The Dawn of Dusk

~ Eighteen years later ~

Beep!

The light streaming through the windows of the royal suite in the Royal Palace’s east wing had done precious little to wake the sleeping stallion nestled in the Princess sized bed for the past few hours. What did finally cause him to stir was a noise that came straight from Tartarus itself.

Beep! Beep!

The midnight blue pegasus hadn’t cared until right at that moment that it was quickly approaching two in the afternoon. He didn’t much care he’d slept almost the whole day away and that his mane looked like he had flown through the Everfree Forest backwards. Hitting the foliage of every tree in the process.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

“Buck off!” Dusk Midnight Melody groused, his voice muffled a fair bit by the plush sumptuous duvet he was nestled under. He was warm, comfortable, and he did not want to move, even to shut off his alarm clock. ‘Who in Tartarus even set his alarm clock anyway, it was a Saturday for Celestia’s sake! It was the weekend! Nopony set their alarm on the weekend!

Try as he might to get back to sleep, and he did try, because he had been dreaming of going to the spa where he was being massaged by several large, hunky, muscular oiled up earth pony stallions all at once, the infernal alarm clock would not allow him to doze any longer.

Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep!

Vague memories of the night before came swimming back. Memories of a Friday night with his friends in his suite. Himself, his best friend Wildfire and very good friends Darkstar, Brightstar and Cyclone along with his two other friends Air Raid and Slingshot had been playing poker and drinking. Drinking rang a bell in his head. They had done much, much drinking. They had gotten through almost two barrels of his mother’s moonshine.

The hard stuff, too.

Dusk himself had put away three quarters of a barrel on his own. Alas, he was too hung over to consider if he had a drinking problem or not. ‘No…’ he thought, ‘I can’t have a problem, I can get it whenever I like!’ As more and more of the previous night returned to him, the more he was horrified. He had lost four thousand bits in the poker game, mostly to Darkstar and Slingshot.

Almost his whole month’s allowance!

Beep! Beep! Be…

“Buck off!” Dusk had at last had enough of the damned alarm clock. He lifted his hoof up from the remarkably comfortable cocoon of his duvet. Blindly he felt around on his nightstand to silence the merciless beeping. First thing to get knocked off to the floor was his glass of water. Thankfully it was empty and the glass didn’t break on the carpeted floor of his suite. Second thing to go was book h had been reading. Sadly, the wretched alarm clock was the third thing to hit the floor.

Thoroughly unable now to even think about venturing back into the Dreamscape and the spa with the oiled up stallions, Dusk Melody swore under his breath and cursed the manufacturers of all alarm clocks in Equestria as he hauled his hungover carcass out of his bed.

Sadly, as he was swirled up in his duvet, this was not an easy manouvre and, with a muffled crash, the young Prince was the fourth thing to hit the bedroom floor. Fortunately, this placed him within reach of his clock, which he now silenced with extreme prejudice.

Rubbing his pink eyes with the tips of his wings, Dusk trudged over to his vanity in his room. If he was up, he could at least look like he belonged in the Palace and not the Badlands. The reflection that stared back from the mirror was not very kind. While the Prince was a rather effeminate stallion – he’d been mistaken for a mare many times – his charcoal grey mane stuck out at every angle known to mathematics. ‘Better fix that…’ he thought. The billowy magic mane look didn’t suit him.

Smiling, Dusk took up his favourite manebrush and, a few well-placed strokes later, it was back under some semblance of control. Nice, long strokes down the back and rounded out up front. He giggled, because now his mane looked uncannily like his mother’s, Octavia’s. He liked it though, the slightly girly look suited him. He knew while he was doing this that he’d be taking a bath in a moment, and that he’d have to brush his mane and fur again. That didn’t stop him. He didn’t get bored of styling his mane. Something he had in common with Cyclone.

They’d spent many hours brushing each other’s manes, much to the amusement of the rest of their friends. Not that they were malicious, far from it.

