Monster

Monster

Skyward

My name is Skyward. I’m the son of Princess Celestia and Sombra. Most didn’t think my parents would even think about being with each other, but I’ll tell you a secret. They’ve always placed an act on, sorta like to keep the relationship a total secret about each other. They were happy, ’till they ended up divorcing each other and my dad went away. Claiming, he didn’t wish to spend his time doing royalty things when he could be doing better things. Mom didn’t like how he spoke and banished him into exile. But, that’s okay. I’m fine with it. Dad and I never got along anyways.

I have a cousin.

His name is Orion.

Prince Orion, son of Princess Luna and Discord. Night and Chaos. It’s weird to think about it because I’ve seen Uncle Discord get along pretty well with Aunt Fluttershy, but she knows about how weird I think it is and explained everything. She used to have feelings for him, and as did Uncle Discord, but... Aunt Fluttershy met this other stallion. His name is Dumb-Bell. They’re happy, and Orion loves playing with Dumb-Bell.

When Orion was born, Discord allowed Fluttershy to help name his son. Aunt Luna was sleeping at the time to recover from birth, and so Orion was named while she slept. Thankfully, she loved the name when she awoke to hear what her husband and friend had come up with.

Orion looks different from everypony else.

He’s got one full black leg that vanishes into his usual coat color of a very light purple-bluish color. His mane holds a white color with some features of Aunt Luna’s mane at the bangs and back, and there’s one stripped black and blue section. His two hind legs are spotted with Zebra colors. One of his hind legs is a paw with claws. He’s got chest fur that’s more fluffy like Uncle Discord but it’s gray. His tail is the same like mine though, but only, purple and blue and it waves. He even has horns on the side of his head! Even one of his ears is colored with spots of black and white underneath.

His eyes are pretty! Like Aunt Luna’s.

I’m stuck just looking my plain old father. My fur is dark gray but a tad lighter, my mane is black with a few streaks of color from my mom, and my eyes have this weird eye smoke, and it’s all light black. However, I’m lucky because I got my mother’s eyes.

To be honest, I wish to be like Orion. He looks very cool, and everypony has this weird desire to be like him. Cousin Flurry Heart, has told me this herself once. She’s our oldest cousin, and we have another one. Aunt Twilight’s colt, Lapis Spirit.

Today, right now, is Orion’s birthday. He is now four years old, and he’s taking after his father a lot. He has this endless energy like I do, and he always wants to get up so early in the morning to see the sun rise, and mother doesn’t complain, she loves her nephew a lot just like she loves me.

Orion, right now, is sleeping while we’re getting ready to surprise him. I’m helping with Flurry Heart, the big old seven year old, and Lapis Spirit, the six year old. I am five. They don’t get Orion like I do. They always comment on how Orion could do something and want to continue on doing so without getting bored of it. Lapis can get bored easily, and Flurry just wants to be with her friend.

Nothing new in my family.

“Do we have everything? This needs to be special!” I hear Uncle Discord say while he floats into the room, Aunt Luna trailing behind him. He looks at everything, and clicks his tongue, moving over to where a guard was standing. “Oh, that armor will not do!” He snaps his fingers and the guard stands in shock when he realizes Discord changed his armor into something silly. “Better, my son will love it.”

“This is... this will only be for the day right, sire?” The guard asks, shifting in place, feeling ashamed to be wearing the armor.

“Of course!” Discord answered. “Only for the day... sure. Go with that, if you will. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go check on everything up and make everything good.”

He vanishes from sight after that, and my eyes only stay on the guard before moving back to finish up my work. Flurry is rolling her eyes at Discord, and I know why. She doesn’t have a liking to him, and calls him something she cannot say. I always thought that sort of thing would come into teenage years... not colt hood.

Lapis is trying to make everything perfect like Twilight does, commenting Orion would like everything to be neat and tidy. I think he even got Orion a book, and I knew Orion would like something much better than that. Something he could use to practice his skills with. A toy sword is what I got him, and I even got him a pretend enemy!

We’re going to be playing all day long with that, and sadly, but thankfully, Lapis couldn’t join in because he’s not interested to be doing that sort of thing. So, it’s just me and Orion.

“Thank you, you three,” Twilight smiled at us as she walked towards us, Lapis stood up straight as his mother nuzzled his head before looking towards us. Admiring our work. “This looks wonderful. Orion will love it, and everyone else will too.”

“Mother, can we go and wake Orion now?” Lapis asked, his tone slightly chancing into a whine. Nothing like a prince tone, but he does take after his father almost. With his orangey fur and all. “I do not like waiting for him, and plus, everything is ready to go.”

Twilight shakes her head. “You know the rules, honey. You need to wait until Auntie Luna says its okay to go and wake Orion up from his sleep. He stayed up late last night.”

“From what?” I asked. This is the first time I heard of this. Orion never stays up too late, always in bed by ten or nine simply because he knows he needs the sleep. “Do you know what he stayed up late from?”

“Sadly no. Even Luna and Discord doesn’t know what.”

When it did came time to wake Orion just, I jumped to my hoofs and sprinted out of the room, earning a laugh from my mother as I did so. Lapis was forced to stay behind because his mother said one was enough, and he groaned. Flurry only stayed beside her parents.

