The Adventures of a Dark Duelist

            Shadow's vision faded in and he looked around slowly, holding his head in pain and attempting to clear his blurry vision. "Ugh, where in the circles of hell am I?" He asked to no one in particular. His vision slowly cleared up, and he noticed he was in some form of cavern. Then he noticed something else, something he should have noticed before, he had hooves. "What the fuck?"

        He took a look in one of the crystals and saw both what he was expecting, and what he was not expecting. In his reflection he saw a dark coated pony with a red and white mane. He also saw a horn and wings. "I'm an alicorn, holy shit."

       "Hello? Who's there?" He heard a voice call out from down the cave. He quickly ran through it to see a very malnourished pink alicorn. The weak looking pony stared at him with wide eyes. "Who are you?" She asked.

       "My name is Nightshade." 'Might as well take the name of the bastard that did this to me.' He looked around for a second. "Where the hell are we."

       "I don't know, but I think we're in the crystal mines under Canterlot." She responded, still weak.

       "Any idea how we get out of here?" As if on cue a large explosion tore a hole in one of the cavern walls, revealing a purple unicorn. A very familiar purple unicorn.

       "You!" Before I could even process what happened, she was on top of the pink alicorn. Again, he was get groggy from just waking up, so he didn't catch any of what happened next. But they were suddenly running through the caverns, the pink one was singing, and in no time they were flying down the track of a minecart. Then they were literally flying, Twilight was holding onto the alicorn, and his wings spread on instinct so he was gliding. They were stopped in front of a large gate and niether of his companions could open it.

        "Do you think you could try to open it?" He heard Twilight ask.

        "Huh?" He asked.

        "Niether of us can open t with our magic, but since you're an alicorn and you're not hurt maybe you could try."

        "Uh, I'll try." He said, he channeled the same energy he felt when playing his cards into his horn, and quickly found himself on the other side of the door, how, he did not know. He quickly slid the barricade off and opened it. "Can either of you tell me what just happened?" He asked the gaping mares.

     "Uhhh, you used your magic, then you turned into a shadow, then you slipped under the door." Said the pink one.

     "Alright then, by the way, I never got your name." He told her.

     "My name is Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, but you can call me Cadence." He smiled at her.

     "Well, a modest princess, haven't seen one of those ever. Pleasure to meet you." After that they continued out the cavern, after Cadence tricked a couple of green eyed brides maids... Which was hilarious. We finally made it outside and Cadence turned to me.

      "I want you to find my Aunt, Princess Luna, somepony needs to make sure she's alright." 'Nightshade' sighed before reluctantly agreeing.

      "Alright, but this is your wedding present Cadence." He said before breaking off in a run for the palace, which wasn't hard to find. He got to the front and one of the guards hesitantly blocked his path.

      "I need to speak with Princess Luna, I was sent by Princess Cadence." Shadow said in a rush. The guard eyed him curiously.

      "You used her nickname, does this mean you are close to her?" He asked and Shadow facehoofed.

      "Considering I woke up next to her in an abandoned mine while she was sobbing about how her fiancée was going to marry an imposter AND she was starving to death, not to mention the fact that I helped her escape. Yeah, I'd say we became fast friends. NOW TAKE ME TO LUNA!" He shouted at a volume that rivaled the Royal Canterlot voice. The guard took in all the information and at the seriousness of the situation complied.

      "Understood." He turned to his partner. "Go, alert the rest of the guard." Back to me. "Let's go-" just before we moved the large dome around the city started to shatter. "Oh Buck, we need to hurry!" They started sprinting through the halls and reached the throne room. Where Luna was fighting at least two dozen changelings.

     "Get away from the Princess!" The guard shouted as he charged in, Shadow followed shortly. Contrary to his usual self, He acted on instinct, not moral code or strategy. One changeling rushed him, he used the momentum to grapple it, turn it around, and throw it back into a few of its friends. He continued fighting like a human for several minutes until they were down to a dozen changelings, and he was utterly exhausted. His reflexes slowed and he got  a changeling hoof to the chin, and a horn to the back. Another came up, and the three proceeded to beat him into submission. That was of course before all four of them were struck with a pillar of black energy.