Four hours later, with the wall clock just starting to chime six in the evening, Dusk Melody emerged from his bedroom in his suite following an extensive and luxurious bubblebath. He did love his bubblebaths, mostly thanks to the shampoos and things imported directly from Saddle Arabia. He emerged, much like a butterfly from a chrysalis – dear Celestia he was such a mare! – refreshed, brushed, combed and preened. He couldn’t shake the feeling though during the bathing that he was missing something.

He was definitely missing something. What though, he couldn’t put his hoof on.

A cursory glance around his suite revealed nothing out of place, although, he noted, the Palace cleaning staff had been in while he had been out cold and cleaned up his place. He knew they’d done this not because the beer bottles and empty cans were gone, and it didn’t smell like a salt lick factory – looking at you, Slingshot – but because his coffee table was different.
He was sure yesterday it had been round, walnut and with a drawer under it. Now it was rectangular, and made of black oak. Then it dawned on him. After the tenth moonshine, Slingshot, Brightstar and himself had engaged in a sheath measuring contest on the table. As it turned out, the earth pony’s package was biggest, his was smallest. They had then carved in the results with a knife. To record said results.

No wonder the table had been changed.

Still, he was sure he was missing something, something he wasn’t getting. And it wasn’t the table. Whatever it was, he was sure a cup of steaming hot earl grey tea would provide the answer. Tea, he found, was the solution to many of life’s problems.

As he walked over his thick carpeted floor through his open plan, fancy, expensive suite filled with the trappings of his station, Dusk Melody found his kitchen. Making the earl grey, the thought nagged at the back of his mind. “Definitely. Missing. Something.” He said to himself. Try as he might, he couldn’t put his hoof on it. But, what exactly?

Thankfully, helpfully, when Dusk went over to his fridge to get out the milk for his tea, his pink eyes drifted over the calendar held in place with an ‘Equestria’s Bestest Friend’ madnet that Wildfire had made at high school years ago. For a moment, he couldn’t figure out why a certain date had a big red X on it. Today’s date. “Why does today have an X on it?” he spoke out loud to the empty suite, wondering what today was. It was only when he had made his earl grey and put the milk back that he saw a picture of the Royal Canterlot Theatre.

It was only when he was sat in his recliner, sipping his tea, that he finally figured it out. Mostly because he saw his violin in its case resting on the side dresser. “Saturday’s marked…the RCT…violin…what is it…” Then, with eyes wide, it hit him. "Oh my goodness, the theatre!"

How could he be so stupid? A question Dusk asked himself along with the addition of a stiff facehoof. “Tonight! My performance! It’s tonight!” In a literal flap, expertly preened wings outstretched in panic, he was on his hooves doing a fretful dance. “It’s tonight! I should’ve practiced!” Realisation that hours of practice time had been taken up with a luxurious bubblebath.

“Oh Celestia! Oh momma! Momma!” Dusk Melody pranced in place for a precious few moments as he panicked as to what to do. His eyes settled once more on his violin, a priceless Stradimareius that had been a Hearths Warming gift from his mothers when he had been six, after getting his cutie mark. He knew what he needed to do. He had practiced. The seventeen year old was ready. It was just a performance, after all.

A performance. A solo performance. At the Canterlot Royal Theatre. His mothers would be there. His aunt would be there. His friends would be there. So would half the press and the upper crust judgemental elite of Canterlot, but he didn’t care about them. He however, would not be there if he didn’t get a wriggle on. It was a quarter past six, and he was due on stage at half past seven.

“Time to go!" he thought, snatching up – carefully – his violin in its case and wrapped the instrument’s harness around and over his shoulders. With that, he galloped out of his suite and through the palace, all he could think of was getting out and to the theatre in the Upper Noble District.

~ ~ ~

The sun was just starting to set over the capital city of Canterlot, bringing with it an orange and red glow over the land. The dry summer heat was slowly replaced with a cooler air, signaling the coming of the night. At any other time, Dusk Melody may have stopped to admire the view, the beauty of the sunset lowering over the peak of Canterlot Mountain.

