The Dark Zoner

Prologue: Legend of the Zoner

Once upon a time, there existed two Realms on this Plane. The Everfree and Everlasting Moon Realm. The other Realm, was the Glorious and Gracious Sun Realm.

The two Realms were governed each by one Princess, the luminescent Princess Luna who controlled the Moon and her elder sister, Princess Celestia, who in turn controlled the Sun.

The two Realms were once One until a struggle between the two sister grew. No one knew quite what had happened that tore the rift between the two loving sisters but everyone knew it had to do with their opposing beliefs and powers.

The younger sister, Princess Luna, had grown a bit lonely since there were none that could relate to her besides her sister and had decided to breed a new life into being. They were her creations in finding something beyond the Realms of the Moon and the Sun. They were in the zone of impossibilities, whom she aptly named the Zoners.

She spent countless time and power on their creation but the fruits of her labors were shown. The Zoners were everything that represented the ponies that she had lived among but more powerful, more graceful, more unique.

And to further their uniqueness, she created only one. She sent her creation to live among the normal ponies and learn to coexist together.

This creation added into the rift that grew between the two powerful princesses.

It was a Sin in Princess Celestia’s eyes to breath false life into the world that they lived in. Her idea was that the False Life dirtied and plagued the world of the beautiful life that already existed here and that Princess Luna was blemishing the world they that they lived in.

Princess Luna ignored her sister’s words, taking them as wild rants. So, she continued to create more creatures. This time, she desired more in quantity than quality so as to fill the world with many of her creations as much as possible.

After the Zoners, came the Cockatrice, then the Hydras, and many more afterwards. Each creation she made was more disfigured and unrecognizable from the last. To Princess Luna, this was an art, each creation was different and special.

This only disgusted Princess Celestia more.

The Prime Lives and the False Lives began to live together in an uneasy but uneventful peace.

This went on for quite some time, until a certain event came that finally ripped the final bonds holding the two great sisters together.

One of Princess Luna’s creatures went into a wild rage and took the life of one of the ponies. This was the first ever recorded ‘non-natural death’ and ‘murder’ that the creatures in this world ever knew.

Princess Celestia could stand Princess Luna’s experiments no longer and decided to confront her sister more directly. She demanded that Princess Luna removed her creations and to return their world to its once harmonious paradise. Or else.

To her surprise, Princess Luna wasn’t going to listen peacefully. She blamed that the pony that was killed was harassing her poor Hydra.

In a fit, Princess Celestia raised a hoof to strike her sister but only to get pushed back by Princess Luna’s first creation, the one and only Zoner.

“You cretin!” Princess Celestia roared in a fit of rage and struck the Zoner with a powerful blast of magic. In her rage, she spent more magic than she intended.

“Noo!!!” Princess Luna cried out, her First was obliterated right in front of her eyes. She turned to look at her elder sister with teary eyes, “And you say that they are the monsters!”

The black ash on the ground started to move up before shaking. It brushed off easily, leaving a badly wounded but still living Zoner under it. Celestia, and even his own creator Luna, was shocked beyond belief.

“Princess, are you okay?” The Zoner asked without a hint of pain in his voice although his body was twitching and dripping endless fountains of blood. Princess Luna flew over to him, grabbing him, and fled to a safe haven away from Princess Celestia.

Everypony just saw what had just happened between the two sisters, and adding that to the death of their own earlier, became more tense not just with the False Lives but with each other.

They were split among each other on who to side with. The eccentric but sound Princess Luna who had every right to defend her creations or the protective Princess Celestia who only wanted her ponies safe and out of harm’s way?

That was when the ponies of the Equestrian Realm went to war among each other. One protested the extinction and eradication of beings that they considered a virus while the others disapproved of the cruel and heartless treatments.

Princess Celestia created a Realm of peace and prosperity with a proud and pure clan of pegasus as her front guard, the Starlights. They headed her armies against the demonic creations of her younger sister as much as they could to protect her citizens.

Princess Luna created her Realm with freedom and an open mind. She too chose a head for her armies, her First, the Zoners. The Zoners would take on the blunt of the Solar armies to weaken them for the rest to take down.

They were at war with each other so often that it became the norm and no pony knew of any other life.

Each sister had an opposing mind and opposing strategy in their warfare that were opposite but equal with one another that made them end in an endless stalemate. That is, until the Zoner, known as Dusk Striker decided to create more Zoners the way only nature knew.

Dusk Striker was a powerful Zoner, aging to the ripe old age of 700 and something inside him suddenly ticked. His biological clock was ticking and he needed to find a mare to breed with.

Even though he was old enough to be a pony’s great grandfather several times over, he had the appearance of a middle-aged pony. And he wasn’t exactly bad looking with his shiny black and purple coat, and multi-shade of purple and dark red mane.

Everypony found out what allowed the Zoners to be truly called ‘monsters’ when they found out how the aged Zoner looked for a mate.

This poor soul was then dubbed, the ‘Fated Partner’.

