Chapter 1: Prophecies can be fulfilled
Twenty years had passed since Equestria’s foundation. In those years, cities started to grow and the population was living in a prosperous environment. Pegasi were in charge of the weather, earth ponies cultivated food for everyone, and unicorns had the most important job; they raised and lowered the Sun and the Moon. Without this, none of the species would be able to survive. Thus, when it was time to decide who would become king and the queen, a family of unicorns was chosen to rule. Those were good times, but a dark cloud was coming.
In a small village there lived a married couple, composed of a Pegasus mare and a unicorn stallion. Although they had and exhausting job, they could still enjoy a very happy life. The wife, called Grey Weather, and the stallion, called Sun Pride, lived in a poor area. However, they had enough money to eat- and sometimes, enough for some fun. They enjoyed street theater and they always used to give a few coins to the actors and actresses.
But there was a void in their lives- a void that could only be filled by a son or daughter. They both agreed that it would be difficult to raise a child with their current life style, but it was something they both had to do. After a wonderful night, they would only have to wait. They were so excited; finally, a foal or filly to love with their entire hearts.
One day, the village´s oracle announced that she had something very important to say, and summoned all the ponies of the village to gather in the main square.
“Aren´t you ready yet, honey?” asked Sun Pride.
“Yes I am. Let´s go, I don´t want to be late,” answered Grey Weather.
“I´m looking forward to telling my friends about this. They are going to love the news! And some of them have children, too. They can give us advice,” Sun Pride declared happily.
“I´m also gonna tell my friends. They´ll be able to help me with all this.”
They left their home to arrive in the main square of the village. They didn´t have to walk very far, as it was a small town.
Meanwhile, as the oracle arrived, they split up to find their friends and tell them the good news.
“If it´s a foal, you´ll have great time together,” said one of Sun´s friends.
“Yes, we´ll play together, we´ll drink cider together… hehe.”
“And what if it´s a filly?” asked another friend.
“Nopony will touch her!” Sun Pride exclaimed.
All of them laughed.
“Well,” continued Sun Pride, “can you give me any advice for this?”
“Of course we can!” answered one of his friends. “There are some things you must never forget…”
On the other side of the main square, Grey Weather was talking with her friends and her pegasus colleagues.
“Honestly, I hope it’s a filly,” Grey said excitedly.
“Well, I don’t think that will be a problem. I don´t know why, but most of ponies are mares,” added one of her friends.
“That’s true…” Grey Weather answered thoughtfully.
“And do you know if it is going to be a pegasus or a unicorn?” asked another friend.
“I would like it was a pegasus. I could teach her how to fly, how to manipulate weather, you know.”
“Shhh,” one pony said over the crowd. “It´s starting.”
An ancient hooded mare walked thought the crowd to reach the centre of the square. Each pony in the crowd contemplated her advance in silence. Finally, after 10 seconds of complete silence, she began to speak.
“Mares and stallions!” she said loudly “I´ve had a vision of the future. The stars have told me of paramount events.”
Everypony looked at her cutie mark, which showed a star inside a crystal ball.
“In the next winter, a new princess will be born, but she won´t be a normal pony. She will be the union of three species: an Alicorn.”
The crowd of ponies started to mutter.
“An Alicorn?” “That´s a legend” “It´s impossible”
“She…” as the oracle resumed speaking, the mutter died. “…will be able to raise the Sun on her own, without the assistance of any others. This shall be the proof of her amazing power. And she´ll be eternal, just as the world itself.”
The crowd was astonished.
“But this isn´t all. Some years later, a second Alicorn shall be born. She´ll be in charge of the Moon, and this mare will be nearly as powerful as her sister. But, my predictions are not as joyous as they may seem. Dark times are coming, for on the same day that this new princess is born, another creature will do the same. A creature that nopony has ever seen. A monster. He will bring chaos and destruction to everything he touches. And like the Alicorn, he shall be immortal.”
