Sunlight leaked through the thin blinds that covered Skye's bedroom window. The warmth the light provided was enough of a temperature change to stir him from his slumber. Skye slowly and very groggily pushed himself out of his bed and made his way to the bathroom. He didn't get much sleep last night after work, and it was made very apparent considering the state his mane, coat, and feathers were in. He felt like a zombie pony that had been through a tornado.
Skye sighed as he entered the bathroom and started his morning routine. He grabbed his toothbrush and coated it with some spearmint toothpaste. As Skye brushed his teeth, he thought about today's plans. It was Saturday which meant he had the day off from work and it was also the day of the Wonderbolts show in Ponyville. He was always excited to see one of Soarin's shows, because he had helped him train and become the Wonderbolt he is today. Skye spit out the toothpaste and looked in the mirror once more. His messy mane was matted down and covered his right eye. If he was to go to the the show, he would need to at least look somewhat presentable. Skye focused his eyes over to the clock that sat next to his bed on a nightstand.
8:00? Not bad. The show starts at 10:30 which gives me plenty of time to get ready and fly to Ponyville.
Skye stretched and stepped into his shower. With a turn of a knob, a blanket of warm water washed over him.
Meanwhile at the Ponyville Event Center...
With the Wonderbolts show just a few hours away, Mayor Mare was checking off her list of preparations. So far everything was going smoothly, decorations were up and looking nice, the concession stands were stocked, and the sky above the event center was clear and ready for the Wonderbolts. There was just one last thing she needed to check before she could take a break. She motioned the head of security, Iron Shield, over to her.
"What can I do for you ma'am?" he asked
Mayor Mare adjusted her glasses and spoke, "How are security preparations going?"
Iron levitated his clipboard in front of him, "Very good. I've hoof selected the best of the best for guards and assigned them to several key positions. We have three guards at each entrance and exit, five guards assigned to concessions, two guards for each section of seating, and five guards for the VIP area."
"Good. This place is going to be packed and I want it to be very secure. Considering..." Mayor Mare trailed off.
"Considering what?" Iron asked.
Mayor Mare's expression turned into one of concern, "Have you read the Ponyville Express lately? There have been a few attacks at local businesses." She cleared her throat before continuing, "And they are not just your ordinary attacks."
This news piqued Iron's interest. "How so?" he asked.
"Eye witnesses say that the attacker was an earth pony with some sort of electrical powers." she explained
"Electrical powers? How is that possible?" Iron asked stunned.
Mayor Mare shrugged, "I don't know, but the thing is despite all the effort we have put into forensics, we haven't found anything that would help us with the investigation."
"You think such a pony would target an event like this? Especially with the Princesses in attendance?" Iron questioned, "One would think their presence would be intimidating or become an obstacle for their plans."
"At this point I'm not sure whether or not this pony will target the show. However, we need to be prepared just in case it happens." Mayor Mare said as she adjusted her glasses. "Better safe than sorry."
Iron Shield nodded, "Understood. I'll tighten security up a little more and even get some guards to continuously monitor the perimeter during the performance."
"Thank you, Iron." The Mayor smiled, "I really appreciate that."
Back in Cloudsdale, at Skye's Apartment...
Skye stepped out the shower and grabbed a towel that hung from a rack nearby. Quickly drying himself self, he walked over to the mirror and started brushing his hair. Skye's signature hairstyle was having his mane brushed back with lots of volume and slightly in an unkempt manner, making it look as if his hair was the physical embodiment of wind. Once he was done doing his hair, he left his bathroom and went back into his bedroom to grab his tickets and some bits so he buy some snacks later. He set his stuff in a saddlebag and put it on. Skye had everything he needed, now it was just time to head out. He glanced at his clock one more time.
9:00 huh? Perfect, I have plenty of time to get there before the show starts.
Skye left his bedroom and made his way out of his apartment. Outside, he took a breath of fresh air and took a minute to observe his surroundings. The skies were a vast clearing of blue that stretched infinitely outwards with rays of golden light that intersected and blended beautifully. In the street in front of his apartment, many ponies were out going about their mornings. Some heading to work while some were heading to the marketplace. It was truly a peaceful start to the day.
Spreading his wings, Skye took off as fast as he could carry himself towards Ponyville. Excitement fueling every flap of his wings.
At the Castle of Friendship...
"Is everypony ready?" Twilight asked as she entered the foyer.
Applejack nodded, "Yup!"
"I guess so... " Fluttershy shrugged.
"Silly question Twi! I'm not just ready, I'M PUMPED!" Pinkie said bouncing around the room in circles.
