Chapters Luna floated in the expanse of consciousness that made up her dreams, being the princess of the night one of her duties was to watch over all of her little pony’s dreams, tonight was a particularly calm night in that she only had to deal with three ponies having nightmares, which left her with a lot of free time. Maybe I can check on starry? If he isn’t having too good of a dream maybe he wouldn’t mind if we talked or something. Luna cast out her mind, searching for starry. After a few minutes of sifting through dreams she came across one that felt familiar, the edges were more hard defined and Luna could feel starry behind the sphere. Luna pushed past the sphere and made herself invisible so she wouldn’t disturb a good dream if starry was having one. Slowly sounds began to fad in around her, followed by walls a floor and a room, when Luna opened her eyes she was standing in the middle of a classroom, foals, probably eight or so were filling the desks, Luna walked to the edge of the room and looked for starry, then she saw him, or rather thought she saw him, he was sitting in the back away from every other pony, but he was a foal, which was off because dreams didn’t usually alter your appearance to fit you in a scene, you just fit in because the dream willed it so. The teacher at the front of the room cleared her voice, drawing Luna’s attention; she stayed because typically dreams of schools became nightmares.
“okay class it’s time for you to show us what you learned over the past week, first up is… sparkling brook!” a unicorn filly slipped out of her desk and walked to the front of the class.
“today I’m going to make water from this rock,” she announced happily producing a rock from her saddlebag, and setting it on the floor, before pointing her horn at it and after a few seconds the top of the rock burst with water like a geyser and the room was filled with the hoof stomps of applause.
This went on for a while with various students going up and preforming small feats of magic, when Luna suddenly noticed another older pony in the room with her, looking over she noticed starry skies standing off to the side at his correct age. The night princess looked over and saw the foal starry still at his desk, then it hit her. He’s lucid! This is a memory... I should really leave… Luna turned to walk out of the lucid dream memory when suddenly the teacher called out.
“Let’s see who is next, ugh... starry skies,” she said with some hint of irritation. “Get up here and show us what you learned. Luna was shocked at the sudden angry tone the teacher had when talking to starry. Luna’s curiosity got the better of her and she turned to face starry on the raised area at the front of the classroom looking very uncomfortable.
“Okay, so, today I’m going to infuse this ball with magic and make it glow.” Starry said and sat a ball on the ground, pointing his horn at it and making strained sounds. After a few minutes he was practically banging his head against the ball, and the class was growing restless.
“Come on starry! Get off the stage!”
“Quit trying you blank flank and let someone else go.”
“Yes starry I think it’s time that you gave up,” the teacher said and stood up from her desk.
“N-no! I can do this,” starry grunted and squeezed his eyes shut tight, when Luna noticed another student wadding up some paper than threw it at the poor unicorn. Soon the rest of the class started throwing things, and the teacher just sat there. Luna then noticed sparkling brook pick her rock up then throw it and gasped. Time seemed to slow as the rock impacted Starry’s head, eyes going wide and in a flash his horn lit up like the sun, a bright beam shooting from his horn and into the ball, causing it to glow brightly before exploding. Luna looked around and the class was quickly exiting their desks and being herded to the back wall by the teacher, Luna looked back to foal starry and he was up in the air, bolts of light began sweeping out of his horn, then suddenly the memory skipped ahead as if the dreamer didn’t want to watch the whole thing.
Starry was standing in a black crater when the memory resumed, a good portion of the class was charred and some of it was on fire, Starry’s head was bleeding from the rock and the area around his horn was badly burned and scorched. The foal climbed out of his crater and looked at the destruction around the classroom.
“I- I’m sor-“he began but was interrupted as the teacher yelled at him.
“GET OUT NOW!” starry was taken aback and attempted to apologize again but the teacher just screamed at him again, with tears in his eyes he quickly ran out of the classroom, only Luna noticing the new mark on his flank, Luna looked at the teacher’s face, making sure to commit it to memory as the scene faded away to blackness, with starry sitting in the middle with tears in his eyes, not noticing Luna because of her invisibility. Luna was about to walk to him when another scene populated the dreamscape.
Foal starry was standing in a very sparsely furnished living room, it was clearly the same day noting by the injuries the foal had. An earth pony and a Pegasus were looking down at him, a male and a female.
“What in tartrus is wrong with you boy,” the male said, there was a slur in his voice and Luna could practically taste the alcohol on his breath. The female looked to her husband with a look of disapproval and fear.
“Now dear I’m sure he didn’t mean t-“she was cut off as the brown earth pony turned and back hoofed her into the nearby wall.
“SHUT. UP! This is my son and I will talk to him however I damn well please!”
“P-please don’t hit mom,” starry pleaded, and suddenly the stallion rounded on him and pinned him against the wall with a hoof.
“YOU WILL NOT TELL ME HOW TO TREAT MY WIFE YOU INSIGNIFICANT PILE OF TRASH!” Luna watched with horror as starry was thrown across the room, landing in wooden chair and splintering it to pieces, his horn letting out little sparks of energy in stress, as he stood up he ran to his mom and checked to see if she was okay. Starry’s mom had a bruise on her cheek and tears in her eyes, Starry’s coat was matted with blood as parts of the chair had cut him pretty badly. Starry’s father turned back to him.
“I bet you didn’t know your little school is making ME pay for the damages you caused with your little stunt today.” Starry’s horn flared with power as he stood up.
“You aren’t paying anything! Mom is the only one who has a job!” starry yelled, his father immediately narrowing his eyes and advancing on his son. Starry’s mom’s eyes widened and starry stood in front of her, with a bright blue flash and a muted boom, his horn let out a concussive blast, throwing his father into a wall. The brown stallion quickly stood up and glared at the foal. Starry’s mom gasped loudly.
“I’m going to kill you boy...” he said in a too even tone, grabbing one of his alchol bottles and smashing it over the counter.
“starry run!” Starry’s mother yelled and the foal quickly turned and ran out the front door, his dad quickly following behind him and stopping at the door. “Yeah you better run! If I even see you again I’ll kill you and your mother!” he finished and stalked back inside, the scene fading to black again, to be replaced by another scene, of foal starry, laying in a field under the night sky crying, slowly the foal began to grow up until it was present starry under the night sky crying in his dreams. Luna looked around and noticed he was the only starry in the scene so he must be the original and decided she couldn’t let him go on like this, but since this was a lucid dream she didn’t have enough control to turn the scene to something happier, so she did the only other thing she could think to do.
Luna dropped her invisibility and walked over to starry skies, lying next to him and draping her wing over his shivering frame. Starry looked up shocked and rubbed his nose on his forearm, then waived his hoof in front of her as if he was trying to dispel a memory, then looked shocked when she persisted in the scene.
“W-what,” he asked confused as to why there was an element of his dream he couldn’t control.
“it’s really me starry, as princess of the night I can enter other ponies dreams, and I very much apologize for intruding on your privacy.” Starry was going to say something when another wave of sobs wracked his body, Luna just pulled him closer and he hid his face in her neck.
“Shhhh, don’t say anything. Just let it out…” Luna said as starry cried into her mane.
“I just I don’t- I didn’t mean... “ starry cried as Luna listened.
“It wasn’t your fault” Luna consoled as starry shook, noting how well constructed this dream was in that it hadn’t broken yet from the dreamers emotions. He must be lucid a lot to hold one together this well.
“I-I know I wasn’t the m-most liked unicorn... b-but everyone hated me and I just…I didn’t mean to.” Luna nodded as starry continued sobbing for a few more minutes before starry said something that gave her an idea.
“I- I just ... I miss my mom…” starry whined to Luna and she looked down at him, getting an idea that might make him feel better.
“Do you want to tell me about her?” Luna asked and starry skies looked up.
“Sure okay,” he said trying to force his sobs down as the scene around them began to warp, to foal stary and his mother standing on a hill in front of him, what looked like modified saddle with a basket attached was resting in front of them, as Starry’s mom leaned down to nuzzle the side of his neck, eliciting a giggle from the foal.
“My mom’s name is spectral cloud, and she worked at the weather factory, this memory is my best memory…” starry said as he whipped tears from his eyes and spectral pulled the basket on her back before securing it tightly with straps. “This is about four months before my incident, and this was the day my mom took me flying for the first time, and took me to the weather factory. The section of ground Luna and starry were on separated from the rest of the field and floated gently into the air. Spectral then picked up starry with her hooves and sat him in the basket with a smile.
“Now hold on tight,” she said as she beat her wings powerfully, slowly taking off from the ground and starting to fly to the distant city of Cloudsdale, Luna and Starry’s platform following behind. Luna looked at spectral cloud, her coat was a powdery blue, her mane and tail were a lighter shade of blue, with a sliver streak through them, and she had pink eyes and a rainbow cloud for a cutie mark. Then Luna noticed a bracelet on her left fore hoof, the same one that starry was wearing.
Finally spectral and starry landed on a street of Cloudsdale, many ponies rushing over to see her and waive and fawning over foal starry in the basket.
“Oh is this your foal? Awwwww” a pink pony said staring at the smiling colt in the basket.
“Yes, this is my pride and joy starry skies!” spectral announced beaming. “Today I am going to give him a tour of the weather factory.” Luna smiled at the happiness from this memory as compared with the previous and looked over to see starry smiling also.
“Yeah, everypony loved my mom, she was the kindest pony I have ever met, and would always stop to help those less fortunate.” To show a point starry had the scene advance to deeper in Cloudsdale, where a pony was attempting to buy something.
“Please I’m just twenty bits short, I need this ring, I’m planning on proposing to her tonight and I’ve been saving for months for this particular ring,” the stallion pleaded to the vendor and Spectral’s ear perked slightly, altering her course to approach the fretting stallion.
“I’m sorry I can’t, business has been bad lately and I can’t afford to give that big of a deduction on one of my best pieces,” the merchant said with a heavy heart. Spectral cloud approached the stallion and gave a warm smile and reached into her bag to pull out twenty bits, depositing them on the cloud counter, designed to not let objects fall through.
“there, that should cover it!” spectral said happily with a warm smile, the other stallion gasped as the merchant took all the bits and brought out a little black box.
“Wha- I- really,” he asked shocked and happily at the blue Pegasus who just nodded. The stallion grabbed the box happily and stuffed it into his saddle bag, turning back to spectral cloud.
“I don’t know how I can ever thank you,” he said and thrust his hooves around her neck in a big hug, after the hug spectral just smiled at him.
“Go get her,” she said and he nodded, flying off.
Luna watched the scene change again to spectral touring the cloud factory.
“Wow that was very kind, especially with how much a weather pony gets paid.”
“Yeah, my mom was like that, she couldn’t stand to see others unhappy.”
Luna watched the tour for a bit longer then looked to starry.
“Did you ever go back?”
Starry looked down.
“yeah, but she wasn’t there, my dad had died from alcohol poisoning and my mom had moved away, without telling anybody where, she just told them the town had too many bad memories. Starry stood up and the dreamscape shimmered, everything falling to blackness before being populated by a cozy library, lit by floating blue spheres. “thanks Luna, I feel a lot better, I’ve never told anypony about what happened to me, and I got to show you, so don’t feel bad about breaking into my mind, if there is one pony I would be okay with doing that it’s you.” Starry stopped and looked down. “Luna,” he asked.
“Yes,” Luna answered.
“are you my friend,” starry asked. The question took Luna back, she hadnt really made a friend since returning, unless you counted the elements of harmony at last nightmare night, which I suppose she did, and she came to her conclusion.
“Starry, you are my best friend.” Starry smiled happily at Luna and sat down on a couch that appeared in the library.
“You are my best friend too Luna” starry said and Luna smiled. After a few minutes starry looked around the library. “Hey, Luna, how long till morning?” Luna closed her eyes for a second.
