//------------------------------// // Chapter 6 // Story: A Lighter Shade Of Darkness // by veteranO'awesome //------------------------------// (A/N) Got a LOAD of pm's from people (and maybe a vote from myself, hehe.), so I took tally and figured out what song to play. What? You want to know the song now, sorry! Trololo. Enjoy! Ponyville, one hour before the end of the last chapter "Alright." Shade said to the mint-green unicorn at his side. Once again they were walking through Ponyville, now getting smiles and stares from the ponies around them. "The DJ's name is Vinyl Scratch?" "Yep. We're about five minutes away from her place." Lyra replied. "Good. Say, do you think you can get her and explain everything? I have to go get something from Twilight's place." "Sure. But how do you know Twilight?" She asked. "Weeellllll." He said whilst scratching his head. "She kinda one of the ones, along with Rainbow Dash, that saved my ass." Lyra cringed at the use of the word. Living in Equestria, she had not heard any swears, but this one just made her feel strange. Shade took notice and decided to keep an eye on his language. "Sorry about that." He said, now full of regret. "It's fine." Lyra said back with a smile now on her face. "Just don't do it around anypony else. They might take it the wrong way." "Can do. See ya later!" Shade said, going off path and towards Twilight Sparkle's tree library. Elsewhere "Have you identified anything about that planet yet?" "No, sir. I'm still working on it." "Alright then. Send a few recon to see what we are soon to arrive on." "Already done, sir. I sent two." "Good." Ponyville "So, time to go over what I need to do." Shade said to himself. "I need to stop by Twilight's to talk to Jackie, then I need to head to the stage in town without being seen. I can probably do that pretty easi-OOF!" Shade's lack of attention had caused him slammed into Twilight's door. He rubbed his head and cursed to himself and slowly opened it, not wanting to startle anything that he hadn't already. He peaked inside the barely lit room, only to see a small purple and green thing covered in scales poking his helmet. It had the shape of a humanoid, but lacked the typical stature of a human. Maybe it was a dragon, but just a baby. "Quit touching my helmet!" He shouted at the supposed dragon. It screamed, dove under a nearby chair and put it hands over its head with its eyes closed. It doesn't matter if that thing (apparently a male due to the pitch of the scream) was touching his helmet, it hurt Shade inside to see anything like that. Plus, the dragon was probably just curious about the strange thing on the table. Even though Shade had seen countless horrible things, he couldn't stand to see anything scared of him, which is why he was so happy that he had the ability to walk through Ponyville and not get screamed at by locals, even though they were slightly afraid. The dragon started to whimper, which made Shade feel even worse. He walked over to the chair he was cowering under and sat on the floor to make him seem less intimidating. "Hey there buddy. You alright?" Shade asked him. It opened one eye, saw Shade's eyes, and immediately closed his. "I have got to get Jackie to disable the damn functions in my eyes." He muttered to himself. "It's OK little guy. I'm not gonna hurt ya." The dragon instantly opened both of his eyes and said right to Shade's face, "Who are you calling little?" Shade just grinned and stood up, showing his normal height. "Oh." He said, a look of sheer terror on his face. "You don't have to be afraid of me. I'm not going to hurt you. Who and what are you?" "My name's Spike. I'm a baby dragon." The little green and purple dragon said back, puffing out his chest. "Nice to meet you." He chuckled. "I am Shade. I was brought here by Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash. Also, sorry about yelling at you, I shouldn't have jumped to conclusions without knowing what was going on." "It's all cool. What is that thing on the table anyway?" Spike said, pointing at the table in mention. Shade walked over to the table and picked up the round glowing object. "This thing?" Spike nodded. "This is my helmet. It protects my face, allows me to see things better than the average human, and a whole bunch of other stuff I'd rather not go into right now." Shade explained. "What's a.....Hoo-man?" Spike had trouble pronouncing the word because he had never heard it before. "Well...I...err....Jackie!" He shouted at the helmet. He didn't want to remember the hate he felt towards most people. Spike looked at Shade like he was insane until the helmet spoke back. "Yes, Shade?" It asked. Spike started to stutter and mumble to himself, but they both ignored it. "How did your batteries recharge?" "It seems that in the presence of magic, I can absorb its energies." Spike had stopped making noises and was actually listening to and hopefully studying the conversation , so Shade decided to educate him a bit. "Spike..." Shade said. "This is Jackie, my helmet's A.I." Spike nodded in understanding. "What's an A.I.?" Spike wanted to know more. It was one of the few times he had been interested in learning something. "A.I. stands for Artificial Intelligence. It-" *Ahem* "SHE assists me with the uses of my suit." Spike nodded again. "Jackie, can you give me full control of my suit's abilities for a while?" Shade asked the helmet. "Yes, Shade." He set the helmet on the table and a bright red beam of light appeared out of it. It scanned Shade and covered his whole body, head to toe. "GAHHHH!!" Shade screamed out, latching on to his head. He screamed for a few minutes while all Spike could do was sit and watch, horrified by it. Shade eventually started breathing normal again and he let out a sigh of relief. "That. Sucked." He said. "Let's see what I can do... Boots, activate!" Steam came out from under his feet and lifted him into the air about a foot off of the ground. "Awesome!" Spike said, filled with awe. "I know right?" Shade said. He was still hovering and decided to try something else. "Let's see here....I want to go a little higher. So...Up!" *FWOOSH* "It's working! This is awes-BAHH!!" Shade was on the ceiling, still being pushed into it until either the ceiling broke, or he broke. "Son of a-OFF!" The stream disappeared from his feet and he came crashing to the floor. "You look like you need some help." Spike walked over to Shade, who was laying on the ground incoherently mumbling swears to himself, being extra careful not to let Spike hear any of them. "That would be nice." (A/N) Well then, it looks like the NEXT chapter has the fun stuff. Already working on that one. P.S. I'm changing the name of the story to 'A Lighter Shade Of Darkness'. Lemme know if that's alright.