The End of an Era

Celestia, the Princess of the Sun, sleeps soundly in her chambers with her precious phoenix, Philomena, in the cage next to her bed. Philomena's door is open as she sleeps perched on her post inside of the cage. Her red and gold plumage smouldering slightly. Suddenly she awakes and screeches loudly, jumping out of the door to her cage and gliding off towards the balcony.

Celestia awakes with a jump, landing next to her bed and pointing her horn at her door slightly before she notices the trail of embers floating out of her balcony door.

"Philomena! What is wrong?!"

Celestia runs over and out onto the balcony watching as Philomena flies off towards the Everfree Forest. Seconds later the front door of her room flies open as a few Royal Guard ponies flood into the room

"Princess!" one of them shouts.

Celestia turns to them and smiles softly. "I am fine guards, Philomena however is acting strangely and I must see what has her troubled."

The guards then bow and then stand. The unicorn guard in the front then looks up to her and speaks softly. "Princess please, you must rest."

Celestia nods slightly. "Very well, however, I will take this up with my sister before returning to bed."

She then walks out of her bed chambers and into her anteroom to get dressed. She levitates her shoes over and slips them on before placing her necklace on. She does not bother with her crown as she is not taking the throne in the middle of the night. The guards file out silently and back into the hall, leaving her front golden ornate doors open for her. Quickly she walks out of her anteroom and into the hall heading straight for the throne room, doors closing right behind her.

Whatever could Philomena be doing flying off like that into the Everfree? And in the middle of the night no less? She wonders quietly to her self; keeping a calm smile on her face as she passes the guards in front of the throne room doors.

The throne doors swing open and at the other end of the hall sitting upon a golden throne with red cushions is a blue Alicorn levitating several scrolls and a book as she stares blankly at them. Several scrolls float around as she groans and references them with the book, a quill scribbling furiously in between the books and the scrolls. Her midnight blue hair speckled with the stars of the night sky flowing softly beside and behind her. She does not notice Celestia and continues to grumble quietly as hears the door open. The moon light filters through the windows as she closes her eyes and recites her greetings. "Thou art welcome to the Night Court subject. What is thy grievance?"

Celestia chuckles softly and looks up to her sister shielded in her scrolls and books "Is that how you greet your dearest sister Luna?"

The book in front of Luna's face snaps shut and the scrolls roll up quickly before falling to the floor as Luna jumps off the throne and runs to her sister.

"Tia mine dearest sister!" She says quickly and wraps her forelegs around her sisters neck. "'Tis good to see thou in the night court, but what doth trouble thou?" Luna pulls back from the hug and stands in front of her sister looking slightly concerned.

"Lulu it is good to see you too." Celestia smiles  and nuzzles her sister softly. "It is Philomena, she is acting quite strangely. She woke me up not but a few moments ago and flew off into the Everfree faster than I had ever seen her fly before."

Luna frowns slightly and rubs her chin with one of her front hooves. "Thou sayeth the Everfree? We have heard of a magical disturbance in the Everfree just earlier this eve. Perhaps that is what she is after. We would be happy to look into this for thou, shouldst thou wish to return to bed."

"Very well sister, let us hope that Philomena is alright. However tomorrow I will follow after her if she does not return. Please pass words to the guards to have a patrol ready to accompany me." Celestia nods and then hugs her sister again. "It is good to see you again sister, we spend so little time together as it is."

Luna returns the hug and smiles "Thou speeks the truth dearest sister. We wish you a good eve and entrust in us that we shall do as thou requests." With that the sisters separate and walk in opposite directions, Celestia back to her room, and Luna to the throne. "Guard!" Luna commands as a night guard approaches her. His black armor and blackened bat wings held tightly to his sides as he bows. "Yes Princess."

"Report to the barracks and pass word that our Sister may require a squad of guards tomorrow. Also, bring us our own best pegasi, We leave immediately for the forest!" She commands as she stares down at her guard.

"Yes your highness!" the night guard quickly leaves the room as Luna returns to the throne and opens up one of the scrolls next to her on the floor.

