Light and shadow

by cyberpony mark 5

Rating: teen
Tags: Adventure
Length: 50169

As the dark try's to take over the light it up to a few ponies to fight the darkness away, will they be able to do it?

It started five years ago, near the forest, when Celestia's prodigy played witness to a shadowy conspiracy surrounded the Princess of the Night.

Now the devastation begins, mere weeks before the world watches the royal wedding, perhaps the most terrible possible consequence comes of Luna's rash actions.

Alone in a world seemingly turned against him Shadow Chaser is forced to walk the line of living and dying until the day might come when his past comes to light. The machinations of royalty and magic flow around him without breaking, revealing a current of events the poor colt only has the slightest knowledge of. Through his eyes exists a window into the events of a larger and more fascinating equestria than was ever explored by the classic adventures.

What exactly happened between the seasons?

Do you really want to find out?

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2014-04-11 14:33:17 UTC

The Mystery Foal

Twilight Sparkle trotted along the snowy main street of Ponyville, looking around the empty stores. It was well past midnight and the Hearth’s Warming Eve festival earlier that night had wound down hours ago. She tugged the brown cloak around herself more snugly as a breath of wind tried to lift it away. Her horn glowed telekinetically, catching her cloak and freeing her hooves to keep pushing through the thick snow.

“This snow is ridiculous,” she muttered to herself as she diverted some of her magic to assist in clearing the path “the way this is going, I’d almost think Discord’s returned.” She sighed “I guess I shouldn’t joke about that, especially not when I’m going to meet the princess…”

Twilight shook a bit of snow off her hood, beginning to wonder now if this wasn’t some elaborate prank by Spike. She very much doubted the princess would even be awake at so late an hour, let alone come out in the cold and snow. Unfortunately that wasn’t a risk she was prepared to take, so all she could do was follow the path the letter had specified.

As her hooves struck the dirt of the path down toward the forest however, she began to have her doubts. She took the letter out of her saddlebag, planning to check the directions again, but the wind snatched it away. “No!” she called, galloping after it as the wind carried it steadily toward the forest.

Twilight stopped as the letter passed the tree line. She was instantly struck with a sense of indecision. If she arrived at the meeting place without the letter there was no telling what the princess could do. She might be killed! Or worse, Celestia might expel her as a protégé! But to go into those trees seemed suicidal…

Just as she made up her mind to take the first step, however, there was a flash of lightning and she turned quick as a whip to see a black chariot flying down from the clouds. Not without a backward glance, she darted to where the chariot was pulling up for a landing.

“I’m sorry princess!” she gasped, bowing as the wheels landed with a soft poof in the snow “I lost the letter, it just got away from me, but I’m here, just as you asked!”

“Twilight?” came a voice from the chariot “Did sister send you?”

Twilight looked up in surprise; the voice did not belong to Celestia. Her purple eyes connected with a set of deep blue, staring up into the face of Princess Luna.

“It doesn’t matter,” said Luna, stepping down from the chariot quickly “we could use your help anyway.” Twilight noticed now that Luna had a small bundle held tightly against her with magic. To Twilight’s slight shock, she saw the bundle shift slightly of its own accord.

“The night’s getting on,” said a deeper, masculine voice, as a black stallion stepped out of the chariot after her “We don’t want any pony to be getting suspicious…”

Luna turned to the stallion, a slight look of hurt in her eyes “Umbra…” she said “you don’t have to do this; you can stay in Canterlot, both of you!”

Umbra walked over to Luna and put a hoof around her shoulders. Twilight was amazed a regular stallion could be tall enough to do so, “My love,” he said “your safety is far more important than my comfort, and so is his.” Umbra’s eyes fell to the bundle now, his expression softening.

“It’s so hard though…” said Luna “I don’t want to let go…”

Umbra turned to Twilight “Judging by the fact you’re still alive, I’m going to believe she trusts you,” he said “could you build a shelter please? This cold is biting…”

“Yes, of course!” Twilight said, casting her magic toward the trees, working into the wood’s shape, bending it and twisting it into a cubic form. She began featuring it a bit more precisely as Umbra continued talking.

“You know as well as I the changelings have been on the move” he said “Discord has escaped once already, and the dragons have been moving out of the southlands. Everfree’s influence is growing, and it would take advantage of your weakness. I know how you feel but we have no choice.”

A tear streamed down Luna’s face “I’ll never find a better captain, you were the best…”

“Come now,” said Umbra “How about that kid, what was his name… Shining Armor! He’d do well.” Twilight perked up at the sound of the name “He’s got the spirit for it.”

“I’ll just let Celly decide,” said Luna, starting to choke “She would…know best…”

Twilight finished the structure as Luna started to cry. She was tired from the exertion of magical energy, and confused by this conversation. Was the captain of the royal guard resigning? With her brother to take his place? But equally important, why would Luna, and the current captain, be here in Ponyville. And what could be bringing Luna to tears like this?

Umbra nodded in Twilights direction, then turned back to Luna “It’s time,” he said “there’s no need to wait any longer, it’s almost time for you to lower the moon.”

Luna nodded, bringing the small bundle up to eye level “Goodbye,” she said “goodbye… my little Shadow…” She lowered the bundle onto Umbra’s back and he draped his wings protectively over it.

“We’ll come back to see you when things have calmed down.” He said reassuringly “Five years should go by in the blink of an eye for you.”

“It will feel like all my years lost on the moon,” said Luna “and more, just to go without seeing you two.”

“I’ll keep him safe,” said Umbra “I swear that on my own life. Now go, you have work to do.”

Luna nodded, turning with a low head back toward the chariot. As the bat winged pegasi lifted it off the ground and swung into the night sky Twilight could see her sobbing.

“Twilight,” said Umbra “I need to say something to you.”

“Of course!” Said Twilight, not daring to question how this Pegasus had known her name.”

“This foal means the world to Luna, and then some,” said Umbra, his flashing red eyes seeming to bore slowly into Twilight “You will leave this place and never tell a soul what has transpired here. I am now a travelling Pegasus, having moved here from Canterlot for better living arrangements with my son. If I hear any other story out of you, it will be your end…”

Twilight noticed now that Umbra had a long sword hanging by his side. She gulped “Yes sir!” she said “I swear it!”

Umbra merely nodded again, turning toward the house Twilight had fashioned and walking inside. As the door slammed shut behind him the gravity of the situation slammed into Twilight with the force of an Ursa’s punch.

As most ponies might know the next several years were very eventful, especially in the little town of Ponyville, but most of the commotion passed harmlessly over the little house by the forest. As such it came to no one’s mind that there was anything suspicious about a new student enrolling at Cheerilee’s schoolhouse. Anyone walking by the forest that August morning would’ve spotted a very bouncy Pegasus colt with gray fur and a dark green mane standing in the doorway of the cottage.

“Come on Dad!” he shouted “Where’s my lunch? I’m ready to go!”

“Be patient Shadow,” Umbra’s voice came from the kitchen “Sorry if I haven’t made a sandwich in months.”

“It’s just bread, lettuce, tomatoes, bread…” Shadow grumbled, his wings beginning to flutter.

Umbra walked over and placed a lunchbox in Shadow’s schoolbag, then handed it to him “Now you behave yourself.” He said cautiously “I know you’ve got a kind of a habit of bouncing off walls, but Cheerilee isn’t there to babysit you.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ve got it!” said Shadow rolling his eyes “Can I go already? I want to meet my new classmates!”

Something suddenly caught Umbra’s attention out of the corner of his eye “Go ahead,” he said “Why don’t you see how fast you can go?”

Shadow didn’t need telling twice, he kicked hard, his wings hauling him into a low flight while his hooves continued to pound the ground. Umbra waved and turned to Fluttershy, who was walking up to the house with a smile.

“Oh my, he looked energetic,” she said mildly “is it his first day of school?”

Umbra gave a smile “Yeah, they really grow up fast,” he said “You know what it’s like?”

“Of course,” said Fluttershy “I’ve watched so many little critters grow up and leave home. It’s sad every time.” She looked back to Umbra “So why did you ask me to come over?”

“It’s nothing major,” said Umbra “I’ve just had this migraine for awhile. It’s not bad but it’s kind of tugging at the back of my head.”

“I’m not a real doctor you know,” said Fluttershy with a giggle “how long has this been going on?”

Umbra shrugged “Oh…five months?” he said, and then winced a little “I haven’t been to the hospital because it might cost us on the health care, you know how often kids like that can get into trouble.”

“Has it been on and off that whole time?” asked Fluttershy, sounding frightened.

“Not really,” said Umbra “it just started off as a little tick and started getting worse steadily. It’s just a sort of dull roar I guess.”

“Your eyes are bloodshot…” said Fluttershy “that could mean you’re sick…”

“I work the night weather remember?” said Umbra with a laugh “I don’t get enough sleep.”

“Umbra!” Fluttershy exclaimed “You could have a hemorrhage, or a clot, or brain cancer! You could bleed into your brain!”

“Now can it really be all that bad?” said Umbra “I’m still alive aren’t I?”

“Not if that pressure gets too intense,” Fluttershy squeaked “You need to get to the hospital, if just to make sure. Now!” She punctuated as Umbra seemed about to object.

“Alright, well I’ll go, just let me leave a note for Shadow,” Umbra said, and when Fluttershy seemed ready to interrupt “I won’t take long if it means that much to you.”

Later that afternoon found Shadow skipping gleefully back home, his backpack stuffed with the spoils of the first school day. It had been so much fun he was almost looking forward to the homework… well…almost.

“Dad! I’m home!” he shouted, bounding in the door “I behaved just like you asked!” when there was no response, he started poking around the house. Finally after climbing one of the chairs he discovered the note that had been left on the kitchen table.

“Shadow,” he read aloud slowly “a friend of mine has discovered some health problems I overlooked… I’m going to the doctor to get a checkup. There is food in the fridge, but don’t eat too much and get sick. Dad.” The formality of this was totally lost on Shadow who immediately dove for the fridge.

Two hours and a full tub of ice cream later he began to get worried. Umbra still wasn’t back yet. He peeked up at the phone with the two emergency numbers listed. The first was 911, but he was too afraid to press that. The other one connected to the library. After pushing a chair and a few phone books over to stand on, he dialed.

“Hello,” came an unfamiliar voice on the line “Ponyville library, Twilight speaking.”

“Um…hello?” Shadow spoke, still mostly unsure how to use the device “This is Twilight Sparkle right?”

“Who is this?” Twilight’s voice sounded agitated now “It’s nearly ten PM, is this some sort of prank?”

“No!” Shadow shouted “please don’t hang up! I just called the number my dad says is for little emergencies!”

There was a sigh, then a slight laugh from the other end “Well who is this?” she said “I’ll see what I can do to help.”

“I’m Shadow Chaser!” said Shadow “I live in the house near the forest. My Dad went to the doctor while I was at school and hasn’t come back!”

“What’s your dad’s name?” asked Twilight, sounding serious now.

“Umbra Chaser,” said Shadow “can you help me?”

“I’ll be right over.” Said Twilight, sounding almost scared herself.

Before Shadow even had the chance to hang up the phone there was a knock on the door. Twilight must have teleported over. He ran over and jumped at the doorknob a few times before Twilight opened it herself.

“Hey,” she said “are you alright?”

Shadow, who had tumbled over as the door opened, stood up again “Yeah, you’re Twilight?” he asked curiously.

“Yes,” said Twilight with a warm smile “I’m Twilight Sparkle, can you tell me exactly what happened?”

When Shadow explained what had happened, Twilight had begun to feel a little better. Shadow was really just a scared kid, and Umbra’s delay had of course frightened him. “Come on,” she said “let’s head to the doctor, we can meet your dad there.”

Shadow practically flew out the door “Well come on!” he said “Or we might miss him!”

Twilight laughed as she followed the little Pegasus out the door, almost able to forget how serious this could be…

When they arrived at the Ponyville medical center Twilight left Shadow in the sitting area of the lobby and went to the front desk.

“I’m looking for Umbra Chaser,” she told the brown unicorn “His son’s pretty much scared to death.”

“Oh dear,” said the unicorn, turning so he could check the files telekinetically “that sounds dreadful. Let’s see, Chaser you said? Yes, Fluttershy checked him into the infirmary this morning.”

Twilight breathed a sigh of relief, if Fluttershy had something to do with this everything had to be okay “Could you tell us where he is? The little guys really worried.”

“I don’t think that it would do you much good,” said the unicorn, “he’s in urgent care, long term clotting in the brain.”

“Is he going to be okay?” asked Twilight, her stomach seeming to jump into her throat.

“It’s not looking great, but it’s not bad either,” said the Doctor “he has a fighting chance, he’s pretty darn tough for a Pegasus his age. You should tell the boy that Umbra will be fine by tomorrow.”

Twilight nodded and walked back to Shadow, who had occupied himself with a few of the toys scattered about the lobby “He’s still here,” she said “but he’s pretty sick, do you want to wait here until he’s better?”

Shadow seemed to contemplate this for a long time, then nodded “If he’s that sick he’ll want to make sure I’ve kept up my flying practice” he finally said “I’ll wait right here Ms.Twilight!”

Twilight almost blushed, she wasn’t often addressed so formally “I’ll stay here too,” she said “I can’t leave you here alone in good conscious.”

“I don’t know what conscious is…” said Shadow “but… you know what?”

“What?” asked Twilight playfully.

Shadow suddenly darted forward and poked her nose “You’re it!” he shouted and took off at a hover. Twilight laughed and followed after him at a trot.

The sun cresting the horizon the next morning illuminated Shadow, sleeping uncomfortably on one of the hospital chairs. Twilight sitting to him, eyes open, waited for the desk worker to clock in for the morning.

As the pink mane of Nurse Redheart finally appeared behind the desk Twilight carefully got up and walked over “I’d like to know the status of Umbra Chaser.” She said formally.

“Nice seeing you Twilight,” said Redheart with a smile “sure, I can get that for you!”

“Sorry we haven’t talked more often,” said Twilight “the library really is a full time job; I’m only here because it’s an emergency. Well, minor emergency I suppose.” She couldn’t help laughing to herself as she remembered Shadow’s childish explanation.

Redheart’s smile suddenly faltered “You said Umbra Chaser…?” she asked worriedly.

“Yes…” said Twilight, her expression dropping.

“Oh no…” said Redheart “I’m so sorry Twilight, Umbra Chaser passed away in critical care last night…”

“What…?” came a small voice from behind Twilight.

She turned quickly to look down at Shadow, she hadn’t heard him approach, and based on Redheart’s shocked look, neither had she.

“He’s…Dad is…dead?” Shadow’s eyes filled with tears “No… he can’t be… we were going to Canterlot… he promised….Dad!” Before either of the mares could stop him he was off down the hallway at a full sprint.

Lighting struck

Shadow Glared up at the red school building of Ponyville Elementary as he slowly trotted up the hill. It was the first day of the new school year and all around the playground and play structures students new and old were running, screaming and playing, excited for the upcoming year.

One colt, however, was far from excited. As Shadow walked past Applebloom, who was working on fixing Scootaloo’s scooter, there was only one thing on his mind. What had happened one year ago today.

It was still a few minutes before school started, for which he was thankful. He flexed his wings, broad for his size, and ruffled them a bit. He took a small rubber ball out of his backpack and glared in concentration. He tossed it up in the air, then knocked it forward with a wing, then alternated, building up a steady rhythm. Right, left, right, left, right left, knocking the sphere against the painted wood in perfect rhythm, just like Dad had taught him…

The ball hit the grass behind him. He had to stop thinking about that day. There was nothing he could do about it, it was better just to pretend it had never…

“Hey!” came a voice to his left “I got your ball for you! What are you doing just standing there? Are you…crying? What’s the matter?”

Shadow quickly forced himself to breathe regularly again as he turned to face the new pony. It was a red coated filly with a shockingly electric blue mane. Her eyes were covered by sunglasses, too big for her face, and her jagged tail waved wildly back and forth like a dog’s.

“I’m fine…” said Shadow “now can you please give me that back?”

“I’m Lightning Strike!” said the filly loudly “This is my first year here, is this a fun school? What’s your name?”

Deciding to answer the second question first, “Shadow, Shadow Chaser.” Said Shadow, forcing himself to bow as he knew was appropriate when introducing oneself to mares.

“Well it’s great to meet you Shadow!” said Lightning, giggling and dropping the ball as she began to bounce in place “You wanna be friends? I haven’t made any friends yet. I tried the kids on the playground but they all said I was crazy.”

“Uh…” was all Shadow got out before he was blown away again.

“Do you like games? Of course you like games. Oh! You’re a Pegasus! Can you fly yet? I met a unicorn once who was too young to do magic, how boring is that?

“It’s… um…” Shadow mumbled.

“Do you think unicorns are snooty?” Lightning shot off again “I’ve heard pegasi think unicorns are snooty. What about clouds? Can you move clouds? But you didn’t say whether or not you can fly! Can you fly yet? I’d be really jealous if you could. I don’t have wings or a horn. My brother doesn’t either so I guess it’s a genetic thing?”

“Look, Lightning?” Shadow interrupted “I’d love to talk but I need to practice.”

“Oh, right!” said Lightning rolling the ball back over “Sorry, did your parents teach you to do that cool trick with your wings?”

A weight dropped into Shadow’s stomach. He turned around and started to walk away “I don’t have any parents…” he said over his shoulder.

Then, Lightning said the only two words that could make him stop “Me either.”

Shadow froze, then turned to look at Lightning, who had a pained smile on her face, though it was hard to tell with the sunglasses. “I’m sorry,” she said “I don’t really like talking about it either, I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“It’s okay…” said Shadow slowly, just as the bell rang.

“Oh! Class is starting!” Lightning shouted “I’ll see you later Shadow!” she proceeded to join the mad dash of kids all surging into the building.

“Yeah…” said Shadow after she’d already gone “see you.”

It turned out they would be seeing each other much sooner than he thought. When he managed to squeeze his way into the schoolhouse he discovered Lightning waving to him from the desk next to his.

“I asked Sweetie belle where you sat so I could sit next to you!” she said with a laugh “You look like you need a friend.”

Shadow wasn’t sure whether to feel amazed that she had gotten up the courage to talk to a fifth grader or flattered she wanted to sit by him.

“So seriously,” said Lightning “class is fun isn’t it? I’ve heard people say its fun, but others say it’s boring.”

“It depends on the day,” said Shadow, glad she had allowed a pause for him to speak at last “today’s probably just going to be a bunch of lazy introductions.”

“Well that doesn’t sound like fun…” said Lightning with a smirk “come on, I have an idea.”

“Idea…?” Shadow said curiously, he was getting quieter now the lesson was starting.

Lightning gestured to one of the open windows with a grin, then slid carefully out of her desk and crawled toward it.

“Stop!” Shadow hissed “You’ll get caught!”

“No I won’t!” Lightning replied in a singsong whisper then dove out the window.

Shadow turned quickly to see if Cheerilee was watching. When he saw she was writing something on the blackboard he slid over and followed Lightning out the window.

“You’re crazy!” he shouted once they were a safe distance from the schoolhouse “do you have any idea how much trouble we’ll be in if we get caught skipping class?”

“Nope!” said Lightning, smiling widely “Do you?”

“Yeah!” said Shadow “what happens is they… um…uh…”

“Exactly,” said Lightning, stopping to let Shadow really catch up to her “you see we’re skipping so it’ll be an adventure, but since neither of us have been caught before, that’d be an adventure too!”

Shadow had to think about that one. She could have a point he supposed. He felt a familiar stirring in his chest, a feeling he hadn’t felt for a long time. He suddenly broke into the first smile he’d had on his face in ages.

“I know just the place if you want to explore,” he said “come on, follow me!”

“Right behind you!” Lightning shouted and they both took off at a gallop.

Shadow led them along a familiar path, at least to him, which ran down the school’s hill past Fluttershy’s cottage. At one point they had to duck to the side of the path as a pony walked along the other direction. Overall for the two young foals it was already shaping up to be quite an adventure.

Lightning, however, did not suspect such an exciting adventure as the one Shadow led them to. And before she knew it they were standing at the edge of the Everfree Forest. Shadow kept walking casually, crossing the tree line, but Lightning hesitated.

“Hey, Light,” Shadow called back “are you coming or what?”

Lightning was staring into the trees, a feeling of trepidation starting to form now, “But…” she said “That’s the Everfree Forest! Ponies who go in there never come back!”

“It’s just a bunch of dumb trees,” said Shadow, rolling his eyes “I don’t get why everyone’s so scared of it.”

“Because there are monsters in there!” Lightning nearly squeaked “and they eat ponies, or turn them into stone, or kill them and take their skin!”

“The manticores, cockatrice, and changelings all live miles in,” Shadow responded “I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night otherwise, I live right near here, and heck Zecora lives in it.”

“I know…” said Lightning, shivering now “but…changelings…”

“Alright” said Shadow “you can go back to school, but then you’ll miss out on the secret tree house!”

Shadow knew he had won the moment Lightning’s ears perked up “Secret tree house?” she asked intrigued.

“Oh, I shouldn’t tell you,” said Shadow, turning back toward the tree line “It’s only for ponies brave enough to go into the Everfree Forest.”

In the next second Lightning was ahead of him “Well lead the way!” she said enthusiastically.

Shadow flapped his wings, floating ahead to lead the way “Well don’t lose your shades,” he said “well… actually you might, it’s pretty dark in there.” As they continued, the speed at which Lightning had overtaken him stuck in his mind. Could all earth ponies run that fast?

The tree house he was talking about was actually a relatively short trip. Safely near the edge of the forest the tree house of black wood stood somewhat steadily in one of the tall oak trees. Shadow had discovered it during the last school year when he followed two fifth graders after school. He’d been too afraid to approach, but after they had left he’d explored the tree house himself.

Now that they were approaching it again he couldn’t be more excited. The students who had used this tree house before would’ve graduated by now, meaning it was time for someone new to claim it. Lightning was right, this was turning out to be a real first class adventure.

“Um…” said Lightning, prodding one of the moldy rungs on the ladder that led up into the tree “how do we get up there?”

Shadow, in his distraction, had already flown halfway up “Oh yeah, the ladder’s totally busted he said, going back down “let me help you.”

Before Lightning even knew what was happening Shadow had grabbed her round the middle and started flying again, pumping his wings like an insect, straining from the exertion.

“What do you think you’re doing you idiot?” Lightning squeaked “You can’t lift both of us! Stop! You’re gonna drop me!”

Despite her complaints, however it was barely twenty seconds later they were both safely on the porch of the tree house. Shadow smirked.

“I practice carrying weights around,” he said smugly “that was nothing.”

“Stupid Pegasus…” muttered Lightning.

“Stubborn earth pony,” Shadow replied in like.

They both entered the tree house itself and Lightning gasped. The wooden walls were covered in carvings. Some were recent, a snake Shadow guessed could’ve been carved just last year, but others were old, very old. A few were in languages he didn’t know or even recognize. Finally against the back wall was a single carving that dwarfed the countless others. A huge star swirl beside a glorious lunar shape, both entwined within the shape of a diamond.

“Incredible…” Lightning said, pacing around “I mean, really, really incredible. How old do you think this is?”

“No idea,” said Shadow, but he had some theories “I think it’s got to be magical somehow or it would’ve rotted away a long time ago. It’s only slowed though, and it’s starting to fall apart anyway. Probably some really powerful unicorn built it when they were just our age.”

“It really is old, do you know what this is from?” asked Lightning, indicating a large hold in the back corner.

“No idea, again,” Shadow replied “It’s really rotten over there, don’t go walking on it.” He unfortunately knew perfectly well what that hole was from. The very first time he had been here he had crashed right through the boards and landed in the leaf mold below. He shuddered just thinking about it, but Lightning was too busy trying to read the writing on the walls to notice.

“I think I recognize this one!” she said excitedly, motioning toward the caption under the star swirl and moon “It’s Alicornian, my big brother sometimes gets assignments written in this language, I can’t read it though.”

“Dang it,” said Shadow “I really wanted to know what it said, I’ve been curious about it forever, don’t get my hopes up like that!”

“Sorry,” said Lightning “I probably shouldn’t talk about it anyway, he’s an admiral in the royal guard you know.”

“No, I didn’t know,” Shadow replied “that’s really cool! My dad used to be the captain!”

“No way,” said Lightning “Shining Armor has been captain of the guard since before we were born.” “I said used to be,’ said Shadow, the excitement, for now, holding back his memory reflex “we moved to Ponyville when I was real little.”

“Why would he give up a position like that?” Lightning pondered.

Shadow shrugged “I don’t know, but I sure like it here, can you imagine going to Canterlot with all the noise?”

“I’ve always wanted to go to Canterlot!” said Lightning indignantly “I had to stay with Cheerilee for a whole week while my brother was on guard for the royal wedding.”

“That stinks,” Shadow sighed, remembering wanting to go himself “I heard there were changelings!”

Lightning froze “Were there…?” she asked slowly.

“Yeah, I know,” said Shadow “I wish I’d have been there, I’d have given them worse than a party cannon!”

“No way!” Lightning exclaimed “I never want to see a changeling, not now, not then, not ever!”

“Oh what’s the matter?” asked Shadow smugly “Chicken?”

Lightning was dumbstruck. She turned toward the exit, blinking back tears and dove out the door.

“Lightning!” Shadow called, running after her quickly “where do you think you’re going?”

By the time he made it out she had leapt down off the porch and took off at a gallop, she shouted back over her shoulder “Somewhere where you aren’t!”

Shadow sighed, then gasped. Lightning was running even deeper into the forest…

Orochi

“Light!” Shadow shouted, flying after the electric blue mane “Light! Stop!”

“You can’t tell me what to do!” Lightning shouted back at him, not breaking her galloping pace.

“Light, you’re going the wrong way!”Shadow yelled “That’s going deeper into the forest! That’s where the monsters are! Manticores! Cockatrice! Changelings!”

That seemed to get her attention, she slowed to a fast trot, letting Shadow catch up “Well we haven’t seen anything yet…” she said “actually I can’t see much of anything, how long have we been running?”

“I don’t know… five minutes?” Shadow said, his eyes adjusting a little bit better to the deepening darkness “I think we should turn back now..”

“I guess…” said Lightning “but which way is back? We’ve turned how many times?”

“We just follow the…” Shadow trailed off “Where’s the path?”

“It stopped a little while ago,” said Lightning innocently, “I just kept going, I wasn’t paying a lot of attention.”

Shadow brought a hoof to his face. Thanks to this ditzy filly they were lost in the Everfree forest with no idea how to get out.

“Should we yell for help?” Lightning asked, starting to sound worried now.

“That would be ill-advised,” said Shadow, trying to put on a brave face, but his voice trembled “The sound would probably attract more bad things than good.”

“Like Manticores?” Lightning squeaked in fear “I heard they find foals by the smell then hunt them down and gobble them up.”

“Actually, I’m not really worried about Manticores…” said Shadow.

“Well that’s a relief…” Lightning sighed.

“They’ll all be hibernating,” said Shadow “this is timber wolf season. They attack travelers in packs and rip them to pieces.”

Lightning squeaked and pulled one of Shadow’s wings out, hiding behind it. Shadow sighed.

“Look,” he said “I see a little light coming up here, it may be the way out.”

Lightning peeked out over his feathers “Oh yeah,” she said “can we go now?”

“If you let go of my wing, sure.”

Lightning let go slowly and started trotting towards the light, Shadow following at a bored pace behind. As they approached they realized this wasn’t a way out at all, but rather, a clearing with a large hill.

“Great…” Shadow muttered, starting to scale the hill “now we’ll never get home.”

“We can just climb the hill,” said Lightning, her voice quailing “then we just look around, find our way home…right?”

Shadow, having reached the top of the hill, sighed “It doesn’t go over the trees,” he said “I don’t know what to do…”

“No way!” Lightning shouted, running up to the top of the hill to join him “There’s… no way… we have to get home. Can’t you just fly us over the trees?”

“I could barely get you up to the tree house” Shadow muttered dejectedly “we’re miles from home and no one even knows we’re out here.” He sat down “We’re dead…” he moaned “we’re gonna die…”

Lightning quailed “No way…” she said quietly, tears starting to form “No… I don’t want to die…”

There was a slight shudder from the ground and Shadow’s ears stood up. He may have given up but Celestia be damned if he went down without a fight. He turned to Lightning, who was completely oblivious to the low rumble. He glowered slightly, and pounded the grass with a hoof.

The entire hill suddenly shook violently. Lightning jumped up “What was that?” she shrieked diving toward Shadow. Shadow caught her and looked rapidly around. The grass was starting to split around the base of the hill, their altitude seemed to be changing, the trees seeming to fall into the ground.

“We’re going up!” Lightning squeaked, gripping Shadow tightly “What’s happening?”

Although he was too stunned to speak, Shadow managed to get an assessment of what was going on. The dirt falling off the hill revealed a dark mass of gigantic scales. The hill was rising steadily off a single pillar

“We’re on a snake,” he managed to choke out “a massive snake.”

A patch of grass next to them suddenly fell away, revealing a huge yellow eye. It dilated and focused on them, a low his rising from below.

Shadow jumped, wings spread, Lightning still clinging to him. They fell more than flew downward, Shadow’s wings beating fast. The massive head above them shook back and forth, raining dirt down over the forest like a meteor shower. A loud predatory hiss came from it as it focused again, staring right at them.

“It’s looking at us…” Lightning whimpered, grabbing even tighter around Shadow, who was looking desperately around for somewhere to crash. The lake had come into view now but it seemed unlikely they would make it that far before splattering onto the hard ground.

The huge snake lunged, mountainous fangs glinting in the sunlight as it shot toward the two. The choice now seemed to be to angle downward and die in the impact, or be devoured by a monstrous snake.

Just as Shadow shut his eyes, ready for the fangs to sink firmly into him, he felt a push forward. He didn’t know it yet, but Lightning’s hoof had connected squarely with one of the fangs. There was the sound of cracking bone as the kick pushed them forward.

The snake reared up, letting out a horrifying screech, the massive fang falling with a crash into the forest below. Before Shadow could figure out what was happening they were splashing down in the lake

Lightning let go to struggle to the surface and Shadow came out of the water barely a moment behind. They bobbed in the water for awhile, dumbstruck, watching the huge snake’s body lower slowly into the forest and vanish.

They stared out at the forest for a long time, just floating on the water, Lightning was the first one to laugh as the situation finally started to brighten. Shadow was quick to join in.