“About five hours,” she responded and starry nodded, summoning the spell book from earlier and leafing through its pages, his subconscious holding a perfect memory of the book, so he could study it and learn it with his conscious mind.
“Okay I don’t want to hold you up from doing your other jobs “starry said and got more comfortable, then Luna rubbed a hoof behind her head.
“Starry, how are you this lucid,” she asked, marveling at the extreme detail in the room around them, starry looked up from his book and around the room.
“After I was forced out of home, I used to have terrible nightmares, so it was either learn how to control my dreams or don’t sleep.” Luna nodded then slipped to her second point.
“Starry, would you like to... accompany me in watching other ponies dreams?” starry dropped his book and looked up at the princess with a smile.
“You can do that?” he asked and Luna nodded. “That sounds great!” Luna nodded and pointer her horn to starry, thick blue tendrils of light touching him and wrapped around his body, he became vaguely aware of being pulled from something then his vision was filled with an uncountable number of spheres with little worlds suspended in them.
The battle of pirate cove
Starry skies stared at the endless expanse of dreamscape all around him, as far as he could see there were floating spheres of various colors and sizes.
“Wow, are these all ponies dreams,” starry asked looking around and finding Luna floating next to him.
“Yes, each one is a sleeping pony.”
“How do you tell which ones need help,” starry asked staring at the multiplicity of dreams before him.
“It’s the color of the dream,” Luna answered gesturing a hoof to some of the dreams.
“We can ignore most of the colors for right now, what we are looking for is a nightmare.” Luna surveyed the dreamscape before finding dream shrouded in a deep red fog some distance away.
” Ah! Come here starry there is a nightmare.” Luna grabbed Starry’s hoof and pulled him along till they were floating in front of the sphere. Inside the dream bubble was an island surrounded by a churning sea.
”okay we are going to go in, then disguise ourselves so we blend in with the dream, then we find the dreamer and help them beat the nightmare. Sound good,” Luna asked and was answered by a nod from starry, she then braced her hooves against the sphere and began to slide in. starry pressed his hooves against the sphere and closed his eyes as he felt his senses ebb away to nothing.
Starry slowly felt senses return to his body. First starry felt a cool breeze against his coat, followed by the smell of seawater. Starry opened his eyes to look around. He was standing on a rocky cliff face, behind him was the cliff edge a long drop into the churning waters below. A little ways away from the cliff was a beach with several ships sitting in the cove waiving large pirate flags. Luna came up behind starry and eyed the ships.
“looks like a pirate dream,” she said, her form shrinking down to that of a regular pony, her coat becoming a bright red, followed by her hair becoming black and chopped short into a kind of messy look, her cutie mark was soon replaced with two crossing swords. Starry looked at her new look and closed his eyes, focusing in changing his appearance, he dropped the sheen in his coat so it looked dirtier and made his hair black and shorter, then changed his cutie mark to a large cannon on a disproportional boat. When starry looked back to Luna she had donned a pirate hat and had a sword holster attached to a saddle bag, starry quickly copied the ensemble and smiled at Luna.
“So, let’s go find this dreamer!”
A small colt ran through the dense jungle, his tan and brown pinto coat was matted with dirt and sweat. Pipsqueak was being chased by bloodthirsty pirates, after him for finding the location of their treasure. Suddenly the dreaming pony hit a dead end, that he swore hadn’t been there earlier and whipped around to see five of the nastiest, meanest pirates to ever disgrace the face of equestrian with their presents advancing on him from the thick vegetation. The pirates laughed menacingly as they advanced on their prey, when suddenly a yell broke the air and two ponies landed in front of the colt.
“captain pipsqueak thank goodness we found you! We don’t think we could have handled these pirates on our own,” Luna said throwing a hat and sword holster to pipsqueak, both seeming to magically attach to him.
“what,” pipsqueak asked looking at the two new ponies on the scene.
“I know its dark out here captain, but don’t you recognize us? It’s us your loyal crew,” starry skies said cheerfully and turned back to the nightmare pirates. Pipsqueak stared at the two for a moment before it began to make sense.
“oh yeah! That’s right,” pipsqueak yelled and stood up taller.
“well, crew, lets teach these no-good pirates how we deal with enemies of Equestria!” pipsqueak pulled his sword out of its holster with his mouth, followed by starry and Luna doing the same. Pipsqueak dove forward and used his front hooves to knock the middle pirate down before striking him in the chest with his wooden sword, the pirate let out a wail of agony before exploding into dazzling sparkles of light and glitter.
“amazing captain,” Luna called out through gritted teeth as she and starry feigned difficulty fighting off one pirate. Pipsqueak smiled and dived to the pirate Luna and starry were fighting, executing a masterful roll he brushed the wooden “blade” of his sword against the pirate’s midsection, causing another explosion of lights and glitter. Pipsqueak then stood in front of starry and Luna brandishing his sword in a heroic pose as the three remaining pirates advanced on them.
“for equestrian!” the colt called out before running to the middle pirate and jumping on his back, and spinning around in a circular motion, hitting the two pirates around the one he was standing on, then jumping into the air and aiming his sword down as he hit the last pirate, causing him to land in the ensuing explosion. Luna and starry sheathed their wooden swords and faced pipsqueak, who had done the same.
“great job captain,” Luna cheered.
“what is our next course of action,” starry asked, looking around the jungle as if he was looking for more pirates.
“simple,” pipsqueak said coolly.
“we just get to the treasure and escape pirate cove and head back to equestrian waters!” pipsqueak jumped then faced the jungle that led back to the beach.
“now, onward to victory,” pipsqueak called out and ran into the dense vegetation, followed by his two loyal crew members
Luna advanced the dream so the three were lying prone behind an overturned palm tree. Pipsqueak had a telescope positioned over the trunk and was surveying the scene. No less than fifty pirates were patrolling the beachfront, torches had been stabbed into the ground and bamboo scaffolding and pathways were all protecting a large hole dug into the sand.
“okay,” pipsqueak said, stowing his telescope in his saddle bag and facing his crew.
“we are massively outnumbered and outgunned, but I think with careful planning and precision we can get the treasure without too much trouble.” Pipsqueak looked at Luna.
“I need you to go start a fire in that shack over there.” Pipsqueak turned to starry.
“you go raid their stash of rubber band guns and get to a high place without being seen.” Starry nodded and pipsqueak turned back to the pirate’s camp.
“I’m going to go secure one of the ships out there once Luna starts the fire, and starry I need you to back me up if any pirate sees me. ready,” pipsqueak asked, his daring and loyal crew nodded and slowly stood up from their hiding place, pipsqueak immediately ran off and dived into a rut in the sand he used to crawl over to the beached rowboats without being seen.
“this is going very good,” Luna whispered to starry before running off to the shack she was supposed to set fire, and starry ran over to the munitions storage and grabbed a long-distance rubber band gun and two balls of rubber bands.
Luna kicked over a torch and dashed off into the jungle as pirates came running over to attempt to put out the fire, seeing his signal pipsqueak jumped into a rowboat and cast off, rowing to one of the ships on the horizon.
Starry looked around and after a second closed his eyes and willed a large tower of bamboo and palm tree leaves into existence near the shore and watched as it shimmered into the dream reality, its floors becoming populated by dream pirates. Starry quickly ran to the tower and pressed himself against the base looking around suspiciously before ascending the ramp to the first level. Staying low to the ground starry slowly came up behind a pirate, whipping around and bucking him in the flank, causing the explosion of light and glitter as he ascended to the next floor.
Luna looked out from the jungle, and then willed herself into the rowboat with pipsqueak as he met the ship and altering the dream flow so pipsqueak would think it made sense for her to be there.
“here captain,” Luna said, pulling a grappling hook from her bag and hoofing it over to pipsqueak.
“thanks mate,” pipsqueak whispered and rotated his head till the hook end was whirling around with considerable speed and loosed it upward, the grappling hook catching the rope net that connected with the crow’s nest.
“let’s go!” pipsqueak said and began shimmying up the rope.
Starry finally reached the top of the tower and was confronted with three dream pirates; quickly he launched himself into the air and hit one in the face with his fore hooves, causing the pirate to tumble over the edge, where he fell to the ground, exploding in a dazzling light show. Starry quickly whipped around and head-butted the nearest pirate so hard he flew back into his comrade, causing them both to explode. Starry then leaned against the wall of the tower, pulling the rubber band gun out and looking through the scope at the dream scene before him.
Pipsqueak finally reached the deck of the ship then gasped and looked up as he saw a pirate holding a sword in his mouth, glaring at the young colt.
“any last words,” it asked as it brought the wooden “blade” close to the rope pipsqueak and Luna were hanging from, it reared its head back and was about to chop the rope when it suddenly exploded into a burst of light and glitter. Pipsqueak pulled himself onto the deck, then helped Luna up and looked around for whatever saved him, then way off in the distance by the beach on a tall tower saw a blue unicorn waving at him with a rubber band rifle slung over his shoulder. Pipsqueak nodded and stalked to the captain’s quarters of the ship and pushed the door open, seeing nopony in sight. Suddenly there was a loud gasp from outside and pipsqueak ran out of the captain’s room to see Luna being held by a large black coated, red maned earth pony, and his wooden sword against Luna’s neck as she feigned fear.
“Black Heart!” pipsqueak glared at the pirate captain and brandished his sword.
“this has nothing to do with her, this is our fight,” pipsqueak yelled at the pirate, who nodded and threw Luna to the deck.
“so right you are, captain pipsqueak,” Black Heart replied in a gruff, menacing voice, then reared up on his hind hooves and pulled out two wooden pirate swords, one on each hoof as he striked a menacing pose, his long leather jacket billowing in the night wind.
Pipsqueak dove forward, sword in mouth and landed a strong blow against Black Heart’s exposed chest, sending the pirate captain stumbling backwards as he worked to hold himself up on two hooves.
“Lucky hit foal” Black Heart sneered at the valiant captain before him.
“now it’s my turn.” Black Heart lunged forward and brought his swords down, pipsqueak barely managing to roll out of the way as the pirate’s swords impacted with the deck, splintering the wood.
“you’ll have to do better than that,” pipsqueak taunted and rolled past Black Heart, landing a neat blow on one of his hind hooves, making the pirate stumble forward. Then Black Heart brought his hooves out and brought them together in a scissoring motion where pipsqueak was, the colt merely jumped, landing square on his crossed swords, bringing the pirate back on all fours and pinning his swords down. Black Heart looked at pipsqueak with fear in his eyes.
“you truly are the greatest captain ever,” he said defeatedly. Pipsqueak let out a triumphant smile.
“you bet your flank I am!” the colt brought his sword down on the pirate’s head, causing him to explode in a brilliant flash of light. Luna got up and trotted over to pipsqueak as he sheathed his sword and both of them looked to the island, which was dotted with little explosions of sparkles and glitter as starry cleaned up the beach with his rubber band gun.
“let’s get that treasure,” pipsqueak called and jumped back down into the rowboat and he and Luna rowed back to shore happily, when they arrived at the sandy beach starry was waiting for them, and together the three of them walked to the hole in the beach and down to the large brown chest.
“oh no! how do we get in,” starry asked gesturing to the large metal lock shaped like a skull on the front of the chest.
“I got this,” pipsqueak said and reared his hoof back, then punched the lock, causing the metal to crack and shatter, the chest lid suddenly tilted back and gold pieces flowed out from it till the three ponies were sitting in a pile of shimmering rare metals.
“we got the treasure!” pipsqueak threw some of the gold into the air, causing it to rain down on the three and suddenly the dream started to shimmer and starry could feel his senses ebbing away again, then looked at Luna.
“he’s waking up,” she stated with a smile on her face as starry suddenly lost all connection with the dream.
Starry opened his eyes to find himself back in the dreamscape, the sphere in front of him slowly shrinking away. Giving a quick look around starry noticed there was a significantly smaller amount of dreams populating the dreamscape.