Everfree Forest

The man falls from the sky and lands with a loud cracking sound. His body collapses to the ground from his legs breaking on impact.

"Son of a --!" Was all he could get out before the large tree limb collided with his head, knocking him unconscious. As he remained motionless on the forest floor, snow began to fall.

High above the forest canopy, Philomena blazes across the sky towards a crackling purple and black cloud. The phoenix reaches the spot just as the mysterious cloud dissipated. She circles the area a couple of times, searching for anything out of place on the forest floor.

Finding a broken branch, she descends and lands atop it. The branch shifts and Philomena gently pecks at the snow under it. She soon finds something soft under the snow and spots the faint glimmer of blood shining in the moonlight. She reared her head up and after a few more quick glances around the took to the skies again.

Fluttershy's Cottage

Fluttershy snoozes quietly in her bed, her pink mane covering half of her face as she's bundled up in her light green blankets. Her soft yellow fur shining slightly in the moonlight from her window with a bunny at the foot of the bed. She awakes with a squeak due to her window being pecked at relentlessly. She looks around and then realizes the sound is coming from the window. Slowly she makes her way over to the window to see Philomena pecking at the glass.

"Oh my... Philomena what are you doing here at this hour?" the golden pegasus asks as she opened the window. The phoenix flies in and lands on her outstretched foreleg.

"What are you doing away from the castle?" Fluttershy asks quietly so as not to wake up her pet bunny. Philomena screeches a bit and coos softly as she starts flapping her wings and landing back on the window seal.

"Oh my an animal is hurt in the forest?" She asks quickly flapping her wings and flying over to the cabinet to get a first aid kit. Philomena screeches again and flaps her wings, not leaving the window seal.

"Hurry, right, I'll be out front in a moment Philomena, then we can go save this creature."

With that Philomena flaps her wings and then flies out of the window and circling the house. The yellow pegasus pushes her bunny gently.

"Wake up Angel this is an emergency.. that is... if you don't mind." The bunny slaps her hoof and then looks up at her rubbing his eyes.

"Angel I need you to get a place ready down stairs for a wounded animal, I have to hurry and get it before it gets hurt any more in the forest." Fluttershy asks sweetly.

The bunny hops up and nods her before running out the door and down the stairs, followed quickly by his owner. Once the pegasus is outside the front door Philomena screeches and flies in front of her and then taking off back into the forest. The pink and gold caretaker holds the first aid kit in her mouth and flies quickly to catch up and follow the fiery messenger.

As she reaches the forest's entrance she is stopped by the sight of the blue alicorn princess, Princess Luna, and her contingent of gaurds. Philomena is flapping her wings and cooing softly on the back of the midnight princess as the yellow pegasus arrives. "Philomena, Princess Luna!" The pegasus squeaks and lands next to them.

"Ah Fluttershy! Thine hath returned our Sister's pet. Pray what art thou doing with thine equipment?" Luna asks as she points a hoof to the first aid kit in the yellow pegasus' mouth.

"There's a creature that is hurt and Philomena here was going to take me to it... That is.. If you don't mind..." Fluttershy hides slightly behind her mane as she turns her head away from the princess.

"Very well then, our guards shall assist thee in thine journey. Guards!" Luna speaks softly while she snaps at the end of her sentence getting Fluttershy to quiver a bit as the guards snap to attention. "Lead on Philomena, take us to this creature."

The phoenix coos and then lifts off into the air and flies into the forest leaving a trail of flame and embers behind her. Fluttershy quickly follows, the first off the ground after the phoenix and into the forest, followed by Luna and her guards. The snow is starting to fall a little faster as Philomena starts to circle around the forest before she lands next to a branch with a rope around it. The phoenix starts pecking the branch and screeching, waiting on Fluttershy to arrive.

"Oh my what's this?" Fluttershy asks as she puts the first aid kit down in the snow and trots over to the branch. She looks the branch over and sees the rope and pushes the branch off to the side, following the rope down into the mound of snow.

