What Remains II: After the Fall

Chapters

Prologue
Invisible Hoof
Veiled Intent
A Silent Fall
Golden Days
Unlikeliest of Friends
Cold Case
Eased Burdens
Immortal Truth
Cold Insight
Loyalty to Friends
Know Your Role
Rendezvous
Cloaked Daggers
Two Faced
Reunion of Sorts
Fire on the Horizon
Epilouge

Prologue

The monolithic black construct reached up ominously over the over the dark sprawl of trees and shrubbery which surrounded the building on all sides. Jagged stone towers jutted upwards from all four corners of the fortress’s sides; piercing the dull blue night skin that had hung over the structure and the surrounding land for millennia.

And situated deep within the construct’s center, stood two ponies, a mare and a stallion.

“The time is nearly upon us,” grandly announced the stallion, his entire body concealed behind a shimmering blue-black robe that gave him both a wizardly but as well ominous presence. “Soon, our greatest ally shall be by our side, and with him, the ultimate power in all of Equestria!”

“I don’t see how this is necessary,” stated the mare with a stern glance toward the stallion. “After the conversation we had I’m very quite sure he’d be more than happy to follow us willingly. He seemed convinced.”

“We can’t know this for certain,” replied the stallion. “His mind is malleable and young, subject to change whenever he feels the need. He could’ve just as well altered his stance in the months you last saw him.”

“Is this the best way to convince him then?” countered the mare with both a growing worry and defiance. “Transporting him forcibly with magic? It would definitely give him a sound enough reason not to trust us.”

The stallion seemed to ponder this for a second, and then quickly shook his head in disbelief. “No, a show of power will introduce to him what we already hold in our hooves. The shock and awe will be enough to entice him to join us, then, we will educate him on what is at stake. We've waited long enough as it is and I don’t want to even open the possibility of jeopardizing the brittle situation. Careful and precise planning has always been the key to our success.”

The mare’s eyes sharpened. “He’s not as foolish as you’re making him out to be. In the situations I’ve seen him in he’s more than capable of understanding and adapting to his surroundings. He’s not going to fall before us in submission.”

“He will be no match for us,” said the stallion flatly. “Any act of resistance will be responded to swiftly and effectively. The boy is merely one piece in a larger puzzle, and although his continued service would be preferable, we can gladly do without.”

“Perhaps if we—”

“The spell shall still be performed,” announced the stallion conclusively, raising both his hooves to the air as if to end any further discussion. “However, I will leave it to you to decide the handling of the boy when he arrives, since you have taken such an interest in his welfare. Does that sound suitable, Commander?”

The mare stooped her in reluctant compliance. “As you wish, my lord. Is there any particular way I should treat the human?”

The stallion shook his head. “Act as you would with any other youngster. Sincerity will as well be a factor that could alter his judgment. If we are going to ensure adequate compliancy on his part, then he needs to feel comfortable among us.”

The hooded stallion stretched a wry and sarcastic grin across his shadowed face. “Friendship, after all, is magic.”

Catching the blatant sting at Celestia’s insufferable philosophy, the mare smiled in return. “That it is.”

Invisible Hoof

Dear Administrator Ash Leaf,

I regret to inform you that the operation in Southeastern Equestria, commonly referred to as “The Vile Stretch”, was in unmediated failure. As usual, the local municipality was unwilling to agree to whatever proposal that was set forth unless taxation of their trade sectors would be significantly reduced to nearly half of what it is currently.

As usual with protocol, I explained to them the boundaries that I am able to function within and that the requests they put forward were wholly unreasonable to an agreement that would mutually benefit the ponies in their region as well as all throughout Equestria.

It was immediately following this statement that the discussion was officially dissolved by the local mayor, Girder Rust, and I was informed (quite hostilely so) to vacate the room.

I understand that the resources that these ponies possess can be quite valuable to the internal needs of the country, but as I have suggested on numerous occasions, I recommend that are efforts be focused elsewhere to ponies or other creatures more compliant towards actually making progress towards something.

Sincerely,

Alistair

The young human boy of fair skin, chestnut hair and a large nose which contrasted greatly against the rest of his face read back the letter he’d just written. Perhaps some elements of the composition were a bit too emotional, and maybe he should try to stretch out the dull professionalism that was encouraged when writing such highbrow government documents, but as it stood currently, he couldn’t care less about how it looked.

Placing the letter into an envelope, he sealed the paper shut and tossed it haphazardly onto the small boat’s floor, opting to deal with the matter of his work when it would feel less like a waste of time. When that would be, he didn’t know.

Alistair wordlessly looked out across the dark waters of the Equestrian-Griffon Sea, and sighed. A magnificent blue nebula hung peacefully over the still ocean water, the twinkling stars reflecting off the water as it quietly sloshed against the small cutter he road upon.

Grasping the edge of the rudder with his left hand, he steered the medium size vessel into a pointed position further north up the coast.

“Beautiful night,” he mumbled with a reserved satisfaction. “At least something positive came out of this trip.”

True, his skin hadn’t gotten a bad reddish-burn this time around; he’d kept himself moderately in well order in terms of cleanliness, and he was fairly sure that he hadn’t contracted a lovely case of food poisoning from sampling the local wares. Maybe adaptations among mammals did occur faster.

For the past few weeks he’d been trying his hardest to secure a fishing trade deal with the ponies of the Vile Stretch, a backwater etch of marshland that would only look even partially desirable to the backward ponies that lived there. And, as another one of his periodic trips into Equestria’s armpit neared its conclusion, it once again felt like an absolute waste of time.

The little prats were trying to play the system (was anything new?), refusing to deal in anything Canterlot put forward unless some ridiculous kickback was given to them in whole, and in return, they would promise something that might pass for moderate civility among their stinking clans towards whatever Canterlot would ask of them in the future.

But he knew this was nothing but garbage and he’d picked up on that the very first time his leather shoes first squelched against the land’s muddy soil. Those ponies would continue to make their voices clear that being under the banner of Equestria was the last thing on their list, and the fact that an External Affairs diplomat was the one attempting to make trade deals with them only spoke volumes on how bad the problem was.

Still, he’d kept himself useful and was able to again get out of the madness that was the External Affairs office. And even though the fervor of a high reaching government facility was replaced with murky mud pits and pea soup fog, the change of scenery was still well received on his part, even though the stink would take a few days to wash off.

Looking out across the long expanse of water, he could see the distant lights of Canterlot casting themselves into the passing clouds that nearly scrapped the tip of the mountaintop city. At the rate his boat was maneuvering, he expected to pull into the metropolis’s service docks in no less than an hour.

And as the imminent event of his arrival back in Canterlot literally loomed in the distance like a rolling storm and the succeeding day that would of course be spent performing his daily rut of money management and returning telegraphs, he couldn’t help bit feel a twinge of disappointment creep up.

This wouldn’t have happened if you’d just stayed in Ponyville the voice in his head declared. Maybe if you’d just learned to cope with—

He grunted restlessly and promptly shook his head, extinguishing the discomforting thoughts along his subconscious. Sighing in dejection once more, he passively scanned his perimeter for anything interesting that might hold his attention until he got home.

On his third absent look, as he was about to peer back down the horizon, something off to his right skittered in the corner of his eye. Turning towards it, he was immediately left with a sense of wonder and confusion over what it particularly was.

It appeared to be a large fog of some sort, its gaseous cloud churning and floating not but one thousand yards away from his ship. It seemed odd how easily the specter-like-mist had evaded his normally keen eyes, almost appearing out of nowhere when he wasn’t looking.

Grabbing the main sail rope, Alistair leered the cutter away from the approaching fog and felt a burst of wind pick up from behind him. Feeling the craft surge forward, he almost sighed a breath of relief at the much needed speed. But instead, he felt the craft begin to lurch itself into a starboard turn, moving away from the safety of the coast and directly into the fog’s path.

“What the—”

Alistair yanked even harder against the sail’s controlling rope, doing his best to reposition himself back to the craft back to its original course. But the boat did not budge an inch, continuing its slow approach into the shimmering ghostly mist.

Gripping as hard as he could, he gave one last desperate pull, feeling the rope’s friction sting against his reddening palms.

The cutter broke through the edge of the fog’s cloud, and floated steadily into the center of its mass. Slowing itself to a halt, the boat stopped suddenly, with nothing but the eerie low rumble of the fog being heard.

From a distance just along the edge of the coastal inland, a bright white flash could be seen from within the shimmering cloud. And, as the odd display of light slowly glowered back into darkness, the cutter, Alistair, and even the fog itself, had abruptly disappeared.

Veiled Intent

Pencil Press kept his head stooped lowly against the top of his plain looking office desk, his pen jerking ferociously as he glided over word after word of the important message he was composing. Finishing at the bottom of the page with a dotted circle, he folded the piece of paper up and placed it gently into one of his desk drawers.

Standing up stiffly, he let out an exaggerated yawn as he caught a quick glance at the room’s wall clock. A mere three minutes till his next appointment. Before the clock’s second hand even a chance to twinge ever so slightly, the yellow-furred earth pony was already strolling through the External Affairs building’s looping corridors.

As he swooped through the hallways and dodged the other frantic government workers who too had much important things to attend to but not much time to get to them, he couldn’t help but stop at a slight commotion taking place by one of the stairwells.

It was two creatures, one griffon female adorned in the gaudy silken robes that diplomats from the Griffon Kingdom wore with such ardent pride in their hopeless excuse for a nation, and one unicorn stallion. The griffon pointed an accusatory talon toward the unicorn, while he in turn glared harshly back.

“You think you’re so clever trying to cut our boundaries!?” shouted the griffon. “We’ll see how smug you are with a broken nose!”

“You do not scare me!” spat back the unicorn with a dandified Canterlot accent. “Your barbarity perfectly encapsulates your equal stupidity!”

“I’ll show you ‘barbarity’!”

Internally smiling at the lapping political undertones of this hostile conflict between two individuals meant to represent their respective countries, Press continued onwards.

Stopping just short of the half opened door to the administrator’s office, Pencil Press exhaled deeply and began what he set out to do. Skittishly poking his head through the doorway, he pursued his lips in quite visual weakness.

“Mr. Ash Leaf?” the young colt called louder than he intended, the last part coming out with a comedic shrillness. “I’m here for that meeting I requested.”

The grey maned and green furred stallion turned around to face the new arrival with a wrinkled fire that pretty well summed up his aged personality.

“Well, what are you waiting for then?” the elder stallion demanded gruffly. “I’ve got the Saddle Arabian ambassador coming in here in—” he quickly glanced at the wristwatch around his hoof—“fourteen minutes and twelve seconds. So let’s make this snappy!”

Press replied with a nod and immediately stepped into the superior’s office. Closing the door behind him, he took a seat by the massive crescent shaped desk that was his boss’s domain.

Plopping down in his much larger and wheeled leather chair, Ash Leaf lit a massive amber colored cigar between his teeth, and paused to take a brief drag of the savory stick. “So…” he said through an already billowing cloud of smoke erupting from the scented torch. “What’s this all about kid?”

Press swallowed nervously. “Well sir, I’ve been having some concerns the past few days…”

The stallion fixed him with an icy stare. “I swear, if your thinking of ratting me out about my extended lunch breaks I will personally—”

Press grinned. “Nothing like that sir. It’s something a bit more pressing.”

“That being?”

Press wrung his hooves together uncomfortably. “The human,” he managed out quietly. “Alistair, our prime volunteer for direct diplomacy operations?”

“I know of him,” Ash said with a nod. “How couldn’t you? That kid stands out more than a fly in cake batter.” He took another puff of the cigar and directed the smoke upwards toward the ceiling. “So what’s got you stirred up about him? Is he bothering you?”

Press shook his head. “Not in the slightest. However, I was looking through some of our travel ledgers and I understand he enlisted on a trade negotiation down in the Vile Stretch?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, it said his vessel was due to dock back in Canterlot not but three days ago.”

Ash Leaf shrugged. “So? How’s this important?”

Press rapped his hooves across the desk with an oddly timed excitement. “Well sir, what’s got me a bit bothered is that I haven’t seen him around External Affairs since he was due back.”

The stallion’s brow furrowed. “What?”

“I haven’t seen him at his desk or around any of the other offices. Security claims they haven’t even caught a trace of the kid.”

The statement took a moment to properly click into place, but once it did, Ash shakily stubbed out the cigar. “Oh no,” he mumbled through a raspy choke of air, “the higher ups are gonna kill me for not realizing this sooner.” Cursing under his breath, he looked back to Press. “Do you have an idea where he might be? Were there any reports of storms in the area?”

“None sir, wasn’t any indicators on his desk either.”

Ash cursed once more and slammed his hoof against the top of his desk. “Great, this is just freakin’ great. I got a missing human on my watch—the only one in the entire freakin’ world—and it took three days and somepony thirty years younger than me to finally realize that he’s gone.” Ash muttered yet another curse. “How could I have been so stupid?”

“There’s still a chance we can find him,” added Press quickly. “There has to be something floating around that may lead us to him, or at least, give us a hint of where he last was. He’s bound to have made some schedule or list as to what his activities would be when he got to the Stretch, as well as his returning trip.”

The administrator grimaced. “I wouldn’t count on it. That kid likes to stick to himself, if he had any written clue to his whereabouts, he would’ve kept it on him.”

“Still,” said Press with ever increasing energy. “There’s bound to be something we can pick up on. And I can help with it.”

Ash Leaf raised a skeptical eyebrow. “I hope you’re not serious, cause’ there’s no chance I’m doing that.”

“S-Sir?” the colt stammered out. “I believe I should be the one searching for his whereabouts. I was the one who first figured this out, and I can be a lot more discrete than a Royal Guard investigation—”

“You’re also a lot more of an amateur,” cut in Ash sharply. “I can already smell a government scandal looming on the horizon, but I’m not going to risk the safety of another being just to try and keep this thing covered. There’s no telling what danger the human might be in and I’m not going to be the one who puts him in even more.”

Press’s face darkened. “I take it you’re not even going to listen to my idea?”

