It was early in the morning when a pink pony woke up in her room in Sugarcube Corner with a huge yawn as she scratched the back of her poofy mane. A sudden twitch in her forelegs took away the small shreds of lazyness on her face, replacing them with a huge grin as she jumped off the bed and inhaled deeply before yelling at top of her lungs.

"OH YEAH! WE'RE ON THE SPOTLIGHT, BABY!!!" She excalimed in glee during a gravity-defying hover that lasted a few seconds before she allowed her body to obey physics again and land gracefully on the wooden floor. Careful no to trip on the many toys and party supplies she kept for any future surprise parties. Unfortunately, her sudden celebration was cut short by her employer, startling her and making her step on a half eaten cupcake she left for Gummy last night.

"Pinke dear, don't be so loud or you'll wake up the twins." Said the muffled voice of Ms. Cake, who heard her employee's ruckus from somewhere in the house.

"Oops... SORRY MS. CAKE!, no, I mean, sorry Ms. Cake" She said realizing her mistake. She shook off the mush of the flattened pastry and made her way out of her room to begin what was going to be the start of a new adventure. "I know something cool is gonna happen, I just know it." She squealed to herself as she pranced past the door.

----------------------------------------ooo----------------------------------------

Not very far from the Sugarcube Corner, in the Castle of Friendship, Spike was sorting trough the lower shelves carved in the cristal walls of the library 3B, which was open to everypony who wanted to research on the diverse topics of innate magic of the three pony races, the basics of spells and recent historical events from the last few centuries. Many other libraries were built in the castle to use most of the empty rooms and halls generated inside the structure, most of them were like the average library one was expected to see anywhere else. It was a select number of them, located near the newest Princess' chambers, dedicated to her personal collection of books gifted by Princess Celestia or the foal books she owned as a young filly when she started reading and her interest for knowledge sprouted from.

A loud belch erupted from the young dragon and a puff of smoke materialized into a scroll laced with a silver colored ribbon sealed shut with a dark blue wax stamp. Luckily for him, this time he recieved a letter via dragon fire he wasn't climbing on the ladder he frecuently used to reach the higher shelves, saving him from an otherwise embarrassing fall. With no time to lose, he grabbed the letter tightly in his claw and he ran to deliver it to Twilight.

It didn't take him more than a few minutes before he found her in the throne room reading a request for a reschedule of the next rains on Ponyville, althought this task was more suited for Mayor Mare, Twilight was required to have a say on this matter because her castle was in the vicinity of the little town.

"Hey Twilight, Princess Luna sent you a message" He said, giving her the scroll. She put aside the request she was reading and opened the letter, as she did so, a small 'clink' rang as a tiny crystal held in a glass tube encased in between two silvery cap-like ends fell to the ground. She raised it to her face while reading trough the letter and her eyes widened at the information held within the device.

"Spike, I need you to gather the girls here. They need to know this."

"Got it. What are you going to do?"

"I'll prepare the information we have on the human world and compare it with the results of Princess Luna's interrogation to make an exposition interesting enough to keep Pinkie's attention and simple enough for Rainbow Dash to understand." She said as she stood up from her throne and started walking away.

"You mean with those holographic pictures and stuff?" He asked mostly to himself.

"Exactly!" She exclaimed without looking back.

----------------------------------------ooo----------------------------------------

"Ah'm tellin' ya, Rainbow," said an orange mare by the name of Applejack, "Ah can't have ya nappin' on top of mah trees. The apples may get bruised by yer tossin' and turnin' in yer sleep, or worse, get eaten!" She warned as her friend, a cyan pegasus with a rather colorful mane was lying upside down at the base of an apple tree, dizzy from falling of it after it was bucked during the dialy harvesting at the Sweet Apple Acres.

Getting up on her hooves, Rainbow Dash shook her head and retorted. "And how many times I must tell you to at least wake me up before kicking me off a tree?" It was a lousy comeback, and she knew it, but she couldn't think of anything else to say with her brain shaken as it was.

"It's easier this way."

"Woah, AJ taking the easy way. Somepony better catch this changeling quick!" Quipped the pegasus with sarcasm dripping from each word as Applejack rolled her eyes. But before the discussion could escalate any further, a purple and green baby dragon waddled as fast as he could on his stumpy legs to the bickering mares and called out to them.

