//------------------------------// // Oh Brother There Art Thou // Story: The Cosmos Calamity // by 42Zombies //------------------------------// An alicorn. Twilight didn’t know what she’d been expecting when she, Tempest, and Spike had discovered that somepony had broken into the royal vaults. She wouldn’t have been surprised to find a rogue Changeling or a remnant from the Storm King’s forces. She knew what she hadn’t been expecting, though: An alicorn. The alicorn folded their wings back to their sides and began trotting towards the entrance once again. Now that they were closer, Twilight could make out their features more clearly. The alicorn had a grey coat and a long, charcoal-black mane. Their frame was thin and wiry, to the point where they looked almost malnourished. Most shocking, however, were the plainly masculine features on the alicorn’s face. The alicorn stopped at the doorframe, staring tiredly at Twilight and Tempest. Twilight watched him as he cradled the Staff of Sacanas in one of his forelegs. When Twilight looked to his other foreleg, she saw it ended in a stump just above the knee; a brass prosthetic had replaced his hoof. That explained the noise he’d been making. “Is… this another princess?” Tempest whispered through the side of her mouth. “I’ve been away for a while; I don’t know all of them.” “No,” said the alicorn in a distinctly male voice. “I am not a princess.” Tempest’s eyes flickered towards the alicorn. She was evidently unhappy that he had listened in on her comment to Twilight. Tempest’s irritation only grew when she recognized the staff resting in the alicorn’s front hoof. Her eyes narrowed and her brow furrowed, sparks of magic bursting from her horn. “Put back the staff,” she said sternly, “and walk away. Or else we do this the hard way.” “Oh, my. Intimidating.” The alicorn said looked at the Staff of Sacanas with his tired, pale eyes. “Do I have you to thank for bringing this into Equestria? I’m quite grateful. Stealing it from the Arimaspi it belonged to may have been difficult. Stealing it from here, though?” The alicorn spun the staff around in his hoof. His eyes, black and baggy, looked up at Tempest with something approaching mild amusement. “You might as well have gift-wrapped it for me.” With the look Tempest was giving to him, Twilight almost expected her friend to tackle the alicorn right then and there. Despite her anger, however, it looked like Tempest’s military training was once again in control. Without any Obsidian Orbs or magic-cancelling armor, Tempest was probably weighing the situation before she attacked the alicorn. “Who are you?” Twilight asked, drawing the alicorn’s attention. She hoped that if she bought time and distracted him, Tempest would get some sort of an opening. “Why did you break into the royal vaults?” The alicorn studied Twilight for a moment. His eyes looked over her horn, her wings, and her dragon. He stared at Spike in disinterest before he finally responded to Twilight’s question. “I don’t want to talk to you,” he sighed wearily. As the alicorn looked off into the distance, Twilight stammered to come up with a reply. Ordinarily, Twilight was used to villains and evildoers pretty much just spelling out their plans right away. This alicorn, however, didn’t seem interested in sharing. Twilight almost felt like she was intruding by asking him for the bare details of his identities. “Do you want to talk to somepony else?” Twilight ventured, smiling awkwardly. “You can talk to Spike, if you want.” Twilight gestured to the dragon riding around on her back. Spike waved briefly at the alicorn, who continued to barely pay any attention to the other ponies in the room. “I was just about to get going, actually,” the alicorn said with a sigh. “I’ve wasted over a thousand years already; I don’t want to wait another minute. And I’d rather not stand around while your edgy girlfriend keeps glaring at me.” Tempest took this as a cue to glare even harder at the alicorn. The way he was casually dismissing both her and Twilight was beginning to wear on Tempest’s nerves. Normally, Tempest knew how to keep her cool during tense situations. Her earlier bickering with Twilight had shortened her temper, however, and this alicorn’s flippant attitude was only making things worse. “What makes you think you’re going to get a chance to leave?” Tempest asked. “What do you have planned? Teleportation? Do you really think you can cast a spell before the Princess stops you?” The alicorn sighed and lifted his brass hoof to his face, clumsily brushing his greasy mane aside. The Staff of Sacanas became enveloped in an aura of white magic and drifted to the alicorn’s side. “Ah, the ‘princess’,” the alicorn mused. “I suppose you’re the pony to