Eclipse

Eclipse

Chapter 2

Jail break

“NO! I won't do it!” Cadence yelled, glaring at Eclipse

“But Cadence!” Eclipse begged, “You're the one that said I didn't deserve to be hung! So why not help me!”

“Because it's illegal! You want to stop yourself from getting hung, you find a way, but a LEGAL way!”

“There is no legal way! MY mother has seen to that! Even if I do find a legal way, she'll block it before I can even start to take it! This is the only way!”

“But what if we get caught? We'll both be charged, you'll still be hung, and I'll be put in prison as soon as I'm old enough! It's too risky!”

“But what if my plan does work? I'll be free! We'll never be caught! Think of the benefits!”

“I... I'm sorry Eclipse, but I can't help you... if you get out, come find me, I can give you a place to stay, but that's all I can do, and that's if my mother doesn't find out.” Cadence said, her voice full of regret that she couldn't help Eclipse, but she knew she couldn't risk being involved, Eclipse was the only one that could do this.

“But my plan won't work without you! I NEED HELP!” Eclipsed knew he shouldn't ask Cadence, but he had no other options, she was his last hope.

“I'm sorry, but I just can't.”

“Fine, where can I find you when I get out?” Eclipse said with a heavy sigh, defeated, doubting he would make it at all, but he still wouldn't give up.

“Go to the old apartment complex on 25th and mane street, the abandoned one, from there I can show you where you can stay, and Eclipse?”

“Yes?”

“Be careful” She said, before giving him one last hug and calling for the guard at the end of the hall to let her out.

“I will” He said, a new found determination in his voice, he had to make it out.

“Good bye, Eclipse, hopefully I'll see you again.” she said as the guard led her down the hall and out of the prison.

He had 5 days left before he was executed, and that meant he had only 4 days to prepare, but he would have to work very carefully. He couldn't risk tipping off the guards as to what he was doing. It was going to be a long and tedious process, but he was confident that he could do it, he had to do it. Come on, Eclipse thought to himself, you can cause eclipses, whats one tiny jail break?

He trained at night when the guard was asleep, which wasn't often. The guard was well trained, so the most time he had was in the early hours of the morning, when the guard finally fell asleep and before the morning guard got in for his shift. So he did the best he could with the time he had. He started by slowly building up magic in his body, then he tried to form a simple spell, it didn't work, but the more magic he gathered, and the longer he tried to cast it, the hotter the collar got. At fist it just got warm, but as a focused he felt it get hotter and hotter until it started to burn him, then he tried to maintain that heat, building up his pain and heat tolerance. After the first session he noticed that he already had to use more magic to make it hurt, so he knew it was working.

After just 2 days he could just barely bend the metal. It took all his strength, and it went back into shape immediately after he stopped pressing on it, but he could do it, so he kept practising. On the third day, just 2 days before his execution, the guard came to his cell again, “your one popular prisoner.” The guard said as he unlocked the doors.

“What is that suppose to mean?” Eclipse asked accusingly.

“It means you have another visitor.” the guard answered. Another visitor? Did Cadence come back? Of course she did! Who else would? Eclipse thought, but as he watched the filly come around the corner, his hopes that it was Cadence shattered, instead of Cadence there was a whit alicorn with a pink mane.

“Celestia.” Eclipse growled through clenched teeth, “What are you doing here? Did mother send you to torment me?”

“Why what would make you say that?” Celestia said in an overly innocent voice “Can't I see my brother one last time before he's hung?” Celestia said with a devilish smirk on her face.

“No.” Eclipse answered flatly.

“Aw, why not? Don't you love your sister?” Celestia mocked with a fake pout.

“Celestia, just tell me what you want, I'm trying to live out the rest of my days in piece, can't you at least give me that?”

“I don't want anything.”

“Then leave.”

“You're no fun! Actually, on second thought, I do want one thing” Celestia said, a devilish grin spreading across her face.

“what?” Eclipse asked, he had a bad feeling about the answer.