“We’re alive!” Lightning shouted “No dumb snake’s gonna get the best of us!”

“No way!” Shadow hollered back “You may be big and bad but I’ve never seen a snake that can fly like a Pegasus!”

“Oh but I’d love to see a Pegasus kick like an earth pony,” Lightning teased “did you see that? I knocked his fang out!”

“Earth ponies can’t fly either,” Shadow scoffed, splashing Lightning with a wing “There’s no way you could’ve gotten out of there without me!”

“That goes double for you!” Lightning shouted, throwing both hooves down into the water and sending a wave over Shadow’s head.

This argument continued for a full hour, both sides attacking with great waves of water. They splashed around in the lake happily, diving and swimming and everything in between. There are some things you just can’t do without becoming friends, many are near death situations. Even at the age too young to understand death, the bonds are just as strong.

By the time Lightning and Shadow’s water battle finally slowed down the sun was starting to set. Shadow was the first to climb out of the lake and shake off the water, preening a bit to get the water off his wings. Lightning leapt out a moment later, spraying him with water droplets all over again.

“I guess we can find our way home from here huh?” Lightning asked “It’s what, ten minutes?”

“I don’t know,” said Shadow “but I am hungry!”

“You want to get tacos?” asked Lightning with a smirk.

“That sounds good!” said Shadow, shaking the last of the water out of his feathers.

“Last one to Taco Gio’s pays!” Lightning spoke quickly, then took off at a full gallop towards town.

Shadow, not one to be outdone, sprang off the ground and took off after her. She may be light on her hooves, but he would eat his shoes before a Pegasus lost a race to an earth pony.

Lunar visitor

Shadow pushed his way through the thick blanket of snow that had fallen overnight. The weather pegasi had officially declared it winter time and Shadow was psyched. He was on his way to Lightning’s house, not to stay though. They were planning to get some cake at sugarcube corner then go to his house for a sleepover.

It was his birthday after all, it was about time he had a good party…

Lightning’s house wasn’t situated in the good part of Ponyville but in a town like this one there was no bad part. It was only a small house in a block of others just like it but Shadow thought it was a very big house indeed, compared to his cottage at least.

Suddenly getting an evil idea, he rolled a snowball I his hoof before knocking on the door. The moment it opened he threw hard, the sound of snow splattering on a coat sounded from within.

“Ha-ha!” Shadow shouted gleefully “who’s quicker now…Light?” His voice trailed away as he realized he was not staring at Lightning, but rather, a tall red stallion. He gulped.

“Got you Shadow!” Lightning’s voice came from behind the stallion “I knew you were going to try something like that. Thanks bro!”

The stallion smiled as Lightning squeezed into the doorway “Didn’t scare you too bad kid?” he asked ruffling Shadow’s mane “Name’s Saber Strike, nice to meet you. I’m my sister’s legal guardian.”

“Yes, but you’re still my brother,” said Lightning, reaching up to poke him in the still snow covered chest “which means you can’t tell me what to do!”

“That’s right,” said Saber with a laugh “you two have fun okay? And Lightning, try not to give Shadow’s parents too much grief.”

“I don’t think that’ll be a problem…” said Shadow awkwardly.

“Then you have more faith in her than I do,” said Saber “just keep safe alright?”

“Oh I’ll try,” said Lightning, grabbing for her saddlebag “come on already Shadow, I can practically taste the cake!”

“Your brother is the one holding us up,” said Shadow, switching tactics to hover just enough to walk on the snow “I’ve just been waiting for you.”

“Yeah, whatever,” said Lightning, walking through the rut Shadow had dug to get there “blame the earth pony, typical Pegasus.”

“I’m not trying to be mean,” Shadow muttered “you just like arguing don’t you?”

“I do not!” Lightning exclaimed.

“You do,” said Shadow

“Do not!”

“Do so!”

“I do not!”

“You most absolutely do!”

“Never!”

“Always!”

“Nyeh!”

“Well nyeh, back!”

They continued like this all the way to Sugarcube corner, Lightning tunneling through the snow behind Shadow. When they finally pushed the door open most logic was left long behind.

“Well I say Rainbow Dash is the most popular pony!” Shadow shouted.

“Well you’re wrong!” Lightning said angrily “because Pinkie Pie is the most popular!”

“Gosh!” said a bubbly voice behind the counter “am I really?” Pinkie Pie had just put a new batch of cupcakes into the display case and was smiling at Lightning.

“Yeah,” said Lightning “see Shadow, I’m right!” she stuck her tongue out at Shadow and sat down.

“Kiss up…” Shadow grumbled, sitting across from her.

“Well what can I get you two?” asked Pinkie, bouncing over “we’ve got cupcakes fresh out of the oven!”

“Ooh,” said Shadow, starting to drool “defiantly, vanilla please!”

“Chocolate!” Lightning added.

Pinkie laughed and bounced away to get the cupcakes, Lightning turned back to Shadow “Do I have to pay for this one? Since you lost the race?”

“I did not lose that race!” Shadow said indignantly “you got a head start!”

“Even Gio said I won!” Lightning pointed out “There’s no way you can argue that, I brought some bits anyway.”

“Well so did I!” Shadow exclaimed, voice rising now “I’m the one who planned this aren’t I?’

By the time Pinkie had returned with the cupcakes they were in full swing again “Aw…” she said “you two are so cute when you argue!”

“We are not cute!” both Lightning and Shadow shouted simultaneously, this was mostly off put by the fact their voices both cracked.

“Aw… is someone cranky-wanky today?” asked Pinkie “I don’t like to see cranky little kids, I think a song is in order!”

Now this turned some heads. Pinkie Pie’s singing was not a treat to miss, and just like that she burst into song

Sometimes you feel discouraged

Or just a bit depressed

Perhaps you’ve lost your courage

Maybe you’re in a mess

But arguing and fighting

They have never solved a thing

So stop your silly bickering

Come on you guys let’s sing!

And now, spontaneously as ever, a great few of Pinkie’s friends joined her in chorus.

Get along with your best friends

Even if you’re at wit’s end

Just turn that sad frown upside down

And then begin again!

Shadow couldn’t help but flush. Pinkie Pie burst out into random, seemingly rehearsed song for everyone, but this was a total first for him. And judging by the look on Lightning’s face it was the same for her.

“You see?” Pinkie said “its way more fun to get along and be friends than it is to fight and argue!”

Shadow could only nod, afraid this pink pony might burst out singing again. Lightning however, smiled broadly.

“Thanks Pinkie,” she said “sorry if we caused a little fuss…”

“That’s alright!” said Pinkie with a giggle “You guys are still so cute when you argue, but it’s so much more fun to get along and be friends!”

Shadow was still looking around the rest of the shop where every pony had returned quite fluidly to what they were doing before the song. There was no way that had been totally spontaneous was there?

“Tell you what,” said Pinkie “you can have those cupcakes for free today! You can use the bits to buy something fun instead!”

“Yay!” Lightning shouted, digging into her cupcake.

“Thanks Pinkie,” said Shadow, trying to be a bit more reserved, but still pigging out a moment later.

They left Sugarcube Corner with faces full of frosting, laughing now, planning what they would do for the rest of the day and marveling Pinkie’s random abilities.

“It wasn’t her best song you know,” Said Lightning “my brother still has a recording of smile, smile, smile, that’s one of the best song’s I’ve ever heard.”

“Oh I don’t know,” said Shadow, licking a bit of frosting off his nose “remember with the Cutie Mark Crusaders did Babs Seed for the talent show?”

“With Rock Star on the guitar?” Lightning said excitedly “how could I forget? Oh gosh… I forgot!” And with that she started running back along the rut they had made to reach the store, it was already filling with snow again.

“What did you forget?’ asked Shadow curiously.

“My guitar,” said Lightning, grumbling “I can’t miss a practice day!”

“You never told me you played guitar!” Shadow exclaimed “why haven’t I ever heard you play?”

Lightning blushed a little “I’ve only played for a year…” she said “I’m not really all that good.”

‘Doesn’t matter,” said Shadow “it’s good you remembered, I want to hear it!”

“It’s only practice for now,” said Lightning “I’ve never actually played for any pony yet…”

“Well now’s your chance!” said Shadow happily “I can’t wait!”

“Yeah…sure…” said Lightning uneasily as she stepped back up to her house. Saber was there almost before she knocked.

“Your guitar?” he asked, passing a small black case to her.

“How did you know?” asked Lightning sarcastically “don’t think this means I’m coming home so soon.”

“Then get outta here!”Said Saber laughing.

“I’m going!” said Lightning, sticking her tongue out and taking the guitar “Come on Shadow, can we get going already?”

“You’re the one holding us up again!” Shadow complained “I’m standing out here in the cold waiting for you!”

“Well stop waiting, we’re going!” said Lightning vehemently “Lead the way flyboy!”

“With pleasure…” said Shadow, still holding his wings out to walk on top of the snow, smirking as Lightning had to dig her way through.

It was only about a five minute walk from Lightning’s house to Shadow’s cottage even with the snow. Even so they were cold and miserable by the time they got there, Shadow holding the door open as Lightning pushed up and out of the drift piled up at the stoop.

“I love wintertime!” she said “The snow is just the greatest! What?” Shadow was looking at her like she was crazy.

The house itself had deteriorated with only an elementary school caretaker for a solid year. The floor was coated in a fine layer of dust, hoof prints showing the exact pathway Shadow would take to and from the door in the mornings and evenings. The bed, destroyed from overactive bouncing, was piled up by the fireplace. The bookcase, deemed useless, was toppled over and covered in a few tatty blankets.

“This is…interesting.” Lightning said, poking around the cabinets lined along the wall “you don’t really know how to take care of yourself do you?”

“Shut up,” said Shadow “I’ve kept the fridge and the water going this whole time haven’t I?”

“I was actually wondering about that,” said Lightning “there weren’t any power lines leading out here, how do you have electricity?”

“It’s because…” Shadow paused “I have no idea…”

Lightning merely shrugged, pulling out a box of Twinkies “Are these any good?” she asked curiously.

“Hardly a day old box,” said Shadow proudly “see? I do know how to take care of myself!”

“There’s only one left…” said Lightning.

            “Yeah…” said Shadow “help yourself!”

“Nah,” said Lightning, “these things have enough sugar to fuel the town, let’s split it.”

“That totally works too!” said Shadow, perhaps a little too enthusiastically.

Lightning cut the Twinkie carefully in half “Do you have anything to drink?” she asked.

Shadow opened the fridge, revealing it to be totally full of soda bottles “what flavor do you want?”

“Um…” said Lightning, for the first time ever not knowing how to respond to a question.

“You look like a red pop person,” said Shadow, rolling over a bottle filled with red, bubbly liquid.

“Faygo?” asked Lightning reading the label “what is this?”

“Soda,” said Shadow, getting one for himself “I like the rock n rye best but red pop is good for first timers.”

“I’ve had soda!” said Lightning indignantly, opening the bottle and taking a short sniff “but… this smells like cough syrup…” she turned to Shadow, who seemed to be chugging his, then took a tentative sip.

“Good isn’t it?’ asked Shadow, surfacing from the bottle “only problem is there’s a lot of sugar in it.” He released a loud belch and covered his mouth.

“Well excuse you,” said Lightning, giggling, then releasing a hiccup herself. They both went into conniptions, laughing until their sides hurt.

Shadow suddenly grabbed one off the blankets off the “bed” and draped it over himself “Rawr!” he shouted “I am a terrible timber wolf! Aroo! Bow before me pitiful pony!”

“Oh no! Someone help me!” Light said with a giggle “Or rather, they should help you! For I am no mere pony!” she proceeded to open her guitar case “as one of the fantastic pony musicians, I will control you with my hypnotic sound!”

“No!” Shadow play-quailed “Not my only weakness! How did you know?”

“Your big ears gave it away mister timber wolf!” Lightning said with a smile “and now, I vanquish thee!”

She struck the strings of the guitar, and at once a sweet song poured out. It was a basic melody, but a beautiful one. Shadow indeed was almost hypnotized, just as she had said. The song, wordless and yet wonderful, seemed to carry memory of things far away. Images of snow, and a crystal kingdom appeared in the mind’s eye, capturing every detail even without a single explanation provided.

The music trailed into the evening, the sun setting slowly and a full moon rising behind. The song seemed to beckon the stars themselves to shine even brighter around the cottage. And indeed, one spectral entity whom was not a star.

A flash appeared from the lunar sphere as a dark shape descended slowly on ebony wings toward the cottage. The hooves that landed in the deepening snow held the tall pony high above the icy crystals.

“What is that tune…?” the pony questioned the empty night “Umbra’s violin? No… that sounds deeper. A guitar? Hm…”

The music drew to a close and the pony smiled “I suppose I’ve been noticed” they said “It’s finally time…”

Lightning couldn’t help but grin as Shadow shook off the sound’s enchantment “He must have really enjoyed it,” she thought, glowing with pride.

“Well…musician…” said Shadow, tumbling for some way to one up her “the powerful Manticore is immune to your haunting melody!” He reared up on his hind legs and made snorting noises.

“Oh but you silly manticore,” said Lightning “you are no match for the mother of all things dark,” she yanked another blanket off the bookshelf and tied it off as a cape “Nightmare Moon!”

Shadow took a moment to think if there was anything that could defeat Nightmare Moon. At a loss, he lowered down “No miss Nightmare, have mercy on this poor manticore!”

“Never!” Lightning cantered, rearing up herself now “as punishment for being a disobedient and rather rude monster, I am going to use my dark magic powers to turn you into a frog!”

Shadow gave an exaggerated gasp and jumped up onto the bookshelf, taking off his blanket so he could hide under it. “I’m doomed!” he shouted “Doomed I say! Doomed!”

Neither of them noticed the door open as the pony walking in, ducking through the doorframe. Her eyes looked around the dust and debris, heart jumping into her throat.

“Umbra?” she called, too quietly to really be heard. She thought for a moment that the house had been abandoned, until she heard a sound from the corner. She turned sharply, not daring to hope, and her eyes fell on the red earth filly, standing on her back hooves, turned away from her.

“Ha-ha!” said Lightning “There’s nowhere to run now you horrible Manticore! Prepare to meet your doom!”

Shadow’s head emerged from the blankets, smiling “I have one last trick up my sleeve…” his voice trailed away as his eyes ascended to a point above Lightning’s head “Nightmare…Moon…?”

“Yes you foal!” Lightning cackled, totally oblivious to the tall pony behind her “and now, I will gobble you up!”

“We do not have any pretext for gobbling innocent ponies!” came a tremendous voice from behind her “we would much appreciate it if thou would cease thy infernal ideals!”

Lightning froze, then turned slowly to face the pony behind her. Green eyes connected with a set of deep blue, then travelled up to the dark horn, ten to the wide wings, and to the lunar styled robes.

“Nightmare Moon…” Lightning squeaked, backing up into Shadow, pressing them both against the wall “No… this can’t be happening…Shadow?”

Shadow had been stunned into silence the moment he had spotted the dark alicorn princess. It didn’t seem like he was going to come back to reality anytime soon. Luna leaned forward, eyes seeming to drill into the two foals.

“Dost thou find it amusing to go poking around the places thou dost not belong?” she scolded “canst thou return to thy mothers?”

“I d-don’t have a mother!” Lightning squeaked “I-I’m j-just here f-for Shadow’s p-party!”

“Shadow…?” Luna seemed to pause here, eyes locking on Shadow now. A flash of recognition crossed her face, followed by stark relief. “Shadow, it is you.”

“You’re after him?” Lightning exclaimed “there’s no way!” If you want to get to Shadow you have to go through me!”

“You do not understand child,” said Luna, smiling brightly “I mean you no harm, I’m here to…”

“Get back!” Lightning shouted, rearing up on her front hooves and kicking back hard.

Luna recoiled, the blow had done little damage but it had been strong, and it was very painful, “Shadow…” she said slowly “what’s wrong…?”

Lightning was standing protectively in front of him. He looked frightened to say the least as well as bewildered. Maybe, just maybe, a glimmer of recognition? But no… it was just a trick of the mind. Luna realized now that Shadow had no memory of her at all.

“Get out!” Lightning shouted “Go away! We don’t want you here monster!”

Luna was crushed to say the least, but she had one more question “Shadow…” she said “where is Umbra? Where is your father?”

Shadow didn’t have to answer, she saw the moment his face moved from abject terror to pure sorrow. She couldn’t believe it, didn’t want to believe it, but the evidence was all around her. Umbra, whom she had waited all these years for, was gone.

“Will you leave already?” Lightning shouted, legs wobbly “or… I’ll hit you again!”

To Lightning’s terrified surprise, Luna’s head bowed. She turned around and walked quickly out, the door slamming shut behind her.

Lightning collapsed, dizzy from fear “We did it,” she said “we really beat Nightmare Moon!”

Shadow was staring at the closed door, still shocked out of speech. A million thoughts were racing through his mind. For starters, what was the princess of the night doing in such a small town as Ponyville? Let alone his little cottage? It seemed totally preposterous. He glanced over to where Lightning had hauled herself up into a wobbly victory dance. She hadn’t really done anything to defeat her… so why had she left?

“You don’t think maybe she didn’t want to eat us?” Shadow asked, after he found his voice again.

“Well of course she was trying to eat us,” said Lightning matter-of-factly “Nightmare Moon gobbles up little ponies for breakfast, lunch, and dinner!”

“But Nightmare Moon was banished from Luna decades ago…” Shadow pondered “so that had to have been…”

Lightning gasped “Princess Luna?” she exclaimed “no way! Not a chance! Why would she be here?”

“I don’t know that,” said Shadow grimly “but you kicked her!”

“Oh…” said Lightning, starting to sound scared again “do you think the royal guards will come after me now? Will they banish me to the moon?”

“I don’t know…” said Shadow, the childish fear creeping into his mind again ‘I don’t know what to do…”

“Oh no…” Lightning fell again “I can’t believe it, I’m so stupid!”

Shadow, maintaining a sort of composure, rolled off the bed and landed on his hooves. He trotted, wobbly, over to the row of cabinets and grabbed his schoolbag, rummaging a bit.

“What are you looking for?” Lightning asked weakly.

“Travelling stuff,” said Shadow “do you know how to make trail mix?”

“No,” said Lightning “why are you getting travelling stuff?”

Shadow pulled the bag over his back and sighed “Well you know,” he said “In school they tell you to always say sorry when you do something wrong… I’m going to go say sorry to Luna…”

Lightning gasped “In Canterlot?” she exclaimed “no way! You don’t think you can fly all the way there?”

“I’m not flying doofus,” said Shadow “I’ll figure something out…”

There was a thump of hooves as Lightning jumped off the bed and walked over “Well not without me you aren’t!”

“But…”said Shadow “won’t your brother be worried?”

“Oh he’ll get over it!” said Lightning, rolling her eyes “so have you got everything? The sooner we go the less likely it is the guards will arrest me!”

Shadow laughed and threw open the door “Look out Canterlot!” he shouted into the night wind “Shadow Chaser is coming to town!”

“Hey,” said Lightning, pointing to the left of the house “what is that?”

There was something glowing a deep blue in the snow a little ways off, clearly visible in the dark. Shadow walked over and lifted it up out of the drift.

“It’s some sort of necklace…” he said, holding it up. It was the sphere on the end that was glowing blue, the only thing on the small silver chain. “What do you think this is?”

“I dunno,” said Lightning in wonder “can I try it on?”

Shadow had started to drape it over his own head for a moment, eyes flashing from their usual red to a deep blue “Oh, sure,” he said, removing it and handing it over.

Lightning brought it over her head, eyes shifting color, but it was imperceptible in the dark “Huh,” she said “I don’t know what it is, but it’s pretty!”

Shadow rolled his eyes “Fillies…” he muttered, starting to walk across the snow.

“What?” Lightning shouted, pushing after him “I say it takes a real mare to understand beauty! Nothing a dumb colt could understand!”

“If all it is, is pretty,” said Shadow looking down at her “It’s pretty much totally useless!”

Lightning proceeded to grab Shadow’s tail in her mouth and drag him into the snow. They started fighting in the powdery crystals.

“Dang it!” Shadow shouted “at this rate we’ll never get to Canterlot!”

The capital city

“You’re sure about this?” Shadow asked “this is kind of your last chance to back out.”

The two of them were standing in trees that overhung the railroad track. It was technically still the Everfree, but it was way on the outlying portion, Ponyville station was visible on the edge of vision. The tracks led north in the other direction en route to Trottingham, the Crystal Empire, and just a bit more locally, the kingdom of Canterlot.

“Of course I’m sure!” Lightning shouted back, bouncing a little on her branch “I wouldn’t have followed you all the way out here unless I was prepared to do something incredibly stupid.”

There was the distant sound of a steam whistle, the morning train was leaving the station “Get ready then Light!” Shadow shouted with a smile “here she comes!”

The train rolled slowly toward them, puffing along the track, building speed second by second. Lightning and Shadow were poised to leap. If anything about this situation held true, it was Lightning’s intrepid description. This was an incredibly stupid idea.

By the time the train passed into the trees it had picked up to at least thirty miles per hour, the pink and yellow engine car rolling ahead of the rest of the blue carrier cars. The whistle blew painfully loudly and the steam blew up into the faces of the two foals.

“Now!” Shadow shouted, diving toward the train. Smoke filled his eyes and nose over the longest three seconds he had ever lived through and persisted through the terrible recoil when his hooves hit the roof of the train. He slid backward fast, careening toward the back of the car.

And abruptly slammed into Lightning. She looked down at him curiously, her stance far more solid. It was obvious that as an Earth pony she wasn’t sent flying nearly as bad as Shadow.

“What are you doing?” Lightning shouted over the rushing wind.

“Hopefully not falling!” Shadow yelled back, standing more steadily now “Wow! We did it! That actually worked!”

“I wish you wouldn’t sound so surprised,” Lightning shouted, squinting into the headwind “it makes me think this was a bad idea!”

“Of course this was a bad idea!” Shadow shouted, smiling now “So was going into the forest, and so was kicking the princess of Equestria in the face!”

“Shut up!” Lightning growled “I’m making up for that, that’s why I’m here!”

“The one crazy idea that I came up with!”

“Shadow, shut up or I’ll throw you off this train!”

“Duck!” Shadow yelled, yanking Lightning to her belly as the train passed through a tunnel, the loud echoing of the engine noise roaring through the darkness.

“What happened?” Lightning squeaked, hardly audible anymore “I can’t see anything, what’s going on?”

“We’re in a tunnel!” Shadow shouted back “I can’t see you either, don’t worry!” he hesitated on this last sentence as he noticed something strange. There were two small pinpricks of blue light off to his side, glowing ghostly in the blackness. He kept his gaze on them, not knowing what they were or why they were keeping pace with the train.

As the tunnel ended and light shone once again onto the pinkish metal Shadow realized he had been staring into Lightning’s eyes. They still burned blue, but now it was natural. Perhaps they had caught the light on the way out?

“We should try to get into the train!” Lightning shouted, breaking Shadow’s train of thought “I’m tired of all this wind!”

“I agree!” shouted Shadow “did you see a hatch anywhere?”

“I was about to point out that one!” Lightning yelled, motioning to the front of the train car, where indeed there was a cream colored hatch in the roof “but then the tunnel came up!”

Shadow quickly moved forward, twisting the hatch and finding it easy to move, when he tried to push it open however, it stuck fast. Lightning might’ve shouted at him, but Shadow didn’t hear. What he did notice was the entire weight of a fairly strong earth pony hitting him from the side. The hatch burst open and they tumbled through it, a jumbled mess of legs and tails.

“My goodness!” came a voice from somewhere above “where did you two come from?”

Shadow pushed Lightning’s tail away and found that he was looking up at a cream colored earth pony with a blue and pink mane. She laughed slightly as they rolled off each other.

“We’re um… along for the ride!” said Lightning, obviously at a loss for a better excuse, “this is the train to Canterlot right?”

“Well we’re actually going to the crystal empire,” said the crème colored pony “Lyra does this train make a stop in Canterlot?”

A green unicorn, sitting very strangely Shadow thought, looked up from her magazine “I think so,” she said “it’s the full northern transit.”

“Well anyway… I’m Bonbon, and that’s Lyra,” said the crème colored pony pleasantly enough “who did you say you were?”

“I’m Shadow Chaser!” said Shadow, giving the bow customary when introducing oneself.

Lightning rolled her eyes “Lightning Strike,” she said “and yes, I’m with stupid.”

Bonbon giggled “Couldn’t get train tickets I suppose? Don’t worry I won’t tell. But goodness you two must be very brave to have stood on the roof of the train this far.”

“More like crazy…” said Lyra, not looking up from her magazine.

“Lyra, please,” said Bonbon “why don’t you two sit down? We have a long way left to go even just to Canterlot. Maybe Lyra will even tell you one of her human stories…”

Shadow took this chance to get a better look around the car. It was empty save for the four of them. That made sense he supposed, the big cities were all further north. The cabin obviously wasn’t first class, but it was well furnished and the seats were made of what he thought was probably sheep’s wool.

“So why are you going to the Crystal Empire?” Lightning asked, sitting next to Lyra.

“Family,” said Bonbon with a smile “I discovered recently that one of my ancestors was one of the crystal ponies that was locked away. So naturally, I’m going to go visit her.”

“It’s pretty much the weirdest family reunion ever,” said Lyra, setting down her magazine at last “for all I know I could have an ancestor there too you know.”

“Well I actually know for sure,” said Bonbon “her name is Sweetmane, she’s a stylist now or so I hear.”

“Wow…” said Lightning “it must be so cool to have relatives that are more than a thousand years old!” Shadow smiled wryly at this, but he himself wasn’t sure why he did.

“That’s why I insisted on this trip!” said Bonbon proudly “I worked double time at the candy shop for months so I could afford it.”

“You know…” said Lyra “I’ve been thinking, if the crystal ponies have really been around that long, they could know about humans!”

“Humans?” Lightning asked curiously “what are humans?”

“Oh no…” said Bonbon “don’t even get her started….”

“Oh humans!” Lyra said dreamily “wonderful creatures, bipedals! Without any wings or magic! And that didn’t stop them; they built wonderful things, castles and palaces just as great as the crystal empire, all with these wonderful contraptions on the ends of their front hooves, called hands!”

This was, as may be predicted, only the beginning of a very long and tiring speech about humans. White humans, black humans, orange humans, red humans, yellow humans, Lyra knew about them all and their individual cultures. Lightning was profoundly interested, asking questions whenever they were begged and commenting on everything. Lyra was very pleased with herself, thinking perhaps that she had found herself an absolutely wonderful apprentice.

Shadow mostly ignored this, and talked with Bonbon instead about Canterlot. She and Lyra had been there for the princess coronation awhile back and knew a lot about the layout. Shadow was making a very honest attempt to memorize every word. From the sound of it Canterlot was a massive city compared to Ponyville and he wasn’t good with directions even back home.

The friendly conversation ended about an hour later when the train began to slow, and finally stop. The voice of the conductor came over the intercom “Now arriving at Canterlot station! Passengers stopping at this station should begin unloading their things!” This message was repeated three times as the whistle blew. Shadow found himself shaking with excitement, they were finally here.

“You should make a stop at Doughnut Joe’s,” said Bonbon, pulling the door open for them “he’s my cousin, if you mention me he’ll probably give you some sort of discount.”

“We will!” Lightning confirmed enthusiastically “thank you so much! And tell Lyra I’ll try to be at the next human con!”

“Alright,” said Bonbon with a laugh “just when you do, don’t take the train.” Lightning fell into a fit of giggles.

Shadow missed this entire exchange, to his credit though he had just glanced upward at the towering city. He knew it was built into the mountainside, but the meaning of that was lost to him until he saw it up close.

The castle, it seemed, was less the centerpiece than it was the top of a single colossal structure that flowed down from the spire like a cascade. Every street was built into a different layer, seeming to only grow more fantastic as they rose. The predominant colors of white, purple, and gold struck such a contrast from the rest of the ebony mountainside it seemed like magic, and, Shadow reminded himself, it probably was.

Lightning waved to Lyra, who was leaning out the window as the train pulled away from the station, then turned to Shadow “what’s the matter?” she said “cat got your tongue?”

Shadow managed to come out of his reverie, but it wasn’t so easy this time. Something about this place seemed to resonate with him on a whole new level. The bustle of the city and the magnificence of the view made his wings stand on end.

“Sorry,” he said, rubbing the back of his head “I just got caught up in the scenery I suppose…”

“Well I guess you have to fill that empty head of yours with something,” said Lightning, gazing upwards herself “I guess you’re right though, it’s quite an eyeful.”

She turned now to where a stand for maps had been set up and pulled one down, unfolding it onto the concrete. At its full scale they could both stand on it and examine it. They took their time obsessing over many of the small details before finally getting down to some form of business.

“Okay…” said Lightning “we’re here at the train station, where should we go first?”

“I kind of thought this was a one purpose mission…” said Shadow “the castle’s easy enough to find, what’s the fastest way to get there?”

“Luna won’t even be awake yet,” said Lightning, rolling her eyes “and I’m starving, where is this doughnut Joe’s?”

“I think it must be Canterlot pastry shop, here,” said Shadow, pointing it out “it’s not far from here, but it’s in the opposite direction we would take to get to the castle.” His stomach growled as he said this “but I suppose it can’t hurt…”

“Exactly,” said Lightning, beginning the tedious task of folding up the map again “and since we only have…twenty bits between us? We need the best deal we can get.”

“Leave it to a filly to follow the sale,” said Shadow with a smirk.

“And to the colt to be as clueless as ever,” Lightning retorted, placing the map in her saddlebag and slapping Shadow with her tail.

They started walking along the bustling city street, keeping off to the side mostly to avoid the risk of losing one another in the crowd. It turned out after awhile that while the pastry shop had appeared close on the map they actually had a very long walk ahead of them. About halfway there they stopped on a vacant bench to rest their tired hooves.

“I don’t like this place as much as I thought I would…” said Lightning “Ponyville doesn’t have nearly this many people, and all these unicorns are so snooty.”

“It’s nice in its own way,” said Shadow, eyes resting on the distant castle “the scenery is fantastic…”

“I guess so…” said Lightning, taking her guitar out of her saddlebag and starting to strum.

“You brought that with you?” Shadow asked “Isn’t that a bit excessive?”

