The Shadow of the Moon

The Shadow of the Moon

Act 1: Drifting

Chapter 1: First Impressions

Ponyville was buzzing with anticipation of Princess Celestia's arrival. The Summer Sun Celebration had consumed everyponies thoughts and efforts for the last several days as Twilight Sparkle coordinated the preparations. I looked up at my parents as we walked excitedly through the streets. My father was a big, light grey earth pony with a deep brown mane named Broad Oak. He was a talented carpenter for the town. He was responsible for building everything from homes and barns, to furniture and tables. Essentially, if it could be made of wood, he could build it. He had built their house himself as a testament to his love to Midnight's mom, Sweet Breeze. I looked at my mom. She was a coal-black pegasus with a deep blue mane. She worked with the weather patrol and had been busy the last few days helping keep the skies clear and redirecting all other weather away from Ponyville.

They both looked really tired from being up so early. I was too, but after the initial grogginess had passed, I was bustling with excitement and energy. We walked past an unlit toy shop, but that didn't stop me from planting my face in the glass and trying to look in. In the reflection of the glass, my bright blue eyes stared back at me, wide with excitement and wonder. The soft morning breeze tossed around my untidy black mane and ruffled the small dark grey feathers on my small wings tickling me slightly. Until my wings grew some more, I could do little more than ‘glide.'

In all honesty, it was just falling with my small wings flailing around. Some of the ponies at school would tease me about it. It wasn't my fault that my body grew so much larger than my wings. The problem was my wings were the right size for a pegasus my age. It was my body that was the wrong size. Doctors said it was growing and developing like an earth pony instead of a normal pegasus and that the best we could do was hope that either my wings grew proportionally later or my body stopped growing, but neither was likely.

"Come along Midnight," my dad's voice said with an air of authority.

I jumped away from the glass and ran to his side.

He looked down at me, smiled and spoke more kindly, "We don't want to be late and miss seeing Princess Celestia raise the sun, now do we?"

"Really, you mean she's really going to be there," I asked excitedly. I had never seen the Princess before but heard so much about her in class. At least I did when I was actually paying attention and not drawing stick ponies fighting on my paper.

“Everypony says she will,” my mom answered. “That’s entire town has been hard at work getting ready.”

Exhaustion was clearly painted on her face. She had been flying hard the last several days and needed a few days of rest before going back to work.

“Mommy, you look really tired,” I tell her. I snuggle up against her side as we walked, “Are you okay?”

She rubbed a hoof through my mane where to two became impossible to distinguish blending into each other.

“I’ll be fine Midnight. Don’t worry about me,” she spoke softly.

My parents had named me Midnight Shadow because of my dark coat and mane.  At first the other foals at school teased me over it until we played hide and go seek. Then, all I had to do was go find a dark place to huddle down and close my eyes enough to where my bright blue irises wouldn’t stand out. Nopony could find me unless they looked really hard.

“Here we are,” my dad said.

Before us was the town hall. The place was packed despite the early hour of the morning. Some ponies still looked like they had rolled out of bed, while others seemed to have just come from partying all night, and others looked like they could have done either. We walked inside. Excited shouts and screams filled the air as the town talked to one another about the celebration, and the princess’ appearance.

Nearly as soon as my family found a place to stand, the choir of birds started singing and everypony quieted down. The mayor stepped out onto the lower stage and began addressing the town by announcing the beginning of the Summer Sun Celebration. This received a large amount of cheering as the excitement in the room began to feel electric. She said a few more words and then announced Princess Celestia. On cue the birds began singing again and a unicorn drew the curtains apart on the upper balcony. A spotlight shined brightly on the empty space, but nopony appeared.

I looked up to my dad and quietly asked, “Where is she dad?”

He reached out a hoof and drew me close to him, “I don’t know son. This doesn’t feel right.”

My mom stepped closer and put me in between the two of them. The mayor’s face became more troubled as each second that passed didn’t reveal the princess. She tried to speak some consoling words, but they didn’t have a chance as the unicorn on the upper balcony came back out from the upper chamber and announced, “She’s gone.”

A gasp ran through the crowd as each and every pony stood in shock of the princess’ disappearance. A sparkling smoke began to bellow forth from the upper balcony, and drew another gasp from the crowd, this one more anxious than the last. As the smoke conglomerated, the form of a black alicorn with lighter blue armor appeared with a tail and mane made up of the same smoke that had spawned it. My parents scooted even closer to me, as if they were trying to hide me from the dark figure above us. The figure began speaking, and called us her beloved subjects. From the tone of her voice, I wasn’t so sure we were her beloved anything.