"Of course you are." Twilight said smiling and shaking her head at her friend's enthusiasm. "What about you Rarity?"
Rarity walked in with a freshly done mane and wearing makeup and jewelry to compliment it. "All done."
"About time! You take forever." Rainbow said rolling her eyes.
"At least I do my mane" Rarity said with a smirk.
Rainbow stuck her tongue out at Rarity before turning her attention back to Twilight. "Well since everypony is ready now, I say we get going now so we can get get some good seats for the show."
"I suppose you're right." Twilight replied, "Let's just all make sure we all have our tickets though before we go."
Everypony held out their tickets and each of them had theirs.
"Good! Now let's go!" Twilight beamed as she walked out the door with the others in tow.
Unknown to Rainbow as she quickly flew out the door, her saddlebag's main pocket flew open and her ticket fell out.
At Ponyville Event Center
At last Skye had finally arrived at the show and entered the line for admissions. He looked ahead at the length of the line and saw that it was quite long despite being about forty five minutes early. Skye sighed and simply relaxed as he waited for the line to move, but as he did so he couldn't help but notice the six mares waiting in front him. They looked rather familiar for some reason, so to pass the time he decided to study them and figure out why.
There was a orange earth pony wearing a stetson, and telling by the accent she had it seemed likely she was of southern decent. The next pony was another earth pony that was pink and had a bubbly mane. She seemed rather hyperactive considering that she was the only one out of all of them that couldn't sit still. Standing to the right of her was a yellow pegasus pony with a long pink mane that somewhat hid one of her eyes. Further studying her body language he could safely assume that she was very timid. Skye moved his attention over to the cyan pegasus that flew above her. This mare stuck out the most to him for some reason he couldn't put his hoof on. She had a mane that spectacularly held all the colors of the rainbow.
'You don't see something that beautiful everyday.' Skye thought to himself.
Skye looked her over, she seemed to carry herself very confidently like the world could never bring her down. That was the one trait that he always admired in anypony. The next pony to catch Skye's eye was a white unicorn mare with a curly purple mane. She gave off a very regal or upper class feeling that could be felt from a considerable distance. Although she gave off that felling, he could tell that she didn't act like she was above others. Finally, Skye laid his on the last mare who was... wait... an ALICORN?
It took a moment for this fact to settle is his head and for him to recollect his thoughts. Skye studied her further.
'A lavender coat and mane of dark indigo, pink and purple...' Skye thought before coming to a realization, 'OH! She's Princess Twilight Sparkle! Which means that these other mares must be the elements!'
Skye took one more overall glance over them, 'Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash and Rarity!'
It all made sense now on why he knew them from somewhere. He had read about them and their heroic acts over the past few years in the newspapers. Skye really admired what they had done for Equestria, because without them the whole kingdom would probably be in ruins right now. After snapping out of his thoughts for the moment, Skye noticed that he and the group of mares in front of him were now at the admissions stand.
"NEXT!" yelled the bulky grey unicorn stallion attending the stand.
The girls one by one gave the unicorn their tickets, except for Rainbow Dash who scrambling to find hers.
"Rainbow, where's your ticket? I could've sworn you had it earlier." Twilight asked.
Rainbow was starting to panic, "I-I don't know! I had it in my bag but now its not there!"
The girls gasped. Except for Rarity who was inspecting her friend's saddlebag and noticed the state of it.
"Um Rainbow, didn't I tell you to replace that miserable excuse of a saddlebag a while back?" Rarity asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Not now Rarity!" Rainbow said continuing to try to figure out where her ticket could be.
"Yes now! I know what might of happened to your ticket!" Rarity shouted at Rainbow a little louder than she meant to.
Rainbow stopped searching and gave her friend her attention. "How?"
Rarity grabbed Rainbow's saddle bag and demonstrated how loose and fragile the main pouch was. "Your saddlebag must of flew open as you sped over here."
"Oh..." Rainbow said rubbing the back of her head in embarrassment.
The unicorn in charge of the tickets huffed and spoke. "No ticket. No entry."
"Wait! Can I just buy a new ticket?" Rainbow asked.
"No can do. All sold out."
At that moment, Rainbow's mood deflated and she sighed.
Twilight frowned and felt bad for her friend. "Sorry Rainbow, we'll meet you at that club you wanted to check out after the show is over ok?"
Rainbow nodded and started to walk away slowly.
Skye saw the whole situation and couldn't stand to see a pony so upset and have their day ruined. He had to do something, he couldn't just stand by. It felt wrong to do nothing. Skye took a deep breath and then shouted. "Hey miss!!"