“Luna? What time is it,” starry asked turning to Luna, who had reverted to her normal alicorn self.
“its almost six am, everypony is waking up, you will probably be waking up soon.” Starry nodded and looked around as the dreams shrank and faded away slowly.
“I don’t usually stay in a dream that long, usually just long enough to turn it away from a nightmare.” Starry nodded and started to become aware of a pressure on his side, he looked and saw that it was pressed as if something invisible was pushing against him.
“see you in a few minutes,” Luna said as starry started to feel absurdly sleepy.
Starry opened his eyes and was in his bed, sitting up and yawning. The unicorn took a hoof and rubbed it on the sheets softly, the fabric feeling alien to wake up to. Slowly starry slipped out of the bed and landed on shaky legs, slumping to the floor before pulling himself up. Starry trotted up to a big mirror next to a dresser and noted a brush sitting on it. Ignoring the magical backlash from his horn starry picked the brush up with his kenesis and pulled it through his mane and tail. Starry put the brush down and walked over to a sink and using his hoof, turned the water on. Starry dipped his hoof into the water then used it to wipe the scorch marks off his coat around his horn.
There was a knock at the door, starry rubbed his hoof on the towel next to his sink and walked over to the door, using his hoof to push the handle down and pulling the door open to see Luna standing there.
“good morning,” the night princess said hapilly.
“goodmorning,” starry replied walking out of his room to stand next to Luna.
“so what are we doing on my first day as your student,” starry asked, the part when he mentioned being a student making him smile.
“well, first off we need to go meet Twilight at the train station.”
“Twilight,” starry asked looking at Luna as he followed her down the hallway.
“yes, my sister’s student and the element of magic.” Luna walked out of the main entrance of the palace and through the garden.
“oh,” starry said simply, keeping up with Luna as the two entered the town proper.
“Several ponies gazed at the princess and the thin unicorn with looks of confusion as the pair made their way to the Canterlot train station.
Magic lessons and mailmares
“So wait, who we are waiting for again,” Starry asked as he and Luna sat on a bench in the train station.
“We are waiting for twilight sparkle, my sister’s student and bearer of the element of magic of the elements of harmony.”
“Which is what again,” Starry asked looking down the track, seeing the smoke of a train far off in the distance.
“It’s the weapon that was used to defeat Nightmare Moon a thousand years ago, free me from her influence, and defeat discord.” Luna stood got off the bench and approached the platform as the train came rolling in.
“Oh okay,” Starry said, still not fully grasping what Luna was talking about.
The train came to a halt in the station, the brakes hissing slightly. The doors on the cars started to open as various ponies trotted out. Then one car opened its doors and a mountain of books slid out onto the train platform.
“Ah that must be her,” Luna said approaching the train car.
“Twilight is a bunch of books?” Starry looked at the volumes trying to catch their names. Luna stopped and looked at her friend for a second.
“That’s a surprisingly accurate statement,” Luna said as the books began to levitate out of the car and onto a nearby baggage cart, followed by a purple unicorn. The joke was lost on Starry as the unicorn trotted up to them, pulling her cart of books behind her.
“Hello princess,” twilight said happily while bowing.
“Hello twilight, thank you for coming, this is my new student Starry Skies you will be helping me teach.” Luna stepped aside and pointed her hoof to Starry.
“Hello! Nice to meet you, I’m twilight Sparkle,” twilight said ecstatically holding her hoof out to shake, which Starry slowly reached out and accepted. “So shall we make our way to the palace,” twilight asked while walking to the exit of the train station, Starry and Luna following behind.
“okay let’s see what you can do Starry, pick this up,” Twilight said as she levitated a large rock over from an assortment of objects that were stacked near the corner. The trio had gone back to the palace and was now standing in one of the guard training halls. Starry leaned his head down and pointed his horn at the rock, his horn giving a soft blue glow as the rock lifted up easier than he thought it would. Starry winced as blue ribbons of light started weaving off his horn and brushing his head and mane, marking his coat with little burn marks.
“okay hold that there,” twilight said and walked over, using her hoof she touched Starry’s horn and gasped pulling it back quickly and shaking it.
“that’s some really bad backlash you have,” twilight said while motioning for Starry to drop the rock. Starry dropped the boulder and reached up to rub his head. Twilight walked over to her large cart of books and pulled one with a yellow cover out and levitated it to Starry.
“I want you to read this after we are done.” Twilight pulled out another book and put it in front of Starry as he stowed the yellow book in his saddlebag.
“okay now I want you to cast this spell,” twilight said as she flipped through the pages and stopped on one.
“I’ll give you a few minutes to study it.”
“Oh! I already know this one,” Starry said and closed his eyes, beginning to collect power in his horn. After gathering up enough power he shaped it into the proper shape for the spell, then released it.
Starry’s horn suddenly flared with power, deep blue tendrils of light erupting outward and wrapping around his body, till he was no longer visible under the swirling mass of energy. After a few seconds the ribbons of light flew away and left Starry on the ground, two big butterfly wings protruding from his back.
“that’s very good,” twilight said and walked up to Starry, giving his wings a slight touch to see if they would hold together.
“Well you can perform spells very well, which is impressive since you weren’t taught much else than levitation at a school.
“The only thing I can think of right now is for you to learn how to control the power you are actively using, so you won’t have that backlash anymore, then I would suggest starting you on lessons in advanced magic’s.” Starry looked down with a shy smile and kicked the ground with his hoof some.
“so are we done for today then,” Luna asked while walking over from where she had been watching.
“yes princess, I know we didn’t do much, but I don’t want to go much further until Starry can control his backlash.” Luna nodded and walked over to Starry and nodded.
“then why don’t we all go get some lunch,” Luna suggested, greeted with two eager nods.
Starry was sitting in his room, Luna and twilight had left him to start on a lesson plan. Starry looked over the book in front of him, it was explaining that you need to taper the flow of your energy when channeling it, and exactly how to do it. Starry read through the various magical equations on how to taper the flow to be what you need then sat the book down and looked at it. after a second Starry’s horn glowed softly, then the book glowed and lifted off the ground, Starry crossed his eyes and looked up to his horn, little ribbons were still flittering around it but when they brushed his head they had no affect at all. Starry gasped happily and lifted his saddle bag along with the book, then the mirror on the wall, then the dresser, then the bookshelves in his room, then the bed. Starry looked around happily as expending this much energy beforehand would have been excruciatingly painful, all the objects hovered high in the air surrounded by a blue glow with little ribbons of light flittering around them.
“wow,” Starry stared wide eyed at the objects.
“that’s really impressive,” a voice interrupted Starry’s concentration and he dropped all the objects, only for them to be enveloped by a soft purple glow and lightly sat down as twilight walked over to Starry.
“sorry I didn’t mean to startle you,” twilight said as she lightly sat the yellow book on Starry’s bed.
“n-no that’s fine, uh thanks,” Starry said, looking behind twilight to see if Luna was there.
“can you pick something else up though,” twilight asked gesturing to the book, Starry nodded and picked up the book with his kinesis.
“these ribbons are very interesting, are you doing them with a glamour?” twilight waved a hoof through the little ribbons, watching as they dodged and attempted to get away from it. Starry shook his head as twilight examined the ribbons.
“that’s very curious,” twilight said making a mental note to research it later.
“anyway I was coming here to tell you tomorrow we start on advanced magic’s, specifically teleportation,” twilight said for the first time noticing how thin the other unicorn was, then looked up at his face.
“Starry, are you okay? You are looking a little pale,” twilight asked, a worried look coming across her face.
“T-teleportation,” Starry asked looking forward at a point in space twilight couldn’t seem to pinpoint.
“yeah, that’s okay isn’t it,” twilight said with a quizzical look to twilight.
“oh, yeah that’s okay,” Starry said not sounding very convinced, but twilight didn’t want to press, then she remembered the other part of Celestia’s letter.
“hey Starry, do you want to go for a walk,” twilight asked, with a smile. Starry stared at twilight for a few seconds, looking for any sign of malice or ulterior motive, he found none, just a genuine smile.
“sure,” he said and turned to follow as twilight led him out of the room.
The two walked out of the palace and into the streets of Canterlot, it was only a matter of minutes before Luna would raise the moon. Twilight was grasping for anything to talk to Starry about but she didn’t know anything about him and thought back to when she made friends with the other five elements. She couldn’t come up with anything, the others had made friends with her first, but now she was the one trying to make friends with somepony else.
“so.. uh.. do you like to do anything,” twilight asked trying to get a conversational topic.
“well, I like to play games, build things. I love to do magic, I like to fly, and I like to read.”
“you like to read,” twilight asked, her eyes widening slightly.
“oh yeah I love to read, you can get so much information from books and, why wouldn’t you want to know more,” Starry said happily.
“I know! None of my friends want to read and I just can’t convince them to.” Twilight stopped and turned to face Starry.
“I have an all access pass to the royal Canterlot library, we can go right now,” twilight said looking at Starry intensely.
“let’s go,” Starry said simply and the two began galloping down the streets to the Canterlot library.
Twilight and Starry emerged into the wonder that is the royal Canterlot library, five floors and a countless number of books. Twilight couldn’t be happier, she finally had a study buddy, but what to study?
“so, what should we study,” twilight asked, looking over to Starry who was marveling at the library he was seeing for the first time. Starry thought for a second and flittered his gossamer wings.
“flight mechanics,” Starry asked, and was answered by a nod from twilight.
“meet back at that table with books?” Starry gestured to a table near the middle of the atrium of the library, a vertical column of nothing that reached up through all five floors, ending at the ceiling with a domed window. Twilight nodded and dashed off to one of the sections of books.
Starry flapped his enchanted wings and took off to the second floor, searching through the books , finding one on griffon flight physics, the magic of pegasi, dragon wing shapes, various feather compositions, and a whole host of other books. When Starry came back to the table, twilight was there with her own big pile of books; he sat his next to hers and gave her a smile.
The next hour or two, or three, or four, or five were spent with the two ponies reading through the books and sharing relevant information with each other, trading books and learning an absurd amount of information about flight mechanics. During the first hour of studying Starry’s wings had run out of power and dissolved and they couldn’t test anything easily, so the two just kept studying.
Starry was starting to feel a little sleepy as he turned the page in the book and found it blank.
“huh?” Starry flipped through more of the book and found every page after the one he had just read blank, then he realized he didn’t feel sleepy in the slightest. Starry sat up and looked over for twilight, but found that he wasn’t even in the library, he was in a nicely furnished room, with bookshelves lining the walls and floating blue lights.
“oh, I must have passed out.” Then suddenly something knocked at the door to his room. Starry stared at it for a few minutes, the door was really just an aesthetic piece for the room, because rooms without doors look very odd, anything past the door should just have been unstructured dreamspace. A knock came again and Starry curiously trotted up to the door and opened it.
“oh Luna!” Starry said happily, stepping aside for the alicorn to enter.
“I was wondering when you would fall asleep, its three am Starry what have you been doing,” Luna asked with a smile as she sat on Starry’s dream couch.
“oh me and twilight were studying at the Canterlot library,” Starry said as he walked up to the bookshelf, looking and finding the information he had gathered the day and putting up the book he was holding in his kinesis.
“oh, how was the library? Did you have fun while you were there,” Luna asked wondering if twilight and Starry were getting along, so her two friends would be friends.
“well, actually, I’m still there. Me and twilight must have passed out while reading,” Starry said walking over to the couch and sitting next to Luna.
“oh,” Luna said before suddenly blinking out of existence, leaving Starry on the couch for about five minutes before she blipped right back to where she had been.
“what was that,” Starry asked to Luna who had reappeared next to him.
“I went and told some guards to fetch you two and bring you back to the palace.”
“oh, thanks” Starry said, looking at Luna. “so, are there many nightmares tonight?”