"Rainbow, Applejack, Twilight needs you at the castle. She has to tell you about some official stuff Princess Luna discovered a few days ago. Ok bye, I'll get the others!" He half said-half yelled as he was already on his way to Rarity's

The orange mare was the first to break the silence. "Um... he does know you can tell the others faster than him, right?" Only to turn back to find a pony-shaped cloud of dust where her friend used to be. Deadpanning, she sarted walking after the multicolored trail leading to the Castle of Friendship muttering, "Dang it, Rainbow Dash."

----------------------------------------ooo----------------------------------------

"Pinkie!, Pinkie!" Exclaimed Spike from the counter at Sugarcube Corner, ringing the service bell with urgency. For another five seconds he kept calling for the odd mare before the bell was swiped out of his reach by Carrot Cake, the co-owner of the locale. The stallion sported a tired expression on his face as he massaged his left temple with a bag of ice. With the kindest tone he could muster, given his current state, he addressed Spike.

"Spike, calm down! Where's the fire, little guy?"

"I'm looking for Pinkie, it's an emergency and Twilight tol- Mr. Cake, what happened to you?!" He asked, maybe a little too loud for the stallion's liking, making him grit his teeth with the volume of the baby dragon.

"It's nothing to worry about, Spike. I just couldn't sleep well last night and woke up with a really bad headache." He took a moment to remember where her employee was and said, " As for Pinkie, I can't really tell where she might be. She told me she had something important and left five minutes ago."

"Oh ok, thanks Mr. Cake. Guess I better go now." Before he could get halfway to the door, Carrot asked.

"Before you go, could you please tell Pinkie to foalsit the twins? We got a big order we have to deliver to Vanhoover and we won't come back until tomorrow noon."

"Sure, good luck with your delivery Mr. Cake." And with that, he went to the Carrousel Boutique.

----------------------------------------ooo----------------------------------------

It was near noon when Spike arrived at the doorstep of the Carrousel Boutique. He let himself in at the sight of the sign on the door reading 'open' and good luck seemed to smile at him today because Rarity was having a pleasant conversation with Fluttershy over some tea and cookies. 'Cool, this saves me some time.' He thought, letting out a sigh.

Rarity was the first one to notice his presence and motioned him to come closer saying "Spikey, dear what brings you here?" Then she poured tea in one of the unused cups on the table with practiced ease and levitated it to Spike's claw.

"Thanks, Rarity. Hi Fluttershy. Twilight wants you to come with me to the castle so she can tell you some news" He said trying to keep a nonchalant attitude, and almost failing miserably as his tail wagged excitedly at the prospect of coming back along with the white unicorn.

Setting a half-nibbled cookie on a napkin, Fluttershy said in a volume not too much higher than a whisper, "Um... Then we better leave soon, I mean, what if the others are already there waiting for us and Twilight gets mad at us for being late?"

"Nonsense, darling. She wouldn't mind if we take our time to finish this gossip I heard about Cherilee and Big Mac-" She didn't get to finish as the little dragon interrupted, in the least rude way he could.

"I'm sorry Rarity, but Fluttershy is right. Twilight told me this was very important and she doesn't want to wait anymore time than necessary for me to get you." Pausing for a second, he added "By the way, have you seen Pinkie? I couldn't find her earlier today."

"Well then, in that case we must hurry." Said Rarity, pouting in a way Spike thought was cute. And with little else to do, the two mares and dragon left the building and headed to their destination.

----------------------------------------ooo----------------------------------------

Twilight Sparkle paced in circles around the Cutie map, fiddling with the small crystal she got earlier this morning. Albeit unresponsive, it still gave off a strong magical signature, courtesy of Luna. No matter how many times she tried to pry open the glass container, it didn't seem to even affected to her attempts to get to the contents of the item that taunted her with its mere unresponsive, stationary state. And nothing ticked her off more than not getting things to work, except maybe not to understand something. She had already compared her notes with Luna's and the differences between Sunset's world and Hunter's couldn't be anymore staggering, and if what the letter was saying was true, she had to reveal the secrets held in the crystal soon.

Before she could throw her hooves in the air in frustration, a loud *THUNK* came from the western window, telling her that Rainbow Dash was already here. "Starlight, would you please open the door? I'm a little busy at the moment." She called.

"Coming!" Came the response from the newest addition of her growing circle of friends. Starlight Glimmer did as was asked only to find nopony at the entrance, stepping trough the entrance and turning to the western side of the building she found Rainbow passed out on the ground, apparently the impact against the reinforced window has knocked her out cold. Muttering something under the lines of "It's the fifth time this week" and "Having a skull as thick as the arm of a minotaur", she picked up the unconscious pegasus with her magic and brought her inside.