Rainbow stopped in her tracks and turned to the pony that called her. He motioned her over to him. Cautiously and with lots of confusion, she approached him.
"I can't stand to see somepony's day ruined, especially for a beautiful mare like you." Skye said as he dug through his own saddlebag and pulled out one of the two shiny VIP tickets and held it out to her.
The girls gasped at the stallion's kindness and Rainbow's eyes went wide as she was struggling to figure out what to say. "I-I don't know what to s-say... I don't even know if I can accept this..."
Skye smiled and gave a small chuckle, "Don't worry about it. You can thank me by enjoying the show."
Rainbow took the ticket. "Thank you, mister...?"
"Skye Swift. But please just call me Skye, I'm not comfortable being called mister."
"Well thank you Skye. Nopony has done something like this for me." Rainbow replied with a smile.
"You're welcome. Hopefully you take advantage of those VIP perks so I can see you in the VIP box." Skye smiled.
Rainbow nodded and gave the admissions her ticket and joined her friends. As they walked away, Twilight looked back at Skye and mouthed thank you. Skye nodded and proceeded to give admissions his own ticket and walk in.
As he walked through the entrance, Skye noticed the tightened security and couldn't help but feel uncomfortable all sudden. After all, Ponyville was a very peaceful and quiet town and they wouldn't increase security unless they were anticipating trouble. Skye's eyes scanned the field, the audience, and the air for any signs of any trouble. However, he could not find anything out of place. Skye took a deep breath. He knew he had nothing to worry about despite his instincts telling him otherwise. Skye walked up some steps and stopped at the entrance to the VIP area.
The security guards stepped in front of Skye, "Stop. This is VIP only, show us your ticket."
Skye grabbed his ticket and showed it to the guards.
The guards studied the ticket before nodding and stepping aside, "Thank you. You may proceed."
Skye put his ticket back in his saddlebag and sat down in one of the seats. The VIP area was very nicely decorated and had a nearly perfect view of the field.
He smiled to himself, 'I'm definitely gonna have to thank Soarin and team again for this. This is awesome!'
As Skye settled in, the sounds of trumpets echoed throughout the building making it known the the princesses have arrived. From the northern side of the field on the top floor, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna walked into view and waved at everypony before Celestia walked over to a microphone and spoke.
"Fillies and gentlecolts! Welcome to the Ponyville Event Center!" she announced.
The audience started applauding before quieting down again.
Princess Celestia smiled and continued, "In celebration of the 95th anniversary of Ponyville's establishment, we have some very special guests here to perform for us."
The audience started to get very excited and Princess Celestia's smile grew. "So without further ado, it is my honor to bring you the best flight team in all of Equestria... The Wonderbolts!"
Just as Celestia finished announcing, Rainbow walked in with popcorn and sat in a seat next to Skye.
"Hey" Skye smiled, "I was beginning to wonder if you were coming or not."
Rainbow nodded and laughed, "Yeah I was gonna come and sit with you earlier, but my friends wanted me to get snacks with them."
"Well you made it just in time! They're starting now." Skye laughed before turning his attention to the show.
Each member of the Wonderbolts came flying in and landed on the field one by one. First was Spitfire, then Soarin followed by Fleetfoot, Misty, and Rapidfire. They stood there in a straight line for about a minute or so before getting into a triangle formation. Once they finished, all of them took off at a mane-raising speed into the sky. Streaks matching the color scheme of each team member filled the sky.
They flew synchronized in a loop before splitting off and each of them beginning to show off moves they planned for the show. Fleetfloot started to speed up and doing laps around the arena before shooting up into the sky and in the blink of an eye spelling "Love you Ponyville!". Rapidfire landed on the north side of the field and waited. Soarin started to fly towards him, but before he was about to collide he curled his body into a ball and Rapidfire bucked Soarin into the air. Once Soarin was about hit the ground, he adjusted himself and landed perfectly on all fours.
As the crowd cheered and the Wonderbolts continued their show, Skye noticed something moving in his peripheral vision. He turned his head to the source and saw a blanket of dark clouds approaching the event center. All the hairs on his neck rose and the feeling he felt earlier returned. The weather for Ponyville was supposed to be clear for the next few days with no storms scheduled. While Skye was trying to come up with a rational reason for the clouds being there, he failed to noticed three figures hiding in the fluff of the clouds.