Fear could be felt in the air. All the ponies were nervous.
“But, what can we do?” asked a pony.
“Nothing. Destiny is written in stone. Nothing can change it,” the oracle answered firmly. “But there´s something more to fear.”
“What!? This can´t get worse!” screamed another pony.
“Do you truly believe that? What if I told you that this creature, this monster, will be born here?”
Everypony looked to each other with confusion and fear.
“Yes!” screamed the oracle. “As you´ve heard, I´ve been told that this horrible creature will be born here. And there is nothing you can do to avoid it. He is already inside a mare´s belly.”
Grey Weather looked to her husband and to her belly. No, it couldn´t be true, she thought.
But Everypony started looking the pair- some of them with confusion, others with fear, and others with rage.
“Let’s get out of here,” Sun Pride whispered to his wife.
They started walking slowly across the main square, feeling the stares all over them.
They arrived home, closed the door with key, and sat down.
“What do you think, honey?” asked Grey Weather.
“I don´t know what to think,” he answered.
“Well, I know. We shouldn’t listen what that oracle says. I´m sure she is a liar who is only trying to make money from gullible ponies. And even if what she’s saying is true, I´m sure we aren´t the only marriage waiting for a filly or a colt,” she said firmly.
“Yes, you´re right,” answered Sun Pride. “We shall overcome this. They´ll forget what that oracle has said. And our colt will be a normal and strong pony.”
“Colt? Why not a filly?” she said jokingly.
They laughed and hugged each other.
“Don´t worry,” Sun Pride whispered in her ear, “Everything will be alright.”
The days passed. Contrary to what Sun Pride had said, ponies of the village didn´t forget the prediction. They acted towards the couple with fear and contempt. The two of them lost all their friends. They even received letters with threats, and some ponies went so far as to throw objects to their house.
At work, nopony wanted to be near Sun Pride. Fortunately for Grey Weather, she didn’t have to work due to her pregnancy, so she felt less despised.
Peer pressure can change many minds, and Sun Pride was subjected to so much of it that he was starting to change his mind about his own wife and future son. But he didn´t show his feelings.
Finally, while they were at home one night, Grey Weather felt that their baby wanted to come out.
“OH MY… Help me!” screamed Grey Weather.
“What´s going on?” Sun Pride asked, somewhat fearfully.
“Our baby is here!” she answered.
“Ok… ok, I´ll get some help,” he said nervously.
“No! Please, stay with me…” she managed to say through the pain.
“But we´re not prepared for this. I should look for the village doctor…”
“Please, think about it,” she said with difficulty, “After all the hate we’ve received, do you really want them to know that our baby is being born? Some of them would come here to hurt him, or even worse…”
“Ok honey, don´t worry. We´ll do it by ourselves.”
He crouched and kissed her in her front.
They had to take control of the birth on their own. It was difficult, and painful. Without any experience, they didn´t know very well what to do. But, after many hours of pain, their baby was finally born. The weak lights of dawn were beginning to enter through the window.
Sun Pride took a towel and put the baby on it. With how nervous Sun Pride was, he hadn´t even looked at him yet.
“We did it,” Grey Weather said weakly but happily.
“Yes, we are parents. And when they see our baby, they´ll forget that stupid prophecy,” he said excitedly.
“Come on, bring him here, please. I want to hold him,” she said with a smile in her face.
He carefully took him to her. They were both so excited. They wanted to know if it as a foal or a filly- a unicorn or a pegasus. They unwrapped the towel slowly, and neither of them was prepared for what they saw. His head was grey with a deer and a goat horn, and his body was long and brown. He had a lion paw and an eagle claw as hands. His legs were a horse hoof and a reptile leg. On his back they saw a pegasus wing and a bat wing. He had a long snake tail that ended with a furry tip. Laying there in front of them there was a monster.
“What is this?” Sun Pride asked in a shocked voice.