Ash shook his head. “No, I’m not. I really do appreciate you bringing this to my attention but for now we need to rely on those trained for this sort of thing, for everypony’s sake.”

Pencil Press rose from his chair, a tight glare focused on his boss. “There’s other ways to help, and the Guards aren’t the only ones who can.” Turning around, the young colt stormed out of the administrator’s office.

A Silent Fall

A light breeze grazed across Alistair’s clothing and skin as his senses slowly returned to him. He found that he lay against something coarse and cold, with a dull light barely illuminating the room he was in. Struggling to his feet, he felt a stream of aches slam against the entirety of his back, nearly causing him to stumble back to the floor. Straightening himself, he slowly raised his body out of his momentary hunch and into its full height.

Another breeze pushed him, this time much more abrasive and intrusive to his nerves, prompting him to shudder at the sudden drop in temperature as he attempted to inspect his surroundings.

A thick night sky still hung over the world, the dull gray moonlight giving impression that not much time had passed since his arrival. However, it looked wholly different from when he last saw it. It was blacker, more outstanding to the eye, with the natural subtly being cast away for something that appeared deliberate in its own beauty.

Looking around further, Alistair could see that despite the clear view of the space above his head, a set of hexagonal walls surrounded him on all sides, comprised of holey obsidian slates that appeared to have been stripped directly from coarse volcanic beds.

“This is odd,” he remarked aloud, his voice echoing lowly through the open chamber as he appraised it. “Castle-like fortifications, but an open air ceiling. Interesting concept, but contradictory and nonsensical…”

“A shame that you have this sentiment,” called a faint voice from a distance away, the sound too amplified by the room’s structure.

“Who’s there?!” demanded Alistair as he immediately ignited his magic to his hands, a sizzling electric blue light sparking outwards from his closed palms.

His feet promptly spread themselves apart, evening himself into a fighting stance that had become second nature after years of practice.

“There is no need to react in such a way,” comforted the voice gently from somewhere in front of him. “I mean you no harm, Alistair.”

The boy quickly dissipated the magic from his hands while staring in bewilderment toward the voice’s origin. Although he only saw blackness in front of him, he looked upon it as a personification of the mysterious figure.

“How do you know my name?” he asked with a growing stiffness that poorly masked his discomfort.

“I know all that is of necessity to the welfare of Equestria, especially you, my dear friend.”

His eyebrows arched into a frown. “That’s quite a vague sentiment. And I normally don’t consider ponies I’ve never met before to be my friends.”

The voice chuckled. “The Commander was correct, you are devious one.”

“I try to be.”

“Step forward then,” said the voice with sincere invitation. “Perhaps you’ll find me more affable in the proper lighting.”

Clenching his fists together, Alistair took a few careful steps forward.

As he moved, seemingly on command to his advance, the dull moonlight shifted from its unfocused position and shined directly into the center of the room, fully illuminating the voice’s source while still keeping the outer edges of the area hidden.

It stood just a few yards away, cloaked in a swooping black-blue robe that gave it both a wizardly and unsettling air. It was an equine male in shape, with a ghostly white snout poking out from under a pulled down hood. From there, there was nothing else he could see, the figure’s specter-like presence seeming to bloom outwards in an ethereal light.

Alistair’s eyes widened in surprise. “W-What in the world…”

“I am not a phantom,” answered the stallion patiently, seeming to read Alistair’s unspoken thought. “Merely the effect of a certain spell, one that was self-imposed for my own benefit.”

“There’s a story to that statement,” Alistair noted.

“It’s a tale for another day,” the stallion answered with a wave of his hoof. “Perhaps once we grow to be a bit more acquainted with one another, I shall explain it to you.”

“If you wish to grow more acquainted you could at least begin with telling me your name,” he said with waning patience.

“Silver Eclipse,” replied the stallion.

“Yes, well then, Silver Eclipse,” he uttered the name with clear derision, “I don’t quite understand what is happening or how I got here in the first place, but my instincts tell me that you had your hoof in the equation. Is this correct?”

Eclipse nodded, a wry grin stretching across his shrouded face. “That is correct.”

“Then if you’d be so kind, could you please explain to me what the heck is going on here before I go and find out on my own? I’ve had quite enough of whatever game you’re trying to play.”

“Easy there, old sport,” echoed a sly and familiar mare’s voice from behind him. “I know you can have a pretty sore temper, but try to show just a little ounce of respect.”

Blood running cool at the voice, Alistair turned around to see that a gray furred and lavender maned mare now stood behind him, a confident but friendly grin across her face. Her name was Shale Press and she’d been a thorn in Alistair’s side since his very first month in Equestria.

She, with the assistance of several other unnamed ponies, had tried and failed twice over the course of two years to harm and apprehend him for their own nefarious purposes, nearly carrying through on their first try but clearly not anticipating the resilience of Twilight Sparkle and a few other close companions.

“Shale…?” he said alarmingly as the color began to drain from his face, turning his fair skin a ghostly white that nearly matched the cloaked stallion. “How did you—”

“—Sneak up on you?” she finished with a smirk. “Easy, just have to move when you’re talking. I don’t know the precise statistics, but the brain gets quite distracted when conversing with another.” She shrugged. “Something with chemicals.”

Alistair crossed his arms clumsily, giving his best visual display of heroism as his mind slowly stopped reeling. “I know you’re not just here to enlighten me on brain chemistry.”

“You’ve gotten better,” she remarked cheerfully as she took a few steps closer to him. “You’re not even shaking this time.”

“I’ve gotten better at controlling my fear,” Alistair said flatly. “I’m not as frightened as I once was.”

“Really? Then how come you still—” she reached forward in a flash, and patted Alistair’s cheek softly, relishing at his startled wince to her touch, “—do this?”

“S-Stop that!?” he stammered while jerking his head away.

Shale giggled in delight. “I’m just messing with you, no harm done right?”

“Commander Shale,” boomed the ghostly stallion’s voice impatiently, “may we please focus back to the task at hoof?”

Shale’s expression immediately shifted into one of centered concentration as she dipped her head formally to the stallion. “Yes, my lord.” Scurrying over to the raised section of the floor, Shale quickly stood at Silver Eclipse’s side.

“As you may have figured out at this point,” Shale continued as if not interrupted prior, “Silver Eclipse and I share a common ideology in a sense, a dictating drive that keeps us closely in league with one another. And although we have different ways of achieving what needs to be done, we both have the same goal.”

“We represent a force of change in this world,” continued Silver Eclipse, “a powerful cabal of ponies united in our effort to extinguish the long troubled light of Equestria, and upon its ashes, establish a new order for all ponies to flourish properly in. The road has been harsh and filled with adversity, numerous setbacks and periods of hardship slowing our progress. But now, in these times of troubles, our opportunity of greatness has finally revealed itself.”

Alistair raised a queried eyebrow. “Are you plotting some political insurrection, a military coupe perhaps?”

Silver Eclipse grimaced, something close to anger appearing from behind the cloak. “I take it you assume I’m just some over ambitious Royal Guard general, a foolish old stallion with the childlike intention of usurping Celestia simply out of some deluded sense of superiority?

The boy shrugged. “More than likely not, what you’re describing would probably be adorned in bejeweled Guard armor with a fruit salad of self-appointed metals draped across your chest. You’re staying humble, I’ll give you that, but you’re still not divulging the entirety of what you are.”

“That information will be given to you once your loyalty is assured,” growled the stallion.

“Well, that leaves in a tricky position,” Alistair mused. “I’m expected to blindly obey a mysterious cloaked stallion with the promise that more details on whatever he’s trying to do will be supplied to me in the future.

Eclipse crossed his hooves. “Your insolence is impressive.”

Alistair shook his imploringly. “You misunderstand me; I meant no insult in the statement. I was simply feeding back to you my current standing on the unusual expectations you’ve thrust upon me. At no point was I insulting you, or the organization you represent.”

“I told you he would do this,” mumbled Shale just audible enough for Eclipse to hear it.

Glaring at Shale, he looked back to Alistair with equal discontent. “I still take it from your quick dismals that the subject of rebuilding Equestria no longer interests you.”

“Not at all,” he said inclining his head respectfully, “I still most definitely believe in your criticisms of Equestria. The internal disputes, lack of security, improper representation, and so forth. However, I still have important business to attend to back in Canterlot and little time to play whatever game your offering.”

Shale chuckled aloud, inciting a faster than normal glance from the boy. “I see that your stint with External Affairs has rubbed off well enough.” She took a step away from Eclipse. “But even then, I don’t truly believe that you wish to go back there.”

“Really?” he answered sourly. “And why do you think that?”

Shale had anticipated the conversation gravitating into this territory, the topic in question a highpoint on the boy’s conscious whether he realized it our not. It had prompted him down several paths, to his relocation to Canterlot, and more importantly, his meeting with her today.

Letting the select name roll off her tongue with a casual offhoofedness that would have made the title seem unparticular and of ill interest, she set the trap into motion.

“Twilight Sparkle.”

Alistair’s expression almost immediately darkened with the mere drop of the mare’s name. A deep shadow seemed to cast over the entirety of his youthful face as his cooled expression twisted into one of thinly veiled rage. His mild and cultured tone as well became something of a dark contrast among its previous self, with a harsh vehemence sharpening the ends of his words.

“Don’t speak that name,” commanded the boy with a grave sting as a dark magical red aura began to fizzle along the edges of his fingers, casting a bloodied glare over his features. “Simply mentioning it leaves you at my short mercy.”

Shale looked to Silver Eclipse, who in turn looked back to her with a solid solid, notifying her that the situation was hers. Swallowing her fear, she took a few careful paces toward the fallen Alistair, speaking as gently as she could.

“I don’t believe you’ll do anything that you’re implying, Alistair. Your threats are hollow.”

“Is that so?” he said while raising a closed palm that now seethed in the dark red magic sparking off it. “And what makes you think that?”

She gulped once more. “Because you wouldn’t hurt one of your friends.”

The magic in Alistair’s hand immediately deactivated, as Shale’s words abruptly blindsided him.

Good she congratulated herself internally, now keep it moving.

“I know how you scratch around back in Canterlot. Your job, what you do. You hate it my than anything in the world. You were driven away by the one pony you cared for the most, and now you’re forever condemned to scraping out a menial existence among the politics that is tearing Equestria apart from the inside out.”

“Master Eclipse brought you here—we brought you here—to offer you a second chance. We can take you away from the world that has beaten you down, we can make you a part of something good, we can give a new purpose to your life. But most importantly, we can give you the one thing that has so long evaded you, friendship.”

Now finalize it

Taking a few paces closer, Shale placed her hoof atop his shoulder and looked directly into his eyes, still speaking in a gingered tone.

“Wouldn’t you prefer to stay here just for just a little while, just to get away from it all?”

Alistair’s body seemed greatly weighted as he quietly pondered the situation. The darkness from his face had greatly receded, leaving only a pair of glassy eyes that stared forlornly toward the floor. Wiping something from the edge of his eyes, he briskly looked away and nodded.

“I, um, think that sounds good,” he answered tunelessly, his tone wavering back and forth with each word sounding.

“Splendid!” proclaimed the stallion jubilantly with a single clap of his hooves. “This is wonderful news! You had me going there for a moment, my dear boy.” Bounding over to the still shaky Alistair, he clasped both his hooves onto the boy’s shoulders. “You’ve taken your first step toward a much brighter future, Alistair. And as a minor gift for doing so,” he reached into the deep folds of the robe and pulled out a dark blue jacketed book, “I’d like to give you this.”

Absently accepting, Alistair sullenly nodded in thanks.

“Now, Commander Shale will sure you to your quarters for the time being. While your there, I’d like for you to read the tome I’ve given you. I believe you’ll find it most informative.”

Understanding the implied command, Shale stepped forward and gestured for Alistair to follow. Wordlessly moving after her, the two exited through the darkened side of the hexagonal chamber, off into the great unknown.

Golden Days

“Twilight, pass the ball over here!” shouted Pinkie Pie frantically, waving her hooves in the air with both glee and desperate tenacity.

Smiling at the display, Twilight chucked the purple ball forwards with a single lobbing arch from her magic, sending the soft rubber sphere directly towards the spunky pink pony.

Seeing her opportunity, the airborne Rainbow Dash made an immediate 180 degree turn in her flight path and rocketed towards the gap between Twilight and Pinkie, hoping to intercept the ball before it reached its recipient.

Too late. Clutching the ball tightly with her hoof and foreleg, Pinkie tossed the ball to Rainbow’s right, straight into the waiting hooves of Applejack.

“Y’all gotta be faster than that Rainbow if you ever wanna to get out of the middle.” AJ chided at the sky blue pegasus.

The six friends (plus Spike) had been screwing around for the better part of an hour along one of Ponyville’s several spanning plains. The sun hung highly at half mast across the cloudless sky, approaching its predetermined dip off the edge of the Earth.

“It’s not far!” grumbled Dash in despair. “Being the monkey in the middle is always the hardest. I deserve a partner or something.”

AJ shook her head stoutly. “That ain’t what the rules are. All of us have been in the middle plenty of times. You just gotta be ready—” AJ briskly bounced the ball off the bright grass and followed up with one of her signature propelling bucks that rocketing the ball into a line drive, “—for anything!”

Spike stood poised to receive the ball, with bent knees and open claws just waiting to catch the rubber orb. But, as the purple cannonball blasted towards him, in the last few split seconds the baby dragon began to doubt his own abilities. The ball, colliding against his chest with an audible slapping sound, Spike tripped backwards and landed flat on his back, stars dancing in his eyes as the world shifted up and down.

“Are you okay, Spike?” called Twilight a few yards away, her even tone displaying neither shock nor worry.

Diving for the ball that now rolled harmlessly across the grass, Rainbow triumphantly held it towards the sky in victory. “I did it!” she announced happily. “I’m not in the middle anymore!”

“Hold on Rainbow,” cut in AJ as she walked over with the rest of the collective group. “I don’t think Spike is in all that good of a position to play anymore.”

“Ohhh, Spikey-poo,” cooed Rarity as she knelt over the wounded dragon, rubbing his chin affectionately. “Are you okay?”