Not today however. Frantically, the midnight blue pegasus tried to gallop through the cobbled streets to get to the Royal Canterlot Theatre. Unfortunately, it seemed everypony else in the city wanted to get there too. There were crowds, but all were slow moving and contained sophisticated dressed ponies. It was rare to see anypony run in the luxurious town.

The rich and elite were never in a rush, favoring fashion over punctuality. With their chins held high, Canterlot ponies walked with care, treading gracefully with their social status in check. Many ponies were heading home, others were off to whatever it was they were doing, be it charity ball or a quiet wine tasting party at home. Or, in this case, heading to the theatre.

Along the main streets of Canterlot, the panicked stallion ran as fast as he could, weaving through the slow moving crowds. Unlike the well-dressed ponies around him, the pegasus dashed as fast as he could through the traffic. His eyes locked on the grand theatre he could see hove into view in the Upper Noble District.

He wanted so desperately to fly, to spread his powerful midnight blue wings and soar above these slow moving aristocratic idiots that surrounded him. Alas, unlike much larger, metropolitan cities like Manehatten, Baltimare and Vanhoover, there was no formal flight traffic system. Canterlot, because it was smaller, was much like Ponyville and Whinnyapolis in that regard. As such, with the possibility of being hit by a careless flyer and seeing as he was carrying a priceless violin, he didn’t dare take off.

“Okay, keep on your hooves, Dusk, you'll get there in no time," he told himself, trying to quell his rising panic while at the same time trying to not to get in anypony's way. Unfortunately, there were a few other ponies that weren’t being as careful as he was. One such pony happened to be a tall well-built unicorn stallion who looked to be at least as wide as he was tall. And he was a head taller than Dusk. Going full tilt into the unmoving slab of muscle dressed in a tuxedo, Dusk went sprawling. "Pardon me, sir," Dusk immediately apologised, almost instinctively, as he got up to his hooves and checked his precious violin case for any scratches or bumps.

None. Good.

The stallion in front of him walked past him without bothering to spare the Prince so much as a nod or a look. He did however mutter a most disrespectful, “Out of my way, you coltcuddling freak!” He knew perfectly well who Dusk was, but the fact he was into stallions made him less than dirt in most Canterlot ponies eyes.

It was no secret that Dusk preferred the company of stallions. The effeminate stallion had ‘come out’, as it were, a couple of years ago. This had surprised nopony amongst his circle of friends or his family but, sadly, while the law prohibiting same sex relationships in Equestria had been repealed five hundred years ago, attitudes among the ruling classes in Canterlot were slow to change.

Thankfully, he didn’t have much time to dwell on the rude stallion. It was par for the course and by now he was used to it. More to the point, he had somewhere to be and a performance to put on! Dusting himself off, his trot rapidly became a gallop as the pressure began to settle in. “Time's ticking, Dusk, get those hooves moving!” he chivvied himself along, though the ponies walking by him were making it rough to run through.

Thud!

The second time Dusk found himself on his ass, it wasn’t his fault. A sky blue pegasus mare, not looking where she was going as she flew low along the road, had done exactly what he feared. Her attention focused on her phone, she had flown straight into him, their bodies forming a T where they intersected each other.

Of course, the mare didn’t stop to apologise. She threw an insult at the gay Prince and flew off, her body soon lost to the crowds. That didn’t concern Dusk though. What did concern him was the fact that the force of the impact had sent his violin case flying the air, landing a few feet away from him. As he picked himself up off the cobbled street he looked about for his precious instrument.

He found it, about to meet the wheels of an oncoming taxi. “Oh sweet Luna!” he cried and, in a mad dash, just managed to save it from certain annihilation. As he hovered over to the other side of the street, landing on the sidewalk, the case swung open, and he made an emergency inspection...