"Oh no..." she whispers as she starts digging into the snow. "Somepony help me get this snow off!" She shouts at the guards coming out of the woods behind her. The guards rush over and start digging until they see blood and bones sticking out of the snow.

"Miss, come quick!" one of them says as the rest start to dig out the strange creature from the snow. It's breathing is ragged and shallow but it does not seem to be conscious.

Fluttershy quickly comes over to the gaurd and looks down. "Get me splints quickly! And bring me tape and rags!" She shouts commands at the guards as she continues to dig out around the legs of this creature.

Luna steps up next to her and helps dig out this creature, she unties the rope from around the branch and then around its neck. It's neck has rope burn marks and bruises all around it so she carefully digs out its torso and arms.

"WHERE ARE MY BUCKING SPLINTS!?" Fluttershy screams as she holds some rags in her hooves as the guards rush out of the forest with sticks strong enough to be makeshift splints. Luna looks over surprised to see the usually quiet and timid mare shouting such profanities to her guards, but she remains silent.

"Hold it down I need to reset the bones before I wrap it up." She says looking over at a guard still digging out this creature. The guard nods and then pushes down on its back and leans his weight on it. Fluttershy then places her hooves on both sides of one of his legs and then pulls, sliding the bone back into the skin and resetting it. The creatures groans and starts shaking, becoming unconscious for a second and then blacking back out from the pain.

A Hospital Room

beep... beep...beep...

The man groans as he hears the beeps coming from his right. He tries to open his eyes but he can't see anything and quickly passes out again.

beep... beep...beep...

"What is it?" a feminine voice asks as the man groans again gaining consciousness once more. His mouth is dry and he can't force anything else out but a soft groan.

"I think he's waking up. Shh now, quiet now, you're hurt pretty bad. You're in a hospital, you're safe." A different voice says. It's soft and sweet, just barely above a whisper as something presses on his shoulder. "It's going to be alright now, just rest." With that, he loses consciousness again.

beep... beep... beep... beep... beep...

The man wakes up again and breathes slowly, his neck hurts but he cant move it. He opens his eyes again only to find that he can't see much besides the slight grey of light filtering through gauze bandages. He tries to move his arms a bit but he finds their tied down, the same for his legs.

Great, I'm in some kind of suicide ward 'cause I fucked up and didn't kill myself right... I can't do anything right.

The man struggles again and hears jingling coming from the straps and then footsteps approaching him so he stops struggling and stays quiet.

"Are you awake now? Please relax we can't have you hurting yourself anymore then you are. Can you speak?" A feminine voice asks. The man stays silent but manages to whisper something under his breath. "What was that dear?" the voice asks again seeming to move a little closer.

The man sighs and tries to whisper again "W..w..water... p..please.."

"Alright but take it slow, you can't move much so be careful" the voice says and soon enough something cold his pressed against the man's dried and chapped lips. Water slowly starts to drip into his mouth and he swallows. The water is cool and refreshing but once it gets passed his tongue and into his throat it starts to burn from not having anything to drink for a while. The man grunts and the water stops coming.

"Th..thanks..." the man says quietly and the glass is set back on the table next to him. He hears footsteps leave his bed and then a door opens and closes leaving him alone again so the man falls asleep again.

Beep... beep... beep...

The man wakes up a little quicker the next time to two voices talking next to him.

"What do you mean you don't think he's dangerous?" One of the feminine voices' asks.

"Well he doesn't have any sharp claws and he is really hurt..." Another soft one says..

Hey I think I remember that one...

"Well what about the fact he's twice our size? And the fact we've never seen anything like him before!" the first voice asks.

What do you mean never seen anything like me before... I know I let myself go but I didn't... oh no... maybe I'm deformed from the suicide! the man thinks to himself and starts to struggle a bit in his slight panic, pulling on the restraints.

The two female voices' gasp as the heart rate monitor begins beeping faster. "I'll get the nurse!" one of them says as she runs out of the room, the other presses down on his shoulder.

"Shh now relax it's alright we're here for you." The soft voice coos. The man stops moving and stays still his heart rate picking up more and more.