Pink hearts danced into the whites of Spike’s eyes as he sprang back to his feet almost immediately. Exhaling deeply, he sighed in pure bliss while clasping both his claws together. “I am now.”

“He doesn’t look all that bad,” agreed Fluttershy with a nod. “But maybe he could use a bandage on his knee, a small one too.”

The group of friends casually chatted over the not quite dire situation, trying to decide if the mortal wound on Spike (a skinned knee) should either be treated or ignored. As they discussed over everything, a lone Royal Guard pegasus graced high above their heads, and landed on a hill overlooking the bright green plain.

Immediately spotting the white furred stallion, Twilight turned to the rest of her friends. “You guys keep playing, looks like I have some princess duties to take care of,” she gestured to the silent colt in the distance.

Agreeing, the ponies and Spike got back to their game as Twilight half trotted, half fluttered over to the waiting Guard.

Stopping in front of him, Princess Twilight smiled warmly while fancying a quick bow of her head. “Hello there, what seems to be on the agenda today?”

The stone faced Guard saluted to Twilight and cleared his throat, not wishing to even skip half of a beat. “Princess Twilight, a recent development has just come out of Canterlot. I was instructed to deliver this message to you personally.”

Twilight’s brow furrowed. “What’s happened?”

“A missing persons report was filed just under an hour ago from Equestria’s External Affairs offices. Details at this moment remain murky, but we do have some general information supplied by the lead administrator.”

“Is an investigation already under way?”

“It’s being organized but no significant actions have been taken as of yet. We’ve been awaiting your personal overseeing of the operation before we begin.”

Twilight rubbed the edge of her chin in pondering. “Who specifically is missing then? Is it one of our ambassadors?”

The Guard shook his head. “Nothing of that magnitude, but it still is an extraordinary situation. The reason we are requesting your assistance is not only due to the wisdom that your Alicorn powers can grant, but as well as your personal connection to the missing. It’s the human, Alistair.”

Twilight could feel something faint drop into the pit of her chest but quickly felt it dissipate from herself, replaced with a cool constitution of focus that soothed her nerves. Still, she couldn’t help but widen her eyes in shock, not expecting the bad news the Guard had bore.

“My goodness…” she exclaimed quietly while bringing a hoof to her forehead. “This is important news.”

The Guard continued. “He was due back from an expedition to the Vile Stretch three days ago. His last reported location was aboard a personal watercraft travelling along Equestria’s eastern coast. From the orders I’ve been given, you’ve been requested to return to Canterlot immediately.”

Twilight nodded slowly, doing her best to shake off the clouding feelings of panic and desperation. “I understand. If there’s anypony who knows Alistair best, it’s me. We’re close friends after all.”

The Guard politely inclined his head forward. “Do you need transportation of goods or luggage, your highness? I am fully equipped to carry whatever you find necessary.”

She shook her head dismissively. “That won’t be needed, I can leave now. I just need to speak with my friends about this.”

Strutting back down the hill’s incline much slower than her original ascent, she carefully approached her gleeful friends with the troubling news. The festivities of the day would all but end shortly after.

Unlikeliest of Friends

Although not well known among most scholarly institutions, the spell of Shroud Appearance cannot be specifically classified as a ‘lost spell’, but more a wholly obscure one, with its power on occasion being inadvertently rediscovered when certain illusion spells are practiced incorrectly.

It’s with this obscurity that the full extent of Shroud Appearance has never been examined to determine its fullest potential. As detailed in this compendium, Shroud Appearance grants the user with an invisible barrier of sorts, that both blocks recognition in both the profane and arcane sense.

Not only will the user appear invisible to any trained eye, clairvoyance detection and simple sensing of magical energy will be ineffectual in most situations. However, there are a few exceptions to this fact, most notably in those immensely powerful in the arcane.

Although never confirmed, it can be assumed beings such as Princess Celestia or the ancient tyrant Discord would most likely possess the ability to nullify the effects of the spell, immediately seeing through the field no matter how powerful the user may be.

Keeping this slight hinder in mind, the amount of magical prowess to resist this spell has never been fully recorded, so be wary when engaging a highly skilled opponent.

The spell is as follows: Abjecte Licht Geten Darklyng

Once activated, the user should immediately experience the effects. If no result is seen, perform once more, stressing the vowels of each phrase with a much lighter annunciation, as if speaking in a normal manner. From there, one must—

A light knocking came against the door, shattering Alistair’s concentration and sputtering him for a moment.

“Come in,” he called with an edge of impatience, not looking away from the book.

Poking her head in carefully, the gray furred and lavender maned Shale Press appeared in the door’s small opening. Seeing Alistair still quietly reading, she opened the door partway and stepped in, quickly closing it behind her.

“It’s nice to see you’re interested in the tome,” she exclaimed kindly, looking absently around the room with feigned interest. “Master Eclipse was worried that you weren’t ready for it yet.”

“Not ready?” Alistair repeated with a queried eyebrow. “Does he think I can’t read?”

Shale sighed. “He assumed you’d only hold moderate interest. Although he recognizes that you aren’t completely illiterate in terms of the arcane, he still believes that your age is a hinder.”

A defiant frown crossed the boy’s face. “Is Silver Eclipse aware of what I was doing before he plucked me from the Equestrian--Griffon Sea?” He ruefully snorted. “I think working in Equestria’s External Affairs constitutes as statement of my own maturity.”

“His thoughts, not mine,” she said with her hooves raised in defense. “I’ve seen you in action old sport, the stallion hasn’t.”

Alistair shut the book and placed it gently to his side. “Well, you have a point there. I guess I shouldn’t mind his opinion—much.” His faced abruptly brightened. “But I take it you came by to talk about more pressing matters, eh?”

“How did you know?” she said with exaggerated surprise. “Has that book taught you how to read minds too?”

“Not yet.”

Pacing around the small stone space, she absently looked from corner to corner of the confined quarters. Minus the bed, a sink, a table, and a forlorn chair, the chamber was akin to that of a dungeon, with a thick panned glass window supplying minuscule connection to the outside world.

Moving through the bare room, she plopped herself down on the absent chair and awkwardly strummed her hoof across the table’s surface. Silent for a moment, she looked back to Alistair.

“You remember what we went over back in the Griffon Kingdom, inside that frigid crypt darker than the night itself?”

He nodded. “I remember. It was like walking into my very own tomb when I chased after you. I didn’t even realize what direction I was running until the light behind me receded.”

“Then you remember the talk we had about Equestria, and Celestia?”

He grinned once more, displaying a touch of solace to his words. “You make it seem like I have a selective memory. Of course I remember everything we discussed, it was meaningful to me.”

Shale bit the edge of her lip, worried over what his next response may be. “Is it still meaningful to you? Does the inadequacy of Celestia’s rule still bother you? Does the fact that she destroys all who oppose her still flicker injustice in your heart?”

When Shale had originally asked such questions and planted the seeds of doubt along Alistair’s subconscious months ago, he’d still been under the dark rage that had consumed him from the final acceptance of what Twilight Sparkle had become. And although he’d seemed incredibly convinced at the time, there still was a flaw to its structure.

Shale recognized that emotions were a powerful driving factor behind one’s motivations, but if anger and pain were the only reasons one was acting upon something as ideological as what she spoke of, then a path of destruction would already be set upon. Either he’d simply lose interest in the entire matter and simply scurry away from it, or even worse, pretend to still be loyal to their ranks and then silently betray them to Celestia’s cronies, eradicating the entire Order in one swift stroke.

She needed to know if Alistair truly did believe that Celestia needed to be stopped, that every action she took was one of weakness and submission that only crippled Equestria in the long run. If Alistair truly didn’t believe this, the Night Lords may have to resort to other means of compliance to ensure his role in their grand plan could still be counted upon.

Rubbing the light hairs sprouting across his chin, Alistair slowly nodded in recognition. “Perhaps it’s not as much as a fiery zeal of when you first mentioned it to me, but the feelings are still there. The lack of internal security, improper representation, how she handled Luna’s opposition, I don’t feel as enraged by it all, yet I understand why it should be fixed. It’s a hatred of what’s been put in place, but a passive hatred.”

Shale couldn’t help but lightly sigh in relief, something of a correct answer being given to her. She smiled at Alistair warmly. “I’m very glad you still think this way. Most ponies just like to continue along their merry ways and simple ignore the glaring problem in front of them. But it’s the select few like you and I who are able to turn around and acknowledge that something must be done.”

“I hope you’re not starting to doubt me,” he said pointedly. “Other than you there hasn’t been anypony else who’s seen me in action.”

“Not entirely. There were several lower ranking agents who cam along for both escapades, first in Ponyville and then to the Griffon Kingdom.”

He slowly nodded. “Oh yes—I forgot about those ponies.”

Shale waved the air dismissively with her hoof. “I don’t expect you to. They’re trained to follow orders and not much else—at least—until they achieve a higher rank. And even then, you cut through them so quickly I doubt you even had the time to give them a second glance.”

“Thank you,” he said with a light blushing of his cheeks. “I’ve never particularly acknowledged my own skillfulness in combat.”

“Not vocally, no,” Shale stated with a slice into his modesty. “But you still recognize them internally. No pony gets adept at fighting without at least realizing they excel in some form of it.”

“And what do you excel in then?” Alistair countered with a smirk.

“Hoof-to-hoof combat, as you saw back in Ponyville. Oh, and saber fencing as well.”

“Saber fencing!?”

“Most certainly. It’s elegant and precise, adaptable to most situations, easy to pick up, not segregated to one race of pony, and with the right equipment and enchantments, able to resist even the strongest of magic.”

Alistair’s eyes widened. “I’ve never heard of a swords being able to do that.”

“Because you trained under somepony for years with a much narrowed minded projection of magic and its bounds. True, Twilight Sparkle is very quite skilled in the execution and even creation of spells, but her comprehension stops there. She appears to have never taught you even the basics of enchantment, alchemy, or illusion, leaving you with a rudimentary education that can hopefully be expanded by both that book of yours and Master Eclipse’s wisdom.”

“Then why hasn’t he done this already?” said Alistair. “Wouldn’t he want whatever he’s going to instruct me on be introduced immediately?”

Shale shook her head. “I’m afraid that’s not how he see’s things. He makes his decisions wisely but with a touch of over-caution as you’ll come to find out. I’m not bashing him in any sort of way; we’ve just had a few disagreements over the years on how to properly handle things within the Children of the Night.”

Rising from her seat, Shale made her way towards the door. “But I’ll leave you to your studies for now; Master Eclipse would hate it if you got behind.”

Alistair shook his head and beamed back at her. “It’s alright; I appreciate you coming by for a moment, reminded me that there’s actually somepony I know around here.”

Shale smiled back. “No problem, it’s what friends are for.”

Cold Case

Twilight Sparkle strolled quietly down the quite insignificant stretch of Canterlot residential buildings. The blocky white and pink constructs sat next to other buildings of almost the exact design, giving the impression of a single monolithic living complex that was oddly spaced apart by an alleyway or street corner.

An occasional passing glance was given to Twilight during her brief scurry through the streets, but as she neared her destination, the attention over the snooty Canterlot ponies began to be focused on a much different attraction.

Clustered around another simple looking apartment block was a sea of curious and nosy ponies inching in on a large blocked off perimeter around the building, yellow warning tape blocking the entrance and surrounding street to anypony that wasn’t a Royal Guard Investigator.

Stepping through the crowd and casually over the line, she nodded at the several Guards surrounding the building. Pushing open the front lobby door, she made her way up a nearby staircase to the top floor.

Just as she climbed the last step, she spotted the center point of activity spilling out into the floor’s hallway. A single apartment door, swung wide open with several Guards moving in and out appeared to be just the place Twilight was looking for. Approaching coolly, she was about to enter when somepony called out to her from behind.

“Princess Twilight!” shrilly shouted a peach colored colt as he galloped over to her from the stairs she’d arrived from. “I’m so happy I didn’t miss you!”

He came to a halt in front of her, immediately thrusting out his hoof to shake. Nodding to him, Twilight took it. “It’s very nice to meet you…”

“Pencil Press,” the colt said with a formal bow. “I work in one of Canterlot’s External Affairs offices. I knew your friend Alistair before he—vanished.”

Twilight’s eyes widened in subdued surprise. “You knew him? Were you two friends?”

The stallion shook his head. “We weren’t that close, just worked in the same building is all.” His mood suddenly lightened excitement now heavy in his tone. “I was the first to realize he was gone, you know, brought it to everypony’s attention. If it wasn’t for me we may not even be having this investigation right now.”

Twilight uncomfortably nodded her head in agreement, a bit off put by the stallion’s odd mood shift and bragging. “I assume that’s why External Affairs put you on with the investigation? If you were able to figure out he was missing, you must be a pretty good detective as it is.”

The peach colt thought about this for a moment. “Y-Yeah, of course! My boss recognized my talents and immediately set me right on the trail. I’ve been helping out the last few days, right once the investigation started.”

Twilight nodded once more, gesturing to the opened apartment door and the hive of activity. “Well then, care to join me inside with the rest of Guards? We could use a pony like you.”

“I don’t think so,” said the colt briskly. “I’ve got some other things to take care of. I should get going now.” Then without another word, the colt turned around and bounded back down the stairs, not even a second glance back at the puzzled Twilight.

Steel Cuff winced as Princess Twilight Sparkle slowly maundered her way into the already frantic apartment space, glancing around casually at the Investigation Guards as if they were mere children involved in something far beyond their lowly comprehension, at least, that’s what the old stallion assumed, and for the most part, he was quite sure he was correct.

Adorned in the standard sparkling armor of all Equestrian Guards, the grizzled but still thoughtful stallion swept a testy hoof through his gray mane that had once matched the plain white fur across his earth pony body. Straightening himself into attention and acknowledging the inevitable moment with a sigh, he approached the haughty Princess.

“Princess Twilight,” he greeted with a heavy bow, the firm voice matching with his body language. “It’s good that you finally arrived.”

The mare stooped her head in reply. “I’m happy to help wherever I’m needed.”