“Well I wasn’t going to leave it at your house,” said Lightning “besides, I came up with a great song about Canterlot!”

“Is it blues?” asked Shadow.

“Well no, but I know I’ll have some of that soon,” Lightning said “I love the blues; I think it’s the most beautiful music that any pony ever played.”

“Whatever,” said Shadow “are you going to play it or are you just going to leave me at that?”

Lightning didn’t respond, rather, she started to strum an upbeat tune. Perhaps it didn’t hold the same enchanting quality as the melody from the night before, but it was faster paced, and still turned a few heads. It was city music, the kind played by ponies that made their living with a guitar and an empty cap. In just the chords Lightning seemed to capture the very essence of the city of Canterlot and let it free to fly across the strings in an excited flurry of rhythm. That wasn’t the end of it either, because as ponies started to congregate to the sound of her music, she started to sing to it.

Canterlot city isn’t it pretty?

Coated with the snow of December

Castles and spires, and unicorn powers

Would anyone dare not remember?

Whether by train or bus or plane

However you come to Canterlot

Why don’t you stop and stay for awhile

Though maybe the folks don’t smile

We’ve got all sorts of ponies in Canterlot

The rich the poor, the smart and the brave

The only real problem I see here

Is the get them all to behave

Life may be grand in Canterlot

But as a traveler you’ll have to see

Manehatten, Las Pegasus, Ponyville, Trottingham

To know both Equestria’s seas

Canterlot City, isn’t it pretty?

Painted up white for the snow

The cold and the fun will only be done

When hearts are warmed by the friends you know!

Lightning played out a few finishing chords and let the rhythm sail off into the air. By the time she stopped a small crowd had gathered around to listen, and they stomped their hooves appreciatively as the song drew to a close. Shadow, to his credit, was smart enough to lay out the map again as a place for the ponies to throw change, which a great many of them did. Canterlot is a rich town after all.

Lightning blushed and put her guitar away as Shadow put the bits into his bag. Lightning tried to kind of hide behind him as they walked through the crowd toward the pastry store again.

“That was awesome!” Shadow exclaimed, hovering a little off the ground in his excitement “I mean really, really, awesome! Did you really just come up with that?”

“Not really,” said Lightning, clearly embarrassed “I mean I’ve had the tune forever but I never really knew whether or not it should have words. When we got here it just sort of…clicked.”

“Well the unicorns obviously liked it,” said Shadow “I mean look at this, you earned thirty bits for that little performance! You could buy a gamecolt game with that kind of money!”

“Then I guess I’m treating us to doughnuts huh?” said Lightning.

“You bet you are miss rich,” said Shadow “a whole dozen of them!”

It was then they finally found the pastry shop. They actually walked right past it the first time and would’ve ended up circling all the way around again if Lightning hadn’t pointed it out. Actually it was kind of easy to miss, a small white store tucked away between two clothing outlets. It seemed very homely in contrast with the larger city around it.

Upon entering the store it became clear this place didn’t receive many customers. There was a broad shouldered brown stallion behind the doughnut bar, but otherwise it was completely empty.

“Well howdy!” said the stallion, who they were sure was doughnut Joe “what can I get you two?”

“Bonbon sent us,” said Lightning, staring around at the polished chrome tables and tile floors, the place was remarkably clean.

“Thought I’d give you a discount did she?” said Joe with a smile “well I suppose I can do two foals a favor, whatcha hankering for?”

“Can we get a dozen glazed and two hot chocolates?” Lightning asked “and whatever else you would recommend.”

“Tell you what,” said Joe “I’ll give you each a jelly filled for free. Bumblesweet!” he called to the back.

A yellow, frizzy maned earth pony mare bounced out. Shadow thought that she looked astonishingly like Pinkie Pie “Yeah boss?” she said curiously.

“I need a dozen glazed,” said Joe “be generous with the honey.”

“Coming right up!” said Bumblesweet, grabbing a honey twirler from the bar and bouncing back to the back of the shop. Joe moved to the coffee machines to get their hot chocolate ready.

“So how did you two meet Bonbon?” he asked appreciatively “another one of Lyra’s human parties I suppose? You look like you’re about that age.”

“On the train here actually,” said Lightning, ignoring Shadow’s motion for silence “she’s going to the Crystal Empire with Lyra to meet her ancestor.”

“Train huh?” asked Joe “So where are you two from if not Canterlot?”

“Ponyville! Ow!” said Lightning “that hurt, Shadow!”

Shadow, who had indeed just kicked her, was giving her the “shut up while you’re behind” look.

“Ponyville, oh that’s right!” said Joe “How’s Pinkie Pie? She’s kind of an old rival of mine.”

Lightning glared at Shadow, who nodded, before continuing “She’s doing pretty well,” she said “at least as far as her crazy song and dance routine always suggests.”

Joe chuckled, placing two piping cups of cocoa on the counter “That’s Pinkie Pie for you. I remember her detective stunt, totally shown up by her unicorn friend though. You Ponyvillians aren’t all crazy are you?”

“She is,” said Shadow, pointing at Lightning.

“He is,” said Lightning, pointing at Shadow at the same moment.

Joe burst out laughing just as Bumble sweet came back to the front balancing a box of doughnuts on her head. “I got em!” she said “One dozen extra glazey doughnuts!”

“Alright, thanks Bumble,” said Joe “that’s ten bits for everything and shoot I forgot your jelly filled! I’ll be back in a moment.” Joe went back to the back, followed by Bumblesweet.

Shadow took advantage of this and turned to Lightning “Let’s not put too much attention toward us okay?” he said.

“Why not?” asked Lightning, already starting on her first doughnut.

“Remember the Canterlot guards could already be looking for you, us,” said Shadow “not to mention going into Canterlot Castle might not be allowed. Your brother might be looking for you too. There are all sorts of reasons we should try and stay hidden.”

“Oh…right…” said Lightning.

Bumblesweet came back with a small bag with the jelly filled doughnuts inside “Hey, I heard you two are from out of town,” she said “do you know this pony?” she proceeded to put a picture of Pinkie Pie on the counter.

Lightning and Shadow exchanged a look, this would seem suspicious even if they hadn’t been sworn to silence just a moment before. They shoot their heads in unison.

“That’s okay;” said Bumblesweet, sounding dejected “let me ring that up for you…”

When they left the pastry shop they still wondered if lying to Bumblesweet had been the right thing to do. Unfortunately they didn’t have time to ponder that for long. It was winter after all, meaning that by the time they exited the shop the sun was already starting to set.

“So which way is it to the castle?” asked Shadow, to Lightning who had the map.

“Up…” said Lightning with a groan “and the stairs are only on either side of the city… we have to zigzag all the way up…”

Shadow looked up to where the sun was crossing the sky, almost gone “we don’t have time for that,” he said “we need to find some other way up.”

“Do you have some sort of idea?” asked Lightning, sounding slightly intimidated.

“Heck yeah I do,” said Shadow “but yes, it’s totally crazy.” Without a word he took off running toward a vegetable stand.

“Shadow what are you doing?” Lightning shouted. What he was doing in fact was taking a gliding leap, landing squarely on the center of the stand’s tarp roof. Lightning watched, dumbfounded, as the tarp dipped down then shot upward, propelling Shadow up to the next level, slapping his wings just to make sure.

“Come on Lightning!” Shadow shouted down “it’s easy!”

“Don’t even think about it you crazy kid!” The vegetable vender shouted at Lightning, shaking a hoof in her direction.

Lightning took a deep breath, ran for the stand and kicked hard with her back hooves, shooting upward and landing on top of the stand. She gulped as the tarp bent a little bit further than when Shadow had leapt, but it recoiled twice as far.

Shadow whooped as Lightning landed on her back a little ways behind him “Nice jump!” he shouted, running over “You’re okay right?”

Lightning groaned and stood up slowly “Where did you learn to do something so stupid…?” she asked slowly, dazedly almost.

“Dunno,” said Shadow with a laugh “I guess I just thought of it. We can fly the rest of the way if you want.”

“Yes please…” said Lightning squeamishly.

Shadow managed to pull them up a very solid eight walls before he couldn’t fly anymore. They noticed that the higher they went the closer they got to the castle, the richer and fancier the services were. The sky was growing deeper purple as they ran down the last street at a full gallop, not caring for the ponies they forced out of their way.

When they finally arrived, panting at the castle gates stars had begun to sparkle. A black barded pony was changing shifts with one in golden armor as they approached the bridge.

“Halt!” said the one in black, bat wings unfurling “Canterlot castle is no longer open for visitors!”

Shadow, who had all but collapsed from exhaustion, let Lightning do the talking “Lightning Strike and Shadow Chaser! We’re…here to see the princess!” her voice broke a bit at this last part, clearly out of fear.

The guards interest seemed to be piqued “And where do you come from?” he asked measured, almost seeming to be testing her.

“Ponyville!” Lightning squeaked.

“Dawnstar!” the bat winged guard shouted at the white white unicorn walking away toward the castle “Can you cover just a bit longer?” I need to escort these two.”

“Typical of you Nightwing,” said Dawnstar, walking back “you’ll take any excuse to get off work won’t you?”

Nightwing glared “This colt is Shadow Chaser,” he said “does that name ring a bell Dawnstar?”

Dawnstar seemed intrigued himself now “Well that’s a pretty damned good excuse,” he said “If it’s true that is. Get going then, but make it fast, I’m ready to pass out.”

“Thanks Dawn,” Nightwing said “come along you two, it may be a bit of a walk.”

Nightwing led them over the huge wooden platform that hung over the moat far below. The sound of roaring water could be heard as they crossed, distant and eerie. Shadow could feel his heart skip a beat as he though he heard a dull roar somewhere beneath them. He looked up at the archway, hundreds of meters up, and wondered what marvelous entities required such passage.

Of course what really went through his childish mind would be better translated as “I’m so scared, everything is so big!” let’s remember now he’s only six.

The foyer of the castle was gargantuan to the point of being uselessly large. The pillars holding up the vaulting ceiling vanished into darkness and the stairs were so high the two foals couldn’t see the top. The entire room was done in shades of black, white, and pink. Shadow might have guessed it’s relation to the three princesses if he’d been less preoccupied.

There was a sudden snap from behind them and Shadow turned sharply to see the drawbridge had closed behind them. Nightwing stifled a laugh when his expression grew fearful.

“Don’t worry Shadow,” he said “we’re not trying to lock you in; we’re just closing for the night. The only ones here now are the princesses and the guard.”

“Nightwing!” came a voice from the top of the stairs “why aren’t you at your post? We have a schedule to keep!” Shadow’s ears twitched, he knew that voice from somewhere…

Nightwing bowed quickly, Lightning, unsure of herself, following suit as the figure approached “My apologies princess,” said Nightwing “I assure you this is a matter of great importance.”

“Twilight!” Shadow shouted, and sure enough it was the purple unicorn coming down the steps resplendent in robes of blue. There was something different about her but Shadow couldn’t quite identify it as he ran up to her.

“Shadow!” Twilight smiled as she spoke “well isn’t this a surprise! You must be here to see Princess Luna.”

“How did you know…?” he asked curiously.

Twilight seemed confused for a moment, but then smiled in understanding “I had a bit of an intuition,” she said “come on; I’ll take you to her myself. You can get back to your post Nightwing!”

“Yes princess,” said Nightwing, trotting quietly back toward the gates.

“Princess…?” Shadow said slowly, then gasped as he realized what had changed about Twilight “You’re an alicorn! Oh my gosh the princess coronation… that was you?”

Twilight laughed at this, spreading her wings out to show them better “It was indeed, and I’m very happy for it. It’s kind of a new feeling, telling ponies what to do myself instead of looking to Celestia for advice.”

“That is so awesome!” Shadow said, poking at the purple wings almost to confirm they were really there.

“And um… who is this?” asked Twilight motioning toward Lightning. She seemed to have gotten bored with the conversation and was climbing on one of the huge winged pony statues next to the stairs.

“That’s Lightning…” said Shadow, sounding a little embarrassed.

“Oh, hi princess!” Lightning shouted as she noticed the conversation had shifted to include her “what’s up…oops!” she jumped and grabbed onto the railing as the statue toppled underneath her and shattered on the floor. “Sorry about that…” she said looking sheepishly up at Twilight.

“It’s okay,” said Twilight, her horn glowing as the statue levitated upwards and began to repair itself “that statue kind of has a habit of attracted trouble.”

“Like a moth to the flame,” said Shadow with a smirk. Lightning stuck her tongue out at him and dropped off the railing onto the stairs.

“I suppose you’re both going to see Luna?” Twilight asked, to which they both nodded enthusiastically “This way then, she really should’ve raised the moon by now…”

Twilight led them upward along several marble hallways and several flights of stairs. Shadow was desperately curious of what was behind many of the doors on either side but was willing to ignore it for now. There were more important things to be doing right now. They arrived at a small flight of wooden stairs with a silver ladder rising from the platform at the top.

“That leads to the Celestial platform,” said Twilight “be respectful, it’s the sacred place where the royal sisters have raised the sun and moon for millennium.”

They both nodded seriously “You go first,” said Shadow to Lightning “You’re the one who has to apologize after all.”

“No, you go first,” said Lightning “I don’t want to be the first one seen…”

“Fine,” said Shadow, not wanting this to become an argument “I’ll go…”

He was shaking so badly that he could hardly get a grip on the ladder. Lightning followed him when he was about halfway up, shaking the ladder even worse. If the ladder had been any taller he feared he wouldn’t have made it up at all. But sure enough he found himself staring at the wooden trap door at the top of the ladder…

“Well what are you waiting for?” Lightning called up, even more impatient than usual out of fear “Just go up already!”

Shadow took a deep breath and pushed up on the door, and found he couldn’t lift it. “Uh… Light?” he said “could you come up here and get this?”

Fortunately the ladder was wide enough for them to both stand comfortably on the top rung. Lightning couldn’t quite lift it either, but when they pushed simultaneously they managed to open it just a crack and squeeze through.

And what a sight awaited them. The tower-top they had arrived at was covered in polished ivory, glowing in the glory of the reflected starlight as perfect and serene as a pool buried in a cavern’s depths. Their gaze moved from the floor they had landed on unceremoniously to see Luna standing a ways off, her horn glowing a soothing blue.

They watched in astonishment as she unfurled her wings, flying gracefully upward, beating her great wings as the moon rose up in the distance along with her. They rose in perfect harmony until the moon had reached the exact center of the sky. The stars exploded, brighter and more beautiful with the mother of the night in her wondrous place in the sky.

Luna descended, landing with the grace of an angel back down on the ivory tower. The moon now reflected directly underneath her, the sky cast above and below as a testament to her light. The night sky seemed to be everywhere from this view, the stars dancing in the heavens above and in the floor below.

Lightning and Shadow watched this all in silent awe, not even standing up from where they had tumbled out the trapdoor. They were filled completely with the wonder of the night, which neither of them would ever have the words to describe.

“Shadow…?” said Luna, walking over to the two of them “What are you doing? How did you get here?”

“What…?” Shadow said, barely emerging from his stupor “Princess! Um… I, I mean we came here to…” he found himself stuttering out his words, his awe turning to fear as he realized he was intruding upon a hallowed place.

“I’m sorry!” he heard Lightning squeak “I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to offend you! I shouldn’t have kicked you! It was such a terrible thing to do! Please, please forgive me!”

Luna turned to Lightning, an amused expression coming to her face “There is no need to apologize little one,” she said kindly “I would never hold your innocent fear against you,” she put a hoof to Lightning’s chin and brought her to eye level “what is your name?”

“Lightning Strike,” she said, calming at the sight of her eyes now “and this is…”

“Shadow,” said Luna, Shadow looking up to her as well “You are the spitting image of your father…”

Shadow gulped “Did you know my dad well?” he asked “You knew him, and he was captain of the guard, can you tell me about him? Was he ever in any battles?” he wasn’t sure exactly why he had suddenly asked these questions, but if any pony would know it had to Luna right?

Luna smiled, “He was the bravest stallion I ever met,” she said “he saved my life when Canterlot was first attacked by the changelings. He stormed the infested night tower with alone with a sword. It was many years ago now… but it was a moment I will never forget.”

Shadow seemed to glow with pride; he’d never heard this story before. Sure the battle of the first changelings was well known, but his father had protected Princess Luna? That sounded fantastic!

“I wish he’d been there in the second invasion…” Lightning said dejectedly.

“The Strikes fought bravely,” said Luna, turning to her “they never lost one another, despite the changelings, when they were lost they took many of the strongest changelings with them. I’m sorry,” she turned to Shadow again “for your losses, you both have suffered more than any foal your age ever should.”

Lightning quickly ran over to Shadow, trying to get back into Luna’s view “What about me princess? Do you think I’m as brave as they were?”

Luna laughed again “Maybe when you’re older,” she said “though many full grown ponies have quailed in my presence. You’re shaping up to be just like them.”

Lightning bounced in place, so ecstatic about this situation she felt like she could burst. Shadow was desperate to know more, but too afraid to ask.

Luna stared him in the eye again “I’ve waited so long…” she said slowly “for the day Umbra would come back to Canterlot…” Shadow smiled, and as he stared up at the princess he suddenly felt a familiar warmth in his chest. It was the same warmth he felt whenever Umbra had told him stories about the guard, or taught him flying, or even just watching him run wild in the grass. That warmth… he hadn’t even noticed it was gone. It told him what Luna was going to say before she had begun to even form the words.

She pulled him into an embrace that somehow didn’t surprise him “I’ve waited so long for the day you would come back…my son…”

A mother love

Shadow was overwhelmed, ecstatic, elated. No words in his young mind could express his joy. He didn’t doubt it for an instant. That feeling he had ever since he arrived in Canterlot, this was why. He had been born here, and he was finally home.

Lightning, however, seemed completely shocked, as she well should be. “What…but…how…why…huh…?” she babbled innately, feeling terrified and out of place.

Luna finally released Shadow from their hug “I know it’s a little late,” she said “but you deserve an explanation. Come on, this isn’t the place.”

She led them back down the silver ladder and into the hallway. “Darksword,” she addressed a passing guard “Call Saber Strike to active duty, make sure he’s here as soon as possible.”

The guard saluted and quickly started off in the other direction. Lightning seemed somehow disappointed “You’re calling my brother?” she asked “why?”

“Lightning, you have to realize that foals cannot go running off without a word,” said Luna “we will leave your retribution to your brother to decide. Though I believe we can remain lenient.”

Lightning nodded and yawned “Okay…” she said sleepily.

Luna led them down the hallway to the beginning of a marble staircase that spiraled upward into a spire. Windows were inlaid into the granite walls every sixty or so steps. Shadow tried to count their paces as they ascended quietly, but quickly lost count.

Indeed it was a good ten minutes of climbing before they reached the top of the spiral staircase and found themselves facing a round blue door. There was no visible knob, but Luna’s horn glowed and the door swung open on invisible hinges.

Luna’s chamber was as large as Lightning’s entire house. Two staircases were on either wall leading up to a platform with a giant glass sphere inlaid in the center. The platform led outside onto a balcony and the indoor portion had bookshelves along both sides. Under the platform was the area made for leisure. The bed, placed in front of the panoramic windows, was patterned in lunar designs and stars. There were couches and stools enough to house a whole host of ponies, all dyed a soothing blue. The effect was magical.

Lightning walked over quickly and jumped on the bed “Wow!” she exclaimed “I could run laps on this! And it’s so soft, com on Shadow!”

Shadow looked to Luna for permission, and when she nodded, he flew over, dive bombing onto the bed. “Wow!” he said “you were right, this must be enchanted or something!”

“It’s moon cloth,” said Luna, sitting on one of the stools nearby “it’s sewn from dewdrops held together with spider silk, it’s very much enchanted, it would be impossible otherwise.”

Shadow sniffed at the fabric curiously as Lightning finally grew bored with her bouncing and lay down on the blanket. “That’s amazing princess…” she said tiredly, it was becoming obvious that she was exhausted. She yawned again and snuggled into the blanket.

“Can you tell me now?” Shadow asked, sitting down near Lightning “why Dad left Canterlot, what happened?”

Luna smiled sadly at Shadow “I won’t make excuses…” she said “your father and I believed it was for the best. The changelings were mustering in the forest lands to the north again and the power of Discord was growing day by day. We feared that protecting you in Canterlot was too great a risk.”

“When you were barely a week old we came to Ponyville under the cover of night, a small anonymous town, and we had friends there. Celestia’s student, Twilight, helped us get things ready for Umbra to stay and protect you. I can see he did the greatest job anyone could’ve…” a tear fell down her face and to the floor. She didn’t want this to be her first impression on Shadow, but it didn’t change the fact that Umbra was gone. That fact, that stark fact was enough to make her lose herself.”

“I wish he was still here…” said Shadow, his voice carrying a sorrow no child should ever have “I don’t even know what happened… he was there… and then he was gone…” he shut his eyes, trying to stop the memory of what he had seen that day, when he’d run past Twilight and Redheart. When he found the door with his Dad’s name on it. Seeing nothing there but the shape of a pony under a white sheet. The memory threatened to break him again.

That’s when he felt a gentle touch between his wings. He opened his eyes again, looking up at Luna, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “You were alone…” she said “and I know that is the worst thing you can be. I’m going to promise you now Shadow, I promise you will never be alone again.

Shadow’s face lit up, “Cross your heart?” he asked.

“Cross my heart,” said Luna, smiling to match his.

Shadow cuddled against her, shuffling as he yawned again. It wasn’t long before Luna could feel his soft, gentle, breathing. She pulled the blanket over him, noticing Lightning curled up beside him still. They were both sleeping away the long exhaustion that only children know after a long and exciting day. She couldn’t help but reminisce of  when, all those eons ago, she and her siblings had known that same exhaustion.

There was a knock on the door and a voice came from behind “Luna!” the voice said “What are you doing in there?”

Luna smiled and unlocked the door, allowing another alicorn to enter the room “Please keep your voice down sister,” she said “they’re sleeping.”

Celestia entered the room, stepping quietly over to stare at the foals, making sure her aurora mane didn’t fall over them “Luna…” she said “this is…?”

“Yes,” said Luna “and his friend.”

Celestia shook her head “He’s still in danger,” she said “we have yet to fully reign in the changelings, do you feel this is wise?”

“His father…is gone…” said Luna, frost tinting her voice “I couldn’t leave him in Ponyville a day longer unattended, not that I would’ve anyway.”

“I meant you no offense,” said Celestia, looking Luna in the eye “as long as you are firm in your decision, I will assist you in it.”

“He’s my son,” said Luna sadly “this is a new experience for me. I can never be sure of any of the decisions I make.” Her expression turned humble now “what would you have done if it was Cadence?”

“Exactly what you’ve don’t,” said Celestia “love is the strongest protection we can provide. Don’t think you could’ve done anything else.”

“The worst thing,” said Luna, holding in her tears this time “is knowing that Umbra is gone… I knew it would happen eventually…but so soon… its killing me…”

“I know how you feel,” said Celestia “just remember, he may be gone, but his love for you lives on.”

Luna turned back to the colt, who was smiling in his sleep. His coat was lighter than Umbra’s, but the mane, the smile, it was all there. She smiled back at him, realizing just how true Celestia’s words were.

“I suppose you’ll be insisted on a ceremony?” Luna asked her sister.

“But of course,” Celestia replied “I could never deprive our subjects of such a celebration. Twilight should coordinate this one… it would be a good experience for her…”

Pandora's box

Shadow couldn’t help but open his eyes as the painfully bright sunrise poured through the huge windows. He sat up, thinking that it was time to see what sort of lunch he could pack up and if he was going to be late, but the bed seemed so comfy… it was never comfy…

His eyes shot open as he realized he wasn’t laying on the toppled bookshelf at all. The memory of the day before flooded back all at once and he nearly took off flying in excitement. No school today! Or at least probably, would he have to go to school now? He hoped not. He turned to see Lightning, still asleep near him.

“Oh get up will you?” Shadow said excitedly “brand new day, brand new exciting stuff!”

“Shut up Saber…” Lightning muttered sleepily “school doesn’t start till I say it starts…”

“No school today!” Shadow said, shaking her “come on! Aren’t you excited about what’s going to happen today?”

“No…school?” Lightning muttered, sitting up and rubbing her eyes “what do you mean? If I miss school…” she suddenly came to the same blurry epiphany as Shadow “Oh my gosh! We’re in Canterlot! Shadow!”

They started bouncing circles around the bed, ecstatic at the idea of spending a fun day in Canterlot, with royalty none the less. The idea of foreign adventure, as you may well know yourself, is the dream and passion of every child under the age of twelve.

“It’s about time you two woke up,” came a deep voice near the bed.

Lightning and Shadow turned sharply to see a familiar red stallion glaring at them. “Saber!” Lightning shouted, sounding more surprised than fearful “What are you doing here?”

Saber stood up and walked over, clearly furious “No note, no call, the house you were going to not only empty, but abandoned?” he spat “And I get called to duty at one in the morning only to find out you’re here, miles from home! Do you have any idea how worried I was?”

“V-very?” Light stammered out, the gravity of the situation starting to hammer home.

“Very doesn’t even begin…” Saber growled. He then sighed heavily and sat back down “Mom and Dad would’ve been proud of you wouldn’t they…? My six year old sister managed to get to Canterlot in one piece… I should be proud of you too…”

Lightning jumped off the bed and pulled Saber into a hug “Thanks for being worried big brother,” she said happily “it’s great to see you!”

Saber forced a smile and ruffled her mane “It’s great to see you too sis…”

Shadow, having no interest in this lecture from the start, had flown off the bed and begun to climb the stairs to the balcony level. He paused every few steps to look at the books, all huge with titles like The Canterlot Code of Conduct or Impersonation of Wizardry all of which seemed very important, though he could understand none of them.

When he arrived at the upper platform his attention was immediately captured by the huge glass sphere in the center. He gazed into it, amazed at the display within. A huge sphere of flame sat at the center while tiny planets orbited around it. There were labels on the planets like Zion, Gallifrey and Callisto. He pondered a bit as he spotted a green and blue one labeled Equestria which was very near the edge of the sphere. Equestria wasn’t round, it was flat!

Deciding to cautiously examine it, he climbed up on top of the glass and looked down. From this closer, though quite honestly much less cautious, vantage, he could see more clearly the planets and the huge glowing star. Another detail also presented itself as he watched intently, the space between the planets was not empty, but rather, full of miniscule rocks. They looked like granules of black sand, only visible when the sun shone behind them. As he watched one of them touched on Zion and disappeared in a flicker of flame.

“I see you’ve found the model of the solar system,” came Luna’s voice from the balcony.

Shadow jumped, sliding off the dome and landing on his face “Princess! I mean Luna! I mean Mom! I mean… um…”

Luna smiled and helped him to his hooves “Careful there,” she said smiling “I know it’s fun to explore but don’t get yourself scraped up.”

Shadow nodded, staring back at the dome “What is the solar system?” he asked “It looks like a bunch of balls, and sand, does it mean something?”

“It’s a model,” said Luna “of things beyond the sky. You see the ball of flame in the center? That is the sun that holds the planets in orbit. The planets are all worlds just like Equestria.”

Shadow, having trouble wrapping his mind around any of these concepts, asked the first question that came to mind “But doesn’t Celestia control the sun? How could that be the sun when Equestria is so far away?”

“Look more closely at Equestria,” said Luna, pointing out the small green planet “Do you see? It’s small, but down closer to the surface is a much smaller sun. That is the one Celestia controls.”

Shadow squinted down at Equestria “I think I see it!” he said “Barely though… I don’t know… why do we have two suns?”

“The sun we orbit around is too far away,” said Luna, clearly enjoying this explanation “In the days before Celestia created our sun Equestria was very, very cold. The northern and southern hemispheres were totally inhospitable.” Shadow gave her a quizzical look, so she elaborated “That means it was too cold for ponies to live there.”

“Oh,” said Shadow “but why are they all round? Equestria is flat isn’t it?”

“Equestria is round,” said Luna “but it’s so big that when you walk on it you can’t tell.”

Shadow stared carefully at the ground for a moment; it was obvious he wasn’t really buying this explanation.

“Would you like to get some breakfast?” asked Luna “The dining hall is getting prepared for tomorrow, but I’m sure the chefs will be able to spare some time.”

“Oh!” said Shadow excitedly “Can Lightning come?”

“Well if her brother allows it,” said Luna, turning to where Lightning and Saber were walking toward the exit “would you two like to stay for breakfast?” she called down.

“Yes!” Lightning shouted and immediately ran up the stairs “do they have waffles? Oh my god, I just love waffles!”

“Lightning!” Saber called from below “We’ve intruded on the princess enough already and I need to get back to my post, come on!”

“Aw…” said Lightning “but I want to stay with Shadow…”

“Come on,” said Saber “I’m sure Shadow’s busy.”

Lightning lowered her head in disappointment and was about to walk back down when Shadow spoke up “What if Saber goes home and Lightning stays here? It can be like a sleepover party, come on Mom?”

“Well I don’t think I can impose…” said Saber awkwardly.

“Oh, it’s fine,” said Luna with a smile “we would love to have her if you would allow it.”

“Please?” Lightning said eyes wide and sad looking “Please, oh please, oh please?”

“Lightning,” said Saber “I may not be able to come get you for a few days, are you sure you’re okay with that?”

“Yes!” both Light and Shadow shouted in unison.

“Well as long as the princess is okay with it…” said Saber, looking somewhat desperately toward Luna again.

“She will be in good hooves,” said Luna.

“Come on Saber, please?” Lightning begged.

“You’re sure you’re okay with this princess?” Saber asked again.

“Of course,” said Luna “Shadow’s friends are welcome here anytime.”

“Well…” said Saber.

“Get out of here!” Lighting and Shadow shouted together.

Saber sighed “Alright he said “just please, please don’t get into any sort of trouble okay…?

Lightning wasn’t listening however, from the word “alright she and Shadow had begun a victory dance. “Thank you big brother!” Lightning shouted.

“You’re welcome…” said Saber, obviously still having doubts about this “Princess.” He bowed and left the room, muttering something under his breath.

“So what about breakfast?” Shadow asked quickly “can we go get breakfast now?”

“Yeah!” Lightning said “I can’t wait! Waffles, waffles, waffles!”

“Luna smiled down at them “Yes, come along,” she said “the sooner we get there the less busy the dining hall will be.”

