"You are under arrest in the name of the Sun God Solaris!"
As Ciroc was shoved forcefully to the ground by what seemed to be an entire regiment of the Solar Guard he found himself wondering where his life had gone so terribly wrong. It must have started when he met that crazy purple haired wizard in the marketplace a week ago. Twilight Sparkle, as she called herself, had led him on one absurd adventure after another over the course of the last week all of which had finally culminated with this ill-fated trip to the Temple of the Sun where he now found himself under a half-ton of armored guards.
"Could someone please tell me what I'm under arrest for?" Getting an explanation out of the Solar Guard was hard enough when they weren't angry, let alone when they were treating you like the greatest threat to the Temple of the Sun since the Great Lunar War of 1134 but Ciroc figured it was worth a try.
"You and this wizard here. . ." began the Captain of the Solar Guard as he motioned towards Twilight, who was standing a few feet away from the Sun Stone, which, it should be noted, was a magical artifact of untold power used by the High Priestess of the Sun to raise and lower the sun every morning. "are trespassing within the inner sanctum of . . ."
The captain's speech stopped rather abruptly when he realized the import of where exactly Twilight was standing.
Every eye in the room turned toward Twilight who stood at arm's length from the glowing crystal with her hands extended, hovering a few inches from the surface of the Sun Stone. A distinct humming filled the air as magical energy visibly crossed the distance between her outstretched hands and the powerful artifact. "Twilight, what are you doing?", Ciroc's voice held a tinge of worry, "Twi, I would suggest stepping back and . . ."
The guard captain's voice cut Ciroc off sharply, "Step away from the Sun Stone. Now!"
Every guard in the room suddenly forgot about the current arrest in progress and swiftly formed a wall of spears and shields encircling Twilight. Twilight, for her part, didn't even seem to notice the fact that she had become the center of attention as she stood enraptured by the dancing lights and entrancing sounds coming from the Sun Stone.
"Can you hear him?", Twilight asked no one in particular, "He is crying for his freedom."
"Wait, wait, wait." a noisy patron interrupted Diageo from the back of the tavern common room. "You can't start the Legend of the Twilight Sun there. You have to start from the begininning."
"Who's telling this story, me or you?", Diageo retorted angrily.
"I'm just saying that no one is going to understand the significance of the deeds in the story or the characters who performed them if you start in media res." the interrupting patron countered.
"Fine, perhaps a little lore is in order for those of you who haven't heard this story before.", conceded the bard, "You see, what was about to happen had roots all the way back to the beginning of this world as we know it, back when Solaris brought life to a dark corner of the universe. Back at the First Dawn."
Solaris turned his penetrating gaze away from the burning inferno that was his latest achievement. It was perhaps his greatest work yet, a star of such power and beauty as to make the greatest Powers green with envy. A star that radiated life-giving, magic-providing energy for every being around it. And yet, for all its majesty, the burning orb was merely the groundwork for his true vision. The star would serve as a power source, a guiding light, and a sign of his watchfulness for the future inhabitants of his new world, Of course the world was now merely a lifeless hunk of rock floating unassumingly in a forgotten corner of the cosmos. That state was not to last for much longer.
"You do know that this task will drain you of much of your power leaving you weak and unready to defend this new world, do you not, brother?" The voice that interrupted Solaris' thoughts had a graceful, smooth beauty.
"Are we to forever live paralyzed by fear? Kept from achieving great things because we dare not make the attempt?", Solaris' voice rose to a booming thunder, "I say NO! If they would take my greatest creation let the spirits of darkness come for it. They will find that they have lifted a weight too great for even their greedy claws."
The silence that followed seemed all the emptier for the outrage that had come a moment before. It seemed like an age of time before the melodious voice again broke the ancient stillness, "So we are throwing the gauntlet into the collective faces of the enemy? No matter what becomes of this it will change the balance of power forever."
Solaris' face remained set like a flint toward the newly lighted world.
"That is what I am counting on, brother."
"My Lord." The voice that intruded onto the Darkness had a hideous, serpentine quality to it that would drive most mortal minds to the brink of madness with a single word. "My Lord, Solaris has . . ."
"You think that I am unaware of my enemy's actions?" It would be difficult to describe the voice that now spoke but if one were to try he might say that the voice was the Darkness itself, or that rather the voice came from all darkness, everywhere, or perhaps that all darkness came from the voice. In any case, it was a voice that silenced all others when it spoke and caused paralyzing terror in those who angered it. "I must admit his hubris is as amusing as it is futile. He fancies himself a creator and I shall leave him to his games."
"But My Lord. . ." The serpentine voice tried to interject again only to be silenced in the same manner as before.
"Solaris is blind to his own limitations. He has architected his own demise and that world will be the death of him. I have no reason to interfere, the others will destroy him before he can recover from the effort." A sense of finality seemed to settle in after this proclamation and the being with the slithering voice hung in space on the edge of the Darkness unsure of how to proceed.
The Darkness spoke again, "I do have one task for you, Chaos. When the time comes and the others corrupt and twist Solaris' world and defeat him, ensure that he does not escape."
A hideous smile spread across Chaos' face. "It would be the greatest honor you could grant to me, My Lord."
Author's Notes:
1. As you may have realized, there is some heavy alternate universe shtick going on in this chapter, but have no fear, an explanation of how Twilight and the others got to this alternate universe is on the way in the next chapter. Also, you probably noticed that Twilight currently has hands (down Lyra, down). She will actually spend most of her time in this story as a pony but she learns a spell along the way that allows her to assume a human form when necessary to blend in.
2. This being my first fan-fiction of any kind I would welcome any help that you have to offer, especially constructive criticism that would help me improve.
