest showing the still fairly recent scar of the shrapnel that nearly killed him. He came to a final stop at Renny's bedside. "Renaultar."

Renaultar said nothing at first. He ignored the green vial tossed on him and Blue's arrival hardly phased him. He stared out the window still before sighing.

"...Hey Blue." He said weakly.

Life was hoping that Renaultar would take the medicine. It was the strongest thing he had conjured up. He wasn't worried it wouldn't work, he knew it would work. If only Renaultar would take it...

Blue frowned. "I know you have enough courtesy to at least look at your visitors."

Renny made no attempt to look Blue's way. "...They say i killed several ponies....All that could have been avoided...If it weren't for me...What am I Blue?"

With a solemn step, she entered the room wherein lay Renaultar; imprisoned, and willingly so. She carried in her teeth a bouquet of roses from which a single head had been plucked to rest in the mane of another stallion. These, she placed gently at her lover's side. He faced elsewhere.

Silently, as she rounded the foot of his white bed, she scanned his list of misfortunes. By whatever means, he would live. By whatever means, there were things to be mended.

She touched her lips to his neck. "Sorrowful thing," murmured Victoria, motherly in manner, absent of grief or reproach.

"You once promised me 'zat you would fare safely in the streets of Manehattan. What misfortunes invalidate our promise, monsieur?"

OOC: (note to readers. Indigo will not be posting in this topic anymore and thus his involvement will be ignored from his arrival.)

Renaultar winced at the question, especially coming from Victoria. He kept staring out into the cloudy sky, watching the storm develop.

"...A city of lies....makes a liar out of me." Renny muttered, his tone flat and uninterested. The emotion in him was far from the energy that he usually gave off.

With a gentle hoof, Victoria displaced a length of his mane. She remained in this way, silent, carressing his features; probing for his apathy. He was to her, now, a puzzle to be analyzed and solved.

"Perhaps. Perhaps not. What's in a lie, when it is said of lies told often enough that they shall become truth? Do not reply."

She drew closer, forelegs retracted, breast supported by the edge of the cradle. Her velvet curls shrouded Renaultar's heavy iron shackles. "'Zey've taken your strength. Have you been robbed of your confidence, too? You look as though your exterior is but injured, whereas you lay dead underneath. Please find courage to tell me about it," the mare grimly requested. As a subtle accomodating gesture, she turned to face the same dark clouds which congregated beyond the window pane.

Renny continued his hollow gaze, his monotone voice still carrying on, dry and cracked.

"The city robbed me...Or did it just change me?....I swore to protect this city...To save everypony I could. No pony deserved ultimate punishment. No one was supposed to be a victim."

His eyes traced along the clouds as they got closer before unfocusing eerily. "....I murdered seven ponies. Seven dead poines....Dead. Because of me. And i knew it."

Startled, the mare hastily shushed him with hoof upon lip.

"You jest -- Love, tell me you jest. You could not've murdered anypony," Victoria protested in whisper. She peered slowly over her shoulder, distrusting of the very walls, anxious and perturbed.

Notwithstanding, she was in the next moment composed. Idly stroking his mane once again, she spoke calmly; almost jocularly. "I know not what transpired, but rather 'zat you could not have done anything which hadn't needed to be done." She glanced hurriedly across the room once more before resuming. "Yes, it is impossible 'zat you've committed such atrocities. Now then, do not self-deprecate. The law will betray you; and you shall, in turn, betray me and yourself, should you falsely claim responsibility."

"Listen to me," she barked suddenly and sternly. "Whoever the culprit may've been, it was not you, Renaultar."

Renaultar closed his eyes tightly and cringed, holding back some tears. He could remember fighting those ponies. He could not see them clearly, but he remember his uncertainty of their survival.

"I....It was...not me..." He said weakly, words mumbling. "...Because I'm not the same pony anymore. I did it. I know I did. I felt my hooves bucking into them, throwing them, battering them. Their blood...literally is on my hooves. What am I now? I have become what I want to be rid of....I committed the ultimate criminal act...."

His hooves grasped onto Vicky tightly, trembling as a tear left his eye.

Pulled to his breast, she felt his jagged breaths and quivering frame. Kicking her hindlegs over the cradle, Victoria rid herself of contortion and lay with him. At last, she spoke with her muzzle to his throat and with eyes fixed directly upon his listless own.