As they passed through the foyer toward the kitchen Shadow noticed a great deal of ponies flying about the place. Pegasi were trailing techni-colored banners across the ceiling, unicorns were levitating decorations while Earth ponies wheeled the supplies around the room.

“What are they all doing?” Shadow asked curiously.

“Your aunt thought it would be a good idea to give you a welcome home party,” Said Luna “but I’d like it to more be celebration of the fact that you did just turn seven.”

Shadow’s wings began to flutter in excitement. This had to be the best birthday ever! Well, he supposed there was the one time dad had gotten Rainbow Dash to perform a sonic rainboom for him, but what could possibly top that?

A brown, bearded unicorn approached Luna from the crowd “Everything is going splendidly your highness,” he seemed a little sarcastic as he said this “I was just about to get started on the edible decorations, and I was wondering if you would allow me to add my own special touches.”

Luna gave him a stern look, but softened quickly “Very well,” she said “but remember, we’ll have the elements on hand, so keep it under control.”

The unicorn seemed to positively beam “Oh I’ll try,” he said “but I guarantee this, Prince Shadow, this is going to be the most fantastic celebration of your life…” without another word he vanished. Shadow thought it was teleportation but his horn hadn’t glowed in the slightest.

“Don’t mind him,” said Luna “he’s merely coordinating some of the events and putting his magic to good use. I hate to say it but I think the poor dear is starting to have fun with all this…”

“Is that a bad thing?” Lightning asked.

Luna didn’t answer, but kept trotting toward the dining hall. Lightning shot Shadow a quizzical look and they followed.

The dining hall was a vast room that was almost entirely empty. Long tables ran from one end of the room to the other and countless chairs were stacked against the walls. A few ponies in guard’s armor were moving the tables into a new order, and a pleasant aroma wafted from the kitchens situated near the back.

Lightning seemed to melt “I smell waffles…” she said dreamily “and toast with butter, and pop tarts, and custard…”

“Do you even know what custard is?” asked Shadow.

“No,” said Lightning “but I smell it.”

“We’re in luck,” said Luna “it looks like our worker’s breakfast is just getting started. If you would like I’ll alert the chefs to your requests while you two go and explore.”

“I’ll take whatever,” said Shadow, wings twitching a bit, betraying his otherwise calm attitude.

“Waffles!” said Lightning “Oh! With chocolate chips!”

“Duly noted,” said Luna, smiling “now go play; just don’t cause anyone too much trouble.”

They were both too busy running back into the main foyer to respond. They very nearly toppled a group of earth ponies hauling a cart of banners and the unicorns had to stop their spells to make sure the foals weren’t hit in the crossfire. Chaos seemed to be an inevitable outcome with these two today.

They tore down every random hallway they could conveniently reach, not even bothering to check the doors just yet. The exploration had really become more of a race between them, with no beginning and no obvious ending. A game of one-upmanship where fast beating wings attempted to match the speed of equally quick hooves, neither getting ahead of the other.

The ending of this pell-mell sprint was Shadow slamming into someone on a bad turn. Lightning, having shot right under their legs, turned to see a very tall white figure.

“Careful Shadow,” said the new pony “I don’t want my nephew getting himself hurt.”

Shadow stood, looking up, craning his neck to see the face of princess Celestia “Oh!” he said “I’m…sorry?” he wasn’t quite sure what to say, he was in awe, but as a prince should he be?

“Wow!” Lightning shouted, grabbing at a strand of aurora colored hair “I really like her mane! How did you get it to do this?”

Celestia smiled “It’s magic, Lightning,” she said kindly “I keep my mane like this so it doesn’t trail on the floor behind me, though some other princesses find it uneccesary.”

“That’s right…’ said Lightning “Princess Twilight’s mane wasn’t like this… I think she would look better with it.”

“Lightning,” Shadow muttered “you’re talking to Celestia, be respectful…”

“No, it’s quite alright,” said Celestia “I would much prefer you to be honest with me than respectful.”

“Yeah!” Lightning shouted “I’m just being honest, Shadow!”

Shadow thumped the ground with his hoof awkwardly “Okay…” he said “well we were just going exploring the castle a little bit, we’re really sorry to have bothered you.”

“What about there?” Lightning called, pointing toward an ornate white door at the end of the hallway “come on, that looks like a great place to start!”

Celestia turned sharply to look at the door herself “No,” she said sharply “that room is not safe for children. You two must promise me you will not set hoof inside.”

Lightning looked up to Celestia, shivering a bit at her serious expression “Of course!” she said quickly “I swear it!”

Celestia turned back to Shadow, who quickly recited “Cross my heart hope to fly stick a cupcake in my eye! We’ll… never set hoof in that room!”

“Thank you,” said Celestia with a sigh “I have to go talk to your mother now Shadow, might I recommend the upper parapets if you’re interested in adventure? There’s plenty to do there.”

Shadow nodded, though he had no idea what that meant, as Celestia walked on. “I guess we should try to find our way to that place,” said Lightning “where do you think that is?”

Shadow, turning to make sure Celestia was a safe distance away, walked over to one of the windows and peeked out. “We’re not going anywhere,” he said “yes… there’s a window in that room!”

“Shadow!” Lightning exclaimed “we promised not to set hoof in there!”

“I’m not gonna let my hooves hit the floor,” he said with a smirk “I’ll be two seconds, I’ll fly over, look around, come back. You’re curious about what’s in there too aren’t you?”

Lightning looked at the door again. Big fancy door, plus the fact Celestia didn’t want them inside, it seemed intensely interesting. “Alright,” she said “but remember not to let your hooves touch the floor! Or I will stick a cupcake in your eye!”

Shadow smiled, balancing himself carefully on the windowsill. Looking down he could see a courtyard so far below that the ponies walking around looked like tiny ants. He gulped, the idea of his wings not holding him and loosing flight seemed all too real now.

“Hurry up and get going!” Lightning half shouted at him “Celestia could come back!”

Before he realized he was doing it, Shadow was sky walking. His wings held him up, flapping at a steady rate as he carefully maneuvered to the other window. When the fear finally started to settle, he realized what a huge accomplishment being able to fly steady here was. Even Scootaloo couldn’t fly without help yet!

Shadow poked his head into the room and looked around. He was very surprised to find that at first glance it looked empty. Indeed he was getting ready to turn around and fly out again when he spotted the small chest sitting in the center.

He took wing again, peering around the smooth white walls again. It was totally featureless and there were only three windows, seeming more to blend it into the rest of the castle than to serve any other purpose. The round room was clearly devoted purely to the protection of the little red box in the center. He fiddled with the latch, excited to find it unlocked. He was about to open it, but he heard Lightning on the other side of the door and reconsidered. Instead he scooped up the box and carried it out the window with him.

“What took you so long?” Lightning asked impatiently as Shadow flew back into the hallway “What was in there?”

“Just this,” said Shadow, putting the box on the floor gently “seriously, there was nothing else in there at all!”

“Weird…” said Lightning “is it locked?”

“No,” said Shadow, walking around the box, inspecting it closely “what do you think? Should we open it?”

Lightning nodded, fumbling with the catch. There was a click as it came undone and slid slowly open. The inside was red velvet with two small silver bracelets sitting inside, unmarked and plain looking.

“Huh,” said Shadow in disappointment “this isn’t interesting at all.”

“Dang it Shadow,” said Lightning “always you with your silly not-worthy attitude, just like with the necklace! Besides, these are really pretty, and valuable if the princesses went to so much trouble to hide them. Do you think they’re platinum or chrome?”

“I don’t know, and I don’t care,” said Shadow “you can play dress-up here if you want, I’m going to see what that upper para thing was.”

“I’m not just going to let you walk away!” said Lightning, sliding a bracelet onto her hoof “you aren’t going anywhere until you try this on!”

“This is ridiculous,” said Shadow “I’m leaving.” He turned to walk away, but was suddenly jerked around to look at Lightning again.

“I told you, nowhere till you try it on.” She said smugly, sitting down next to the box again. Shadow had forgotten just how fast this filly was.

He rolled his eyes “Fine,” he said “though I still think this is really, really, really, really, really stupid.”

“Just put it on,” said Lightning, sticking her tongue out at him.

Shadow lifted out the silver band and slid it onto his hoof. This all seemed extraordinarily silly to him and he was more than a little chagrinned that Lightning had gotten him to play dress up. This was a fillies game!

“There,” he said “now can we…wha?”

“What?” Lightning asked, noticing his distraction.

“You’re…glowing!” Shadow exclaimed, tossing the bracelet aside in a panic. Indeed, Lightning’s hooves had begun to slowly illuminate, and despite Shadow’s horrified desperation, so were his.

“What’s going on?” Lightning shouted in horror as the light grew harsher, beaming so bright they had to shut it out of their eyes. They screamed together as the light grew to envelop them both in a powerful surge of brilliance.

Meanwhile, in the castle throne room, Celestia and Luna were seated in their respective golden seats, discussing matters of grave importance. It was surprisingly simple a room for what it was, the windows along either wall lacked any sort of outstanding detail and the only decorations to be seen beyond the huge red door were the great indigo banners criss-crossing the ceiling. If it wasn’t the room so clearly situated in the heart of the castle, it could easily be mistaken for just another side room.

“I still think it was a bad idea to let those foals go running pell-mell about the castle,” said Celestia, sounding slightly annoyed “they very nearly entered the timeless chambers, you know what might happen if they went in there…”

“You worry too much dear sister,” said Luna, smiling contentedly “the room is locked magically, even if I could worry they would break the spell, neither of them are unicorns. Besides, even if they did miraculously go inside, do you think they would activate it?”

“They’re children,” said Celestia coldly “if their simple pig-headedness did not lead them to open the box, their curiosity certainly would.”

Luna giggled, which seemed to infuriate Celestia even further “Maybe it would do them some good,” said Luna “to see things from a new light and all that, isn’t that what we designed the chamber for?”

“It still isn’t a magic with which to be tampered with,” said Celestia “who knows what sort of havoc they could unleash with the power in that room?”

“I know it couldn’t be all that bad.” said Luna.

“That’s as good as saying ‘what could possibly go wrong’,” said Celestia angrily now “try, at the very least, not to make the situation any more tense than I feel it has already become.”

“Nothing has come from it at all yet,” said Luna “if I know foals, I know they keep their promises very seriously. They more than likely turned out of that hallway and went to the parapets just like you said they should.”

Celestia stood up “I’m going to check on them,” she said “I simply do not trust them to keep their word.”

“Sit down Celestia,” said Luna “you allow the changelings more doubt than you’ve given these two. Will it really be an adventure for them if you’re hanging on their every movement?”

Celestia turned again “Unlike the changelings, those children have nothing to lose,” she said “life is still a game for them, we simply cannot let them run about unchecked.”

Luna was about to reply when she noticed a glow near Celestia’s hooves “Oh dear…” she said “Sister… please tell me you’re the one doing that…”

“Doing what?” Celestia asked angrily, looking down at her hooves. She gasped as she too saw the growing light “Luna! I told you nothing good would come of this!”

Luna lifted a hoof to her face, observing the glow that had begun to illuminate her own hooves as well “I would’ve never thought…” she began.

“Of course you didn’t think!” Celestia shouted “You never consider anything! You act rashly and let your emotions take over with every decision you make!”

“I won’t be talked down to like this!” Luna responded in like, the light beginning to grow brighter around the both of them “your judgment has always been equally flawed! You continue to idolize the morning and shun the night, you only give me glory now to prevent me from lashing out!”

“You did not have to endure both our tasks for a thousand years!” Celestia shouted, the room beginning to quake from the power of their combined anger, all the while the light grew more intense around them.

“I was locked away on the moon for a thousand years!” Luna erupted like a volcano “Because you were more interested in seeing me gone than you were in seeing me restored! You had the power to do either and you know that! I won’t bow to this outrage any longer!”

The light intensified to a piercing glare as the two royal sisters flung at each other, intent to kill…

Ageless

Shadow felt himself slowly begin to come around, blearily opening his eyes to blink away the pain of the blackout. What was that light anyway? He forced himself to his hooves, nearly succumbing to the vertigo as the ground seemed to shoot away from him, and the dizziness must be more intense than he thought. He shook his head, mane flying across his face. Was his hair always that long? He looked around and saw Lightning, already standing nearby. Her face was locked in an expression of terror.

“What’s the matter?” he asked, noticing his voice sounded deeper than usual “I think my brains were knocked loose by that blast, I’ve been seeing things all crazy and my voice sounds…” he stopped dead, noticing what the shock was.

Lightning was taller, twice the height she had been before, and much stronger looking. Her mane had snapped out of its usual ponytail and cascaded down her neck like an electric blue waterfall. Her huge blue eyes met his in identical expressions of shock.

“Shadow…” Lightning said first, her voice had changed, sounding silkier, more womanly “what happened…?”

Shadow opened his wings, feeling them stretch wider than they ever had before, stomped his hooves on the ground experimentally, and wincing as the floor cracked under the force. He noticed that his coat had darkened from its usual fluffy gray to deep noir. Noir, which was a word he didn’t know the meaning of. It was obvious what was going on, but his brain was rejecting it like a steel wall.

There was a muffled scream from somewhere below and Lightning quickly turned “Come on!” she said without thinking “that sounds bad!” She took off running down the hallway, slowing to a trot as she realized Shadow’s wings were now too broad to fly down the narrow hallway.

“This stinks...” Shadow muttered, running at full gallop just to keep up with Lightning’s slow job “don’t get smug, you still can’t fly.”

“I wasn’t,” said Lightning “just as long as you really are going as fast as you can.”

They came to a huge red door inlaid with golden spheres. The screaming was coming from the other side. Shadow realized this was probably the throne room, but the obvious guard posts were vacant. Lightning nodded, and Shadow pushed the door slowly open.

Neither of them was at all prepared for what greeted them on the other side, and neither were the stunned unicorn guards who had gotten there first. “Shadow…” Lightning said “are you seeing what I’m seeing?”

A white alicorn filly with a fluffy pink mane had a younger, blue filly in a headlock. The white one was pulling hard on the mane of the blue, from whom the screaming was coming from.

“Celly! Stop!” the blue one shouted “it hurts! Please! You win! You win!”

“That’s what I thought!” the white one said, voice muffled by the hair in her teeth “that’ll teach you to mess with your big sister!” she let the mane drop.

“It’s…Celestia…” said Lightning slowly “that means…they…we…”

The filly, who they now realized was Luna, started to bawl, “Sissy! You’re so mean!” she sobbed.

“You deserved it!” Celestia said, sticking her tongue out and sitting down, legs crossed and wings spread wide “Remember, I’m the big sister!”

“I think I can take it from here,” came a voice from the door “Guards! Dismissed!”

Shadow and Lightning turned round to see Twilight standing in the doorway. The guards quickly bowed and exited as she walked into the room and cast her gaze around.

“You two found the ageless chamber didn’t you?” Twilight said sternly “Big white room? Smooth round walls?”

“Well I had no idea it would’ve caused this!” said Shadow defensively “you honestly think I would’ve done something like this on purpose?”

“Of course not,” said Twilight sternly “but let that be a lesson about poking around in places you don’t belong.”

Luna and Celestia had started to scuffle again; Twilight seemed to want to pull them apart but was clearly hesitant to do so. The consequence of the situation was hidden by the awkwardness for the time being.

“Should we…stop them?” Shadow asked.

“Do you think we can?” Twilight asked “They’re still the princesses of Equestria after all, I don’t think I could pull them apart…”

“Just try!” Lightning said angrily “they’re really going to hurt each other if this keeps up!”

Twilight took a deep breath, a purple nimbus appearing around the two princesses, tugging them away from each other and lifting them into the air.

“Hey!” Celestia shouted “Put me down you big meanie!” Her horn sparked white as if she was trying to do magic, but quickly fizzled out.

“Alright you two,” said Twilight, clearly forcing herself to use her commanding tone “I don’t want any fighting between you two alright? We’re going to keep you here for a little while alright?”

“I gotta go potty…” Luna whined.

Twilight released Luna from her magic grip “You know where the chamber pot is,” she said “Light, Shadow, I have an emergency job for you.”

“Anything we can do the help…” said Shadow, watching awkwardly as Luna scurried behind the throne area.

“I need you two to go and monitor the preparations for the ceremony tomorrow,” said Twilight “It was my job but instead I’m going to have to take responsibility for Luna and Celestia. I don’t want any pony to worry about the situation so tomorrow must go smoothly, do you understand?”

“Y-yes madam,” Lightning stuttered “but are you sure we’re the best ponies for this?”

“Right now you’re the only ponies available,” said Twilight “now go quickly, breakfast is going to start and five minutes and we need someone there. After that I want everything moving like clockwork. The schedule is in my room, now get going!”

Not daring to ask any more questions, Lightning and Shadow exited the room. “Alright,” Shadow said “I’ll go make sure there’s nothing going on with the workers, can you run and get the stuff from Twilight’s room?”

“Yeah,” said Lightning “just save me something to eat alright?”

They turned and headed in opposite directions. As Shadow walked he looked over himself, pondering some of the changes. He wasn’t entirely sure why his usually soft gray coat had turned such a coarse black color, or more interestingly why the fur was totally gone from his hooves. It almost seemed like he had been badly burned from something. But of course that was preposterous… He also noticed his cutie mark was still absent. This was perhaps the greatest disappointment, as it could’ve provided some useful insight on the future.

He took a deep breath as he pushed the door to the dining hall open. Everything seemed organized without his help already. The ponies were seated at long tables while unicorns walked back and forth serving them. Hopefully this was a sign his job would be relatively simple. A few ponies said hello to him as they passed into the dining hall, and he nodded back, slowly growing more confident.

“I see you’re taking things well,” came a familiar voice to his right “and what fun it is indeed…”

Shadow turned to see the brown unicorn who Luna had spoken to earlier. He narrowed his eyes, “Something you need?” he asked curtly.

“Oh nothing Prince Comet, or excuse me, Shadow Chaser,” said the Unicorn with an exaggerated bow “being omnipotent mixes me up sometimes you know. I was just noticing the subtle change you’ve made and I was enjoying the spectacle.”

“Who are you…?” asked Shadow measuring this newcomer “and more importantly how do you know who I am?”

The unicorn grinned menacingly, his eyes flashing to red and yellow for a moment as he laughed “I can answer both questions at once,” he said, extending a hoof “I’m Discord, spirit of chaos and disharmony.”

So that’s who he was, the ‘reformed’ lord of chaos himself. This had the potential to become interesting. Shadow shook his hoof, halfway expecting some electric shock or other prank, but nothing spectacular happened.

“I’m going to guess you already know the situation,” said Shadow evenly.

“But of course,” said Discord, never losing his wide smile “and I haven’t smelled such delectable chaos in years! Why, I would say the last time I had this much fun was when I turned Ponyville absolutely upside down!”

Shadow shuddered, remembering holing up inside during that hellish week of havoc. The small house had been mostly clear of the chaos, being so close to the forest had a few perks. But the sounds of the storm were enough to scare the young colt under the covers. For the first time he realized that may have been somewhat childish.

“Not too fond of that one, eh?” Discord asked, sounding bored now “oh not many ponies are. Though I can’t say I’m surprised. I’m no good at age spells of course but if you would like I might help you liven up the party?”

“Um…” Shadow said, realizing this was his first definitive decision for keeping things in control “that wouldn’t be a bad idea no, but keep it down alright? Nothing that will hurt any pony or anything in any way, you understand?”

“Of course!” said Discord, excitement tinting his voice “Oh I do look forward to you taking the throne! Celestia forbid the use of my powers during the mealtimes!” Before Shadow could say another word, Discord was gone.

The door to the dining hall opened, and Lightning walked in, carrying a large scroll in her teeth. She set it down as she approached “I got the list, and it’s a doozy… are those candles dancing…?”

Shadow turned “Yeah… I kind of gave Discord the go ahead to make some…entertainment… I suppose…” he said sheepishly.

“Well at least they seem to be enjoying it,” said Lightning with a sigh “make sure you rein him in alright?”

“Is that my job then?” asked Shadow.

“Yeah, that actually sounds alright,” said Lightning unrolling the scroll “almost half of these jobs are Discord’s responsibility. If you could keep him in check for those I would be extremely grateful.”

“You sure you can handle that?” Shadow asked “That looks like a lot of jobs to do.”

“It’s mostly confirmation and checking,” said Lightning “just a big check list essentially, mostly a formality. The only real job is written here at the bottom, it just says to not let Discord go nuts.” She rolled up the scroll again “in a way I’m giving you the only job!”

Shadow smirked “Alright,” he said “Let’s get this done!”

A few hours later found Shadow and Discord working on the gardens on either side of the castle. The gardens were well situated, the moat still dividing them from the rest of the city but far enough from the castle to provide the perfect view. The hedges, statues, and labyrinth ringed the castle like a halo of greenery.

Discord had been magically trimming the hedges, the gardening tools carving the bushes into swirling patterns while he sat to the side, straw stuck in a cotton candy cloud. Shadow was practicing with his wider wings, finding them much stronger and more easily maneuverable. To his surprise, however, he didn’t fly much faster at all.

“Try to angle yourself a bit more downward,” Discord advised from the ground level “that should make you fly a bit faster.”

“I’ve already tried that…” Shadow said, landing again, less shaky than the last several attempts “I’ve got all sorts of crazy lift now but I can’t get my wing-beat going nearly as fast, and it’s really hard to fly downward…”

“Tough break,” said Discord, procuring a glass filled with a red fizzy liquid “Soda?”

“Thanks,” said Shadow, taking it and drinking. His eyes lit up as he tasted it “Faygo? No way, how did you know?”

Discord raised an eyebrow “I didn’t,” he said curiously “Faygo has always been one of the hallmarks of my chaotic powers. It’s because of the sugar I do believe, or perhaps it’s’ strange connection to juggalo culture.”

“The sugar makes it taste better, and it gives you energy,” Shadow elaborated, throwing the empty glass to the side where it exploded “you know Discord, you’re alright.” He held out a leg, and they hoof bumped.

“Shadow!” Lightning’s voice called from somewhere above “those hedges are supposed to be even! What are you doing with those spiral patterns?”

Shadow looked up to see Lightning on one of the balconies, a gray coated mare with long black hair was also with her, carrying a huge instrument case.

“I think it looks better that way!” Shadow shouted back up “it’s not like this is a formal celebration! It’s a party, Lightning! Relax!”

“I don’t care if it’s a party; it’s a party we’ve got a schedule for!” Lightning shouted down “now get those hedges in the shape they’re supposed to be in! Come on Octavia, the concert hall is this way…”

“Ignore her…” Shadow said quietly as Lightning walked back inside “gosh she’s getting to be such a killjoy…”

“Octavia isn’t a bad choice for the music,” said Discord, dispersing the hedge-clippers “though I would’ve hired Vinyl Scratch myself. Now she is a professional musician! For a pony anyway…”

“You’ve got that right!” said Shadow “I’ve actually got one of her albums, it’s the only music CD I own.”

“Well then, you my friend have quite the sense,” said Discord “of course Neon Lights is also very good, as well as Sprocket but… oh my!”

Shadow turned to see what had distracted Discord. His jaw hit the floor as he saw the goliath mass of balloons cresting the horizon in a rainbow of shapes and colors.

“What…is that…?” he asked.

“Pinkie Pie…” said Discord.

Sure enough, as the base of the balloon mountain finally came into view it was revealed that the pink earth pony had somehow tied all of the balloons to her tail. A tremendous shadow passed overhead as the balloon behemoth blocked out the sun overhead.

“Oh, hi Discord!” said Pinkie “who’s this? Oh my gosh are you the new prince? I’ve never met a Prince before! Wait… if you’re a prince why are you just a Pegasus? Your dad must have been a Pegasus! How cool! I see why they call you Shadow; your coat is the perfect color!”

Shadow recoiled, this speech was sounding way too familiar. It was also interesting to note Pinkie hadn’t recognized him from the café… was that really just the day before yesterday? The change must have really made him look different.

Before either of them could respond however, Pinkie Pie had passed them by and entered the castle, her sky full of balloons following after her in a swirl of rainbow color. They squeezed in through the gate all together with one tremendous squeak.

“Well I guess she’s Lightning’s problem now,” said Shadow “what’s next on our to-do list? Discord?”

Discord was staring after Pinkie Pie, a bit of a silly grin on his face. His eyes had turned pink and heart shaped, which Shadow supposed was probably a draconequis thing.

“I get it…” he said “I think someone’s got pink on the brain.”

Discord’s eyes went back to normal and he coughed “Well…perhaps…” he said embarrassedly “is it really that obvious?”

“Yeah, you made it obvious to the point of being kind of redundant.” Said Shadow “Hey, I totally see where you’re coming from. She’s probably the only creature on Equestria as random as you are.”

“So delightfully random…” said Discord, the shrubs along the path starting to pop into heart shapes.

“Easy there buddy,” said Shadow “can you go ahead and change that back?”

“Oh yes, of course” said Discord “I was supposed to be changing those into the shapes of guards anyway.” There was a puff of green smoke as each hedge took on the shape of a pony with a helmet.

“Much better,” said Shadow “now what do you say we go get some lunch? I could really go for an egg salad sandwich right now…”

Meanwhile, inside the castle, Twilight was having a wide variety of difficulties of her own…

“I’m hungry!” Celestia would whine “when do we get to eat?”

“The servants are on their way with your lunch,” said Twilight, a headache slowly turning into a grade A migraine “can you please just wait until then?”

“But I’m hungry now!” Celestia complained, running in circles around Twilight “make the servants come faster!”

“Miss Twilight?” said Luna quietly “can you please make Celestia play with me? I’m getting bored…”

Celestia flopped down on her stomach and crossed her hooves in front of her “I’m going to absolutely faint from hunger!”

Luna quickly clambered onto her sister’s back and started to sing “I’m walking on sunshine! Whoa-oh! I’m walking on sunshine!”

“Stop it!” Celestia shouted, horn sparking uselessly “Don’t make me pull your hair again!”

Luna just kept skipping in place and singing as Celestia grew even angrier. There was a knock on the door and Twilight sighed in relief, running over to open it, a tongue lashing prepared for the bellhop who would make her wait.

“Thank goodness you’re here…” she said as she opened the door, realizing she was really more relieved than angry “I’ve been waiting so… oh… hello Pinkie Pie…”

Indeed it was Pinkie Pie who was standing in the doorway along with about a million technicolored balloons “Hi Twilight!” she said excitedly “I heard you were in here so I thought I’d stop by and say hello!”

“I’m sorry Pinkie, but I’m just incredibly busy right now,” said Twilight “could you do me a favor and talk to the red earth pony with the blue mane? She can tell you what to do with all those balloons.”

“You got it Twilight!” Pinkie said, bouncing away, followed by her utterly silly entourage.

“And if you see the bellhop on your way down, tell him his going to get his flank kicked if he doesn’t hurry up!” Twilight called after the balloon army. She sighed as she turned to where Celestia was chasing a screaming Luna in circles around the room.

“That is it!” Twilight shouted, stopping them both with her magic “You two are going to sit still and behave if it kills me! If either of you tries to hurt the other anymore, I swear I will hold you in status like this for the rest of the night!”

“But miss Twilight…” said Luna innocently “I have to go potty; I can’t do that when I’m hanging here!”

“Then behave!” Twilight shouted “I am not done with this lecture!”

“I really gotta go!” Luna whined, squirming in the air “I’m gonna pee right now!”

Twilight groaned “Fine,” she said, releasing Luna from her magic grip “just make it quick!”

Luna jumped up and kicked Celestia so hard she was knocked out of Twilight’s magic grip. She giggled and ran away before Twilight could grab her again. Celestia started bawling in pain on the floor.

There was a knock on the door “Room service!” came a voice from the other side.

I shudder to say that the poor unicorn being the bellhop today was unprepared to see Twilight burst through the door, mane askew, nostrils flaring.

“You’re late!” she shouted, so loud that a few of the windows shattered “do you have any idea how long I’ve been waiting for you? Why I outta…”

Lightning, meanwhile, was perhaps having the most comparatively normal day of any of them. The party’s checklist was mostly managing itself smoothly, with just a few minor adjustments at least. As lunch time began to roll around again she was found in the upper balcony of the concert hall, arguing with a white unicorn that had a startlingly similar mane to her own, electric blue and wild.

“Just hold on a second…” said Lightning, looking over the list again “You aren’t on here, who hired you?”

“The scratch goes where the music is needed,” said the unicorn casually waving a hoof “let’s just say my job pays for itself pretty well.”

“Vinyl…” said Lightning “I don’t really mean to offend you or anything, but we’re running a delicate operation here, anyone not officially hired to provide a service here has to wait for tomorrow.”

Vinyl adjusted her enormous purple shades and sighed “Alright,” she said frustrated “Pinkie Pie’s paying me to make a surprise entrance after the official announcement, now can I unload my speakers and get going already? I need the practice!”

“I can’t argue with you can I?” asked Lightning, giving up before she had really started “fine, but you’re done at eight, I don’t want dubstep keeping the place awake all night! There are children in this castle I’ll have you know.”

“Well, yeah,” said Vinyl “I’ll be responsible or whatever I guess. When do I get to meet the prince anyway?”

“Shadow’s a busy stallion,” said Lightning curtly “I’m sure he won’t have time…”

“Hey Lightning!” came a voice from the balcony’s entrance “I heard you were up here, I was just going to get lunch, you coming or not?”

Vinyl and Lightning turned to see Shadow standing in the entrance; he walked toward them, squinting a little at Vinyl.

“Hello hot stuff…” said Vinyl, loud enough for Lightning, but not Shadow to hear. She smirked and Lightning rolled her eyes, stupid DJ.

“No way…” said Shadow as he approached “You’re Vinyl Scratch aren’t you! Shadow Chaser, I am a huge fan of yours.”

“Well I guess the prince has some time after all,” said Vinyl smugly “tell you what, let’s all go grab something to eat, we deserve it.” She lowered her shades enough to let Shadow see her pink eyes, and winked.

Lightning’s tail flicked in annoyance, “I thought you had unloading to do…” she said tersely.

“Oh I can wait!” Vinyl said “come on Shadow, tell me about you!”

Shadow turned to lightning who mouthed the word “Lie”. He nodded in agreement, and started talking to Vinyl again.

