Blight Squad

When I woke, the first thing I noticed was that it was still rather dark. I stayed under the covers to wait until Reveille sounded at dawn, but it was only getting darker.

"What...?" Confused, I exited my tent and instead of light rising form the east, I saw light receding in the west. Did we sleep through the entire day? I saw other ponies exit their tents and notice the same thing I did about the sunlight.

I dashed back into my tent and searched for my Royal Guard armor, and found that it had changed into the armor from the mass-dream.

I slowly walked back outside trying to comprehend what had taken place last night.

I walked over to Kwill's tent and pushed aside the front flap, finding Kwill with his hooves on either side of his head, hyperventilating; his eyes were wide, his pupils fearfully dilated.

he didn't even look up when he asked, panicked, "Did that really happen last night? Did that happen?"

He stood up and started rapidly pacing across the small expanse of his tent. "Princess Celestia...abandoned us? Why would she do that? How could she do that?!" He stopped and looked at me. "Did...that...happen?"

"Yes," I replied, "I'm afraid it did."

Kwill collapsed onto his rump and started trembling in shock, his mouth hanging open.

I pulled a blanked from the floor with my teeth and draped it over him and said, "I don't know why Celestia would behave this way. It doesn't make any sense to me either."

Kwill looked up at me. "Apparently you're not affected as heavily by it as I am!" Kwill shouted. "I on the other hand...the Royal Guard was my life! How could she take that away from me! ...From us!

I just looked at the ground; I didn't have a reply.

After a few more minutes of ranting, Kwill took a deep breath, donned his new armor, and we stepped outside together.

We walked in silence for a couple moments until I finally said, "At least you're not afraid of the dark. What's a nocturnal pony who's afraid of the dark?"

Kwill chuckled, but then he full-on laughed.

"It's not funny!" I shouted, even as some amusement crept over my face and I started to laugh along with him.

Kwill wiped his eyes and said, "Well, that's awkward. You're now nocturnal but you're afraid of the dark..." He shook his head. "That's just ironic on so many levels. I don't know what Luna was thinking making you into what we are now. Who knows? Maybe you'll get over it?"

We stopped at my tent so I could grab by own armor.

At that time the sunset had completely faded away, and the moon had finally risen just above the treetops.

I noticed that, as it grew darker, my eyesight was getting better, as though they were modified to see in the dark.

A shadow appeared on the moon, and from out of that shadow appeared Princess Luna, who proceeded to glide down to the middle of our encampment and addressed us all in her Canterlot voice, "Soldiers of the Night! Come forth, for thy new liege has arrived!"

Round Shield stepped forward, and we saw, to our amazement, that he had all four legs back. "You heard her, stallions! Form up! Our leader wants words!"

"He's quick to change loyalties," Kwill whispered to me. "It's as though he wasn't affected at all by last night's news!"

"I guess you can't dwell on past matters," I whispered back, "otherwise you'll most likely be haunted by them for the rest of your life. Not to mention, Luna healed him of his missing leg! I guess that's reason enough for him to change loyalties."

When everypony had arrived, Luna began, "We must begin training at once! Thou must learn how to use your new hoof guards. Round Shield, please step up."

I noticed that she was wearing the same armor that we were wearing. Does she intend to fight alongside us?

Round Shield did as told.

When he was about ten meters away, Luna said, "Attack us."

Round Shield was taken aback. "Your Highness? I don't think I could bring myself to hurt--,"

"Do not think of us as your rulers right now. Think of us as some horrible creature that needs to be put out of its misery. Show no mercy!"

Round Shield was still rather hesitant, but he did as Princess Luna commanded. Before he did anything, Luna instructed, "Thy blade is connected to thine thoughts. Use thine mind to tell the blade what to do. To bring it forward, say in thine mind, 'Forward.'"

After a moment Round Shield's blade was no longer pointing up, but turned to point forward.

"Now, attack!" Luna yelled. She hand't pointed her own sword forward yet.

Round Shield charged. I could barely look, but I forced myself to anyway. Round Shield tried to thrust his sword at Luna's chest, but she quickly swept the blade aside with her shield. When he was wide open, she hit Round Shield in the chest with her sword's pommel--for he couldn't bring his shield forward without losing balance--knocking him across the circle that we formed.

We stood there motionless, in shock, staring at the bested best. Round Shield was the greatest swordspony we knew, yet here he was lying on the moonlit dirt, wind knocked out of him. We knew at that moment that we were fighting things that our wildest nightmares couldn't possibly fathom.

"Thou are going to have to do better than that if thou are going to survive even a single night!" Luna proclaimed.

