In Sun's Light

In Sun’s Light
Prologue
Thursday

The Castle was dark, and the moon new. Although the Princess of the Night didn’t like it, the moon had to be invisible at least once a month to show the world’s cycles. It was a perfect night for Will O. Wisp’s plans. He snuck quietly past guards, having to put a few under sleep spells, as he slowly, quietly made his way to the Princess’s chamber. One guard he gave a swift blow to the head. The guard’s partner saw him and tried to sound an alarm, but was quickly put to sleep. None died. When his plan worked, he would need all the royal guards he could get. And no guards were catching him. Everything was going perfect.

So imagine his surprise when he was caught by a green maned yellow cook on the way back from the kitchens. He had researched most of the staff in the castle, but this one was one he hadn’t seen before. Three fritters adorned her flank.

At first she glanced at him with surprise, then with fear as he moved closer. Will needed to knock her out quickly, or she would alert the door guard. That would not be good, he needed all his strength. He managed to knock her out right as a little squeak came out from her lips. Then, she fell to the ground, her warm cider splashing out of the cup she had been carrying.

This caught the door guard’s attention. His head snapped the direction of the sound, and he moved to the mare as Will snuck past through the shadows.

“Hey, Apple Fritter?” he said as he shook her awake.

“Oh… Oh my! Hello there, Graphite! How’d I get here?”

“I think you blacked out for a second. You spilled your drink.”

“Shucks, I sure as sugar did. Sorry about that…”

“I’ll clean it for you. Get some sleep.”

Graphite watched as Apple Fritter rounded the hall corner, not even aware of the door to the Princess of Day’s chamber latching closed behind him.

Celestia, as always this time of night, was fast asleep. Will put a magical barrier on the doors and windows to block sound and light, then moved closer, sure it was smooth sailing from this point on until he tripped on a fold in a rug on the floor. The thump he made when he hit the ground awakened the princess with a start. She looked to the source of the noise and was greeted by the sight of a cloaked figure.

“Who goes there?” she said, a slight quiver of adrenaline in her voice, “How did you get past the guards?”

Will whipped off his cloak, revealing his white coat, and started using magic, the same color and shape as the metallic blue ball of fire decorating his flank. Celestia stared with shock at him.

“Will!” she whispered, before countering his magic with her own. 'Something is wrong,' she thought. 'I should have been able to subdue him on a moment’s notice!'

Noticing the look of shock and confusion on her face, he pointed to a trinket around his neck.

“I stole it from an old zebra in the Everfree forest and changed the color of its magic so that no one would be suspicious of me. They don’t call it the Alicorn Amulet for nothing. Really, Celestia, don’t look so shocked, I was a rather easy threat to spot, I think”

“Guards!”

“Oh, that won’t do you any good. I’ve sealed all of the entrances. Nopony can hear you, or see the mess of light we are making. And once you’ve tragically disappeared, Equestria will need a ruler. A pony who is strong. A born leader. One who isn’t a sap for pranks and lessons about friendship. ME, Celestia.”

“How did you know of Twilight’s letters?”

“I’ve been watching, preparing for this for a while. And obviously you didn’t know about me. Too bad, too late.” He started his spell, opening a portal. “I have just the place to put you, you’ll love it. But, just in case you know a spell to get back to Equestria, let’s do this.” Celestia was aware of herself becoming smaller, until she had the size and proportions of the fresh bunch of fillies and colts going into her school for gifted unicorns. She screamed, the process was so painful, and was aware of her voice being a higher pitch as well. She was a filly. Before she knew it, her memories started slipping away, ripped down to the amount she originally had at the age she was becoming. She watched with horror as her cutie mark faded, then realized she had never got her cutie mark!

“Let’s see how long it takes for the coyotes to get you.” Why was Will doing this?! He had always seemed so… Wait, who was Will? Why was this guy hurting her? Fresh fear washed over the filly as she realized she didn’t remember her name. Her scream of terror was cut off as the portal closed.

Will chuckled and then walked out as the last of the magic faded. Luna was in for a surprise tomorrow morning. As he walked out, quietly knocking out the door guard, he didn’t notice the last of the magical energy turn into blue dust on the floor.

Friday

Canterlot; The next morning

The whole city was in panic and word was spreading quickly to the other cities and towns. Equestria was entering a state of widespread panic and Celestia was nowhere to be found. Luna had finally caught on that something was wrong when the sun didn’t follow the moon through the sky. She had accidentally coated the world in eerie twilight before realizing that Celestia was missing. That was when she had called Shining Armor to investigate. And boy was he livid. Luna was standing awkwardly as he exploded at his guards.