They swapped stories all the way back down to the dining hall, Shadow’s made up but believable, and Vinyl’s…well…Lightning certainly hoped that they were made up. If this Vinyl character turned out to be any sort of trouble she would definitely be there to nip it in the bud.

“Whoa,” said Vinyl as they entered the hall “this is sweet!”

Lightning’s jaw dropped. The walls had changed from wooden to some sort of purple plastic. Neon lights danced across the now checkered patterned floor and loud dubstep was blasting from some unseen speaker.

“This is like heaven!” Vinyl shouted, dashing out quickly. Shadow and Lightning stared after her, both dumbfounded.

“Is that…white noise…?” Lightning asked slowly.

“Discord!” Shadow shouted, though it was mostly drowned out by the wild music. A few ponies walked out of the hall, looks of disgust on their faces. Lightning apologized to them quickly as Shadow pushed off the ground in search of the draconequis.

Discord was found standing on the ceiling, his pony form abandoned. His arms were crossed in front of him and he was bouncing to the sound of the music.

“Discord!” Shadow shouted, flying steadily nearby “what part of this is in any way under control?”

“Some of these ponies are enjoying themselves,” said Discord, a pair of shades and a jacket appearing on him “I mean look, the ponies that are still here are positively rocking!”

“Yeah, well the rest of the ponies in the hallway have a halfway decent sense of music,” said Shadow angrily “stop this, all of this, now.”

“Fine,” said Discord with a shrug “but I thought you said you liked Vinyl Scratch’s music.” He snapped a clawed hand and the room reverted back to the way it had been before.

“From now on, no messing with the dining hall,” said Shadow angrily “stick to your assignments, we don’t need any more nonsense you got me?”

“Of course, your royal bossy pants!” said Discord, appearing on the ground in his unicorn form once again. He smirked and waved upward before turning and walking smugly out of the hall.

“Yeah! Real mature!” Shadow shouted, flying down “why don’t you come here and say it to my face wise guy?”

“Oh it wasn’t so bad,” said Vinyl walking over to him “sure it was one of my weaker beats but the drops were gorgeous. You guys must have some real wicked subwoofers stashed around here somewhere.”

Shadow turned his attention toward Vinyl “That really was your music?” he asked “I thought you did synth and techno, not dubstep.”

“I did a bit of synth when I started up,” said Vinyl, tilting her head “I haven’t done anything but dubstep in like four years dude, how old are your albums?”

“My dad got them, I wouldn’t know…” said Shadow, hoping desperately he wasn’t letting something slip with those words “it’s a pity, I really like techno.”

“Eh, techno, dubstep, it’s all sweet music, what’s the difference really?” she asked with a shrug.

Shadow’s ear twitched. He thought the difference between techno and dubstep was the difference between good music and bad music. Before he could voice his complaints, however, Lightning had galloped over to join them.

“Okay,” she said “I’ve managed to pacify everyone who was freaking out about the lunch fiasco, but now we’ve got a report going that someone’s let a bunch of show animals loose in the labyrinth, now I’m not sure what to do about that.”

“How soon are you going to be needed again?” asked Shadow “we might have to go after them ourselves. I think Discord can go without being monitored for awhile, I just scolded him after all.”

“I think we can spare some time then…” said Lightning “we’re just monitoring after all; everyone already knows what to do.”

“Don’t jinx it…” Shadow said “If I hadn’t stopped Discord just now who knows what could’ve happened.”

“That was your fault in the first place,” said Lightning “you two were getting awfully chummy. If you had been a little stricter with him he wouldn’t have thought he would get away with that.”

“Look, not that this isn’t exciting and all…” Vinyl piped up “but if y’all don’t mind I’d like the go-ahead to use the concert hall for my afternoon practice session.”

“Fine,” said Lightning “so long as you aren’t bothering anyone I really don’t care where you practice.”

“Alright!” said Vinyl excitedly “It’s the Canterlot Scratch Sessions rocking the castle starting now! Anyone who wants a sweet show should head for the concert hall now!” she proceeded to dash out the door followed by a few excited looking ponies.

Lightning sighed “I hate dubstep…” she said “I don’t get why she’s so popular.”

“I don’t either,” said Shadow “but she did used to do some fun music, not as good as yours maybe but still pretty darn good.”

“Stop it,” said Lightning, despite her smile “come on you big oaf, let’s go deal with the maze problem.”

They fought their way through the crowd of ponies gathered around the hall, many questioning exactly what had transpired inside the dining hall. Lightning moved Shadow forward, who was slightly reluctant to miss the opportunity of being in the spotlight. It took them almost a full ten minutes to get back to the main gate and another idiotically long time to get out through to the gardens.

“I hate these huge crowds!” Lightning exclaimed as they finally separated themselves from the mass of ponies gathered by the main gate and hallway “I swear, if this ever blows over I’m never having another birthday party again as long as I live.”

Shadow pushed his mane out of his eyes for what felt like the thousandth time, it really needed to be cut “If we were usual size we could just duck under every pony’s feet you know?”

“Ew…” said Lightning “that just wouldn’t be right!”

Shadow raised an eyebrow curiously “What’s so bad about it?” he asked.

Lightning blinked, seeming to shake off a sort of trance, “I’m…not sure…” she said dazedly “I have these memories that I don’t know are mine. They keep coming to the surface and I don’t know what to think of it.”

“That’s weird…” Shadow agreed, but when he thought about it more closely he had felt some other sort of familiarity when he’d first talked to Vinyl Scratch, almost like, though he didn’t know to compare, but almost like he was meeting an old friend…

“I saw how well you got along with Vinyl,” said Lightning, a little uncannily “I’m starting to think I know her from somewhere too… And the orchestra pony, Octavia. When I first met her I immediately thought ‘teacher!’ but I’d never seen her before in my life!”

“I don’t know…” said Shadow “I do know I’m really creeped out by this whole thing though… Let’s talk about it later okay? After we get through the maze and…”

“And what?” Lightning asked as he trailed away.

“I…I don’t remember,” said Shadow “I thought something else was going to happen… but I don’t remember…”

“Good,” said Lightning quickly “come on, let’s go, and try not to waste too much time on it okay?”

Shadow nodded as they started down the cobblestone path to the hedge maze. They passed through the sculpture garden with the representation of many famous ponies and ideals. The pedestal where Discord had previously sat was now occupied by the famous replica of the mane six. Much of the sculpture garden and maze had been renovated since the incident with Discord, but there were still some familiar landmarks.

The entrance, for starters, hadn’t changed a bit. The vine covered archway still loomed the same way it had years ago, proud sentinel of the largest maze in all Equestria. Without even a flyover Shadow could tell finding circus animals in here would be little more than folly.

“I don’t know…” said Shadow hesitantly “do you think it’s still worth checking out?”

“I think I deserve a chance to go through the maze after a long day of hard work,” said Lightning “whether I can find animals or not seems suddenly irrelevant.”

They laughed together at this and started down a random passage where the hedges seemed to be in bloom with brilliant roses. They trotted along and laughed together. It seemed that even while heavy snow persisted outside the castle grounds the gardens could remain miraculously untouched.

“So why didn’t you just fly over?” asked Lightning once they were a good ways inside “you could’ve gotten your view of the maze just fine without me you know.”

“I couldn’t risk you getting yourself lost silly,” said Shadow with a smirk “besides I’d have it a bet I would get lonely without you.”

“Aw… how sweet,” said Lightning, an unfamiliar smile gracing her features “I didn’t know you knew how to work with words.”

“I guess I just know what makes ponies tick,” said Shadow with a grin “and I’ve known you for long enough haven’t I? You should be like putty in my hooves.” He laughed and ruffled her mane.

“You wish…” said Lightning, running ahead so she could bat at him with her tail “don’t go getting fun with me Shadow, that’s my job.”

Shadow sneezed “I can see that,” he said with a smirk, wiping his nose “just try not to let playful turn into frisky.” He honestly expected her to blush and turn away at this. To his surprise, she turned and winked at him.

“Maybe I’ve already decided to get frisky…” she said mysteriously, then walked ahead without elaborating. Shadow suddenly found himself in the most inconvenient position of embarrassment. What the hay had she meant by that…?

As he turned the next corner after Lightning he was met with a sight he was totally unprepared for. They had entered a wide open, circular portion of the maze. Apple trees lined the hedges in every color apples could be in, as well as a few he was sure they didn’t. There was a clear, sparkling lake in the center, perfectly symmetrical and glistening with the noonday sun, not a single ripple marring the surface. Huge stone statues, not unlike the ones from the sculpture garden stood along the edge of the lake. Rather than merely famous ponies, however, these statues depicted characters that were nothing short of legendary.

“No way…” said Lightning, walking around in wonder “I didn’t even know these existed!” I only recognize the princesses, and Discord I suppose.”

“This guy looks pretty cool,” said Shadow, indicating a large stallion in heavy looking armor, the horn on his head almost looked like a claw.

Lightning had walked right up to the lake and looked into the still water. She was clearly reluctant to disturb the crystal-smooth surface “Come here and have a look at this, Shadow.” She said “I can see my reflection so perfectly in the water.”

Shadow walked over and took a look for himself. Indeed it was interesting just how pristine and reflective it was. A gust of wind passing sent his mane back into his eyes but it didn’t disturb the lake at all. It was one thing to be pretty, but this was starting to get downright creepy.

Providing an interesting parallel, he now noticed Lightning’s reflection staring at his own. When he looked up he found her face uncomfortably close. He quickly took a step back, mumbling a hasty apology.

“What is it with you today?” asked Lightning with a giggle “You’re acting like a school colt with a crush. Did you hit your head when I wasn’t looking?”

Shadow mentally shook himself, realizing she was right “Nah,” he said “I’m fine… I guess I’m just not myself today…”

“Oh, that’s a shame,” said Lightning, stepping closer again “I was really starting to like you today…”

Shadow found his wings growing uncomfortably stiff now. There wasn’t any problem with what Lightning was saying, but some part of his mind seemed to totally reject it. She was his best, his only friend. This was far from a problematic direction, at least in his mind. Then what was this strange force screaming at him to stop…?

They were painfully close to each other now. They could feel each other’s breath on their faces. Blue eyes met red, both seeming to be in a trance. Finally, Lightning pushed forward through the haze, moving right toward Shadow.

And Shadow jerked back. He wasn’t sure why he did it, he knew more than anything else he didn’t want to do it. He felt like screaming out for backing away. It was an instinctive movement, but shouldn’t an instinctive movement have brought him forward?

“Why did you stop…?” Lightning asked, sounding hurt “I thought… we were…why…?”

He wanted to say he didn’t know, he wanted to say he was sorry, he wanted to say something, anything to salvage the moment. His mouth moved, ready to apologize, to make something of the situation before it shot past him. Instead, one word rolled off his tongue.

“Iris…” he said.

“Who’s Iris?” Lightning asked.

And just like that he didn’t know. He cursed at the barriers in his mind and further at the unknown memories that were blocking. It was an awful tantalizing feeling as he sensed the words drip out of his mouth from some unknown tap in his brain, stuck open and impossible to close.

“Lightning… I love you,” said Shadow, not even sure he knew what he was saying “Like a sister. You’re like a sister to me, and I wouldn’t trade that for the world…”

Lightning’s ears fell flat against her head. It was clear she was trying to be angry with him, but was only finding emotions of bleak disappointment. “Oh…” she said “That… that makes sense…” she turned on a dime and walked blindly forward into the statue of Luna.

Shadow couldn’t help feeling guilty at this. Of all the things he could’ve said…Of course now would be the time for his brain to lose all function and start babbling inane nonsense. He didn’t even know anyone named Iris!

There was a huge thud directly ahead of him, halting his train of thought like a tree along the tracks. He looked up to see Lightning’s accidental bump had completely toppled the statue of Luna. Her strength already scared him a little, but that little display was nothing but impressive.

“Oops…” said Lightning vaguely, looking at the single wing protruding from the now rippling water “that was a mistake…”

Shadow felt a little uneasy at this motion, that pool just didn’t seem like it should be disturbed. The awkwardness of this situation as well was reaching an unparalleled echelon. Lightning was deeply wounded emotionally, that was obvious. And this dumb mental barrier was blocking him from speaking the only words he knew would console her, as if the situation wasn’t already lost long ago…

Their attentions simultaneously turned back to the lake from which a huge plop had resounded. The part of the Luna statue that had still stuck up out of the water had been sucked under into the water which returned to its pristine condition.

“Lightning…” said Shadow slowly “I think we have a problem…”

Their eyes snapped back to the exit, which had vanished, replaced by a solid wall of hedge. Shadow looked around for possible escape, but the paths around were quickly growing up with new plant life. The sun was suddenly shadowed, and he was afraid to look up to see just what it was.

“Dome!” Lightning screamed, looking up to the huge cover of vines and ivy that had crossed the space overhead “What are we gonna do? We can’t survive if we’re trapped in here! What will we eat? We’re doomed!”

“We’re not doomed!” Shadow said, forcing himself once again to be the calm one “We have plenty of water, and in case you didn’t notice we’re surrounded by apple trees. Someone will come find us before tomorrow, some unicorn who knows how to reverse whatever’s going on here.”

Lightning started to calm down again, much to Shadow’s relief. “You’re right…” she said “you…always know what to say when I panic…” she suddenly threw her hooves around him, a wide smile on her face “Thank you… brother…”

Shadow blinked, returning the hug on instincts which had thus far failed him. She suddenly understood now? What was going on today? He jumped suddenly as he felt water touch his hoof.

They looked back to the lake now, and almost instantly felt the need to panic again. The water, which was now glowing a faint blue, had begun to swell in volume, bursting the bank and flooding toward them. They made a dash for the hedge, which proved impassable as the water flooded against it and began to rise.

“Quick,” said Shadow “get on my back, while my wings are still dry!”

Lightning sensed the urgency and leapt onto him swiftly, not that she would’ve had the time to argue as the water quickly swelled to knee high. Shadow managed to push up out of the water and they flew up to the dome, determined to put off the inevitable for as long as possible.

Shadow started pounding against the vines as hard as his desperation would allow. “Break!” he wailed “Celestia damn you just break!”

“Shadow…” Lightning said worriedly “the water’s almost here…”

It was giving, he could feel the vines push away from the offending pounding. He was so close, he could see the green outline of the castle. He very nearly cried out as the water touched him.

“I don’t want this!” Lightning burst into tears “I just wish we were still foals, where the biggest adventure was skipping school! I wish with all my heart! I just want to be a little girl again!”

The water finally reached the point above their heads, just as Shadow pushed through the vines. He gasped in a burst of bubbles, exultation turning to horrified anguish as he realized the miniscule hole he had made would not be enough to escape through. And the water escaping it was doing nothing to quell the oncoming mass. He stared back at Lightning, for what he was sure would be the very last time, and felt the world go dark.

A child's mind

Vinyl stood excitedly over the turntables, she had moved up to the balcony of the main hall, letting Octavia take the soundproof concert hall for her silly orchestra. It was beautiful music in its own right, sure, or else she may have bullied her out of it, but the world really did need the miracle of her dubstep.

Unfortunately for her, however, the balcony was inconveniently situated. It may have been the center of the hall at some point in time, but since then some expansion or other had been made, placing it closer to the western end of the hall. That didn’t stop her of course, quite the contrary, the spectacular view of the gardens from this vantage was giving her a flood of inspiration. She was typing in the keystrokes for some of the synthetic instruments she hadn’t touched in absolute ages.

She smiled at the quizzical looks she was getting from below, it was completely understandable of course, from that point it must have seemed like a ghostly orchestra had entered the hall with all the whistles bells and trumpets. It took a great deal of guessing to discover the mare, who looked more suited to entirely electronic sounds, was the one conducting the virtual symphony.

That Shadow guy may have been onto something when he said her synth was better than her dubstep. It was certainly attracting a great deal more positive attention. She liked the feeling, it was the same positive undertone and sweep of pride she felt at her usual concerts, but today it was spiced with a whole new wave of ideas and emotions. On something of a reminiscent whim she pulled up an old file she had very nearly forgotten about. Her first file, the music she had played to earn the double eighth note that was so very proudly emblazoned on her flanks.

There was a moment’s hesitation before she actually went about loading the sound. It almost didn’t seem right to be playing this piece now in front of all those ponies. She felt trapped under a brilliant luminescent spotlight that could somehow put her soul on display for all to see.

And suddenly it was playing. She gasped, unsure if she had actually pressed the start button, but her hoof was squarely on the spacebar. The sound rose up and over the hall to hang like a cloud of sound, ready to burst, the sound falling down onto the crowd like a lovely springtime shower. It was heaven, and she realized that not only was this her starting point, it was the final piece that fused all her music together. Her only regret was that her words and singing would never extend past this little booth.

Vinyl turned the music down and looked out the arching window once again. A blue glow had coalesced over the garden now, which her eyes read as the sun slowly moving to the afternoon position. It was such a fantastic sight, just like it had been when she played for the royal wedding. Thinking back, she really owed Pinkie Pie for that little gig. It had been her big break, and now she was the hottest thing in Canterlot, if she were honest with herself, this castle performance seemed like more of a sentimental game than a real gig. Its pay had been very low considering her demand…

There was a sudden crash, stirring Vinyl from her reverie to look at the window. Blue water had inexplicably started to pour through a large crack in the glass. She looked up to see a fantastic arch of water connecting the window to some far distant portion of the gardens. Canterlot was just as full of surprises as usual…

She grunted slightly as her hoof touched the water and instantly became sore. Whatever magic was in that water it was painful. The exit to the balcony was already supporting a makeshift waterfall of the stuff, but the only other way down without touching the poison would be to jump, and that was of course insanity.

There was another tug as her hoof touched the water again. Sure it wasn’t comfortable to touché, but what could a little water really do to her? She started walking back downstairs, ignoring the growing pain and steadily intensifying sense of vertigo. The ground seemed to shoot downward far more than it should have ever time she took a step. What the heck was this stuff? It made it seem like the ground was shooting toward her…

Vinyl tumbled down the last few stairs and collapsed, groaning as she felt her forehead touch the ground. The ground seemed so close even at the height of her fall. She needed help, and tried to call out, but the only sound that emerged was a sort of most unlike her squeak. As a matter of fact she hadn’t made that noise since…

Completely unaware of the poor DJ lying unconscious on the stairway in the main hall, Twilight desperately read the seventh book she had managed to dig up on aging spells. It would’ve been grossly uninformative anyway, even if she wasn’t continually distracted by the two fillyfied princesses running amok around the throne room. The day was starting to wane and she still had no idea how to reverse this spell. If it had just been normal ponies she could’ve done the age spell without overmuch trouble, but this was a most unusual magic working on the princesses, and magic was difficult to perform on an alicorn anyway.

Twilight sighed, at the very least she could’ve returned Lightning and Shadow to their younger forms. Celestia and Luna seemed to have no memory of the days before their foal hood. Based on this there was a very good chance that the two in the same situation running the entire operation might be having memories from some point in the future. That could be devastating, but right now she needed the monitors right where they were.

“Miss Twilight,” came Luna’s voice, a bit more respectful since her earlier outburst “I have to…”

“You know where the chamber pots are,” said Twilight patiently “when you have to relieve yourself you do not have to ask for permission.”

“Thank you Miss Twilight,” said Luna, bowing and scurrying off again. Twilight smiled, Luna really was sweet when she managed to behave herself. Celestia wasn’t a terror anymore either, though she was rather reclusive after her fierce scolding. She had been brushing her mane in silence for almost an hour now, totally silent as she fumbled with the comb, not used to her lack of magic. Twilight had offered to help a few times, but had been rebuffed.

“I can do it myself,” Celestia had said angrily “I’m not a baby Twilight!”

No, that was true, but she did look like she would need help if this disastrous mane incident continued. Twilight’s mind snapped back to the two foals in adult pony bodies. If she knew memory spells, which she felt she knew very well, they would be having future memories bubbling through by now. That spell needed to be reversed, and soon, or there might be unexpected consequences…

There was a knock on the door and Twilight quickly cracked it open, surprised to come face to face with an all too familiar brown unicorn. “Discord!” she exclaimed, trying not to sound offensive “What are you doing here…?”

“I’ve finished my tasks for today,” said Discord in a tone Twilight couldn’t read into at all “and I’d like to report a slight problem…”

Discord was actually reporting a problem? The prospect of something that bad made Twilight’s stomach turn into uncomfortable knots. “What is it?” she asked, her air of professionalism cracking slightly under the pressure.

“It’s the prince,” said Discord uneasily, “he and his friend went into the gardens just after noon and haven’t returned. I believe it may be necessary to send a search party. I am… quite worried about them…” He seemed reluctant to say this last bit, obviously embarrassed.

Twilight smiled “It’s not shameful to have friends, Discord,” she said happily “You have my permission to do whatever you deem necessary in order to find them. I can tell that you’re very worried.”

“Thank you!” said Discord, in a tone of barely contained relief “I hope nothing’s happened to them… I should leave now.”

“One moment!” said Twilight as Discord turned to leave “The aging spell may be effecting their memory in an incredibly derogatory fashion, and I have to reverse it as soon as possible.

“You want me to bring them to you,” Discord finished for her “I suspect I would’ve anyway, I would hate for anything bad to come of this situation, certainly not anything worse than it may already have become.”

“Thank you Discord,” said Twilight, amazed at her own ability to say these words.

“It’s no trouble of course,” said Discord, waving to Luna who had just returned to view “especially considering the predicament you’ve been in yourself all day. Hello little princess.”

“Hi mister old pony!” said Luna, waving back.

Discord’s eye twitched slightly, he was clearly irked by this comment but trying hard not to show that it bothered him “I really should get going now Twilight,” said Discord respectfully “good luck, and good night.”

“And to you as well,” said Twilight pleasantly, shutting the door as the lord of chaos walked away. It was a good feeling to have real faith that Discord was truly reformed at long last. She had never actually trusted him until now, keeping Celestia’s warning to keep the elements on hoof.

The elements brought up another thought. As the element of magic she was the key that truly held the elements together. Now she was a princess, would she effectively be able to fulfill that role? She would have to talk to the princesses about finding the new elements of harmony as soon as they had their memory back.

“Is the Prince’s memory gonna go boom?” asked Luna innocently, clearly having attained a limited knowledge of what was going on.

Twilight couldn’t help but giggle, Luna really was irresistible as an adorable little filly. “No sweetheart,” she said, resisting the urge to pick her up for a cuddle “The prince’s memory will not go boom…” her tone shifted sharply as she suddenly realized the solution for their problem had been drifting through the conversation this whole time.

“Luna sweetie,” said Twilight, horn beginning to glow a strong purple “can you please sit still for me? This won’t hurt a bit.”

Perhaps if Discord had been paying more attention to his surroundings as he started to patrol the halls, he would’ve seen the white unicorn wake up from her blackout and stumble toward the door. He was otherwise engaged, however, shedding his pony form and beginning to snake his way about the castle. The prince had to be found, it was an absolute necessity.

As he started down another hallway, rolling an eyeball to the end of it just to make sure no one was watching. His tail reached inconspicuously around the corner to scratch a small, complex rune in the corner. Yes…the prince absolutely had to be found…he was so vastly critical to the operation.

“Yes,” said Discord, retrieving his eyeball “but this is only the first of many…” his tail waved over the rune, causing it to vanish instantly.

The sun was fast approaching the furthest edge of the horizon as Discord walked outside. Seemingly on cue, a hooded pony figure slunk out of the Shadows. He had no obvious features, but based on his height it could be assumed he was a stallion.

“Status, Discord?”

“You may tell the queen that operation Everfree is ready to enter stage two,” Discord said smugly “everything has been taken care of. I will begin tomorrow on schedule.”

“I will alert the queen on my own time, for now it would be wiser to confirm the success of stage one. You have, in the past, proven to be overly confident and easily defeated when the conditions slide out of your favor.”

Discord’s horse-like muzzle took on the shape of a scowl. “Oh please,” he said “I’ve only ever lost once. Believe me, as the first to ever be working an inside job within Canterlot, I cannot fail.”

“It’s exactly that attitude that jeopardizes everything we work so hard to put in motion. You’ve only served to increase my doubt of your abilities. The queen will be alerted after stage one is complete.”

“Oh I will show you…” said Discord angrily “you’ll regret assigning me to stage one. I’ll do this job perfectly.”

“That is my assumption. You would be advised to not let me down. Now get back to work.”

The hooded form was suddenly gone. Discord was used to his mode of transport by now. The pony did not teleport like a normal pony would. When he was done with somewhere he simply wouldn’t be there anymore, and begin again in the next place.

If the princess knew who was on her castle grounds at such a time, or even at all for that matter, she would have been mortified. Even the alicorns knew terror at his name…

The slowly setting sun descended at the perfect angle to fall directly into the fatigued eyes of the small gray colt, asleep on the castle grounds. He wasn’t sure where he was, nor did he know how he might’ve gotten to this spot, or why he was soaked to the bone when there was apparently no water nearby. This poor colt was so completely disoriented by recent events he wasn’t even sure what the light now shining in his eyes was.

As he opened his eyes, he found he could see almost nothing. The light of the orb he now remembered to be the sun, was glaring in exactly the wrong spot. He snapped his eyes closed again, blocking the painful beams. He took a moment to find his strength, then stood shakily on his four hooves, wings flaring out instinctively to help him hold his balance.

“I think it’s about time to figure out where I am…” he thought in a haze “Grass…what does grass mean? It means I’m in a field. Water, I’m covered in water, was I swimming? Drowning maybe? But how could there be enough water for me to drown in an open field?”

Fur suddenly connected with his back legs, and his eyes snapped open, completely forgetting the piercing sunlight. The image of the red pelt was enough to send his memory flooding back. They had drowned! But if that was true, where were they now…? This wasn’t the eternal herd was it?

“Lightning!” he shouted in a high pitched, childish voice “Lightning! Come on! Wake up! Something’s happened!”

Shadow suddenly found himself being blown over with the force of a small train. Lightning had tackled him in less than an instant. She stood triumphantly, pinning him to the ground with a look of smug assurance.

“You should see your face!” she snickered “You sure didn’t see that coming did you? Can you believe it Shadow? We’re foals again! The spell must have been reversed by the magic water! We’re back to normal!”

Lightning’s inane babbling, now there was a familiar sound to shake off the last traces of remaining disconcertion. He tried to shrug her off but her hooves were pressing his wings painfully into the ground.

“Hey Light…” he said, cutting into her monologue “could you let me up? This actually really hurts…”

“Oh yeah…sorry…” said Lightning, stepping off of him “You don’t think we missed the party do you? That would be awful if we did…”

“The sun is setting…” said Shadow “See? It’s in the west. That means it’s probably still the same day we were checking the party stuff. Do you think all those chores will have taken care of themselves?”

“I’m worried about Discord…” said Lightning “most of my stuff was alright on its own, but Discord could get out of control.”

Shadow nodded, looking to his left to see the labyrinth at least a full hoofball field’s length away. “How did we get all the way over here?” he asked curiously.

“I was thinking about that too…” said Lightning “I think that as we got smaller in the water we were finally able to get out the hole you made in the dome. The water had to have been spouting out really fast, I mean look! It broke a window!”

Shadow looked at where Lightning was pointing to see one of the high windows had a large cracked hole in it. He doubted that water could make that ridiculous of a journey with that much force, but they had to have been expelled somehow. There was visible liquid glinting on the glass too, could it really…?

“I know,” said Lightning with a giggle “that was pretty much the awesomest thing ever!”

“Awesomest isn’t a word…” said Shadow “I think a better word would be…” he trailed off “never mind let’s just pretend it is a word.”

They both fell over giggling for a minute, but recovered quickly as Lightning suddenly gasped “Look!” she exclaimed “look, up there on the tower! The moon’s starting to rise!”

A small purple figure was indeed floating above the celestial platform, barely visible from so far below. As the shape ascended steadily into the air they recognized the rising moon on the distant horizon. It wasn’t quite as magical as when they had seen the spectacle up close, but moonrise was still marvelous.

Lightning suddenly wrapped her hooves around Shadow’s neck, looking him in the eye “Brother and sister, you and me, from now on.”

“Brother and sister,” said Shadow, returning the hug, “forever and ever!”

Lightning smiled, “Thanks BBBFF…”

“Oh come on,” said Shadow, blushing “I’m only a few months older than you..”

“I like big brothers,” said Lightning, giggling even more “and trust me; I’ve had a lot of experience with them.”

“Well lucky you,” said Shadow, rolling his eyes exaggeratedly “but seriously, we need to get back to the castle. Do you have any idea how worried mom must be?”

“Mom is our age…” said Lightning.

“Oh yeah…” said Shadow, dears drooping “that sucks…” he paused “Did you just call her mom too?”

“Well you are my brother now you know,” said Lightning “you have to share.”

Shadow shrugged, not really knowing how to respond to that, he instead turned his attention back to the castle. “We really should get going,’ he said “Twilight will probably kill us for being late or not finishing the checklist… or breaking the window…”

“Maybe we should just stay here…” said Lightning.

“Nah,” said Shadow “I’m so hungry I could eat a whole apple tree.”

“Oh yeah?” said Lightning “Well I’m so hungry I could eat the castle! If it were made out of gingerbread anyway…”

“That would be awesome…” said Shadow whimsically “a real life-sized house made out of gingerbread…”

“Stop it…” Lightning whined “You’re only making me hungrier…” Almost on cue her stomach released a growl. Shadow laughed until his did the same, causing them both to fall into conniptions yet again.

“Hey!” came a sudden high pitched voice “What the hay do you think you’re doing?”

Shadow looked up and squinted into the gathering darkness from where the voice had come from. He could make out the figure of a unicorn running toward them. A wild mane came into focus as the figure drew closer.

“Is that…Vinyl?” asked Lightning.

“I don’t know,” said Shadow, trying to get a better look “She still looks pretty far…” he was cut off as a bolt of white suddenly barreled into him, followed by a barrage of stamping hooves.

“What the hay!” Lightning exclaimed, trying to extricate the newcomer “What do you think you’re doing?”

It was obvious what Vinyl was doing, for indeed it was Vinyl. She was trying to beat Shadow into a pulp. “You did this to me!” she shouted in a high voice that cracked with every other word “You did this to me! I know you did this to me! The same thing happened to you! I’m going to…”

Lightning finally managed to dragon Vinyl off of Shadow, who honestly looked more shocked than injured or afraid, and for very good reason. The vinyl Scratch who was being held at a distance was very different from the one they had met earlier. She was their height now; her mane looked more like a frizz than an intentional mess. The shades she had been wearing were gone, revealing the soft pink eyes underneath.

