Searching of the Soul Chapter One: Three Months Later
“Nebula!”
A dark blue mare with flowing three tone purple mane and tail growled at the sound, looking up toward the room where the voice had originated with a sigh, “What is it Rainbow?”
“Can you bring me some of hay fries, I’m bucking starving.”
Nebula grumbled, getting up from her seat and then using her magic to call and heat up a bag of hay fries for her mate, finally reaching their room and heading over to her bed. Atop the bed lay Rainbow Dash, laying upon her side, her belly showing that she was three months along in her pregnancy.
Nebula sat down beside her, handing her the bag of hay fries before sighing as she spoke. “You know Dash; you’re going to become fat with all this food you have been eating, not that the baby will complain.”
“Do I have any reason not to get fat,” asked Dash with a smirk, “I mean I do have this baby I have to take care of. Also I don’t really need to train anymore; the Wonderbolts won’t take me on account of this,” Rainbow finished, pointing to her long horn with a grin.
“Yeah,” said Nebula, “Sorry about that.”
“Hey none of that,” said Rainbow with a smile, “I would trade all the Wonderbolt tryouts in the world to stay with you; the magic is just a cool bonus.”
Nebula nodded, and then got up to leave, only to have Rainbow grab her wing with her magic. “Um…Neby, can you stay with me for a bit?”
“Dash you know I can’t, I have work to do…”
“Neby no, you need to take a break, even if I have to force you.”
Nebula was about to protest, till she suddenly felt something fall upon her horn and the unnerving sensation of her magic being cut off, narrowing her eyes as she began to speak. “Why you little…” she started, only to get picked up in Rainbows red magical field and deposited upon the bed next to her, wrapping her forelegs around her so that she could not escape.
“Told yah, even if I have to force you, you are taking a break.”
“Oh fine!” said Nebula in fake frustration, a smile spreading across her face as she laid down next to Dash, who was busy inhaling some hay fries. However after a moment she lifted her head, looking back down toward the door to their room and shouting, “Spike!”
After a few moments, Spike crawled up the stairs and entered the room, crawling toward the bed and then sitting down before speaking. “What is it Twi…”
“Spike,” said Nebula, “we talked about this, that’s not my name anymore.”
Spike scratched the back of his head sheepishly, “Sorry…I’m still getting used to that, anyway what did you need me for?”
“I need you to write a letter to Princess Faust, tell her I still have no leads on the soul mates for the other alicorns, but I will continue to work on it alone, and I do not require help.”
Spike nodded and left the room, the door not even fully closed before Rainbow opened her mouth to speak, “Man he grew up fast.”
Nebula nodded, though deep down she was feeling the same amazement Rainbow was feeling over Spikes recent change. Three months ago, Spike had still been the cute little dragon everypony had gotten to know since he and Nebula had moved to Ponyville, and he still had his crush on rarity, for he did not know of the existence of Yin and Yang.
However, all dreams must come to an end, and so too did Spikes infatuation. It had been a few days after the imprisonment of Twilight and the two sisters, Spike had decided to go ask Rarity out on a date, for it seemed her becoming an alicorn took away all the excuses he had been creating not to ask her. But when he had knocked on the door, he had not expected to be greeted by a male alicorn, and worse still, he had not expected to see Rarity kissing another male alicorn when he had been escorted into the living room.
Nebula, who had been sleeping after a massive surge of magic, was awoken by the sound of a massive roar, and had looked out the window to see a fully grown Spike tearing his way out of Carousal Boutique. Luckily for them, Sunset had been around to quell Spike, for while she had been a dragon slayer in her time, she also knew many ways to subdue a dragon without killing them.
It had taken ours to finally calm Spike down after that, but once he had finally recovered his senses, he had not reverted to his original state, instead reverting to about the size of an adult stallion. Nebula had been confused by this, and even more confused when Sunset had been the one to tell her why he had changed.