Yeah he grumbled internally, sure you would. Maybe take over this entire investigation while you’re at it too.

When given word from his superiors just hours earlier that the ‘guiding wisdom’ of Princess would be most necessary for the undertaking of locating the lost human, Steel had immediately reacted in his typical resort of vocal disgust and unasked handling of how he would guide the situation if placed under full command. And, as the boneheads wearing fruit salads of badges across their chests normally did, simply ignored whatever he said.

Sure, the Guards had unicorns among their ranks to deal with magic related threats (if not to as well give a handy combat edge when the threat wasn’t magical), but the graying stallion still had to admit that no pony within their ranks could even compare to the power that the small cabal of Royalty possessed. And so, with heavy reluctance, a dependency was still tied with the longstanding rulers of Equestria, continuing a tie Steel Cuff wished had ended long ago.

“What we need,” the stallion stated stiffly, “is an arcane scan of the room to try and pick up on any trace amounts of his presence. I don’t understand most of it, but from what the unicorns among our group tell me is that the normal bounds of their magic can’t reach the range we’re shooting for.” He leaned his head slightly forwards. “I assume this doesn’t apply to Alicorns?”

The mare nodded sincerely. “Thankfully, no. The limits of my magic can easily reach to wherever in the world Alistair might be.”

Showoff, none of us Guards would ever say that.

Evening her stance, Twilight tightly inhaled as she centered her concentration into the magic of her horn. Pressing her hooves tightly against the flow, she felt a shimmering spark from within herself as her magic charged.

Suddenly, in a blinding thunderclap of force that stopped all flurry of activity in the room, a purple wave of energy shot out from Twilight’s horn, phasing through the entire chamber and its inhabitants while rippling out of the room altogether.

Standing there a moment with eyes shut tightly, Twilight hardly kept her constitution unfocused, not letting the slightest pain or fatigue drain her benevolent focus as it instantaneously scoured the world for any trace of her friend. After another few minutes of this and with a large exhale, her eyes slowly opened. The fizzing of her horn slowly shimmering out, leaving the room quiet once again.

Sensing the display to be over, the Guards briskly moved back to their activities, acting in such a dutiful manner one might assume that the magical performance by one of Equestria’s reigning monarchs had never happened in the first place. Steel Cuff silently cheered.

Panting at the exertion, the Princess looked up at the stallion dejectedly, the weight of failure heavy in her face.

“I couldn’t detect him,” she stated gravely, slowly shaking her head. “Something’s blocking his essence out.”

The stallion swallowed nervously, feeling a dead end being approached. “Where you able to detect anything else?”

“There was…something,” she hesitantly stated. “It was in this room, not a specific object, more so a feeling. It still was something…” her eyes glazed over for a moment, her vision turning absent for a split moment, “dark.”

The stallion sighed. “I wish we could have reached a more concrete conclusion, but I still must thank you for coming by.

Turning away from the mare, Steel Cuff moved back over to the rest of his comrades, his confidence in success slipping by the second.

Eased Burdens

Alistair’s skittered up and down the pages of the large spell tome laid across his lap, intently reading every page of the thick text for all of its arcane secrets. He’d been gladly reading in privacy for the better part of a week, and it seemed he wasn’t even halfway done with book as it was.

A light knock came against the door to his small quarters, followed by a familiar mare poking her head in.

“Still reading that book, eh?” exclaimed Shale Press with a grin. “Would’ve thought you’d get bored of it by now.”

“I don’t have much of anything else to do that’s productive,” replied Alistair with a shrug. “If there’s anything important I’m going to get done, it’s this book.”

“Well…” said Shale as she stepped into the room casually. “How about you take a break for a little while and I take you down to the practice rooms for a bit? Get the blood circulating while teaching you a thing or two.”

Alistair raised a questioning eyebrow. “Would your master allow this?”

“Lord Eclipse was the one that suggested it in the first place,” she replied dutifully. “He understands that reading a book can only teach you so much if you never learn to apply it. Now come on.” She gestured out the door enthusiastically, seeming to have her own motivation for getting him to leave the room.

Nodding in acceptance, Alistair rose from his bed and followed after her.

A few minutes later the two stood in a large stone chamber, with large fluorescent tubes cascading abrasive white light down onto the dully colored floor. Several large target blocks had been erected at the end of the room, just waiting to be struck by a bolt of whatever magic the sender could come up with.

Alistair stood at the other end of the room, feet spread evenly apart as he breathed slowly in concentration. Blue auras of magic sizzled in the palms of his hands, their colors a bit darker than normally, but still emitting small, dazzling sparks of light. Inhaling one last time, Alistair’s eyes flashed open.

Thrusting his right hand outwards, a crackle of electricity shot out from the tips of his fingers, whizzing in a flash across the room until colliding with the small stone construct, exploding it in a single concentrated blast.

“That’s good,” congratulated Shale from off to the side. “But try to use less familiar spells; I’m sure you know others.”

Nodding at the statement, Alistair prepped for a different attack. Clasping his palms together, he focused his magic into the collective power of both hands and centered it on the entire space of his balled fists. Throwing his hands above his head, he broke the locked position and made a wide sweeping motion toward one of the pillars.

Materializing below one of the monolithic constructs, a whirlwind of air suddenly appeared out from under the flow, swirling aggressively around the heavy piece of architecture while simultaneously lifting into the air. As the obelisk slowly rose off the ground by just a few inches, its inner masonry shattered abruptly, crumbling the stone into small chunks of dust.

“Aggression isn’t always the key,” added Shale. “Less destructive spells can become more powerful than you realize if you know how to use them. Try some from the tome.”

Grunting at the request with an irritable edge, he combed his mind deeply in search for something he had recently retained. The problem was, there was just so much written upon the text in a single page alone, remembering the specifics of any spell performance required repeated memorization, or preferably, the book right in front of him.

Unfortunately, Alistair had none of these. And yet…there was something he recalled, something simple and ineffective for his tastes, but a single spell had stuck after all those hours of reading. Mentally shrugging, he decided to perform it.

Reaching out with his right hand, he charged the magic to the top of his palm and thrapped it sides ways through the air, as if throwing in invisible ball forwards. On command, a blinding white light shout from where he thrust his hand, sending spots dancing through his eyes as he stumbled back in confusion.

Rubbing his eyes while immediately dissipating the humming magic in his hands, he couldn’t help but stop to catch his breath, feeling a much larger wave of exhaustion than he initially realized.

“That’s good,” greeted Shale as she walked over to him. “Not all the spells you use have to be harmful. Some can serve other purposes, and maybe even be more useful than fighting all together.”

Alistair responded through several heavy pants, arching his back forward while resting his hands against his knees. “You talk as if your one of these Night Lords yourself. I thought you didn’t practice magic?”

Shale patted the center of her straight mane, gesturing to the glaring lack of a unicorn horn. “I already have a pretty large handicap in that department. But even then, you can pick up on the proper ways to use magic instead of actually performing it yourself. It’s tactics really. And even then, I have my own preferences for combat.”

“Oh,” said Alistair alarmingly as he rubbed the edge of his cheek in remembrance. “Those punches back in Ponyville were pretty bad, you know. I’m surprised you didn’t break any of my bones.”

The mare shook her head bashfully, a bit ashamed at her past actions against the boy so many yeas ago. “I understand hoof-to-hoof fighting can be useful,” she explained. “But when I can I prefer to use—” she reached behind her back and brandished a gleaming steel saber seemingly out of thin air, “—this.”

“My goodness,” exclaimed Alistair as he took a few steps back from the long blade. “How did you take that out so quickly?”

Smirking, Shale sheathed the blade back into a belt along her torso. “Trick of the eye, grabbed it when you weren’t looking. Mix some speed into the mix and well…now you know.”

“I’ve never seen you use a sword before,” Alistair noted. “Has this been a hidden secret of yours or did you pick up the practice in the three months since I last saw you?”

“A bit of both. Dabbled in dueling for awhile but finally decided to go all in after our little rumble back on the train all those years ago.”

“Really?” Alistair said as he crossed his arms. “What prompted you?”

“That you were able, despite my best blocks and counters, to still grip me tighter than a metal vice and electrocute the stuffing out of me. If even somepony as skilled in martial arts as I am can’t defend against that, then maybe it’s time to pick up a new style of fighting.”

“You don’t seem to be bitter over it,” he stated sincerely. “I would assume you’d still carry a dislike for me after everything that happened?”

“Are you still bitter at me?” Shale countered, turning his own question on its head and redirecting it back.

Coughing in sudden surprise, Alistair promptly shook his head. “I don’t hate you if that’s what you’re asking. I still remember what you said, what you did. I understand you had a mission and all but it’s hard to shake off getting stomped twice in a row by the same mare.”

“But it’s more difficult trying to tell myself that things are different now, that there was a justification to it all and a higher purpose you served. All these years I thought you were just part of some agency that hated humans and wanted me dead. But then I find out that it’s bigger than that, that a chance to stop Celestia’s reign of tyranny has finally been put into motion.”

A silent shout of success rang through Shale’s mind, Alistair’s utterance of Celestia’s true nature still fresh in his mind. Days earlier she’d been unsure and even skeptical if the boy still harbored such strong ideas against the mad tyrant, and to her joy, he still most certainly did.

If it hadn’t been for her grand reveal of her true motives back in the Griffon Kingdom, if it hadn’t been for her excellent skills with persuasion, and if it hadn’t been for her manipulation of his absolute hatred toward his former friend Twilight Sparkle, who knows what would have became of him?

Smiling in satisfaction, Shale gently patted his shoulder with her hoof. “You’ve learned much in the short time you’ve been with us. Perhaps you’d wish to stay longer, just to understand a bit more?”

Alistair shook his head immediately, not needing even a moment’s contemplation. “Oh yes, I’d like that. I’d like that a lot.”

Immortal Truth

Twilight Sparkle glided solemnly over the rooftops of her former beloved hometown, Ponyville. The sun hung at half mast as she fluttered over the yellow thatch roofs of the multi-colored wooden shops and homes, casting an orange light that baked the ground in a comfortably warm glow.

It was amazing that just days ago, she’d been happily enjoying a visit to this very location with her closest friends, completely unaware of the crisis unfolding right under her snout. The disappearance of her friend Alistair had been one thing, but the complete lack of anything to go off of made the search seem even more desperate than it already was.

But that wasn’t completely true, she still had one base to go from, but the dark feeling she sensed inside Alistair’s apartment didn’t particularly help triangulate where he’d been or where the darkness had come from in the first place. Needless to say, her one last hope was living somewhere in Ponyville and hopefully he could set her on the right path.

Spotting the address she was looking for, she evened herself into a descending glide until her hooves skidding against the dirt road, just outside the house she was looking for. Dusting herself off, she approached the front door and knocked gently against it with her hoof.

A few moments later, the door swung open to reveal a heavyset, electric blue earth pony colt with a spiky dark blue mane. A set of glasses were perched atop his snout as he looked Twilight over with widened eyes of surprise.

“P-Princess…” he began, awe struck that one of the Equestrian royalty had just shown up right up at his doorstep. “What are…?”

“Hello, Commodore Blip,” greeted Twilight with a small smile, “or would you prefer that I call you just Commodore? I’m Twilight Sparkle.” She held out her hoof cheerfully.

Staring at the hoof unsurely, he slowly shook it in return, nodding his head in agreement. “Just Commodore is fine.”

“Good, would you like to step outside then? I wish to talk.”

Wincing in shook, the colt nodded quickly. “Uh, sure. W-Why not? What do you want to talk about?”

Gesturing for him to follow, Twilight took a few steps toward the road. “I’ll tell you as we go.”

Commodore stared forward as he and Twilight moved down the winding pathway, the sprawling countryside of outer Ponyville spanning before them.

“Are you afraid of me, Commodore?” Twilight spoke suddenly.

The colt nervously swallowed and promptly shook his head. “I’m not afraid, just…surprised. You’re a Princess and all, and with you showing up at my door…”

“Even though I used to live in Ponyville for quite some time, even after I became a Princess for awhile?” she replied.

“But that was before you destroyed Lord Tirek and got your own kingdom. I mean, sure, you were a Princess before, but what more proof do ponies need to know that you’re the real deal? I know I don’t.”

Twilight grimaced at what Commodore had just spoken of. Of course she’d fretted over what he had just spoken of, the separation, the entitlement, the metaphoric raising of her superiority of all those around her. And yet she’d almost completely been able to convince herself that all such notions were ridiculous and simple anxiousness in accordance to her recent ascendency to royalty. The key word being that she almost had been convinced.

“Commodore,” she stated evenly, “you know of the disappearance of Alistair, correct?”

Commodore gravely nodded. “I almost couldn’t believe it when I saw it in the newspaper. I know he’s out doing that big job of his, but he’s still a kid and all, you don’t imagine that happening to somepony.”

There it was again, Commodore bringing to light more factors Twilight wished to not consider. Yes, Alistair was still a kid, but a human kid. No pony would bat an eye at him being in position suited for somepony much older than him. To most ponies, even Twilight sometimes, a human was a human, with not much variation in between.

“Is that why you came?” asked Commodore with pleading eyes that didn’t quite suit his age. “You want information on him, to find out where he might have gone?”

Twilight exhaled deeply. “Not exactly. I don’t have an exact trail to lead me directly to him, but I think I may have a clue I can go off of, if you’re willing to help.”

“What do you mean?”

She pursued her lip. “While searching through his residence back in Canterlot just the other day, I sensed something unusual rippling outwards from his room. I couldn’t pin down precisely what it was but…”

Commodore gestured for her to continue. “But…what?”

“It was darkness,” whispered Twilight, the unspoken word from her mind finally being said. “It was hatred, cold and raw. Gaping forth from and projecting itself all throughout the entire room. I shuddered as I felt it sweep past me, like an icy invisible force grazing over my skin, the evil within it almost tangible. It was darkness.”

Commodore looked alarmingly toward Twilight. “Is something wrong, Princess?”

“No,” she said with a shaky wave of her hoof, “nothing is wrong. I was, uh, I was just wondering if you knew anything about the…the, uh, the thing I mentioned.”

