Fire and Shadows

I wake to the sound of the door creaking open, and Sombra walks into the room carrying something with his magic.

“Hello, my beautiful bat,” he says.

“Hey.”

“I came in here earlier to check on you. It seems you were tired after all.”

“Seems so.” I sit myself up, yawn and blink the last traces of sleep from my eyes. “A cup of coffee could still help.”

“In a moment. Let me just prepare something for later.”

I raise an eyebrow at him. He places the object he was carrying on the table, and I realise what it is when I see my reflection in the glass. The intricately carved gold frame with the fleur-de-lis pattern confirms my suspicions: it’s the old mirror. The one that shows glimpses of the past and present to anypony who asks the right question.

“What’s this for?”

He smirks and takes a seat next to me. “Skywalker wants to play a little mind game with the Elements of Harmony. He thinks it would be best if the two of us were not there, so that he and a couple of other guards can say what they need to say.”

I blink a few times, unsure what to say in response and slightly confused.

“They think that the Element Bearers could have their opinions… swayed a little, without the use of more extreme magic.”

“You mean, without the mind control spell?”

“Yes.”

“That’s a shame. I’d like to see Twilight Sparkle’s face when that spell is used on her.”

“Indeed.”

I look in the mirror and brush my mane with my hooves to make it look slightly more acceptable than the frizzy mess it was before. How does it always end up like that?! I’m sure most ponies don’t have this much trouble with their manes.

“So, how long until the Elements of Harmony get here?”

“Ten minutes.”

“Right… wait, what? Skywalker said they were over an hour away. How long was I asleep for?”

“Just short of two hours. I wanted to make sure you had enough beauty sleep.”

I lean into him and rub my head against his. He wraps a foreleg around me and I close my eyes. Sleep threatens to wash over me again, but I force myself to stay awake.

“Oh, I almost forgot about this.” His magic softly illuminates the room, and he places my tiara gently on my head. “You should wear it more often, my queen.”

“So, what now?” I say after a pause.

“Mirror, show us the Crystal Castle throne room right now.”

I watch the glass as our reflections fade and are replaced by a view of the throne room from above the huge double doors at the entrance. Only two ponies can be seen there, Skywalker and Hanzal. Both are sitting on the bottom of the stairs leading to the raised platform. The doors open, and a third pony walks into the room, quickly shutting the doors behind him.

“Swift? Are they on their way, then?” Hanzal asks.

The red earth pony nods. “Yup. They’re about ter infiltrate the castle.”

“You might want to leave, just in case Sparkle recognises you.”

“Ah’ll be off, then.” He sighs and trots back through the doors, looking dejected.

“Wait,” Skywalker orders.

He stops.

“I… want to thank you for helping us in this.”

“Ah… Uh… Yeh’re welcome.” He smiles before leaving the room and closing the doors.

I look back up at Sombra’s face. He simply looks at the mirror, although I’m unsure whether he’s concentrating on the reflection or the mirror itself. I don’t dare read his thoughts, in case he wants a little privacy. It’s likely that he’s thinking about Amoré. The mare I never met, the beautiful yet cold snowflake of the Crystal Empire. Really I don’t know enough about her to make assumptions on who she was, and I wish I knew exactly how much she did to shape the Crystal Empire and her successor.

A sigh makes me look back to the mirror and the two stallions, who sit next to each other while staring at the silent doors. Then, I see Hanzal turning his head towards Skywalker.

“Something on your mind?” He asks.

The bat pony nods in silence before saying. “A lot, actually.”

There is a moment silence whilst both of them look at each other with serious expressions on their faces. Although I’m able to recognise concern in Hanzal's eyes, Skywalker's face shows some emotion I can’t distinguish easily. Sadness, nostalgia? Perhaps concern as well? I honestly don’t know.

“Do you… remember when I threatened to go away from the Crystal Empire when Sombra used his mind magic on me?” Skywalker voices.

“Yes.”

The bat pony sighs as he looks down at the ground, thinking on that exact moment; the moment none of us knew where we stood or who we could trust. His face now shows an emotion I can recognise: sadness. Pure, emotional sadness.

“I’m sure you were confused as to why I acted like that… why, after so long attempting to reach a safe place, I suddenly wanted to leave as quickly as possible.”

Hanzal doesn’t respond. Instead, he looks at the doors once again, surely thinking of that tense moment as well.

“I did it for you.”