Carefully setting her on the throne-like seat corresponding to the element bearer of Loyalty, Starlight said. "It seems like the adrenaline junkie is here, Sparkle."

"I take it she didn't slow in time. Maybe after this she will finally stop her bad habit of breaking through my windows, they're no longer made of common glass." Pinching the bridge of her muzzle, Twilight let out a frustrated sigh and said. "This means I have roughly an hour before everypony comes here."

With a mysterious inert crystal and an unconscious pony in the map room, she decided to resume her work on the presentation that no doubt would raise as many questions as answers, to her friends as well as herself. "Starlight, I'm going to do some private stuff and I'm probably going to be busy for the rest of the day. Why don't you take the rest of the day off?" She asked, mostly for her own sake rather than her student, who knew it would be the best no to bother a princess with a record of stress induced hysteria.

"Uhh... Sure, Twilight." Responded the unicorn, who tried to come up with a benefit of her current situation. "I think I'll go to the Crystal Empire to visit Sunburst to catch up on some stuff, last time I saw him he was super excited about some ancient spells he found in the old library." With that, she left Twilight to do wathever she was doing and exited the castle a few minutes later. Just as she was leaving she bumped into Applejack, who sported a rather bemused look on her face.

"Twilight, your friend Applejack is here!" Belowed the unicorn, not wanting to stay anymore time near the time bomb that was her mentor's temper. "Good luck with her, she's kinda grumpy today." Starlight warned, only to recieve a nod from the orange mare and with little else to do, she left to the train station.

Seeing her muttering friend in the brink of a minor mental breakdown, Applejack went to the near hysterical mare and did what was best for this situation.

*SLAP*

"Ow! What the heck was that for?!" Exclaimed the alicorn rubbing a sore spot on her cheek. She noticed the bemused expression on her friend and she continued, "I was getting out of hoof, wasn't I?"

"Sure ya were, Twi'. Now, can ya please tell me why am Ah here for?" She said sparing a glance at the pegasus who was starting to stir awake and went to her seat.

"Of course, Applejack." Responded a fairly more collected Twilight, "But I can only tell you so much before the others get here, I don't want to repeat the most fine details too many times. A couple of days ago Princess Luna discovered a being with a similar capacity to enter someone else's nightmares and fix them, and she told me that this being is from another world, most possibly an entirely different dimension." She picked up the problematic crystal and showed it to Applejack. "Also, she sent me this earlier today and I can't for the life of me figure out what it does."

"So it's a big deal, right?" She poked the floating item with her hoof and noticed some engravings on the metallic caps at the ends of it, one of them was almost identical to her cutie mark. With a closer look, she saw the figures matched almost perfectly with her friend's cutie marks. "Uhh Twi'? Ah think we're gonna need the rest of us to open this thing." She pointed out.

As soon as Twilight noticed the engravings she said, "Ugh, I can't believe I didn't see them." Rubbing her eyes with the back of a hoof she continued, "Maybe I should visit the oculist, probably all those nights reading are finally catching up on me, alicorn physiology or not. Do you think this will react like the Elements?"

The orange mare shrugged, "Ah'm just sayin'. Ah mean, it fits with the whole 'Element Bearer's bussiness' with the cutie marks and such."

"Ow... my head..." A faint raspy voice muttered form the side, turning the mares' attention to the cyan pegasus awakening from her unespected nap.

"How do you feel Rainbow?" Asked Twilight, magicking a bag of ice near her friend so she could calm the pounding headache. While the concern was there, she couldn't exactly say she was surprised to see her awake so quickly. Having grown accustomed to the risky stunts Rainbow performed on an almost daily basis with a rather predictable failure/success ratio, Twilight was more than prepared for these kind of situations with a small pocket dimension full of first-aid equipment.

"Like Big Mac and AJ bucked me like an apple tree trying to see who knocked more apples." She mumbled as she pressed the bag to her head. Looking at the window, which sported several pony-shaped dents, she sighed and asked quietly, "I did it again, didn't I?" A couple of nods were the answer. "Sorry, Twi. Force of habit."

"Look, don't worry about it. There are more important things to do." Turning to the earth pony, she said, "How much time do you think the others will take?"

"Ah don't know, sugarcube."

Not a second after she answered, the sound of the door opening along with the clip-clop of hooves against the crystaline floor made itself present and two mares and a dragon came in. Rarity and Fluttershy went to their seats as Spike spoke to Twilight, a little of dissapointment on his chubby face.