talk to if I want a message delivered to Celestia, yes?” “I mean, she has a PO Box, dude,” Spike chimed in. “You could just send a letter. You don’t need to break into a thing just to talk to her.” The alicorn ignored Spike’s comment and began to survey the room. His eyes seemed to be focusing not on the ponies in front of him, but on the empty space between them. For just a moment, the alicorn’s eye twitched and the glow of magic from his horn intensified. Twilight didn’t want to see whatever it was he had planned. She began to focus the magic in her horn, ready to counter the alicorn’s spell. Twilight lifted her leg to take a step forward… Only her hoof remained firmly planted on the stone basement floor. Twilight looked down at her hooves in confusion. To her shock, the floor of the basement was no longer there. Instead of the dark, stone bricks that Twilight had become accustomed to during her descent into the vaults, there was… well, nothing; just a black, unending darkness in place of a floor. A blackness that everypony except for the mysterious alicorn was slowly sinking into. Twilight flapped her wings, desperately struggling to free herself from the void she was falling into. All she managed to do was tire her wings out. Trying to levitate herself with magic yielded similar results. Spike’s cries of panic and tugging on Twilight’s mane weren’t helping, either. Tempest was struggling as well, angrily trying to pull her hooves off of the ground. They weren’t sinking terribly quickly, but her hooves were still almost magnetically stuck to the surface of the void below. Looking around, Tempest saw that the unconscious guards were all firmly stuck, as well. Sparks of magic erupted from Tempest’s horn in frustration. “You don’t need to panic so much,” the alicorn said, annoyed. “I’m just sending you somewhere else. It’s a basic portal spell. Stop freaking out.” He spoke with all of the impatient frustration of a foalsitter trying to calm down a foal who didn’t want to eat peas. Twilight looked up at the alicorn, gritting her teeth as she continued to struggle. Her expression slacked in shock, however, when she saw the strange changes he was going through. Shimmering, black and green cracks were beginning to form in his horn, and his expression was warped from exertion. “When you go tattle to Celestia that I stole this stick, give her a message from me.” The alicorn scowled down at Twilight as she sunk further and further. His expression twitched a bit, as if in pain. “Tell her that when everything in Equestria rots and dies, it’ll all be on her. Everything I’m about to do? It’s all her fault.” “What are you—” Twilight felt her words die in her throat as a strange sensation overcame her. She could feel herself being pulled apart, almost. It was a bizarre, buzzing feeling, as if every particle in her body was being disassembled and dragged away. She could feel herself sinking into the portal, faster and faster, her eyes locked on the alicorn’s. As the room began to fade away, the alicorn began to smirk at the rapidly disappearing ponies. “And when she asks for a name, you can tell her that Cosmos is back.” When Twilight’s friends returned to the throne room to meet with Princess Celestia and Luna, they immediately knew something was off. Twilight wasn’t there. Ordinarily, she would have been the first one back in the throne room. But when Rainbow Dash and the others arrived, Celestia and Luna were the only ones waiting for them. “Maybe she ran into somepony,” Fluttershy suggested. She wasn’t particularly worried; none of them were. They had no reason to suspect something bad had happened to Twilight in her own hometown. “But it’s been fifteen minutes, Fluttershy,” Rarity pointed out. “With how worried she was about this star business, you’d think she’d make her way here post haste.” “I am certain Twilight Sparkle has only allowed herself to become momentarily distracted,” Luna said from where she stood beside her sister. “To be honest, I am eager to discuss this matter with the stars, myself.” “Should we go look for her?” Rainbow Dash asked. “I don’t wanna stick around just waiting for Twilight so show up.” “Be patient, my little ponies.” Celestia gave a motherly smile to Twilight’s friends. While she shared their mild concerns, Celestia didn’t see any reason to form a search party just yet. “I’m certain Twilight Sparkle is on her way here as we speak.” As soon as Celestia finished saying this, Twilight Sparkle, Spike, and Tempest Shadow fell from the ceiling. They were joined by about a dozen unconscious guards, who fell onto the stone floor of the throne room with a soft thud. “There they are!” Pinkie exclaimed excitedly. As her friends gathered around her, Twilight slowly got up onto