"I can't move my head... is there something stopping me moving my head?" The man asks the voice, wherever she is.

"Yes there's a brace there, but your neck is hurt but nothing is broken, do you want me to remove it?" She asks softly.

The man can swear he hears something flapping but he just passes it off as wind flowing through the curtains. "Yes please, and can you get this thing off of my face?"

Suddenly the door opens up and what sounds like lots of footsteps enter into his room. A male voice speaks up next and close to him. "Hello, so you're awake are you?"

"Yea.. can you get this thing off my neck and off of my face?" The man asks again, getting a little irritated.

"We can take the brace off of your neck but be still, we don't want to hurt you accidentally." The male voice says as pressure is applied to the man's neck. After a bit of fumbling the brace comes off and the man feels a cool breeze bat slowly against his neck like there is a rotating fan blowing on him.

"Thanks Doc..." The man says slowly as his neck feels a little better. He slowly turns his head on the pillow and tests out his range of motion. "How long was I out for...?"

"We found you about two days ago, you were banged up pretty bad, I'm surprised your still alive to be honest." The doctor says, a hint of sadness in his voice. "Who would do that to you?"

The man remained silent but kept turning his head left and right, trying to get all of the kinks out. There didn't seem to be any pain which was strange, he figured he'd have some kind of problems turning his head considering what happened. "Can you take this thing off of my face please?"

The doctor sighed and then spoke softly "Alright but I need to warn you, we haven't seen anything like you and this may be extremely strange for you. The nurse will have a sedative ready if you start getting out of control. It's as much for your safety as it is ours."

The man swallowed quickly and tried to prepare himself.

What does he mean never seen anything like me? I'm a fucking human! What kinda bullshit ass psycho ward am I in?

"I'm sure I can handle it doc..." The man says as he closes his eyes.

"Alright well we'll take the bandages off slowly just keep your eyes closed so you can adjust to the light. Nurse if you would please?" The doctor says as the man's head is lifted up on what seems like a pillow. His face is covered in a tingly sensation that he passes off for just moving his neck. Slowly the bandages start to unwrap around his head as the light starts to seep in more and more into his eyes.

"Oh my..." the soft angelic voice from earlier says as the light gets brighter and bringer.

"Alright son the bandages are off just give your eyes a minute and then you can look around." The doctor says as everyone seems to take a couple steps back. The man's head rests on the pillow once again and he slowly opens his eyes, quickly blinded by the bright white hospital lights.

"Shit it's bright." The man says quietly as he squints his eyes, opening them slowly to see that he is indeed in a bright white hospital. He looks to his right and sees a heart monitor beeping slowly and then down to see his right arm with an IV inserted into it and then down to the straps holding his wrist. He looks at his chest and sees that he doesn't have  a shirt but is covered by blankets that go down to his knees where his legs are in casts and strapped to the table.

Well that explains why I can't move my toes...

The man then closes his eyes and lays his head back.

Well for the moment of truth I guess...

He opens his eyes and looks to the left to see who all was taking care of him. Looking back at him are a group of ... fucking horses...

"What the fuck..? WHAT THE FUCK! OH FUCK!" the man starts screaming and tugging at his restraints as his heart rate spikes up. The two horses in front of him quickly approach him. One of them is just your every day brown horse with a black mane, but he's wearing a white lab coat with a green vest under it and a stethoscope. The other is a white horse with a horn on its head? It's a unicorn? What!? It has red hair and pink eyes with an off white nurse's cap on top of it's head. The two rush forward and push down on his chest and shoulders as the unicorn's horn starts glowing, levitating a syringe over to him.

"FUCK YOU! GET THE FUCK BACK! NO! FUCK LET ME GO! I WON'T BE A FUCKING SCIENCE EXPERIMENT! GET THE FUCK AWAY!" The man screams and struggles underneath the two horses as he see's two others, a purple unicorn with a purple mane and tail with a pink highlight running down through it, standing next to a yellow pegasus with a long pink mane and tail. The yellow one was crying softly as the purple one moved in front of it.

