Luna's Secret World Redux

Luna’s Secret World

Interlude One

Two weeks back home

By: Azurekaryu

*DISCLAIMER, SLIGHT USE OF STRONG LANGUAGE*

August 26,1008 PN

“Enter,” The captain of the Equestrian Royal Guard, Prince Shining Armor replied to the knock that disturbed his thoughts.

The enchanted oakwood door protecting the prince’s office creaked open and a grey mare sporting a slightly lighter mane walked into his office with a stoic face.

Oh brother. This girl again.

“Hello Captain. How have you been these past few days? I know it must’ve been terribly stressful for you.”

“Yeah well, I’m as good as I can dealing with my missing sister, and Princess Luna as well,” Shining was already annoyed, he was too busy to deal with this, “I assume you aren’t here for the small talk, Chancellor.”

The mare let a small smile show through, “I’m afraid not Captain. You are aware of Princess Celestia’s… neurasthenia, correct?”

The stallion interest was piqued, “Yes. What about it. Has something happened?”

“Yes and no… the good news is that our Princess has not gotten much worse, but she is still greatly upset. There have been reports from some of your guards that they hear sobs from her chambers, but we cannot confirm the truthfulness of these reports.. Unfortunately, the council has met and given the disappearances and the griffon aggression has called for a National state of emergency..”

The prince raised a brow. A state of emergency had not been declared for hundreds of years, “Has it really gotten that serious?”

The mare’s face fell to the stoicism she wore before, “I’m afraid so. But there is more, The princess sent us a letter that helped us, the council, make decisions to help this nation.”

“And what exactly are these resolutions of yours? Unless you can find my sister I’m not particularly interested.” The Captain was annoyed with the mare. He could be using this time to go over the reports from his intelligence team and try and secure the borders of their land, but instead he was listening to the Chancellor of the Equestrian Council spout nonsense that he most likely did not need to know.

“I promise you, these will change your life and your wife’s as well. Spark, please bring in the papers.” Shining was worried as her wife was brought into this. What could any of this have to do with Cadence?

An orange pegasus trotted into the room with a scroll in his mouth, which the chancellor swiftly removed with her horn and proceeded to read aloud, “Due to concerns of aggression from sovereign nations, the disappearance of Princess Luna Candescent Luminas and the disappearance of Element of Magic Twilight Sparkle, the Equestrian High Council has come to a unanimous decision in accordance to Equestrian to instate a national state of emergency. , Princess Celestia Candescent Luminas has declared herself in a frame of mind unfit to rule following the disappearance of her student and sister,”

The mare stopped speaking for a second as the listener’s eyes widened significantly and his jaw dropped a little bit.

Wha-

The Chancellor continued, “As a result, Princess Celestia has agreed to turn over explicit power to the rulers of the Crystal Empire, Princess Mi Amore Cadenza and Prince Shining armor. As of August 31 The pair will formally inherit all power and responsibility of the throne, including Day and Night Court, as well as absolute control over all military assets.” The mare took a deep breath as she finished and looked to the understandably surprised stallion in front of her.

What. It was all shining could think of. Quickly he picked his jaw off of the table, “Hold on. What.”

The Chancellor chuckled softly, closing her eyes and looking down for a moment, “Yes, Prince, you heard all of that correctly and this is not a dream. Princess Celestia is in a bad spot right now. She did not see me in person, having a letter delivered to my office instead. We must assume that if she deems herself unfit to rule it is certainly true. She will still handle the setting and raising of the celestial bodies, and will help you as much as she can, but she is doing this for a reason.”

“What if I say no?” When he said that he did not mean to imply he was going too, but it was a valid question.

“Well, we hope that you do not, but should both you and your wife refuses to take over as the temporary Rulers of Equestria, then the council will likely take control, which could be a mess and create problems.” The mare sighed at the end, she wanted more power, of course, but she knew nothing was going to get done with the mess of ponies who all wanted the best for themselves.

Shining was still horribly surprised and did not entirely agree with what he was being told, but he did not want to show it in front of this mare, “Alright. I’ll discuss with Cadence and hopefully Celestia. We will get back to you by tomorrow at the latest.”

“Take your time Prince, but not too long. Equestria needs you to be strong for them.”

The mare gathered her things and walked out of the room, her assistant on her heels. He shut the door with his magic and sat down, trying to process what had happened just then.

I couldn’t have been dreaming, right? Celestia’s breakdown is really that bad? What will Cadence thing of this?

Before he had much more time to ponder, a loud, anxious knock rung through his ears. He gathered himself as best he could, “Enter.”