her hooves. She felt as if she’d just spent an hour spinning around in circles. The alicorn’s portal spell wasn’t exactly smooth traveling. Gradually, Twilight steadied herself and looked around at everypony else who’d traveled through the portal with her. The guards were still all unconscious, though from the sounds of their groaning, they’d be coming out of it soon. Spike was already up and wobbling around, looking like he’d just gotten off of the world’s most dizzying roller coaster. Tempest was the only other pony who looked like she’d regained her composure even a little bit. She was standing up, but her eyes didn’t seem to know where to look. “What in tarnation just happened?” asked Applejack as she reached out a hoof to help steady Twilight. Twilight grabbed onto the hoof appreciatively, and didn’t let go until the room stopped spinning. “Princesses,” Tempest said, looking vaguely in Celestia and Luna’s direction. “We’re robbery.” “I… beg your pardon?” Celestia asked. “I thought her name was Tempest,” Luna whispered to her sister. “Who’s Robbery?” “No,” Twilight said. The vertigo was finally beginning to die down. “What she means is there’s been a robbery. Somepony has broken into the royal vaults and stolen the staff… thing.” Celestia and Luna both exchanged a concerned look. “The royal vaults have not been broken into for over five hundred years,” Celestia said, stunned. “Do you know how the thief bypassed the alicorn security measure which guards the reliquary?” “He didn’t need to bypass it,” Tempest explained. She’d more or less steadied herself, but her head was starting to pound fiercely. “He just walked right in. The thief was an alicorn.” A look appeared on Celestia’s face that Twilight had never seen before. It was something like shock, but seemed much more intense. Luna also had a look of horrified surprise on her face. The two royal sisters glanced at each other, communicating wordlessly, and then looked back to Twilight and Tempest. “He was an alicorn?” Celestia repeated, putting emphasis on the word ‘he’. Twilight couldn’t blame the princess for being surprised; in all of Twilight’s research, she didn’t remember ever reading about a male alicorn. Then again, alicorns weren’t exactly as common as unicorns. There wasn’t much information to go off of. “Yes,” Twilight said. “An alicorn stallion. One with a gray coat and a long, black mane.” “His right front hoof was missing,” Tempest added matter-of-factly. “He looked sleep-deprived, as well; he had heavy, black bags under his eyes.” Twilight nodded in agreement and turned back to the princesses. She was shocked to see that the looks of surprise on their faces had escalated into pure horror. Celestia had extended a hoof towards Luna, who was helping her older sister stay standing. Twilight had never seen the princesses quite so shaken. “Twilight,” Celestia said slowly. She hesitated, taking a deep breath, and then looked into Twilight’s eyes. “This is very, very important. Did this alicorn say his name? Did he even hint at his name?” The look in Celestia’s eyes told Twilight that the princesses already suspected what the alicorn’s name was. And for some reason, these suspicions were terrifying them. “He was…” Twilight hesitated for just a moment. For some reason, she was almost afraid to tell Celestia and Luna the alicorn’s name. But keeping it a secret wasn’t going to help anypony. If they knew who this stranger was, they might know where he was going or what he was planning. With that in mind, Twilight took a deep breath and gave the princesses their answer. “Cosmos,” she said. “He said his name was Cosmos.” The words hung in the air for a few seconds that felt like hours. Everypony watched the expressions on the princesses’ faces change as the name fully set in. There was fear, shock, sorrow, and a host of other emotions Twilight couldn’t even begin to recognize. Celestia swooned, reaching out a hoof to brace herself on her sister. “All these years…” Celestia muttered. “All these years and he shows up like this?” “Have faith, sister,” Luna said as she struggled to maintain her own composure. She brought a reassuring hoof to her sister’s chest, trying to help calm her. “Do not assume the worst. There is bound to be an explanation for all of this.” “Hey, if there’s an explanation, you mind letting us in on it?” Rainbow Dash asked. “I’m still trying to wrap my head around everypony falling from the ceiling.” “It was Cosmos,” Tempest explained. She sounded slightly bitter when she revealed this fact. “He was able to utilize some sort of… portal spell. With that kind of magic, he’s probably long gone from the vaults.” “Portals?” Celestia repeated, still reeling. “That doesn’t make sense. Cosmos could never utilize magic