Princess Twilight, Princess Cadence, Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, Shining Armor, Starlight Glimmer, Sunburst, Fluttershy, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Spike, Trixie, Discord, and a small number of other all trotted at the head of the entire force of the royal guards as well as the Wonderbolts overhead, approaching the Crystal Empire. The strange part of it being they were nearly at the capital and had met literally no resistance so far. During a meal break, the four princesses and Sunburst met together, as they wanted to, again, confirm what exactly happened when King Sombra returned again.
"While Princess Cadence was away, Sombra rematerialized in the crystal throne room, used his magic to drive everyone out of the castle, stole the crystal heart, then ransacked my library!" Sunburst seemed more upset about the sacking of his library than the fact that Sombra was back!
After a short silence Twilight spoke up. "And...?"
Sunburst simply blinked in confusion. "And?"
Twilight shook her head. "And then he started to enslave ponies? Started to produce mind controlling suits of armor? Started to build up an army?"
Sunburst paused and then shook his head. "Uh, no, none of those."
Twilight's only response was "Huh..." As she sat back to contemplate why Sombra would act so differently than in the alternate future she had seen during her fight with Starlight Glimmer. While Twilight was busy thinking the other three princesses went on to discuss their plans for securing the capital and finding the crystal heart again.
"We'll need to come up with something new to fight Sombra since he seems to have found a way to overcome Cadences magic." At Luna's comment, she and her sister turned to regard the pink princess who let out a rather guilty cough.
"Well... I may have... Forgotten to renew the magic..." The following shouting match was enough to even snap Twilight out of her thoughts, but she didn't have any interest in joining in the shouting match on either side, so she simply walked away from the 'planning' session, it would be far more useful for her to spend her time speaking with her friends, and making their own plans to find the crystal heart again. This time she could count on Starlight's, Trixie's and Sunburst's assistance as well.
The fact that all their planning came to naught was a bit of a shock to the entire force of ponies returning to the Crystal Empire. They found it's citizens, though, with a bit of an annoyed streak among them by having a mass hoard of ponies invading their city, along with the castle cut off, none of them seemed the worse for wear. The city was much the same, they couldn't find any building ransacked, or anypony who even reported such, besides Sunburst of course.
They found the castle in much the same, despite dispatching some of the royal guard to watch over the city the bulk was held in reserve for when whatever machinations that Sombra had in store. After dealing with the dark magic that sealed the castles doorways, that amounted to little more than "stay out" signs in the amount of time it took the princesses to break through.
A quiet three count outside the throne rooms main doors and four princesses burst through magic flaring!... For nothing. There was no one in the throne room, it was completely empty. Not even a sign of Sombra or the crystal heart. And with that, the search began, the scouring of the castle to find the erstwhile king. As the castle was chopped into parts to be searched Twilight and her friends received the dungeons, much to Rarity's chagrin, though she knew that in this case, it would not be the appropriate time to object.
There was where they finally found Sombra. While Rainbow Dash was sent off to hurriedly summon the other princesses the remaining five watched as Sombra worked... On a wall? They watched as he set gems of all kinds into places set into a wall, long strips of metals, copper, gold, bronze, with runes inscribed upon them, stones of dark obsidian, all were set into the wall, Twilight realized that he was building an arch of some kind that had been carved into the wall, and at it's apex was the crystal heart.
As the last piece was put into place, the other princesses arrived, and with the others burst into the room, right as the arch shimmered with life, a strange portal appearing with it. Much to their surprise, Sombra simply turned, looking completely unconcerned at the four alicorns arrayed against him. "Welcome to my castle princesses, you are already too late."
This time Princess Celestia took the lead in confronting the old tyrant. "Do you really think that you can stand against the combined might of four princesses!?"
Sombra only chuckled darkly and raised his eyebrows at the ruler of Equestria. "Who said anything about standing against you? I have what I want, I have no need to fight you."
Celestia stared for a few moments, her mouth hanging open before it snapped shut, and she regained her regal air. "Well then, you will be taken back to Canterlot to be put on trial."
Sombra chuckled again, seemingly most amused by the current scene unfolding in front of him. "Well at least this time you offer a trial, more in keeping with your claim of justice, but no, I will not subject myself to your justice again. Another thousand years as a shade, as some half living, half dead creature stuck between worlds? No, not again!" This time Sombra stomped down hard on the stone, causing an echo to bounce around the chamber.
Celestia blinked and was about to retort before Twilight held up a hoof. "Princess, there's something more to Sombra's intent here..." She lowered her hoof and looked to the king. "King Sombra, I would have expected you to raise an army and attempt to reconquer Equestria if you regained power, why have you not?" Though looking a bit perturbed Celestia did not object to the questioning.
Sombra looked to the pile of scrolls on a nearby table. "Because this time I did not need to scour all of Equestria for the last piece of my portal."
Twilight was going to ask a follow up before she was interrupted by two things, one, a quiet "Darling!" And look to see Rarity pointing at the portal, where, just faintly, though coming into more focus, was a mare, and a stallion. The second being the loud gasp from Sunburst.
"The location of the afterlife!?" This outburst caused everyone save Sombra to stare at Sunburst, who smiled nervously. "Uh... Well... The magic address for a portal at least..."
Instantly Celestia whirled back around to Sombra and let out a bolt of her magic at him, unfortunately, the reason the outer defenses were so weak was that Sombra has stored all of his dark magic in runes for his own defense in this room. As the bolt shot towards Sombra a dark rune on the wall flared to life and shot it's own dark bolt, colliding with the princesses and destroying both. "You cannot call the dead back to this world!"
Celestia's angry outburst simply caused Sombra to laugh, again. "I am no fool Celestia, I know that one cannot call the dead back into this world."
The group of ponies just stared at him now. "Then why...?"
Celestia's question was cut off by a harsh retorted. "Because I will not spend the rest of my days as a shade! I will not let your twisted sense of justice doom me to an eternity away from my wife and my son!" This statement caused both Celestia and Luna to look horrified, it hadn't been their intent to cause such a horrific punishment. Sombra turned, starting towards the portal, and the group realized, he would go to them, they would not return to him.
Twilight couldn't help but ask one last burning question before Sombra was beyond her reach. "King Sombra wait! Why? After you became a shade this was your only way to move on, but before that, you forced ponies to search with such fervor, you put down those who defied you, you killed ponies in war, even if then you thought you could bring them back, you also could have just waited. You killed for a few more years in this world? Why!?"
Sombra smiled his dark smile, as he looked back at Twilight, bringing himself up to his full height as a king should. "Think of it princess, my wife, a pure, innocent soul, and my son who died as a foal. I would not go to the place they went to. Never again to feel a warm flank against yours, never again to cradle your foal in your forelegs. Yes, princess, I would kill for that." With that, he walked through the portal, in the land of the living no longer.
Author's Note
I kind of waffled on if I should give it more of a solidly concluded ending but then I decided not to, the story is about Sombra, even if the beginning part was by necessity focusing on others.