“not one,” Luna answered staring at the bookshelf, noting a calendar on the wall next to it, and a photo album sitting on the top shelf.
“huh, so what do we do then,” Starry asked looking back to Luna, who was looking over his bookshelf.
“well, what you usually do when you are sleeping,” Luna asked
“well I usually either study books I have read or go over my memories,” Starry replied, and for the next few minutes both ponies stared blankly at the dream wall in front of them. “I don’t think I have ever been this bored,” Starry said getting off the couch and walking around in circles for a bit before sitting back down, just to do something. Suddenly the whole dream became translucent and cracks started to streak down the walls of the room.
Starry opened his eyes to a guard looking at him, with a sly grin.
“What’s up with that,” Starry thought to himself and attempted to get up, finding a weight on him. Starry turned his head, a deep blush immediately spreading across his face. During his sleep he had slid down and leaned against twilight, and in her sleep she had wrapped her hoof around him. twilight was wearing the same expression Starry was. After a few seconds of awkward silence the two pulled away from each other at the exact same time and avoided eye contact as the guards led them out of the library and back to the palace.
“uh, erm… goodnight twilight,” Starry said as he turned down the hallway to go back to his room.
“yeah, uh goodnight Starry,” twilight said and quickly made her way to her room. After the two unicorns left their escort guards were free to burst out laughing.
Starry laid in his bed wide awake. Try as he might, toss and turn, rotate his pillow, the unicorn could not find his way to sleep. Fears of twilight played in his head. “what if she doesn’t want to be friends with me anymore,” Starry asked himself, rolling to the side of the bed once again, his tossing wrinkling the bedspread.
Several hours passed before the first rays of Celestia’s sun started to stream in through the window. Starry slipped out of the bed as soon as he was sure the sun was above the horizon. After brushing his mane and tail Starry walked out of his room and into the hallways of the palace, blinking slightly and starting on a path to the kitchens. Food, that’s what would make him feel better.
Starry arrived at the royal kitchens, his legs just barely holding him up. After a quick chat with one of the chefs he was walking to a table, a muffin in his telekinetic hold.
Starry became aware of a hoof on his shoulder, opening his eyes he saw his face was in the wrapper of an eaten muffin, pulling his head up he saw Luna staring at him.
“Starry are you okay,” the princess asked, her face plastered with a look of worry.
“I’m fine Lufa,” Starry replied as Luna used her hoof to pull him up to his legs.
“are you sure? You never went back to sleep,” Luna said following Starry to the trash can to throw away the muffin wrapper.
“I was distracted,” Starry replied and slipped to the side a bit, catching himself slightly.
“distracted about what,” Luna asked while rushing to Starry’s side so he wouldn’t fall down.
“I might have ruined my friendship with twilight.” Starry looked down at the ground.
“how would you have done that?” Luna followed Starry as he walked to the guard training hall where he was supposed to meet with twilight for today’s lesson.
“I fell aslalp last night and must haf leaned against her, she must have laid her hoof across me when she was asleep.”
“is that all,” Luna asked letting a relieved smile play across her face. Starry looked up at her confused.
“is that all,” he repeated as if he couldn’t believe Luna had just asked it.
“yeah, twilight is a better pony than that, sure it may have embarrassed her and you, but she is a very forgiving pony and I’m sure it didn’t ruin your friendship, and if you are still feeling bad you can always apologize,” Luna said. Starry nodded and walked into the training hall, giving a quick look around for twilight he saw her standing near what appeared to be stacks of pillows, Starry trotted up to her.
“hey twili-“ Starry was cut off by twilight.
“listen Starry, I’m really sorry about last night, hope it doesn’t change anything between us, and if you are willing to I would like to study with you again later,” twilight said to a shocked looking Starry, Luna was a few feet away and trying her best not to start giggling.
“its fine twilight,” Starry said happily with a smile then gestured to the pillows with a hoof and blinked trying to keep his eyes open.
“so, what’s all this,” Starry asked.
“oh, yeah we are going over teleportation today and its best to have somewhere soft to land your first few times, the other pad is in the garden.” Starry nodded and twilight began explaining all the intracies of teleporting, ending with a summary of a summary of how it works.
“ so really you just have to picture in your head where you want to be when you cast it, then you will be there. So I need you to picture the garden, a little to the left of the statue of discord.” Starry yawned a little and nodded as twilight walked out of the room and down to the garden. Luna looked at Starry.
“ are you sure you can do this right now,” she asked. “ you look really sleepy.
“yeas I got this,” Starry said and began charging for the spell, his horn letting off a soft glow as he readied himself to cast the spell. Luna watched Starry get ready to cast the spell , his head slowly sinking lower as if he was falling asleep.
“Starry,” Luna asked.
”man, a pillow would be really good right now.” Starry’s mind started to wander slightly as he charged for the spell. “or maybe a cloud would be nice, I can just see it now, all white and fluffy, and sof-“ Starry’s thoughts were abruptly cut off as the spell released.
Twilight was standing in the garden, next to a pile of pillows when she felt a burst of power from within the palace, turning to look at the pillows she expected to see a flash of light, but there was none. Seconds turned into minutes and twilight was getting worried when she saw Luna flying over in the distance and landed in front of her.
“did Starry ever show up,” the night princess asked looking around the garden.
“no, he hasn’t,” twilight replied.
“I think he may have passed out right as he cast the spell,” Luna said and looked to twilight.
“he passed out,” the unicorn asked looking back to Luna.
“yeah, he didn’t sleep last night because he was afraid he messed up your friendship.”
“oh,” twilight replied with a rather blank expression.
“we should go look for him, he must have changed his destination just before he cast it, let’s check his room first, he may have thought about his bed.” The two mares ran off towards the palace.
Ditzy was having a fairly good day, she only had to drop mail off at the palace then she would be free to go back home and spend time with dinky and sparkler. The grey Pegasus smiled and flapped her wings harder at the thought of getting off work early and going to spend the day with her daughters, then later Doctor Whooves was supposed to come back and spend time with them. Ditzy was entertaining thoughts of spending time with her family when she saw something very peculiar. On the top of a nearby cloud there was a flash of blue light, followed by a light blue Pegasus practicing his dive bombing above the palace.
“that’s odd,” Ditzy said aloud. “ponies aren’t allowed to practice stunts above the palace usually, I should go warn him before he gets in trouble.” Ditzy smiled to herself and altered course to meet up with him in the air, then she started to notice some odd things, for one any sane Pegasus would have pulled up from a dive by now, two there appeared to be something stuck in his forehead, and three, which was most bothersome, was that this Pegasus had no wings, which was rather odd for a Pegasus. Ditzy gasped as she realized it wasn’t a Pegasus practicing tricks, it was a unicorn falling through the air. Pumping her wings as hard as she could Ditzy sped up and grabbed the colt around his midsection with her forehooves, and beat her wings down hard to slow their descent. Luckily for them both Ditzy was a mailmare and lifting heavy things for a living had given her very powerful wings, also this pony was unbelievably light. Ditzy beat her wings hard as she held on to the other pony and strained hard to save them from the ground that was very quickly rushing up to meet them.
Ditzy realized the colt had been too close to the ground when she grabbed him and had been moving too fast for her to slow their descent in time and knew there was no way for her to slow them down enough to prevent injury so she began looking for other options. Ditzy gasped happily as she saw that not too far off was a small lake in the middle of the royal garden, beating her wings hard she began to alter their direction, suddenly the two ponies impacted the lake with a massive splash, Starry’s eyes shot open and he looked up, seeing himself moving further away from what appeared to be the surface of a lake, Starry began thrashing his limbs around in an attempt to get back to the surface. Above him he could see a grey mare with a blond mane and tail swimming down to him, after a second she hooked her fetlock with his and began beating her wings hard as if she were flying, pulling them both to the surface of the water, then pulling them to the shore of the lake.
“w-what happened,” Starry asked, coughing out lake water and pulling himself the rest of the way out of said lake.
“you fell out of a cloud,” Ditzy announced as she laid back against the beach and picked up her mail bag with her forehooves. She pulled back the flap and looked in the bag, finding all the letters to be dry and heaved a sigh of relief, she would really have to think sparkler for enchanting her bag when she got home. “what were you doing up there anyway,” the mailmare asked looking at Starry, who immediately looked down in shame.
“I think I fell asleep in the middle of casting a teleport spell,” he said not taking his eyes off the ground, then jumped slightly as he felt hooves prodding his sides and legs. Ditzy was a mother of two and as such her motherly instincts had kicked in. ”what are you doing,” Starry asked as the mare inspected him.
“I’m checking you for cuts or bruises or broken bones or something, you hit the lake first and water can sometimes be as hard as concrete on impact, do you feel okay,” Ditzy asked while checking him over.
“yeah aside from being wet I feel fi-“ Starry interrupted himself as Ditzy touched a rib on his left side and he inhaled sharply, his legs threatening to give out under him.
“yeah, that’s not good, you may have broken a rib, and possibly this leg,” Ditzy gestured to Starry’s front left leg, which until just now he was unaware he had been holding off the ground. Starry cautiously pressed his hoof against the ground and immediately winced in pain and pulled it back up. “come on, let’s get you inside, I’m sure the palace has a doctor, and they wouldn’t expect us to walk you all the way to the Canterlot hospital,” Ditzy said, walking to Starry’s left side, then taking a wing and laying it over his back to steady him as he leaned against her and the two began walking into the palace. “so, what’s your name,” Ditzy asked as they limped through the garden.
“my name is Starry skies,” he said, forcing a friendly smile.
“Ditzy stared at him for a moment, his name seemed familiar to her, but she couldn’t quite place it, so she left it for the moment.
“that’s a nice name, mine is Ditzy Whooves,” Ditzy announced proudly, as the two walked through the door to the palace, the guards parting as soon as they saw Starry.
“hey Starry, why did the guards lets us in without asking any questions,” Ditzy asked, throwing a look back at the guards as Starry motioned which hallway to go down, he still wasn’t familiar with the whole palace, but he remembered where Luna had taken him before.
“oh, I suppose that’s because I’m Luna’s personal student.” He replied, trying to not make it seem like a big deal, even though every time he got to say it made him want to jump, which would probably be a bad idea in the present situation.
Ditzy stopped and looked at Starry for a few moments, well looked isn’t exactly the correct word. The mare’s shining amber eyes didn’t seem to work together at first, looking off in separate directions before actually focusing on the pony in front of them.
“I didn’t know Luna had a student,” ditsy said as she resumed walking at a slow pace so Starry could limp and lean on her.
“well it kind of just happened, as in two days ago, I don’t suspect news has gotten out yet,” Starry said as they walked into the royal medical wing, a pair of nurses quickly running over and separating the two as they were taken to different rooms.
When finally both had finished Starry had a cast on his left leg and a metal ring clipped to it that was enchanted with royal level healing spells, that should have his bone mended by morning, and his midsection was wrapped with medical tape, and a little metal pin was pinned to his left side to mend his fractured rib. Ditzy walked out with nothing, she was just fine, years of working as a mailmare had really toughened her up and strengthened her bones, while inversely years of poor diet had rendered Starry’s bones relatively weak in comparison. As the Starry walked back into the lobby Ditzy twilight and Luna were all waiting for him, Luna quickly rushed over to give Starry a light hug, while twilight felt the urge to do the same the memory from the night previous just inclined her to give a warm and relieved smile.
“sorry twilight, and Luna, I may have passed out during the lesson,”
Starry said looking down embarrassed as Luna pulled away from the hug.
“that’s okay, though next time I suggest you don’t stay up the whole night worrying about such silly things,” twilight said with a smile. “we are friends and one embarrassing incident won’t change that.” Starry smiled happily at his friend , then Luna turned to Ditzy.
“I really can’t thank you enough Mrs. Whooves,” Luna said with a smile.
“oh it was nothing, I was just doing what any pony would do in my situation,” the mare said happily.