Suddenly, a look of confusion and surprise takes the seriousness away from Hanzal’s face as the pegasus turns towards his mentor. Yet, he remains quiet, anticipating what the older stallion might say next.

“I- ...I was worried about you all,” Skywalker admits. “The moment I sensed Sombra using his magic on me, I feared he would use it on you all. For a moment, I doubted whether what we’ve heard about him and Moonlight was nothing but a vile lie.”

Hanzal remains quiet. I look back at Sombra for a moment, and he grimaces. “I really shouldn’t have done that,” he mutters. I force myself to keep listening to the conversation the other two are having.

“But now?” Skywalker adds. “For the last couple of days I have been waking up and walking through the city, looking at the people… and what do I find? I find, not only ponies, but also changelings and yaks, all living happily as if they didn’t care that an ex-tyrant is ruling them.”

“Ex-tyrant?” His friend finally asks.

The bat pony nods at him. “Exactly.” He says. “Sure, he isn’t perfect and still has tons of mistakes to correct. But… he isn’t that evil pony anymore. He is… benevolent."

One last sigh comes from him, but this time he shows a smile. “And, boy, do I owe him an apology.”

They share a couple of chuckles before the sound of hoofsteps galloping through the corridors of the castle cuts their conversation short. The hoofsteps stop, and there is a moment of silence. Then, the doors are thrown open and all six Bearers of the Elements of Harmony - plus the baby dragon whose name I can never remember - sprint into the room, each of them wearing the Elements and ready to attack us. However, they skid to a halt as they realise that neither Sombra nor I are anywhere to be seen.

“But - where are they? This is the throne room!” Twilight cries. She notices Skywalker and Hanzal for the first time. Although I can’t see her face from where she is standing, I can hear the accusation in her voice as she demands, “Where are they?”

“Where’s who?” Hanzal asks innocently.

“Queen Moonlight and King Sombra, of course!”

He smirks. “Oh, them! Yeah… they’re not here, unfortunately.”

“Well, where did they go, then? We’re here to talk to them!”

Skywalker shrugs. “I dunno. Taking a walk, having breakfast, perhaps they’re even having a chat in the next room! We don’t know.”

“Yeh’re lying!” Applejack shouts at them. “Yeh know where they are, now just get the darn thing over with an’ tell us. We ain’t got all day.”

“Well, we do.” Hanzal replies.

“Eeyup!” Skywalker confirms. “However, if you’re looking for them… It might be difficult to find their majesties in such a huge castle. I mean, they could literally be anywhere!”

“Mirror, show me Twilight Sparkle’s face,” I whisper. The reflection changes, and oh my goodness, it’s hilarious. Her eyes bulge out of their sockets for a moment, then she gets annoyed and furrows her brow. Magenta sparks fly around her head.

“Well, come on. If we’ve gotta find ‘em the hard way, we’d better get looking,” Rainbow Dash says to her friends. “I can clear a cloudy sky in ten seconds flat, but it’s gonna take longer than that to find them.”

Then, a loud series of laughs escape from both stallions.

“Oh, boy! This is gonna be so fun to watch!” says Skywalker.

Hanzal nods in agreement as he speaks. “Imagine this: they walk through a room with its floor wet after being mopped, with a WARNING sign included, but they are so focused on finding them they just break their noses when they fall!”

There's another round laughter as their faces become red.

“My oh my, how rude!” Rarity gasps, flicking her expensively styled purple mane as if she were some Canterlot aristocrat unhappy with the taste of an expensive sponge cake. I could imagine Celestia doing the same. Seriously, how much cake can a pony eat?!

Twilight growls, “Stop it!” She stomps on the floor with both front hooves, and for a moment, her magic changes colour from magenta to deep purple, and a purple and green mist begins to form around her eyes and the Element in her oversized crown.

“There we go. She understands,” Sombra grins to himself.

Hanzal and Skywalker stop laughing immediately, and Twilight’s friends shy away from her for a moment. Then, a mutter comes from the former.

“I think King Sombra might have an apprentice.”

None of them can’t help but let out another round of laughter, whilst also tears of joy fall from their eyes. This causes Twilight to completely lose it. She casts a dark magic spell on Sombra’s throne, and in front of Hanzal and Skywalker, the hidden passage and the stairwell to the second tallest tower is revealed.

“Dammit,” Skywalker huffs, although I can tell he’s not serious. “You’re serious about searching this place top to bottom, aren’t you?”

“Top to bottom?” Hanzal asks. “Seriously? The staircase thing?”

