Chapter 5
“Why am I not hungry?” Cozy asked. The filly was pretty sure enough time had passed by now that she should be starving, yet the girl felt nothing.
“It’s the magic of Tartarus. You don’t feel hungry or thirsty. “You just exist,” Tirek explained and gestured around. “You can sleep, but that is just to pass time, if anything.”
Cozy furrowed her brow as she considered this. She glanced at Sombra’s cage. Ever since the princesses had dropped by, shortly after Queen Rabia’s visit, the king had been absolutely silent. He just continued to lay in his cage with his back turned towards her and Tirek.
“Why is he called King Sombra? I know he ruled the Crystal Empire, but wouldn’t that make him emperor?” she asked, sighing as the girl remembered how close she had been to her own empress title.
“Well until his mother so unexpectedly returned, he was the only remaining Dark Pony left of the royal line. So even if it was gone, he did have the right to call himself the King of the Dark Ponies. Why they didn’t call themselves emperor or empress since it was mostly ruled by mares, I wouldn’t know,” Tirek responded and shrugged. “Makes about as much sense as to why Celestia calls herself a princess.”
“Saddle Arabia had emperors. When the first queen broke us Dark Ponies away from them, she declared that no Dark Pony would be ruled by an emperor, so she called herself queen and declared that her successors would only use that title or in my case, a king.” Sombra raised his head to look at them, looking grim. “Of course, the Saddle Arabians were so insulted by us daring to break away from their ‘generous’ rule that the emperor changed his title to king, vowing to never restore the emperor title again until we were all destroyed.”
“Uh, that’s odd, the Saddle Arabians didn’t switch back to emperor after the Dark Pony Empire was destroyed,” Tirek pointed out, folding his arms as he did.
“Well I did slaughter the king who destroyed my race, along with his entire court,” Sombra grunted and lowered his head again.
“Saddle Arabia doesn’t have a king or a queen. They have an emir,” Cozy told them. This prompted Sombra to raise his head again. He looked puzzled.
“Emir? But that’s…” the king trailed off and stared thoughtfully at the cage floor.
They were interrupted by a glowing portal opening near them. Through it stepped Celestia and Luna. The two princesses wasted no words, they immediately stepped up to Sombra’s cage and once again Luna placed a sound proof bubble around them.
“We are here about your terms,” Princess Celestia addressed the Dark Pony. Sombra rose to sit and looked at the sisters, assuming a more neutral expression.
“If we agree to them, you will provide us with information about your mother?” Luna asked firmly.
“That was the deal,” Sombra nodded his head, glancing at Celestia. “I take it he agreed?”
“He did.” Celestia responded flatly. “We are going to transfer you to a cell in Canterlot castle, let you get used to being outside of Tartarus again. Then Luna will transfer you to him.”
“Why not go immediately?” Sombra asked. “I haven’t been in here that long and it doesn’t take that much to get used to the outside world again.”
“I still have a few things to discuss with your new custodian, plus we need to make a few modifications to your manacle,” the solar princess stated. Her horn began glowing and the cage Sombra was in slowly began to disintegrate, then his leg chains began vanishing.
“What kind of modifications?” the king asked suspiciously. He stood up and began stretching his sore legs now that he could.
“That question is not part of the deal, Sombra. I can put you back in the cage and replace those shackles again if you like,” Celestia simply said.
Sombra froze in mid-stretch, then he narrowed his eyes and stood up straight. With a low growl the Dark Pony just nodded his head. Luna removed the silence bubble; a new portal was formed and Celestia gestured for him to walk through.
“I can’t believe it, he gets to leave? What kind of a deal did he make?” Tirek protested, but he was ignored and had to watch the three ponies leave through the portal that closed very shortly afterwards. The centaur grumbled and sat down folding his arms in a huff.
“Well, looks like it’s just you and me now,” Cozy shrugged, grinning innocently at the glare she received from her inmate.
“That doesn’t look like a cell,” Sombra remarked as he entered a guest room in Canterlot Castle. He glanced back at Celestia and the guards who had escorted him there.
