Diamond clenched her teeth as she felt the stomach turning sensation of being dragged out of shadow travel. Buck, she hadn’t realized he could do that this far back.
“I am Starless Night, Alicorn of Despair. I guard this path and you shall not pass.”
Blacklight opened with his familiar his of oiled metal on leather. “I am Black Diamond, Shadow of the Star.” She met the colt’s eyes with the smirk she’d learned from her master. “And I exist to hunt Nightmares and fight Despair.”
Vambrace glanced around as she and her passenger rose from her shadow. She hadn’t realized it would be so tiring bringing somepony else along.
“So there is more than one Ranger.” The voice from her left was almost mocking. “Well that explains a few things. And Left, I’m surprised to see you here.”
“I am no longer the Left Hoof Right.”
“Oh?”
“My contract with Demon Blood was shattered when another took its place. I am no longer what I was. Neither are any of us for that matter.”
“…That wash of magic…”
“Yes. It changed the game. We have a chance now, all of us.”
“..I see. Well yippee for you.”
“What? But… We’re free now; we don’t need Demon Blood anymore. The contracts are void, we aren’t unfoals.”
“And I’m not like you! I never was. Demon Blood is still my only chance at living. And I’m no traitor either.”
“You know he’s going to betray you, right?”
“So far he’s the only one who hasn’t.”
“She won’t listen.” Vambrace cut into the conversation, her horn starting to light up. “Let’s just finish this.”
“No, I have this under control.” The colt jerked his head towards the cave. “Diamond’s waiting for you.”
“You sure?”
“Yes, I can handle her tricks. Just let me make sure this works.” As he strode towards their opponent, his shadow began rippling. “Fighting Darkness, born of Night, live in Shadows, protect the Light. Stand for Right and never Fall. I now heed the Shadows’ Call.” When the colt finished, his tan coat had turned slate gray, his bright blue mane had darkened into a rich sapphire, and his eyes had changed from blue to amber. “Oh good, it worked.”
Vambrace rolled her eyes. “If nothing else, your sense of dramatics fits right in.” She turned and started walking to the cave.
The colt simply smirked, then tackled his former compatriot while she was aiming a spell at his current one. The two nameless foals tumbled through a bush and down the bank of a dry riverbed.
Black Diamond awoke to the sight of her own face. Not unusual in itself, there were a number of mirrors in her bedroom after all.
What was unusual was that this face was covered in dust and had a black eye. Diamond knew what was going on; they had met earlier at Sweet Apple Acres. “Where–”
“Shush.” Future Diamond put a hoof to her lips. “No questions. Not enough time. We just had a duel with the alicorn colt. He’s off chasing us now, thinks we left the caves. Demon Blood is that way.” She pointed down the tunnel. “You need to go face him and I need to get out of here. I’ve already probably done too much and we really can’t afford tonight falling apart from a paradox.”
The colt smiled as he stalked the tunnels. He had just been informed that three of the unfoals were keeping Honesty busy and away from the caves. The Ranger had briefly given him the slip, but he had realized quickly that she’d doubled back into the underground network to hide, and from the sounds of it she was just around the corner.
As he jumped around said corner, the spell he was charging fizzled out. He clamped down on his emotions quickly however, revealing no other outward manifestations of his surprise.
“So,” He said, “Magic has decided to come and play. Do you really think I’m going to simply let you take Nightmare Moon away?”
The purple alicorn turned from the intersection she was contemplating with glacial slowness and mechanical precision. The way she was using her powers to wreathe herself in shadows would have made it quite impressive if he weren’t above such things as being impressed.
“You.” Her voice was almost hollow, she was so near beaten she couldn’t even bluff properly. “I recognize you. I memorize the magic of all Nyx’s friends. You’re Night, aren’t you? The colt she was supposed to be playing with?”
“I am Starless Night, Alicorn of Despair. Look upon me and tremble, for you–”
“Where is she?” It was impressive how steady the mare’s voice was, considering how much punishment she must have taken getting here.
“Safe, away from you who poison her mind with–”
“You didn’t hurt her?” It was odd though, he didn’t remember any reports about a fight with Twilight, and he was sure they’d have been noticed.
“I would never harm my sister! It is the rest of you alicorns who are–”
“So you only took her then? Fair enough, you get to live… for now.” It was at about this point that the colt’s sense of smell kicked in. As it did, he realized that it was smoke rising from Twilight, not shadow.
He felt time freeze as he drew a few conclusions from that. Not the least of these was the realization that the bursts of power coming off the mare in pulses were not the final waves of her depleted energy, but her ironclad grip on her magic slipping ever so slightly.
The colt gulped nervously as he stepped back.
“Huh.” Diamond idly spun as she entered the large cavern, masking her scan for Nyx. Unfortunately she found her lying unconscious at the hooves of a familiar alicorn. “Huh.” She repeated, forcing herself not to react and give anything away. “Wouldn’t have expected to be able to face you this quickly. Couldn’t find a cult on short notice?”
Demon Blood smiled. “Oh, I did, it simply seems you have reinforcements this time.”
“Ooh, yeah… Sorry, we’ve been trying to solve the problem with the whole shortage of guardians… that didn’t inconvenience you, did it?”
Demon chuckled. “Greatly child. So here we find ourselves again, you and I, in a cave.”
“No pits or cultists this time.”
“No armies of escaped foals either.”
Shadows rose to fight the Dark.
Vambrace picked herself up from where she’d taken cover when the wall exploded. Looking through the new hole, she could see several more ruined walls before her view was cut off by one that had collapsed completely.
She turned to face the other side of the tunnel, where a colt with a horn and bat wings was just pulling himself out of the wall, wincing as he stretched a wing.
“Broken, definitely broken. Waiting for rege–” He broke off as he noticed her. “Hello, who are you?”