Apparently, Spikes subconscious had been keeping him in the form of a baby dragon to protect him, first due to his connection to Nebula to allow her to take care of him, and later due to his feelings for Rarity, his immature crush actually keeping him in an immature body.
But as Sunset had explained, the moment he had witnessed Rarity kissing Yin; it had caused a conflict between the emotions keeping him a baby dragon, and his more mature emotions wanting expansion and growth. This conflict had of coursed caused another rapid growth spurt, but after he had calmed, his more mature side had finally won out, resulting in his current state.
“I just hope we don’t get any more surprises like that,” said Nebula as she laid her head down to rest, “that was a doozy.”
In the city of Canterlot, in the newly built bedchambers of the new princesses of Equestria, Princess Faust groaned. The three months since her daughters imprisonment had not been kind to the old mare, and while she would never admit it to another soul as long as she lived, she really wished she had given the job of ruling the nation to somepony else.
When Faust had shown up in Canterlot and told the populace about what had transpired, the nobles had been the first to react to everything. The first thing they had had a problem with was with Faust taking over ruler-ship of the nation. With Celestia and Luna now imprisoned in stone, the laws stated that Ruler-ship was to be passed and divided amongst the nobles, insuring that the ruler-ship would remain just and fair. To counter the argument, Faust had summoned both the sun and moon into the sky, and said if the nobles wanted to rule, they had to move them back into their rightful places.
They had of course failed, but that didn’t stop them from complaining further. The next problem they had brought to her attention was the sudden appearance of thirty seven new alicorns, five of which were well known commoners who had no ties to the royal bloodline. This had been insulting enough to them, but when she had revealed that they had all become alicorns through use of an ancient spell, the nobles had become near mutinous, demanding that these new alicorns be returned to their original state and that the nobles be elevated to the mighty status of alicorn.
Faust had of course refused, saying that no noble save a fare few were near enough to earning the right to become alicorns. But the other reason was because the ones who were alicorns had already earned the right to be alicorn, despite their noble beginnings, and she refused to take away the right they had justly earned.
This however had not dissuaded them from lashing out with their final complaint, that of Faust’s wife Chrysalis, who they said was an enemy of the state. Faust had not however defended her mate, instead letting Chrysalis do the defending. It had been brutal, many of the nobles not wanting to see that she was sorry for what she had done, and especially not wanting to believe that she was a changed mare. It had finally come to a head when they had said she had no purpose anymore, that all she was good for was being Faust’s fuck toy.
While her anger was obvious, she didn’t immediately vocalize it, instead lighting up her horn and causing the entire world to shake, before rising above the balcony and unleashing her alicorn enhanced voice.
“WE ARE MOTHER EQUISE HERSELF,” Faust had remembered her roaring, “AND IT IS BECAUSE OF US THAT THE WORLD HOLDS ITSELF TOGETHER! BUT IF THOU TRULY THINKITH US USULESE, THEN BY ALL MEAN, GO AHEAD AND KILL US, AND WATCH THE WORLD BLEED FOR IT!”
This had been the thing that had finally stopped the noble’s complaints, well…at least it stopped their outward complaints, for Faust was pretty sure many of them still didn’t like what she was doing, but it had quieted them for a time.
She was brought out of her musings by the sound of a letter appearing out of the fireplace, grabbing it with her magic and then pulling it over to read, only to grumble once she was finished. “Oh Nebula, what am I ever going to do with you…?”
She summoned a piece of parchment and a quill, and then began to write, saying the words allowed to better help herself as she dictated her response to the young alicorn. “Dear Nebula, I know you think you need to do this alone because of the promise you made to your sister Twilight, but some things cannot be handled alone. Now I know for a fact both your great grandmother Andromeda and your step sister Cadance have expressed their desire to help you in this endeavor, and I cannot stress enough how valuable their aid would be.
Cadance as you know is the goddess of love and passion, and as such she would be able to detect such strong connections as the ones between soul mates. As for you great grandmother, she may not be Twilight, but she the only one besides you that can even equal to her knowledge in the soul arts, and to shun her help would be foolhardy on your part…”
“Faust…?”