“Let go of me!” Vinyl Shouted “I’m going to beat him black and blue! How am I supposed to do magic like this? My career is over you evil jerk!”

Vinyl suddenly went limp in Lightning’s arms, anger transforming into wracking sobs. “Why?” she wailed pitifully “Why did this have to happen to me…?”

“Shh…Vinyl…” said Lightning, trying to sound soothing “It’s going to be okay. Can you tell us what happened?”

Vinyl wriggled out of Lightning’s grip and glared at Shadow. “I was just minding my own business, making some awesome music on the balcony, and then I hear the window behind me shatter! All this water started pouring in from the hole; I don’t even know where it came from!”

Lightning and Shadow simultaneously looked back over to the broken window; they could guess the rest before Vinyl elaborated. “I tried ignoring it for awhile,” she said “but then it started getting on my hooves and it felt all tingly. I started running down the stairs for help, but then I got vertigo and I fell down the stairs and blacked out.”

“Are you okay?” Shadow asked reflexively.

“Fine,” Vinyl grumbled “I woke up like an hour later with this splitting headache. I came out to find where the crazy magic water was coming from, and I realized I was like this! My magic’s shot and I’m too short to even get up to a turntable!”

“Well at least you’re cuter…” said Shadow, completely platonically.

“I am not cute!” Vinyl nothing short of screamed at him “I want you to change me back right now!”

“Calm down!” Shadow exclaimed, raising a hoof in case she tried to attack him again “It’s not like we did this on purpose. We should go talk to Twilight; she would know how to reverse the spell or whatever it is.”

“You think she’ll do it?” asked Lightning worriedly “we’re going to be in really big trouble with her already…”

“What do you mean you’re going to be in trouble with her?” asked Vinyl hysterically “I’m not going to go down because you’re pissing off the princess!”

“Vinyl!” Lightning exclaimed “Language!”

“Sorry!” Vinyl drawled “As if I care, look what you’ve gotten me into! If you can’t reverse this, I’ll…I’ll…” she trailed off, voice breaking “I don’t know what I’ll do…”

“Don’t worry,” said Shadow reassuringly “We’ll get this figured out. You’ll be rocking out tomorrow at the party, I promise!”

Vinyl turned, eyes glinting with the tears she refused to shed. “You…you better!” she exclaimed, giving him one more kick for good measure.

Shadow winced, but managed to force a smirk “I never break a promise…” he said.

“Would you slowpokes come on?” Lightning said exasperatedly “We’ll never know unless we hurry up and find Twilight. If they don’t have a search party out for us already…”

So they returned to the castle, lucky that they were on the right side of the moat or else it was probable they wouldn’t have made it at all. They saw no sign of the search party, or really any pony at all. The outlines of the whimsical decorations were just barely visible in the dim light as they walked past, not a single detail being divulged in the darkness.

They did end up getting lost in a variety of situations. Shadow, at least, was staggered by the sheer number of guest rooms. At Vinyl’s suggestion they had begun to throw open random doors in their effort to find the throne room, but all this had achieved was the discovery of many of the ponies staying the night for the next day’s excitement.

“I told you that was a bad idea,” said Shadow as Vinyl slammed yet another door and another utterly bewildered pony “I’m telling you, it’s a big red door with little golden orbs in it.”

“And I’m telling you I don’t know what that would look like,” said Vinyl, her exaggerated eye roll further emphasizing the absence of her shades “So I’m just going to try all of them.”

“The last door you tried was blue…” said Shadow “how could that possibly be the red door?”

“As if I listened to your description,” said Vinyl infuriatingly “anyway, you sent thunder ahead to go look for it; we’re pretty much just killing time right now aren’t we?”

“No…” said Shadow, getting very annoyed by now “Lightning is ahead of us because she walks faster, we are still trying to find the…”

“Found it!” came Lightning’s voice from far ahead in the hall “we must have walked past it in the dark like five times! Would you two quit flirting back there and hurry up?”

Vinyl blushed wildly at this, to which Shadow very nearly lost his cool. This was the second girl to display the obvious signs of a crush on him today. The cootie content must have been enormous! He took wing quick as a wink and flew ahead of Vinyl to catch up with Lightning.

“Gosh you left her in the dust,” said Lightning, looking past Shadow as he approached “what did she do, bite you?”

“Let’s not talk about it…” grumbled Shadow “Did you knock or anything?”

“Well I was kind of waiting for you two to catch up…” said Lightning, clearly hesitant to place her hoof on the gigantic door.

Vinyl finally managed to catch up to them, panting hard. “How…do you guys…run so…fast?” she said between shaky gasps.

“He doesn’t,” said Lightning, pointing to Shadow “The only way he’s ever able to keep up with me is by flying.”

“Which I am not half bad at,” Shadow punctuated his self-assuring sentence by spreading his wings to their fullest extent “I’ve been told I have the wings of a pony twice my size! I’m going to be able to fly faster than you could ever hope to run!”

Lightning stamped her hoof on the ground “We are not going to have this argument again…” she said, clearly annoyed “we’ve established this so many times already. You can fly; I can run and kick things. I’m just a little bit better than you at what I do.”

“Shouldn’t we maybe go in…?” asked Vinyl, hoping to quell the argument. Quite the contrary however, Lightning turned on her next.

“And you have your magic right?” she said “Everyone is equal! No need to talk bad about any pony for any reason!”

Vinyl really didn’t feel the need to mention her magical ineptitude since her reverse aging, and fortunately the need didn’t arise. At that moment the giant red door was flung wide and Twilight walked out. “My goodness!” she said “what are you three making such a ruckus for…? Shadow? Lightning? Discord just went looking for you…”

“These two idiots were passed out in the courtyard,” said Vinyl, clearly demonstrating a disregard for authority “I’m not surprised you sent some pony after them. Now can we please deal with the problem at hoof?”

“Yes, yes,” said Twilight “Come on in, who’s your new friend Shadow?”

“Oh, funny story,” said Shadow, rubbing the back of his neck “we got into kind of a mishap in the garden…this is actually Vinyl Scratch…”

Twilight tilted her head as they entered the room, wondering if she should know this name or not when she gasped “You two are back to normal!” she exclaimed “how did you reverse the spell?” The fact of course, hadn’t immediately registered because of how little time she had seen them as adults, and probably how little she had talked to them at all.

“Hold up…” said Vinyl slowly “Back to normal? What is that supposed to mean?”

“Oh yeah…” said Lightning “Vinyl doesn’t know does she…?”

“What don’t I know?” Vinyl asked indignantly “You dragged me into this mess, you have to tell me everything!”

“We’re actually supposed to be this age,” said Shadow bluntly “it’s not the first age spell we’ve gotten into…today…”

Vinyl looked like she was on the verge of fainting. “No way…” she said slowly “and I was planning on sleeping with him… maybe both of you…”

Twilight began to splutter, while a totally oblivious Lightning merely gave her a curious look “Well Shadow’s got a really big bed in his room I’m guessing, you still could if you really wanted to…”

Shadow, noticing Twilight’s violent reaction, queried further “Is there something wrong with that or something?”

“Well it’s not just…” Vinyl began, but paused “There’s… something else… I think…?”

Lightning and Shadow both gave her a look that plainly read “What are you? Crazy?” while Vinyl shook her head, trying hard to remember.

“She’s not supposed to be your age is she?” asked Twilight, regaining her composure “Whatever you two did to reverse the spell, she got caught up in it too didn’t she?”

Shadow and Lightning looked at each other guiltily “You can change me back though right princess?” Vinyl asked desperately “Come on please? You’ll get tickets to all my concerts ever, free of charge!”

Twilight’s horn glowed dimly, seeming to in a way taste the air around her, probing the magical charge. “This is an interesting signature…” she said musingly “it’s similar to the first age spell, old arcane magic. But somehow it’s even more complex than the one from before…”

“You can still fix it can’t you?” asked Vinyl “Please tell me you can fix it!”

Twilight shook her head slowly “I’m sorry,” she said “I couldn’t even reverse the first spell. My specialty is modern magic, I’m not sure any mage still alive could reverse this spell…”

Vinyl looked crushed, beyond crushed even. Her face paled beyond its usual white and her legs gave way. “No…” she said slowly, tears finally releasing and dripping off her face “this can’t be happening!”

“No!” Shadow shouted, holding back the squeak in his voice “I promised Vinyl she would be able to play her music tomorrow and she will!”

“Shadow, I’m sorry,” said Twilight “but there’s really nothing I can do right now. Once the princesses have fully recovered they may be able to help, but until then…”

Shadow moved to try and comfort Vinyl, who had lost all control and now burst into tears. Twilight turned her attention to Lightning again, a curious glint in her eye “Could you tell me where you got that necklace?” she asked.

“Oh!” said Lightning, having almost forgotten about the little blue gem “I don’t really remember, I just kind of picked it up the other day. Why? Is it important?”

“I just noticed it’s charged with a huge amount of magical energy,” said Twilight, bending down for a closer look “I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s like some sort of self replenishing manna battery…”

“Is it dangerous…?” asked Lightning, looking down at the gem hesitantly.

“I don’t believe so,” said Twilight, horn glowing lightly again “it seems to give a steady flow of magical power to the user. It may be slightly redundant given the fact that you’re an earth pony, but I don’t have any reason to believe it will hurt you.”

Shadow’s ears suddenly perked up. He stood up and looked quickly toward Lightning “Give me the necklace,” he said “Now!”

“Shadow,” said Lightning, “did you not just hear Twilight? This won’t hurt me!”

“Just give me the necklace!” Shadow exclaimed.

A little intimidated by the intensity of his demand, Lightning quickly brought the necklace up over her head. The moment it had cleared her mane her eyes flashed from blue to green. Shadow was a little surprised by this, but he was on a hot streak and was willing to ignore it. He snatched the necklace quickly from lightning and walked back over to Vinyl.

“Hey Vinyl,” he said “Can you lift your head up for me?”

She didn’t really comprehend what he was saying through her haze of tears, but she did raise her head up to look at him. Thinking she had heard him he quickly slipped the necklace over her head. He watched curiously as Vinyl’s eyes shifted from pink to blue.

“What did you…?” Vinyl started to ask.

“No questions!” said Shadow “Try to lift something with magic, no questions!” he repeated as it looked like Vinyl was ready to interject again.

Vinyl stood, a bit unsure as to why Shadow was so determined in this. She had, unfortunately, been too busy wallowing in self-pity to hear Twilight’s talk. She focused, the familiar magical sensation seeping into her horn and causing it to glow a pleasing blue. It was familiar, but she knew it was still futile; her magic was that of a young filly again. As she focuses randomly on a book laying open a few feet away she didn’t have any real hope of moving it.

Shadow almost laughed at Vinyl’s gasp. A book that had been left on the floor (probably by Twilight) was floating in the air, surrounded by an ice blue aura. Lightning too let out a little gasp, knowing that even older unicorns like Sweetie Belle were only just learning their magic. That gem was powerful, powerful enough to enhance a young unicorn’s magic by several years.

Vinyl let out an excited squee, proceeding to send a few more random objects floating around. She finally caught Shadow in a telekinetic grip and dragged him into a hug. “Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you!” she squeaked, barely containing a bubbly giggle “I can spin my records again! You’re even better than the princess! Thank you so much!”

Twilight tried not to be overly offended by this, but still felt the need to intervene. “Alright, alright,” she said “I know everyone’s happy to have a happy ending but it’s too late to be playing dubstep. Come on Shadow, Luna had a room set up for you.”

“Oh yeah,” said Lightning, looking around the throne room “where did the princesses go? Did you manage to fix them?”

“What’s wrong with the princesses?” asked Vinyl, who was still holding onto a struggling Shadow with her magic.

“Nothing,” said Twilight, turning to the door “Come on then, I suppose these two will want to be in the same room?”

“Definitely!” Lightning exclaimed “Vinyl, can you please let go of Shadow? I think you’re strangling him.”

“Woops,” said Vinyl, having completely forgotten about her psychic hold “sorry about that, I didn’t mean to.” Shadow dropped with a thud to the floor a few inches beneath, breathing hard.

“Be more careful…” he muttered as they followed Twilight out the door.

Looking at the castle from the main gate an observer would be able to see two towers on either side. A clever observer could realize that these towers were built for the purpose of housing the princesses during their hours of sleep, assuming they had any. A view from the gardens, or maybe a glimpse from a pegasi’s vantage, would’ve revealed the two smaller towers on either side of the castle’s rear. These towers were designed more for architectural symmetry than any other purpose, and occasionally delegates from other countries would have the privilege of staying in that tower.

Of course it had been centuries ago that the castle was built and in the most recent decades one of these towers had been home to a young alicorn princess the princess of the crystal empire as a matter of fact. As it was, since whisper of the new prince had spread throughout the caste, none of the servants assigned to make the adjacent tower hospitable were surprised in the slightest. Quite the contrary, it had become something of a contest among the servants to see which accommodations the young prince would favor.

The young prince, as a matter of fact, found this a challenge himself. Shadow was met with a sort of sensory overload as Twilight opened the door to his new room. It was larger than his whole house, but at this that didn’t even faze him. What did shock him was the useless number of things neatly organized within.

There were, as a matter of fact, five beds, a huge plush bed with an overhead canopy with two sets of bunk beds, one on either side. All the blankets were done in the same royal blue that Shadow had started to associate with Luna, as well as the pillows and the half a dozen bean bags scattered around the foot of the bed. One corner of the room was piled high with stuffed animals of very size and species from alligators to timber wolves. The entire pile, however, was dwarfed in comparison by a massive teddy ursa leaning against the wall, at least six feet tall.

A plasma television was hooked up to another wall with a variety of video game systems attached to it, some of which Shadow didn’t even know the name of. There was both a popcorn machine and a soda fountain plugged in nearby and fifteen or so theatre seats were lined up in front of the television. Turning a full circle upon entry revealed the last wall to not be a wall at all, but a solid bookshelf with every shelf completely filled. Even the doorway was a swinging bookshelf.

“Well?” asked Twilight, leading the three inside “What do you all think?”

She was greeted with little more than a stunned silence. Shadow, Lightning, and Vinyl were turning around and around, trying just to see everything the room had to offer, not even bothering to try and comprehend it just yet.

“That’s a coltari 2100…” Shadow nearly drooled “that system isn’t supposed to be out for another two years…”

“Look at those speakers…” Vinyl said dreamily “I bet the bass on that is huge!”

“Teddy ursa!” Lightning squeed.

“The television plays video games, movies, and music CDs,” Twilight began to explain “3D glasses and controllers are in the tray underneath it. Popcorn, butter, and salt are all stored inside the machine. The books are most of the library’s children’s section as well as a few reference books all recopied. The room still has a little space if there’s anything else you want moved in here and you have a lever next to the bed that calls people in here. To open the door you pull on the book titled Fallout Equestria. You got all that?”

Shadow nodded vaguely, more worried about what he was going to do first than any of Twilight’s silly rules.

“I bet I can beat you at Fighting is Magic!” Vinyl shattered the silence and made a dash for the television.

“Oh filly please,” said Lightning, darting over to join her “I haven’t seen a pony who can take my thirty-two combo flank kicker!”

Not even entirely sure what the game Fighting is Magic was, Shadow decided to start with a snack and watch the girls duke it out on the game. He was very pleased to find Faygo on the soda fountain among the countless other choices, and quickly started mixing flavors.

“You’re seriously playing as Apple slice?” Vinyl asked as they entered the character selection menu “You do know the earth ponies are way underpowered right?”

“You’re obviously not playing it right,” said Lightning, rolling her eyes “Apple slice is a character who takes skill and timing to use correctly. Who did you pick?”

“Night canter,” said Vinyl with a smirk “that’s a character that pretty much fights for herself.”

“Figured you would need a handicap,” said Lightning, returning the self satisfied smirk.

As Vinyl and Lightning set about their attempts to defeat each other in a violent virtual struggle, Shadow started trying to get the popcorn machine to work. The instructions on the storage door were not much help, just a bunch of vague red images and multi-lingual instructions. Shadow rolled his eyes, wondering why you always needed to know so many languages just to read the instructions.

“Hey! That’s not fair!” Vinyl shouted “How did you get that golden lasso thingy?”

“Secret combo move,” Lightning said smugly “All the earth ponies have them. I guess you should’ve thought twice before picking the tank character.”

“Oh you are going down sister!” Vinyl grumbled, mashing the buttons harder. It was clear that while Lightning had greater knowledge of the game Vinyl’s magical manipulation of the controller was going to give her an equal advantage.

The popcorn machine was beginning to make strange noises as Shadow watched it eagerly. Not knowing any better he had dumped an entire bag of kernels as well as a solid stick of butter into it. He was in the process of popping the top off the salt shaker and pouring the entire contents into the mix as Vinyl and Lightning were finishing up.

“Come on Night canter…” Vinyl groaned “This earth pony has nothing on you!”

“Not a chance!” Lightning shouted, trying to break Vinyl’s concentration.

The game gave the call for a combo breaker as Vinyl’s character deftly rolled out of the way of Lightning’s repeated assault. Shadow watched eagerly as both character’s health bars dwindled down to almost nothing. Vinyl shot forward, horn aglow while Lightning prepared to meet the blow with a reverse kick. All three watched expectantly, desperate to know who would win this contest.

A high pitched whistle suddenly came from behind Shadow as the popcorn machine erupted, tipping over and spilling its contents all over the floor. Shadow panicked and jumped out of the way, tripping over the game’s power cord just as the sound of the blows connecting came from the speakers. The screen went black as Shadow fell, covered in a pile of popcorn.

“No!” both Lightning and Vinyl called simultaneously, dropping the controllers into the popcorn, seemingly too preoccupied in the lost game to notice the minor catastrophe.

“That was the sound of a kick!” Lightning exclaimed, glaring at Vinyl “Meaning I hit first, and I won!”

“Are you kidding?” said Vinyl, rising to the challenge “That was obviously the horn drill that hit first! Don’t even try to deny it!”

“Well if you want proof I’ll gladly demonstrate the sound of an actual flank kicking…” said Lightning, beating on the theatre seat with a hoof threateningly.

“Is that a challenge?” asked Vinyl, horn starting to spark in anger.

The sound of crunching suddenly interrupted their argument, and they turned to see Shadow sitting up in a huge pile of popcorn, eating calmly. “Well don’t stop on my account,” he said, mouth still full “I was looking forward to this.”

Lightning stuck her hoof in the pile, pulling it out again, yellow, sticky, and covered in bits of popcorn. “Did you add enough butter?” she asked sarcastically.

“Wow!” said Vinyl excitedly “It’s just like my fifth birthday party! My parents filled the whole pool with popcorn!” She proceeded to slide off the chair and begin stuffing her face.

Lightning stared at the two other kids like they were crazy. She gingerly stepped off her seat, walking carefully around the scattered snacks and moving toward the bookshelves. She was a little curious as to just how this door worked, but had forgotten which book exactly was supposed to be pulled on. She turned back toward Vinyl and Shadow, deciding after some contemplation that she didn’t want to go near that much butter. Instead, she pulled out a random book and started to read.

“It’s good to hear that the night guard, at least, has been taken care of.” said Twilight, addressing Nightwing by the castle gates “No suspicious activity I assume?”

“None your highness,” said Nightwing respectfully “Discord passed this way while searching for the prince but returned soon after, otherwise nothing noteworthy has occurred.”

Twilight sighed in relief; it looked like tomorrow would go smoothly after all. “Thank you,” she said to the bat-winged pony “Keep up the good work.”

Nightwing saluted as Twilight walked back into the castle. She had one more destination before she turned in for the night. She had yet to master the princesses’ spell that voided the need for sleep, which she found very limiting. As she made her way toward the small wooden door by the main staircase she couldn’t help but utter a long yawn.

The small hidden door under the staircase led down a long spiral staircase into the underground parts of the castle. Long ago this path had been passage out of the castle and into the smaller houses in case of a siege, but many of these pathways had long since been blocked by construction and modernization.

What Twilight was really interested in was what was at the very bottom of the staircase. There were no lights or torches down here, so she lit her horn to see the path ahead. There was a wide room at the bottom, littered with scrolls and ancient tomes. The Canterlot archives housed information enough to fill dozens of libraries. Despite the fact that she had been down here so many times the purple alicorn still felt a shudder every time she entered the place.

A second, pale orange glow was barely visible around the monolithic shelves. Twilight approached to find a spectacled unicorn mare, college age by the looks of her, with a frizzy brown mane and tail. Her horn was glowing to give her a view of a long scroll written in one of the languages of the zebra plains.

“Excuse me, Letter heart?” Twilight said, glad the mare hadn’t been startled by her entry “I need something looked up.”

“It’s been awhile,” said Letter heart pleasantly, “almost a whole week, never knew you would be able to resist a visit that long. What are you looking for this time?”

“I’ve been busy,” Twilight explained “I still am as a matter of fact. I’m looking for the family records for Vinyl Scratch, as well as the current occupation and next of kin.”

“You sound so morbid,” said Letter heart, levitating a slightly newer looking, but unnaturally large, book over to her “That’s the Canterlot census of this year. Vinyl should be in there, she moved here from Manehatten a couple of years ago. Any relevant information should be in there.”

Twilight cast her own magic around the gargantuan book and opened it carefully. The book clearly wasn’t made to be read by earth ponies or pegasi, which she supposed made sense, since it was a census of Canterlot. She blinked through a majority of the book, slowing as she reached the Qs and halting entirely at S, flipping through the pages one at a time.

“There are a ridiculous amount of ponies with an S in their last name…” Twilight muttered, but in reality she had found Scratch rather quickly “Honestly, fifteen pages of just SA and SB…”

“There are quite a few ponies in Canterlot,” said Letter heart “Don’t blame the messenger.”

Vinyl Scratch, listed as the daughter of Daisy Hearts and Crimson Melody, who apparently still lived in Manehatten. Twilight cursed under her breath as she saw they both lived in a home for elderly ponies. There was no way they would be able to care for the filly-again Vinyl. There were no other relatives listed and she would surely have forgotten any trustworthy friends as her mind reverted back to her younger age. Not that a DJ would have trustworthy friends anyway…

“Find what you were looking for?” Letter heart asked.

“Unfortunately yes…” said Twilight with a sigh as she shut the book again “We had an age spell go wrong and Vinyl Scratch has been, so far as I can tell, permanently transformed into a filly.”

“So that’s why you’re looking for her parents,” Letter heart said, clearly having pieced this all together a little while ago “and judging by the disappointment in your tone, you either didn’t find it, or it wasn’t an adequate solution. The time you spent reading it tells me it was the second one.”

Twilight smiled, marveling again at how observant her friend was “Think you would know a solution that would work?” she asked.

“Let her stay with the prince,” said Letter heart, not even looking up from the scroll “It’s not as if the princess can’t afford it.”

“I didn’t mention Shadow to you…” said Twilight, curious now “have you been out of here today?”

“No,” said Letter heart, “But it would take a child’s mind to activate either the ageless chamber or the lake of dreams, the only sources of magic you couldn’t easily overcome that are remotely available. The child in question would’ve also had to have been of exceptionally high status, and the ruckus going on overhead pointed back to the lost Prince Shadow. If she was mixed up in the age spell Vinyl must have been closely associated with him, and as such, most probably still is. You let her stay with Shadow for the foreseeable future and there shouldn’t be any lasting consequences.” Letter heart finished with a broad grin, she never got tired of explaining her brilliance.

Twilight could only shake her head in astonishment, “You never cease to amaze me,” she said “And you might be right… The presence of another foal in the castle certainly can’t hurt anything. Maybe it would be the best thing we can do for her.”

“Yeah…” said Letter heart vaguely, her attention having shifted back to the long roll of parchment totally now

“I’ll suggest the idea to the princesses then I think I’ll turn in for the night,” said Twilight, yawning and turning back to the staircase “Thanks for your help Letter heart. Are you coming to the party tomorrow?”

“I don’t think so…” Letter heart said vacantly, hoping to sound like her attention had turned away.

“Alright, but if you change your mind we would love to have you!” Twilight called as she began to trot back up to the surface.

Letter heart heaved a sigh, turning back so she could view the Pi symbol emblazoned on her flank. She had received the mark when she had discovered the impossible end of that number, after calculating ten to the fifteenth to the fifteen to the twentieth to the sixteenth point seventh integers. Her IQ was higher than that of both princesses combined; every problem put in front of her was a matter of ease, every language, childsplay. The world opened up before the power of her mind.

This was the hell she called life. She had grown up knowing everything, and everything that would happen. Life was totally without variables to her. It was always a prideful moment to bend her mind flexibly around every event that transpired within the range of her sense, but sometimes…no…all the time, it was too much.

The curse of her knowledge, she had long ago calculated, was her premonition. She could know well in advance what was going to happen given only a few details. Even adding all of her own possible actions, she would always know the outcome. It was the most horrifying thing in the world, knowing everything that ever could, that ever would happen, and not being able to change anything.

Her real name wasn’t Letter heart, her name was two simple letters. Pi.

She had crafted the alias Letter heart when she came to Canterlot. In her five minute meeting with Celestia she had been able to determine the events that would transpire everywhere in the world until Twilight became an alicorn. Merely being in the presence of Celestia opened her mind to godlike powers, but she weathered the psychic nightmare for she knew there was a solution. As a matter of fact, she knew weeks before hoof that she would find this solution.

The mare by the name of Letter heart had been given the job of record keeping in the archives, and she had never been happier. So far underground her mind was safely isolated from her gigantic logical premonitions. The news she received, the equivalent of the entirety of Canterlot’s gossip, was during the times twice daily when a servant would enter, give her a meal, and change the used chamber pot with a new one. What was more, she was kept busy. The memorization of these billions of records was finally a task to keep her incredible mind busy.

It wasn’t so much that she didn’t want to meet the ponies at the party and get to know them, she had even debated the possibility of letting her mind absorb the entirety of all the ponies around the world, it would take weeks to get over, but would it not be worth it? No, Twilight’s visit had confirmed that. Aside from the return of the young prince of Canterlot, she had read dozens of other events from her body language. It was a shocking thought that the princesses were out of commission, more so exactly how Twilight had decided to go about fixing the problem.

But what was most shocking was the prediction she had been able to make about exactly what would transpire at the event. The horror of that would be more than even she could readily overcome. And worse, she didn’t have the details to know everything this terror would involve, and a certain irreversible magic, one she never wanted to know, was a heavy probability…

Letter heart rolled up the scroll again, figuring that it was time she got some sleep. Her dreams would surely be riddled with the wild half conjured illusions of things that were or things that would be, and perhaps, if she was lucky, she would dream of ignorance. That single, untouchable, bliss…

Shadow wasn’t aware that he had fallen asleep on the floor until Lightning started to nudge him awake. He opened his eyes blearily, noticing first the queasy feeling in his stomach, and second, the total absence of popcorn that had, last time he checked, been all around him.

“Shadow,’” he heard Lightning’s voice “get up already! This is important!”

He rolled over onto his stomach, wincing as he held back vomit rising in his throat. He opened his eyes again to see the dual green orbs that were Lightning’s own eyes staring back at him.

“I can’t believe you two actually ate it all…” he heard her mutter in the darkness “Come on, get up! You have to see what I just found!”

The clock on the idle television screen read that it was past midnight. Shadow groaned as he stood up, wondering what good reason Lightning had for being up this late. He cast his gaze over to where he heard her hoof steps, seeing the glow of a small electric lantern that he probably hadn’t seen in his first analysis of the room. She had apparently built a fort entirely out of books while he had been asleep and was now crawling her way back into it.

“Well come on!” she spoke in a very loud whisper “Get in here!”

Shadow hauled himself to his hooves and struggled over to the book-fort. Lightning had a heavy looking book open in front of the lantern and was reading an article under a black and white picture of a large group of ponies and buffalo standing on a sandy plain.

“What’s that?” Shadow asked, still tasting butter on his lips. He tried to lick it off as he sat down next to Lightning.

“This is a book about the founding of Canterlot,” said Lightning “Apparently the pony settlers made a treaty with the buffalo that allowed them unicorn protection in case of an attack on the tribe. In return they were allowed to build the city on the mountain.”

“Wow…” said Shadow, reading through the article carefully “so if the buffalo came under an attack it’s our job to stop the attackers?”

“I don’t think we have to worry about that,” said Lightning with a shrug “No one is going to be stupid enough to disagree with buffalo after all. But that’s not what got me interested, take a look at this.” She pointed to the side of the photo “Does that look familiar to you?”

There were an awful lot of ponies and buffalo in the photograph, so it took Shadow a minute to figure out exactly what Lightning was pointing out. A few young people were a ways off to the side in what looked like an old fashioned photo-bomb. What irked Shadow slightly was that one of them was a Pegasus and the other an earth pony. All the other ponies he could find in the photo were unicorns.

“There are four of them you see?” said Lightning “A pegasus, an earth pony, a unicorn, and a buffalo.”

“Yeah,” said Shadow “So what? I would’ve done the same thing if I was there.”

“That’s kind of what I’m saying,” said Lightning “How many Pegasus colts are there with a wingspan that big? And look at the mane on the unicorn filly, looks pretty unique to me.”

“You’re right…” said Shadow slowly “And that’s the same ponytail that you have!”

“Yeah but Applejack has that ponytail too,” said Lightning with a shrug “It’s hard to tell without the color, but I think these might be our ancestors!”

“Huh…” said Shadow, stifling a yawn “I guess that’s really cool… I’m going to sleep now, I’m really tired…”

“Oh come on,” said Lightning “It’s only, what, eight? Let’s stay up for another hour at least, I want to finish book-fort one.”

“It’s past midnight…” said Shadow, not even trying to hold back his next yawn. “Come on, you can be crazy tomorrow, but I’m sleepy now.”

“Technically it would be later today.” Lightning pointed out.

“Just shut up and go to sleep…”

Shadow stood up again and trundled over to where the beds were set up. He was unsurprised to find Vinyl had taken the canopy bed, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t a bit chagrinned about it. He looked to the bunk beds, his disappointment evaporating as he wondered what it was like to sleep on the top bunk. He flapped his wings a few times, carrying him up to the top easily. Not even bothering to slide under the blanket, he turned a circle and slumped down.