"Nurse the sedative!" The brown one yells as the syringe quickly buries itself into the neck of the screaming and struggling man. The plunger depresses as the liquid is pressed into him with the white unicorn holding his shoulders down.

"RAAH NO! FUCK YOU!.....get... away...." the man finally passed out and was surrounded by darkness once again.

After the creature calms down the doctor and the nurse back off and turn around and look at the two others in the room with them. Fluttershy was crying softly with her face buried into the purple unicorn's neck. "It's alright Fluttershy. He's just asleep don't cry. I have to send a letter to the Princess in order to let her know what happened here. You can stay here and look after him if you want." The purple unicorn says.

Fluttershy sniffles a bit. "Alright Twilight." With that Fluttershy walks over and sits on a cushion next to the bed watching the creature sleep. The nurse and the doctor both leave with Twilight the purple unicorn and head back into the hall and shut the door.

beep... beep...beep...

"Oh my head..." The man groans silently as he opens his eyes to look up at the ceiling. "What a fucked up dream..." He says as he blinks his eyes before he slowly realizes where he is and his heart rate picks up again, echoed by the beeping from his right. He starts breathing quickly as he tugs his hands a bit and then relaxes, not wanting to alert anyone. He quickly looks over to his left and looks around the darkened room. He can barely make out the shape of something next to his bed so he bites his bottom lip.

What kind of fucked up drug world am I in?

The man starts moving his left hand around slowly, trying to slip out of the strap. It's coming undone slowly but it's also jingling more and more. The shape next to him starts to stir a bit so he stops moving and closes his eyes a bit, pretending to be asleep.

If I can get out of this one brace I can get out of here and get away... Remember the code of conduct they taught you about... Name, rank, age, date of birth and service number, nothing else.

After waiting a few minutes longer he looked out to his right and saw a small window with the moon just above the horizon.

Well that mean's it is either just before dawn or just after sunset. I have to get out of here quickly under the cover of darkness... now for these fucking straps.

The man quietly went back to rotating his left arm around a bit, getting the strap to loosen slowly. "That's it come to papa..." He whispered. Finally after what seemed like hours his hand slipped free from the strap and went over to undo his right hand. It took a bit because he wasn't familiar with them but he got his hands undone and suddenly felt a rush of adrenaline, spiking his heart rate a bit.

Mother fuckin' heart monitor... shut the fuck up shit!

He grit his teeth and tried to calm down while sitting up slowly and trying to get to the straps on his feet.

Maybe if you did some fuckin' sit ups once in a while you wouldn't be such a fat shit and could reach these straps!

He leaned back a bit, took a deep breath and then stretched forward and started to undo one of the straps. His legs burned from being straight out and not being that flexible, but if he could get free, it wouldn't matter. He fiddled with the straps a bit and got one free.

*Squeak!* The man froze and started to sweat a little more, his heart rate spiked as he slowly turned his head left and saw the figure there standing up next to him shaking.

Oh shit....

"Hey... Uh.. you're having a nightmare.. go back to sleep..." He whispered quickly and pleadingly. The moonlight shone through the window and lit up her big teal eyes and bright pink mane and yellow fur.

The yellow pegasus then moved closer to the bed slowly.

If it can get your other strap off you have a hostage...

"Uh.. Hey.. can you get this other strap off?" The man whispered.

"Are you trying to get free?" The pegasus asked, almost sounding like a squeak. It was then he realized who it was. It was the same voice that comforted him when he first woke up and the same one that calmed him down when he realized he was trapped. He could use this to his advantage.

"Yeah.. I... have to go to the bathroom. And I don't want to do it in this bedpan..."  He stated. He looked down to see that his bedpan was empty, but he was naked. He could probably use the bedpan to knock her out, but he didn't want to be violent to the one who helped calm him down. The yellow pegasus slowly went to his other strapped leg and undid the buckle quickly.

"There," she said quietly, at least it sounded like a she. "I'll take you to the bathroom then."