Round Shield stood up, coughing to get air into his lungs again. He stood, faced Luna again, and charged, this time zig-zagging in an attempt to confuse Luna so that she wouldn't know which direction he was going to attack.

Luna remained motionless.

When Round Shield was close enough, he veered to his left, Luna's sword-hoof's side, and tried to stab at her side. Luna didn't even flinch as Round Shield proceeded to try to stab at her. To Round Shield's astonishment, the blade only glanced off of the armor in a small shower of sparks; the blade didn't even leave a dent.

Luna swept Round Shield from off of his hooves with her right wing, which she had lifted as Shield attacked her side to keep it from getting punctured.

Their dancing continued for a few minutes, until Round Shield was finally able to get the edge of his sword up to Luna's chin.

"Very good," she breathed.

Round Shield lowered his sword, his legs shaking with exertion, his breath heavy.

Luna said to us, "Get into groups of two and spar until the moon has lowered beneath the trees. At that time, we will show you how to use your shield not only for defense, but for offense as well."

Kwill and I found a bare spot to spar in. Kwill took an offensive stance as I stood my ground in a more defensive stature. Kwill and I stood, studying each other; how was one going to attack? How was the other going to defend?

Kwill brought his sword forward.

I continued to watch for anything that might betray his movements: eye movements, shiftiness, twitch of the ear, tail, anything.

Finally, he charged.

His eyes suddenly shifted to my left. I stepped to the right, told my sword to come forth, and brought the flat of my sword around to land on his flank as he sped past me; he was moving too fast to slow down in time.

He was able to finally skid to a stop to face me again. This time I charged as he was still getting his bearings. He brought his sword forward so as I might impale myself upon it, but I brought my shield up to knock his sword skyward just as my sword receded to point toward my shoulder, and thrust my sword's pommel into his chest-plate, knocking him to the ground. He lay on the ground, groaning.

I decided I may have gone a little overboard with that routine. I went over and offered him my hoof to help him. He took it, and stood back up.

"You want to go again?" I asked.

"Have at thee!"

We continued until the moon had lowered behind the treetops and Luna called us back for offensive shield maneuvers. We then sparred some more to practice those maneuvers.

After this, the first light of dawn was starting to appear. We were tired and beaten, but we felt like we accomplished something that night.

The next night, Luna taught us how disappear from one area and reappear in a different area via the shadows on the ground, called "Shadow Teleportation".

"It's rather difficult at first, for thou must feel like thou are part of the shadow thou are trying to use for the teleportation. Thou must also determine which shadow thou want to reappear in before the process, otherwise thou will become one with the shadow world and never get out. That is why thou must master this technique in case thou need to get thyself out of a sticky situation. It must be flawless, or it will have dire consequences." She walked over to a shadow of a tree, gestured at a shadow across the clearing, and said, "We are going to reappear over there."

She closed her eyes, stood motionless, and seemed to quickly sink into the shadow she was standing in. We looked over to the other shadow and, sure enough, she had successfully reappeared in that shadow.

"Is anypony brave enough to go first?" she asked in almost a sing-song voice.

Kwill decided he would try it first.

"Remember," Luna told him, "make sure thou knows where thou wants to go first."

Kwill nodded, stepped into a shadow, and, after a few moments, sunk completely into the shadow. He didn't reappear for a couple seconds; I began to worry he may have been lost to the shadow world.

But he managed to reappear in my own shadow.

"Well done, Kwill!" exclaimed Luna.

"Thank you, Princess," he replied, blushing.

"Anypony else?" she asked.

"I will," I said as I raised my hoof. I stepped forward into the shadow that Kwill had used. I located a shadow on the other side of the clearing. That one. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and said to myself, I am one with the shadow. I am one with the shadow. I am one with the shadow. I continued repeating this to myself until Round Shield shouted, somewhat distantly, "Oi! Midnight! Open your bloody eyes!"

I opened them and saw that I was not standing near the rest of the troop, but in the shadow that I had chosen as my destination. Amazing! I didn't even feel myself move at all!

I trotted back over, giddiness overtaking me as the though of what I had just risked finally registered into my mind.

"Very good, Midnight!" Luna said as I took my place next to Kwill. "A bit late on realizing thou had arrived at thy destination, but otherwise very well done!"

"Thank you, Princess!"

It took about an hour for everypony else to practice the Shadow Teleportation. After that we were told to practice the maneuver during battle practice.

We continued until dawn approached, and we turned in for the day.
The next evening, we went through a different drill that tested us of everything we had learned.

The next week, we got some very big news.