“oh but you still deserve some kind of reward,” Luna said pulling out a bag of bits.
“oh I couldn’t accept princess, getting a gift for doing the right thing isn’t proper, and kindness is its own reward.” Luna smiled at Ditzy.
“you are indeed a wise mare Mrs. Whooves, then perhaps I could repay you with dinner? Tonight you and your family are invited to the palace for dinner, I insist,” Luna looked to Ditzy.
“well who am I to say no to a princess,” Ditzy smiled happily and took a few steps to the door. “what time will it be,” Ditzy asked looking back to the other three ponies.
“show up whenever you want, the food will be served at 7:30,” Luna stated happily.
“Okay, ill finish this delivery, get my daughters ready and be over soon,” Ditzy said as she rushed out of the room to finish her mail route.
“she seems nice,” twilight said walking up to stand next to Starry and Luna.
Brush your teeth after dinner
Ditzy fluttered over to the palace post boxes and began sorting through her mail, depositing mail in the boxes accordingly, she needed to do this quickly, as her little adventure with starry had set her back about an hour and her family would be expecting her home soon. After ditzy finished sorting her mail and depositing it in the boxes she turned towards the palace exit and beat her wings hard, her hooves leaving then ground then dashing through the air out of the palace and into the skies over Canterlot. Ditzy flew to the edges of the city, where the stonework stops and the dirt and grass begins, landing in front of a wooden house surrounded by trees the mailmare smiled happily and trotted up to the door, bracing herself as she pulled it open.
“mommy!” ditzy was promptly tackled to the ground as a light purple filly whizzed through the door and into her mother’s arms, a pink pony with a purple mane and three diamonds for cutie marks, roughly Starry’s age following her younger sister out.
“hello muffin,” ditzy said happily as she picked herself up and placed dinky on her back, then giving a warm nuzzle to sparkler before the three went back into the house.
“So what took you so long to get here,” sparkler asked pulling her mother’s mailbag off of her and hanging it up on the rack next to the door.
“Oh you guys will never believe it,” the mare said happily, then looked around for a second.” Where is the doctor,” ditzy asked.
“He left a while ago, something about tartar sauce,” dinky announced happily from her mother’s back.
“Hehe, it’s a tardis honey, and he better be back soon because we have somewhere to go.” Moments later the door to the house opened to a brown earth pony with an hourglass for a cutie mark. ”there you are doctor; okay now let me tell you all what happened today.” Ditzy smiled and sat on the couch, grabbing dinky and setting her down on the couch also.
“Okay, so there I was doing my normal mail route, it was my last stop and I was flying above the palace when suddenly I see a Pegasus practicing dive bombing above the palace. Now you know this isn’t allowed, so I went to warn him that he could get in trouble with the guards I noticed he wasn’t a Pegasus, but a unicorn!” sparkler and the doctor had walked up and were sitting on a rug in front of the couch.” So I tried to catch him and pull him up, but we were moving too fast, so I just redirected us so we would land in a lake. After I pulled him out I walked him to the palace medical wing, because he had broken a rib and leg on impact with the water, and you’ll never guess who he was!” Dinky scooted closer and looked at her mother with big eyes.
“Who was he,” she asked impatiently.
“He was Princess Luna’s new student! I saved the princess’s new student!” dinky and the doctor gasped while sparkler just sat there with a smile. Ditzy was expecting dinky to gasp but the doctor reacting in such a surprised way was rare.
“You know something dear,” ditzy asked looking at the doctor teasingly.
“Erhhm, spoilers,” he replied simply with a knowing smile. Ditzy stuck her tongue out at him
“You’re no fun. Anyway the princess was so grateful she invited all of us to the palace tonight for dinner.” This time sparkler gasped and her eyes shined with anticipation.
“w-we get to go to the palace,” sparkler asked, her eyes wide.
“Yep! Now you girls need to go get ready, sparkler help dinky,” ditzy said happy that she was getting to take her family out somewhere. After a few minutes dinky came down, her mane and tail brushed to perfection, and a small saddle bag with seven bubbles as a clip for it strapped to her back. Sparkler came down next, her mane and tail brushed as well, a necklace with many colorful gems around her neck.
“Everypony ready,” the doctor asked opening up the door for his girls, to be greeted by eager nods.
“Well allons-y!” the doctor raced out the door after his family.
Starry was in his room poking at his cast with his other hoof.
“you shouldn’t do that,” twilight said sitting next to him, a pile of books sat between the two unicorns. Starry breaking his leg and getting an enchanted brace was the perfect chance to study the medical magic that was currently working on his leg. Across the bed Luna sat a pile of books her own as she had decided to join in on this study session.
“she’s right, you will only make it worse,” Luna said setting her book down and looking at her student, rubbing the cast with his right hoof.
“it itches,” starry complained.
“come on, it comes off tomorrow can’t you just go one day with it,” twilight asked, joining Luna in staring at starry. Starry huffed slightly and pulled his hoof away from the cast, both mares smiled at him and went back to reading their books, starry pulling his own up and reading something about the intrinsic healing properties of silver when a knock came at the door. Starry got up and pulled the door open to see a guard standing there.
“excuse me, but your guests have arrived, should we escort them to the dining hall,” the guard asked to be answered by a nod from starry, then a confirmation nod from the guard who turned and walked off to the palace entrance, starry turned to the other two ponies in the room.
“so it looks like ditzy and her family are here, lets meet them in the dining hall,” starry said and began trotting out of his room and down to the dining hall after the other two had taken lead.
Ditzy and her family walked into the royal dining hall and marveled at the beautiful marble columns reaching up to the top of the tall room and the fine rug encompassing most of the floor they stood on, a long oak table sitting in the middle of the room, with two chairs at one end, clearly one was for Luna and the other Celestia. Sparkler immediately dashed off to look at the jewels that were made into artwork on the walls, her special talent being a jeweler made her very curious about these things.
Ditzy looked over to see four ponies walking into the room, Luna, her student starry, Celestia and twilight. The doctor, ditzy and sparkler all bowed. Looking around dinky saw her family all bowing to the princesses and quickly bowed herself, making Celestia smile softly.
“welcome my little ponies,” Celestia began, sitting down, her celestial hair flowing in the solar winds. “I must personally thank you for saving my sister’s student today,” Celestia said, the praise from her princess making the mailmare beam happily. “even though he has only been here for three days we have all grown rather attached to him, and it just wouldn’t be the same to not have him at the palace.” Ditzy noticed that last point make starry blush, and smiled happily at him. “well shall we eat,” Celestia asked, taking her seat at the head of the table, Luna sitting next to her, followed by starry sitting on the side of the table Luna was nearest, and twilight doing the same for her teacher. Ditzy saw the doctor and sparkler sit next to starry, so she took dinky and sat next to twilight.
“so starry, how did you manage to become Luna’s student,” the doctor asked, in his Trottingham accent. Starry looked at the table in front of him for a second, his eyes glazing over before Luna sat a hoof on his shoulder and gave him an encouraging smile, which actually surprised her, she had never actually encouraged somepony before, then she realized she had done a lot of things with starry she had never done before. The other day in the dream after starry had relived him losing his home Luna had comforted him, something which she had only been on the receiving end of for so long, and it felt good, it felt really good Luna realized as she looked at starry who was already looking better than when he had shown up a couple of days ago. Not only was starry looking physically better (aside from the currently broken leg and rib) but his smiles were less forced, he could actually talk to ponies, which on their first day presented a significant problem as the only two he would talk to were golden light and herself. Starry sat up and looked at the doctor.
“well I botched a teleportation spell and pulled something from another plane through, it chased me all the way into Luna’s room before it cornered me and I lost control of my magic.” By now the entire rest of the table was listening as starry talked, since Luna hadn’t actually told anypony what happened that first day yet?
“what do you mean by lost control,” twilight asked from the other side of the table. Causing starry to look up surprised as he noticed other ponies were listening. Luna decided to take this question, based on what she had heard of twilight from Celestia.
“like you did when you were trying to hatch spike, except a lot more violent, less channeled magic into spells and more into raw arcs of power.” Luna answered for starry
“it happens when I get really nervous, scared or stressed,” starry said as everypony looked at him. twilight nodded knowingly. “then, well I don’t really know what happened after that but when I got back up there was scorch marks over the floor and the creature was gone.”
The palace chef’s came in with daisy sandwiches and hay fries. Without another word all the ponies dug in, after a few minutes Luna was leaning over to starry to tell him the way to properly eat a sandwich when in a fancy setting such as this, while ditzy was doing the same to dinky across the table. Twilight and Celestia shared a glance, attempting not to laugh and just settled on a slight smile.
After everyone had finished their meal all the ponies had engaged in polite conversation, the doctor inquiring many things of starry about who he was and how he came to this point in his life. Ditzy was explaining postal code to twilight and sparkler was talking to the princesses. Finally it came the time for everypony to part ways; sparkler came bounding up to her mother, her body practically trembling with excitement as the family said their goodbyes to the princesses and their students.
“what has you so excited,” ditzy asked to sparkler as they exited the palace.
“I was talking with the princesses and Celestia asked about my necklace and when I told her I made it, you’ll never guess what! She asked if she could stop by one day and look at my stock,” sparkler said quickly without stopping or taking a breath, she took her younger sister and placed her on her back. ”isn’t that great dinks,” sparkler asked dinky as the little filly giggled and held onto her sister’s mane.
“yes! Sparkler you are the best jeweler in Equestria,” dinky announced happily. Ditzy smiled and looked to the doctor, who seemed to be lost in thought.
“well doctor you seemed to be rather interested in Luna’s student,” ditzy asked, the doctor snapping out of his thought.
“sorry dearest, can’t say much on the matter. He is just, important.” Ditzy smiled and draped her wing over the doctor’s back. As the family walked home.
Luna was walking with starry, twilight had decided to spend some time with Celestia for a while and write a letter back home to spike to make sure he was handling things all right.
“I should fall out of the sky more often,” starry joked as he and Luna walked to the royal gaming room at a rather slow pace, just enjoying each other’s company in the near empty halls.
“yes I agree, ditzy and her family were quite charming and a pleasure to be around,” Luna said.” But I wouldn’t recommend fall-“Luna was cut off by the surprised exclamation of a familiar voice.
“oh dear sweet Celestia, Starry is that you?!” Luna and starry both turned around to see a light blue pony with only a little older than starry with dark blue and white hair and an hourglass for her cutie mark rushing over to them, Luna noticed Starry’s eyes light up and he started to run towards the filly.
“Colgate,” starry exclaimed happily as the pony wrapped her hooves around his neck and he returned the hug happily.
“oh where have you been? I thought something horrible happened that day in the market,” Colgate said pulling out of the hug and smiling at starry.
“I had to run, I was framed for stealing carrots and the guards came, as they closed in on me I lost control. When I regained my mind all I could do was run as fast as I could out of town.
“wow, that’s awful, we were so worried about you, after we heard what happened we thought you must have been taken away or killed, from the damage in the market we mostly assumed the ladder.” By now Luna had walked up, immediately causing Colgate to bow as Luna recognized her as the royal dental hygienist.
“starry, I believe I am missing something here,” Luna stated simply, attempting to make sense of this latest development.
“oh I’m sorry, where are my manners? Luna this is Colgate, she was the first pony to treat me well, her and her mom even offered to take me in, she also gave me a toothbrush, and a tube of toothpaste, and taught me what grass to eat to prevent tooth decay,” starry said, exceptionally happy at being able to meet an old friend.
“yeah I did didn’t i? open up,” Colgate announced and starry sat down, and open his mouth for the unicorn to peer into. “very nice starry! I have regulars that can’t keep their mouth in as good condition, what happened to you,” Colgate asked, now that the shock of seeing starry had mostly worn away she noticed the bandages on his midsection and his cast.