       The three changelings were sent flying, and he should have too. He didn't though, he absorbed it, and he started channeling his own magic, this time it was much easier. His horn took in the light around him and he focused the shadow out of his horn and threw it. It started to shift and form before finally fading, revealing a familiar figure to the exhausted duelist. Standing. In the middle of the room. Drawing a sword. Was Archfiend Soldier. The duelist was only able to form one sentence before collapsing.

       "Archfiend Soldier, attack the changeling swarm." The last thing he saw before fainting, was changelings running for their lives.

        Luna watched in both horror and awe as the creature of nightmares formed before her eyes. She watched it draw its demonic blade, but it did not attack, not until it was given a command by it's alicorn summoner. The Princess was shocked further that it did exactly what it was told, it did not do so much as hesitate to cleave the bugs in two. The changelings however, did not get the picture. As they continued to try and fight it. However, it simply breezed through them as though they were made of butter. However, when the carnage stopped and there was no sound left but the sound of changeling blood dripping from the blade. It sheathed its weapon, stood next to the collapsed alicorn, and motioned for Luna to come over. She was hesitant, but figured complying was the best choice of action.

       "Yes? What dost thou need?" She asked as she slowly inched towards the unusual pair. The fiend patted the fallen pony on the back. "I- I don't understand." It facepalmed, which made her smile, before pointing to her horn then pointing to him. "Oh, thou asketh us to heal him." She said before touching her horn to his and channeling magic through. Slowly, the midnight alicorn's wound healed and his eyes slowly opened.

       "Huh- wha- Luna!" He shouted, before recoiling as he expected pain. "Huh, I'm healed. Uhhhh thanks. What about your guard, and what about yourself. You're kinda beaten up too." He asked.

       "We must tend to our civilians before ourself or our guard." She said with a small smile, which he returned.

       "Well then, we need to go get Cadence, she might be in trouble." Luna went to run off but the guard spoke up.

       "What about this... Mess?" He asked.

       "Uhhhhh, Archfiend Soldier, clean up here. I don't want the maids to hate me, then come find us okay." It nodded and began to drag the dead bodies away, to where? None of them wanted to know.

       "Well, now let us go." As soon as they got to the door we stopped again. There were waaaaay too many changelings outside. "How do we get passed this." Luna asked. Shadow put a hoof on his chin for a second.

"I might be able to turn us into shadows." He said as he charged up his horn, this time he kept his eyes open, and he noticed that he and Luna, slowly faded into darkness. They melded into one mind, and Luna guided their shade straight towards the church before seperating and reforming. Luna was about to rush through the doors, but she was stopped by Shadow. "Stop. Tell me you don't feel that as well, it feels... warm" Before Luna could even answer a sudden explosion of pure, condensed, love shot out from the structure and sent the two a few feet back with the force alone. Though, that wasn't all that happened, the changelings were sent flying like bats out of hell. Once they regained their footing, Shadow went to open the door, this time he was stopped by Luna.

"Take this." A cloak materialized, wrapping itself around him and concieling his wings. "A new alicorn this soon after such a dramatic event could cause problems, especially with your 'unique' abilities." She said with a smile, they both walked into the church. they were greeted by six excited and confused faces, along with two familiar ones.

"Auntie, Nightshade! You're alright!" Cadence shouted as she ran up to hug Luna.

"Yes. It seems I have reattained some of my dark magic while helping her out." The words came out of his mouth before  he even thought about it. This seemed to make the onlookers nervous for a second. "Anyway Cadence, helping your aunt was my wedding gift to you. So I still owe you for getting me out of those caves." Shining armor approached and warily put a hoof on his fiancee.

"Uh, Cadence, who is this guy?" He asked as he eyed Shadow.

"Shiny, this is Nightshade, he helped me and Twilight escape the caves." She answered whole-heartedly.