“Well, when I signed in to see you, I noticed you had another visitor a couple days ago, a Cadence, was it?”

“What about it?”

“I was just wondering why anypony would want to see you of all ponies.”

“She actually cares that I'm going to get hung, she actually nice to me!”  Eclipse snapped, getting even more angry at his sister.

“How could anypony care about you? You killed father, everypony hates you.”

“Well she doesn't.”

“How can you be so sure? Maybe she's just lying to you for her own entertainment, after all, nopony can like you.” Celestia chuckled under her breath, knowing that she was starting to get to him.

“She wouldn't do that!” Eclipse said, but in his mind he was starting to wonder if his sister was right.

“Of course she would!” Celestia said, “You just met her, and she's visiting you in jail? Seems like a lot of effort to go through for somepony you just met.”

“NO! She's just a really nice pony! She would never do that!” Eclipse tried to defend Cadence, but he knew Celestia was right. I can't believe this! How could Cadence do this to me! I really am alone! Eclipse thought to himself, losing the will to fight. Now even if i do make it out, I'll have no where to go, I'll be captured again, and i will never escape. Eclipse thought, giving up his last strand of hope, he was doomed, the one pony he had thought liked him was just playing a joke on him. There probably wasn't even an apartment complex on 25th and mane, it was probably a guard station to take him back to prison, he was alone again, and he hated it.

“Did you actually think she liked you?” Asked Celestia, unable to hide how thrilled she was that he was miserable again. Eclipse couldn't answer, he was to ashamed of himself for falling for such an obvious trap. He really was going to be hung, and nopony cared. Just as he accepted his fate, Celestia decided to make it even worse.

“Aw, what a sad sight, a lone colt just realized that he would die and nopony would remember him, nopony would even miss him, poor, poor Eclipse.” Celestia's words stung like salt in an open wound, and he couldn't take it anymore. His hanging couldn't come fast enough.

“SHUT UP!” Eclipse screamed, unable to hide his frustration any more “JUST SHUT UP! I'M GOING TO DIE! ISN'T THAT ENOUGH FOR YOU!?”

“hmm, no,” Celestia teased “I'm having to much fun to stop now.”

“OK, that's enough, visiting hours are over.” called the guard, letting Celestia out and closing the door behind her.

“Goodbye, dear brother, the next time we meet, you'll be hung, I'll look forward to it.” Celestia called back as she walked through the hall to the exit.

Eclipse couldn't contain his rage any longer, he started kicking and throwing anything he could get his hooves on, mainly hay bits of food from his dinner, he was just so mad, both at himself for falling for Cadences tricks and at Cadence for feeding him lies. He was truly alone in the world, but not for long. Soon he would be dead, and never have to worry about anything ever again, and he too looked forward to it.

“Hey, prisoner 56395, you got another visitor.” the guard called through the bars, Eclipse was currently laying on his hay bed facing the wall, but he didn't need to look to know who it was, the day before his hanging? Who would it be but Celestia?

“Go away.” Eclipse said flatly, “You'll see me tomorrow at the hanging, give me my last day of piece.”

“W-what do you mean? I-I thought you were going to escape.” That voice! No, it couldn't be.

“GO AWAY!” Eclipse yelled, not pleased with Celestia's intrusion in his final day on this earth.

“B-but, y-you said that-that you were g-going to get o-out! T-that you were g-going to live! W-whats wrong?” The voice that called back was NOT Celestia's, but somepony else, somepony he had tried to forget.

“Cadence.” Eclipse growled, “Come back to make fun of me some more? Go and tell all your little friends how gullible I am? Just go away.” Eclipse said, even less pleased then he would have been had it been Celestia.

“Whats wrong Eclipse? I've never seen you act like this before.” Cadence said, her confusion evident in her voice.

“Don't bother Cadence, i know what you're up to, just make it easier on the both of us and leave!”

“Eclipse...”

“I SAID LEAVE!” Eclipse screamed as he rolled over and through a bunch of hay at Cadence, he would much rather through something much heavier, but hay was all he had, but it got the point across.