“What I want to know right now is how you guards let ANYPONY get through! How did he even get to the door? Why am I standing here, having to ask you these questions today?”

“If you’re going to get angry at anypony, get angry at me, sir.” a surly looking guard at the edge of the line said. “It was my mistake, I was watching the door. This pony got past me too.” Shining looked and was shocked to find the sky blue coat and blue/white mane of Graphite Sketch. He was a great artist. He had signed up with the royal guard to prove his trustworthiness, and boy had he.

“Graphite! But you’re one of my best guards!”

“Not this time, sir. I’ve screwed up.”

Shining was shocked. Graphite was a great guard, not much could slip by him because he was a pretty good sneak himself. Takes one to spot one, he always said.

“Show me what happened.”

Graphite took him to the spot he was guarding and ran him by the events of the night.

“You’re sure it wasn’t the cook?”

“I would have noticed an earth pony. This one was disguising him or herself with magic… But they also might have…” Graphite cut himself off, realizing what had happened. “Man, I went and helped the cook back up. Must’ve been why she fell, she was knocked out. This pony used her to distract me…”

Okay, credit where it’s due, Shining thought, that is pretty smart. Just then a purple alicorn burst into the hallway, quite freaked out by the news.

“I came as fast as I could! Is there any sign of her?!”

“Calm down, Twilie. We’re still looking.” Twilight looked over at the sound of her brother’s voice, and a little smile came over her face. At least her big brother was on the job.

“Shining! Boy, am I glad to see you. Has anything developed?”

“Nothing besides the fact that this guy was really smart.”

“He would have had to be smart to sneak in. Have you checked her chambers?”

“We were just getting to that.” He opened the door and held it, going in after Luna, Graphite and Twilight, who bent to examine some blue dust on the floor.

“This is magical residue.” She said. “Someone must have got rid of her with a teleportation.”

“Is there any way to trace it?” Graphite asked.

“Not anymore. This is probably long powerless.” She started to lift some up, but a shock of energy zapped her horn, making her drop it. “Wow! I was wrong! This is powerful! The teleportation trail has long disappeared, but the dust still holds an insane amount of magic!” A thought occurred to her. “It’s too powerful. Whoever this is, they’re not a unicorn. This kind of magical power only houses itself in immortal alicorns!” All eyes immediately went to Luna.

“Where were you last night?” Twilight asked, suspicion creeping from her mind to her voice. “What were you doing?”

“Are you assuming that I offed my own sister?!”

“You’re the only one powerful enough to do it! It had to be you!”

In a fit of rage, Luna’s mane swirled around Twilight, lifting her bodily off of the ground and pulling her close enough for the young alicorn to see the fury in her eyes.

“My days of razing this land with my jealousy are over, Twilight Sparkle. I would never hurt my sister, and you would be a fool to think otherwise.” With that said, she put Twilight down and walked off in a huff.

“Well,” Graphite said, “It’s not all bad. If she was teleported, then she might still be alive.”

“You’re right!” Twilight said, refreshed by this little bit of hope. “We need to find out where this portal led, and fast!”

* * *

In a completely different world, amongst a few bushes, a small filly with a white coat and a long pink mane awoke. It had been a short night after she arrived. She had fainted after showing up… She still didn’t remember her name! As she came to her senses, all she remembered was forgetting. She couldn’t remember what she knew she needed to, and it was all because of that horrible stallion… The stallion! He wasn’t here, was he? She looked around in a panic, and realized she didn’t know where she was. She needed to get out of this forest, then maybe she could get her bearings.

As she walked, she heard howls and yelps. Something was nearby. Maybe the stallion hadn’t been kidding about coyotes. She decided to hurry. The yelps were getting closer. The filly kept walking, and looking over her shoulder. She heard a sound in front of her, turned, and froze as she looked a coyote right in the face. She had been going the wrong way! He seemed surprised to see her. It was a standoff until she quickly turned and ran away. She could hear the coyote behind her, and more following it. She was running as fast as her little legs would carry her, trying not to get caught, but they were gaining on her.