"Oh please, all I did was open a door." This time it was Twilight that spoke up.

"By turning yourself into a living shadow! How did you do that? Not even Starswirl the Bearded created a spell like that." In the wise thoughts of Shadow Strike 'She's having a total nerdgasm.'

"As I spoke before, that was an example of my dark magic. It's difficult to explain-" They were interrupted as a loud crash behind them sounded, the terrified looks on all of the ponies in front of him meant that it could only be one thing. Without turning around he spoke. "Ah, Archfiend Soldier, I was wondering when you were going to show up. No matter, you're released." The demon walked up beside him then faded into a three dimensional shadow, before slipping into a stream of darkness and flowing into Shadow's horn. He then refocused his attention on the speechless ponies in front of him.

"Wh-wh-what was that beast." Cadence asked, stuttering over herself.

"I must apologize for not warning you about that Cadence. Also, the correct term is fiend. I can summon many creatures and abilities from the dark realm. Now, since I have revealed to you all one of my abilities, and how the majority of them actually work, I ask for the purple unicorn to show me the events of the past few days. I would rather see it than hear it." The group still shell shocked, parted so that a previously note-taking Twilight could approach the onyx alicorn. She touched her horn to his and in a split second, hundreds of memories over the past few days flashed through his head. As soon as the spell stopped, mere moments after it began, Nightshade had a look a pure hatred on his face. Before anypony could react, he dug a hoof straight into Shining Armor's face. The sound of the impact made everypony stagger, and sent Shining spiralling. Shadow found himself restrained by a silver aura.

"What art thou doing Nightshade!?" She asked, even though he couldn't move, he spat at Shining.

"'IF I WERE YOU I WOULDN'T SHOW UP TO T HE WEDDING AT ALL!!!'" This sentence caused all but Luna and Cadence's eyes to go wide. "YOUR SISTER WAS RIGHT ALL ALONG, YOU HADN'T EVEN BEEN FULLY ENSLAVED YET, AND YOU FUCKING SAID THAT TO YOUR OWN SISTER! NO MATTER WHAT HAPPENS, NO MATTER WHAT THEY HAVE DONE, AS LONG AS YOUR FAMILY'S HEART IS IN THE RIGHT PLACE YOU SHOULD NEVER FUCKING SAY ANYTHING LIKE THAT TO THEM!!!" His eyes then turned to the other elements.

"AND YOU FIVE! DID YOU FORSAKE ALL OF YOUR ELEMENTS!" His words were laced with venom, He pointed his now free hoof at Rarity. "ELEMENT OF GENEROSITY MY ASS! IF YOU'RE SO GENEROUS, THEN WHY COULDN'T YOU GIVE YOUR FRIEND THE BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT!" Next was Applejack. "ELEMENT OF HONESTY! YOU SHOULD HAVE BEEN ABLE TO TELL THAT TWILIGHT FULLY BELIEVED IN WHAT SHE WAS TRYING TO WARN YOU ABOUT!" Next he moved the hoof to Pinkie. "ELEMENT OF LAUGHTER?! ARE YOU KIDDING ME!? DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH DESPAIR YOU PUT YOUR 'FRIEND' THROUGH!?" He calmed himself, but kept his scornful hatred, as he moved to Fluttershy. "Element of Kindness. Do I really even need to explain it? You couldn't even show a comforting smile when Twilight had been  driven into the deepest pit of depression." Finally somepony spoke up, unfortunately it was the wrong one.

"HEY LEAVE HER ALONE!" Rainbow shouted, causing Shadow to scoff.

"AND YOU! Up until this point I respected and admired you, Rainbow Dash, but now I see just how much of a hypocrite you are. You call yourself the Element of Loyalty, when you would prove yourself more loyal to a Princess you had probably never even heard of before that event and the brother of the very friend you betrayed, PATHETIC!" Finally he broke free of Luna's magical grip entirely.