“Captain’s Lieutenant Vambrace, Shadow Rangers.”
The colt blinked. “Of course. There’re two of you. That’s why I underestimated you.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Allow me to introduce myself. I am Starless Night, Alicorn of Despair.”
“Don’t suppose I could talk you into surrendering?”
“Nope.” The colt popped the “P” in the word.
“Drat.”
Diamond slid into shadows as she landed on the wall. Not very far, just enough for three of her hooves to stick there while her right forehoof drew part of her shadow across her body to create a barrier. The shield blocked the dark blast it was intended to, but her eyes widened as she saw another coming on its heels.
Demon’s gaze was unblinking as he waited for the smoke to clear from the new crater in his wall. He’d seen too much to think it was already over.
He turned at the sound of an impact to find the filly panting but on her hooves. She had landed heavily, but she wasn’t done yet. Truly, she was the most unconquerable mortal he’d met since that fiddler all those years ago.
“Still fighting?” He asked.
“Always.”
He sighed. The amount of respect she demanded was starting to annoy him. “Why bother? Really? This is a repeat, I’m sure we’ll have many more if you win. Why keep fighting if locking me back up today simply means fighting me again tomorrow?”
“Because today’s worth living.”
“…I don’t follow.”
“I fight today so that there’s a tomorrow to worry about. I fight in shadow so that day need not fear. I am Nightborn, so I will always stop the Darkness.”
He smirked. “You little foal. You have no idea how deep the Darkness runs. Someday the light will fade, the protectors of Equestria shall falter, and then we will rise.”
“No.”
“What?”
“No. Never. I promise you, today, tomorrow, a year from now, wait as long as you want. You and your kind will never find Equestria unprotected. The Day will always be defended by the Night and I will always be right there on the front lines, defying you until the end.”
Demon hadn’t even noticed his smile falling. “So much like him. I wonder… If I kill you, will it kill Him?” With no more warning than that, he fired off five blasts in a row.
Diamond was more prepared for a rapid-fire attack this time, and managed to block two of them outright. The third was deflected, destroying the ground next to her and throwing her to the side. Because of this, the fourth struck only a glancing blow.
The fifth bolt however struck true.
Death, Fate, Luna, Celestia, and Discord were seated around a table making empty small talk in the hopes that it would take their minds off their worries. They were all failing miserably, but none of them were willing to admit to that fact.
That is, until Death cut off mid-sentence and his coat changed colors from pale gray to white.
Fate found herself struggling not to choke on the air that had suddenly solidified in her lungs. “Dad?”
Death swallowed, slowly washing his gaze over the other four. “I… Just found out what happens. I’m sorry. I… I have to go.”
Luna hesitantly reached out with a hoof to touch his shoulder. “Midnight?”
Death shook his head. “No. I’m not entirely sure who, it’s… fuzzy. But I know it’s not an alicorn or legend. You and us… we all feel completely different when it’s time.”
Celestia’s head twitched in what was probably supposed to be a sympathetic nod but didn’t quite have enough energy to it. “Do what you must.”
The stallion nodded, and with another “I’m sorry,” he stepped away from the table, materialized his scythe, and faded from view.
As she entered the cavern, Twilight watched the shattered ground swallow Black Diamond with a certain sense of detachment. On some level, that worried her greatly, and she wondered if she could consider herself mentally healthy.
The other alicorn present recoiled slightly in surprise upon seeing her. “Ah. Magic. Come to punish me for trying to escape Tartarus? I must say, I’d be slightly more worried it you had Harmony at your command, but without your friends…”
“I don’t care.” The clinical part of Twilight’s mind decided that it would be best to let others know about her observations of her current mental state.
“Oh? Such spirit! Do you think you can defeat me just because you’ve decided to?”
“Not what I meant.
“I don’t care. I don’t care about you getting free. I don’t care about you potentially taking over Equestria. I don’t care about your grudges with Celestia, Luna, or Midnight. Tartarus, I don’t even think I care right now that I probably just saw you murder a filly.
“At the moment, I find I can only seem to care about one thing. And that’s that you foalnapped my daughter. Again. That’s all I’m here about. And that’s why you’re going to go lock yourself in Tartarus now…” Twilight finally unclenched the tight hold she was keeping on her power and emotions, slowly letting it out.
It was the first time she’d found herself truly mad since she’d become an alicorn. Oh, she’d been annoyed, scared, tired, even mildly angry, but this… This was the kind of emotion that could consume a pony, mind and soul. She’d rage-shifted before, but this was almost something else. That was a burning heat, this… this was a burning cold.
Her mane changed first, purple hair slowly igniting with a violet fire speckled with silver that almost clung to her coat. Her tail soon followed, and in the light cast by the blaze, her coat seemed paler, almost changing to white. The whites of her eyes began shining a pale blue, even as her irises and pupils turned crimson. Finally, her wings ignited with the same flames as her mane and tail, though there was black mixed in. The ground at her hooves began distorting slightly as the temperature rolling off the mare in waves alternated between unbelievably hot and impossibly cold.
All of which went unnoticed by the mare herself as she finally met Demon’s eyes. “…Because that’s the only place I won’t be able to get to you.”
The Alicorn of Tartarus hastily threw up a shield to absorb her laser.
Death sighed.
It just wasn’t fair. The filly was vibrant, full of life… but it was her time. He closed his eyes as he rested his scythe across his withers. There were times when he really hated his job. Fortunately he likely wouldn’t have to do it much longer – he really didn’t see Midnight letting him live after this.
He looked down at Black Diamond again, trying to think of a way out. Unfortunately, without anypony around to “cheat” him… He sighed again. He could delay no longer, the necromantic energy she had absorbed had likely already forced her soul from her body; it was time for him to claim her.
The scythe rose and fell.