Rating: Possibly Dark, Possibly Teen
The lights are there, I know they are, they have to be, I’ve SEEN THEM. Starshimmer is an ordinary earth pony, no special background, no weird friends, no history of insanity or bouts of madness, and yet she’s different. She lives in Ponyville, as it seems more and more ponies do these days, the little town had grown a lot in the past few years. She’s been to the Everfree Forest more than most, and she cannot seem to fathom why. All she knows is that something keeps drawing her there, something strange, something important, something everypony should know about, something that is hidden away to keep it safe, but what? It all began after the return of Nightmare Moon, and her final defeat in the old castle ruins deep within Everfree. Every time she goes to the Forest she sees them, the lights, the shimmering, twinkling lights, they’re always there, hiding in the darkness and the shadows, disappearing whenever she tries to catch them, and nopony else ever sees them, even when they’re looking right at them. Starshimmer doesn’t know what the lights mean, only that they remind her of the stars in the sky, only ever twinkling in the dark, just out of reach. Now she has returned to the Everfree Forest, alone this time, though she doesn’t know why, and this time she intends to find out the secret of the lights, the stars, and just what their purpose is. This journey will lead to long untold pieces of the past, lost to the ravages of time, magic so ancient it dwarfs the Elements of Harmony by millennia, before the time of the ponies when the moon and sun were moved by the magic of the planet itself, and finally to the magic of the stars, a magic that dates back before the earth, before Harmony and Chaos, the power of the stars themselves, a power steeped in mystery, and so great it’s true potential has never been breached. When even the moon fears the nightmares, what is certain but the uncertainty. Sometimes there is more truth in a lie than in what is right, sometimes, the greatest dream becomes the worst nightmare, and sometimes even when you’ve woken up, the nightmare doesn’t end.
Rating:Everyone
Most of us ponies view time as linear, always moving forward, with only the strongest of us able to generate the magical force needed to jump backwards in time for a few simple moments. But I know time in another light, a much darker view. What if I told you that everything that is going to happen, has already happened, and is happening, is all just a loop. An infinite unending spiral of the same events over and over. Equestria is trapped in a cycle of time around four-thousand years in length. Now when I say the same events, I don't mean the strictly second by second identical happenings of the world, but that key events, large pieces of time, keep happening over and over, leading to the same conclusion, and the beginning of the loop. We never can remember this loop and therefore end up repeating it over and over. My name is Timeline the Relative, a unicorn in what I believe to be the beginning of the loop. I know about this loop because I have received a message, through time, from myself in the future at the end of the loop, sent to whenever I would be born in this iteration of these events. It is my job to ensure that this cycle of events fails to occur, and therefore, that the loop is broken, and the paradox shattered. I have already followed my previous/future counterparts instructions and have sent a message to myself in the next time, explaining that this is the second time a message like this has been sent and that I would send another one to arrive just a few seconds after the first one detailing mistakes I have made along the way, as well as how to perform the spell needed to send said message to those in the next iteration of the loop. Provided I fail this should occur. However if I succeed, the message will instead be sent to Celestia explaining about the loop as well as instead of showing her the message intended for me, another message detailing what not to do in the future as to prevent this cycle of events from ever occurring again. I only hope I only need one try.
Rating: Teen
What if the stars disappeared? ALL of the stars. Every single one of them, until only the moon hung in the sky. The sun, the stars, Celestia, and Luna have all vanished. Gone. Nopony knows where they are, nopony knows why, or how. Only the pale light of the moon, unaided by the stars it had been so used to having as company in the sky, lights Equestria now. Many ponies believe this is a regression of Luna back into being Nightmare Moon, others believe that Discord may be involved, some even suspect Queen Chrysalis, or the newly crowned Twilight Sparkle. The land is in disarray, fights are breaking out over what will soon be dwindling food supplies, the Royal Guard is trying desperately to restore order under new direction from Princesses Twilight Sparkle and Cadence, and Prince Shining Armor, and of course, without the heat from the sun, cold is setting in extremely quickly and it is predicted that Equestria will be covered in ice in 4 weeks. Also adding to the air of suspense is the disappearance of Discord just days before this incident, but is he the orchestrator, or just another pawn? There are only four weeks to find out what is happening, who has done it, why, how, and then fix it. With only the light of the moon to guide them, the Mane Six are facing their hardest trial yet, time is of the essence, and this time, this time, more than just the fates of the ponies are at stake. Every living thing needs the sun to survive. With the Earth in the balance, time quickly running out, and their friendship taught at it’s strings, will the stress crack the Six?
