The Forgotten King

by Ghost Writer

False hope

Eclipse woke up eager, he wasn’t feeling tired even though he had hardly slept because today was the day! The day he would become free! He was excited. He headed over to Celestia’s room and knocked on the door. She opened it up and escorted him in. “So do we start now?” he asked.

“Let’s wait for the others to get here.” She said.

They sat around for about fifteen minutes and finally everypony arrived. Luna was the first to show up.

She stuck her head through the open door and looked at Celestia. “I trust I can watch?” she asked.

“Of course.” replied Celestia.

Luna walked into the room and took a seat next to Celestia.

Briefly after that Twilight, Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie walked in and took their places next to Eclipse.

“Where’s Rainbow?” asked Eclipse.

“She’s probably just sleeping in. You know how much she likes to sleep.” said Pinkie.

“Shall we start without her?” asked Celestia.

“No, I want everypony to be here for this.” said Eclipse.

“WAIT!” came a shout from the hallway. “I’m here! I just overslept a bit.” said Rainbow as she ran into the room. She was out of breath from running to Celestia’s room and quickly moved to sit down with her friends. “I didn’t miss anything did I?” she asked.

“Nope, we were just about to begin.” said Celestia. “Eclipse, can you step forward?”

Eclipse stepped away from his friends and stood in the middle of the room.

“Alright, I’m going to cast the same spell I used to banish Atrox on you and it should re-banish him and leave you free.” said Celestia.

Eclipse drew in a long breath and looked back at his friends for a moment. “I’m ready.” He said.

“Then we’ll begin.” said Celestia. She tilted her head down and a small glow started to emanate from her horn.

The glow grew stronger and Eclipse felt the hair on his neck stand up. He wasn’t sure if it was the spell or his eagerness that caused it. He thought about what it would be like to be free. He would no longer be influenced in his sleep or have to fear going outside at night. Thinking about it he realized that there had been some lack in activity from Atrox since they got to the castle. He hadn’t talked to Eclipse in his dreams or made him feel anger at Celestia like he did when they first arrived. Even now it seemed quiet.

Celestia tilted her head back up and the glow from her horn multiplied in intensity. The glow around Eclipse did the same and he started to feel slightly light headed.

Suddenly he felt as if something were clawing at him mentally. It was like something was trying to hold on to him and refused to let go. He knew that this was Atrox trying to resist the spell and for a second he had a flash of doubt. But then he was reassured by the thought that Celestia was the one casting the spell. After all she had banished him twice before and she could undoubtedly do it again.

The clawing sensation became stronger and Eclipse was starting to feel sick. His head was swimming and he was starting to sweat. It felt like he was being pulled at from everywhere possible. His emotions were a mix between every kind of feeling and he wasn’t quite sure what was happening anymore. It was like his mind was being pulled at by some strange force. He was forced to the ground because standing started becoming too hard. His vision blurred and he felt like throwing up.

Celestia increased the power of the spell even more.

At that point Eclipse lost consciousness and slumped down. His color seemed to lighten slightly back to his original blue and the red areas in his mane started to fade.

The other ponies held their breath as they watched Eclipse regain his normal color and hair. They wanted to cheer but Celestia wasn’t done casting the spell and they didn’t want to disrupt her.

Eclipse was now completely back to his normal color and his hair no longer had any red tint in it. Celestia cut the power to the spell and sat back on her haunches. She was covered in sweat and was taking heavy breaths. The spell had taken a lot out of her.

Everypony cheered and hugged each other; they were all delighted to see their friend back to normal.

Eclipse moved a bit on the floor. It seemed that he was regaining consciousness. He stood up and took a long deep breath. He was facing away from the other ponies and shook his mane.

Twilight ran up to Eclipse and patted him on the back. “It looks like you’re back to normal.”

He laughed and turned to look at Twilight.

Twilight cringed and jumped back a pace or two when he did. She started shaking and the other ponies ran to her side.

“What’s wrong?!” asked Rainbow.

“L-look at his eyes.” said Twilight.

The ponies all turned and looked at Eclipse. Everything looked normal but when they looked into his eyes they saw cruel, dull blood red eyes devoid of life in place of Eclipse’s normal lively blue eyes.

They all recoiled when they saw it and Celestia was instantly up and alert again.

“Something wrong?” asked Eclipse in a deep, menacing voice heavy with sarcasm.

“Atrox!” said Celestia, as she stood up to face him.

“It looks like your spell failed. Now he’s is mine and there’s nothing you can do about it.” said Atrox with a wicked smile on his face.

WHACK! There was the sound of a solid hit and Atrox’s eyes rolled back and he crumpled to the ground. The other ponies looked up to see Luna levitating a book in the air next to Atrox’s still form.

“I saw the eyes and I knew it was Atrox. I had to knock him out, I didn’t know what else to do.” said Luna.

“The spell didn’t work.” said Celestia. “There’s nothing else we can do, we have to lock him up until we can find out what to do with him.”

Twilight fell to the floor crying and so did Pinkie. It crushed them to see that there was nothing they could do for their friend. The only plan they had failed and there was no backup.

Upon Celestia’s command eight guards filed into the room and dragged Atrox’s limp form to the dungeon to lock him up.

Everypony in the room was silent for a few minutes and the only noise was the occasional sniffle of Twilight or the others.

The guards took Atrox down to the dungeons and threw him in one of the cells. It consisted of four stone walls, one with a thick iron door with a small set of bars in it to talk through, and a small port to let light and air in.