As the party starts to wind down, Darkness escorts the diarchs to their chariot. As they arrive Darkness nods to the guards, “I’ll see you two back in Canterlot, Your Highness.” He bows and starts making his way towards the train station, already having had a discussion with Fizzy about her staying here for a while to make sure Twilight is situated before heading back.
Celestia shakes her head, “Come with us Darkness. It’s been awhile and we should get caught up.”
Darkness just raises an eyebrow at her, “Celestia as much as I would enjoy doing that, as far as your guards are aware I’m just part of some sort of militia group, I doubt they would approve of me riding with you.”
Celestia looks over at the guards and they recoil, “I don’t think they will be a problem.” A hint of seriousness enters her voice, “Besides, there is something I wish to show you.”
Darkness pulls up his hood again and rolls his eyes, “If you say so, your highness.” He gets onto the chariot after the princesses.
As Darkness looks over at the view from the side of the chariot he hears Luna call out, “Sister, what caused that crater over there?” Darkness looks over in the direction Luna points out then clutches his head and the side of the chariot as a flash of light pops into his vision
Luna notices and rushes over to support Darkness as much as she can with her smaller frame, “Sister what’s happening?”
As Celestia is about to say something, Darkness lets go of his head, “That was an unpleasant experience living that again, wasn’t pleasant the first time.” He notices luna by him and gives her a gentle hug, “I’m fine now Lady Luna, just reliving what should have been my death.”
Both sisters look at each other, then at him, and Celestia speaks up first, “What do you mean Darkness?”
Darkness gestures to the approaching crater, “Luna, what caused that crater was a dark magic user that caused Celestia to gather all active forces, and even asked the one-eighty-first to come back to active duty and help.” He sighs after they landed and notices something in the crater and starts walking towards it, “Everything was going fine, until they decided if they could not win they would take us all out with it.” He turns around to the sisters that are following him, “I decided to enclose myself and that dark caster in a dome made of twenty-five layers of shielding, the next thing I knew there was a flash which I presume was the explosion then just an empty plane with nothing but a tower, and two annoying spirits.” He stops in front of a statue of himself that was placed on a magical platform in the middle of the crater.
Luna steps up next to him and looks at the statue then Darkness and back, “Huh, sis did you provide an illusory image for them to get this accurate?”
Celestia was about to comment when Darkness burst out, “What in Discord’s name made you think to put that on the epitaph!?”
Luna blinks at Darkness using the Chaos spirit’s name to call out her sister and looks at the epitaph.
Lord Darkness Shield
Lieutenant, Commander, Guardian
Confidant, Friend, Brother
Gave his life To protect others
70 SR - 100 SR
Luna then notices a pattern of stars underneath the first epitaph and she realizes it’s a code in Moonscript.
Prince Consort of Princess Luna
Luna finishes reading and her face starts glowing bright red then hides behind her wings.
Darkness just looks at Celestia, his eyes twitching with a hint of red to them, “Neither one of us were around to agree to that, so I can’t wait to hear your explanation for this.”
Celestia taps her hooves together nervously avoiding the gaze of her brother-in-law, “Well, I spent the first few years thinking neither of you would return, and you two were obviously in love with each other even though Luna turned you down.” Celestia and Darkness look at the embarrassed Luna, “So I decided with my powers I would have you two married post-mortem.”
Luna, still red-faced, goes over to berate her sister while Darkness rubs at his temples
Darkness sighs as he hears a voice speak to him, “You seem to be in a pretty interesting situation.”
Darkness looks around seeing that the sisters are still “talking” to each other and the guards are watching them not noticing the new voice. Darkness directs his conversation inward, “It seems that way, are you here to cause trouble or just to watch?”
Darkness could almost see the voice grin, “Oh, I’m just here to watch your progress, many ponies have been in your position before, only to be consumed by what they sought.” The voice starts to quiet down, “I will leave you with one warning, beware your metaphorical shadow.”
Darkness blinks and sighs, “Another headache, for another day.” Darkness makes his way over to the sisters, “Luna are you opposed to the idea?”
Luna stops berating her sister calming down to look at darkness, “Not really no, but I wish she would have asked us beforehoof.” Then she taps her hooves together shyly, “and I kinda wanted a formal wedding.”
Darkness grins then looks at Celestia, “Well, can we leave it to you to set up a formal wedding to make up for this?”
Luna notices Darkness’s grin then turns towards her sister giving her puppy dog eyes.
Celestia blinks and smiles nodding to them both, “Well it will have to wait until after Luna gets her powers back.” She leans down to nuzzle her little sister.
Darkness nods, “I guess I can help by finding some pony to officiate the wedding, because Luna would probably want you to be her mare of honor.”
Luna looks at Darkness and blinks, “Darkness, wilt thou please stay out of our head!”