that sophisticated. He struggled with basic levitation for years!” Twilight had a difficult time imagining an alicorn having difficulty with basic magic. She knew of unicorns with magical disabilities, of course; it was as natural as pegasi who couldn’t fly, or earth ponies who couldn’t do earth pony things. But an alicorn with a magical disability seemed absurd to Twilight somehow. A thought occurred to Twilight. Over the years, Celestia had had many students, and had taken a great interest in the lives of alicorns or potential alicorns. That was why she had mentored Twilight, and why she had adopted Cadence as a niece. Was Cosmos another one of these ponies who had drawn Celestia’s attention? “Princess Celestia?” Twilight asked. “This Cosmos… was he another one of your students?” Celestia looked at Twilight as if she were speaking some alien language. The princess took a deep breath, put a hoof to her head, and did her best to get her thoughts straight. When Celestia finally felt as if she were over the shock of Twilight’s news, she finally spoke. “Not… as such, Twilight.” Celestia sighed. “Cosmos was… is…” Twilight had never seen the princess struggle to find her words like this. Celestia always seemed so sure, so certain. Now, however, she seemed truly shaken, and it was almost as if Celestia didn’t know how to deal with her loss for words. Finally, Celestia steeled herself and simply let the words fall out. “Cosmos is our brother, Twilight.” The silence in the throne room was so thick that it could have been cut with a knife. After a while, the groaning of waking guards began to bring reality back. Twilight and her friends looked around as the guards slowly began getting back onto their hooves. None of them seemed to be suffering from the dizziness that Twilight had been. Unconsciousness was probably the thing that’d saved them. “Oh, jeez,” one of the guards said. “What’d I miss?” “I have no doubt you all have many questions.” “Not really!” Pinkie exclaimed. “I’m pretty content!” After all of the unconscious guards had woken up, and after Celestia had given them some time to rest, the throne room was quickly deemed an inappropriate place for the conversation that would follow. Without much explanation, Celestia and Luna brought Twilight and her friends into the royal libraries to continue their talk. Everypony, Spike included, had gathered around a large table sat in the middle of the well-maintained library. Luna spent some time scouring the book shelves before bringing a large, dusty tome to the proceedings. Inscribed on the cover in gold print was ‘LINEAGE OF ROYALTY’. “Very few ponies know about our lives before we became princesses,” Luna said as she magically opened the book. “However, before Star Swirl the Bearded approached us with the offer to become Equestria’s protectors…” “Wait, hold on,” Tempest said, slowly raising a hoof. “You two became princesses? Some pony just walked up to you and asked you if you wanted to rule a kingdom? There’s no line of succession?” Celestia and Luna both exchanged a glance. They weren’t really used to these sorts of questions. Tempest had spent the last few years serving under a king, so it was natural she’d wonder why Equestria only had princesses. Still, it wasn’t really the point of this little get-together. “Tempest, we can discuss Equestria’s royal family later, darling,” Rarity said to the confused unicorn. “For now, I think we’d all like to have this Cosmos business sorted out.” “Agreed,” Twilight said. “Please, Princess, continue.” “Cosmos’s existence is not widely known,” Celestia said solemnly. “I would wager that only dedicated historians or researchers would even know his name. That is because we were… separated from our brother before history truly had its eye on us.” “Begging your pardon, princess, but what do you mean by ‘separated’?” Applejack asked worriedly. As someone with a younger sibling of her own, Applejack found herself emphasizing with the princesses, even if the whole story hadn’t come out yet. “It is not a fond memory of ours,” Luna said solemnly. She had finished flipping through the pages of the Lineage of Royalty, and had opened the book to a family tree diagram. At the very top of the tree, connected by a solid black line, were Celestia and Luna. No mention of any parents. Twilight noticed, however, a small asterisk next to Celestia’s name. She immediately began searching the page for the corresponding footnote. Finally, she found it; at the very bottom of the page, in very small print, were three fairly unilluminating words: ‘Possible third sibling?’ “When Luna and I were young, we and Cosmos were raised by a small tribe of alicorns,” Celestia began as Twilight continued perusing the book. “We received a basic education in magic, flight, and the ways of our kind. Luna and I both excelled in magic, while Cosmos…” Celestia trailed off, trying to think of a good way to phrase what she needed to say. After a second of silence, Luna took over. “As we said before, Cosmos had certain disadvantages when it came to magic,” Luna said. “He struggled with getting the magic within himself to flow outwards. In these modern times, he would have been diagnosed with magical blockage syndrome.” “Magical what now?” Rainbow repeated, staring blankly at the princesses. “It’s a condition which severely limits a unicorn’s magical abilities,” Twilight explained, switching over into egghead mode. “MBS, as the name suggests, creates magical blockages inside of a unicorn’s horn. It’s fairly uncommon; only about one in fifty unicorns is born with MBS.” “And unlike certain conditions, MBS is treatable.” Tempest added, a trace of bitterness in her voice. “A powerful magical surge from an outside source can potentially clear out the blockages. Either that, or seriously overload the unicorn’s brain.” An uncomfortable silence settled in. Nopony wanted to ask why Tempest knew about that, or what ‘overloading a brain’ constituted. They all had their own theories, however. “Cosmos flourished in many non-magical fields,” Celestia continued. “Flight, combat, the culinary arts… But over the years, as he observed Luna and I hone our magical talents, he grew frustrated. He started to think of himself as a failure, and became desperate to fix whatever was stopping him from reaching his potential.” “Oh, dear,” Fluttershy whispered sympathetically. She knew how damaging failure could be to a pony’s self-esteem; everypony at the table did. “At the time, I did not realize how difficult magic truly was for Cosmos,” Celestia said. She looked off to the side, as if trying to avert everypony else’s gaze. “Magic came so simply for us; it never even occurred to me that it was different for our brother. I believed that Cosmos simply wasn’t applying himself. I thought…” Celestia closed her eyes, trailing off. Some sad memory was beginning to surface; one that looked as if it might bring the princess to tears. Once again, Twilight found herself seeing her former mentor in a new, more vulnerable light. Luna, seeing her sister at a loss for words, continued the explanation. “As the years went on, Cosmos grew more and more obsessed with finding a way to let his magic flow more freely,” Luna said. “He ventured to places of power and consumed various potions and tinctures. Nothing he did succeeded in improving his magic, however, and with each failure he grew more and more bitter. “Eventually, Cosmos began to research the very nature of magic itself,” Luna continued as Celestia regained her composure. “He read everything he could on the natural flow of magic throughout the world. Eventually, he found something.” “The Heart of Equestria,” Celestia chimed in. All eyes looked to her in surprise. “The Heart of Equestria is a focal point for all of the magic that flows throughout Equestria and beyond,” Celestia explained. “It serves as a sort of balancing stone, ensuring that all natural magic gets to where it needs to go. Cosmos became convinced that by coming into contact with the raw, natural magic contained in the Heart, he could solve all of his problems.” Something told Twilight that things hadn’t gone according to plan for Cosmos. Messing around with an object that maintained the balance of magic in Equestria was a surefire recipe for disaster. Twilight couldn’t even consider the number of ways that tampering with the Heart could go wrong. “So what happened?” Spike asked, practically standing in his chair so he could be better seen. “Did this Cosmos guy go after the Heart? Did you have to banish him like Nightmare Moon?” Luna gave Spike a small glare at the mention of her alter ego. Chuckling awkwardly, the young dragon sank down into his seat. “When Cosmos came to us to tell us about the Heart of Equestria, he wanted us to come with him,” Celestia said. “As I said before, I was not aware of the nature of his disability. I thought he was simply being lazy. And after pestering us about the Heart for a bit, I… may have let him know my opinion.” Celestia sighed in shame, lifting her hoof to her head. “We exchanged words. Harsh words,” Celestia said. “In the end, Cosmos ran off by himself in the middle of the night. Stubborn filly that I was, I refused to chase after him. I was certain he would return home within a few days at most.” “As you might guess by our surprise at hearing of his return, that was not the case,” Luna said. “We have not heard from our younger brother in over a thousand years.” “Please, try to understand.” Celestia said