Princess Luna was bored.
She was currently sitting in her throne, the soft red velvet of the cushion doing little to help make court any more bearable. In front of her was the object of her annoyance, a brown coated stallion with a slicked-back black mane. His cutie mark was a small white bag with a string tied loosely around the top, and his eyes were a dark shade of blue. Around his neck he wore an equally deep blue tie with yellow dots strewn about it. Around barrel were two saddle bags, no doubt containing several papers to help his case.
"Please state thy name and occupation." She asked, her voice devoid of emotion.
"Bit Bag, your honour. I am the owner of a small apartment complex a short walk away from the Castle."
She gave him a small nod, and asked him to state his case.
"Over the course of two months, this mare-" he gestured his head towards a mare on the opposite side of him. Turning her head, she took in the mares features. Her coat was a pale green, almost to that of a ripe pear. Her mane was an almost equal shade of green, but had darker streaks of green running through it. Casting a glance to her flank, her cutie mark appeared to be a green, oval shaped leaf. "-has been late on every biweekly payment. I give all the residents ample time get the required bits in order, but she refuses to pay on time." He finished, casting an annoyed glare at the mare.
Luna turned to face the mare, and asked for her name and occupation.
"Minty Fresh, ma'am." Luna could tell how young she was from the sound of her voice. Her answer came out shaky, no doubt she was very nervous to be here.
"Occupation, if thou would?" She asked the mare, casting a smile her way to try and get her to calm down.
"Oh! right-" she made a noise akin to clearing her throat "-I'm working as a waiter at a salad bar in the Cloud district."
Luna raised an eyebrow at this. "The Cloud district? That's quite a distance away from your apartment complex. I don't suppose thou walks there and back every day?"
Minty gave Luna a small smile, answering with a nod.
Luna turned her attention back towards the stallion, who was fixing his mane after a stray hairs began poking out. She offered a small cough to get his attention. At this, he gave her a small apology.
"How late is she on her payments, on average?" she asked.
"Hmm...I would have to say a couple hours at most." he replied, rubbing his chin with a hoof.
Luna physically face-hoofed.
This is going to be a long day, she thought.
After a long day of court, Luna found herself in front of her chamber's doors, the two guards stationed raising their hooves to their foreheads in a respectful salute. She gave them a small nod, allowing them to go back to their duty. With a flick of her magic, the lock on the door quickly vanished and she was able to push herself inside.
Once inside, she let a large sigh of relief leave her and took in the sight of her large room. The walls were the same dark blue all around, and there were many bookcases aligning the walls. She hardly gave them any attention, as her eyes were set on the other side of the room where a large four poster bed sat. She trotted tiredly over to the bed, and gracefully collapsed on top of it. After several minutes of lounging on her bed, she finally got bored and looked around her room for something to occupy her.
Looking to her right, she saw her ornate black desk. Covering the desk were several books and scrolls depicting different events in history since her banishment. She had been studying a lot since she came back from her exile, so much so that she hadn't had much time to just have fun with her sky like she used to.
To the right of her were the closed doors of her balcony. Reluctantly, she got up from her bed and trotted over to the double doors. With another flick of her magic, the doors swung open and Luna was met with a refreshing wave of the cool night air. She took a few ginger steps outside and froze.
On the railing of her balcony sat the dark figure of...something staring off into the night. From behind she could make out two legs, of which the creature was swinging back and forth. A long tail was also coming down from above it's rump, and it was swinging from side too side in tandem with its legs. At the end of its forelegs (arms?) were small appendages that looked similar to the ones Discord had. Glancing further upward, she noticed two long ears that looked to be connected by an odd half-circle device going above it's head. Oddly enough, the creature was the same shade of black from hoof to head.
Luna was about to try and get it's attention, but it must have known she was there. Turning its head towards her, she got a full view of it's features. The first thing she noticed was it's large mouth and the four identical teeth. They looked sharp enough to tear through flesh. This was not the thing that unnerved her, for it was the lack of eyes that made her nervous. Though it had no eyes, she could tell that it was still able to see from the way it's tail stopped it's swinging when it turned to her.
"Wha-" she wasn't able to finish, as when the word came from her mouth, the creature swung its arm up and snapped two of the digits on its arm.
The effect was instantaneous, Luna's conciousness slipped away from her and she fell side-first onto her balcony.
The first thing Luna noticed was the weightless feeling she gets whenever she steps into the dream realm. But something was off about it this time, she didn't feel...connected to the realm. Groaning in pain, she rubbed a sore spot on her head just beneath her horn, a small gift she received from her balcony floor she assumed. She slowly opened her eyes and took in her surroundings. The dream itself was almost all black, if not for the seemingly endless floating white dots that circled around her. Where am I? she thought, This dream feels unnatural, as if somepony is forcing it upon us. But who?
She thought back to the balcony, and remembered the strange feline creature. It must have done this. We have never seen such an odd creature before, and it seems to be able to manipulate dreams. A fresh, but miniscule, wave of pain came from the base of her horn, prompting her to massage it gently. It can also knock us on our flank.
As she was about to get up to investigate, two thin orange lines appeared from the corners of her eyes and met in the middle. It was then that she began to hear the beginnings of an odd beat.
It started off slow, with an unknown voice coming in too harmonize every few seconds. The orange bar soon had numerous other lines popping out of it, all the same colour, seeming to respond to how loud the different sounds were. Many of the different sounds she was hearing were different then what she had been used to, but they were not unpleasant. Eventually the song started to escalate into what she assumed would be a climax. The music stopped at the top of the climax for a split second before dropping into a faster beat. Around her, she noticed that the faux stars also moved to the beat of the song, going from slow to fast. Thought she didn't know it, she was tapping her hoof to the beat of the song on the invisible floor that was keeping her afloat.
After the song was over, the bars that had been poking out of the original line receded back into it and the small line vanished much like in the way it appeared. The stars disappeared from view and she was left alone in the black void. An unavoidable urge to close her eyes came over her, and she soon gave way to a sudden wave of exhaustion.
Author's Note
Okay, this is the first fanfiction I've written. Criticism is welcome!