He smiled softly and nodded and slid over to the side of the bed, trying to put his feet down on the floor. He grabbed one of the blankets and wrapped it around himself in a sort of make shift toga since he couldn't find a hospital gown anywhere. It was then he noticed this bed is way too close to the ground and the room was extremely small. He looked over at the heart monitor and turned it off before pulling the wire off of him in order to not alert anyone from him suddenly flat lining.

"I'm gonna need a hand getting out of bed, do you think you could come here for a moment?" He asked as she looked over to him, quivering slightly. Slowly the yellow pegasus walked over to him and stood next to his hand. The man put his hand on the middle of her back and felt her extremely soft fur and feathers from her wings. Putting his weight on her back he slowly tried to stand and found that his legs didn't hurt, but they were immobilized from the casts.

Man either I'm dead, dreaming, or these drugs are so good I don't feel shit and I'm hallucinating a bunch of talking horses.

He hobbled his way over to the bathroom with the yellow pegasus and over to the toilet. He then sat down on the toilet and looked over at her. She seemed to blush when he turned and looked at her and she kept staring.

"Uhm.. could you.. I don't know, give me some privacy please?" he huffed at her and she shook her head quickly and then ran out of the bathroom shutting the door, squeaking her apologies.

The man looked around the bathroom now that he was alone and found the toilet paper roll next to him.

"At least they don't use the three sea shells..." he chuckled to himself as he took care of business. When he was finished he put his hand on the counter and pushed himself up to standing as he looked himself over. He was much taller then most of the things in the room and his head almost reached the ceiling.

"Good thing I'm short as shit huh.." he whispered to himself and then looked over at the mirror. He gasped and then hobbled back against the wall and almost screamed as he put his hand to his mouth to quiet himself.  As he looked into the mirror everything that was usually there was there, his blue eyes, brown short hair, a couple weeks worth of brown unkempt beard. What shocked him was his neck, it was black and blue with a red scar all the way around his neck from where the rope cut into him.

Oh fuck me...

He then started to look down at his legs and hobbled over to the door. He opened it and the yellow pegasus mare fell over into the bathroom. She had been leaning against the door with her ear against it.

"Oh my! I'm sorry! I didn't mean to eaves drop on you honest!" she squeaked and hid behind her mane as she shook on the ground, frightened by what she thought he would do to her.

"Look it's ok if you can get these casts off and not tell anyone else about me, I need to get out of here before anyone...." Just as he was speaking the door opened and the white unicorn nurse walked in with a clipboard hovering in front of her. The nurse looked over to the bed and saw it was empty and the clipboard dropped to the ground with a loud clap, then she looked over to the man and yellow pegasus shaking in fear.

"Oh shit..." he said quickly.

"Get back you monster!" The nurse shouted as she hit the emergency button on the wall with one of her hooves causing an alarm to go off in the hallway. As he heard the alarm he bent over and grabbed the yellow pegasus by the neck and lifted her up with her back against his chest. "Let her go!" The nurse screamed as many regular horses quickly filled the room.

"Shut the fuck up and back off or I'll snap her fucking neck!" He yelled holding the yellow pegasus up. His arms were straining and he couldn't hold her for much longer, let alone probably break her neck, but they didn't seem to know that. The yellow pegasus started whimpering silently as tears rolled out of her big teal eyes and down her cheeks. The other ponies gasped and took a step back with one running out of the room.

"Good now back up some more, I'm getting the hell out of here, and if any of you try to follow me she dies!" The man growled and bluffed. Even in the movies this never worked but he was slowly hobbling his way over to the door with his back against the wall. His arms were burning holding this tiny horse thing up in his arms but his adrenalin was pumping into his veins allowing him the extra strength in order to get to the door.

The horses rotated around to the middle of the room as the man made it to the door and he backed up out of it slowly until he ran into something firm, but not a wall. He slowly turned his head to see a much larger blue horned pegasus that was glaring daggers down at him with cobalt blue eyes. The man then released the yellow pegasus that slumped out of his arms and onto the ground, running towards the other ponies inside of the hospital room.