“We need to stop messing around, don’t we?” He finally turns back to the Element Bearers. “So, are you going to get looking, or not?”

Twilight tries to teleport, and her reaction to Sombra’s defences is priceless as well. She yells, “Damn you, King Sombra!”

“Wouldn’t shout that too loudly if I were you,” Hanzal advises her. “He might make you regret it, find out what other nasty thoughts you have floating around in there.” He points at her head with his right wing.

The Element Bearers remain silent as the meaning of Hanzal’s words sink in. None of them have even had the mind control spell used on them as far as I’m aware, but they know what it does.

“Girls,” the little yellow pegasus with the pink mane whispers.

“Fluttershy?” Rainbow asks dubiously. So that’s her name. She never spoke loud enough for me to hear.

“Um, don’t you think King Sombra would be a bit more, um, strict towards his guards? I mean, um, they’re just sitting here. Why would he do that?”

“Good question.” Rainbow zooms across the room and hovers above the hole in the floor, giving Skywalker and Hanzal a deadpan stare. “What are they up to? Is this some sort of trap?”

“Trap?” Skywalker asks, showing indignation. “Ma’am, you insult me with such words!”

“Why would King Sombra want to set up a trap?” Hanzal adds.

Sombra chuckles by my side. “Next time I receive a tip about these mares coming to bother us, I think I will prepare something special for them.”

“What do you mean, this isn’t some crazy evil setup?”

“Evil setup?”

“Well, yeah.”

The pink one with the frizzy dark pink mane starts talking. “Yeah, those two are super duper evil! They took over the Crystal Empire, destroyed the Crystal Heart, made it look all sad and gloomy everywhere and used weird creepy dark magic on everypony. And then they started spreading these mean nasty lies about Princess Celestia and how she’s not doing a good enough job, even though I think she’s doing a super-duper job if we’re not including the Grand Galloping Gala, but some ponies started believing them and being super-duper mean to Princess Celestia and her Royal Guards, which is totally unacceptable because Twilight’s brother is the Captain of the Royal Guard and he’s awesome!” She stops to take a huge breath. Thank you, little pink pony, for telling me that a few ponies in Equestria have been giving the Solar Guards their due. “And then came the newspaper last week.”

“Ah, the newspaper… I actually appreciate that some truth was finally spoken after so many lies.” Skywalker responds before looking at them. “Speaking of which, I'd like to know the truth about whether you are just blindly following Celestia's instructions or if you have your own reasons for coming here. May I know how old you are?”

“Seriously?” Rainbow crosses her forelegs. “What sort of question is that?”

“I’m just trying to have a… civilized conversation with you, ladies.”

“Oh yeah?!” She yells. “Just like before?!”

“Fine, that was unprofessional, considering we’re supposed to be guards,” Hanzal sighs. “But it was pretty funny.”

Rainbow flies back to where the other girls are standing. “Fine. I suppose you’re being serious this time.”

“Absolutely, and I would like to humbly apologize for such poor behaviour of ours.” Skywalker replies sincerely. “Now, please, if you don’t mind telling us… how old are you?”

There is a prolonged silence, with the Element Bearers unwilling to trust those who had barely mocked them; both Sombra and I give each other with confused looks, as neither of us expected Skywalker to change his attitude so quickly. It's as if we had seen two different ponies talking, only through one single body and sharing the same voice.

As my eyes focus once again on the mirror, I can see a look of disappointment descending on Skywalker’s face. He sighs.

“Was a boring conversation anyway,” Hanzal says quietly. Then, “You best get going. You don’t really want King Sombra to find you here.”

“He has a point,” Sombra laughs.

“Before you go,” Says Skywalker. “Why exactly do you want so much to find him? ...And, before you say that it’s because he’s a tyrant, Sunbutt sent you here and all that same stuff, I want to know your reasons.”

The mention of the name 'Sunbutt' makes Twilight's eye twitch slightly.

“Um,” Rainbow says. “Um,” she adds. “You pretty much summed it up.”

“We’re here to defend Equestria and our families,” Applejack tells them.

“What, defend them from ponies like us? All we’re doing is protecting the Crystal Empire and its rulers from the likes of you walking in here. We’re not attacking your home, are we?” Hanzal says.

“Well, that doesn’t mean what you’re doing is right,” Twilight argues.

“Miss Sparkle, I understand very well that the past influences the present a great deal," Skywalker steps in the conversation. “But that doesn’t mean the present is the same as the past.”