Faust stopped her writing, looking up to see Chrysalis standing in the doorway to their bedroom, sweat running down her form as she stared at the regal white mare with want in her eyes.
“What’s the matter love,” asked Faust, though she knew in the back of her mind what was going on, especially behind the wanting in her mate’s eyes.
“We…we need thee, we need your touch…so badly.”
Faust immediately got up, walking over to Chrysalis and began to kiss and nibble her, but almost at once Chrysalis pushed her away with a snarl. “That is not what we mean,” said Chrysalis with exasperation, the sweat on her body even more apparent as she gazed pleadingly at Faust. “That is not the touch we want love, we need your special touch…your forbidden touch…”
“…I should have known,” thought Faust, before finally letting out a sigh and nodding back toward the bedroom door. “Alright my love, you just get back to bed now, I’ll join you soon…”
Chrysalis panted as she waited in the bed, still marveling at how…sudden…her need had crept up on her. In many ways, it was like the affliction estrus, for it caused her body to burn till she was graced with the touch she so craved. However unlike estrus, her body could not be sated by simply rutting till she was no longer burning like wildfire. No, instead it needed to be sated by something more…magical, something from the before times…before she and Faust had become alicorn.
Suddenly all the candles in the room were dowsed, causing Chrysalis to jerk up, but not out of fear. An unnatural darkness had permeated the room, engulfing everything but the bed she was lying on and her own self, which she knew was the shadows intention.
Every now and then, Chrysalis would pick up the occasional sound of a wing rustling, or the faint sound of hoofs walking across the floor. Each sound caused her to shiver in delight, for this was all part of the game, and while she wanted nothing more than to leap into the shadows and let the one controlling them have its way with her, she was enjoying the game too much to care.
Luckily she didn’t have to wait long, for out of the corner of her eye she caught movement near the dodge of the bed, and turned to see a black, oozing tendril slithering its way onto the sheets along with several others, each tendril leaving behind black stains. When the tendrils had reached the halfway point to Chrysalis, Faust had finally emerged from the shadows, the sheets turning completely black the moment her hooves touched them.
The black ooze that had been coming from the tendrils dripped from Faust’s body like miniature waterfalls, her mane and tail being held down by the stuff as it flowed from her body. She made her way slowly forward, watching as the tendrils began to slowly wrap themselves around her mates shivering form, drinking in her delight at being caressed by the familiar appendages.
“You have missed this greatly haven’t you,” said Faust with a grin, her voice not coming from her mouth, but instead from the shadows all around them.
“Yes,” moaned Chrysalis loudly, “we have missed it…we have felt so empty without it.”
“You shall not feel that emptiness for much longer my love,” said Faust with a grin, before leaning down and to claim her lover’s lips within her own.
Searching of the Soul Chapter Two: Accepting Help
Faust woke up with a smile on her face, opening her eyes and looking upon the room as she lay there. Stains covered many parts of the room, the black ooze still slick and shining as when it had first gotten there, for it was incapable of drying.
She honestly wanted to let it stay, for it reminded her of the simpler time, before things had gotten so…crazy. But she knew it could not, for if anypony saw it they would freak, and it could possible cause more problems with Nebula and the elements if they got…ideas.
So with a sigh of defeat she got out of bed, opening all the shades and the door to the balcony, and then walking outside. She didn’t bother cleaning herself off, for she knew she wouldn’t need to, and instead lit up her horn and raised the sun.
As the sun crested the horizon and light began to touch her body, the ooze began to fade, slowly at first, and then in earnest. She knew why of course, the ooze was a thing born of the dark, not meant for the light; as such it could not stand the blinding rays that came from the sun.
But there were good things that came with the fading of such shadows, and it became quite apparent when she looked at the room. All the places the ooze had touched were immaculately clean, looking as though they had never seen any kind of wear, and upon the bed Chrysalis lay upon pristine sheets; her fur, mane and tail glowing bright as though they held their own light.