Darkness chuckles as he makes his way back to the chariot, “I spent enough time with you Luna, I should be able to guess what you would say.”
Celestia climbs into the chariot then turns to look at Darkness, “Why did she turn you down again?”
Darkness grins, “She turned me down because I wasn’t immortal and would leave her eventually, and apparently it was eating her up inside after that response.”
Celestia rolls her eyes as the chariot takes off towards Canterlot, “You can say that again, I think she started writing poetry as a way of trying to get your attention to try again afterwards.”
Luna pouts at the two as they laugh, then eeps as Darkness pulls her in for a hug which she quickly returns.
After a time and some failed attempts to embarrass Darkness on Luna’s part they begin to land in Canterlot. Darkness looks down and takes on a more serious air to represent himself as a recruit for the guard and not somepony so familiar with the princesses. As he was in the back of the chariot Darkness marched off first and stood by the side as the princesses stepped down and the other guards took the chariot away. Celestia nods to Darkness to keep up with them and he quickly falls in line.
“Princess Celestia!” a white-coated mare with a dark brown-mane and tail run up with a squad of guards behind her. The mare stops in front of the three, “We were about to mobilize some units to search for you, Your Highness.” Then she notices Luna, “Princess Luna!” The mare quickly bows, “I am glad to see you returned to us.” Before she can say anymore more she hears a gasp and what sounds like a spear falling to the ground which prompted everyone to look at the soldiers, then at Darkness, the mare’s eyes going wide.
The guardsman spoke up, “Lord Darkness?” The pony rubs his eyes, just to see a chuckling Darkness step up beside Luna, “but how?”
Darkness smiles and shakes his head, “Seems there are some ponies that actually do know about me in this era, as for the how, I don’t know myself, still trying to figure it out.” He looks at the mare, “I’m more curious about you Raven, all I know about me was, I ended up displaced in time and space, and what have you been doing to keep yourself looking like that?”
Raven tilts her head, “Like what sir?”
Darkness smirks, “Like you’re not a year over twenty.” He motions his hoof to keep her from saying anything, “Doesn’t matter right now, we can discuss it later, but I do think we should get things in order for Luna to get reacquainted with society.” He notices the nod from Raven then looks at the guard that knew who he was, “What’s your name soldier?”
The guardpony snaps to attention with a salute startling some of his companions, “Prince Blueblood sir.” He goes into a more eased position, “Aunt Celestia told me stories of your achievements, sir, and they inspired me to prove myself as a noble in her eyes.”
Darkness raises an eyebrow at Blueblood, “If you’re using me as a standard for success then I will be personally watching over you to see how you do, are you the Captain of the Guard?”
Blueblood gulps at the first part then shakes his head, “No sir the Captain of the Guard is Shining Armor.”
Darkness nods then looks at Celestia after stepping back, “I think after today we should all get some rest.”
Celestia nods, “You are right Darkness.” Celestia turns to Raven, “Please guide Darkness to that room.”
Raven blinks then shivers, “Yes Ma’am.”
Darkness follows Raven as the guards fall in line behind Celestia and Luna to escort them to their chambers, “If this room is cursed, I will make her training harder,” he mutters, earning a stifled giggle from Raven.
Raven stops in front of an onyx black door, “Here we are, this used to be a guest room the ambassadors and embassy workers, we sealed it off because of some disturbing incidents.”
Darkness’s eyes glow as he enters the room and blinks as he looks around, “Uh, did the incidents happen to be a red spirit popping out of the walls and threatening said workers?”
Raven nods, “That is correct Darkness, do you know a way of getting rid of it?”
Darkness just looks at the desk in the room, “I can already say it won’t be a problem anymore, as that spirit was me when I was trapped.” He goes over to the desk and cleans it off, “I had learned that when it was something I had a strong connection to was involved I could project myself.” He looks over at Raven, “and rage was a good amplifier to go after ponies that decided to pick on my daughter.”
Raven nods and turns to leave, “I’ll let Celestia know that the situation has been resolved.”
Darkness looks around the empty darkly colored room, “Also let her know to add training to the guards to differentiate between guardian spirits and ghosts.” He shudders at recalling a memory, “That was not fun when the guards came after me.”
Raven nods and heads out closing the door behind her.
Darkness smiles and looks through one of the other doors in the room that leads to a bedroom and sighs, “Of course there would be a bed that big.” He goes to check the other door in the front room revealing a closet, “Hmm, I can work with this as long as I can keep the set up quiet.” Darkness yawns, “Well time for me to head to bed, even though I won’t be acting as a prince until the official wedding, I’m now a noble apparently.” He heads to bed turning off all the lights. Darkness climbs into bed, “I need to go see Tux tomorrow.” He closes his eyes and goes to sleep.