“I don't know whats wrong, but remember, 25th and mane, snap out of it and be there, I won't wait any longer then midnight, so you'd better hurry.” Cadence said as she called for the guard to let her out, who was just out of earshot while they were talking, at least he got SOME privacy. Stupid Cadence, thinking I'll still fall for it, I know what she's planning, and she won't get the better of me! Eclipse thought to himself, as he did he heard the little food door in the cell open, lunch time. As he rolled over though, he noticed it wasn't lunch at all, it was a light brown teddy bear, with a cream coloured face and paws, with a note attached: Dear Eclipse, since you were so grumpy today you wouldn't even let me give you this, so I had the guard give it to you with this note, I don't know whats wrong, but I hope it wasn't something I did, if it, was I'm sorry, but I still hope to see you again, and not at the hanging. From: Cadence.

What kind of cruel joke is this? Eclipse thought, fist she tried to come back and torment me some more, and now she left me this so I can remember how cruel she was to me! Eclipse couldn't stand it. He through the bear as hard as he could against the wall, but as he did so, the note fell off and fell in front of him. As he read it again and again, he started to realize something, as the note got towards the end, the hoof writing got less and less neat, as if the pony writing it was shaking. Then he noticed another thing, the note had little round wet marks on it, as if... was she crying?

No, it couldn't be, somepony as heartless as her wouldn't be crying, it was just another trick. That's what it was, she was just tormenting him more by making him think she was crying. She really was heartless, but the more he thought about it, the less sense it made. Why would she go through all this trouble when he had already seen through her disguise? Once her cover was blown there was no way to make him believe her again, but then why the tears? If she truly was just making fun of him, then why try to keep up the charade after she got a good laugh out of it? Unless she was even more cruel then he thought. Another problem,her mother was definitely not kidding when she told Cadence to stay away from Eclipse, so why risk all the trouble with her mother? It wouldn't be worth the hassle after if her mother found out, unless... “Celestia.” Eclipse muttered.

It's the only answer that made sense. Celestia had fooled him into thinking Cadence was a traitor, and he believed her! He couldn't believe he had been so gullible, why would he ever believe Celestia? She never told him the truth about anything, so why would she start now? What could he do now? Cadence would never forgive him about how he treated her, all he had lest to remember his one true friend was this teddy bear and the- THE NOTE! She said she would still wait for him! He could explain everything! And he could earn her forgiveness! He knew what he had to do, he had to break out of jail, tonight!

He knew he had to wait for the perfect time, but it was hard, he had to be there before midnight, so he would have to do it when before the night guard came but after the afternoon guard fell asleep. He had a 15 minute window based off previous nights, but he wasn't sure he could do it. After the the guard was asleep for 1 minute 30 seconds, he started to gather his magic. Letting it build up inside of his body, after about 5 minutes of this he felt he had gathered enough. Holding the magic in his body he put as much hay between his neck and the collar as he could, hopefully preventing him from getting burned to badly. He had just 8 minutes left to get the collar off and find a way out of his cell. He started trying to form the most complex spell he knew, the one he used to cause the eclipse. He could feel the heat building up through the hay, but he kept trying to form the spell. He noticed the collar start to turn a faint red, then start to glow. That's when he covered his hooves in hay and forced the collar in 2 different directions. At first nothing happened, but the the collar slowly started to bend, the hay around his hooves was starting to smoke, indicating he had to pick up the pace before the collar burned right through the hay. He put all his strength into forcing the collar open, the back of his neck started, to burn, but he ignored it and kept pushing. Just a little more and he could squeeze it around his head.

NOW! He held the collar in place and pulled his head back and right through the collar, his neck was pretty badly burned, but it would heal. He had hit his left ear with a piece of the collar, but he didn't have time to think of that, the collar was off. Now all he had to do was get out of his cell, past about 3 guard stations, through the streets of Alacropolis, and to the building on 25th and mane, easy, right?