“Captain!” A guard ran in quickly, saluting. He had no markings on his armor, indicating his rank.

“Yes private? Is something wrong?”

“No sir! Well… yes, Sir! Major General Swift requests to see you at your earliest availability!”

“Very well, tell him I’ll be down in a bit. Intelligence quarters, correct?”

“Yes sir!” The guard prepared to bolt back out the door, but shining stopped him.

“Wait! This wouldn’t happen to be about the griffons would it?”

“I’m afraid it is sir.”

“Alright. I’ll be down shortly.”

The guard saluted once more and ran down the hall.

Shining armor sighed. Am I going to get a break or is there more shit the world can throw at me?

***

Shining armor turned right once more and proceeded down the hall to the room the intelligence ponies would be working in. He didn’t even have to open the secure metal door to hear the commotion inside.

“Somebody get me the damn troop maps!”

“Where is the rest of second brigade?”

Shining armor opened the door with his magic, and walked into the steel walled room without be noticed until he reached the center of the room.

“CAPTAIN ON DECK!” The room immediately ceased all action and conversation as all the ponies jumped to attention.

“Where is General Swift?”

“Right here sir.” The blue maned pegasus quickly responded, walking towards the Captain.

“I understand you wanted to see me?”

“Yes sir.”

“All right, At ease everypony, continue with what you were doing.”

Immediately the commotion started up again.

“Follow me if you would, sir.” The general walked towards a door near the corner of the busy room. Shining looked around, noticing all the maps pinned up on the walls, most of them of western equestria and the border between the griffons and their own nation. The maps varied from physical geographies to troop positioning, some even recording information on the griffons troop movement.

Once they entered the room the dark blue pegasus was leading him too, Shining wanted to get along with business. “What is it you wanted to see me about.”

“Captain, within the last hour we have received reports from three scouts, one from first brigade, one from second, and the other one from fourth,” The turquoise coated stallion paused, pointing to the massive map that covered the entirety of one of the sections of the wall. It was similar to those in the other room, but this one showed both the northern and western border between the griffons and themselves. Several large circles with numbers next to them were spaced apart all near the border, each of them representing a city. The two farthest south, labeled one and two, had blue question marks over them and a few red X’s around the outside, all facing the border. Another city, this time the far northeast of the border, had a massive X over it with arrows pointing west, this one marked with a 4.

“As you can see from this, our scouts have told us that all three of these towns were suddenly attacked, almost simultaneously. According to first and second scouts, the two brigades responsible for the southern cities of Phillydelphia and Trotsen, have surely fallen to the mass number of griffon forces. Damage is unknown and we are preparing the wonderbolts to assess the situation. Northeast of those two cities, Stalliongrad was also attacked. The fourth brigade pony that made it back to us told us that the city was lost very quickly. He was banged up and pretty spooked and said that the brigade had retreated to the west to hopefully meet up with sixth.”

“So what you’re telling me is that the griffons have launched a full force invasion?” Shining held a straight face, but the worry and anger was building up inside him.

“We aren’t sure of it quite yet sir, but from what the messengers told us, we need to be prepared for anything.”

Shining grit his teeth and punched the wall next to him, “Damnit! Why does this have to fucking happen now of all times!”

Major general Swift had worry obvious on his face, but did not say anything. Shining collected himself quickly, “Have you sent out any messengers with orders for sixth, seventh, and third?”

“No sir, we wanted to wait for your orders on that.”

This situation might still be salvageable. If I can get sixth to regroup with fourth and hold Marestogne, I can send up ninth to stop the griffon’s from advancing further south. Seventh and Third can help first and second maintain control of their respective cities.

“Alright, good. Here’s what I want you to do. Send ponies to Third and Seventh, have third regroup with first and try to secure Phillydelphia, and Seventh with second and have them secure Trotsen. I want sixth to regroup with fourth and hold the fort at Marestogne. Prepare Ninth brigade to push north and stop any advance the griffons try to make south, and I want eight and ten to go replace the posts Third and Seventh were holding. The entirety of the fifty third airborne division will serve as a support asset to all forces on the border to be used as needed.”

“Yes sir, and shall we still send the wonderbolts?”

“Yes. I want info on those cities ASAP. Let’s make sure our ponies are safe.”

“Yes sir, I’ll get it done.”

“Good. I’m counting on you, General.”

Damn griffons, why can’t you wait a few more months before doing this crap?

“Oh, and send those three scouts to my office when you get a chance!” The captain walked out of the office as Swift got busy organizing everything. Walking through the commotion of the busy intelligence workers, Shining armor quickly removed himself and instead of walking teleported himself to his office.

This is going to be one hell of a month.