"YOU!!!" He yelled as he pointed at Celestia. "'YOU HAVE A LOT TO THINK ABOUT!' YOU GODDAMN BITCH, YOU COULDN'T EVEN LISTEN TO YOUR STUDENT, THE PONY WHO LOOKS UP TO YOU AND CHERISHES YOUR WORD MORE THAN ANYPONY ELSE, AND YOU COULDN'T EVEN ALLOW HER TO EXPLAIN EVERYTHING! SOME BENEVOLENT RULER YOU ARE!" Shadow stomped his hoof, leaving crack marks in the floor. "None of that, NONE OF THAT MAKES ME AS MAD AS THE FACT THAT NONE OF YOU HAVE APOLOGIZED YET! UP UNTIL THIS POINT IT PROBABLY HASN'T EVEN CROSSED ANY OF YOUR MINDS!" He then spoke quietly. "I will still show up to the wedding, to show support for Cadence, and to clean up the aftermath of the invasion, but I could never live here. YOU'RE EVEN WORSE THAN THE CHANGELINGS! THEY FEED ON LOVE, THEY USE IT AS A LIFE SOURCE! YOU JUST TOOK IT AND THREW IT AWAY LIKE IT WAS TRASH!" His horn started channeling power and slowly he broke apart the fabric of space in front of him. "Dimension Hole." Before it shut behind him, they could see a glimpse of the royal throne room, those that weren't blinded by the tears in their eyes.

Luna did not know how to react, on one hoof, a strange alicorn with dark, evil looking powers just assaulted the captain of the guard, and verbally assaulted the elements of harmony, and her sister. On the other, they all deserved a severe talking to at the least for what they had apparently done, not to mention the fact that they did not even apologize for it. She couldn't make a decision on the matter, and it looked like while Cadence wasn't going to let that interfere with her love for Shining Armor. He would definitely be sleeping on the couch for a few weeks.

Celestia herself looked destroyed, she had been beating herself up for what she had said the moment she realized she was wrong, and she knew she had to apologize, but her pride simply would not allow it. That speech however, drove her over the edge, and now she was breaking down in tears. She couldn't bare to look any of them in the eye.

"How the hell could they possibly have acted like that?!" Shadow shouted at no one in particular. "Love and tolerate my ass." He slowly found himself reeling at the amount of power that was required for the dimension hole. Not even having the strength to call out for help, he collapsed on the palace floor. Welcoming, the all too familiar darkness.

          Shadow looked around, seeing that he was surrounded by the creatures he so dearly plays. "Great, so what am I in the duel spirits world now?" Rainbow Dark Dragon responded.

          "No Sam, you are unconscious. We are here to help you use the new abilities you have attained. You now control darkness, just as Celestia controls the sun and Luna the moon, you wield what they cannot. At the moment you merely have control over shadows, we will assist you in using it to its full potential." A room faded in, full of items. "You're shadow puppeteer skill, you may link your shadow with the shadow of any inanimate object. If it may bend you can make it do so, you may also use this to replicate the unicorns telekinesis." The Dark Dragon paused. "You must go now, it is time to wake up, time spent unconscious goes by much faster than sleep, in our future sessions, we shall go further." The space around him started to fade, and as he woke up he heard himself shout.

       "What the hell?! That was like thirty seconds!"

       "Actually Nightshade, thou were unconscious for at least three hours." He turned his head to the left to see the princess of the night.

       "Oh, Luna! Look I'm sorry about the... Scene I caused at the church, I've gone through a lot in the last couple days. I-I couldn't stand to see someone's ideas so hatefully disregarded without even listening to what they had to say. I don't regret what I said to any of them, I meant every word. I regret how and when I said it. I also don't regret clocking the groom in the face, I stand by that, and now I have an interesting story." He chuckled. "But... I'd like to apologize to the elements, Celestia too."

        "As far as I'm concerned, we all have things to apologize for. Though, your hateful words, while brash, were needed to make them see that." It was at this time he noticed that he wasn't in the throne room anymore.

         "Uh, Luna, where are we?" He asked.