“One of your demands was better living conditions. We have now met two of them,” the princess remarked. “You are confined to this room until Luna moves you tomorrow.”
Sombra couldn’t really argue with that. He noted immediately that this was a pretty standard bedroom with a bed, dresser and a closet. Then his stomach started to gurgle, reminding him that it had been ages since he last ate. He was no longer under the effects of the magic of Tartarus.
“Food is being prepared for you. You should lie down, you’ll be feeling pretty weak soon,” Celestia advised him.
Not a bad idea. Sombra was already feeling a bit light-headed. He stumbled to the bed and climbed in to lie down. Alright, having a day to prepare before going wasn’t a bad one either.
“Why him?” Celestia asked and approached the bed, signaling to the guards to stay outside.
“I recall the deal being about information regarding my mother,” Sombra raised his head. He was starting to feel famished.
“I was hoping you would indulge me,” the princess said. “You have been strangely obsessed with that pony.”
“He and I share a longer history together than you know, Celestia,” the king muttered and lowered his head to the pillow. He was so weak and hungry that he couldn’t even really enjoy the softness now under him.
“I am aware you abducted him as a colt through time pony magic spells,” the princess said, arching her brow when hearing the low chuckle coming from the bed.
“Oh no, our history goes much further back than that. Don’t tell me you don’t know already that he travelled back in time long ago, before I possessed him, to the empire I was born in,” Sombra said and closed his eyes. “You and he have something in common. You both met me when I was but a prince.”
Celestia frowned. She had been informed of the memory lock that had been put on Private Iceland and briefly what it had been about. The princess had though not asked for full disclosure since, as far as she was concerned, it was none of her business to know.
A food cart was soon pushed into the room by a maid, Celestia thanked her and dismissed the pony. Then she used her magic to push the cart all the way to the bed. Sombra raised his head. For a second nothing happened. The king sighed, remembering he couldn’t levitate. Using his hooves, he grabbed the cover off the plate. Then he just bent over and started greedily gobbling up his meal, too famished to care about dining etiquettes.
The sun princess watched. She noted that the staff had remembered to provide some fish and meat produce as per her instructions. Although not on the menu of her subjects, they did have visitors from other lands that did eat meat and so there had been some available.
When Sombra finished, he lay back down, sighing in contentment. Celestia moved the cart away and moved in closer, sitting down by the side of the bed.
“I suppose it would be too much to ask to modify the manacle to allow me simple levitation,” Sombra remarked, feeling quite a bit better with a meal in his stomach.
“Tell me, why Private?” Celestia asked instead of responding to that. The king eyed her, raising one eyebrow.
“What do you want to hear? That I still claim him as mine? That I consider him a friend? Perhaps I just enjoy messing up his life so much.” Sombra rose up to lie on his stomach, crossed his forelegs and regarded the princess with narrow eyes. “Why are you so interested?”
“Private is an Equestrian citizen and as his princess, it is my duty to protect him from enemies of Equestria, which you have proven yourself to be on multiple occasions,” the princess said, narrowing her own eyes. “You of all know that I will do everything I can to protect them. I’ve personally seen the damage you have done to him and his brother. I’m only delivering you to him because he agreed to it.”
“Your mother would certainly agree with such sentiments,” she then said. Sombra sneered and fell silent. “So, I ask again. Why Private Iceland?”
“Considering my options, I had little desire to reside anywhere close to the ponies that killed me. I considered him the best option because…” Sombra lowered his head and laid it on top of his legs. “I miss him.”
Celestia arched her brow. There had been something strange in the tone of the king’s voice when saying that. Almost sincerity. She activated her horn and used her magic to fiddle with the manacle on his horn, then she rose to stand.
“I’ve granted you limited levitation - small objects only. You can’t throw with it and you can’t use it on living beings,” she told him and turned to walk away. “I’ll let you rest; Luna will come tomorrow to pick you up.”
“And Sombra,” Celestia said when she reached the door. The king slowly looked up. “Do not make us regret this.”