Without thinking he started a teleportation spell, he couldn't teleport through the walls, but he could teleport out of his cell into the hallway, he just had to hope the guard didn't wake up. He gathered his magic, focused on the hall just on the other side of his cell door, and with a flash of light he was out in the hall. Luckily for him the guard was a heavy sleeper, so he just kept snoring away while Eclipse planned out his next action. He couldn't just walk past the guard stations our out the front door, there were guards everywhere, it was a prison after all, so that left him with one option, the roof.

The stairs were just passed the guard station, and they were guaranteed to notice him teleporting, so that was out of the question. He couldn't sneak past with all the cameras in the area. The way he saw it was he either had to distract the guards or knock them out somehow so that they couldn't call for reinforcements. Eclipse wasn't strong or fast enough to use brute force to knock them all out, so he was left with nothing but his magic, a tool he was used to using. He tried to remember the sleeping spell he had once learned when e used to have nightmares and couldn't sleep. Hopefully it would work just as well on the guards as it did on him. Once again calling on his magic he let it flow through the guard station, slowly wrapping around all the guards he could sense.

He had found at a young age he could very easily sense where and who somepony was, using very little magic so that when he did it his “aura” as it was called, didn't grow strong enough for other alicorns to sense, giving him an edge over the bullies at his school. He used this power now to find the guards without them seeing him or them sensing him. He slowly worked his way through the room, finding every guard and slowly wrapping his magic around them. Once he was confident he started to form the sleeping spell and slowly feed it through the magic tendrils the he had attached previously. At this point the guards started to sense his magic, but it was already to late. As soon as he felt the guards start to use their magic to track him down he activated the sleeping spell. Almost instantly they all fell to the floor. No alarms were sounded, no back up was called. The only thing that came out of the guard station was a quiet collective snore of the guards. Eclipse waited a few seconds to be sure he had got all of them, but after 30 seconds and no alarms, he figured he was safe to proceed.

Shortly after passing the guard station he came to the stairwell. Using his aura sensor spell (as he had come to call it) he searched the stairwell for and guards that might be patrolling the upper floors. When he was satisfied it was safe to proceed he climbed up the stairwell. Everything was going fine until he reached the roof door, locked with a magic-proof padlock that looked like it belonged on a giants door. There was no way he could pick that, or blow the door open with his magic. As he stood dumbfounded looking up at the door fate decided to give him a hand. He heard whistling coming from the floor just below the roof, probably the guard that was going to relieve the one at his cell. He silently and slowly crept down the stairs until he could sense the guard just around the next corner. Without thinking he jumped around the corner, grabbed a bucket from a nearby janitors closet, and whacked him over the head with it. The bucked made a rather large bang, but the stairwell was nowhere near any active guard stations, so Eclipse figured he would be OK, at least until somepony discovered the K.O.’d guard. Running his magic down to the guards key ring he quickly unclipped it from his belt and ran back up the stairs.

Luckily for him the guard only had about 20 keys, and even better was the fact the he 7th key he tried fit the lock. Doing a quick sweep with his magic he determined that nopony was on the roof or the stairwell. He went out onto the roof, closing and locking the door behind from the outside, giving him some extra time should somepony find the guard and come looking for him. He walked to the edge of the jail, it was the just a little after 11:00 PM, so the moon was high in the sky, illuminating everything rather well. About 4 stories down was the street, but how to get down there? He couldn't teleport down, even at this time of night the street was still fairly busy, so somepony would have noticed him. Luckily, however, nopony was on the roofs of the other buildings, so he could just teleport from roof to roof.

Slowly making his way to 25th and mane through the rooftops. The city lights looked beautiful from up in the buildings, but now was not the time for sight seeing, he saw his destination on the horizon. The old building was nearly falling apart and was condemned may years ago, the perfect place for a criminal to hide out.

Making the last teleport Eclipse found himself on the roof of the old apartment complex. Finding his way to the stairwell door along the roof. When he tried to open it the door came right off it's rusty hinges, if there had been a lock on it, it was a pile of dust now. The stairwell itself was pitch black, all Eclipse could do was light up his horn and descend into the unknown building.