         "I moved you to my chambers, I needed to ask you something." It was at this moment he finally noticed she wasn't using the royal 'we'.

         "Ask away."

         "Up until today, there has only been three alicorns in Equestria. Not only that, you hold very unique abilities, summon creatures I have never even heard of. Who are you?" Shadow looked back and forth before swallowing and answering.

          "I will answer as long as you do not disclose this information to anyone else." She hesitantly nodded. "My real name is Samuel Stratos, I was originally a species known as human." Her eyes widened, obviously they were heard of here. "When I was little, I was skilled in a card game called YuGiOh. In this game there were three main types of cards, trap cards, spell cards, and monster cards. In my world they were nothing more than pieces of paper, here, they are powerful beasts and dangerous abilities. I'm not sure how I got here why I'm a pony now or why I have control over shadows. Have I answered your questions?"

        "Yes. Now I shall take you to the throne room, this time, leave your cloak here. The only ponies there will be ones I trust." He drew a blank for a second.

        "Uh, won't I raise a commotion if we walk there?" Nightshade asked.

        "Who said anything about walking?" She asked with a smile and he sighed.

        "You want to use shadow step again don't you?" Her smile turned into a huge grin.

        "Yes! It's so much fun!"

        "Alright, here we go." A familiar feeling overtook them both. They melded together and flowed across the hallway floor moving at an immense speed towards the dining hall. Sitting at the end of the table was Celestia, on each side of her was as follows: Cadence and Shining, Fluttershy and Rarity, AJ and RD, then Pinkie and Twilight. They all had clearly been crying recently, this was more than enough to break Nightshade's concentration. He and Luna materialized in front of the exit, all eyes were on him, all but two pairs of them were hate filled. Night shrank at their gazes.

       "Everypony, Nightshade has something to say." Luna put him on the spotlight even more.

       "I-I-I-I'm sorry!" He shouted, everypony sitting at the table was surprised. "I'm sorry, what I yelled at you about. It not only wasn't my business, but the timing was unacceptable, how I said what I said even more so. I apologize, not for what I said make no mistake of that, but how I said it and when I said it. I just, I just don't understand." He turned away and prepared a dimension hole. "I understand if you don't want me here anymore."

       Silence hung.

      It was excruciating for both sides of the situation.

      "Sit the buck down, this is way too sappy." He was surprised to see Rainbow Dash.

"Wha- but... you were the one that I insulted the hardest." He started tearing up involuntarily. "Why would any of you even look at me after that, when I was little I was beaten up for far less." The memories of bullies throughout his school life flashed through his mind.

Luna was just staring at the creature before her. 'Is this really a being that can bring for creatures of destruction at a moments notice?' As these thoughts crossed her mind, niether of the two noticed the elements surrounding Nightshade and hugged him. He wasn't ready for the embrace, as he almost summoned another monster out of reflex, but he quickly melted into it.

The embrace ended quicker than he would have wanted, when Celestia cleared her throat. "I would like you to live with the elements while we figure out your living arrangements, okay?" Night nodded.

"I just need to get my cloak." He charged up some magic in his horn, a very creepy blue chest appeared in front of him and he started hitting the top of it with his hoof. "Come on cough it up!" To the mares surprise and disgust the box opened, and out came a long cloak, it was untattered by the hundreds of teeth inside and completely dry. "Sorry about how creepy they all look, they're just really helpful." He said as he strung the cloak around his neck. "So how do I look?"

"Creepy. Why do you need that cloak anyway?" Dash asked. Nightshade put on his best 'you serious?' face, then realized the problem.

"Is my coat really that dark that you couldn't see my wings?" He asked as he extended them.

"Woah, um, there's another alicorn here. And he's going to be living in ponyville. I MUST GET A NEW FASHION LINE UP!" Squealed an ecstatic Rarity before she galloped out of the room. Nightshade sighed and rubbed his temple.

"She isn't going to treat me like a prince is she?" The silence was all the answer he needed. "FUCK!"