Grey Weather didn´t know how to answer.
“WHAT IS THIS!?” he shouted.
“This is our son,” she answered as calmly as she could.
“NO! This… THING is not our son!”
“You may not like it, but you are his father.”
“NO! I´m not related to this thing. So, the prophecy was right…”
“No, it wasn´t and it isn´t,” she answered angrily. “He may be different, but he has the same blood we have.”
“Think about it. She talked about a monster. Everything she foretold was right. How do you think that ponies from the village will react when they see him?”
“But… he is our son, and… and I´m his mother…” she said, trying to contain the tears.
“Before someone sees him… We should kill him.”
“What!? How dare you!? He is your own son!”
“No! He is not my son, he is a monster!”
She looked the small sleeping creature that she was holding. Then, she raised her head slowly to look into her husband’s eyes.
“Ok. I´ll do it,” she said, crying. “But, you know what? The only monster I see here is you.”
She wrapped the baby with the towel again and left both the house and her husband all alone.
The streets were empty. She walked through them in silence. The sunlight was hitting her in the face. She went to the river behind an abandoned building. Grey Weather held the small creature over the river. The towel slipped leaving the baby uncovered. Now he was awake, and he looked into his mother’s eyes. She felt her heart stop. The little baby raised his hands, trying to reach her mother while laughing. Grey Weather couldn´t handle it anymore. With a quick movement, she pulled away the baby from the river. She hugged her son carefully while her tears fell to the ground.
“Oh, my poor boy,” she said through a sea of tears, “They don´t understand, nopony would understand. But you are my son, and I love you. It doesn´t matter what other ponies think, I´ll always love you, and I want you to remember that.”
The little creature giggled. His mother responded with a smile.
“You will always have me… Draco.”
Little Draco yawned and fell asleep again.
A few hours earlier, in a very different place, another miracle had occurred.
Up in the mountains, in the newly built city of Canterlot, home of the Royal Family, the Queen had started feeling the pain of birth during the night. With the assistance of the royal doctors, and with her husband as witness, a new princess was born the next morning. It was a relief for the royal marriage. They were reaching their life expectancy, which was not very high at that time; they also had no descendants. But, finally, there she was: a successor to the crown of Equestria.
“Your majesty,” said one of the doctors, “Congratulations. You have become the mother of a precious filly- a unicorn, to be exact.”
“What are you saying?” asked another doctor. “You are wrong. She has wings.”
“No, look here, can´t you see her horn?”
Unable to believe their eyes, they carefully picked up the filly.
“This… this is impossible…” whispered one doctor.
“What? Is there something wrong?” asked the king.
“Your majesty, I don´t know how to say it… You are the father of an… Alicorn,” the doctor answered.
The king didn´t know what to say or what to do.
His wife came to the rescue.
“Do you want to hold her?”
He regained his composure and answered with a smile.
“Please…”
He took carefully the sleeping filly with his hooves.
“What shall we call our little princess?” he asked.
“I´ve been thinking about it for a while… what do you think of ‘Celestia’?”
“A precious name- perfect for such a precious pony.”
The king hugged his wife. Then, he kissed their daughter in the front and gave her to the queen.
“If you’ll excuse me…” the king said.
He went to the balcony and looked to his royal subjects in the city. He took air, and with his Canterlot voice, he began to speak.
“Great news for everyone!”
As he talked, everypony stopped whatever they were doing to listen what their monarch was saying. If the king was announcing something, it had to be important.
“After many years, Equestria finally has a successor! Today, and from now on, our princess´s name shall be Celestia! Spread the news, ponies; there is a new member of the royal family!
The crowd began to applaud with their hooves and cheer.
The king looked back and saw his wife´s happy face. The feelings couldn´t be described.
