"I'll catch up in a bit." Sunset Shimmer said to Rainbow Dash. The Friendship Games would have to wait until after she figured this whole magic problem out.
With the games right around the corner, Sunset and her friends were experiencing random spurts of magic. Usually it happened when they played their instruments together but now it seemed to be happening for no reason at all. On top of that, the Twilight Sparkle from the human world had appeared and turned out to be going to Crystal Prep Academy, meaning they'd be seeing a lot of her over the course of the games.
Despite writing to Princess Twilight in Equestria, Sunset had gotten no reply. The rest of the girls thought it was because Twilight was super busy, being a princess and all, but it never took her this long to answer. Sunset found herself standing alone in the hallway. She tried to think of how best to proceed since she couldn't get any help from Twilight. Then, she had an idea.
Sunset walked out of the front entrance of Canterlot High. She opened her journal to check one last time.
"Still no reply." Sunset sighed, staring at the blank pages of her journal. She closed the book and set her eyes on the statue in front of her. The portal back to Equestria.
Meanwhile, the Crystal Prep students were getting off their bus and signing in with Dean Cadance. Twilight stood on her own, waiting for her turn to sign in when all of a sudden, her pendant started to glow. As she walked away from the line to investigate the statue her pendant was pointing to, a voice called out to her.
"Twilight!" Cadance called out. "You have to check in with the others."
Her investigation interrupted, Twilight walked away from the statue and over to the Dean.
"Maybe there's another way I could reach her." Sunset said to herself as she approached the portal. She reached out and stuck her arm in. Sunset's heart sank as she realised what she was about to do. This would be her first time returning to Equestria since stealing Twilight's crown. What if she ran into Princess Celestia? What if Twilight didn't want her to come to Equestria?
Sunset supressed those thoughts as she stepped further into the portal. She'd just have to wait and see what would happen.
Something wasn't right. Sunset was indeed back in Equestria, but she wasn't in the place she expected to be. Twilight had told her that she put the mirror in the library of her castle. But this was definitely not a library. It looked more like a storage room. It felt oddly familiar to the unicorn.
Remembering she had a horn again, Sunset lit it up to get a better view of the dark room. Now she realised where she was. This was the room the mirror was kept in at Canterlot Castle before it was moved to the Crystal Empire, but why was the mirror here?
Sunset took a few steps and opened the door out of the room. Taking in the hallway she walked out to, she concluded that this was definitely Canterlot Castle. The hallway was dark. Sunset guessed that it must be late and everypony had gone to bed, which was weird considering when she left the human world it was midday.
"Sneaking around a castle at night." Sunset thought to herself. It was starting to become a habit of hers whenever she came to Equestria. The thought of this brought her worries back to her. What if she was caught sneaking around and was brought to Celestia? Would she be able to explain herself properly?
Sunset began to quietly sneak up the hallway, hoping her memory served her well and she was moving toward the way out. The hallways of the castle seemed very bare compared to the last time Sunset had been there. Tapestries on the walls had vanished, the carpet on the floor seemed quite dusty and she even came across a smashed window as she turned a corner.
It was also strange that Sunset hadn't seen and guards yet. This part of the castle was quite close to Celestia and Luna's bedrooms and was usually heavilly guarded at night.
Arriving at the castle's entrance hall, Sunset let out a gasp at what she saw. Windows were broken, statues lay broken on the floor and the carpet had noticeable rips and tears. The front doors were also wide open and a strong wind blew through the unicorn's mane. What had happened here? Was the castle attacked? Is that why there's nopony around? Was Twilight captured, or worse?
As Sunset stepped outside, she noticed that the castle wasn't the only place in tatters. The streets of Canterlot looked to be abandoned. Houses had their windows boarded up, there was trash on the streets and there wasn't any sign of anypony around. Looking up at the night sky, Sunset couldn't help but notice how different it looked from before she'd run away. There appeared to be much more stars in all kinds of constellations. She remembered Celestia telling her before that even she could never truly recreate the beauty of her sister's nights, so it was obvious to Sunset that this was Luna's work.
However, something quickly caught her attention. Something she knew she definitely shouldn't be seeing.
The Mare in the Moon.
That can't be right. Luna wasn't imprisoned on the moon anymore, so why was the Mare in the Moon still clearly there? As Sunset continued on her way towards Canterlot's entrance, more and more questions began to spin around in her head, until suddenly...
"Halt!" a voice cried out, causing Sunset to jump. She turned around to see a group of guard ponies running toward her.
"Oh, thank goodness." Sunset breathed a sigh of relief. "What's going on? Where are the princesses?"
"Princesses?" The guard captain said as he approached Sunset. "There is only one princess, and we'll be taking you to her."
"What?" Sunset gasped. "Why? I thou-"
"Canterlot is a restricted area." The captain interruped. "What business do you have sneaking around here?"
"Restricted?"
"Don't play dumb with me, everypony knows that. Now tell me, what are you doing here?"
Sunset noticed the guards' armour for the first time. It was different from the usual night guards armour. It was purple, with a strange design and a material that covered the wings to make them appear as bat wings. Were these Luna's guards?
"I came through the portal..." Sunset explained. "But I wasn't meant to come out here."
"What portal? Where did you come here from?"
"What do you mean 'what portal'?" Sunset was growing frustrated. Surely the guards had to know about the portal.
"I've had enough of this. We're taking you to the princess." The captain turned to a unicorn guard. "Moondancer, take us to the palace."
Before Sunset could say anything, the unicorn had teleported her and the guards away.
Wherever this palace was, Sunset had certainly never been here before. The hallways were coloured with purple and blue tones and seemed a lot older than the ones in Canterlot Castle. As the guards let her into a huge throne room, this theme continued.
The throne, however, was empty. A familiar looking unicorn was tending to the tapestries on the wall.
"Rarity?" Sunset gasped.
"Why are so many ponies coming here today acting as if they know me?" Rarity scoffed. She turned her attention to the guards. "The princess isn't here at the moment. A visitor came here and caught her interest, they've gone out to the forest together for whatever reason."
"I see." The captain said. "This pony was caught intruding in Canterlot. We can keep her in the dungeon until the princess returns."
Sunset was dragged by the guards back down the corridor leading to the throne room and down a winding, narrow staircase which led to the castle dungeon. Before Sunset could protest, the guard captain threw her into a cell, before locking her in.
"Wait here. Nightmare Moon will see you when she returns."