"Hey, Twilight. I couldn't find Pinkie anywhere, it's like she just vanis-oh... There she is!" He suddenly excalimed and pointed a claw at the suddenly occupied place where, indeed, the bubblegum pink pony was waving back at them. "Where did you find her?"

"I didn't! She wasn't even here when you came in." She gestured to the entrance. Huffing exasperatedly, she just said, "You know what? Forget it, I'm not gonna ask."

"What are you talking about, guys? I've been here the whooooole time! You were like, 'Dumb crystal, dumb crystal', and Dashie was like, 'AAAAAAAHHH- CRASH', and AJ was like all grumpy and stuff and Starlight was like, 'Nope', and then the little drawings of our cutie marks on the thing and then you were like, 'Rainbow! You're alive' and I was going to cry because you were all worried and stuff and then Spike got here all sad and then he pointed at me and then I waved back at him and you went all like I appeared out of nowhere and then I told you stuff and, and, and here I am." She finished with a bright, if unnerving, smile and a deep gasp for air her lungs were begging for.

"Uhh, right." Having regained her composture, Twilight said aloud, "I suppose you are wondering why I brought you here." She recieved nods and mutters of approval in response. She pulled out a letter from her seat and continued, " This morning I got a letter from Princess Luna, where she expressed her concerns about a creature she found a couple of days ago."

"Oohh, is it okay?" Quietly said Fluttershy, gently interrupting, "Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. Please continue, Twilight."

"Don't worry Fluttershy. From what she told me, he seems more than capable to take care of himself." She cleared her throat, "By the way, the creature is a he. He is able to travel to the Dreamscape on his own, where he apparently searches for nightmares and stops them."

"Does he have a name?" Asked Rarity.

"Yes. He calls himself Hunter."

"Pshh, scary name, weird dream power stuff, no big deal." Said Rainbow Dash while inspecting one of her hooves, "What more do we need to know about the guy so we can do whatever Luna wanted us to do?"

"That's the thing, he shouldn't be able to do something like that." Twilight replied.

"Why is that?"

"Because Hunter is a human."

"WHAT?!" Chorused the other ponies. It quickly dissolved into a mess of questions being asked at the same time, which caused Twilight to cover her ears and yell.

"Girls! Calm down!"

"Calm down? Darling, these are very big news. You once told us humans can't use magic." Rarity piped in, "How did he manage to even get here? Isn't his species in another world?"

"I was about to talk about that. This morning Princess Luna sent this." She set a small shiny item on the cutie map, "This thing is seemingly sensitive to our passive thaumic spectrum only."

"A ghostly what?" Said Pinkie, tilting her head.

"A passive thaumic spectrum is an unique kind of biological low-level radiation emmited from every single cell in a living magical-wielding body. It means that every magical creature is constantly sending an almost undetectable stream of magical energy and is different from one another."

"Ohhhh... I don't get it." At this, Rarity decided to take control of the explanation.

"What Twilight is trying to say, darling, is that everypony has an unique brand of magic. Think of it like our cutie marks, some may be simmiliar but they are never the same." She explained, getting a grateful nod from the alicorn.

"Ohhhh... Now I get it, it's like when you put Gummy, a cupcake and a rubber chicken in a-"

"Ok, Pinkie. Sorry to interrupt but I didn't call you here for a biology class." Reminded Twilight. "As I was saying, th-"

She never got the opportunity to finish her sentence as the ignored small crystal suddenly freed itself from its transparent casing and strarted floating over the cutiemap. A harsh light and a sharp whine engulfed the item, disorienting the mares below and causing a small surge of panic through the room. The unexpected lightshow was over almost as soon as it began, leaving six confused mares and a terrified baby dragon blinking, trying to recover their sight.

A new voice spoke from the spot of the flash, quickly gaining the attention of the everyone present. The words were a bit distorted, almost as if they were being said through a fan with a few hints of crumbling paper in the background. But the voice in itself was easily recognizable with the bold sonority proper of the princess of the night.

"Greetings, element bearers, I hope you are having a good day." A few seconds later an image flickered to life, showing no other than Luna in an eerily transparent, blue tinted mirage. "This recording is to be witnessed by no one other than yourselves. This is a matter of national security and I wish for you to behave and do not start asking questions until I finished, I shall not repeat myself."