At that moment, in another place, Grey Weather was waking up. She had gone inside of an abandoned building searching for a place for Draco to sleep. There, she had found a bed which was surprisingly clean. She had laid the little baby in it, but after a long night of no sleep, she also fell into a slumber. When she woke up a few hours later, she found that the baby wasn´t by her side. Feeling her heart near an attack, she started searching for him throughout the building. The worst possibilities immediately shot through her mind. What if someone found him? She tried to calm herself and think of something to do when she heard a familiar giggle coming from outside. She ran to the door and there she found little Draco, happily eating grass from the floor.
“Uff…” she said with an enormous relief. “ You were hungry, eh little one?”
His look of confusion made her laugh. That was exactly what she needed after such a terrible night. She had never had such an intense argument with her husband. But, what had happened to him? She was no longer in love with him. He had told her to kill her own son! He was now dead to her. She could not talk to him again. But now she had an enormous problem: what was she going to do now? Her entire life was ruined. She only had Draco, and nopony could know he was alive. They would kill him- there was no doubt.
“Oh Draco, my little Draco… what are we going to do now?”
He looked her. Although he didn´t understand the words, he could capture her feelings. He got up from the ground, and while staggering a bit, he walked in his mother´s direction. When he was in front of her, he left himself fall under his body’s own weight and hugged her mother´s front leg.
She felt warmth in her heart and a smile spread across her face.
“Don´t worry,” she said, “we´ll find a way.”
Then, after letting him fill up on some more grass, he left him in the bed so he could sleep.
Just before he fell asleep, she went in close to his face, kissed him fondly, and whispered to him, “Don´t worry, honey. I´ll be back soon.”
After that, she went out and blocked the entrances of the building so that nopony could enter, or Draco got out.
She quickly went back home, and there she found her husband. They both stood there just looking at each other. The silence was finally broken by Sun Pride.
“Honey…” he began.
“Don´t you dare to talk me again” she said angrily.
“But…”
“You are dead to me,” she said with contempt.
Grey Weather continued walking through the house.
“But have you done it?” he asked with a lump in the throat.
She looked him with rage.
“Yes, I have,” she lied.
“You have to understand; this is what’s best for us.” Sun Pride said.
“Kill your own son!? Just because of his appearance!? Just because of what ponies will think!? You truly are a monster, and I don´t want to be close to you ever again, so I´m leaving. I hope I never see you again!
His silence acted as an answer. He understood her pain, he also felt guilty, but he knew it was what was best for all of Equestria.
She gathered her things: her clothes, some furniture, and even some food from the pantry and put them in a cart.
“But, where are you going to live?” he asked.
She just ignored him. Grey Weather left the house. As she was returning to the abandoned building, she saw a courier pegasus with armor from Canterlot. She was curious because of the unexpected visit to their small town, so she approached the crowd. It looked like an important message. She wanted to be unnoticed, so she listened from a secure place. The courier was speaking loudly, so she could hear everything.
“Stallions and mares! Great news! The queen has given birth to a filly! It is an Alicorn with the name of Celestia!”
After his brief speech, the courier flew away.
Everypony looked to each other nervously.
“An Alicorn?” one mare asked, in fear.
“Just as it was predicted…” added another pony.
“But that means that…”
“According to the prediction, Grey Weather´s son must have born.”
Grey Weather felt a chill when she heard that. She left the place running with the courier’s words in her head. An Alicorn? If that were true, it meant that Draco really was a monster. No! Perhaps that part of the prophecy was wrong… No, if she was his mother, if she looked after him, he wouldn´t become a monster. She repeated that to herself as she ran to the abandoned house.
Grey Weather finally reached the house. So, this would become her home- not just her home, but her son´s, too. Well, it wasn´t that bad. She had grown up in a filthier house. Grey Weather went inside and left her possessions at the entrance.
She went to Draco´s bed and found him awake.
“Did you miss me?” she asked fondly.
Draco giggled.
“Yeah, me too,” Grey Weather answered with a smile.
It didn´t matter what that stupid prophecy said. Her little one was not going to become a monster. She would ensure that.