The blue colt rubbed the edge of his chin in thought. “Well…I can remember talking with Alistair a pretty while back, about a month before he left for Canterlot and all.”

“What did he say?”

“He was feeling pretty down, hopeless even. Said he didn’t seem to have any other choice of what to do with himself. He didn’t seem himself, moving from irate to almost on the verge of tears just like that.” He snapped his hoof in emphasis.

“Did he explain why he felt this way?” Twilight asked with as much forced composition she could muster.

Commodore’s face suddenly wrinkled uneasily. “Well…he felt all stirred up over…you.”

“Me?” she asked numbly, praying that this was all some sort of joke. “How can that be?”

The colt sighed. “You’re not making this easy for me, Princess. But I said I’d help, and I will.”

Commodore briefly recounted the entire pained conversation he had with Alistair from what felt like an eternity ago. He spoke of Alistair’s desperations, his frustrations, and overall mourning of Twilight’s elevation to the status of Princess, with the wound only being worsened by her acquisition of her very own kingdom within Equestria.

He glazed over what Alistair had both shouted in rage and rasped through tears. Perfection was mentioned very quite frequently, with Alistair believing that flagrant similarities between Twilight and Princess Celestia emerged day after day since the Royal tiara had been placed atop her head.

Ending the recollection with another sigh, Commodore shook his head somberly. “That’s everything he said, Princess. Every last bit of it.”

Twilight stood solidly in place, her head cocked slightly down towards the dirt road, a shadow seeming to cast over her features. Feeling a chilly breeze push past her, Twilight responded with question. “Do you think I’m perfect, Commodore?”

Commodore winced. “To be quite honest, Princess, I would think so. You’re an Alicorn after all.”

Nodding darkly, Twilight turned away from the young blue colt and began back down the road. “Thank you, Commodore,” she called behind her. “I appreciate the talk.”

Cold Insight

Alistair sat cross-legged along the edge of the meager bed supplied to him in his even more meager personal quarters, the blue-black spell tome sprawled open across his lap as he continued his in-depth reading of the book and its secrets.

In just the few days (or had it been weeks?) since his arrival among the Children of the Night, he’d already far surpassed the simple teachings that his former friend and teacher Twilight Sparkle had supplemented to him over the nearly two years she mentored him.

With the mere thought of the mare slipping into his conscious, he briskly slammed the book shut and felt the usual seeping of negative anger into his body. He relished and recognized the feelings, feeling his inner power swell whenever he felt such a strong burst of the negative emotions.

True, the occasional instance of loneliness or regret had sometime substituted the usual anger, actually giving him the complete opposite effect, and instead weakening him greatly, with the worst instances actually shutting him down for a few minutes as the painful memories and thoughts of self-doubt clouded his concentration.

But this time, as he always preferred, the familiar sense of cold hatred once again greeted him, its accompanying strength leaving a slight smile across his face.

However, this was quickly dissipated as a hoof lightly knocked against his chamber door, followed by its opening by a familiar grey furred mare.

“Alistair,” greeted Shale Press as she stepped into the room, leaving the door wide open instead of her normal practice of shutting it abruptly. “Nice that I caught you with your reading finished. You’ve been requested.”

“Requested?” he repeated. “For what?”

“Dinner,” she answered simply, seeming to leave it just at that.

Catching her reluctance for detail, Alistair silently rose and placed the tome atop his neatly pressed bed. Grinning slightly, he gestured toward the door. “Lead on.’

The dinning area contrasted greatly from the shadowy crypt he’d first met the Night Lord in. The carpet was comprised of crimson linen with golden frilly designs looping across the edges. Warm golden lamps set along the walls, filling the room with honey tipped light that was somewhere between a dusk glow and a shimmer of dawn.

A large mahogany table had been placed grandly in the center of the room, its size further by the absolute absence of any other chairs or ponies, with an exception of the shrouded stallion seated at the far other end of the table. Smiling warmly behind his swirling black cloak that covered nearly his entire body, save for a ghostly white snout, the aged stallion spoke.

“Thank you for accepting my invitation, Alistair,” called his voice smoothly from the opposite end of the table.

Bowing formally and taking his seat, Alistair responded. “It’s very nice seeing you once again, Master Eclipse. It seems to have been a little while since we last met.”

A faint gleam seemed to flicker across the stallion’s face at the word master, subdued look of satisfaction seen for just a moment. Chuckling, he shook his head. “Only just a couple of weeks my dear boy. As you’ll come to realize, just about everypony in our Order is busy.”

“I haven’t seen much of anypony else around here,” said Alistair studiously. “Of course, with the exception of you and Shale.”

“My point exactly. Most other Night Lords and agents don’t have the liberty to be dawdling about in the corridors. There are many last minute preparations to be made.”

Alistair raised a chestnut eyebrow. “Such as?”

“Intelligence reports, battle meditations, that sort of thing, but please!” he said clasping both his hooves together. “Enough of all this talk about business, help yourself to some supper.”

Through their short exchange between one another, Alistair had apparently missed the wide assortment of food placed before both his end of the table and Silver Eclipse. Scanning over the assortment of wheat, fruit, vegetable, and deserts scattered among the banquet before him, he mentally smiled at the culinary forest in front of him, until his eyes rested upon something very quite unusual in an Equestrian dinner.

“I was worried you’d react in such a way,” the stallion noted cheerfully with a buttered roll in his hoof. “I already was aware of the specifics you enjoy the most.”

And did Alistair enjoy it ever so much, at least, when no pony else was watching him. Because lying right before him, steaming in a brownish sauce across a clear white plate, was a hulking slab of grilled beef, a fork and knife placed symmetrically to his right.

“T-Thank you,” Alistair stammered out, slowly but surely digging into the very immodest helping. “I never would have imagined a pony serving this willingly, especially in their own home.”

“I have no particular taste for it, even if I could digest the stuff. But the smell does not bother me like other denizens of Equestria and unlike other denizens; I understand when to offer the proper amount of respect toward a guest.”

The human looked up from his food and said with a light grin: “I take it you were mistreated at your last gala outing?”

The hooded stallion shook his head. “Nothing of the sort, in fact, it wasn’t until my later years that I even attended such an event before in my life.”

“That’s odd,” exclaimed Alistair with a furrowed brow, “I would assume that the leading Night Lord of the Order would be quite active in social galas, with the other members I mean.”

The stallion finished munching on another roll before he responded. “If you could believe it, I wasn’t always in charge. At that, I wasn’t always in the Order to begin with.”

“You weren’t?”

Eclipse shook his head. “My parents weren’t fortunate enough to be in the Order themselves, before or after I was born.” He shook his head once more as if to confirm what he’d just said. “No, I had to find the Night Lords myself, and by the time I did, age was beginning to creep up on me. Not that it mattered much, the Order couldn’t really be too choosy over who it accepted at the time.”

“Things were different back then,” he continued. “A bit less hectic, a bit more comfort to go around for everypony. And we of course didn’t have all these demons from Tartarus escaping, or rulers of Chaos running amok, or even Griffon pirates causing all that much trouble along the coast. Things were peaceful—as close as it could, anyway—and thus, there was less of a reason to be against Celestia and her rule.”

The stallion learned forward, his shrouded eyes more than likely looking skeptically towards Alistair. “You still believe in our cause against her, correct? Your views have not changed since your encounter with Shale in the Griffon Kingdom?”

Alistair laughed briefly. “She asked me the same thing just a few days ago. I assumed she was just getting over excited, I see now I was mistaken.” He dabbed his mouth with a napkin. “I can assure you Master Eclipse, that not once have I ever even doubted what your organization stands for. I fully recognize the inadequacies Equestria stands for, and I am more than eager to do whatever it takes to fix them. There, does this prove myself?”

“Good,” remarked the ghostly stallion with a quick nod, “that’s very good to confirm. Well then,” he said while putting his utensils down at his plate, “I believe we can cut straight to business then.”

“What we require of you,” Eclipse began, “is your magical expertise in regards to manipulation of realms, specifically travel between them. We understand that this was how you originally were able to arrive here in Equestria, and thus I hope you have at least a rudimentary understanding of it?”

Alistair nodded.

“Excellent, because what we require is for you to perform a spell very quite similar to your original teleportation tome, however, instead of transferring you to another realm, we wish for you to transport somepony else to our current realm. From there the other Night Lords can sort the rest out but we still require your skills to begin the process.”

Alistair smirked, a touch of bitterness creeping into the friendly gesture. “Is that the entire reason I’m here, to simply perform a quick spell that it appears the other ‘experts’ in magic can’t do? I’m not actually part of your organization, just a tool for you to use?”

“Yes,” regarded the stallion flatly, not at all off put by the boy’s emerging hostility and simply meeting it in stride. “You hold within your mind a spell that has all but been lost to us in Equestria. Make no mistake; nearly all of our members were recruited over what talents they could bring to the Order.”

“Shale Press: her skillfulness with stealth and hoof-to-hoof combat. Myself: mastery with dark magic and my personal connections with Canterlot. Our chief treasurer: his amassed wealth and cover among Equestria’s elite. Our head healer: skillfulness with combat wounds and alchemical abilities. You: mastery of ancient spells and knowledge of our enemies.”

“This isn’t a social circle of friendship—at least—that’s not our founding principle. Of course we all become fond of one another, but what determines who does and does not enter into our ranks is determined by what they can bring to the table.”

“Fine then,” Alistair answered shortly, “I understand what you mean. But even if I did perform the realm jump I would need a pin-pointer of sorts, a destination marker to know precisely where to funnel my magic to. Without it, you’d just been syncing in at absolute random, with an almost infinite amount of possibilities. The world could be an uninhabited rock, or a twisted planet full of conquering demons. It’s very quite risky business.”

“I am well aware of the risks,” Eclipse responded patiently, “for now, simply focus on the task at hoof. That is all I request of you.”

Alistair bowed his head graciously. “It shall be done, Master Eclipse.”

“Excellent, my dear boy. That is exactly what I wanted to hear.”

Loyalty to Friends

Shale Press trotted along across the hallways of the Night Lord fortress, dim rays of lit crackling in through the skinny topped windows, illuminating hovering bits of dust in the air.

He wouldn’t tolerate this with somepony else the thought rang through her.

And there was truth in it. Historically, anypony who was a member of the Children of the Night and wasn't a member of the ruling Lords typically lived under the arcane Masters’ steely hooves.

But much had changed in the organization. Numbers had swelled—and still where—with each passing year that Celestia was not able to hold back another ancient threat from awakening. Intelligence agents, basically the ponies that weren't unicorns, had been gaining more say in what was decided of the society’s course of action. And most importantly, their grand plan was already under way.

For years, centuries even, the group had suffered setback after setback, with internal power struggles, the death of members, and just general foolishness nearly leading to their destruction time after time. But the might of Luna shined down upon them, granting them their continued survival, stability, and security from the forces of Equestria.

And now as arrived outside her destination, she couldn’t help but smile as the sentiment that she was apart of something much bigger crossed her mind once again.

In the center of the room, with stack upon stack of high-topped bookshelves to the right and left, stood the Night Lord Silver Eclipse with an eager young Night Lord apprentice.

“As you can see,” instructed Silver Eclipse, holding an unfurled scroll up to the young colt beside him. “The fire enchantment needs a ripened crystal and then the broc rose. If you misconstrue the ingredients the selected item will almost immediately burst into flames and more than likely torch everything around it.”

“I see,” the robed unicorn said with a nod. “Thank you for showing me, Master Eclipse.”

The ghostly white stallion smiled behind the blue-black robe that shrouded him in its mysterious embrace. “All part of the process, Greensleeve. I can remember when I was your age that I—”

Shale cleared her throat to get the stallion’s attention. Turning to her with a slight glance, he looked back to the young pony.

“Run along now, young one,” he said with a pat to the colt’s shoulder. “I have some business to attend to.”

Shale waited for the student to leave and to shut the heavy library door behind him before she spoke.

“Master Eclipse,” she with slight stiffening at attention, “you requested I see you?”

He smiled once again and gestured for her to follow him through the massive archives. “I most certainly did,” he responded as they began to walk. “A pressing matter has revealed itself to me and I believe only you can handle it.”

She raised a queried eyebrow. “What would that be exactly?”

“The human,” he said smoothly. “I still question his loyalty.”

Shale’s lip stiffened. “Even after all this time you still do? Even after speaking with him yourself?”

“I wish to have my fullest confidence in him,” he continued. “But for this to happen, a certain test must be performed to fully turn him over to our side. His connections with Equestria must be severed—permanently.”

“How do you hope to accomplish that?”

“That it where the second part of this problem lies. The spell tome, the one we need for the ritual to be properly enacted, has degraded.”

Shale’s eyes widened. ‘What!?”

“Yes,” the cloaked stallion answered patiently. “The dark magic surrounding it has made the incantations nearly unreadable for him to properly decipher them. Our archivist believes this is so due to it being a rudimentary copy of the original.” He turned to her gravely. “We need the original.”

“And where might it be.”

“Canterlot,” Eclipse said with such offhandedness one would assume it meant absolutely nothing to him. “Inside the Royal Library, somewhere in the inner sanctum.”

“Canterlot,” Shale repeated. “Are you sure there’s nowhere else in the world?”

“Most definitely,” he said with a nod, “and that is where the human comes into play. I want you to bring Alistair along with you and have him be the one to retrieve the book. Once this is done, his place among us will be assured.”

Shale folded her hooves. “It’s going to be a bit conspicuous if any of the Guards or even a passing janitor sees the only human in Equestria running around. They’ll know it’s him, and then our entire ‘disappearance’ façade will be ruined.”

Eclipse reached into his robe’s pockets. “That is why I have constructed—” he pulled out a simple looking vial of red liquid, “this.”

She leaned towards the skinny glass holder. “What is it?”

“A potion I have formulated myself. Make sure the boy drinks it before he leaves, and his identity will be hidden for the time being.” He handed her the vial. “Now go. Prepare for your assignment, it will not be easy.”

She rolled her eyes. “I had that figured out when you said ‘Canterlot’.”