There was a shaking that he was vaguely aware of, resulting from Lightning clambering into the lower bunk. “Goodnight Shadow!” her voice floated up from below.

“Night, Light…” said Shadow, too tired to laugh at his own pun.

He turned over once, staring out at the moonlight shining in from one of the arching windows. “Goodnight mom…” he said, smiling into his pillow as the soft tendrils of sleep carried him away to the land of dreams.

Show time

“Book fort one, book fort one, come in book fort one. This is fluff tower two over!”

“Copy fluff tower two, armed and ready.”

“Book fort one, fire at will!”

Shadow could vaguely hear the sounds of Lightning and Vinyl strategizing some sort of war game, but was still blinking off the last dregs of sleep. He was noticing more and more that Lightning would wake up before him pretty much no matter what he did. The sudden disappearance of his pillow from beneath his head confirmed the magical mischief of the white unicorn. He groaned and sat up, not even bothering to try and earn a few more minutes of sleep as he looked exactly the wrong direction.

Wham! Some mass suddenly connected with the back of his head and sent him reeling forward, falling off the top bunk and onto the canopy bed with a poof. Just as he was going to spring up to repel the attack he was struck yet again, and this time with far more firepower. It was hardly a minute later he found himself covered in a fluffy mass of pillows.

“Nice shot commander Lightning!” Vinyl’s muffled voice penetrated the pillow pile “Target completely obliterated!”

Shadow pushed his way angrily out of the pillows, his bed head now porcupine-like from the early assault. All idea of sleep gone from his mind, and finally catching onto their silly game, Shadow grabbed two pillows and took to the air.

“This is air force one requesting permission to target book for tone!” he said, observing the completed book igloo Lightning has apparently finished, and was now looking up from the inside of.

“Air Force one, target confirmed,” Vinyl responded from the top bunk of the other bed “Prepare to drop!”

Lightning squeaked, taking one of the larger books and holding it over her head as a shield while Shadow threw the pillows down from above. A few books toppled out of the structure, but Lightning had built the fort surprisingly well, and it held strong. She stuck her tongue out at Shadow who simply glared down at her.

The section of the bookshelf that was the door swung back as Twilight walked into the room. She looked tired, but highly pleased with herself. “You all can stop trying to wake up the entire castle now,” she said, though not unkindly “The ceremony will begin at lunch, and I want Shadow, at least, to be ready for it.”

“Well I guess we’d better all be ready to go,” said Lightning, emerging from the book-fort “Because there is no way no how we’re letting him go alone.”

“Not that I want to,” said Shadow, landing next to her “But if you think you can steal my thunder, you’re dead wrong.”

“Well you know thunder always comes after the Lightning!” Light said with a huge and obvious smirk.

Twilight wasn’t paying much attention to their bickering. Her attention was focused on the book fort, which bothered her. Honestly, what a waste of good literature. They should be reading those books not building silly play structures with them…

“I need to get my turntables set up,” said Vinyl, jumping down onto the canopy bed and bouncing onto the floor “Unless you could maybe have someone do that for me? That would be fantastic.”

“I suppose we could arrange to have that done,” said Twilight “Now come along, we have to get you into uniform.”

“I thought we had like till lunch before all this started,” said Shadow “Why do I have to put on clothes before then?”

“So that you can look like a proud and respectable young stallion,” said Twilight, as if her words really meant anything “Now come along my little ponies. I have the perfect little dresses in mind for Lightning and Vinyl, and a little tux for Shadow.”

Vinyl nearly gagged as they followed Twilight out of the room and down the long stone staircase. As they trotted down Lightning and Vinyl shot each other a few signals. Twilight seemed oblivious to this, but Shadow noticed, he just didn’t understand. When he looked toward Lightning questioningly she shook her tail in a fashion that clearly meant something in a code he didn’t know. He sighed, resigning himself to simply follow them if they tried something.

And try something they did, as they reached the foot of the staircase Lightning and Vinyl shot off in opposite directions, dashing silently down two different corridors. Shocked at the amazing silence of their escape, so much so Twilight didn’t even notice it, he opted to make the same movement; following Vinyl who he felt he had a better chance of catching up with.

“What was all that?” asked Shadow as he caught up to Vinyl, who turned to him in surprise.

“You were supposed to stay behind and keep Twilight talking!” said Vinyl, as if this was the most obvious thing in the world “Now she’s going to notice we’re gone, great job…”

“How in the world was I supposed to know that?” asked Shadow indignantly “You two were doing all your tail shakes and head bobs that I couldn’t understand at all!”

“Well then next time we have a brilliant plan we’ll say it out loud,” said Vinyl, rolling her eyes “So that the colt can understand us too.”

“Or you could just teach me your cool code language…” said Shadow, clearly grumpy by now.

“We didn’t plan it all out,” said Vinyl, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world “It’s just signals that we both kind of understand, I thought you did too.”

“Well I don’t so…” Shadow began, but Vinyl quickly cut him off.

“Look,” she said, pointing to where the shadow of a pony was outlined on the wall, approaching from a turn in the hall “We need to hide, now!”

“There!” Shadow said quickly, pointing to a splintery wooden door immediately to their right. They opened the door and ran inside, shutting it behind them and plunging into total darkness.

“Where are we?” asked Vinyl “I can’t see anything.”

“I don’t know…” Shadow muttered “I ran at random, just like I thought you did.”

“That wasn’t random at all!” said Vinyl angrily “The plan is to meet up with Lightning again in the dining hall to get breakfast.”

Vinyl lit her horn and the room was suddenly illuminated in a dim blue. It was some sort of wooden platform littered with mechanics and pieces of litter. To one side was a huge velvet curtain, evidencing that they were on the floor of some sort of stage, though it didn’t look like it had been used in quite awhile. They walked about the place, Shadow keeping close to Vinyl for the light, observing the various broken sets and props.

“This is pretty cool,” said Shadow, picking up a small Styrofoam brick “I bet this went to a big castle or something, what do you think?”

“I don’t know…” said Vinyl vaguely.

“Oh my gosh is this real?” Shadow asked, gripping the handle of a broken sword in his teeth and swinging it around a bit. “This is awesome! We could just hang out here and explore!”

“Mhmm…” said Vinyl, not paying attention to what Shadow was saying, but her enchanted blue eyes were fixated on him.

Shadow looked over to her, head tilted slightly “Are you alright Vinyl?” he asked “You seem a little bit distracted.”

“Oh…” said Vinyl, trancelike state not breaking in the slightest “I was just thinking, you know. It’s just the two of us here…the dim light…alone…”

Shadow gave her a quizzical look “I’m not following…” he said “What are you talking about?”

“Oh you are so clueless…” said Vinyl, stepping closer “I think it’s cute…”

“Um…thank you…?” said Shadow, unsure of himself, as well as flustered as he felt her breath on his neck. She really was uncomfortably close…

“That’s when you’re supposed to say something sweet in return,” said Vinyl, batting her eyelashes as she followed Shadow’s awkward backward scuffle. It was obvious that despite his obvious discomfort Vinyl was just going to press closer.

“You have pretty…eyes…?” said Shadow, tripping a little and stopping so he could keep his balance.

“That’s it,” said Vinyl, swaying her hips in a practiced seductive manner she didn’t have any memory of practicing “I guess there might be some hope for you yet…”

Shadow felt his back hoof connect forcefully with a metal wheel as he made one last reverse movement. Vinyl finally leapt forward, closing the last few inches. She stared deep into his eyes for a fraction of a second, blue meeting red, infatuation meeting confusion, and then she pushed through the tangle of thoughts and emotions to finally connect.

Lightning had taken refuge from the crowd of ponies in the main hall by ducking down a side passage. She didn’t really know where she was, but she had stumbled into a large auditorium so she clearly couldn’t be lost. It was a very old looking theatre room, with rows of wooden seats, the discomfort of such slightly put off by the faded silk cushions. There were no balconies in this auditorium, probably because it was much older and smaller than the current concert hall.

It was actually somewhat eerie, walking about the moldy old seats. Lightning could smell what she thought was mothballs, but wasn’t entirely sure. What if that was what ghosts smelled like? Oh she hoped it wasn’t ghosts… did ghosts eat ponies? How did a pony go about not being eaten by a ghost?

There was a squeak as the curtain on stage started to rise. Lightning screamed, pressing herself against the back wall, wondering what sort of horror she would see on the other side. What she did see as the curtain rose shocked her even more than actual ghosts would have. Vinyl was up there, and Shadow, and they were…?

Shadow pushed Vinyl away the moment he noticed the curtain rising, it must have moved upward when he had kicked the metal wheel. He went so deeply red when he saw Lightning staring at them from the hall that it could be seen clearly even through his gray fur. This was easily the most embarrassing moment of his life.

“Woops…” said Vinyl, turning quickly and running off the stage. Shadow heard the door they had come through slam shut. He turned awkwardly to face Lightning, wondering just what she would say.

Lightning moved away from the wall and walked right up to the stage. She took a mighty leap up and landed on all four hooves on center stage. She walked over to Shadow, who braced for an attack, and ruffled his mane.

“Shadow’s got a girlfriend!” she said in a singsong voice “Shadow and Vinyl sitting in a tree! K-I-S-S-I-N-G!”

“Shut up…” Shadow muttered, not knowing what else to say.

“First comes love!” Lightning kept singing “Then comes marriage, then comes the…”

“I said shut up!” Shadow shouted, wings flaring outward angrily, his glaring red eyes making him look positively alarming.

“Okay jeez…” said Lightning intimidated into backing down “I would just poking fun of you, I didn’t mean it…”

Shadow sighed, his wings furling back to his side. “I’m sorry too…” he said “I just really… just… I don’t know… Vinyl just kind of forced it on me…”

“That’s the second time in two days Shadow,” said Lightning curiously “You aren’t…are you…?”

“No!” Shadow exclaimed immediately “Buck no! Pardon my language… It’s just ever since we got turned older like that I’ve had this kind of image in my head. I keep thinking of this girl, and she’s beautiful, but I can’t actually see her…” he pawed the ground a bit, kicking up dust “I dreamed about her… and I don’t even know who she is…”

“Iris…” Lightning remembered “Hey, I didn’t ask for an explanation, I just wanted to make sure you’re not spreading your cooties to any pony else!”

Shadow had turned back to the door Vinyl had run out of. “It’s silly…” he said, brain dancing in all different directions “Maybe I’m just thinking it’s only friendship and what I’m dreaming about is what I think I’m missing…” he glanced to Lightning again “How can you tell the difference between being friends and being in love…?”

Lightning blushed a little, realizing how much it meant that he was trusting her with that question. “Well…” she said slowly “My brother said it’s when you really want to be with someone all the time, and being with them makes you feel really happy!” she shrugged “Of course he broke up with the girl he was dating when I asked him about it, so he could just be crazy.”

Shadow licked his lips slowly, imagining he could still taste Vinyl on him. It hadn’t been bad, the kiss, actually he thought it was a great feeling. It just seemed somehow wrong… he didn’t know why, but it did. Of course maybe that was just because he didn’t know what he was doing.

Before he could voice another question; the door to the auditorium slammed open and in stomped Twilight. Her composure looked like it had finally reached breaking point, and she was seething.

“I have been looking all over the castle!” she exclaimed “You cannot just go running off like that!” she proceeded to lift them both up in a purple nimbus and carry them over to the door.

“You can’t do this to us!” said Lightning indignantly “We weren’t doing anything wrong, let us go!”

“I’m royalty too you know!” Shadow said angrily “You don’t have any right!”

“Well if you’re going to take that attitude with me,” said Twilight, trying to calm herself down again, “I’ll give you over to someone who can.” Lightning and Shadow dropped to the tile floor outside the room and found themselves under a familiar gaze.

Princess Luna was standing over them, not quite her previous height, but teenaged at the very least. She glared down at them with a clear and obvious anger.

“I shudder to think what you did to your house with a year alone,” said Luna, her voice as proud and commanding as it ever was “You cannot go even a day without supervision? You have somehow succeeded in activating two rare and ancient glyphs that are expressly forbidden to be tampered with, and that, just in a single day?”

“What…but…how?” Lightning stammered. Shadow looked down at his hooves in shame, at a total loss for words.

“You may go Twilight,” said Luna, her tone not slipping out of its stern tone “Lightning, Shadow, you will come with me to the dressing room as Twilight had planned, and no more goofing off.”

Twilight gave a nod and vanished in a flash of bright purple magic. Luna gave a stern glance and began walking down the hallway. Not daring to do anything else, Light and Shadow followed, moving at a quick trot to keep up with Luna’s walking pace.

“I thought you got turned into a filly,” said Lightning cautiously “How did you get back to normal?”

Luna let a smile play around her lips, the stern scolding she had delivered seeming to drop away slightly. “I do owe you an explanation I suppose,” she said pleasantly “Twilight finally got the grand idea to use a memory charm to restore our memory. After that Celestia called for manna batteries from the treasury so we would be able to return to our original ages. Unfortunately they could only bring us this far along, and manna batteries are incredibly rare.”

“I think I’ve heard of manna batteries somewhere…” said Shadow, thinking hard, but not remembering when he had heard the term before.

“I read a storybook once that had a manna battery in it!” said Lightning, proud to remember a seemingly vital detail “A unicorn prince had to battle an evil witch to get it and save his sweetheart from a terrible disease!”

Shadow rolled his eyes, finding this an exceedingly silly little story. “The tale of Glowing Heart and the witch of the ice kingdom,” Luna said in recognition “It was actually a story of King Sombra originally, in the days before his conversion to evil. I suppose the story has been somewhat skewed, but there was no manna battery involved…”

“What did happen then?” asked Lightning curiously, the story having been one of her favorites for when her brother would read to her before bed.

Luna sighed “The truth of the matter is far more tragic,” she said “Sombra was a unicorn of spectacular power in those days. He attempted to live in the crystal empire but was shunned by the magic fearing crystal ponies. About the same time, however, the young princess of the crystal empire was discovered to have been a unicorn in secret. When she met Sombra they fell deeply in love. When it came time for the princess to rule she changed many ponies opinions of unicorns and they finally accepted Sombra. Unfortunately a sickness came upon the princess and she died with none to succeed her. Sombra took the throne by force, and in his anger at losing his love he took his revenge upon the ponies of the Crystal Empire.”

“Oh…” said Lightning, looking down “So there wasn’t a happy ending after all.”

“The manna battery in the story now could be a reference to the crystal heart,” said Luna mildly “That is a special kind of manna battery after all.’

“Then why didn’t Sombra just use the crystal heart to save the princess?” asked Shadow.

“I’m afraid by that time Sombra’s own heart had turned cold from the hatred he had endured during his alienation. The crystal heart caused him more harm than good. He would never have been able to channel its power.”

“That’s so sad…” said Lightning “Did they really hate him that much just because he was a unicorn?”

“You have to understand this was a very long time ago,” said Luna “Not long after my sister and I conquered Discord. In the wake of his chaos those who had no control of magic of their own considered it a great source of fear.”

“I used to be scared of unicorns…” Shadow admitted sheepishly “I know they aren’t any different, but the fact they could use lasers or dark magic any time they wanted… it’s scary.”

“But what stops the pegasi from using the weather in the same way?” asked Luna “Are your thunderclouds any less intimidating than their magic? No, it’s not the fear of their ill-intent as much as it is fear of the unknown.” She gave a kind smile “Do not be so quick to judge harshly, most ponies will be more inclined to do good than harm.”

Lightning and Shadow looked to each other in a sort of stunned silence as they continued to walk down the hall. More of the meaning went over their heads than perhaps should have, but it wasn’t lost in its entirety. It wasn’t a great deal longer before they stopped at a medium sized door that was a very bright fuchsia.

They entered the room behind Luna and looked around, Shadow in dread, Lightning in obvious delight. It seemed like they had walked into a salon with huge hair driers and mane washing sinks, barber chairs, and half a dozen wardrobes. Questionably dressed ponies, mostly female, walked here and there doing things with curling irons and paste that Shadow could never even begin to comprehend.

Celestia was seated in one of the barber chairs, her hair being attended to by a yellow unicorn mare with what looked like a hundred floating tools. Shadow realized this was the first time he had seen her without her aurora colored magic. The way it hung now the natural pink color was visible in its entirety. She looked to be almost totally herself again, more so than Luna anyway.

“So they have come at last!” came a voice with a completely unrecognizable accent “Wundarbar! The Prince and his little friend, this way please!” A blue coated mare walked out, wearing an incredibly puffy pink dress and what looked like Vinyl’s shadows. Her mane was so transparently white it looked ghostly.

“Oh my gosh…” Lightning squeaked “It’s Photo Finish!” She’s the greatest fashion designer in Canterlot!”

Shadow stared at Photo Finish incredulously “I don’t suppose I should know who she is?” he asked.

Two very prissy looking ponies suddenly jumped to either side of Photo Finish, expressions of complete shock on their faces. “Photo Finish is the name!” they exclaimed together, striking poses obviously meant to bedazzle and awe “Making every pony pretty is her number one game, now get up on the stand so she can do her job!”

Shadow resisted the urge to bring a hoof to his face. If that was any more obviously rehearsed it would have to have been synchronized swimming. Fortunately before he could make any movement to signal his exasperation he was whisked over to a small podium where Photo Finish’s assistants began taking his measurements.

“These wings are going to make this so difficult…” one of them said “They’re problematically large; the holes in the outfit are going to look simply gaudy…”

“These tangles are absolutely hideous!” another assistant exclaimed, dragging a comb painfully through his mane “When was the last time you used conditioner, last year?”

Shadow didn’t bother asking what conditioner was, he guessed he wouldn’t get a straight answer anyway. There was the sound of pipes coming on underneath him and water started sprinkling out onto him from the podium. Before he could find it weird that the castle would have showers but not toilets he found his wings tugged outward magically and two pegasus ponies started washing his feathers.

“Oh would you sit still?” a voice came from Shadow’s right, and he turned to see Lightning trying to keep an eye on the pony who was chasing her hair this way and that. The tilt of her head kept the braid tantalizingly out of reach; it looked like they hadn’t even managed to start on her. He smirked, receiving a self satisfied look in return.

“You really must start preening at least once daily Prince Shadow,” said one of the pegasi on his wing “the state you’re in you might start getting lice or other parasites, if you don’t already have them…”

“This is utterly disgusting, look at this!” said the other pegasus, holding a beetle in her hoof “I found this under a feather! We’re going to need to get some insecticide and thoroughly wash him down, pelt, wings, mane, everything!”

Lightning wasn’t in much better of a situation. They had managed to get her mane out of its ponytail and were starting to wash it out with force. “you got soap in my eyes!” she shouted at them “You can’t do this! Cut it out!”

“We’re sorry ma’am,” said one of the assistants “but we really must fix some of these split ends, and we think you may have dandruff. In that case we’re going to have to get some potions.

Celestia, now finished with her treatment, had stood up and reactivated her mane’s enchantments. “This is going to be a long day for them isn’t it?” she asked Luna, who was watching the display with a look of amusement.

“I think I’d better stay here,” said Luna “You know how kids are with bath-time, and these two have had years to accumulate grime…”

“Shadow has bugs in his wings…” said Celestia, wrinkling her nose “Not eve worms and lice, but actual beetles? You were right, he wouldn’t have lasted another day on his own…”

“He’s having trouble adjusting to castle life though…” said Luna, her happy tone slipping slightly “He’s not just going to be contained here and get used to it, he’s going to make an adventure out of every single day no matter how hard it is to do so. He’s been raised in the wild, there’s no taking that out of him.”

“For now the castle is an adventure,” said Celestia “That should keep him for some time yet, but you will have to find another solution before long. What will you do if he abandons the castle?”

Luna’s smile returned “I like to think that I would stop him,” she said “but I don’t think I will.”

After an hour of preening, poking, washing, brushing, combing, and tampering, they finally decided Shadow’s mane was just going to stay a mess. He had heard they were going to call in a potions master for his lice problems but they hadn’t shown up yet. He and Lightning had been instructed to remain on their podiums and wait patiently for them to arrive. Photo Finish and her aides had retreated to another room to work on their clothes. The shower on the floor had been left running to “soothe the maladies a bit” some malady if he didn’t even notice it…

The big pink door opened again, and Shadow perked up from where he had been laying in the water. His first impression of the potion master was that she looked kind of tacky. Her mane was up in a Mohawk of sorts and she was adorned with both golden ear-bands and bracelets. What was perhaps most interesting, however, was that her coat was not a solid color, but striped in black and white.

“Good morning my little pony friends,” she said as she entered “I hear you have problems; I am here to mend.”

“Zecora!” Lightning said excitedly “You’re the potions master? That’s fantastic!”

“Indeed little filly of brightest blue,” said Zecora with a smile, “It’s good indeed to see you too.” She entered the room and Shadow noticed a younger looking zebra following close behind her. Unfortunately they seemed to be hiding in Zecora’s tail and he didn’t get a good look.

Zecora took a silent look over his wings, visibly wincing as she looked closer. “Could you get me my lice potion dear? This condition it seems is far worse than I had feared.”

The figure under Zecora’s tail emerged, revealing a zebra filly who looked to be about Shadow’s age. Her mane looked more normal than Zecora’s but there was something visibly wrong with her eyes. They were a deep violet, but they were misty, like she had a fog behind them. She seemed to stare at the small saddlebag she had for a long time before pulling out a small red vial.

“Thank you,” said Zecora, taking it and pouring it out onto a rag “Hold still please, this should help with those ticks and fleas.”

Shadow winced as the rag made contact with his feathers. The potion seemed to burn at him and the smell that floated off of it was completely revolting. What startled him more was what looked like flecks of black sand beginning to fall out of his wing as the potion started to take effect. That was what was in his wings? Gross!

As Zecora moved to treat his other wing Shadow noticed the zebra filly’s purple misty eyes trained on him. She seemed to be focusing hard on him, or something behind him. He found the situation growing awkward as she continued to stare at him without so much as blinking.

“Now let’s have a look at you Lightning,” said Zecora, moving away from Shadow “Let’s figure out where to treat your sting.”

Shadow couldn’t help ruffling his wings and letting out a sigh. He didn’t even notice how much he had itched until the unpleasant sensation had passed. He did feel the need to preen a little, but the stink of the potion made him hesitant to put his muzzle within any sort of proximity to his wing for the time being. The filly was still staring at him, and it was starting to make him feel uncomfortable.

“Why are you staring at me?” he finally asked, after making sure Zecora wasn’t listening.

“I’m not…” said the filly in a soft voice.

“Yeah you are,” said Shadow “You’ve been looking at me for almost ten minutes here.”

“I’m not looking at you…” said the filly, blushing slightly.

Shadow rolled his eyes, if he was reading these signals right again then this was kind of a problem. “I can see…” he said, a little ticked off at this point.

“Oh…” said the filly “That’s lucky…I can’t…”

“What do you mean you can’t?” asked Shadow, his steady dread changing rapidly into curiosity.

“I can’t see…” she responded, waving a hoof vaguely in front of her eyes “I’m blind… I always have been… I was listening to you, and trying to smell, but my mother’s potion smells kind of bad…so I’m having trouble…”

“Oh…” said Shadow, the thought of being blind almost totally alien to him “I’m a gray pegasus if that helps.”

“Yes, a little…” she said, a small smile gracing her features “I could hear your wings but I didn’t know what they were… I don’t know what gray is though.”

Shadow looked over to where Zecora was chatting with Lightning about something or other, then to the filly again “Well what do you see?” he asked curiously “When you open your eyes, what’s it like?”

“Nothing…” she said “I can’t tell if my eyes are open or closed…”

Shadow nodded slowly, and then shut his own eyes, trying to get an idea of just what he was seeing. “Well…” he said “gray is like the nothing, but there’s less of it. It’s like if you had something and nothing together. That’s what gray is like!”

The filly’s misty eyes widened curiously “I think I can sort of imagine it…” she said “my mother could never describe colors like that…thank you…” Her ear twitched, listening for Zecora’s location “Can I touch you?”

“Um… I guess…” said Shadow with a shrug. The filly walked steadily and slowly over to the podium he was standing on. Her front knees touched it and she felt her way carefully to the top until she could judge the height. She gave a little jump and landed next to him, pushing against him slightly.

“You’re very soft…” she said” and wet… but you did just shower…” she put her muzzle up against his neck and sniffed “You smell like the sky… That’s very cool…” she smiled at him, her head rising up to eye level.

“Come along little daughter of mine,” said Zecora, evidently done with Lightning “It’s almost time for lunch, we have little time.”

“Okay…” said the filly, not turning away “Goodbye Shadow… It was nice meeting you…”

“You too…um…” Shadow suddenly realized he hadn’t ever found out what her name was “wait, before you go could you tell…”

“We mustn’t dawdle!” said Zecora “Lest we get caught amongst the rabble!”

“Sorry…” said the filly, jumping off the podium and walking steadily over to Zecora. She bit down on her tail; Shadow realized this must be how they stayed together when walking around the castle. They left the room, the filly’s ears flickering toward him as they exited, which Shadow took as the equivalent of one last backward glance.

“Well that was nice,” said Lightning, shaking a bit of water off her coat as she stepped off the podium “It feels nice to be so clean, I don’t think I’ve ever had a bath like that before.”

Shadow didn’t move, he just stared blankly at the still open door. “Hey, are you sleeping on your hooves?” Lightning asked “Snap out of it silly!”

“Um…oh!” said Shadow, shaking off his little daze “Sorry, what were you saying?”

“I was just talking about the bath…” said Lightning “are you alright? You look like you just dropped your ice cream on the sidewalk.”

“I’m fine,” said Shadow, hopping off the podium himself “Come on, I’m guessing Photo Finish is done with our clothes.”

Lightning reluctantly let the issue drop and followed Shadow to the wardrobes, a little curious herself of the outfits that Canterlot’s greatest fashionista would have thought up for them.

Vinyl had taken her place on one of the high balconies, staring around at the crowded dining hall. Someone had already brought her turntables up and she was ready for the show. Shadow would be walking through the main doors any minute and that’s when she would start the music. It was all planned out in her head, and it was going to be beautiful.

Being too short to reach up and spin the discs, she had clambered up onto the mixing board itself to prepare for what she felt was going to be her best show ever. DJ Fill-3, now that was a grand and adorable new title…

She gazed out over the gathered crowd seated along the long tables and eating the buffet of winter flowers that was set out before them. The atmosphere was charged, only a day’s notice and the hall had been laced with star patterns, lunar models, and brilliant blue tablecloths. The dishes and silverware were done in the lunar silver rather than the traditional solar gold. With so much done so quickly It was only natural they would be intensely, even painfully curious as to why.

Of course that wasn’t to say a good few of them didn’t already know what was happening, Shadow had done a very poor job of keeping himself secret. Vinyl was pretty sure she was the only one who had been told directly who he was, but the presence of a fluffy gray colt in the castle during such a busy time wasn’t a huge leap of logic. On the other hoof though, this was kind of a big thing, and quite a few ponies would consider the idea of a new prince, particularly so soon after Twilight’s coronation would seem farfetched.

Twilight and Celestia were already standing at the head of the room in their ceremonial purple and white, though Luna was nowhere to be seen. She supposed Luna would be coming out with Shadow to introduce him, but another princess, who had been present at Twilight’s coronation, Cadence was also conspicuously absent. While she was not particularly important, this was still pretty odd. Shadow was Cadence’s cousin after all, why would she not be there to see him introduced?

Celestia suddenly looked up to her balcony and gave an imperceptible nod; that was the signal.  Vinyl smirked, waving to show she had understood and quickly levitated a few discs out of their protective sleeves. She threw them onto the turntables, twirling them a bit to get the feeling for them, then slammed a hoof down on the start button.

Nothing happened. Vinyl looked frantically around to see what could’ve gone wrong when she noticed the power cord had gone limp. She groaned, jumping off the tables to go plug it back in when she saw a brown unicorn standing by the outlet, holding the cord in a nimbus of yellow magic.

“Um, excuse me,” said Vinyl snappishly “I kind of need that, now, so drop it.”

“Oh I’m sorry,” said the unicorn, with a smug grin “I was under the impression that Vinyl Scratch was going to be playing up here.”

“She is, that’s me,” said Vinyl, suddenly remembering who this pony was ‘You’re Discord! What do you want?”

“Easy, easy,” said Discord with a shrug “I’m actually trying to stop some chaos this time. I like a good soundtrack as much as the next guy but honestly Shadow was right to ask me to stop Vinyl Scratch.”

“Shadow was excited to have me playing here today,” said Vinyl, getting really angry now “Why don’t you go serve dancing drinks or something?”

Discord burst out into hysterical laughter “Oh you really don’t know do you?” he said through his conniptions “Shadow positively hates your music! He’s of the belief that dubstep is the worst music ever!” he walked right up to Vinyl and leaned over so he could look her in the eye “You really couldn’t tell? He turned you into a filly so you couldn’t play your music anymore, it’s that bad!”

Vinyl looked back at the double not on her flank, almost as if to make sure it was still there. “No way,” she said, turning back to Discord “Shadow is my friend; he would never do something like that!”

“Oh but he isn’t your friend,” said Discord wickedly, the cord still in his hand transforming into a length of rope “Don’t you remember Vinyl?”

A cloud of pink smoke suddenly appeared in front of Vinyl’s eyes, she gasped as she recognized the image of her teenaged self within the smoke. “I’m going to be a disc jockey!” her ghostly image shouted “I’m going to make the best music any pony’s ever heard, you’ll see! And I don’t need friends like you holding me back; I don’t need stupid friends at all!”

Vinyl shrank backwards as the image vanished again. Her memory was fading backward, but the memory of that day, the day she had exploded at the only friend she had ever had? That was never going to fade away…

“Remember that do we?” said Discord, still chuckling “Let’s try to keep that promise you made, what’s the first rule of being a great DJ?”

“You don’t need friends…” said Vinyl dejectedly “But…!”

“But nothing,” Discord interrupted “Not only have you attempted to make friends, these ‘friends’ have totally abandoned you because your music is so bad!”

“No…” said Vinyl, not even believing her own desperate words now “Shadow and Lightning…they couldn’t…they wouldn’t!”

“But they did,” said Discord, his eyes becoming wild multicolored swirls “And it’s all your fault!” he put a hoof to Vinyl’s nose, laughing maniacally as her white fur darkened slowly to a somber shade of gray.