It seemed Dusk didn’t know himself of who his Fated Partner was, only that she was to the East. He flashed by in streaks of lightning as he left a fiery trail behind in his wake.

He eventually found the place he was looking for. It was a small village with a few hundred ponies. Celestia’s ponies, he momentarily growled in realization.

He walked without a care out in the open, allowing all the ponies to catch a glimpse of him. Dusk didn’t react when the ponies pulled out their torches and pitchforks. He followed the invisible string that was pulling him along until her found a single mare by her lonesome. She was gathering water at the nearby lake.

He smiled a toothy grin when his eyes met hers. He didn’t take notice of the horde of ponies that prepared to jump him with their weapons out.

Before the young mare could react she found her entire village set aflame with Dusk staring at her with those same lost eyes. Her eyes grew blank as she continued to stare at Dusk.

“I found you.” He snarled in joy before he overtook the pony. She didn’t know what to do and was quickly swallowed up in darkness.

A few weeks later, the earth pony mare was going into labor in a section of the Moon Realm’s Castle. She was crying red eyes of pain as she struggled to release the weight inside her.

Dusk smiled proudly at his newfound child. It was a colt, oh glorious joy!

“He’s lovely!” The doctor said as he slapped the baby on the bum before handing it to the mother.

“My…son, my little colt…!”

“He has your eyes.” Dusk cried out to the earth pony. He turned to look back at his captive who he had imprisoned after his massacre of her village. His jaw dropped when he saw her shining green eyes turn white and her forelegs drooped to her side.

“The prisoner…she’s dead.” The doctor said after checking for a pulse. He turned to face Dusk with his mask covered face, “What shall we name him, Master Dusk?”

“Call him…Dusk Shine.” Dusk Striker said without hesitation.

“What an excellent name, sir!”

News of Dusk Shine’s birth brought great joy to the Moon Realm, having another Zoner was only the beginning!

It was decidedly a grand and somber day, that day. Princess Luna’s Shadowguards went to receive Dusk Striker for the celebration’s preparations but only to see his fresh corpse on the ground in his room. Next to it was the young Dusk Shine feasting on his dead father.

Dusk Striker was turning into a black and red gloop that Dusk Shine greedily suckled like a mother’s milk.

One of the Shadowguards charged at Dusk Shine in an attempt to stop the brutal display only to end up on the dinner plate as well. Dusk Shine disappeared in a white flash and appeared behind the guard, leaving a large hole in his shape through the individual’s body.

The other guards started to panic and headed for the door only for it to shut heavily on them, leaving them trapped with the devilish infant.

None had made it out of that room alive.

Any pony that went close to Dusk Shine was immediately dealt the same wrath, all except for Princess Luna. He snarled and attacked anyone who was in his way but grew docile when he was met with Princess Luna.

He still didn’t comprehend or learn speech yet but the way Dusk Shine wagged his jaw and gestured with his hooves was similar to how many of the ponies bowed and greeted the princess.

“Hello, little one.” Princess Luna raised a hoof and petted Dusk Shine on the head. A tear streaked down her cheek. She lost Dusk Striker but he left her a farewell gift. She realized that when she made the Zoners first as one that only one Zoner will exist at any given point and time.

The new Zoner turned out to be even more powerful than his predecessor and he grew into adulthood pretty quickly, in a span of 2 months.

But as powerful as the new Zoner was, he was still not on par with Princess Celestia’s powers or her elite pony guards, the Starlights.

The war was still deadlocked, but less so now.

With every new Zoner that grows into existence, they are more powerful than the last. Each one will continue to look for their Fated Partner and meet the same fate. If mare or colt, it ended the same way for the Zoners, only one was born and the parents always died in some way, shape, or form.

Usually, the Zoners will start to search for their Partner when they breach 500 years, interestingly, the Zoners always look for their Partner after 500 years but sometimes it’ll take a few hundred extra years for that partner to be born. The 5th generation Zoner, Spark Zone, was a ripened age of 1000 before finally finding his mate.

There was also a secret, one that Princess Luna would hope that her treacherous sister would not find out. Zoners were all powerful but they had one distinct weakness. They were not weak as infants and were by no means impaired if the Zoner is a mare going through child bearing but there is a weakness in their invincibility.

Two, if you really felt inclined.

Zoners were powerful beings but they were by no means immortal, they could die when struck hard enough or wither from old age. But the first is nearly impossible and the latter is cancelled out through the birthing process.

But that very process is also the very weakness Princess Luna was hoping that her sister didn’t catch. Zoners only existed as one and so do their Fated Partners. If a Fated Partner is found and killed before the Zoner can take them, then the Zoner’s life is forfeit since they can no longer procreate. Zoners cannot reproduce with any other pony, only their Fated Partner.

It’s been 8 generations of the Zoners and this is the beginning of the last. Princess Celestia never really found out the Zoner’s weakness but she didn’t need to. The last Zoner took care of it herself.

Twilight Sparkle, Princess Luna’s star pupil and caretaker.

Tales of the final Zoner.

Chapter End