"Hark," she murmured. "Had you a choice, perhaps things would be different. As it stands, however, you must assess your options and regain faith in your true innocence. 'Ze world will not accept a stallion who cannot accept himself." In emphasis of her point, Victoria freed herself from his grip, drew her outstretched forelegs around his torso, and stood above him.

"Now is the time to dry your tears," she resumed imperiously, enunciating in spite of her accent. "Many things are going to happen, Renaultar, and you must remain conscious of your priorities."

She braced her hooves against his shoulders, which were no longer conducted with the sureness which she had remembered of them, and arrested his muscles.

Renaultar was comforted by her words, but he still could not bring himself to turnabout. It was a nightmare that he wanted to end. Cringing visibly, he winced and shook his head.

"Everything is going so wrong...I want it to be over. It was so simple before and now...How does this happen? A pony like me like me, trying so hard, end up a killer. Is life so fragile? Are we so unappreciative of life?" His voice was not as meek as it was before. Perhaps even a little frustrated, but still very lowly.

"What....happens now?...Who did I kill? Who were they?"

Outside the door, one could hear some hooves walk up to the door.

Mocha Blitz took a deep breath, a Little nervous, Before knocking on the Hospital Room. "Hello? Is, uh, Renetular Shields here? I'm, er, His Attorney, Appointed by the City." he Said, Poking his head in. "I, uh-- Oh, er, Bad time? I can, uh, just head back outside...." He said, clearing his throat. "I'll, uh, Just stand by these scary looking gentlecolts."

(... Yep. This is gonna be a GREAT first case.)

She swiftly intervened. "No no!" Victoria cried with renewed energy. As she separated from her companion, she glanced deliberately into his eyes. It had become evident that, in his current state, he simply would not hear her; he could but pursue his path of grief. Then, waltzing over to Mocha Blitz, she urged him back into the room with a gentle hoof around his foreleg. "Please, join us."

The mare untied her mane and let it tumble in velvet curls about her shoulders. At last, Victoria moved to the side of Renaultar, even daring to obscure the guardpony from the visitor. To him, in turn, she curtsied.

"My dear Renaultar is in the most awful condition. I am Victoria, his -- " She peered sidelong at his vacant expression. " -- his fiancée. Yes, I care for him very much. Now I hope you will not object to my presence, monsieur. He and I have been sorting 'tings out. Where he may fail, in his mental disarray, to satisfy your inquiry, I do think I should speak adequately in his behalf."

Renaultar was indeed despairing. He would have kept mumbling on into the meaning of life and question existence itself if he was allowed to talk long enough. His world as he knew it, his shield, had collapsed, and the vacume it created was taking away everything that fell under it.

While he was tuned out of the ongoing dialogue almost completely, he did manage to widen his eyes a little. Fancée The surprising though quickly became more depressing as his actions now had condemned such a relationship. Bars would surely keep him away forever from her.

"I...I killed them...Sir...." He mumbled out at the attorney.

Mocha narrowed his eyes at Renny, Taking note of him when he said it. Twitches, averted eyes, even so much as body language.

(Eyes Glancing to the left. Hooves Crossed. nervous look in his eyes. He Believes it, At least Mentally. I'd say, 3 Red Lock's worth. But, Subconciously He knows...)

"I don't think you killed a single one of them."

The mare stole glances at this stallion. How he scrutinized her companion through intent eyes, vigorous, penetrating. Renaultar was all too willing to convict himself. She took Renaultar's hoof in hers before turning to face Mocha Blitz.

"Monsieur," addressed she with restrained courtesy, "Renaultar shall be trusting of his own recollection without regards to its accuracy. He has described to me precisely how he supposedly murdered each of them."

She compressed the guardpony's hoof before continuing in a low voice. "Now, perhaps what is left is to determine a justification for these alleged actions. I know my love would never stray from the law."

False.

That's what Mocha's statement was to Renaultar. On every level, he knew that at least one pony died to his hooves. Once knowing one was dead, why not the rest?

False

Renny never liked to stray from the law, but after that night....He might as well have been as corrupt as some of the ponies that the mob paid off.

He looked to the attorney. His only regret was that he would be tarnishing his record with a loss. "You won't be finding anything to help your case...I killed ponies....That's that."