suddenly, speaking in a defensive tone. “After three days, we went after him. But the Heart of Equestria is located at the center of a treacherous forest known as the Undergrowth. Our every attempt to locate Cosmos was thwarted before we could make any progress. “This all occurred years before Luna and I became Equestria’s princesses. Gradually, our duties to our kingdom began to eat up any time we could have devoted to searching for Cosmos.” “That is not to say we gave up,” Luna said. “We sent search parties into the Undergrowth, time and time again. The ones that returned found nothing. In the end, I suppose we lost hope.” “What about the search parties that didn’t return?” Pinkie asked suspiciously. “What did they find?” “Okay, this has all been real interesting,” Rainbow Dash said sarcastically. “But why did Cosmos bust into Canterlot, knock out a buncha guards, and steal the Staff of… of…” Rainbow glanced over at Tempest, clearly at a loss. “Yo, Tempest, help me out here.” “Sacanas,” Tempest Shadow said dryly. After her years serving the Storm King, she’d gotten used to reminding people about the staff’s name. “The staff can be used to steal alicorn magic. I have no idea what an alicorn would want with it.” Twilight frowned as she considered the facts. It wasn’t easy; she had a lot of new information to process. Everything about Cosmos, his relationship with the princesses, and the Heart of Equestria was buzzing around inside of Twilight’s head. It didn’t help at all that Twilight was still concerned about the vanishing stars. The stars. Twilight’s eyes widened as a thought occurred to her. Her head snapped up to look at Luna, catching the Princess of the Night by surprise. “Princess,” Twilight said. “The stars; they’re old magic, right?” Luna looked around in confusion. She was apparently unsure as to why Twilight was quizzing her on magic. “Yes,” Luna said slowly. “The stars are very old magic. The stars are some of the first things to come into existence in the universe.” “Okay,” Twilight said. She placed her hooves on the table as she tried to untangle the theory in her head. “So if somepony were to tamper with the balance of magic, the oldest magic might be the first to go screwy, right?” “Screwy?” Luna repeated. “Oh!” Rarity exclaimed, quickly catching on to what Twilight was saying. “The stars, darling! You’re saying they’re disappearing because of Cosmos and the Heart of Equestria!” “Exactly!” Twilight exclaimed. “I mean, probably! Maybe? We’re dealing with a lot of unknowns here.” “Wait,” Tempest said, looking off to the side. “If he went after the Heart a thousand years ago, why are the stars only disappearing now? And why would he go after the Staff of Sacanas?” Twilight frowned. She didn’t know how to answer that first question. Clearly, they were still missing a few pieces of the puzzle. But Twilight thought she had a good guess of an answer for the second question. Unfortunately, it wasn’t an answer she liked very much. “Tempest,” Twilight said, turning to the pony who knew the most about the staff. “If the Staff of Sacanas can drain magic from an alicorn… is it possible that it could also work in reverse?” Tempest blinked. “What, you mean could an alicorn use the staff to drain magic directly into themselves?” She asked. “I suppose so? It’s not as if anyone has ever tested that theory. The staff belonged to the lord of a far-off land before an Arimaspi king stole it. I don’t believe an alicorn has ever gotten their hooves on it.” “You mean until now,” Applejack pointed out. “Exactly,” Twilight said. “This is a bit of a longshot, but I think I know what Cosmos is planning. I know why he’s stolen the staff, and maybe why the stars are starting to disappear.” “I thought you just said why the stars are disappearing,” Rainbow Dash said. “It’s because Cosmos messed around with the Heart of Equestria, right?” Twilight nodded slowly. Her brain felt like it was on fire. It always did when she came up with ideas like this. Twilight was well-aware that she was making a few leaps of logic here, but even then she felt that this was the most-likely explanation. “Right,” Twilight said. “He’s tampered with the Heart. And maybe that’s how he’s suddenly more powerful than before. But I’m willing to bet that, whatever it was he did, it wasn’t enough. And now he wants to take another shot at getting even more power." Twilight lifted her head and looked around the table at everypony sitting with her in the library. Some of them were reaching the same conclusion as her. The princesses in particular both seemed terrified at what was being implied. “The first time was just a trial run,” Twilight concluded. “Now he plans on using the Staff of Sacanas to drain the Heart of Equestria’s magic.”