Sombra's Bat

Dear Sombra and Moonlight Shade,

I am writing to you concerning the situation with the Crystal Empire.

Currently, you believe yourselves to be the leaders of the Crystal Empire. However, you and I both know that this cannot continue. While the Crystal Empire is an independent nation, it is still a land of ponies and I see it as my duty to protect everypony from harm and ponies like you.

Your move to form alliances with other nations seems weak, and is only going to cause the situation to escalate. I do not wish to hurt other creatures, but if they get involved then I am not going to show them any mercy. Do you really wish to be the cause of all of this?

This is your last chance. If you surrender now, I will give you both a fair trial and a second chance to prove yourselves. If you refuse, then I am afraid that I will have to use all of my power to force you from the throne of the Crystal Empire.

Yours sincerely,
Princess Celestia.

I give a hollow laugh. "What does Celestia expect to do? Give up? We've gone too far together to back out now."

"I know," Chrysalis affirms. "She can't expect us to just lose hope. The thing is, she has realised that she is not just fighting you two. She is fighting you two, myself, Rutherford and potentially other creatures too. She is intimidated by us."

"Good to know, and now - even though I'm not planning on revealing this to her yet - she has another reason to be upset. I'm a lot stronger now."

Sombra clears his throat. "It might be better if we go elsewhere to discuss all of this."

I teleport the three of us to the dining room where Sombra and I usually eat together. "Discuss away, Sombra."

"Moonlight, do you realise how incredibly foolish you were just a minute ago? You have me worried now. Any one of those guards could be the leak that we are all worried about. They all saw you in your shadow form and Celestia could find out about your decision sooner than any of us would have liked."

"Stop worrying. I doubt she would have one of the guards of all ponies be our leak. Does she know how terrible her own guards are?! It's more likely to be a servant, or one of the ponies outside of this castle. We just have to be careful."

"How am I supposed to stop worrying? You mad devil, Moonlight. You are crazy. I might love you, but you are still crazy and you rush into things without thinking."

"You think too much about things, though."

"For good reason. If I did not think things through, we would never have become the rulers of the Crystal Empire."

"There's a good difference between thinking things through and procrastinating for hours over tiny issues. Besides, if you were really concerned that one of the ponies in that room was helping Celestia, you wouldn't have shown me that letter until I got here. I promise you, it will be fine."

"Both of you have good points," Chrysalis interjects. "It took a lot of thinking and preparation to get where we are now, but snap decisions also work. To alleviate your fears, Sombra, if any of the ponies in that room were secretly working for Celestia, every changeling there - including myself - would have noticed something was amiss. I did not sense anything, so it was not anypony in the room at the time."

"How do we identify the spy, then?" Sombra questions her.

"I have an idea." I create a portal, reach through it, and pull out the scrying mirror from the third floor corridor. "Mirror, show me the spy within the Crystal Castle who is secretly in contact with Celestia."

A stallion appears in the reflection. At first, I struggle to see whether he is a crystal pony or not, but then I recognise him. He has a red coat, a blue mane and tail, and his cutie mark is a golden spear.

"He is the Solar Guard who pulled my mane with his teeth and called me a vampire in front of two other guards," I snarl, spittle flying from my mouth onto the mirror. I couldn't care less. "How did I not recognise him?!"

"The Crystal Guard armour covers the guards from head to hoof. It's not a surprise."

"Mirror, where is this pony?"

The mirror shows me the balcony, where he is stood looking out across the Empire. He holds a scroll in his teeth. Before anypony can stop me, I am on the balcony and I block the path back into the building.

"Hello again," I say casually before I hit him in the face.

"Darn yeh vampire, shoulda known yeh'd fahnd aht soon 'nough," he splutters, holding his hoof up to his cheek. The letter drops to the floor.

I catch the scroll and hand it to a Crystal Guard. Then I rip of his helmet so that I can see his face properly. "You're an idiot. For how long have you-"

"Ah managed ter sneak in when the Elements of Harmony were here. Rainbow Dash was ordered ter distract yeh while Ah found a way inter the barracks. Nopony e'er suspected me, and Ah overheard a few good conversations that Princess Celestia was interested ter hear about."

"I would have gone easy on you if you had let me finish my sentence. Now I'm just going to have you put in the dungeon and write a letter to Celestia telling her to stop sending ponies to do this for her."

"Good luck with tha', vampire. She'll never listen ter scum like yeh and Sombra. She ain't gonna leave yeh 'lone any tahme soon."

Two guards walk onto the balcony and grab him. He does not struggle but walks away with his head held high. He must see himself as one of Celestia's favourite guards, but really he is a moron who I am glad to see put behind bars.

You're not having fun, are you? Sombra asks me. The telepathy spell that allows us to communicate is useful, but he ruined the moment once more. Then again, it's sweet how he can remove all the tension from a conversation, and I know he only does this for me.

Of course I am! Send a letter to Sunbutt. Tell her to act like a grown mare and speak to us herself if she has an issue with us rather than sending messengers and threats in the mail. I would have thought she'd stop sending letters now we're technically at war.

Empty threats or just threats?

As tempted as I am to mock her, I think we need to act sensibly if we want her to follow suit.

Right. I am going to need your input, though.