Everything seemed normal until… "No!” what had at first seemed fine was suddenly not fine at all when Dusk realised two of the strings had been snapped in the violin’s short flight and hard impact with the ground. ‘Oh buck! What am I going to do‽’ he thought, biting his lower lip as his mind raced around for five seconds. Without much other thought, he closed the case, got it back on his shoulders and, making like a rocket, took off for the theatre.

He was sure he could think of something when he got there...

~ ~ ~

Dusk Melody did not think of something when he got there.

Seated in the green room of the Royal Canterlot Theatre, in front of his mirror with the many lights all around it, make up perfectly applied and his mane styled just so, the theatre staff had even provided an earl grey for him, as requested. He made sure to keep the door shut behind him, as he tried to think over what to do about the two broken strings.

"Okay, okay, you can fix this," he told myself, though his reflection in the mirror didn’t seem very convinced. He glanced at the clock, which told him it was 7:05. Twenty five minutes ‘till showtime. He didn’t so much have butterflies as he had a colony of parasprites in his belly.

"Okay, one idea." Clutching at straws, he went to work with his hooves and mouth. Admittedly, as he tied the strings together, it was a bit of a long shot. But he was short on time and long on panic. Tie by tie he worked, getting it just right so there wasn't any bulge to interrupt the strokes when he was playing. It took a few agonizing minutes of try and retry, but, the work paid off...maybe. The strings were in one piece, anyway. Hesitantly, he sat down on the stool, the violin in hoof, and he began to try out his chords.

‘So far so good...’ Dusk thought as he played, though he thought too soon. With a loud ‘snap!’ the strings broke and whacked his muzzle. “Ow!” he yelped, rubbing his snout where the strings had whipped into him. His mind started to comprehend what had happened. Pain receded in the knowledge that his quick fix had not worked. He had wasted time he didn’t have, and now there was just fifteen minutes to go.

As he was starting to panic properly now, a soft knock came at the door. Dusk was about to tell whomever it was to kindly get lost when the door opened and his mother walked in. Octavia Melody looked resplendent in a long flowing dark blue evening dress the same colour as his and Luna’s coats. Especially with the dark blue collar around her neck and her mane done up in a ponytail like that.

It was her habit to come to see her colt before a performance when he played with others in a group. She knew how a well-placed word of encouragement could banish the terrible parasprites and, judging by the look of terror on Dusk’s face, she was right this time too. Mums are right like that. It’s a fact, they just are. "Hello, sweetie.” The grey earth pony mare walked up and nuzzled her son’s cheek. “I'm so proud that you're handling the solo performance tonight."

"Yeah, thanks. Me too." Dusk replied way too quickly, instantly he aroused the ‘mum-radar’ that all mums have. It’s a trouble-o-meter that never failed.

Right now, Octavia’s trouble-o-meter was off the charts. "Are you going to be okay?"

"Yeahsureillbefine." Crap, too fast. And his mother’s questionable look told him so, too.

"Is everything alright?"

"Okay, I may be a little bit nervous about it..." Dusk thought that was a good save. Looking down, he saw his mum’s hoof rest comfortingly on his own.

"What happened to your violin?" Octavia asked, her sharp eyes drawn to the damaged instrument and its two snapped strings. As Dusk babbled something incoherent about a rude stallion and an inattentive mare, Octavia smiled. "Here honey, I think I can help with that.” At his questioning look, she reached into a hidden pocket cunningly disguised in her gown and pulled out several new, intact, strings.

“Mum…where…why?”

“Oh sweetie,” Octavia giggled as she got to work replacing the strings with their correct counterparts and tuning it with her musician’s ear, “I’m a stringed instrument player. I never, ever leave home without spare strings.” Once she was finished, she booped his nose. “One never knows, darling. Now, tell your mum what’s bothering you, hmm?”

Dusk glanced at the clock and stiffened. It was twenty five minutes past seven! He was going to be tardy! “B-But mum, the time! I’ll be late!”