Suddenly a few of the clouds decended into the arena and three black earth ponies jumped out of them. Every pony in the arena gasped and went silent as the atmosphere filled with fear, panic, and even dread. The earth ponies were unnatural. Each of them had black coats covered in scars and swelled glowing veins. Their manes were unkempt rattled messes that were a different color each. One was blue while the other two were red and yellow, but what was unsettling was the fact the glowing veins on their coats matched those colors. The last thing that caught everypony's eyes was the pupils of the earth ponies, or more specifically the lack of pupils.
The Wonderbolts immediately landed and slowly backed away from their show crashers. The earth pony with the blue mane cleared his throat and began to speak.
"Hello there, Ponyville!" He spoke out with a crooked grin, "What a mighty fine day! We have good weather, it's the towns birthday, oh and not to mention that everypony is conveniently gathered in one central location!"
Upon finishing his sentence, a group of royal guards surrounded them. The blue maned pony let out a deep chilling chuckle, "Now now! Let's not get ahead of schedule before my friends and I can properly introduce ourselves."
The blue pony stomped his two front hoofs on the ground and several blue bolts of lightning erupted from the ground shocking each and every guard until they all fell to ground unconscious. "That's better! Now where was I?" He asked before smirking and continuing, "Oh yeah our introductions! My name is Flux and the one in yellow is Amp and the red-maned manic is Impulse." Each of them gave evil grins before waving to everpony. "Now that we have names out of the way, let's begin."
Flux walked to the center of the arena while Amp walked to the right stands and Impulse to the left stands. "You see me and my buddies here are very tired and hungry. However, our idea of food is a bit different than yours." Flux said before motioning a hoof towards Impulse. On queue, Impulse jumped into the stands and dragged a unicorn stallion out back into the field towards Flux. Princess Luna gasped and started to charge out of the royal spectator box before Celestia stopped her with a hoof and mouthing 'Wait! Not yet!'
Impulse released the stallion in front of Flux before heading back to his position. Flux than grabbed the stallion by neck and started to glow a bright blue. While that happened, the stallion he held was screaming and being drained of color. Once all his color drained, Flux stopped glowing and released the stallion letting him fall to the ground. Everypony in the stands started to panic and screamed.
"We require life force to stay alive and that is what we are going to get!" Flux yelled before Amp and Impulse charged the stands and Flux began to start making his way towards the Princesses.
Rainbow shot up from her seat and ran out of the VIP area without a word. Skye looked around at the all the ponies panicking and running to the exits. Skye was unsure at what to do, he didn't want to run out like a coward but he also didn't want to wait here and do nothing. He knew he had to do something. Skye looked towards the right stands which were next to the VIP area and saw a mare holding her foal being backed into a wall by Amp. Skye felt anger and courage building up inside.
He took a deep breath in, than out. 'Here goes nothing!'
Skye ran out of the VIP area, spread his wings, and tackled Amp full speed. "LEAVE THESE TWO ALONE!!" He yelled before punching Amp in the jaw. The mare took this time to run away to safety with her foal. Amp spit out a tooth and glared at Skye before using his hind legs to kick Skye off him and into the ceiling. Skye fell back to down and recovered quickly enough to dodge and incoming punch from Amp. "You know little pony, it isn't very smart to confront one of us!" Amp said to before charging at him. Skye side-stepped and kicked Amp hard enough that he few out of the stands and into the field.
Suddenly a bellowing voice was heard throughout the building. "Do what ever you want to me, BUT STAY AWAY FROM MY CITIZENS AND MOST IMPORTANTLY MY SISTER."
Skye looked to his right and spotted an unconscious Princess Luna and an terribly angry looking Princess Celestia in the royal box surrounded by downed royal guards and security guards. Flux whistled and Impulse along with Amp ran to his sides. Skye knew that despite Princess Celestia being incredibly powerful, she was out matched and likely to lose this battle. Flux and his pals started to charge an electrical beam together to take her down. However, he was going to make sure that this was not going to happen on his watch.
Spreading his wings, Skye flew over to where the Princess was as fast as his wings could carry him and landed in front of her just in time to shield her from the attack. The electrical beam hit him in chest with incredible force and knocked him into the wall behind Celestia. Upon impact, Skye felt several bones fracture and all muscles go numb. His body was now in unbearable pain as leftover electricity was arching throughout him and slowly finishing him. Skye could only lay there and helplessly watch the trio stepping closer and closer to the Princess and getting ready to attack her. He was about to close his eyes when suddenly he saw the six mares from earlier barge through the box entrance and attack Flux, Impulse, and Amp.
Skye tried to watch the battle, but his vision started to blur and he felt all the energy he had left quickly leave. He took one last breath before darkness and pain overtook him.