“I fell out of a cloud.” Starry said still smiling and standing back up to stand near Luna. “also I’m Luna’s student now.”
“no way, I’m the royal oral hygienist,” Colgate announced then looked at a clock on a nearby wall.” Oh I’d love to catch up some more but I have an appointment, we should hang out some time,” Colgate said quickly running down the hallway and disappearing around the corner. Leaving a very happy student and a still surprised princess of the night standing there.
“I’ll tell you about how I met her later tonight, until then want to play some pony fortress,” starry asked happily, resuming his original path to the gaming room.
“yes I like the sound of that.”
Luna and starry played for a few hours before starry eventually fell asleep at his controller, the night princess picking him up and levitating him to his room before walking to her own room, taking care of a few small nightmares then pushing into Starry’s dream, smiling at the familiar scene of his mental study.
“hello Luna,” starry announced happily, putting a book back on his shelf. “did I fall asleep in the game room?”
“yes but I got you back to your room,” Luna replied with a smile before sitting on the couch next to her friend. “so, how did you meet Colgate,” Luna asked, her curiosity making her lose any tact she might have had.
“ah, yes well it was probably my third year on my own when I came across a quiet little town.” as starry talked the room shimmered away and was replaced with young starry walking along a dirt path into the market section of town, his hooves were dragging slightly and his face was bent into a slight look of pain.
“what’s wrong with you,” Luna asked starry as the memory starry sat down and rubbed his cheek.
“I had a toothache,” starry said as a young pony in the crowd seemed to notice Starry’s uncomfortability and trotted over.
“hey are you okay,” the filly Colgate asked, taking starry by surprise, who immediately began looking around for an easy escape route.
“now you need to understand, prior to this I had been to around five towns and all of them shunned me and acted like I wasn’t there, so I didn’t understand her intentions were positive.”
“my name is Minuette! But everyone calls me Colgate,” the filly announced happily then placed her hooves on Starry’s muzzle and pulled it open, taking a peek inside. Starry too shocked to really react. “oh that looks bad, I have just the thing!”
Colgate grabbed Starry’s hoof and began dragging the surprised colt out of the market and to a nearby house next to a clean looking stream. “stay here I’ll be right back. “ Colgate promptly dashed off into her house, coming back after a few minutes with some tweezers and a bowl of something in her telekinetic hold. “Open up,” she announced happily and placed a hoof on Starry’s jaw to pull it open then carefully insert the tweezers. There was the light sound of clicking as Colgate poked around in Starry’s mouth, finding her target after a few seconds and gripping it, slowly pulling it free of Starry’s gums. Starry’s eyes widened with pain for a few seconds as the filly pulled a short piece of hay out of his mouth, the tip slightly pink. Before starry could react Colgate dropped the hay and lifted her bowl, using a small spoon she took some light green tinted goop and pushed it into his mouth, rubbing it on the spot she had just pulled the hay from. “there better,” Colgate asked happily. Starry was finally able to close his mouth and looked at the pony in front of him; cautiously he reached a hoof up and rubbed his cheek, to find no pain at all.
“y-yes thank you,” starry stuttered out shyly.
“you need to be more careful when eating wild hay, its stronger and more brittle than the stuff you can buy at the markets,” Colgate said, picking up her tweezers and placing them into the bowl.
“Minuette dear what are you doing,” a pony called walking up to the two and looking down at them, her face grimacing at seeing the near starved young colt in front of her. “Colgate who is your friend,” the pony asked giving starry a good look over, noting his torn up saddle bag and unkempt mane and tail.
“this is- uh… I’m sorry I didn’t catch your name.” Colgate said blushing slightly as she forgot to even ask this pony his name before dragging him to her house.
“oh uh my name is uh,” starry looked back between the two ponies weighing rather or not he should run, in the end he decided not to. “my name is starry skies,” he said, remembering his manners and offering a hoof to shake with Colgate’s mother.
“very nice to meet you starry, my name is Minty Fresh and would you like to have dinner with us? I was just about to make some for Minty and I, but we would be happy to have you,” Minty offered politely. Against his better judgment starry nodded enthusiastically as his hunger overpowered any logic he might have been considering. “well all right then, Colgate can you go up to your room for a second, I would like to talk to your friend,” Minty said opening the door to her house as her daughter nodded and scampered up the stairs. Minty walked to the kitchen and began pulling out various vegetables. “can you use your telekinesis yet,” Minty asked to which starry nodded and Minty slid over a knife to starry and a couple of carrots. “cut these up for me please,” Minty said as she started to boil water on the stove. “so, starry do you live around here, or are you and your family just passing through,” Minty asked, as she began a broth, wondering what kind of family would let their foal look this malnourished.
“I’m just passing through,” starry said quietly as he held the knife in his telekinetic grip, cutting the carrots to pieces, trying to keep them evenly sized.
“so what do your parents do for money, are they traveling merchants,” Minty asked, knowing merchants often couldn’t feed themselves let alone a young colt.
“I don’t have parents anymore,” starry said, his voice losing any tone as his eyes glazed over emotionless. Minty stopped what she was doing and looked at the colt.
“was there an accident? Were you separated, I could help you find them,” Minty offered and stared at the unicorn who had begun cutting the carrots into little slivers.
“my dad kicked me out after I tried to make him stop hitting my mom…” Minty could practically feel her heart breaking as Starry’s small body began trembling slightly, his horn sparking a little as he chopped faster and faster, turning the carrot he was working on into much. Minty stared at starry for a few moments, then he blinked and a single tear rolled down his cheek, a soft inhale of air as he tried to suppress a sob. Minty couldn’t take it anymore and dropped her forehooves from the counter, quickly pulling the colt into a hug, his walls finally breaking as he launched into full blown sobs against the mare. Minty held starry close and stroked down his mane, shushing calmly as he cried into her coat.
“how long ago did he kick you out,” Minty asked, still wanting to know the whole story.
“a- about three years a-ago,” starry forced out between sobs as he shook in Minty’s hooves. Minty looked down at the unicorn with a look of surprise, being able to keep himself alive this long as young as he is. Slowly Starry’s sobs subsided and he was left standing there with emotionless again, his shaking having stopped and breathing becoming even again. Minty stepped away to add the good carrots starry had cut into her soup and adding the ingredients she had cut, grabbing a big spoon and stirring the pot. Minty looked back at starry who was still standing there, having buried his feelings behind the wall of his icy cold emotionless stare.
“starry the food is almost ready, could you go get Colgate? I’d like to talk to you more after dinner and she has gone to bed,” Minty asked and starry nodded, his gaze becoming somewhat more there as he was distracted from his situation. Starry trotted upstairs and knocked on the only door up there, Colgate soon answering.
“your mom says dinner is ready,” he stated simply and turned to walk down the stairs when a hoof wrapped around his neck to stop him.
“what are you doing,” Colgate gasped and dragged the unicorn to her bathroom. “you can’t eat without washing your hooves first! Like this,” Colgate gestured to the bottle of hoof soap on the counter. She started the water and squirted some soap on her hooves and began rubbing them together, producing a thick white foam. “lather,” Colgate said happily and then ran her hooves under the water till they were clean of white foam. “rinse.” Colgate smiled and squirted more soap on her hooves, then began working it back into thick white foam. “repeat,” she announced loudly before rinsing her hooves off. “now your turn.”
Minty had finished preparing the meal and had set three bowls up on the table. After a few minutes of waiting and the foals not showing up she decided to go see what was holding them up. Ascending the stairs she could hear rushing water and the sound of giggling coming from her daughter’s room, slowly Minty pushed the door open to look in, she was not expecting to see what she did. Starry had a large beard of foam on his face and Colgate was flinging bit of foam at him, after a second starry ran to the bathroom, coming back his hooves were coated in a thick spread of soap, which he then launched to Colgate. “ahm,” Minty said with a smile on her face as she pushed the door fully open, both ponies in the room going wide eyed as they realized how silly they must look.
After dinner Minty had sent Colgate to bed and sat starry on the couch, sitting next to him.
“so why did you get kicked out again,” Minty asked, trying to ask it as softly as she could, Starry’s eyes began to glaze over and his expression faded into a look of neutrality. After a few minutes of silence starry started explaining to Minty what happened on that day, she listened intently.
“that’s just not right,” Minty said as starry ended his story and began to worry that he wasn’t crying or even shaking, he just had this faraway look, as if he wasn’t really all there. “you know, starry you can stay here,” Minty said after a few moments, this brought Starry’s gaze up to her.
“w-what,” starry asked staring at Minty.
“I said you can stay here, really I insist that you do. You are a good kid and can’t imagine even entertaining the idea of asking you to leave.” Starry stared at Minty for a bit before a smile managed to break its way across his face and he threw his hooves around Minty’s neck. Minty smiled and wrapped her hooves around starry.
Luna watched as the following week was condensed by starry into a kind of slide show, showing various things such as: waking up on a bit of folded blankets next to Colgate’s bed, Colgate showing him how to brush correctly and singing the “brushie song”, helping Minty in her garden, getting paid a few bits for the help, nice dinners, board games with Colgate and Minty. Luna couldn’t help but smile at the warm scenes. Then starry resumed the normal speed of a memory that started with starry walking along a dirt path towards the market, his bits jingling softly in his saddle bag.
Starry walked up to one of the vendors in the market and smiled happily at him, placing his bits on the counter.
“three carrots please,” starry said and watched as the vendor smiled at him, sweeping his bits into a bit shelf on his side of the counter, then getting a bag and pulling the carrots into it and hoofing it over to starry. “thanks!”
“my pleasure,” the vendor said with a smile, but as starry turned away he could swear he saw the smile turn to something else. Starry wasn’t five steps away before the vendor yelled. “help thief! That colt stole my carrots!” starry went wide eyed as everypony in the market was suddenly looking at him.
“n-no I paid for them I swear!” everypony stared at him, noticing his near starved body type and immediately decided not to believe him. starry felt a hoof on his shoulder and turned his head to his horror to see a guard.
“come on kid, let’s go,” he said, another guard coming over to snatch up his bag of carrots and return it to the vendor.
“b-no I paid for them,” starry yelled, backing up from the guards as they advanced on him. two pegasi guards bristled their wings in anger and stepped closer to him. in fear starry threw the only defensive spell he knew, a concussive blast shot through the air and knocked the pegasi away. Suddenly no less than twelve guards had formed a circle around him and were slowly closing him in. starry was starting to hyperventilate and his mane started to frizz, the way twilight’s did when she got in one of her moods. “st-stay back!” starry yelled as the guards advanced on him. starry jumped as a guard attempted to grab him from behind, suddenly the whole scene went white. Luna was confused for a few seconds before she realized starry wouldn’t remember something that happened when he lost control.
After a few seconds the scene faded back and starry was left standing in the middle of a shallow crater, many of the stands around him were shattered to splinters, guards were laying across other ponies to protect them seemingly from whatever starry had done, starry started backing up slowly at some of the guards were pulling themselves up on unsteady hooves and glaring at him angrily. In a moment of fear starry turned and began galloping down the dirt path out of town.
Luna watched as the scene faded back to Starry’s study.
“that was awful,” she said simply, remembering the grin that the vendor was wearing right before he accused starry.
“yeah” starry said as the dream began to waiver softly, starting to lose his hold on it. “see you tomorrow Luna.”
A pony ran through the back allies of Canterlot, looking behind him scared. There was nothing, but he knew he was being perused. Suddenly the colt reached the end of the alleyway and having been looking behind him he didn’t see the guard in his path. With a sudden clash of armor on pavement the two collided and fell down.
“Hey,” the guard said loudly, quickly bringing himself to his hooves the guard looked at the unicorn colt still lying on the ground. “Watch yoursel-“the guard started and stopped as the young unicorn was attempting to pull himself to his hooves and was trembling
“Are you okay?” The guard leaned down and used a hoof to help pull the colt up.