Faust walked back to the bed, leaning down to nuzzle her mate, who yawned before looking up and Faust and smiling, “You’re glowing.”
“So are you,” said Faust with a smile, “now come on, let’s go drop some jaws.”
“Have you any leads yet?”
Nebula growled as she heard this comment, looking up to find the sad looking face of Sunset Shimmer, who had been by almost every day since Nebula had begun her research.
“No Sunset, I don’t have any leads, nor will I likely have any tomorrow.”
“…ok, then what about…”
“Also no,” said Nebula, “like I told you before, I will let you know when he writes me back.”
Sunset slumped, completely defeated now. Ever since Nebula had announced to the other alicorns that she was working on finding them their soul mates, Sunset had been hounding her day after day for news, especially when she had found out about an old acquaintance of Twilight’s.
One of the things Nebula had started doing to help with her search was ask the alicorns what they could remember about their soul mates, and when Sunset had described her mate to her, she had immediately been reminded of the stallion Flash Sentry.
When Nebula had told Sunset about her she had become near obsessed, coming every day for news on Flash’s whereabouts, no matter how many times Nebula told her not to.
Nebula noticed Sunset looked like she was about to open her mouth again, but luckily Spike came upstairs, a letter clutched in his claw as he made his way over to her.
“Letter from Faust,” he said, handing it to her before quickly leaving the room, his eyes glancing occasionally at Sunset.
“He still doesn’t trust me does he,” said Sunset as Nebula read the letter, looking at where spike had left.
“No,” said Nebula, “I think he still blames you for what happened to his family, even though it was Twilight how did the killing.”
“Yes,” said Sunset glumly, “but she was reacting to my emotions and tendencies, and I probably would have done the same thing if I had been in control that day.”
Nebula didn’t say anything, instead going back to reading the letter, only to grown as she finished. “Goddess dammit Faust…” she said, then sighed, before turning to Sunset to speak to her. “Hey Sunset, I need a favor from you.”
“Whacha need?”
“Well it seems Faust is going to keep nagging me till I get some help in my search, so I was hoping you could head over to the crystal empire and get my sister Cadence, then maybe I can get that nagging creation goddess off my back.”
Sunset nodded, then got up to leave, Nebula watching her go before turning back to her papers, only to have another letter appear before her which caused her to sigh. “It’s going to be one of those days…”
Sunset boarded the first train heading to the crystal empire she could get on, and now rested comfortably cabin all to herself, though she wished she could ignore such luxury. While yes, hundreds of years ago she had been the personal student of Celestia, and she had been privileged to similar indulgences, she had never partaken in them.
Sadly now she could not do as she used to, for now she was an alicorn, and anytime an alicorn started to act like a normal pony the citizenry began freaking out. So instead she allowed them to give her this compartment, knowing it would not do good to argue, and plus she could use the alone time to think.
But as always, her mind kept drifting back toward her soul mate, who she knew was out there somewhere, battle scarred and in need of love. She had extracted every detail from Nebula the mare was willing to share with her, and now she couldn’t help but go over every detail as the train made its way onward. Flash was an old stallion from everything Nebula had told her, and old stallion who had lived through several skirmishes against the griffins in the few times they had tried to invade Equestrian borders.
Griffins were a dangerous and violent species; they had always been so, even during their earliest age. When Ponies had been stuck in simple tents and mud huts, the griffins had been forging metal into steel swords of the finest caliber, perfecting the arts of metal craft and war long before Ponies began to make their first forays into those arts.
When the two species had finally encountered each other, the results were devastating for the ponies. Being carnivores, the griffins had seen the ponies as a valuable food source, despite the fact that they were sentient. It had been a bloody war, and it had looked like the ponies would end up as slaves to the griffins, had it not been for the dragons.