I teleport and appear back in the dining room. Chrysalis immediately tells me that she can taste my satisfaction. I reply, "Enjoy it. Sunbutt's not going to be sending her spies after we've written this letter."

The process does not take long. Between the three of us, we have a letter that isn't going to make us look like idiots when Celestia reads it. Then we deal with the scroll that I stole from the spy.

StAy put. confuse Them. find out more about their plans. if possible, recover stolen Artefact left Behind by dreamwalker. careful, blade is enchanted. will get yOu out of there soon. GratEful for this.

"Typical Sunbutt talk," I groan comically, passing it to Sombra. "The grammar is terrible. She must have a brilliant scribe."

"Moonlight, you missed the most important details. Some of the letters are in capitals."

I find an extra piece of paper and write down the capital letters. S. A. T. A. B. O. G. E.

"It doesn't spell anything."

Sombra facehoofs. "It is an an anagram, Moonlight. It's not similar enough to be obvious, but it has the same letters as and looks like the word 'sabotage.' This is why we have to engage our brains."

I ruffle his mane, much to his annoyance.

"Moonlight, he is serious," Chrysalis tells me off. "Celestia wants to ruin something for us, and it's likely to be something more serious than destroying a wedding cake. Perhaps if you were clever enough to notice the letters in italics we would be a bit further forward."

I write down the second set of letters. M. O. I. R. R. R.

Chrysalis moans, "The whole thing says sabotage mirror. She must know about this." She points at the scrying mirror. "That is annoying, but if she knows we have it, she knows that we are watching her."

"One problem: the reason why there are so few of them left is that Celestia made it illegal to own one before I went on my trip to the moon," I remember suddenly.

Sombra laughs, "So, how many reasons has Sunbutt got to outlaw us, Moonlight? You and I organised a successful coup of the Crystal Empire, refused to give up our power, teamed up with Chrysalis, are now using dark magic and we also own banned magical artefacts."

"Well, if you're going to get chucked in Tartarus either way, you might as well commit a crime that fits the punishment."

"Talking of Tartarus, what if we were to go and free an old friend of mine?" he speculates.

"Are you talking about doing a prison raid?" says Chrysalis. "I would rather not get involved."

"Sombra, my love, would you be talking about Cozy Glow, by any chance? The abandoned pegasus filly who plotted and planned your takeover of the Crystal Empire with you, over a thousand years ago?"

He nods. "Cozy Glow is probably still obsessed with kicking sweet Celestia's flank, and though my reasons for it have changed, so am I. She is very intelligent, and quite the trickster. Nopony in their right mind turns their back on her. If we can get her out, then she will probably be willing to help us and she might even know a few tricks from the other creatures that we could use."

"Chrysalis, what's you're take on this?"

"Most of the creatures in Tartarus do not need to be there, and have just been put there because Celestia has little idea what to do with them. However, there is one who, in my opinion, should stay there and rot for eternity. His filthy name is Lord Tirek, and he is a centaur. I have hated him for a long while now. He is arrogant and unprofessional. All of us have motives behind what we do - for you two, that is looking after each other and protecting the Crystal Empire, for Celestia it is ruling her kingdom and keeping her power, and for me it is keeping my hive safe - but his is ridiculous. He steals magic, just because he wants to impress his long-dead father King Vorak of the centaurs. If we encounter him, we are not going to let him out."

"Fair enough. I have one question, though. Do either of you know how in Tartarus we're supposed to get into Tartarus and back out again? I don't even know what defences it has and it already sounds Tartarus-forsaken impossible. I want to send somepony to Tartarus," I say.

"You will really want to tell Sunbutt to rot in Tartarus in a moment," Sombra assures me. "The place is guarded by Cerberus, her huge three-headed dog. Plus, there is only one door to the place, and usually the only way to open it is with a Key of Unfettered Entrance."

"Key of what now?" I ask him.

"Key of Unfettered Entrance. Unless you are able to use magic to pick the lock manually, which is much more difficult than it sounds, it is the only way of opening doors like the one that we will have to open."

"Tartarus be damned," I mutter. "I'm assuming you have one of these keys of whatever?"

"Two. If you go there with only one key, you will only be able to get inside. If you want to get out, I'll bring the second key."

"That sounds like a plan. A large rock that rolls around could keep Cerberus at bay, maybe. It depends if he likes to play. Now all we have to do is find the time to go and raid Tartarus."

"No time like the present."

"Sombra, I've only just turned into an Umbrum and am still getting used to all of this magic running around my system. Also, I thought you liked planning."

"We have just made our plan. Chrysalis can stay here to look after the Crystal Empire while you and I do a prison raid. Fun."

"Tomorrow," I protest.

"Fine. Tomorrow, we leave at first light. I have never been there before, so we will either have to travel on hoof or with our shadow forms. We'll get to learn a bit more about your new abilities, Moonlight, and it will make the trip interesting. You will also get to meet my old friend, of course."

"I will stay here in your place, but if you get into trouble, do not blame me," Chrysalis tells us.

"First light, my love." Sombra gives me a quick hug.

"Make sure you brush your mane first."

"Don't start that conversation."

"Promise me you'll brush your mane."

"I will. Now go explore the Crystal Empire again. Nothing much has changed while you've been recuperating, but I know you're itching to go flying."

He's right. I do not hesitate in running outside onto the balcony, spreading my wings and soaring into the auburn sky.