"Son of a b---"

The blue unicorn pegasus thing brought her hoof up as soon as he let go of the yellow one and hit him across the face before he could finish his sentence. The force caused him to topple over in the hallway and land on his side.

"THOU WOULDST DARE HARM AN ELEMENT BEARER?!" the blue one yelled down at him. Just then a series of colorful other horses galloped up and held the man down as he tried to roll over onto his back and slide backwards and away.

"THINE PUNISHMENT SHALL BE SWIFT AND WITHOUT MERCY KNAVE!" The blue horned pegasus leaned her head forward and pointed her horn at the man on the ground, a blue ball glowing out of the top of it as she took a more aggressive stance with her legs. The man closed his eyes tightly and took a deep breath.

"Princess wait!" The yellow pegasus quickly jumped in between the man and his executioner. "Princess stop he was scared! Don't hurt him please!"

"Princess?" What the hell?

He opened his eyes to see the yellow pegasus standing on her back legs with her forelegs spread open, trying to shield him from the blue one's horn."What the ---"

*CRACK*

A blue pegasus kicked the creature in the back of the head knocking him out cold. "Fluttershy are you crazy!?" The light blue pegasus screamed at the yellow one blocking Princess Luna. "This thing was gonna kill you!"

Fluttershy slumped back down onto her four hooves and cowered a bit once Luna disengaged her spell. "He was just scared... I don't think he wanted to hurt anypony, otherwise he would have when I let him go!" With that everyone gasped and took a step back. All except Luna who was still staring down at this creature.

"We shall bring him to Canterlot for judgement for attempting to harm an Element bearer. Our sister will see to his punishment then. Guards! Take this.... thing to the dungeons!" Luna commanded. The guards quickly arrived and put shackles on the creature and lifted him up and took him down the hall and out of sight.

The Nurse in the room quickly came out of the room and bowed. "Princess Luna, if I may speak?"

Luna then turned to the nurse and nodded. "Yes subject?"

"I came in tonight in order to remove his casts, would we be allowed to remove his casts while he is detained?" The nurse asked without looking up to her princess.

"Very well, but thou are to be under watch from the guards and in the morn it is to be brought to trial." Luna commanded and then turned to the group of multicolored ponies. "You six shall be there come the morn to witness judgment. Do not be late."

The six ponies all bowed and spoke in unison, "Yes Princess." With that Luna turned and walked down the hall further into the palace.

After a few minutes of walking she arrived at a set of large golden doors decorated with symbols of the sun and two guards standing watch. The guards snapped to attention as Luna approached and flung the doors open with her magic. She entered the anteroom and the doors shut behind her. Luna walked up to her sister's bedroom door and knocked firmly.

"Sister arise, something of the greatest urgency has happened!" Luna continued to knock firmly as she heard shuffling on the other side and stopped as soon as her sister opened the door.

"Lulu what is the matter, what has happened?" Celestia said rubbing the sleep from her eyes and looking at her extremely furious little sister.

"The creature we recovered has attacked an element bearer!" Luna fumed, causing Celestia to take a step back in shock as she looked at her sister. "Which one? Is she alright? What of this creature?" Her eyes quickly narrowed as she could feel her blood boil, doing her best to control herself.

"The Element of Kindness, dearest sister. Fluttershy." Luna said, almost shouting. "We would have executed it immediately if not for her involvement in asking for mercy. Thus we decided you shall be the one to pass judgement on this creature come the morn."

Celestia's mane was whipping back and forth as her sister gave her the details of what transpired, her eyes growing more and more focused. How could the creature attack an element bearer? Let alone the most gentle of all, Fluttershy? Whatever it was, It's judgement would be swift and without mercy.

"Very well Luna, we shall see you in a few hours to raise the sun. This should not take long, and I request you be there as well." Celestia spoke coldly and quickly, turning and heading back into her chambers.

Luna smirked and nodded. "Yes our sister, we shall see thee in the morn." With that she shut the door and headed back to the throne room to prepare it for trial. It would be a good night, long has she awaited the chance to help protect her subjects more directly.