"The first thing I want to make clear is that a human being is currently residing in our world, the circumstances of his arrival are still a mystery for the time being and it is unknown what is he going to do in the forseeable future, other than his routinal activities." The hologram slowly changed into a silhouette of a human being, crude in the sense of smaller details from his clothing being amiss, not that the bearers would know anyways. But these measly features didn't matter as to what caught their eyes were the half covered face and the slab of metal attached to a curved stick in his hand, provoking more than a few whimpers in the room.

"By Celestia! What is he wearing?!" Was the loudest of the reactions, which on cue ellicted a couple of deadpanning stares towards a horrified fashionista.

"From what he told me, he comes from a world stricken with a disease able to corrupt and transform any being into a monster, or beast as he calls them, and his duty was to get rid of them in any way possible. I am affraid he now carries this affliction." The projection continued, ignoring the reactions from her subjects. "Since he was unkowingly aiding me with the control of nightmares during his nightime, even with his... questionable methods, I am considering helping him with his fear of becoming the same thing he hunts before it's too late.

"I am giving you this information so you can discuss this matter further and reach a viable course of action. In the meantime, I shall keep questioning our interdimensional acquaintance in order to gather more information. I am truly sorry to cut the recording short, but this is a spell that hasn't been casted in a long time." Then she concluded in a lighter tone, changing the image back to Luna. "Princess Sparkle, if you wish to know how to make one of this thaumic crystal engravements then please send a letter and I shall gladly send you a copy of the spell, for your eyes only, of course." With that, the hologram flickered and died.

Rainbow Dash was the first one to break the silence, "Sooo... What do we do now? The dude apparently kills for a living and that stuff is not cool in my books."

"I think we should help him, I mean, if he wants our help that is." Chimed Fluttershy, peeking from under her mane while she tried to calm her nerves at the sight of the strange weapon. "But I don't know if we should let him keep k-k-killing things..."

"Well Ah'm not so sure about this. We don't know if he could turn on us if we tried somethin'." AppleJack tapped her chin with a hoof before asking. "By the way, Rares. Why did ya yell about his clothes?"

"Didn't you see what he was wearing? It was horrid, atrocious, a vile crime against pony-kind, or any-kind for that matter!"

"Don't ya think yer exagerating? Ah mean, yeah his cloak was ugly but nothing to fuss too much 'bout."

"I am definetly not exagerating, darling. He's wearing leather, the use of real leather as fabric is literally illegal, it's common knowledge in the industry." She replied with an undignified huff. "And before any of you ask, I use faux leather on my works, when it's needed of course."

"I don't get it," Said Rainbow Dash, "What's the difference between the faux leather and the real one?" Then Applejack leaned to her ear and whispered where it came from. As soon as she understood the message, she yelled out. "Bathroom!" With a greenish tint to her face, and left faster than somepony could protest. By the time she came back, the others were in a heated discussion on what should be done with the human.

It was clear this was going to be a long day, indeed.

----------------------------------------ooo----------------------------------------

A soft chiming sound echoed across night sky, bouncing on the twisted trees and occasional rock without disturbing the tone of the sound itself. A little bell held by a cloaked figure was the responsible of the almost hypnotic ringing, held not by fingers, claws nor hooves. It was a slimy appendage wrapped along the bony limb of, what appeared to be, a long-dead corpse of a pony.

The only sign of life other than the movement of the body was the near-nonexisten whispers coming from its lips.

"Ye of power beyond ours. Ye of knowledge beyond ours. Ye of purpose beyond ours. We plead for ye to heed our call as we heed thine. We of faith absolute plead for guidance. We plead for ye to grace us with thine blessing of a life beyond our husks we call bodies."

The caller stood in the middle of a circle of roughly 4 feet in diameter, drawn in the soil with fresh blood leaking from one of their legs. Around them, five other shrouded figures repeated the sentences in perfect unison. Everyone of them varied in both shape and size, but they all shared the same decayed state of death and the snake-like protutions sprouted from different places from under the robes.

Flecks of crusty blood floated from the liquid symbol as it shifted and morphed into a straight vertical line, in the middle of said line, where the cultist was, a sideways diamond emerged, on top of it was a small semicircle and below it a bigger semicircle encompassed it.

The final result was a shape that should not exist in this world. A rune which depicted the satelite above them.

The moon has heeded their pleads.

Author's Note

I am so ashamed of myself right now and I have no excuse for taking so much time to update (even worse as it's moslty filler, important but still filler ). For what is worth, I'm sorry but life was being a little too hectic. Hopefully I can get to make another chapter before the month ends.

As you know, please tell me if I left any ortographic horrors and any suggestions are appreciated.