Chapter 8: back to Ponyville

The girls enjoyed the rest of their night after Shadow veil's hearing. They went out and enjoyed some of Canterlot's night life, which consisted of opera plays, musical orchestras, variousness art exhibits, a few night clubs, and some coffee shops. After they took a look at some of the dress shops rarity wanted to see, they took a break at a coffee shop and took in the atmosphere I the night as they sat and chatted about this and that, laughing and enjoying each other's company.

The next morning, they all ate breakfast with Princess Celestia and Princess Luna in the royal dinning hall. They were half surprised that Shadow veil showed up for a short time, ate a quick beagle with cream cheese, saluted the princesses, then left to finish packing, or so he claimed.

After breakfast, the girls packed their things as well and made their way down to the train staton, where an inpatient Shadow veil stood, tapping his hove, his assistant standing next to him, looking equally as impatient but more annoyed.

When he saw them, his annoyed face melted into his usual poker face, and he stopped his hove from moving. But before he could say anything, his dragon assistant, envy, spoke up.

"What took you girls so long?! The train conductor is announcing last calls! And the next train wouldn't leave for Ponyville till this after noon!"

"Sorry" Twilight spoke up. "But we made it in time."

Before Envy could dig into the purple alicorn princess, Shadow veil put a hove over her shoulder. "Silence now, Envy. They made it here in time. Let's just go and get this over with. The sooner we get on, the sooner we come back in a month."

With that, the dark stallion boarded the train with his dragon assistant, who shot a evil glance at the girls and flickered her tong like a lizard.

"Well it looks like we're off to a great start" Twilight said sarcastically.

"Don't let them get y'all down now" Applejack said as she walked up and into the train.

"She's right, we have to keep a stuff upper lip" Rarity added, keeping her head high as she also boarded the train.

The rest of the girls followed suit, and filed into the train. They found Shadow veil and envy sitting in the corner of a box car. Envy was looking out the window, already bored, Shadow veil sat next to the isle totally engulfed a leather bound book. The girls sat on the opposite side of the car from them, but kept to the back so as to keep an eye in them.

As the train began to move, the girls saw the image of canterlot began to shift in the window, and before long, the scenery had changed to the view of a green mountain landscape. Then a pony came by collecting their tickets, each of the girls handed them there tickets one by one, then the ticket master moved to where the dark unicorn was busy reading on the corner. He asked for their tickets, but shadow veil was to enthrall with his reading to pay any attention to the ticket collector. Envy handed the pony their tickets, and as he took them and began leaving for the next cart, she flicked her tung at him behind his back.

The group talked amongst themselves for a good while, then about at the half way point, Shadow veil placed a book mark in the leather bound book he was reading, tilted his head back, closed his eyes, and let out a deep breath.

"What were you reading?" Twilight looked over and asked the Shadow veil.

He cracked one eye open at Twilight and thought to be nice, and replied "Arch Lighthorn's theory of magical properties."

"I've heard of him" she replied, "he's the unicorn in Manehaten who theorizes the creation of magical spells right?"

"That is correct, Princess Twilight Sparkle" Shadow veil said. "He's been working with variousness professors from unicorn schools from all over Equestria, even some from Canterlot, to prove, disprove, or modify his theories. He was going to visit campus a few days after the Lunar Eclipse festival."

"Did you want to see him?" Twilight asked with concern. "I'm sure Princess Celestia might give you a day off and let you come back to Canterlot to see him if you do well with your community service."

"Thank you for your concern, Princess Twilight ?Sparkle, however, I ..." He paused and thought for a moment about which words he would use very carefully. "... I have read his book at least 3 times and fully understand what he is stating. I'm just re-reading his book because I want to make sure I didn't pass anything over. Not because I admire him specifically."

"So what do you think about his work?" She continued on the topic.

"I already know that most of his theories are correct. But he tends to go off more on a scientific note with magic. But magic is more then a science or an art-"

"It's something that can't be explained. Like a feeling deep inside that flows and breaths..." She continued his sentence.

"Precisely" Shadow veil cocked an eye at her. "And frankly I don't know what is worse, Lighthorn's believing magic is a science or that ignorant General who sees it as a weapon."

"So what's the deal with you and that general feller?" Applejack joined in on the conversation.

Shadow veil looked over at the orange farm pony, his face slumped, but he answered her. "Two things; one, his troops keep disappearing, which is why he asked Princess Celestial for more troop support wherever he is stationed at the moment, and two, he knows he needs me, which bother's him so he tends to try and give me a hard time. I don't wish to join the royal guard, but he knows he needs my power and knowlage. But as I said before, his and my views on magic are completely opposite."

"What do you mean by disappearing?" Rarity asked, now joining in on the conversation.

"I hear many things that are whispered in the castle" Shadow veil explained. "And from what I heard, wherever the General and his soilders are stationed, his men seem to mysteriously disappear."

"That's terrible!" Fluttershy silently commented as she put her hives over her mouth.

"Someone needs to do something" Rainbow dash said as she flew up from her seat and hovered in the air, her chest puffed out as if she was ready to take on the world.

