//------------------------------//
// Chapter 8: Rebirth 
// Story: Trixie's Dark Ascension 
// by knightwolf 
//------------------------------//

Chapter 8: Rebirth

The group made their way to the library. There, Twilight shot the area of the wall that Pro Bono pointed out with dark magic. Sure enough, a hidden stairwell appeared. 

“Twilight,” Cadence said with concenrn. “How? Where did you learn to do that?”

Twilight’s cheeks turned pink and she rubbed her left leg with her right. “It’s just something Princess Celestia showed me once.”

They descended down the stairwell and stopped at a door. 

“Wait, this door might be a trap,” Twilight tried to explain, but a guard gently pushed it open to reveal a room on the other side.  “Or not. Never mind, but there might still be traps somewhere.” 

It was a large room full of strange devices and random scattered papers. There were only two things that really stood out, because they were the only things in the room that were glowing. 

One was a very large mound of red crystals in the back of the room that seemed to be connected by pipes and other forms of machinery. It light the entire room in a red glow and was radiating very powerful magic from the Crystal Heart secured on the front of it.  You didn’t need a special talent in feelings to sense the amount of pain a suffering the emanated form it. 

There was another object that was much closer. It was a mound of black crystals glowing a dark purple, that was also was radiating some sort of magic, even though it wasn’t as big or radiating as much power, it still seemed to be more unsettling somehow. 

“There’s the Crystal heart,” Twilight pointed out like a dork.

“Right under our noses the whole time,” Cannon Fodder said.

“Well that solves one mystery,” Cadance said. “But what’s the rest of this?” 

Cadance moved closer to the large mound of black crystals to investigate, when it suddenly started to shake. 

“It moved,” one of the guards freaked out a bit, pointing out the obvious.

Cadance continued to watch the black crystal as it shock itself, until it cracked open with a fissure emerging from its top and running all the way down to the floor. Dark purple light came from inside along with black toxic gas, and from deep within the mound emerged a Crystal Pony. His coloring was dark grey and the crystals that made his body where not clear but soapy. His mane and tail where jet black, and his eyes were red and filled in with a sickly green. He had a straightened horn that glowed bright red, and his teeth were razor sharp. 

The fully grown, newly born pony looked at his crystalline hoofs and started to laugh manically. “Yes, it worked. It worked! I live again!” 

His laughter slowed down and tapered off as he noticed the large group of ponies (many of which were guards) staring at him. “Well, this is awkward. To be honest, I never expected anypony to find this place.

“So… welcome. This is my secret laboratory,” The dark King said.

“Sombra? What? How?” Cadance asked. She then declared, “You aren’t going to get away with this. We’re here to stop you.”

“Stop me?” Sombra looked down at his hoof again and then he looked behind at his flank. He saw that his cutie mark of a black heart surrounded in a strange circle was there, and then he wagged his tail. “Day late and bit short for that.” 

Cadence replied, “Then you’re under arrest by royal decree.”

“Very well,” Sombra replied. “I surrender.”

“What? Really? Just like that?” Twilight questioned, unable to grasp at how easy that seemed to be. 

“Yes, just like that. Although I do expect to receive a fair trial.” Sombra looked at a certain pony, who was cowering behind the Crystal Guards with is tail in-between his legs wishing he wasn’t the only defense attorney in the Empire. 

“Ok, but where’s Trixie?” Twilight asked.

Then the large mound of red crystal in the back of the room made a loud sound that shocked the entire room. 

“Well there’s your answer right there, and it looks like you’re too late to stop that as well,” Sombra said. 

“Too late to stop what, Sombra?” Cadence asked, her voice trembling.

“You will see. That foal Trixie was so desperate for power and glory that it made it so easy for me to manipulate her, but let it not be said that I am not a colt of my word, and did not fulfill my end of the bargain,” Sombra said. “The only question now is if this device still works or not.” 

He looked at the device as the red glow faded and room grew dark. A pod near the bottom of the device opened up and Trixie fell from it, still in some sort of goo. She washed up into the middle of the room twitching at random. 

“Trixie!” Twilight cried out trying to run to the fallen unicorn to only be pushed back again by an arc of red energy that emanated from Trixie body. 

More arcs of red energy came form her at random. She seemed to regain consciousness and tried to stand, legs wobbling as more and more arcs of red energy came from Trixie. She tried to speak but no word would come out. Her entire body started to glow red in a sphere of energy and she floated a little in the air. With a pain filled scream, light came from her eyes and mouth, then she was gone in a grand explosion pushing everypony back against the wall. The only thing left in her place was a scorch mark on the floor. 

“Did not see that coming.” Sombra said. “I’m so very glad I didn’t use that on myself now.”

“Is-is Trixie dead? I can’t sense her presence anymore,” Cadence said while taking back the Crystal Heart. She noticed it had almost been completely drained of power. 

“Probably, but since we’re on exploding unicorns right now.” Sombra’s horn glowed green and black as he shot a powerful beam of dark magic at the device, effectively destroying it. “Don’t need that anymore.”

“Get him out of here,” Cadence commanded her guards. “Come on, Twilight. Let’s get going.”

“Alright, just give me a minute,” Twilight said. “Something doesn’t seem quite right here.” 

Twilight walked over to the scorch mark on the floor for a closer inspection. Twilight backed off for a moment when she realized that the epicenter of the mark resembled Trixie’s cutie mark. 

“That can’t be good.”