“Can’t we talk about this? Come on, why can’t we talk about this? Leave me alone!” she begged as they got closer, and suddenly she was running across a strange strip of black rock with yellow lines in the middle. The transition caused her to trip and fall across the yellow lines. She flipped over and watched in terror as a coyote jumped in front of her, on the other side of the line, and bared its fangs. She knew she wouldn’t be able to get up in time, and was desperately crawling back when the coyote lunged. But right as it did, something huge hit it with a roar and went on, not even stopping. The coyote got caught under it with a yelp. Whatever that thing was, it made a huge mess of the canine. A stray drop of blood landed on the filly’s cheek.

She got up in horror and turned to get off the rock, and another monster roared by, just missing her, going the opposite direction of the first. She screamed, and ran across after it passed. She found a nice sized hole to hide in and cried as more monsters roared by.

In a nearby town

'Halfway through the day,' Gavin thought. It was almost time for school to end, and then he would go to soccer practice, and then home. As it was right now, he was waiting for the lunch line to wear down so he could see whether or not there were any slices of pizza left. He checked, and sure enough, the line was down. Another cool thing was that last in line was Eric. They weren’t exactly best friends, but Gavin was one of the few people in school who accepted Eric.

Eric was a little different, as most people went. He didn’t follow the stereotype of boys liking boy things. He was bullied in school for watching My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.

“Hey Gavin. What’s up?”

“I’m just hanging out. You hungry?”

“As a horse!” Eric said, before chuckling at his reference.

“Same here. I have this, then U.S. History, and then I can get through soccer practice and be done with the day. Maybe relax, watch some Doctor Who.”

“How are you doing on MLP?”

“This again. Eric, I respect that you’re willing to be different. So am I. But I don’t want to watch it.”

“If you say so.” The rest of their time in the line went slowly and quietly. They got their lunches, and then went and sat down. Both of them were into a wide range of interests, so there were plenty of references and jokes in the conversation. Everything from the Cleveland Browns to The Wrath of Khan.

After the bell rang for class, it was time for U.S. History class, which flew by despite the pop quiz. After that was soccer practice. There was a game coming up, they had one week, and at this point they were just keeping everything tuned and ready to go. All their moves were perfected; everyone knew right where to be in any situation. They were a well oiled machine.

And that was why practice ended early. Gavin spent the rest of his time opting to walk home. It was a long walk, for sure, but it wasn’t a bad one.

When he finally got home, and did all of his homework, there was nothing else to do. Gavin was a kid living alone with his mom, and even at sixteen, she trusted him to be alone while she went on business trips. It was a well built and long running trust between the two of them. Gavin was responsible.

And tonight he was bored and restless.
So he laced up his hiking boots and went for a walk. There was a nice forest that he liked to walk this time of night, as the sun set.

* * *

The filly was so hungry, her stomach was hurting. She knew that she needed some plants, but she didn’t know what was safe and what wasn’t. She was getting desperate, venturing farther from the hole she was hiding in every time she went out. And there was a rather large reddish hawk watching her every time she went out. It was scary, she knew it wanted to grab her and eat her.

But she had to find food. She was hungry. She needed something to eat, or she wouldn’t last very long. There had to be something edible to-

What was that sound?!

She turned and saw a tall, two legged creature, coming her way. Everything was so scary. Her first impulse was to hide, but she had gone too far from her hole. She was trapped. She did the first thing she could and hid in the nearest bush, making quite a bit of noise while she was at it.

* * *

Gavin got a little freaked out by the rustling he was hearing. It stopped before he could find out where it was coming from, so he sat down on a log, picking up a thick stick just in case.

“Man, am I tired.” He said to himself. “What a hike.”

* * *

The two legged thing spoke! The filly hadn’t been expecting that. She had tried talking to other animals, and had never got anything. But this creature she could understand perfectly. She tried edging forward a little and found that she was stuck. Her mane was tangled in the branches. It hurt, she couldn’t help but squeak.

* * *

Now Gavin was really freaked out. Something had just whimpered, and it sounded very human. That was the last straw, he was out of here. He gathered his stuff, got up, and walked away before things got weirder. Eventually, he got back home, right as the last of the sunlight had disappeared behind the horizon. He sat down with the remote, and sighed. Tomorrow was Saturday. No school! He should have been planning, texting friends, arranging things, but something was stuck in his head. What were those sounds?

With no explanation, he fell asleep while halfheartedly watching Doctor Who.

* * *

The filly was stuck in a bush, starving with no way to get out, and what was possibly her only chance of survival had just walked away before she could say anything! This was horrible, and she hated it. She didn’t want to die, not like this! 'Not without a cutie mark!' she thought. As the last of her energy left her, all she could do was cry. That night, she dreamed she was alone on the moon.