Shadow veil relaxed in his seat and smiled, breaking eye contact with the mares. "Don't worry yourselves about it. It's going to be worked out by itself in the next week or two."

The girls looked at him like he was nuts or lying. But the sure grin he had on his face showed his great confidante in his remark.

"How do ya' figure tha' one?" Applejack asked.

"I have my ways of knowing, so just believe me when I tell you that we don't need to do anything. Otherwise I would have informed Princess Celestia about the situation and aided her in settling the problem." Small sparks few from his horn as he took a long yawn. "I think I'm going to take a quick nap now."

And like that, the dark unicorn fell into a deep sleep beside his dragon apprentice who was already in dream land.

The girls began to speak quietly amongst themselves again while a horrid nightmare crept into Shadow veil's mind. Terrible images of the past flashed in his head. Hitting him at his very core when his defenses were down, hitting him where he could not protect. He began writhing, twisting and turning in his seat. His face flared his pain. Twilight saw this and carefully approached the dark unicorn, her friends right behind her, watching cautiously. Right before she went to nudge him, he awoke screaming "get away from me!" Just as fast as he awoke, he shot a large surge of lightning from his horn that destroyed several of the seats in front of him and almost hit Twilight.

She fell back into her friends arms as the dark stallion sat there, breathing heavily, covered in beads of sweat with blood shot eyes. His apprentice awoke, just as frightened as the girls had been. She rushed to comfort the dark stallion, but he shrugged her off.

"Get away from me!" He yelled at the young dragon. After a moment, he began to calm down and looked around, seeing the train car different as he had seen it right before he had fallen asleep. He shook his head, stood up, and began to walk away. "I'm going for a walk."

"What the hey was that?!" Rainbow dash's words stopped the dark unicorn.

"In deed, your just going to stroll off without so much as an apology for almost fricasseeing Twilight?"

His blood shot eyes shot back at the mares who winced for a second and his cold gaze met theirs. "If you hadn't tried to wake me, you would have been fine. Next time, mind your own business."

With that, he left the girls and his assistant behind. The girls were both shocked and appalled at his cruel words. He could have seriously hurt somepony, but he didn't even seem to care.

"What a meanie!" Pinkie Pie said what they all were thinking.

Twilight was going to add something but was interrupted by the sound of shuffling glass. The girls looked over at envy who had one of the suit cases shadow veil packed open and was rummaging threw. After a moment, the dragon assistant pulled out a small vile marked with a number '3'.

"What's that?" Twilight asked her.

"It's a potion, duhhhhh...." Was Envy's only response.

The girls continued to ignore the small dragon and tried to comfort their alicorn friend as best they could. But twilight was actually calm about the whole situation, all except for Shadow veil's quick and harsh reaction.

Moments later, Shadow veil reinterred the car, his bloodshot eyes returned to normal, and the beads of sweat had been washed off. Without saying anything, Envy tossed the bottle marked with a '3' at the dark unicorn who caught it with magic, pulled the cork out of the top, and downed the entire thing.

Without saying anything or even looking at the girls,Shadow veil walked back to his seat, picked up his leather bound book, removed the book mark, and picked up where he left off. His assistant places the empty vile back in the same place where she plucked it from in the suit case, then went back to sleep for the rest of the trip.

For the duration of the trip Shadow veil just finnnished reading his book, then pulled out a few scrolls and looked over them with a quill, making slight changes in some calculations. While half of the girls slept, Rainbow dash, Applejack and Twilight kept an eye on the dark unicorn, untrusting of him after the last fiasco that almost took twilight out.

They arrived at the train station at Ponyville in the middle of the afternoon. The girls and Shadow veil grabbed there luggage and filed out of the train. As he left the train, shadow veil handed the conductor a bag of bits to pay for the damaged seats.

Right as soon as they exited the train, Shadow veil looked out over the area, and a wave of painful nostalgia hit him with the force of an Arctic storm.

"I can't believe Princess Celestia sentenced us to community service in this dump." Were Envy's thoughts.

"She took great mercy on us, well..." he looked over to where Twilight and her friends were standing at the station, preparing to head to their respective homes to relax from the trip. "They took great pity on us. We could have been exiled, or worse, sent to work with that fool of a General."

"But the plan is still on, right?" Envy's words came more silently the net previous ones.

"This changes nothing" Shadow veil's tone was hard and dark, "everything is still going to go according to plan. We just need to plan our work around these pitiful and simple minded ponies."

"I guess that means I'm going to be doing more of the running around work?" Envy's enthusiasm had now completely dissipated.

"Yes, you will. Remember, me achieving my goal means you also achieve yours." Shadow veils words were ice, but also what he knew he could be sure on. He knew he could trust those who shared his same goal if it benefited them. As he looked over at the 6 ponies who represented the elements of harmony, they all looked back at him, most of them bearing hard glares. "Nothing will stop us from achieving our goals. Especially not some ponies who's greatest strength happens to be something as weak and frail as 'friendship'."