“Y-you have got to help me,” the pony said looking up at the guard noting he was a Pegasus with the pristine white coat the guard was known for.
“Okay, first tell me what your name is. Then tell me what you need help with.”
“My n-name is Starry Skies and-“starry stopped as a shiver went down his spine, whipping around he stared at the dark alley way he had emerged from moments before. The Pegasus watched as starry turned and looked wide eyed at the alley way.
“What is it,” the guard asked
“T-that,” starry blurted out pointing a hoof to a dark figure walking out into the daylight. The guard instinctively stepped in front of the colt, his terrified demeanor making him look smaller than he was.
“Stop,” the guard yelled out to the shadow now taking a good look at it, it looked like an earth pony that wasn’t allowed to reflect light, and had a slight smoke blowing off of him, with glowing red eyes. The shadow kept walking toward the two.
“I-it’s after me,” starry pressed himself low to the ground, looking from behind the guard in front of him. With a look back towards the palace the Pegasus saw the main gate was open.
“Hey, starry, I need you to go to the palace and tell another guard that I need backup, my name is golden light, can you do that for me?” Starry nodded and turned to the palace, breaking into a run as golden light faced the shadow again. “I don’t know what you are, but I order you turn to turn around and leave now. The shadow kept trotting forward slowly, ignoring the guard’s orders. Golden light bristled his wings slightly as he got ready for a fight.
Starry ran over the entrance to the palace and spotted a unicorn next to the door, quickly running up to him. “Stop, state your business,” the unicorn said to starry.
“G-golden light needs backup over there,” starry gestured with a hoof to where he had come from, two figures moving around each other quickly before the darker one suddenly broke off and began running up the path to the palace. Without waiting for further explanation the unicorn waived more guards to him with a hoof and they started running to the shadow.
Starry watched with horror as the shadow deftly threw the approaching guards away and locked eyes with starry from the distance, without a second thought starry turned around and ran into the palace looking for somewhere to hide. Looking around at the beautiful marble structure the unicorn started running down a hallway.
After about twenty minutes of running around the palace the colt started ascending a spiral staircase. At the top of the stairs starry was greeted with the sight of a dead end and a door. The pony braced his hooves against the door and pushed, the door did not relent. Starry focused on the door and looked at it with his mind; he saw magic wrapping around the door and keeping it closed tight.
Looking behind him Starry’s eyes went wide seeing the shadow slowly ascended the staircase behind him. With a sudden pang of fear starry pointed his horn at the door and with a bright blue glow hurled bolts of energy at the door until the spell finally broke under the brute force. Quickly the unicorn rushed into the open door and looked for a place to hide in the darkened room.
Luna expected a lot of things, she expected gravity to hold her to the ground, she expected air to be breathable, she expected her room to be dark, what she did not expect was to be woken up from her nap by the feeling of her lock spell being forcibly broken open. Now the princess of the night expected to see a professional thief, or some sort of assassin, though when she sat up she saw something unexpected again, there was a unicorn colt quickly slipping through the door and into her room, he was trembling and quickly ran over to Luna’s bedside table and pushed himself under it. Now Luna was about to alert the pony to her presence when something else pushed at her door. Eyeing the door curiously Luna watched as a dark figure stepped in, it was nearly impossible to see amidst the darkness, that didn’t matter though because she could practically feel it.
“Starrrryyyyyyyyy….” the shadow said stopping in front of the door to look around the room, its voice practically dripping with malice. Now however irritated Luna was about her room being broken into and woken up from her nap, she wasn’t about to let, this creature get to one of her little ponies. Luna was about to slip out of her bed when suddenly a dark aura engulfed the entire frame, picking it up and throwing it into the wall, along with the princess.
“We wouldn’t want any distractions would we starry,” the creature asked as it picked up the table and threw it over to the bed, revealing the trembling unicorn.
“Oh there you are.” Starry began slowly backing up until he had to rear back to press his back against the wall opposite of Luna, the shadow still walking closer to him.
“S-stay back!” starry skies said loudly in between ragged breaths.
Luna was angry, very angry, not since discord had anypony got a surprise attack off on her. Luna was about to grab the bed and hurl it to the spirit in the room with her, when something stopper her, she felt a power in the room, carefully she pushed away the bed to see the pony who broke in pushed against the wall his horn was glowing softly and slowly growing brighter. Suddenly there was a flash of deep blue light, starry was now floating in the air surrounded by a blue aura, lightning began to arc off of his horn and scorch the floor around him. The shadow quickly stepped back; wind whipping around the room as various objects were surrounded by his telekinetic glow then changed shape. Starry opened his eyes to show they were white with power; slowly he tilted his head and aimed at the shadow, losing a blinding white beam of energy that struck the spirit dead on. After starry finished his attack there was nothing left of the shadow in the room, however starry didn’t stop, a slight cry escaped his lips as more objects were lifted into the air then turned into other things, lightning trailed over his coat and jumped to the floor, scorching it with black ruts. Luna stared in slight shock as the colt let out a magical storm; even her shields were having moderate difficulty preventing the unicorn from affecting her.
Suddenly a guard pushed into the room with them, Luna turned her head to him, he was a Pegasus and the wing on his left side was very obviously broken, along with his armor being dented and coat covered in dirt. “Starry,” he yelled in shock seeing the colt floating in the air and sparking with electricity. Starry looked over and noticed it was the guard from earlier, the first pony to be nice to him in a long time and then his aura began to fade, his eyes fading from the dazzling white they were to his normal deep blue, slowly sinking to the floor and slumping down to cover his face with his hooves.
Luna decided it was time to make her presence known, she pushed her bed away and began walking to the two ponies, the golden light was in front of starry attempting to get him to say something when he heard the clopping of hooves behind him, quickly he whipped around in a defensive stance to protect starry when he saw Luna. “Princess,” he said quickly bowing before her, Luna didn’t really like how that was everypony's reaction to seeing her, but she didn’t press it any merely telling the guard to stand up as she approached the colt on the floor.
“hello?” Luna asked starry who looked up, eyes widening as soon as he saw the princess, she was taller in person than in pictures, and her hair was falling flat, looking like a shiny blue, rather than the star filled mane she usually had. Oh dear sweet Celestia! Starry thought as he looked around the room for the first time, actually realizing where he was. Oh no! I broke into the princess’s room! Oh she is going to banish me, or throw me into a dungeon, or both! Starry had started to tremble more when the princess of the night’s voice broke the relative silence.
“Are you okay,” She asked, when starry looked up again he came face to face with worried eyes, and his fears of being banished were somewhat quelled.
“Y-yes I'm okay,” starry said pulling himself to his legs shakily, Luna noted he was still trembling and motioned for golden light to open her curtains.
“What’s your name,” Luna asked to the unicorn.
“Oh, my n-name is Starry Skies,” he responded. Luna nodded and winced slightly as the curtains were pulled open, now she could get a good look at starry to make sure he was alright; again she got something she wasn’t expecting. Starry was obviously short for his age, by at least four inches, being a little younger than Celestia’s protégé, and the area around his horn was charred black from magical backlash, something unicorns were supposed to learn to control in magic kindergarten, his coat was a deep blue, his mane and tail were a lighter shade, with a silver streak, his cutie mark was what looked like a hole to the night sky with four five pointed stars surrounded by a golden aura, he was wearing a tattered and old saddlebag that looked like it didn’t even fit well, but what made Luna worry the most was how easily she could see his ribs, he looked down right near death and she began to wonder if he was trembling from fear or from the strain of holding himself up.
Luna looked down to starry. “Can you tell me what was chased you into my room, and for that matter, how you opened my door?” starry dropped his ears and looked down at the floor.
“It all started when I found a book on the ground behind a library in a town not far from here…”
Starry Skies trotted happily as he trotted down the dirt road with a smile, nothing could get him down today. He found enough bits to buy an order of hay fries, and on top of that someone had thrown out an old magic book and he had found it! Celestia’s sun was about halfway through its path for the day and starry had just wondered into an open field and pulled his book out of his saddle bag. Sitting on his haunches the unicorn smiled and flipped through the pages happily, looking for a spell that seemed useful. After flipping through several pages of spells he settled on tow to try for today: gossamer wings, and teleport.
“Okay,” starry said and sat the book behind him, closing his eyes and focusing on his horn, a soft blue glow enveloping his horn.
“think wings,” he said to himself and little blue ribbons of light started to spin around and wrap his horn, wincing as stray arcs of magic burned his head around his horn. After he felt he had gathered up enough energy he released it into the air, the blue ribbons shooting out, then turning back and spinning around his body, slowly the power lifted him up and he felt a tingling on his back. After a few seconds there was a bright flash and he was deposited on the ground. Starry turned around and smiled happily, seeing two big translucent wings attached to his back.
“A little girly, but they could be cool!” starry said aloud, he had grown accustom to speaking to himself since he was alone so often.
“Guess I should see what these can do!” starry smiled happily and flapped his wings, with a sound of delight he found his hooves lifting off the ground.
“Awesome,” the colt yelled and began flying through the sky, only slightly disappointed when he found he still couldn’t touch clouds. After around an hour of flying starry landed back next to his book and picked it up, flipping through the pages down to the teleport spell.
“okay seems simple enough, I make a sphere around myself, then find the point I want to go to, then find myself and bridge the gap, seems simple enough!” starry smiled and slipped the book in his saddlebag, fluttering over to a tree and breaking two branches off, laying them in an “X” on the ground, then fluttering over to another hill about fifty hooves away. Starry began collecting energy in his horn, the soft blue aura collecting around it, followed by blue ribbons of light , then wincing once again at the power sparking from his horn. After a few minutes of collecting power starry located the spot in his mind, then started searching for his own location, finding it significantly harder than what he would have thought. The pain on Starry’s horn intensified as the teleport spell continued collecting energy, increasing its potential range. After a while starry finally located what felt like his location and released the spell.
Starry waited to feel the world move around him and after a few seconds opened his eyes, knowing the spell should have been near instant. What starry saw in front of him was that at his destination was a large blue sphere with lightning arcing off its surface, floating a few inches above his “X” after a few more seconds the sphere popped like a bubble and what was left standing there was a pony seemingly made of thick black smoke.
“Starry…” it said and began to approach the colt. Starry took a step back and looked wide eyed at the creature. After a second starry turned to fly away and once he was a few inches off the ground his wings were surrounded by a black aura and broke in half, dissolving into bubbles and morning dew, gasping starry fell to the ground and began running to a city on a mountain in the distance.
“And it chased me all the way to your room, the door was locked, and it was behind me so I attacked the spell…”
Luna looked at starry as he finished his story.
“Starry, can I see that book you used?” starry nodded and levitated the book out of his saddlebag. Luna grabbed the book, the cover was worn and pages looked like they had gotten wet, a normal pony would have thrown this away for sure. Luna flipped through the pages and eyed the teleportation spell, it seemed normal, then curiously she flipped to the next page and everything made sense. Starry must have accidentally mixed these two spells up.
“Here starry look,” Luna said as she showed starry the page after the teleport spell.
“It looks like you mixed this teleport spell with this plains walking spell, so instead of taking you somewhere else, you pulled something to you.”
“Oh...” was all starry said. Luna looked at the unicorn for a second before turning her attention back to the book. He shouldn’t have enough power to pull an entire creature from another world… and that display earlier was impressive, he is strong if not very uncontrolled… Luna looked starry over again feeling a pang of something in her chest, she really wanted to help this colt, clearly he had the potential to be talented and his parents weren’t taking very good care of him, Luna stopped at that last point and looked at starry, he wasn’t too much younger than twilight, he wondered if he still lived with his parents.
“Starry, where are your parents?” Luna asked, and Starry’s demeanor suddenly sunk further down. “I-if it’s okay with you p-princess… I’d rather not talk about it…” starry said and Luna noted he was staring at his cutie mark. Clearly his talent is magic. Luna thought, looking at the mark and feeling that pang again and suddenly it dawned on her.
