Starswirl stared at the stars. It had been two hours, and he still could not believe what lay in the sky. He had checked and rechecked, but nothing changed. That was the point of studying stars after all. They barely moved. What they could set in motion, however…
He looked at them once again, and tried to get the full picture. The Light and The Shadow, singing and dancing together. The Rock, the Wind, and the Aether, joining the dance after centuries of discordance. The music was perfect, the dancers united.
He already knew this. Anypony simply needed to open a history book to learn it. What came next was far more interesting, and also terrifying.
The Void rose, threatening to consume the quintet, but Light and Shadow contained it. Then Darkness emerged, enslaving and forcing the dancers to sing its own twisted melody. Once again, Light and Shadow stood up and banished the Darkness to the pit from which it had emerged, and brought back everyone into the song.
But the Shadow had witnessed what the Darkness had been capable of. Its intent might had been wrong, but he still had altered the song. So the Shadow tried to alter it too. It couldn’t see its perfection anymore, so changing it was the only way, but it had to face the Light.
Starswirl felt a tear on his cheek. In the Shadow’s rise, he saw countless of deaths, broken ponies, and wrecked harmony. The Rock shattered, the Wind raged, and the Aether dissolved.
The Light tried to sing to its sibling, but the Shadow was deaf to its pleas. So the Light banished the Shadow. It gathered the Rock’s shard, appeased the Wind, and reunited the Aether’s shape.
They sang and they danced for countless years. The Light wanted the song as perfect as it used to be, and even if the Rock, the Wind, and the Aether forgot about the Shadow, the Light remembered. The song was missing one of its members, it could not be perfect. But the song kept going on for eons, as flawed as it was, and the Light kept the dancers united, for better or for worse, waiting for its sibling’s return.
Starswirl moved the telescope two degrees North. There, the Shadow emerged once again. He was expecting to see the same chaos and destruction than the first time, but instead, there was nothing. The Shadow simply took back its place in the formation. What had changed?
He lit his horn and activated several levers on his telescope. The magnifying lenses aligned, and he could look closer at the empty space.
A flicker, a sparkle of hope had brought back the Shadow into the dance. Starswirl could not see how, but it had done it. Happiness filled him as he saw the song return to its original melody. However, it seemed the Sparkle had still a role to play.
It would bring the Void into the song, it would banish the Darkness forever, and it would complete the song. Brighter days would rise from the ashes, the harmony would fill the sky, and no one would be able to silence the melody anymore.
The Shadow was right, the song was not perfect, but the Shadow was not the one fated to perfect it. It was the Sparkle.
Starswirl rejoiced at seeing this hope. The promise of Equestria’s golden age shone in the night sky.
Then, his heart sank when he understood what was asked of him, what toll the ponies would have to pay before seeing this new era. If he intervened, he could deprive Equestria of this future. Who was he to prevent the song from being even more perfect?
He kept gazing at the stars, the sight becoming blurrier as more and more tears filled his eyes. He didn’t hear the alicorn coming from behind.
“Starswirl, my dear friend, I was looking for you,” said Celestia.
He turned his head to her, and she gasped at his red eyes.
“Starswirl,” she said coming closer and putting a wing on his back in a gentle hug. “Are you crying?”
“I am, Celestia. I am crying for what I have to do, or instead, what I mustn’t do. I am crying for the ponies not even born and already doomed to a terrible fate. I am crying for a wonderful future I won’t even see.”
“You seem to have a lot on your heart, my friend. Is there something I can do?”
“Unfortunately, no,” he said gravely. “We can only place our hopes in a Sparkle.”