A voice rose from the crowd and shouted, “What did you do with our princess!”

The dark pony chuckled darkly and said something about “not being royal enough,” and if we knew who she was. It was so hard to hear her since she spoke so softly. Another voice spoke up, this one quite peppy and unperturbed by the events that were taking place, and began to guess as to who she was. If it weren’t for how serious and graven the atmosphere was, I might have laughed at a few of them, particularly ‘Queen Meanie’. The dark pony then began to interrogate the two ponies nearest her, asking them if they had seen the signs. Menace dripped from her voice as she took obvious pleasure in watching them squirm. Again another voice spoke out, and I managed to catch a glimpse of the lavender coat of Twilight Sparkle as she moved toward the terrifying alicorn.

She spoke clearly and confidently, “I did and I know who you are! You’re the Mare in the Moon. Nightmare Moon!”

As soon as she finished those words, a third gasp was heard. This time I felt my parents contribute to it. I sat down.

“Where have I heard that name before?”

I was shaken from my thoughts. The dark alicorn proclaimed loudly that the night would last forever and began to cackle, and spread her smoke, mane, cloud thing above our heads, and summoned lightning down from the funneling clouds.

The mayor came to her wits, raised a hoof to Nightmare Moon, and shouted, “Seize her! Only she knows where the princess is!”

Three royal guards flew up but were struck from the air as lightning rained down on them. They tumbled back down into the crowd where I heard a few ponies grunt as they caught them. My parents had since moved me under them completely. My mother flared her wings, as if she was going to scare off or attack the cackling pony. My father instead hunkered down and was ready to buck out with his strong legs at anything that posed a threat to me or my mom. Neither of them had to do anything though as the dark alicorn vaporized and flew out the door and into the night. A cyan pegasus with a rainbow mane and tail chased the vapors out the door. The very next pony to exit was Twilight Sparkle, as she galloped away. I looked at my parents, who wore very concerned and worried expressions.

“What just happened,” I asked, confused. Eternal night didn’t sound like a very good long term plan.

My parents looked at each other before down at me.

My dad spoke first, “We don’t know. Let’s head home though.”

With that, the three of us walked back slowly, my parents never let me leave their sides for a second. When we arrived home, my dad went into his shop and began working on some of the orders that had been placed for new tables and such. My mom instead went to the kitchen and cooked up some breakfast. At least that’s what I considered it, since it was supposed to be morning. Neither of them said much, so I guessed they were as confused and uncertain as I was. I went to my room and looked over the few books I had, certain that I had heard something about Mare in the Moon in one of them. I finally found one that had the story of a princess who grew jealous of the day and became somepony called Nightmare Moon. The story said she was banished by Princess Celestia to the moon a long time ago.

“So that’s who that was? I thought this was just a story,” I said aloud to nopony in particular. I flipped back to the page where the second princess was drawn before she changed. I stared at the picture and wondered, “Who did you used to be before this? I kept on wondering that for the rest of the “day” until I fell asleep later that “night.” I wasn’t sure how I was going to tell them apart except for when I slept.

I woke up to a blinding sun that shined on me through the window. I sat up confused.

“Was it all a dream? It felt so real.”

I hopped out of bed to look for my parents. Both of them stood at a window staring at the sun lit land in shock.

“Mom, dad, was it a dream,” I asked, startling them to attention.

Mom looked at me and said, “I don’t think so sweetie. I don’t think so. Certainly feels like it though.”

“Let’s go outside and see if anypony else knows what’s going on,” my dad grumbled, still sleepy.

The three of us walked into town with other ponies we met along the way, all of us asking about the short lived eternal night. As the herd of us came to the center of town, we saw many others already gathered around a chariot with both Princess Celestia and the dark alicorn. Only now she was much smaller and had a blue coat, not black. She was wearing regal looking armor plates and a flower wreath and everypony was celebrating. Some ponies ran our way.

“Princess Celestia’s sister has returned,” the one on the left exclaimed.

“Yeah, Princess Luna is back. She was banished for so long the poor dear,” the one on the right added.

I looked back at the younger alicorn on the chariot, “Princess Luna, huh.” I felt a sharp chill crawl up my back and a burning sensation along my flank and the world went black.

****

The blackness faded to bright light. I couldn’t make heads or tails of where I was or what was going on. I could faintly hear voices but they were so quiet I couldn’t understand them. The light and voices lasted for a few minutes it felt like, but it could have been hours, or maybe seconds. I felt like I was floating and everything was timeless, but soon it all faded to black.