Orion was brought back into the room where we all were after I had woken him up, and he basically raced me towards the door. Of course, considering how he was wanting me to go first, I had to open the door. Once everyone saw me, they didn’t think twice before hiding and Orion jumped over to almost the middle and waited until we yelled at him, he beamed a huge grin before racing to greet his parents.

Once he saw the guard, he laughed loudly as did Discord. Twilight’s friend, Rainbow Dash, also laughed when they arrived a little late. Only because they had to take a train and Orion understood, but he never did go near the kids of the elements of Harmony.

I knew one reason why; he didn’t like Rainbow Dash’s foals, Fire Dash and Cobalt Strike. The twin boys were always pushing Orion around, and he never liked it. The only reason why they were here was because Orion had to invite them, despite knowing perfectly he didn’t want too.

Throughout the main sort of events of the party, like singing to Orion and allowing to eat cake, he stuck with me the entire time. Fire Dash had tried to get close to Orion, but never could make it with me by his side. Cobalt Strike just rolled his eyes and mumbled for his brother to come and join their friends.

“Why’d you even invite them if you don’t like ’em?” I asked him, sitting down by Orion. His eyes never left his front hoofs, but I could tell he wasn’t himself anymore.

“Cause I gotta be nice.” Orion mumbled.

I only rolled my eyes at his answer.

Monster

Orion was silent as he unwrapped most of his presents. He had opened the ones from Twilight’s friends first, getting it all over with. Most of them were good, and when he opened Rainbow’s present, I heard Fire and Cobalt mumble something under their breath. No-good colts. They should be thankful they’re even here!

My cousin didn’t say a word though, only kept his eyes heavily on the gifts.

When it came to mine, he stopped everything and tackled me with the play sword, and I grabbed my own I had gotten for my birthday, we began play fighting. Our mothers chuckled while Twilight nearly gasp and moved to stop us. However, I noticed out of the corner of my eye, it was Aunt Cadance who stopped her.

Discord moved to place the unwrapped present somewhere else so we wouldn’t ruin them. Orion didn’t pay much attention to anyone else but me. Focusing on his task at hoof and eventually we stopped so he could finish unwrapping the rest.

He stopped half way through and looked at the sword.

“I wanna go again...” Orion whispered to me, ignoring how everypony else was waiting for him to go on. “This is boring, Skyward, can we stop the present wrapping?”

“Maybe, ask your mother.” I whispered back but he went on unwrapping until the final one had been dealt with, and Orion suddenly picked up his wooden sword and grinned at me. I used my magic to hold my own sword. “Bring it on.”

Luna stepped in the way before we could go on. “Surely you two want to spend time with the other colts and fillies, right? We cannot have you two just wanting to spend more time together. Go play with Lapis and his friends. Maybe play with Flurry Heart a little, but do not spend all time with each other.”

Orion didn’t say much, but he did drop his sword and trot slowly over to the others, and I followed suit. His eyes slowly moved towards the Dash Twins, and then back to AJ’s filly, then to Rarity’s filly, and so on. He came to a stop when he noticed Fire looking at him.

Without thinking, I stood beside Orion, and Fire scoffed loudly before gazing back to Candy Cane.

Lapis used his magic to bring over the book he had gotten Orion and smiled widely before handing it to him, and not helping it, I gazed over Orion’s shoulder to see what type of book it was. A frown fell on my face. It looked way to boring for both of our liking.

Orion didn’t open the book, but he silently promised Lapis he would do it later when everyone went home, and Lapis nodded before moving back to be with his best friend.

“Looks boring,” I commented.

“Very,” Orion agreed. “How can Lapis read something like this anyways? It makes no sense to me.”

Fire Dash rolled his eyes. “Makes sense to no one, freak.” He spat out. His bright eyes landed down on the book, and he scoffed. “Yeah, a book fit for a freak.”

“You can say that again.” Cobalt Strike agreed with his twin. “Bet little Orion is gonna go be the freak that he is, and read it to make Lapis all happy because that is what this ‘friendship’ is about. Ain’t that right, Orion? You gonna make Lapis all happy? You gonna give in like you always do?”

Ignore them, Orion! They have no clue about what you can do! I thought, Orion spoke anyways.

“What if I don’t? You guys going to report me? On my birthday? You’ll get found out because I can admit you’ve been treating me horribly.” He threatened.

“You can’t do anything to us.” Fire spat back, his wings twitching.

Cobalt nodded in agreement, staying quiet for this moment, but he knew Orion could do it. He saw Orion do things before, and when Orion wanted something done, he could make sure it was done and over with. This threat was no different, but Fire believed differently.

“Watch me.” Orion smirked.

Then, he turned to speak with his mother, and I watched as Luna trotted over to the twins, and gave them a glare. Both twins shrunk back, and I grinned.

Orion was not to be messed with.

I nuzzled him happily, and looked at him. “Happy birthday, Orion.” I whispered. “Happy birthday.”

“Thanks...Skyward.” He purred back.

We were happy.

But as you all know, happiness cannot last forever, and that is where our story starts.

The start of a happy, carefree, prince turned into something else... something like a monster.