“Oh yeah?” Rainbow asks. “How?”

The bat pony looks at her with a serious, yet calm look. “Every morning, for the past few days, I wake up and take a walk around the city. I see the beauty and feel its majestic atmosphere; here, I can feel calm just by taking a walk and seeing other ponies smile.”

“Oooh! Smiles! Yeah, I can understand that,” the pink earth pony pipes up. “Smiles make everypony happy.”

“Pinkie!” Twilight snaps at her. “You’re just falling into their trap! They want us to agree with them!”

“Ma’am…” Skywalker says. “I suggest you let your friend speak. I would actually like to hear each one's opinions; after all, if you were able to sneak into the castle, I’m sure you’ve seen how the citizens here live their lives.”

This takes all of the girls by surprise. Eventually, Applejack speaks up.

“Well… Ah didn’t exactly see any ponies with the mind control spell being used on ‘em. None of the glowing eyes an’ stuff. Everypony seemed happy enough, but that don’t mean things are all perfect either.”

Skywalker raises an eyebrow. “And when have I mentioned the aspect of perfection? No place in the world is perfect, no living being is perfect. Perfection… is just an illusion we all wish to accomplish in life, but that it will never be reached.”

“Yeh got a point.”

“I agree. None of us are perfect, but we’re still friends, aren’t we?” Rainbow asks the others.

“I don’t believe in total perfection, however, they have still spread nonsensical lies about Equestria’s rulers,” Rarity points out. Except she has no idea what ‘nonsensical lies’ are.

“Nonsensical lies?” He sighs. “Miss… if you only knew how much damage darn Sunbutt has done to, not only us, but the entirety of Equestria and far beyond… I assure you, your perspective would be... so different.”

“What did you just call Princess Celestia?!” Twilight bellows. “I ignored it the first time, but that’s unacceptable, it’s-”

“He called her Sunbutt,” Hanzal interjects.

“Well, he’s not exactly wrong. She does have a symbol of the sun on her butt,” Pinkie says.

Twilight sighs. “Girls, we’re leaving. King Sombra and Queen Moonlight aren’t here, and they’re probably not in this castle, so…”

“Well, that’s a shame,” Skywalker expresses. “I actually was willing to tell you everything about Sunbutt, but ok.”

The Element Bearers and the dragon trot back out of the room, but I notice both Skywalker and Hanzal smirking. Sombra too has trouble holding in his excitement.

“What is it?” I ask.

“Watch,” he tells me.

Just as Twilight is about to open the double doors, about twenty Crystal Guards burst into the room and surround them, spears pointing at the six mares and dragon. All seven of them freeze where they are standing, although Twilight dares to turn and look back at Skywalker and Hanzal.

“So, this was an evil setup!” she cries.

“What? We couldn’t just let you go after you stormed into the castle like that! Besides, I thought you wanted to speak to the King and Queen,” Hanzal smirks.

“But… I… ugh.” She mumbles. “And where are they?”

“No idea.” Skywalker replies. “All I told them was to go somewhere while we dealt with you.”

“But, if you are still desperate to speak to their majesties, I’m sure we could find the King and Queen, and ask them to go down to the dungeon,” Hanzal adds.

The realisation dawns on the six ponies and the dragon. Twilight looks positively furious. I really shouldn’t like the look on her face, but oh my goodness, it’s priceless. I burst out laughing at the scene in the mirror, and only wish that I were in the throne room right now to deliver a few insults.

“Please, take their Elements,” Skywalker orders. He tries to keep the emotion out of his voice, yet remains calm. He’s gone from being a regular stallion to the Colonel of the Crystal Army. “I wouldn’t like to have a huge hole in the side of the castle.”

The guards snatch Twilight’s crown first, then the other Elements. Rainbow Dash tries to fight the guard who steals her necklace, but a swift kick from another stops her from struggling.

“Please!” Skywalker slightly shouts. “They’re equal to us, I would like them to be treated as such. Not like they were a bunch of trash.”

This stops all of the mares in their tracks. Fluttershy opens her mouth to say something to him, but decides against it, trying to hide behind her wavy pink mane. Then the Element Bearers are frogmarched out of the room by the guards, leaving Skywalker and Hanzal to celebrate their success. Hanzal is incredibly pleased, as am I; however, Skywalker just seems relieved that the plan worked.

Finally, the Elements of Harmony - the most dangerous weapons Celestia had against the Umbrum, against myself and Sombra - are ours.