The dragons, like the alicorns themselves, were a long lived and wise race. However, unlike the alicorns, they had no qualms about interfering in the affairs of creatures they saw had potential, and thus it was with a vengeance that that descended from the heavens upon the griffin nations, raining fire and death upon them till they backed off. It was also why dragon migration patterns took them so close to equestrian borders, for they wanted to keep an eye on the ponies and make sure nothing else tried to wipe them out.
Of course the peace never truly lasted, and despite the ever present danger of dragons descending upon them, some rouge clans took chances and attacked along Equestrian borders, but by the time the rouge tribes had gotten the courage to do so Equestria had already strengthened enough to repel them, but some were still bad.
“Not as bad as the one he had to go through,” thought Sunset, her eyes never leaving the horizon as the train kept going. From everything Nebula had told her about the raid Flash had suffered through, he had what many ponies would call a cursed day, for it had gone from bad to worse so fast it had to have been the product of Discord. He had already been having a bad day due to his partner being on leave, thus he was alone. During his patrol, he had come upon a village that was under attack by griffin raiders, who had struck one of the few brood villages left in the kingdom, right during foaling season.
Nebula had refused to go into detail about what he had seen, but Sunset could guess pretty easily, though she forced herself not to think of it now. So instead she moved to the floor, placing her elbows on the seat before beginning to speak.
“Oh great protectors, hear my plea, watch over Flash Sentry and keep him safe from harm, till we are brought together once again.”
With her prayers done, she got back up, looking out the window to see that they had stopped moving, growling as she went to the door of her cabin and peaked outside, getting the attention of the nearest servant and asking them to go see what was keeping them.
She hadn’t even gotten comfortable however when a knock came at the door, causing her to sigh before speaking again, “Enter.”
The servant entered quickly, bowing low before looking back up to speak. “Your highness, it seems the mountain passage has collapsed, so unfortunately we will have to head back to Ponyville, the conductor extends his apologies for the trouble.”
The servant left after that, Sunset sighing as she looked out the window again, before smiling as an idea struck her. Back before her possession by Twilight, Sunset had been a priestess of the old gods, something many ponies had hated her for. To many of the ponies of her time, the old gods had been considered deceivers, blinding them and keeping them from worshiping the true gods, Faust and her alicorns.
But Sunset knew better than that, for the old gods were alive, and they still held major influence over the world. Each race had some, from the giant cats of the great Feygiptian desert, to the apes and their ever changing pantheon, each was unique and powerful, and Sunset prayed to them all.
For unlike normal magic, being devoted to the old gods provided many powerful spells, many of which would be beyond even a young alicorns ability to perform, and there were many spells the gods provided which she had not tried, one of which would solve her current problem.
So she got up, lighting up her horn as she closed her eyes, bringing forth the image of the crystal empire as she spread her wings and began to speak.
“Omnipotent power, creator of all things, forged by the gods in eternal chaos, fold the space between us and bring me to my destination.”
Cadance watched from the balcony of her palace as a bright light appeared over the city, knowing who it was even before the light dissipated to reveal the golden furred alicorn gliding to the ground. She had been friends with sunset many years ago, before she had left for Canterlot to become Celestia’s pupil, and eventually consort.
She also knew why she was here, for she had gotten a letter from Faust earlier saying that Nebula was finally accepting help, and to expect to be sent for soon.
But before the mare could touch ground, Cadance cast a quick spell; Sunset lighting up with a bright pink aura, while another pink aura appeared outside Cadance’s door, like she suspected it would.
“Sargent Sentry, please come here,” said Cadance, returning her gaze to the outside as her spell ended and the door opened, revealing the grizzled old face of Sargent Flash Sentry.
“What is it you need your highness,” asked the old guard, his remaining eye glaring at her as he waited for her to speak.
“Another one of the princesses has arrived here to meet with me, I would like you to go out and meet her and escort her here, just make sure to remain calm around her.”
“As you command your highness,” said Flash, before turning around and leaving the room.
After the door closed Cadance turned back to the window, smiling at the thought of being able to prove Nebula had made the right choice so early, and sat down to wait.