“Starry, do you live anywhere.” The unicorn was back on the ground and shook his head.
Luna frowned and thought, she really needed to help this unicorn, then it occurred to her, her sister had a student, why not her? In fact, it would be downright irresponsible to let a pony with this much power continue to practice magic without a teacher not to mention a waste.
Luna walked over so she was next to the unicorn then dropped so she had her legs folded under her, then softly draped her wing over starry, causing him to look up at her.
“starry, from what I have seen of you today I have ascertained that you have a lot of potential and would like to propose something to you, would you like to be my personal student?” starry stared at the princess for a long while as what she was saying sunk in.
“R-really,” starry asked, his eyes lightning up. “Yes I would love to!” starry smiled and Luna stood up.
“Okay starry I have got to take care of some things, golden light?” Luna looked to the guard who stood at attention once the princess addressed him. “Show starry to one of the guest rooms in the night wing could you?”
“Yes ma’am!” golden light said and walked over to starry, leading him out of the princess’s bedchambers, Luna turned to look at her room. Her bed was fairly destroyed and smashed into the wall, one of her bookcases was full of cakes that had been books at one point, the floor was scorched and busted, and many of the objects in her room had been warped into other objects. Luna sighed.
The cleaning staff is going to have to take care of this; I need to talk to my sister. Luna thought to herself and walked over to her thankfully still standing mirror and applied the glamour to her mane that made it waive and sparkle like it was full of stars, then the princess of the night walked out of her room.
Celestia was in the middle of a lot of paper work, much of it having to deal with guards medical bills over a confrontation at the north gate earlier that day when a knock came at her door, Celestia sat her Quill down.
“Come in” Celestia said and smiled as her sister walked in. “Luna! What brings you here?” Celestia walked up and nuzzled her younger sister affectionately. Luna smiled back happily.
“Today I met a colt, a unicorn specifically” Celestia’s smile grew wider.
“Oh! Did you make a friend?” Celestia asked with a bright smile, since her return Luna has been somewhat asocial, not really leaving her room for much else than work.
“What no! I- I mean... maybe, that’s not what I was coming to tell you. Starry skies, the colt, he is a little younger than your student twilight, and severely malnourished, I found out that he is currently homeless, and after a particularly devastating show of power in my room I made him my personal student.” Luna said rushing through what she wanted to tell Celestia. Celestia stared at Luna for a while, taking in what she had just said.
“Tell me what you mean by a devastating show of power,” Celestia said and listened as Luna retold everything that had happened since she woke up, including starry summoning the dark creature. “well that explains the injured guards, and you are right, it would be irresponsible to let him leave without learning to control his power, and not to mention irresponsible to send him out since he is clearly having trouble out there.” Celestia said and walked up to Luna. “so first I want you to take him to a doctor to make sure his malnourishment isn’t the only thing wrong with him, then I want you to find out the last thing he learned formally in the educational system, I am going to send a letter to twilight so she can come and help you get started and write a lesson plan.” Luna nodded and smiled then Celestia spoke up again, “I hope you understand what you have gotten yourself into here dear sister.” Luna shook her head.
“I don’t think I do, but I feel as if I am doing the right thing.” Celestia smiled at this.
“Then I know you are doing it for the right reasons.” Celestia smiled at Luna again.
“Your speech lessons are coming along great,” she said to Luna.
“Thank you sister, I am going to go take starry to a doctor before he gets too settled in”
Celestia nodded and grabbed a Quill and parchment to start taking a letter.
Twilight was busy re-shelving every book in the library for what must have been the fifth time that day, Rarity was in Manehattan with applejack attempting to sell dresses and apples, pinkie pie was helping the cakes cater a wedding in Phillydelphia, Fluttershy was in Coltsberg tending to a sick family of bunnies, nobody was going to be back for the week and twilight was bored out of her mind, waiting for a new order of books. As twilight finished the last book she was about to pull them all off again when she heard a belch from upstairs, looking up twilight called out.
“Spike what was that?”
“A letter from the princess!” came the response as the baby dragon rushed down the stairs in front of twilight and unfurled the scroll.
“Ehm... my dearest student twilight sparkle. First off I would like to say that I wish your studies on friendship are going well. And I would also like to ask you a favor. My sister Luna has met a unicorn with a highly above average amount of power, with a severe lack of control, he cannot even suppress his magical backlash when charging for spells. Luna has decided to take him in as her personal student, I am asking for two favors from you, the first being that you help make a lesson plan for him and Luna and get them both started. The second thing is that I feel that this unicorn has had a hard life and was abandoned by his parents, if you could teach him and Luna for that matter, the magic of friendship. Please send a response to this letter detailing when and if you can come.”
Spike finished reading the letter and twilight stood there staring relatively blankly forward.
“Luna has a student!” twilight shouted suddenly and smiled. “And Celestia wants me to help teach him!” spike practically fell down.
“I take it you are going to go?” spike asked while picking himself off the floor.
“Well of course I’m going to go!” twilight said. “There isn’t even anything to do around here, and I get to help teach this new pony and Luna about friendship! Spike take a letter”
Luna went to Starry’s new room and knocked on the door. After a few moments of waiting without a sound Luna knocked on the door again, still again to no answer Luna started to feel a little worried.
“Starry? Are you okay?” Luna asked and waited for a few moments before pushing the door open. Luna stepped into Starry’s room and looked around, finding him passed out on the large bed in the guest room. Walking over to the bed softly Luna placed a hoof on the young unicorn’s shoulder, giving him a soft shake.
“Hey starry?” Luna asked as he started to open his eyes.
“Mmhrrrmmmfff, yes prinfess?” starry asked, still clearly not awake.
“How long has it been since you have seen a doctor?” starry laid there for a bit, looking like he might have fallen asleep again.
“Hrmm... I dunno... ten years give or take.” Starry dropped his head back on the soft bed as Luna stared at him. Luna placed her hoof on Starry’s shoulder again.
“Hey come on, wake up we need to go.” As starry opened his eyes Luna levitated him onto the ground where he stood with shaky legs for a bit.
“Where are we going princess?” starry asked, shaking his head to wake up further.
“Well, before I can start teaching you magic we need to make sure you are healthy, and to be honest starry, you don’t look healthy.” Starry nodded, looking down to his sides and noting his visible ribs.
“Yeah okay.” Starry said and walked up next to the princess.
“So, what are we going to learn first?” starry asked with a smile
“Hmm I’m not sure; first I need to know the last thing you learned in school.” Luna said as they walked out of the room and down the clean marble tile of the palace hallways.
“The last thing I learned in school…” starry said, his eyes glazing over slightly as he was lost in thought. “It was probably telekinesis,” he said looking back up to Luna, who stopped and was now looking at him.
“Correct me if I am wrong, as I have been absent for a thousand years, but isn’t telekinesis one of the first things taught in magic kindergarten?” Starry looked down.
“Starry how long have you been on your own?”
“I’d really rather not talk about it princess.” Starry said rather bluntly, his face losing all expression.
“Oh, okay.” Luna said not wanting to irritate starry.
“Okay, well, can you tell me anything you like to do?” As Luna finished Starry’s mood brightened.
“Oh well I love to read! And study, and I love when I find new spells, and uhh I don’t get to play them often, but I’ve been able to play demo videogames at game stores. Luna’s eyes brightened considerably, ever since she got back from the moon videogames had been something she had developed quite an interest in.
“I have a lot of videogames back in the royal game room, would you like to play for a while after we finish at the doctors?” Luna asked hopefully.
“Yes!” starry said loudly, then looked down and looked back up. “I-I mean yes I would very much like that.” Starry said happily as they reached the palace’s medical wing, which was more or less full of guards injured by the events earlier that day.
“Wait here starry I’m going to go see if I can get a free doctor or nurse.” Starry nodded as Luna walked to the reception desk. “Hello?” Luna said to the nurse who was at the desk.
“Hello princess! Do you need anything? Were you hurt in the attack today,” she asked and began looking the alicorn over searching for anything that would signify she was hurt.
“oh no, no its nothing like that, but that unicorn over there,” Luna gestured a hoof to starry skies, who appeared to be admiring the soft couch he was sitting on by pressing his fore hooves into the cushion and watching it poof back up. For a moment Luna wondered if he was a tad bit delirious from not eating.” Hasn’t been to a doctor in ten or so years, and for that time doesn’t look like he has been taking very good care of himself.” The nurse nodded and looked at starry from across the room.
“Yes it looks like he probably needs vitamin supplements; I’ll be right back with a doctor.” The nurse walked off and came back moments later with a white unicorn wearing a lab coat, who ushered starry and Luna into one of the back rooms.
When Luna and starry finally emerged from the medical area Starry’s saddlebag was filled with various bottles of vitamins and other bottles of medicine. They had learned starry was way under the normal weight limit for a pony his age, his growth was stunted by his bad diet and he probably wouldn’t be as tall as other ponies his age. The good news was that there were no other lasting effects and aside from being horribly underweight he was very healthy. Luna took starry to the royal kitchens where they had a light lunch, starry in particular had a very light lunch on account that the doctor said he wasn’t supposed to eat too much too quickly. Afterwards Luna led starry to the royal gaming room where the two sat down to play.
Celestia was in her room and had finally finished her paperwork, when suddenly a wisp of smoke flew in through her balcony and materialized in front of her as a scroll bound by a little red ribbon; with a smile the sun goddess unfurled the scroll and read it. Celestia sat the scroll down and smiled walking out of her room and looking down to one of her door guards.
“Hello, do you happen to know where my sister and her student are?” Celestia asked the guard with a warm smile.
“Princess Luna and starry skies were last seen entering the royal gaming room your highness.”
“Thank you” Celestia replied and walked off in the direction of the royal gaming room, as she neared it, she became aware of light shouting, this wasn’t anything new as Luna got pretty heated when she was playing games, but Celestia still didn’t like hearing it. As she reached the door Celestia was about to open it when she heard another shout, Celestia decided it would be best to listen a bit before just walking in.
“THOW HATH CHEATED!” Luna yelled, followed by another yell, slightly less aided by magic.
“I didn’t cheat! I’m just better than you!”
“WE CANNOT BELIEVE YOU COULD BE BETTER THAN US!”
“Well you had better believe it because it just happened.”
“THOW HATH JUST ASSURED THINE OWN DESTRUCTION!” Luna yelled, followed by a loud ‘pomf’ followed by a wave of laughter and more ‘pomfs’.
Celestia pushed the door open and saw Luna and starry both staring at each other, their horns were glowing, Luna’s was going a soft blue, while Starry’s was glowing a slightly lighter blue with shining blue ribbons leaping from his horn and creating slight burn marks on his head, above them floated one pillow each.
“THINE SKILLS ARE NO MATCH FOR OUR PILLOW WAR PROWESS!” Luna shouted as she hurled a pillow towards the small unicorn, only for it to be blocked by Starry’s pillow and grabbed in his kinetic glow.
“Well it seems like you two are having fun” Celestia said with a smile at the two, who immediately faced her, starry quickly falling on his front hooves and bowing.
“AH YES SISTER WE-“Luna stopped and coughed slightly. “I mean, I would like to introduce you to starry skies, my new student.” Luna said gesturing to starry who was standing back up
“Nice to meet you princess,” he said with a smile, which Celestia returned.
“The pleasure is all mine starry,” she said as she lifted the pillows off the floor and placed them back on the royal gaming couch. “Anyway I have received a response from twilight and she tells me she will be arriving tomorrow morning by train, so you both should probably get your sleep.” Starry and Luna nodded. Before Luna trotted to the royal gaming cabinet and turned off the royal gaming system. Celestia turned to walk out of the room as Luna and starry followed behind, each going to their respective rooms.