Luna walked carefully and gracefully out to the front of the hall, smiling out at the huge crowd of gathered ponies. The last time she had reason to celebrate like this was over a thousand years ago. The feelings of excitement flowed over her like a crashing wave. She didn’t even feel the blue silk around her shoulders that had so chafed on her barely moments before.

“Fillies and gentlecolts!” she said, calling for quiet in the hall “We apologize for the tantalizing wait yesterday during which we set the stage for this fantastic ceremony. I would like to give a moment to applaud the wonderful ponies who worked so hard piecing everything together.”

The audience whooped and cheered. Luna felt proud of the little quip which had simultaneously increased appreciation and tension for the eventual announcement. “We are aware,” she continued, silencing the crowd again “That we have kept you nervous and expectant for an unprecedented amount of time. So without further ado…”

There was a bright flash of blue as Luna released her invisibility charm on the gray pony in front of her. Shadow was suddenly visible for all to see. He was in a black suit, not just dark black, but a deep midnight that reflected the lights of the room in seemingly unnatural directions. The huge holes in the suit were hidden perfectly by a wide black cape that covered his back and fell down past his back legs. He looked up to the crowd, crimson eyes flashing as his deep green mane glinted, slicked back over his head.

“May I present to you for the very first time, Prince Shadow Chaser!”

Part 1 Draconequis

Shadow’s wings shuffled a little under his cape as he smiled confidently out over the crowd. The feeling was exhilarating, they were cheering for him! Maybe it wasn’t the best thing ever, he hadn’t done anything spectacular to earn their praise or applause, but it certainly wasn’t bad.

Lightning was right there in the front row, tugging a bit at the collar of her dress. She had gotten off pretty easy as far as that went though, no frills or lace. As a matter of fact the jagged diamond pattern across her back suited her quite well. Her hair hadn’t just been put back into a ponytail, but styled so it fell back and forth down her neck like a thunderbolt.

Despite the rowdy cheers and exuberant shouting from the crowd, Shadow felt that something was wrong. He looked up to Vinyl’s balcony, wondering why the music hadn’t started. It was unlike her to start the music late, especially when he was expecting her to start in the middle of Luna’s introduction for the added attention. Lightning was staring up at the balcony too, meaning she was having some doubts as well.

Shadow shuffled his hooves nervously, one of his front hooves finding a groove in the podium and tracing over it. His stage fright had shifted to a different kind of nervousness, one he was less sure of his ability to overcome. It wasn’t just the absence of Vinyl’s music, although that was the most obvious characteristic. Something seemed genuinely wrong with the entire atmosphere. He looked down at the groove he was tracing on the floor, hoping he didn’t look improffesional, and found that there was some sort of symbol there, not worn away, but intentionally etched into the smooth surface.

A dull glow emanated from the marking and Shadow leapt out of the way just in time, tripping off the edge of the stage and tumbling into the crowd. There was a burst of flame from the stage, circling around the three princesses in less than an instant. Before anyone could do more than gasp a pink translucent sphere appeared, incapsulating all three princesses.

“What’s going on?” Lightning squeaked, backing away so Shadow didn’t fall on her. The crowd was beginning to panic, screams erupting and chairs being pushed back. A few guards tried to push through against the gaggle, trying to reach the princesses.

“Look!” Shadow said, pointing out the window to where another huge pink barrier slowly crept up the horizon, blocking all sight beyond the immediate gardens “What’s happening? Where are these domes coming from?”

“I don’t know!” said Lightning, looking around the crowd desperately “Where’s Vinyl, do you think she’s okay?”

“No idea…” said Shadow “Let’s try to get up to her balcony. Even if she isn’t up there we can get a better look at what’s going on.”

“We can’t push through this crowd,” said Lightning “You’re going to have to carry me over, can you manage?”

Shadow didn’t hesitate in pulling himself out of the suit and discarding it on the floor. He took another look to where Luna and the others were pounding at the dome. He wondered why they didn’t use their magic to escape, but there was no time for that now. He grabbed Lightning around the middle and took off into a low flight. It was as much as he could manage over the crowd of frightened unicorns, but they made better time to the balcony than they would have walking.

Shadow started to get really worried as they clambered up the white stone steps. It was completely silent overhead, not even the sound of Vinyl’s voice was heard. That could mean she wasn’t there, and who knows what that could mean…

“Vinyl?” Lightning called as they burst through onto the balcony “Dang it, she isn’t here…”

Shadow looked around, the turntables were up on cinderblocks ready to go but the DJ was nowhere to be seen. “Oh no…” said Shadow, picking up a rope that fed directly into the turntables “What is this…?”

“I don’t know…” said Lightning “It looks like the plug in cord got turned into a rope somehow?” she suddenly gasped “That could only mean…”

Shadow’s eyes widened, coming to the same realization. They leapt up on Vinyl’s turntables and looked out over the panicked crowd once again. The room grew dim as an all too familiar shape began to materialize on stage.

“Hello my little ponies!” said Discord, resplendent in his full draconequis form “I’m glad to see that you’re all enjoying my little party.”

“Your party…?” Shadow said furiously “Why I out to…”

“Stay down…” Lightning hissed “If he finds out we’re up here he might try something…”

Shadow resigned himself to looking back to where Discord was flapping his mismatched wings in pure jubilation. “I thought it was about time we had a little party game,” said Discord with a grin “The first rule of this game is no magic! I’ve put up a manna blocking dome to make sure no pony cheats!” He tapped on the smaller dome holding the princesses “Of course I had to double bag the royalty.”

“That explains it…” Shadow muttered “That’s what the rune was; he’s using black magic…”

“Also to my precious few earth ponies out there: no trying to break the dome.” Discord continued “If you try that you will be disqualified, from life.” The pink dome suddenly crackled with electricity, causing the gathered crowd to flinch.

“There goes my idea…” said Lightning “Most of the ponies are unicorns anyway… Augh…”

“So now beings the game!” said Discord “The game called bow before Discord, The new undisputed ruler of Equestria!” He took a long exaggerated bow, holding a hand up in which a glass of chocolate milk materialized.

The crowd went silent, too shocked to make any sort of response. Discord frowned “Well don’t you all praise me at once…” he said “I think it’s time we had some fun with this.”

Bubbles suddenly burst from the wooden floor and started floating around the air in the room. The buffet suddenly changed from delicious flowers to crawling insects. Fluffy pink clouds materialized around the ceiling, raining chocolate milk on the gathered crowd. There were a few screams as ponies ran for the exit. The door changed into a painting of Discord in a top hat and holding a pipe, barring the only way out.

“Come on we’ve gotta get out of here,” said Shadow, moving toward the door to exit the balcony, flinching a bit as the walls covered themselves in purple ivy, but kept going all the same.

As the two turned to the top of the stairwell, however, they were met with the yellow eyed stare of Discord blocking their path. “And now you two little ponies…” he said, sounding almost bored “Well I suppose I do have to deal with you now don’t I…?”

“You can’t do this Discord!” said Shadow, stepping forward with a determined expression on his face “You may have locked up the princesses, but there’s one member of the royal family you forgot!”

“Yes…that dome was supposed to catch you too,” said Discord with a shrug “Which is why I have to go to all the trouble of coming up here and dealing with you myself. How boring is that?”

“Deal with us?” Lightning exclaimed, emboldened by Shadow stepping forward “We’re going to deal with you! That’s what’s gonna happen!”

“Hmm…maybe I can have a little fun with this…” said Discord, “I’m sure the ponies of Canterlot will have their spirits crushed as much by watching their prince give up. If not more so… I actually very much like this new idea!”

“Watch out Light,” said Shadow, spreading his wings as if bracing for an attack “He’s going to try something.”

There was a burst of orange light as all three of them were teleported back onto the stage. Shadow looked around bewilderedly, wondering what this could possibly mean. He could see Twilight, still trying desperately to cast some sort of spell inside the dome but she couldn’t so much as spark.

“Well my little ponies!” Discord called out to the trapped and panicky audience “It seems your Prince would dare to challenge your new chaotic lord! Is that right Shadow?”

Shadow grit his teeth, putting a hoof forward. “You can’t win Discord!” He said in a quavery voice “Not against all of us! Magic or no magic, we have numbers!”

“Yeah!” said Lightning, also stepping forward “You ever fought an Earth Pony in single combat before? You’re in for a flank kicking of a lifetime!”

“Still up for this Discord?” asked Shadow, his heart warming with the thought that Lightning was by him “Come on, you start this fight it won’t end easy!”

“Is that so…?” asked Discord, walking calmly toward them “Then please allow me to begin this little showdown, I don’t think you’ll mind if my first attack is…” he reached out and poked Lightning’s nose with a chicken clawed hand.

“What are you…?” Lightning started to say, but stopped as her eyes suddenly swirled in blue and yellow rings. She stumbled forward as her red coat slowly turned a dull gray color.

“Stop fooling around Discord!” said Shadow angrily “If you really want a piece of this, of all of us,” he motioned to the crowd, who were beginning to murmer their ascent “Then just try to attack! If you aren’t up for that you can just flap your chicken wings and fly yourself away!”

Not at all offended by this insult, Discord gave a victorious smile “Oh but I’m not sure you really want to fight me anymore do you, Lightning?”

Shadow turned to Lightning again, expecting her to repeat his threat and send him running once and for all. To his horror, she looked back at him with a dull expression on her face and yawned.

“It isn’t worth the effort,” she said, laying down on the stage and resting her head in her hooves “Can you just turn Shadow into a frog or something so I can go home?”

“No…” said Shadow, backing quickly away from the figure of Discord, who suddenly seemed more than twice as menacing “What did you do to her?”

“Too scared to come at me all on your own hmm?” said Discord, his single fang glinting in the light “As you well should be. You know what will happen if you go against me.” He slunk forward on all fours like a grotesque snake “Flee Prince Shadow, flee and save yourself. It is your only chance…”

Petrified, Shadow could only stare from the terrifying beast in front of him, to Lightning, who was watching this development with an expression of amusement. He looked back, to where the stage fell away beneath him. Even if he were to leap off ant try to hide among the crowd there was no escape from the hall. This was it… he was done for…

“No…” he said, red eyes turning determined back to Discord “There is no running. I don’t care what else happens… I… I won’t give you that…”

The crowd let out a collective gasp as Discord snapped his fingers. There was a flash of blue flame and Shadow was gone in a puff of smoke. A hush fell over the hall as Discord stood triumphantly, blowing a vapor trail casually off his fingertip.

“Shadow, no!” Luna shrieked desperately from within the dome, staring at the singed spot on the stage. “Damn you Discord! Damn you!” Her eyes lit up with white light and her horn started to crackle, pushing enough magic through her anger to begin to overcome the magical barrier.

Discord yawned, scratching the floor with a claw. He quickly completed the dark magical rune and another dome covered the first, the sparks from Luna’s horn fading away. “I do believe this situation is called checkmate,” said Discord, smiling wryly as he stepped down off the stage, a fountain of cola opening up with each step.

Part 2 Gray Area

Shadow groaned slowly as he blinked back to reality again. At first he wasn’t entirely sure if he was awake or asleep for he could see nothing whether his eyes were apparently open or closed. The pain of tripping over his own hooves and landing on his face was enough to confirm his wakefulness.

“I’ve got to be dead this time…” he murmered “That was a fire spell… There is absolutely no way I could ever possibly be alive…” He flinched slightly as his hoof connected with something round and metallic, there was a creaking, and a glimmer of light as he touched it.

“Wait a minute…” he said “I know that sound…” He quickly turned the wheel again, squinting a little as a beam of light slowly grew on his right.

The curtain was rising, the same curtain he had been behind when Lightning had surprised him and Vinyl. Someone must have teleported him here before the fire spell had struck, but who could possibly have done that? The dome was still covering the entire castle, the sunlight, filtering pink into the room, confirmed that much. What could’ve happened?

Shadow trotted down the row of delapedated wooden seats to the door at the end of the hall. He slowly opened it, surprised to be met with the sight of two barded unicorn guards. Even more shocking was the sight of the white unicorn filly commanding them.

“You’re entirely sure there are no more stragglers?” Vinyl asked harshly “You’ve checked every corner of the castle? Every hidden passageway?”

“Yes ma’am…” said one of the guards “Not so much as a mouse remained undiscovered, you may rest easy.”

“Good,” said Vinyl, horn flashing with magic “I would hate to have to punish you… Now go check over everything one more time.”

The guards quickly trotted off leaving a smirking Vinyl. Shadow’s eyes widened as he caught sight of the small blue pendant around her neck. The manna battery! Vinyl was still able to use her magic under the dome because of the manna battery!

Vinyl’s horn crackled again as she summoned a small pink cloud in front of her eyes. “Lord Discord,” she said “The castle has been totally secured, there is no chance of any infiltration.”

“Good,” Discord’s voice emanated from the cloud “Thank you Vinyl, now go make sure every pony is remaining in check!”

“Will do sir,” said Vinyl, the cloud vanishing. Shadow felt his heart sink as he saw her white coat was tinted with a dull gray color. Whatever had happened to Lightning had happened to her too!

He quietly shut the door and walked back along the seats in utter shock. He had narrowly escaped death, but for what? Vinyl and Lightning had been hypnotized by Discord to the point they wouldn’t even recognize him anymore. Whoever this mystery pony who had saved him was, they couldn’t have had his best interests in mind…

No, he couldn’t think like that. As long as he was in control of his own thoughts hope was still alive. He remembered vaguely that Twilight’s friends had something similar done to them when Discord had tried to take over Ponyville, but that was just a story to him. The only thing it really told him was that there was some way to win, a useless factoid considering he couldn’t even begin to fathom what that might be.

Looking at his options he did actually have a few. Unlikely as it may be there was probably some way out of the castle, maybe by secret passage or some other magical trickery. There was a chance, assuming he could escape here, that he could find some way to raise the alarm. He could always turn himself in to Discord he supposed, maybe he would be spared that way. Unfortunately both these ideas seemed utterly ludicrous. There really wasn’t anyone out there capable of defeating Discord, and who might’ve inside the castle had been captured. That and he would probably be killed if he tried to surrender…

Shadow groaned as he stared up at the dark slanting ceiling. Adventures were fun and all, but this was starting to drive him insane. There was no winning course of action, but it wasn’t like he could just sit here and wait to be found. What would dad do if he were in this situation…?

He smiled, suddenly sure of what to do next. If there was anything his dad had managed to drill firmly into his psyche, it was a sense of loyalty. Lightning was still somewhere in the castle, lost in darkness. It was up to him, the lone survivor, to find her and bring her back to her senses, no matter what the cost.

There was a sound of hoof steps outside the hall; obviously no way out that way… He remembered the small wooden door that he and Vinyl had found their way through and quickly flew back up to the stage. It was a bit of a nuisance that the curtain seemed to fall back by itself after it was raised, meaning he had to actually lift it up and crawl under. His tail stuck a little as the curtain flopped down again, but he was able to free himself with little effort.

The sound of the main doorway opening and closing caused Shadow to turn back toward the curtain quickly. “I didn’t even notice this area,” came a deep voice “We’d better look it over, but I don’t think any pony could’ve made it this far.”

“I think I saw something…” said another voice that Shadow was relieved to recognize as one of the guards who had escorted him to the castle, Dawnstar? “Behind the curtain! Did you see that?”

“You’re jumping at shadows,” said the first voice “Better check anyway I suppose. That unicorn would probably vaporize us if we missed something…”

Ignoring the obvious irony of this statement, Shadow dashed for the little wooden door and slipped out. He looked up and down the stone walled hallway, trying to get his bearings. He could probably find his way back to his room from here, which was as good a place to start looking for Lightning as anywhere. The only problem would be getting there without being seen…

“Why do we even have to guard the Prince’s tower?” asked one of the two guards stationed at the bottom of the staircase to his compatriot “It’s not like there’s anyone to guard here anymore.”

Nightwing, who happened to be the other guard, didn’t respond at once. “How can you say that Ironmane?” he said finally “You can’t talk about the death, not just of a prince, but of a six year old child, as a casual thing…”

“Sure I can,” said Ironmane with a shrug “He was going to walk through life with a target on his head before any of this happened, better he’s gone soon.”

Nightwing shuddered, he hadn’t been forced to be “grayed out” as many of the guards were calling it, but even worse was having to listen to and cooperate with those who had been. Almost exactly half the guard had been left to their own minds, and they were almost always paired with grayed out counterparts. Discord had clearly done this to make the mood of chaos and misery even more awful. Poor Ironmane had been one of the sternest and most steadfast stallions on the guard, but even he had been broken, re-made, and left as the heartless husk of a pony.

“Doesn’t make any difference so long as we get paid after all,” said Ironmane with a malevolent grin “Maybe Discord as a new ruler will give us some more employee benefits.” Nightwing contained the urge to put his eye out.

Nightwing’s gaze was suddenly caught by a small gray feather floating down in front of his eyes. He snatched it out of the air and looked at it carefully. It was fluffy, like the feather of a young pegasus, but where had it come from?

He looked up and nearly fainted at the impossible sight before his eyes. Wide eyed and frightened, flapping his wings silently to press himself against the ceiling, was Shadow. Nightwing looked quickly to Ironmane, who was too busy picking his nose to notice his reaction, then back up to Shadow. How was he still alive? Was he grayed out? It was difficult to tell due to his natural coloring, but Discord’s minions wouldn’t have to sneak around…

Nightwing gave Shadow an imperceptible nod, which made Shadow relax slightly. He then proceeded to straighten his legs and walk, upside down, up the stairwell to the tower. Nightwing let out a smile, maybe there was some hope yet. The prince was both determined and ingenuitive. There was a chance, however small…

“What are you grinning at?” asked Ironmane.

“Just thinking about a discarded Equestria,” said Nightwing vaguely, hefting his spear with just a little more vigor.

Shadow found himself stopping and staring at the door to the tower room, not entirely willing to open it. He was more than a little bit afraid of what he might find on the other side of that door. There was a chance Light wouldn’t be there at all, and he wasn’t sure whether that would be better or worse than if she was.

Just as he had forced himself to reach out for the door, it flung open on its own and he scrunched himself back up on the ceiling. Vinyl walked out of the room, her pelt even darker than last time he had seen it. She looked livid, stomping out the door like a hurricane.

“You’ll see thunder brain!” She called back over her shoulder “Next time you go against me it won’t be nearly so easy!”

So Lightning was in there… There really was no turning back now. He dropped down to the floor and walked carefully into the room. It didn’t look any different from where they had left it this morning, except some pony had made the bed and fixed the popcorn machine.

He saw Lightning sitting on the front row of the theatre seats, spinning a joystick idly. The huge screen displayed a game of pac-man which Lightning didn’t really seem focused on. As he watched she got a game over and proceeded to just stare at the screen. Shadow found himself waiting for a tantrum he knew would never come.

As he stepped forward, Lightning turned to look at him, her expression completely disinterested. “So Discord was right,” she said in a monotone voice “You aren’t dead.”

Shadow felt a little flutter of hope as he saw that Lightning wasn’t nearly so gray as Vinyl was. “I guess I’m not…” he said carefully “How did you know?”

Lightning clambered out of her chair and walked over to him. “Discord noticed first,” she said “He said when a pony gets incinerated he can taste the fat in the air. Then Vinyl sensed your presence somewhere in the castle so they started a manhunt.”

“I see…” said Shadow, an idea starting to form in his mind “Hey Lightning, do you remember the first time we met? You were acting like Pinkie Pie on a sugar high. And you had those huge ridiculous shades?”

Lightning gave him a blank look so he continued “I know it was crazy, but the Everfree Forest was fun too. We kind of saved each other didn’t we? If either of us had gone alone we would never have gotten out! And coming here? I would never have thought of that if you hadn’t kicked mom!” He found himself laughing a bit, the scene seeming so ludicrous now it was so far in the past.

“And the garden…” said Shadow, face falling as he still saw no change in Lightning’s demeanor “Surely you remember the garden…You know… How we almost…” He found himself getting a little red, but he shook it off “Come on Lightning, you have to remember…please!” A tear fell down his face as he looked down at his hooves. It wasn’t working…

“Hey Shadow…” Lightning said.

Shadow looked up quickly, suddenly hopeful.

“How much do you think I could get for that old guitar?” asked Lightning “I’m thinking fifty bits at least.”

And just like that he found himself totally without hope again. Lightning’s coat turned darker as he watched, a clear sign that his little speech, far from helpful, had driven her deeper into the darkness clouding her mind. His ears drooped, and almost imperceptibly, his green mane sank to a dark gray.

As he descended slowly back down the stone stairway he realized how little effort he was putting in to being unseen. What did it really matter though? Lightning and Vinyl were beyond his help, what else did he have to do? If Discord would find him right now would it really be so bad?

He was vaguely aware of a dull thud from somewhere up ahead, but he didn’t pay it any mind until he felt a hoof on his shoulder. “What do you think you’re doing?” he heard Nightwing’s voice “He very nearly saw you!”

Shadow looked up to Nightwing, then over to where the other guard was unconscious on the ground. “I don’t care…” he said “Discord’s won…”

“You can’t talk like that!” said Nightwing urgently “We need to get you out of here, come on!”

“What’s the point…?” Shadow muttered “It’s not like I can do anything about it…”

“I won’t condone that attitude,” said Nightwing, glaring at him “You are our only hope, you understand that? You are the only chance we have at stopping the draconequis, and as such you are completely forbidden from giving up, you understand?”

Before Shadow could voice a reply he found himself being pushed, almost carried, down the hall. It was interesting that Nightwing would have such faith in him… His slowly darkening mane lightened just a little.

Nightwing led him to a door that Shadow was barely able to catch a glimpse of before he was forced against one of the walls. Nightwing eased the door open and kept a watch on the room while Shadow forced his way forward to get a look himself. He was able to see a sliver of the main hall. He shuddered slightly as he saw the red dragon’s tail of Discord.

“Now let’s try that again, came Discord’s voice from the hall “I want this song to go swimmingly this time!”

“He’s got the whole orchestra set up in the main hall…” said Nightwing thoughtfully “I think if he dismisses them we should be able to move through the hall unnoticed, we’ll blend right in.”

Shadow, somewhat frustrated he wasn’t tall enough to get Nightwing’s viewpoint, merely focused on what he could see and started listening. The whole hall suddenly burst into a chorus of music, fast and hectic, yet still somehow holding an enchanting melody. And as the music started to pick up, Discord started to sing.

Although I admit your twists and tricks

Posed an interesting challenge for me

Yet despite all this, I captured you all

So now what? Oh just wait and see…

Take it from me, awesome is he, my name is Discord

Spirit of chaos, poised for destruction, I’ll let you see…

I won’t take a moment to stop

So don’t you even dare try to block

This awesome performance, a chorus of dissonance

You don’t stand a chance, so come here and dance

With the draconequis who is he, who is me!

Discord! Hold sway over the moon!

The sun will never shine, not even come time of noon!

So sing with me won’t you? (Lest I destroy you)

For the lord of chaos it’s me!

A power enough to conquer Celestia!

Awesome and wonderful, malevolent, despicable

Oldest and fiercest, wisest, and greatest

Unstoppable as the sea! It’s me!

So If you’re still unsure, I’ll give you just a little bit more

I’ll show you the rest, death to all the rest!

And that leaves the awesome and powerful me…

Discord!

The final note was allowed to hand in the air for what Shadow thought was a uselessly long time, after which the orchestra gave a final few notes. If he were completely honest he had to say he thought the entire song was entirely awful, but now wasn’t really the time. As terrible as it was though, it was intriguing, and it was likely that it had served its purpose of intimidation quite well.

“Alright my little ponies!” Discord’s voice came again “You may return to your boring daily routines, but be ready! I may have another fantastic stroke of inspiration at any time!”

There was a flash of light, which Shadow supposed was Discord teleporting. This notion was confirmed by Nightwing pushing him forward into the hall. “Come on,” he said “Stay close to me, if we’re spotted, bolt. You’re more important than I am.”

Shadow nodded, allowing himself be maneuvered down the main stairs and into the gaggle of ponies packing up instruments and milling about the hall. It looked like this group had a few less ponies grayed out than there were on the guard, dissonance most likely interfered with the music. Whatever the reason, it still provided just that little bit more bustle to camaflouge them amongst the crowd.

Nightwing led him on to the bottom of the main stairs and performed a perfect U-turn, walking around the side of the large staircase to a small, inconspicuous door. Shadow thought it looked a lot like the side entrance to the old stage, probably built around the same time. Nightwing took a key out from a pocket of his armor and opened the door.

“Go on,” he said “It’s a little dark down there, but it should be safe. No pony would think to look there, and if they did they would need the key to get in, it’s magically locked.”

Shadow stared at the few black stone steps he could see before they vanished into darkness. He shuddered “Where does it lead?”

“The archives,” said Nightwing “Go, quickly! This oppritunity will not last us long.”

Shadow took a few tentative steps down into the blackness. He turned quickly back to the light from the doorway, convincing himself that so long as he saw that light everything would be okay. Nightwing proceeded to shut and lock the door with a snap, plunging poor Shadow into darkness.

So this was what it was like to be blind, not being able to tell the difference between open and closed eyes. He found himself shaking violently, pawing his way through the darkness to find the next step, then the next, steadily calming down as he realized this wasn’t going to be quite so hard as he thought. He spread his wings to feel both walls, trusting more and more in his ability to safely put one hoof in front of the other…

A missing step suddenly dropped him into open air, his head dropping forward as he tumbled head over hooves downward into the darkness. He fell like this for a full minute before landing, battered and bruised, on a pile of paper. He groaned, forcing his damaged self weakly to his hooves again and stumbling forward across the strange crinkling material that seemed to be the floor.

It was now that he finally discovered that his eyes were, indeed, open. He caught a glimpse of dim light on the other side of what he was able to recognize as a bookshelf. He tried to flap his wings, wincing as he realized they were badly hurt. He groaned as he walked around the large bookshelf, looking up to see the light emanating from a unicorn’s horn.

“So…” said the unicorn, seeming to only be vaguely aware of him “The Prince Shadow has come for a visit, I’m correct…again…”

Shadow took a curious note of the strange symbol that was her cutie mark, then the magical light she was conjuring, then to the huge foreign scroll she was reading from. Questions burst into his mind like a barrage of fireworks, making it hard to think of any single thing to say.

“Who are you?” he finally asked the seemingly most obvious question.

“Letterheart…” said the unicorn after a pause “You’re also wondering why I’m down here, what my cutie mark represents, and how I am able to perform magic underneath the barrier.”

“Um…yeah…” said Shadow, too astounded to do anything else.

Letterheart turned and smiled at him from behind what appeared to be reading glasses “I think it would be best to answer the last question first,” she said “Which should hopefully explain the others. I am blessed with an abundant intellect that allows me to comprehend most everything. That’s my talent in life you know, and it also allows me to invent certain things. For instance, I use a unique magical signature that is neither archaic nor modern magic. As such, Discord’s barrier holds no power over me.”

A plate suddenly appeared on the table beside her scrolls, laden with fruit. “I do suppose you’re hungry,” said Letterheart “Please, help yourself.”

“Oh, thank you!” said Shadow, moving to the table and reaching up for an apple. He winced as his injured wings were stretched, and again as he dropped back to the ground, landing on a weakened leg.

“You should’ve been more careful on the stairs,” said Letterheart, her horn glowing again. Shadow suddenly felt the pain vanish as he flexed a bit.

“It was you…” said Shadow, coming to the realization “You’re the one who teleported me out of Discord’s attack!”

Letterheart sighed “I knew exactly when it would happen,” she said “I have known every detail of the party since Twilight visited me. I knew I would save you, it wasn’t within my physical power to do otherwise.”

Still not entirely understanding, Shadow took a look around the shelves that extended upward apparently far higher than the reach of the light. “Why didn’t you bring me here?” he asked “It seems safer…”

“I didn’t use a proper teleportation spell,” said Letterheart “It was a simple fast travel, easier to perform but same concept. It returned you to a safe place from your own recent memory, that being the stage. The advantage of this was Discord has more ponies suspicious of casting fast travel than he would those who could cast a full on teleportation spell.

Shadow still really didn’t understand, “You had Nightwing bring me here though,” he said “Why did you want to see me?”

“I didn’t,” said Letterheart casually “Nightwing brought you here to keep you hidden. I doubt he even knows who I am…” she paused for a moment “I do know… what’s going to happen…”

“Huh?” asked Shadow.

“You’re not as much as a tell as your mother,” said Letterheart “But just seeing you lets me calculate events far into the future with a one hundred percent success rate. I’m not at all disappointed with what I know, but it isn’t fun to now.”

A scroll suddenly floated down from out of the reach of the light. It looked newer and less yellowed than the others. “I wrote this idea myself years ago…” said Letterheart “I think I’ve finally found where it fits into place… Read it Shadow…”

Shadow looked at Letterheart for a moment before tenderly unrolling the scroll. It took him a moment to read the words, and a while longer to piece together how they fit into the complicated diagrams. He looked back to Letterheart, an expression of shock on his face.

“You expect me… to do this?” he asked incredulously “These are shooting stars! That isn’t possible!”

“I knew you would say that,” said Letterheart “Just as I know what you’ll do with the information. Think about it Shadow, those wings of yours are far from the standard flight material of a young pegasus colt.”

Shadow spread his wings self consciously, waving them around carefully and slowly. It wasn’t something he hadn’t heard before, on the contrary, it was the first thing any pony ever noticed about him. He could fly, which wasn’t just rare in ponies his age, it was unheard of.

He felt his heart pounding in his chest as he looked over the diagram again. Whatever Letterheart had thought out it fit in a horrifying way. His mind flashed back to the dome in Luna’s tower, to the tiny black specks that had been so abundant. The sand that burned when it approached a world…

“I know, already, that the seriousness of this must weigh heavily on you,” said Letterheart “But I have to say, because I am scared to death of the day I’m wrong about something, that you must be careful. You were born an altitude flier, but that doesn’t mean any of this will be at al safe. First, you must succeed with the mission, and second, of equal importance, you must survive.”

Papers rustled about the room as Shadow waved his wings about. His red eyes flashed, the fear being swiftly replaced by violent determination. The gray in his mane vanished into the air and fell like dust around his hooves. Even his coat seemed to take on a brighter sheen.

“I need to get outside the dome.” He said.

“The passage to the archive holds more than just books,” said Letterheart “I think I can help you with that.”

“Turbo need's to be found before it to late!"