Eclipse chuckled. “And that is why I cherish your company, Commander Shale.”

Excusing herself with a simple bow, Shale hurried out of the chamber, the Night Lord’s eyes no doubt following her as she went.

Shale didn’t even bother knocking as she approached Alistair’s door, throwing it open with enough force that the wood banged with a muted thud against the masonry walls.

Alistair sat along the edge of his bed, the familiar blue-black spell book laid out across his lap in meticulous study. Closing it and placing the text beside him, Alistair looked up at her with a smirk, which was promptly dissipated by the grim frown she held.

“Something’s come up,” she said as stoutly as she would address a recruit agent. “I need you to follow me and not ask any questions while we get there. Is that understood?”

Alistair nodded as he mechanically rose to his feet.

“Good, then follow me.”

Know Your Role

Explaining the situation had been more difficult than getting the young human properly equipped for it. As Shale wordlessly tightened and loosened the several straps of the tactical jacket Alistair now wore, she couldn’t help but fret over the smallest of details.

“Canterlot,” he remarked simply among the narrow equipment room walls. “You can’t be serious.”

“I am,” she said with a gruff yank on one of the straps, the force causing Alistair to wince lowly.

“But, there must be some other way to acquire it?” Alistair insisted studiously. “A spare copy lying among the ruins of a forgotten tomb? Or perhaps a rudimentary manuscript within a library of…lesser notoriety?

Shale sighed. “Unfortunately, there’s not. There’s our degraded copy, and the original tome, nothing else.”

“Is stealing the original the best course of action then, prancing right into the most fortified structure in all of Equestria with the intention of stealing an article of such importance, we’re practically swiping it off Celestia’s nightstand.”

Shale stepped back and eyed him wearily. “Would you want to take this up with Master Eclipse then? I’m sure he’d like to hear your critiques.”

“As if I could change that stallion’s mind!” he snorted musingly, not quite picking up on Shale’s dropped sarcasm. “The authority that’s been placed in his hoof something that I understand is flattering, but he could it least keep his mind open to suggestion.”

She sighed. “The fact still remains that the tome needs to acquired, and he's assigned us to it.”

Alistair pursed his lips tightly and sent her a returning nod. “Yes, that’s uh, that’s what we must do.”

Shale raised an interrogating eyebrow. “Are you all right?”

“Yes,” he said quicker than one would normally answer. “I was—I was just thinking of something.”

Leaning in closer to him, Shale placed a reassuring hoof to his shoulder. “Alistair, you are a strong and valuable member of the Order. I went through the same doubtful experience when a stallion named Blackletter was my superior. And although I despised him on all accounts of him as pony, I cannot escape the fact that he trained me well, as I hope to do with you.”

She sighed. “It’s not my intention to make you feel uncomfortable, to thrust you into situations you’re not ready for. I like you Alistair, I really do. And I think you’re more than ready to commit yourself to the first real task the Night Lords and Luna have bestowed upon you.”

He looked up at her with a small smile. “Thank you Shale, it means a lot.”

“Don’t mention it; we all need a little encouragement every now and again.”

Shale casually reached into her one of her jacket’s side pockets and brought out a small glass container into the light. “Take this,” she ordered softly, handing him the bright crystal strip. “It will calm your nerves.”

Eyeing the substance in his palm, he promptly uncapped the vial and downed the contents in one fell swing without another thought to the contrary. Marching over to the room’s exit with a new found energy, he sent her a reassuring beam.

“Shall we go then?”

Inspecting him slowly from head to toe with a queried glance, Shale hesitantly nodded in return. “Let’s get moving we have a long journey ahead of us.”

“Thank you for meeting with me at such short notice, Princess,” Twilight Sparkle said as she leaned carefully against the balcony railing, the silver crescent moon just grazing over the rooftops of Canterlot.

Standing next to her, as well admiring the view that she alone commanded under her unquestionable power, was the Princess of the Night herself, Luna. Turning over to Twilight with her translucent and mysterious gaze, she slowly nodded.

“I am always willing to assist, young Twilight Sparkle. It is my duty to help those in need after all.”

“And I’m very thankful for it,” Twilight said with a slight bow of her head. “I’ve been a bit…troubled these past few days and I was hoping you could offer me some solution.”

Luna’s eyes widened in compassion. “What is the matter, my friend?”

Twilight wistfully grimaced. “It’s Alistair, the human, the one that’s been missing since last month.”

“Oh, yes,” Luna said with vague recognition while rubbing the edge of her chin. “My sister has been doing the bulk of managing the investigation. And it appears that many details have surfaced concerning the boy’s whereabouts…”

“There’s more to it, though,” Twilight continued bleakly. “I was able to sense something when initially searching his room just a few days after the report went through. There was something present reaching out through my magic, something that felt a bit too close to dark magic.”

“I was quite sure what to make of this, but I still had one more lead that could possibly point me in the right direction. An old friend of his back in Ponyville explained it to me. He said that Alistair had been carrying feelings of desperation and hate for the months succeeding my coronation. If what the young colt said is true…”

A shadow of doubt crossed Luna’s face. “Are you quite sure of this? I recall being in the human’s presence prior and not once did I ever detect such an essence.”

“What else could it be then?” Twilight said irately. “If what I felt and what his friend said didn’t match up, then where does that leave us in actually finding him?”

Luna nodded once more in understanding. “I see what you are outlining, Twilight Sparkle. This may be the only way to find him, wherever he might be. Is this why you came to me?”

Twilight sighed in destitution. “That, and to speak with somepony else about all this. I’ve been thinking about it non stop since the moment I was informed, and I just want to get some of these thought out of my head.”

Luna placed a reassuring hoof upon Twilight’s shoulder. “What troubles you then? I am most certain I can provide adequate council.”

Twilight turned away with a small smile and walked toward the opposite end of the balcony, the side facing directly towards the distant glowing lights of Canterlot. A light breeze pushed past her face, bristling the ends of her violet mane.

“I think this may be my fault,” she called to Luna as she stared out over the city. “In fact, I’m certain of it.”

Luna approached softly with an eyebrow rose in query. “How did you come to such a conclusion?”

“Because I could’ve have picked up on this before he left Ponyville, could’ve have read his emotions when he started acting odd around me. I could’ve have spent more time with him, I could’ve just asked what I was doing wrong. I could’ve done a lot of things to help, but I didn’t.”

“Where you as well expected to foresee what would come of this?” Luna remarked pointedly. “Was that too one of your responsibilities?”

“No…” Twilight said hesitantly. “But that doesn’t take away the fact that I should have caught this before it became what it is now. I made a promise to protect him, and I failed.”

“You do realize he is a living being, Twilight Sparkle. Not an object that may break if unattended, nor an animal that must be shielded from its own ignorance. Alistair is a living, thinking creature just as you and I are. And although he may look utterly different, his mental faculties could not be closer to that of a pony.”

“He still feels envy as much as he does acceptance, still feels betrayal as much as he does loyalty. It is with these emotions, this ability to think at a higher level, that he becomes something more complex then what you believe your responsibilities should entail. He is his own person, free to make whatever decision he sees fit. And no matter how much one picks, probes, or protects, he will still do what he feels is necessary.”

Twilight looked back to Luna with weakened eyes, her disposition beginning to teeter. “Did he see leaving without a word to anypony as ‘necessary’, off to Celestia-knows- where doing Celestia-knows-what?”

Luna sighed. “This is not easy for me to say, Twilight Sparkle. But if he truly left upon his own power,” she paused uneasily, “I would believe so.”

A dark cloud seemed to descend over Twilight as the words floated through the air. Giving the cityscape one last glance, she wordlessly began towards the balcony’s exit.

“Thank you for the honesty, Luna,” she called back in a voice that was not her own. “Applejack would approve.”

And without another word, Twilight slipped away from Luna’s pull, something uneasy beginning to churn as she departed. Luna didn’t want to believe, but she too began to sense a dark presence somewhere close.

Rendezvous

The Alistair and Shale Press crept briskly along the near vacant Canterlot streets, both their bodies hunched in a predator-like stance as they skittered through the city’s ornate shadows.

Their journey thus far had been a tedious but yet worrisome journey through a metropolis that seemed to hold a bipolar nature to it from sunrise to sunset. In the day, a bustling center point of culture and class among the nation’s highest of the elite. And at night, a dead vacuum of emptied shops and cafes, with the activity of just a few hours previous seeming as distant as the stars gleaming dully overhead.

But the two were not here to consolidate the snooty ponies that clung to the city like solidified honey. They were upon an activity of their own businesses of their own motivation, and from which would most certainly stir the most famed of capital’s citizens.

As for now, the bulk of their mission was nearly complete. They had traversed the winding rows of residential blocks, infiltrated the Royal Canterlot Castle grounds, scaled the mighty white stone walls of the royal residence, and had moved without a hitch through the confusing sprawl of the outer pavilion gardens.

This left them waiting for their reported contact between a row of hedges and a landscaping structure connected to the fortified spire, crouched in cautious anticipation while casting glances every which way in search of any wandering Guards.

Alistair, a young male with a slight skittishness to his voice which he attempted to hide, whispered to the mare beside. “Is he coming?”

Shale nodded. “He’ll be here. We’re more than likely a few minutes ahead of schedule.”

“That’s good,” the youngster replied with a slight ease to his posture. “I was beginning to think we’d have to improvise.”

The mare briefly scanned the perimeter as she responded. “If that we’re the case then we’d probably just scrape the entire operation and try again later. Our Order has learned that detailed plans are always the key to success.”

“I assume the Night Lords learned this lesson the hard way?”

“Oh yes, we did. There of course was the little excursion we had involving you in Ponyville a few years back, but the real prize went to a horridly botched operation about twenty years ago.”

“There was charity fundraiser back in Fillydelphia, real high-class occasion, city councilors, business executives, even a few military dignitaries stopped by if you could believe it. And in this wild frenzy of the influential was one embedded agent, posing as a lowly civil servant that was dragged along for the ride."

“He was armed with a pair of well hidden blades, just to be certain that if his cover ever got blown he'd be able to hold his own against any of the high-ranking Sun Guards that were scattered about. To monitor whatever important information that was being discussed among the gathered ponies, the agent had a little tape recorder stuffed into his curly mane."

“His orders was to keep a low profile and play a bored persona throughout the party. But then, suddenly in walks the Mayor of Fillydelphia himself, completely unannounced, and starts gaudily meeting with the potential campaign donaters around him. The agent, seeing an excellent opportunity to get some real backroom political corruption down on tape, takes off at an excited sprint over to where the Mayor was standing. The agent tripped, was sent sprawling across the ballroom floor, and what do you bet that both the tape recorder and butterfly knives fall right out of his pockets and mane, just at the hooves of the Mayor."

"Thankfully, no doubt with a little luck granted from the Dark Queen, the crowd of socialites had just burst out laughing at one of their own jokes, which gave the agent enough time to grab his belongings and get the heck out of there. He was able to hold his cover story, but had to maintain whenever asked that the tape recorder was for an audio book he was listening to and that the knives were for his amateur manedressing career on the side." She shook her head. "It would be funny if it hadn't come so close to exposing us."

Alistair was about to pose a follow-up question to what Shale had just said; to further inquire if the organization she served had any other blunders through their long history of secrecy. However, he chose to hold his tongue, nervous that any further question may bring his standing within the Night Lords into further doubt. He was a new arrival within the peculiar group, and for now, he’d go along with his pledge and submit any which way was necessary.

Waiting a few more minutes, a sudden jangling of chains could be heard from inside the large gardener shed, followed by the telltale click of a lock and the structure’s door slowly creaking open.

Poking its head out to of the small break in the door, a peach colored colt wordlessly looked around the garden, not seeming to see the two crouched among the shadows.

“Pen!” Shale suddenly exclaimed as she hopped to her hooves and tenderly embraced the surprised colt. “I can’t believe it’s you!”

The colt, near breathless from the vice-like hug, cracked a worried smile. “Easy there, Shale. We’re still on a mission.”

She blushed and promptly let him go, her voice dropping back into a whisper. “I’m sorry, it’s just been too long, you know? With all the work that I have and the work that you have…it’s like I can’t spend anytime with my little brother.”

“I’m not that little,” he said with a playful nudge. “Old enough to actually be doing some field-work for a change.” He looked at Shale and then back around the garden. “Speaking of which, aren’t you supposed to have a trainee on this one?”

On cue with his question, Alistair cautiously stepped out of the darkened corner, feeling a slight familiarity at the colt’s voice. Keeping with the proper etiquette of a novice such as himself, he respectfully bowed to the colt.

“Ah, so you’re the recruit my sister’s trainee?” Pen said with an appraising glance toward him.

Alistair nodded. “Yes, sir.”

“Well you’re in good hoofs then; my sister’s trained plenty of other recruits around your age, and not once has she ever hit a snag too big for her to handle.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Proper etiquette too, I like that.” He glanced over at Shale. “You seem to have gotten yourself pretty well handled with this one, Shale, seems obedient enough, now we just need to see if he can hold his own.”

“He can alright,” Shale said with an approving nod. “He’s not the best and hoof-to-hoof or conventional weaponry, but his magic really is something to behold.”

Pen frowned at this, and sent another glance over to Alistair. “I thought I saw a unicorn horn poking up through that blue mane. A bit odd he’s working as a field agent instead of one of the sorcerers…”

Shale gave a stiff shrug. “It was on Master Eclipse’s orders. If it doesn’t sound right, ask him about it.”

“Okay, okay,” her brother said with hooves raised in defense. “Not trying to pry or anything, just thinking out loud. The fact still remains,” he eyed Alistair expectantly, “if he knows his role in tonight’s operation.”

Alistair was tempted to tell the patronizing colt off, or at least glare into his eyes to visually vocalize his contempt. But instead, he kept with his submissive manor.

“My objective is to maneuver through the maintenance shaft located within the building you originally entered from. Then, move through hallways B, C, and E till I reach the inner Library chamber. From there, the book should be located in one of the sealed containers dotted along the main level, cleverly disguised as ascetic cylinders.

