Cobalt woke up on a lovely autumn morning, having had a good night's rest. As he sat up in bed and flexed his massive blue wings, which had grown stiff, he thought about what he wanted to do. He had the day off of work, and didn't know how to spend it. Outside his window, a bird chirped.
He put his hooves down on the floor, and slid out of bed. Cobalt walked over to the window lazily, parted the curtains, and threw open the window itself. A small breeze wafted through, carrying the smell of the bakery from a block away. It truly was a beautiful day in Ponyville, Equestria. He first opened all the windows, upstairs and down, and then settled into his chair next to the bookshelf, attempting to decipher what to read. It was then that he realized that he had already read all of his books, and was not in a mood to do so again.
"Library time," he said to himself cheerfully. Cobalt loved the library. It was filled to the brim with books of all sorts, of all ages. It always smelled wonderful, the perfect blend of old paper and dust. And, of course, Twilight Sparkle worked there.
"Twilight..." he sighed. Ever since they'd discovered their shared love for books, he had fallen for her. Hard. Nearly every night, he saw the lilac unicorn in his dreams. The previous night, he had been in a courtyard proposing to her, and she'd accepted. Sadly for Cobalt, it was nothing more than a dream, a fleeting wish that vanished at night's end. On one occasion, he had dreamt of a family with the unique mare. However, he continued to dream of the same thing every night-- Twilight. He had no idea whether or not she shared feelings for him the same way they shared books. Once, he had been stuck in the snow, and she let him stay with her in the library overnight. Cobalt didn't try anything. He considered himself rather classy that way, however delusional that may be.
Another smell drifted in on the breeze. He knew the smell- it was the perfume that a certain unicorn wore out of habit. A knock on the door, and Cobalt trotted happily over to the wooden structure. He twisted the knob, and let Twilight in.
"Hello, Cobalt," she said shyly. A small smile crept onto her face, along with a blush. But she blushed around nearly every stallion, save for Big Macintosh from the Apple family.
"H-hello T-Twilight," Cobalt stammered. Very suave, said a voice in his head. He told the voice to shut up. "W-what are you doing here?"
"This is usually your day to come and pick out a new book on some fascinating subject, and I had errands to run this way. I figured it couldn't hurt to save you a trip to the library."
"Oh. Thanks," said Cobalt. He was feeling very flustered, and evidently, she was too. Her normally somewhat calm state of being was now being slightly influenced by the mutual affection they possibly shared for one another. Her words were a little less smooth and her face was turning bright magenta. Cobalt was pretty sure he was a nice shade of deep purple, being naturally blue. The two ponies stood there awkwardly for a spell, until it was broken by Twilight.
"I, uh, I have some errands to run," she muttered. "I'll talk to you later."
"Bye!" Cobalt called after her as she turned around and trotted towards the main part of the town. Cobalt walked back to his chair and sank deep in it, partially lost in the memory of what had just happened.
As he eyed the covers of the books for what seemed like an eternity, he looked at the titles uncomprehendingly. He was reading the words, but his mind was still on the mare that had visited him earlier. His heart, which had neared the speed of Rainbow Dash during their meeting, was now down to the speed of a race car. A ding from the kitchen interrupted his thoughts. He had forgotten that he had put a piece of toast in the toaster as he had been opening up the windows. He got up for the second time in one hour, and got his toast. He used his wing to open the fridge door and grab the butter while his hooves attempted to subdue the burning toast. It was very hot, and he was not very bright at the moment. He reached into his silverware drawer, and pulled out a fork. He then stuck the fork in the toaster to grab the bread, but instead he got rather frazzled. A poof of smoke came from the toaster, as if mocking the now wide awake stallion. In the mess, somehow the toast had flown out of the toaster and landed in the sink, where a dirty plate that had salsa remnants still on it lay. His salsa-covered, burnt toast was also slightly soggy, due to a cup filled with water spilling onto it in the sink. Cobalt decided to give up and take a shower.
After he had been sure to brush his mane at least one hundred strokes, he trotted back down the stairs to his chair. He settled in one last time, and began to really read the covers. Twilight had brought three books for him-- one on the history of Equestrian lore, one on cooking (he could really use that), and one without a title, only a gemstone in the middle of some diagram drawn in chalk. He traced the intricate lines again and again, each time drawing a little chalk into his hoof and smearing it. The crystal adorning the old brown leather cover was iridescent, changing to every colour in the light and reflecting it upon the cobalt stallion. He, being ultimately most curious about this book, decided to read it first. He opened the worn cover, and saw that, on the very first page, a note was scribbled in Old Equestrian. Only a handful of ponies still alive today could read it, four of them being princesses and others being evil villains who had threatened Equestria multiple times, including Queen Chrysalis, King Sombra and his queen, Umbra, and Discord, who had been reformed.
A paragraph of this old script was written on the second page as well, this time with a depiction of a gateway of some sort. It was shaped like a horseshoe, and the portal within was swirly and misty, not at all somewhere where Cobalt wanted to be. He turned the page, and a small note from Twilight fell out. On it was a small chart showing how to decipher the Old Equestrian. He wasn't interested in that at the moment, and kept turning the page. Another note fell out, this one clearly much older than the lilac unicorn. The parchment was yellowed and crinkly. Another drawing made in chalk was on this, matching the one on the cover of the book. He pulled this out and set it aside, now very much intrigued. Where the note fell out from was several more drawings, each labeled in Old Equestrian. They showed a pony like himself using the chalk drawings to summon the horseshoe portal, even without direct magical influence such as a unicorn uses. This was fascinating to Cobalt. What did it do, where did you go when you went through the portal, how did you summon it? All of these swirled throughout his mind, deciding for him what to do.
Following the pictures carefully, Cobalt placed the old note on the floor and went about drawing it in chalk he had lying around the house. He made sure to copy each curve, each swirl exactly as he could, for fear it would mess about with the portal. Knowing his luck, it probably would.
On the second picture, it showed the pony grabbing an item and placing it on their neck, but Cobalt didn't know what that meant. He grabbed Twilight's decipher, and discovered that it meant to grab a locket and use that to travel back and forth. He trotted upstairs, nearly tripping on his own hooves to retrieve a small necklace his mother had given him as a colt. He shakily fastened it on, and went back down, resuming the ritual.
In the center of the circular drawing now emblazoned on his floor, Cobalt placed the book, open to a special page. In the center of the drawing, there had been an empty space with no chalk lines, but the book completed it perfectly. Cobalt muttered a small enchantment found in the leather bindings, and a bright light emitted from the book, rising upwards and forming a glowing ball of light. Cobalt felt compelled to touch it, to feel it. He could not resist. He stretched out a hoof and felt the magical sphere hovering in mid air. In flashed blue, and he quickly pulled his hoof away. The sphere had grown hotter in a matter of seconds, heating up the room and making the stallion sweat. Beads of perspiration dripped down from his forehead onto his muzzle, and he wiped them away with his wings. Suddenly, glyphs appeared in the air, ciculating around the make-shift altar. Then a bright flash of light, and Cobalt was gone.