“Dusk, sweetheart, so what?” Octavia chuckled, “You aren’t just the star of the show, you are the show! Everypony’s here to see you perform. Me, your mom, your aunt, your friends. We won’t care if you’re a few minutes late.”

“But…everypony else! The nobles, the press!”

Octavia leant in and whispered in her colt’s ear. “Buck them. They don’t matter.”

Dusk however, insisted on panicking, now he was on a roll. “But, mum, what if I mess up? It’s just me! What if I have an utter disaster? The hacks will have a field day!”

"So what if you do? Suppose this is the worst performance you’ve ever done. Say you drop every single note and make our ears bleed. What will happen? Do you think I will love you any less?” She paused while Dusk shook his head. “Do you think I’ll be any less proud of you? Or Lulu? Or your aunt, or your friends?”

Again, Dusk shook his head. “Don't be so worried, honey. I've gone through this same thing when I was young, and need I remind you of the night your mother and I met?”

Now, Dusk Melody burst out laughing. He had heard the story of the Grand Galloping Gala many times. He never tired of hearing it. He only hoped he never did something embarrassing that he’d be reminded about for years afterwards. "I know, and no, you don’t need to tell me again, mum. I’m fine, really, I just want tonight to be perfect, it’s your wedding anniversary…”

“Dusk Midnight Melody.” Octavia silenced her son as if she had struck him dumb. “Keep worrying, and I shall put you across my knee. Now, here, I have something for you.” She reached into yet another skillfully disguised pocket on her gown and pulled out a pink bowtie. Once it was secured around his neck she stepped back with a smile. “It matches your eyes. Now, I’m going to go to your mother. Doesn’t do to keep the Mistress waiting. You. Get yourself together, take your time, and go have fun.” With a kiss to his forehead, Octavia took her leave.

~ ~ ~

Dusk Melody fidgeted behind the curtain of the Royal Canterlot Theatre. The tuxedo he wore was tight and itchy, and for a scandalous moment he considered what it was like to wear a dress like his mum. That would be so much more comfortable! Soon though, in spite of his worries and his nerves, it was time to begin. As he took a sip of his water from the table next to his stool, he heard the MC introduce him.

As the red curtain was lifted, so too was his nerves. Quite like magic. Dusk took up his violin, his hooves balanced the violin against his neck, his bow in his right hoof. The curtains moved away, revealing the young violinist to the crowd in front of him. So many ponies, all high class, were there to watch his performance, but he only had eyes for ten of them.

He found them. His mom, mum and aunt as well as Moonshine, his bat pony father, were in the Royal Box, his mom holding his mum’s leash in her magic. He smiled, for Moonshine looked like the proudest stallion in Equestria at that moment. Dusk was sure he saw the senior Lunar guard shed a tear. In the front row were the other six; Wildfire, Brightstar, Darkstar, Cyclone, Air Raid and Slingshot. His friends. When the spotlight shined right on him, Dusk was in his zone. His eyes met his parents’, whom looked to him with gentle, reassuring smiles.

It helped. With violin in hoof, eyes closed to focus, Dusk began to play his first piece. In deference to his mothers’ wedding anniversary, he played ‘A Thousand Years’, the very first piece his mum ever played for his mom all those years ago on the night of the Grand Galloping Gala.

Applause greeted the completion of the first song. Those four in the Royal Box seemed to be competing with the six in the front row. Moonshine and Air Raid were stomping their hooves, but not to be out done, Wildfire was whooping and cheering like she was at a pep rally not the grandest theatre in the country. Not that she cared.

His spirits buoyed by his friend’s support as well as that of his family, Dusk began his second piece, entitled ‘Elements’ which he followed up with a third, ‘Crystallize’. The performance went on for another hour and a half, with Dusk taking a couple of water breaks here and there. Smiling, he prepared to play his final piece, a piece of his own composing.

Lifting his Stradimareius one last time, Dusk drew his bow across the strings and performed his piece, ‘The Dawn of Dusk’.