“Hmmm,” Pen said flatly as he turned back to Shale. “I would be lying if I said that things are going to go exactly as planned, but this kid seems like he’s going to hold up his end.”

“Alright,” he said as he began to nudge Alistair toward the unlocked shed door, “in you go. Let’s see if you really are Night Lord material.”

As he was led forwards, Alistair gave one last reassuring smile to Shale until he was fully pushed through the doorway. Almost immediately, Pen clicked the door behind him and the sound of rattling locks on the other end could be heard.

For the first time in quite awhile, Alistair was alone once again.

Cloaked Daggers

The maintenance tunnel leading into the Royal Castle proved to be smaller than Alistair had anticipated. Even as he squirmed along his belly the rugged concrete walls kept on pushing up against his arms and legs all the while his head came dangerously close to banging against the sides whenever he’d push forward. If he was having so much trouble getting through, he could imagine the stallion ‘Pen’ from earlier must have had an even more difficult time getting through.

Which brought his attention back to that shifty looking peach furred pony and the lies he’d led Alistair on as the truth.

For one thing, ‘Pen’ bore a striking resemblance in both appearance and voice to a coworker of his back in Equestria’s External Affairs. He’d gone under the title of ‘Pencil Press’ and had kept the illusion that he was a timid desk jockey, willing to go along with whatever menial task was asked of him all the while displaying something less than zero in terms of self-confidence. Alistair couldn’t help but grin at this.

The colt had definitely played his part well, no doubt a cover by the Night Lord agent to keep an eye on both him and any sensitive information that passed through Equestria’s diplomatic powerhouse. It was a tactical one-two punch and only Celestia knew how much the agent had acquired in the years that he worked there.

Still, if Alistair and Pen—Pencil, whatever—already knew him beforehand, why hadn’t the colt acknowledged it when he first laid eyes on him? Was he trying to protect his cover? Maybe keep face when his sister Shale Press around? He certainly wasn’t hard too miss, being the only human in Equestria after all…

Alistair couldn’t come up with anything concrete to answer the flurry of questions, but he knew that an explanation remained behind it, as did all things the Night Lords decided to get into.

Sighing, he continued to crawl ahead.

“A greenhorn,” Pen Press mumbled bitterly as he and his sister Shale crept through the forested section of the Royal Canterlot Gardens, the underbrush gently swishing past their hooves. “I honestly can’t believe Eclipse let him come along for something like this important. It’s ridiculous.”

Shale sighed cheerfully. “I heard you the first time you know, you don’t have to keep repeating yourself to get the point across.”

“Oh, but I do! It’s the only way you’ll ever listen to anything I have to say.”

“I’m listening to what you saying, I’m just choosing not to acknowledge it.”

Pen feigned a pouting frown which quickly flashed back into a legitimate expression. “But seriously, there’s something not right about this. I mean, sure, if we’re just rigging an election or tipping off a few bandits I can understand that we bring a little squirt along with us. But now? Here? It’s insane.”

Shale continued to move forward as she responded, but she could feel a disapproving glare beginning to form. “I hope you’re not starting to question your given orders. Master Eclipse is the reigning Night Lord; we are his loyal servants, and the only pony to defy them is the Dark Queen herself.”

“Spare me the rhetoric, Shale,” the stallion said impatiently. “Just because he’s been granted the title doesn’t make the old colt omnipotent. His predecessors made mistakes and he most assuredly will, and I’m afraid one of them is happening as we speak.”

She gave out another sigh, this one real in its anguish. “Pen, we can we please not get into this again? Now isn’t the place.”

“Why not? Here we are, resting all of our hope in some wimpy little kid with less experience than he’s got facial hair, and going along with it just because Eclipse said so? What kind of sense is that?”

“Pen, its all part of the—”

“—Plan?” he interjected sourly. “So just because it’s part of a misconstrued plan formulated by some senile old fool that makes the situation somehow better? Are you really that blind to what’s going on here? This is important!”

Shale halted suddenly and turned around to face her brother with an icy stare, cold enough to freeze him right in place. “Look, you’re a great brother and I really do love you, but for now, shut up.”

Pen’s eyes widened in shock as he slowly began to shrink down in his own irate grandeur. Taking his stunned silence for granted, she continued.

“Things are already in motion, Pen. I can’t stop them and neither can you, so complaining about what’s already happened isn’t going to do us any good. There’s a darn good reason why the trainee was set ahead and I’ll be sure to inform you of it once this is all over. Okay?”

Pen shakily nodded in reply.

“Good, now let’s keep moving. That distraction isn’t going to start itself.”

The tunnel let out into an air duct chamber, which in turn led out into a twisting series of air vents that more than likely spanned the entire complex and beyond. It would’ve been a nightmare trying to navigate such a cramped catacomb in the dark, but thankfully the first vent slit was exactly the one he’d been looking for.

Unscrewing the panel’s tiny screw with the ends of his fingernails, he silently pushed the metal panel away and shimmied out of the claustrophobic tunnel.

What followed was a long series of crouching, walking, peering around corners, running, sprinting, peering while running, standing, sweating, and every other action that ensured that he wouldn’t be spotted by the Castle’s shadowy protectors. To say the entire ordeal was “fun” would be a blatant lie on his part, but he most certainly felt a rush of excitement as he traversed the dark and ornate hallways at an hour that would have certainly landed him in deep trouble.

He thankfully never caught sight of the gold-plated guardians as he crept along through corridor after corridor, but every now and again he would hear the distant thumping of hooves against carpet, reminding him that the possibility of failure was still a very much real scenario.

Turning one last corner, he stopped dead in his tracks and looked down the vacant space. A large set of double doors sat off to the left, their length reaching from the floor to the ceiling with glass slits along the middle that spiraled up in a translucent path. There was no sign or marker by its gates but the pull of energy he could feel channeling out from it told him all he needed to know about what lay behind the gaudy doors.

Alistair smiled wickedly, he had arrived.

Two Faced

Talk about a wide open space…

The thought echoed through Alistair’s mind as he inspected the interior of the Royal Canterlot Library. The sheer vertical design of the chamber was staggering enough, but row upon row of bookshelves that stretched the entire breadth of the atrium that nearly matched the ceiling in their height, dizzied the young human with its unquestionable mightiness.

He remembered the fondness Twilight Sparkle had regarded the massive archives with, the absolute excitement that touched her whenever looking upon the storehouse of knowledge and realizing that she was in its presence. He’d never quite comprehended what the detestable mare had been speaking of, only now did he truly understand the grandiose image she had painted in what felt like a lifetime ago.

I don’t even know where to start. How can you detect the presence of a single tome in the company of millions?

He scanned the vertigo-inducing chamber for any identifiable sign and promptly sighed.

Simple, you don’t.

Without much direction in his movement, he began to casually walk along the ground level he found himself on, looking around for any semblance of a clue. He no longer moved with the same stealthy crouch he’d navigated the castle corridors with, nor did he stick with the few shadows that hadn’t extinguished by the wide glass windows on all sides. The way he saw it, there really was no discrete way to find the illusive spell book that wouldn’t drag the ordeal out into mid-morning. Besides, what was the likelihood that anypony would be in the library at this hour? Not much.

I wish they would've given me some sort of hint to know where to start looking. For all the talk Shale goes on about the Night Lords and their planning it still seems like no matter what happens some sort of hole appears...

Alistair stopped for a moment in thought. That really is a trend with them, both before and after that Blackletter stallion was terminated from all operations…permanently. I mean, it’s not like they fail at everything they do. Those agents, just Shale alone is a force to be reckoned with. And if that’s the case, why’s Silver Eclipse always intervening in their work, like, right now as I can’t find this stupid book?!

It was at this moment that he felt a slight pulling on the edge of his essence, the energy locked into his soul being gently nudged toward something in his vicinity. He grinned.

I guess complaining really does solve your problems.

He felt his mind begin to creep back into auto-pilot as he followed the energy trail with the tenacity of a bored cattle hound. Taking the opportunity in stride, he fell back into the cloud of his own thoughts.

Silver Eclipse had assigned both of us on this mission, but… he didn’t really give Shale much room to interrupt. And I mean she’s a genius! If she’d been in charge of this operation we’d already be on our way back to the Crescent Isle. But instead, the powers that be for some reason dictates that I have to do all the dirty work, while the more experienced Shale and Pen just have to stand back and watch. Where’s the sense in that?

The question would have to wait for another time. The presence was calling out to Alistair much stronger than before, but the pull still felt strained to his senses. Closing his eyes in concentration, he let the magic inside him drift out and search for the energy’s source. A few moments later, he slowly opened his eyes and looked vertically up.

Somehow I knew this would be the case.

He wheeled a ladder over to where the book was calling out and began to gingerly step up the solid wooden legs. The age old secret of not looking down held true through the short ascent and in no time at all he could practically see the book sitting among its other literary friends.

It didn’t look all that impressive up close, just a plain purple binding with a number draped across its side. No tattered parchment papers jutting out or caked dust surrounding it on all sides, just a book.

He shrugged. A bit anti-climatic but at least I got it.

Placing it under his arm, he began to move back down the ladder as quickly he’d climbed it. He’d never been afraid of heights (not that much, anyhow) but he always preferred solid ground over thin air whenever the choice was given.

He hopped off the ladder with a triumphant leap of two inches and smiled further at the text in his hands. Alright-alright, looks like we’re already half way done. Now all that’s left is getting back out and finding those two. Hmm, that might be a bit more difficult than I thought.

Alistair began to retrace his steps back to the entrance, a bit more careful now that the book was in his possession.

I wonder if they’ll want me to go through with the entire ritual once we get back, or perhaps they’ll give us a few days to rest. I wouldn’t want to perform any sort of Realm Jump or Melding spell with a clouded head. One botch in magic that dangerous could collapse an entire realm and probably shatter several others in the process.

Alistair shuttered at the mere thought. I hope Silver Eclipse knows what he’s doing with all this, or we’re all going to pay for it, dearly. I see the faults of Celestia and her reign but I’m not going to annihilate myself and the entire world just to have an exchanging of power. If that stallion really—

Something flickered along the right side of Alistair’s vision and he immediately froze in place, his blood seeming to solidify in that very instant. He hadn’t heard anything but he most assuredly had seen something, the outline of a figure. Craning his head around to face whomever was watching him, his eyes widened at the sight of a bright blue unicorn standing just a few paces away.

No!

The pony as well looked just as surprised as he did, its eyes widened in horror. Alistair took a few nervous steps back from the unicorn, who in turn, did the same as him. He could hear the thud of his pulsing heartbeat as he raised his hands in defense towards the random pony. Almost at the same time, the colt as well raised its hooves to match his own.

What the…?

Alistair brought his hands back down to rest which the pony mimicked as well. Even more perturbed, he reached out his arm and slowly approached the pony that was now beginning to approach him. Just as it seemed they were about to grasp one another, Alistair’s fingers tapped against the cold flatness of glass. It was a window, and his reflection was in it.

“What is this?” he mumbled, inspecting the figure that silently claimed to be him. It—he, was a wholesome shade of sky blue, with a straight and prim mane that was complimented by a unicorn horn poking out through the layer of hair.

Alistair brought a hand to his face and watched in awe as his reflection mirrored the action, but with a hoof. “Two different creatures…opposites to one another, and yet we’re the same. Both sides don’t match…but we do.”

He looked to his palm and back to the reflection, noticing that the image was starting to become blurred. He gasped in panic and reached out to the dissipating reflection only to see it dematerialize further until nothing but the outdoor view remained. Although he didn’t realize it then, the horrid feeling of loss would stick with Alistair for the rest of his existence.

With a dark shadow over his face, he solemnly rubbed against the now empty glass. Turning his head toward the floor, he sighed dejectedly.

“You’re still you,” echoed a familiar voice from behind, accompanied by approaching hoofsteps. “It’s only an image.”

Turning towards the voice, he locked eyes with Princess Twilight Sparkle and merely nodded.

Reunion of Sorts

“Alistair,” Twilight breathed at a near whisper. “Is that really you?”

With a darkening shadow over his face, the boy simply nodded. “In the flesh.”

Her eyes widened at the confirmation. “So it really is you, after all this time. I thought you were a vision or a manifestation, I never imagined that after all the trouble it’s been; you’d show up right at our hooves.”

He passively shrugged. “Perhaps it was fated then, for the two of us to meet under such unusual circumstances. Sets the scene.”

“Sets the scene?” Twilight repeated. “For what?”

“A discussion of sorts, a little moment set aside to examine our responsibilities and faults at performing them.”

She sighed deeply. “Alistair, I’m sorry for not picking up on how you felt sooner. If I’d known I would've jumped on it immediately. It’s just I was so busy with what happened after the coronation, and Discord, and of course with Tirek, I didn’t have anytime to stop and think.”

Alistair’s eyes narrowed. “There were periods of time between these events, you know, entire months. A lot of chances to sit down and think about why we didn’t have our long talks anymore, or why I started spending less time at home, or just the general distance that was forming between us. You really did take your sweet time figuring it all out.”

“Things were hectic and I—”

“How’d you eventually discover one of your best friend’s true feelings anyway? Did you ransack my apartment or just ask one of your deity pals to pick apart my dreams for the answer?”

“Commodore told me,” she answered quietly.

“I expected as much, choosing the course of action that doesn’t make you contemplate what you did wrong, makes the entire process so much easier.”

“What was I supposed to do!?” Twilight yelled. “Stumble around in the dark without a clue to where in Equestria you might be? I worried for you, put the effort in piecing together as much information as I could, and you repay me through insults and sarcasm. Who’s being neglectful now?”

“Don’t you lecture me!” Alistair said with a poisoned stab of his finger. “I’ve been dreaming of this moment since that crown was first placed atop your head. You’ve had this little confrontation coming for a long time and now I finally get the joy of delivering it.”

“What have you been even doing since you disappeared?” She gestured toward the blue-grey combat vest and pants he wore. “I would assume you’re not living in some gutter considering the quality of your clothing.”

“I’ve been thinking over things, contemplating, examining the world with a group of likeminded individuals.”

“That doesn’t tell much.”

“It’s not supposed to.”

Twilight sighed once again, this time in growing apprehension. “You've changed Alistair, I’m not sure exactly what it is or who’s responsible, but you are not the same little human I dragged out of that muddy ditch all those years ago.”

“Maybe to you, but I’ve grown a new understanding of the system you represent, the system that’s stifling Equestria’s true power and preventing it from unleashing its fullest potential. I’ve learned the ways of magic you claimed were for the weak and evil. And soon, you will finally feel my vengeance!”

She raised her hooves calmly and took a few steps toward him. “Alistair, you’re letting your emotions rule your judgments. This isn’t the real you and you know it. Now please, let’s just stop for a moment and think about this. It’ll be just like before, I promise. We’re still friends after all.”

“No!” he screamed while taking a few steps back, clutching the stolen spell book tightly. “You’re just trying to take advantage of me, like you did all those other times! If there’s one thing you’ve taught is that you can never rely on anypony but yourself. Friends? They will always let you down, no matter what circumstances.”

“Alistair, please—”

“Get away!” he said irately, stretching out his free hand toward her. “I don’t want to hurt again!”

It was at that moment a torrent of blue electricity crackled out from Alistair’s fingertips and shot towards Twilight at a near blinding speed. Catching the lightening in a brisk force field, she redirected the energy to the floor and continued to approach him.

“This isn’t going to solve anything.”

Flipping his wrist in a sideways motion, a small cyclone of wind materialized out of thin air and hurtled towards Twilight. Undeterred, she simply swatted the force aside while shaking her head.

“My power far surpasses anything you can manage, Alistair. It doesn’t matter what you learned or who taught you, I am an Alicorn and you are not. Now please, stop this.”

He hopped backwards an unleashed another torrent of blue electricity from his palms. The attack was once again easily deflected.

“You’ll think I’ll give up just like that? I know I can beat you I just have to try harder!”

Catching the third wave of lightening, Twilight countered with a single blast of energy from her horn. Slamming square into his chest, Alistair was sent sprawling to the floor while the book was sent sliding across the floor.

Twilight now stood over him as he clutched at his chest in pain, breathing heavily while staring daggers back up at her saddened gaze.

“Are you willing to listen now, after you made me stoop to violence just for you to hear me?”

He didn’t respond.

“I still consider you my friend and I still think we can work this out between us. We’d still enjoy one another’s company, still appreciate and care for each other when we both need it most. I’m not going to lie and say things will be just like they were before but at least we can put things back on the right track. What do you say?”

He was silent for a moment and then slowly shook his head. “No, it’s too late for that. What I was, what I cared about and lived for is gone. My friends, my bliss, even my old interests have been taken from. Not by anypony in particular, but just by the world continuing to change.”

“In my home, back in the Realm of Solitude, nothing changed unless I wanted it to. Things were tranquil and understandable; I could maneuver through an entire world with nobody else but me and feel content with the order and harmony that had naturally been formed around it. But here? Things change and no pony remains consistent.”

“I overlooked this when I came here; I was willing to accept the indeterminate in this world in exchange for relationships that seemed to be forged of steel. I saw how you acted with your merry circle of friends, saw how we acted around one another, and I was thoroughly convinced that that was the nature of things. But once you accepted that position of royalty, chose to disregard the wonderful life you already had, I realized that all relationships are never built to last.”

“So no, I don’t forgive you and I’m not sure if I ever will. But what I do know is that I’m going to get that book off the floor, march right out of this blasted chamber, and plan how I will inevitably repay you for ruining my life.”

“I can’t let you do that,” Twilight breathed.

“Really?”

Flipping his right hand suddenly forward, a blinding light exploded out of the his palm right in Twilight’s face. Stunned, she stumbled backwards long enough for Alistair to hop back to his feet and command the fallen book back to his outstretched hand. Catching it, he raised his other arm toward one of the massive vertical bookshelves and telekinetically pulled down on it, tilting the structure ever so slightly and sending it hurtling to the floor.

Finally getting her bearings, Twilight thrust forward with all of her might and caught the bookcase just before it crashed to the floor and where she stood. Struggling against her dulled senses and magical exertion, she caught a glimpse of Alistair sprinting out of the library atrium with the mysterious violet spell book clutched under one arm.

In that split second lapse, Twilight could feel her shaky concentration suddenly snap and watch helplessly as the wooden bookshelf crashed to the ground. The last thing she remembered was the dark and painful slam against her body.

And then, nothing.

Fire on the Horizon

Twilight awoke to the distant wail of sirens and a crushing pain against her ribs. Opening her eyes, she remembered that the massive bookshelf Alistair had toppled was still pressing against her. Concentrating for a brief moment she fired a concussive blast of energy from her horn, shattering a hole in the wooden leviathan and freeing her.

She felt sore all over as she rose back to her hooves but nothing seemed to be too badly damaged…for her. The Royal Canterlot Library on the other hoof was a completely different story.

It had looked like a bomb had gone off. Books and spare pages were strewn all about the chamber, while several other shelves had as well been knocked to the ground and shattered into splinters. The twisted human wasn’t responsible for this kind of destruction, but if it wasn’t him, than who?

Hobbling towards the exit, the smell of burning wood caught her snout and immediately led her towards one of the wide windows that was now left shattered. The overlook gave a comprehensive picture of the Canterlot Gardens, partially ablaze at the moment as crews of firefighters and Guard ponies struggled to control the flames.

It wouldn’t do anypony much good at this point. Nearly half of the hedges and trees were alight while the other half was dangerously close to catching the wave of fiery destruction that had somehow enveloped the courtyard during her brief sleep.

“Princess Twilight!” shouted a stallion’s voice. Turning towards the source, she was greeted by a lanky young Guard who promptly saluted to her. “Are you injured? I can provide medical assistance if necessary.”

Twilight raised a hoof to stop him. “That won’t be necessary, I’m…alright.”

“Are you sure? You’ve got some pretty bad scrapes across your torso and a nasty bruise along your left wing.”

She shook her head. “Nothing I can’t walk off. There are definitely ponies around the castle that are in a much direr situation than my wing and I.”

“Does that mean I should leave, Princess?”

“No, not yet. I need to know what happened before I lost consciousness.”

“You got knocked out?” the colt asked with widened eyes. “How?”

“That’s not important now. Just please tell me everything you know.”

He shrugged. “We’re about as in the dark as you are, Princess. The explosions we’re heard just a few minutes ago, mostly around the Garden pavilions but as well as in close proximity to the library, as you can see.”

“Judging by the fires we’re fighting, the bombs were more than likely incendiary ones, perfect for torching some place in hurry with spot on results. And considering our bomber targeted the most heavily wooded areas first, whoever started this must have a pretty good know-how in handling this level of hardware.”

Twilight bit the edge of her lip. “Do you have any witnesses, anypony in custody?”

The stallion shook his head. “One gardener drunk of his flank on spirits said he saw two ponies running from the scene, a stallion and a mare. We obviously can only take this with a grain of salt but at this point it’s the closest thing we have to a lead. Did you see anything, Princess? You seem to be the only pony that was present in the library before it got hit.”

She yearned to speak with Princess Celestia over Alistair’s involvement in all this, but for now, she chose to stay quiet.

“I didn’t see a soul. The debris from the bomb is probably what conked me on the head when I wasn’t looking.”

The stallion grimaced. “Yikes, you may want to get that checked out then. I’ve heard about head injuries before and they don’t sound like anything I’d ever want a part of. Either way, I better get going.”

Saluting to her one last time, the stallion bolted back out of the room almost as quickly as he entered, leaving Twilight alone in the atrium’s wreckage.

She looked out the shattered window once more and inspected the sea of fire that raged all across the once beautiful landscape. This was an omen of some sort; she could certainly feel it through the core of her magic. What it precisely was she couldn’t foresee but it no doubt involved Alistair and the pledge he made before escaping.

And inevitably repay you for ruining my life.

It was vague but direct, and quite fitting for him to say something along those lines. His own proper word choice mixed in with the iciness that had become a part of his recent personality. No, that wasn’t quite right. The cold hatred within him had been there for awhile now, since her coronation the sentiments had no doubt been growing stronger in his conscious, finally exploding at her in his emotional one-way fight.

Twilight knew she could have subdued him easily, paralyzed him with a nerve spell that would secure him as long as she saw fit. But while she talked with him, while he ranted and accused her of everything under the sun, she still felt that there was a chance to persuade back to the light. At that moment it didn’t seem necessary to use violence or threats to coerce him, just her words. But now that he was gone, the mysterious tome stolen from the archives and the castle’s gardens lying ablaze, maybe fighting him would have been the right option…

But she couldn’t focus on such things now. She was needed somewhere in the castle and her own problems and doubts could surely wait for the moment. For now, she had a job to do.

Epilouge

“Dear friends,” the Grand Night Lord Silver Eclipse announced in a booming tone that still accentuated his specter-like voice. With the mere utterance of his words, a dutiful stiffness possessed the entire gathering chamber within the Crescent Fortress, with the stirring of thousands of Night Lord agents and wizards almost immediately being silenced.

Looking about the sea of his loyal followers atop the stone balcony he stood upon, the ghostly white stallion nodded in approval.

“Our time has finally come. Long have our ancestors dreamed of this day, long have we deserved our final triumphant over the twisted reign of Celestia. For years we have suffered setback after setback, external and internal circumstances always limiting our road towards a better Equestria. It has taken quite some time but now, we have finally achieved the form we we’re meant to take all those years ago.”

“I have seen visions of the world we will create. I see a safe and secure society ruled with an even by mighty hoof that ensures the protection but likewise dominance of Equestria over the world and its other races.”

“We’ve seen the inadequacies of the vile Celestia, seen her subjugation of those who oppose her. And if our near victorious opposition were ever perchance revealed to her, she would most assuredly try everything thing in her power to annihilate us to the last pony.”

Alistair listened to the speech with half an ear, more focused on the standard black robe he wore biting tightly against the flesh of his neck. Whoever had designed the specially made outfit he wore clearly did not hold a proper view of human anatomy.

You think they would have made this a bit more comfortable. Even in that riding jacket I wore there was more space to turn my head, but this? He yanked discreetly at the collar. It’s like I’m actually wearing a dog collar or something.

He glanced over to where Shale and her younger brother, Pen, stood on the other end of the small balcony, both adorned in the same dark cloth. He did his best to catch her eye but it seemed that Shale’s attention was heartily focused on the old stallion’s rambling declaration.

He smiled. Always so serious.

But he’d seen a different mare when they’d escaped from the scorching Canterlot Gardens just a few days prior. He saw a pony fresh with excitement and energy, sprinting as if in paradise as the first step in a grand plan was finally taken. Even against the risk of death by some Sun Guard’s spear or falling debris her enthusiasm would not stifled one bit.

Pen, on the other hoof, hadn’t been quite as enthusiastic about the whole firebombing to cover their escape. Even as they zigzagged through the Outer Gardens and to eventual safety from any pursuing Sun Guards, an element of disapproval hadn’t left eyes. There certainly was something behind this.

“When I joined this wondrous cause in my youth, it was nothing but pitiful relics from the past. Its few members were ancients among a modern era, their bodies weak from the preservation of their lives with eight centuries of existence reducing them to decrepit piles of dust. And once they taught me everything that I needed to know, I set out to remake their idea into a powerful force that would finally achieve its intended purpose.”

“It was not an easy path. When it seemed like we we’re in our finest hour, the traitorous Cult of Chaos staged their insurrection that nearly brought us to our knees. When the formulation of our final plan was still being examined, the dimwitted Commander Blackletter chose to disobey his obligations and nearly exposed our order to the entire world.”

Alistair remembered that encounter with particular disdain. From what he gathered, a simple observation mission had spiraled out of control and became a desperate effort to capture him and forcibly perform the desired realm-jump spell. However, what he was more knowledgeable of was Shale’s devastating competence with hoof-to-hoof combat, the claustrophobic feeling of being locked inside a shipping crate, and the horrid screech of metal against metal when a train derails.

He’d been much less experienced with the realism of ponies actually out to hurt him, but after everything he’d been through since, he was confident that something like that would never happen again.

Amazing how different you were back then. Bright eyed and fresh in Equestria, with such a positive outlook on things. I felt like a kid, an inexperienced one—yes—but one that really did find fun in the little things. Maybe I should go back to that once this is all done. Try and recapture how things used to—

“—and so it is with great pride that I introduce our newest initiate to our ranks and the human bearer of the ancient knowledge that will bring the return of our Queen.”

The clouds of thought quickly dissipated as Alistair realized that now all attention was focused on him. He could feel his eyes widen in surprise as the invisible gaze of thousands seem to tangibly bore into him.

Step forward you idiot, you know what to do.

Stepping forward to where Silver Eclipse stood, the hooded stallion smiled warmly at him behind his flipped down hood. Gesturing for Alistair to put his hands forward, he gently placed the coveted sealing tome into Alistair’s palms and stepped away; giving the boy all the space he needed to perform the spell.

This is it. The moment that they’ve all been craving, and you’re at the center of it, again. You still have a choice you know. You don’t have to follow through with what they want you to do. Nightmare Moon, if she’s really returned to this plain of existence, cannot be controlled.

She’ll cut a path through the world until her dominion is definite. Ponies will die, cities will burn, and the weight of if it will be cast upon your conscience. You’d make a difference in Equestria, you may even get your revenge on Twilight, but would replacing a broken system with a twisted one really be worth the consequences?

He mentally shook his head. No, I’m not a monster. But something’s still got to be done.

He paused for a moment in brief thought and nodded. Yes, that it was what I'll do. It is the only way to fulfill their wishes and your own. All these ponies before me are looking for a sign and I shall give it to them. Finally, there will be peace in this world...and vengeance.

He opened the spell book to the desired page and grazed his fingers of the fine fresh parchment. The entire world drifted into what felt like a dream to him as the he quietly spoke the incantations.

But despite his forced mask of concentration as his eyes drooped down to the pages, anypony who looked carefully enough would have seen a wry grin beginning to stretch across his face.