Sombra didn’t respond, just lowered his head again. The princess waited for a moment before shaking her head and left the room. As she did she instructed the guards to not enter the room unless it was an emergency and that Sombra was not allowed to leave it. They saluted and Celestia departed.
In the guest room, Sombra rested. Stomach full, he now fully appreciated being on a soft bed instead of the cold hard cage floor in Tartarus. He couldn’t really complain at the moment. So far things were going mostly where he had figured they would.
‘Why do you hide, my Little Shadow?’ The king scowled and opened his eyes a crack. Old words from a distant memory began surfacing.
‘My queen, perhaps the boy is too young…’ another voice from the past invaded his mind.
‘Do you presume to tell me how to raise my child, Captain!’ the sharp voice of his mother snapped.
‘Not at all, my queen, but he is only seven winters…’ Sombra shook his head.
‘Indeed, and time for him to see his enemies, our enemies!’ Rabia snapped. The king sneered and closed his eyes tight.
He saw a battlefield in the desert. Armored ponies were charging towards another army. He saw pegasi in the air, magic energies were flying around. His mother stood tall and proud on an elevated area of rocks, clad in armor and her regal cape flowing in the desert wind. Next to her was a heavily-armored unicorn. He looked grim. The king saw himself, as a colt, trying to hide behind his mother, shielding his eyes from the carnage that was happening below them.
Suddenly his mother pushed him forward. With her magic she put down the leg he used to shield his vision, forcing him to watch.
‘Watch, Sombra. Watch our enemies be destroyed. This will one day be your duty. To protect the empire from them.’ She said softly, gently caressing his mane. The captain gave the queen a subtle glare, then a sympathetic look to him before returning his attention back to the battle.
Sombra growled, closed his eyes tight and banished the memories. He knew though why they had surfaced; his mind had drifted to his plans. It was mostly just to get out of Tartarus and hide from his mother. Her knowing he was in Tartarus had not sat well with him. That had triggered his first memories of seeing the carnage of battle, trying to hide from that, but his mother wouldn’t allow it, forcing him to watch.
Sombra tried to focus on something else, something more pleasant. His mind seemed rather insistent on being stuck in the distant past, but then he heard something he had almost all but forgotten.
‘Well Private, it is unfortunate that you and your friend could not stay longer, but I do hope you enjoyed your visit in the empire.’ It was him, much younger.
‘I did, it was an honor to meet you, Prince Sombra.’ Private’s voice, just as dry and quiet as he remembered it being.
‘Please, just call me Sombra,’ he remembered saying, whispering softly out loud.
He saw the gates of the palace. He stood before Private, but younger, his mane and tail not flowing with power. He wore the blue cape and silver armor of a prince. He was giving something to Private. A necklace.
‘I wish for us to part as friends. Here take this,’ he said. The necklace was silver with a small flat medallion depicting a unicorn head with a curved horn.
‘Thanks,’ Private said and on his muzzle formed a smile.
Well I guess it is a more pleasant memory, Sombra grunted, then he sneered and banished that one as well into the far reaches of his mind. Enough of this past reminiscing. That won’t help me.
He did look nice, smiling like that. Sombra ignored that small voice way back in his head. Instead he tried to go over what he needed to do.
I must play nice for now. No doubt I will be under close scrutiny. At least I can levitate a little, but that won’t do much. No doubt I will be confined to the house, I seriously doubt they will grant me that much freedom. He rubbed his muzzle thoughtfully.
The king laid his head back down and relaxed his entire body. He was soon fast asleep, snoring softly into the pillow.
Celestia sipped from a tea cup as she scribbled down notes on a scroll. The Solar Princess was preparing to head off to Fillydelphia to further instruct Private and the others in his home on the security matters around Sombra. She intended to leave them with some written instructions as well.
There was though one thing she did want to do before she headed off. Which is why she was in her private parlor, where the princess sometimes hosted guests. Celestia was waiting for one in particular. In the meantime, she continued to write.
The princess furrowed her brow a little. She couldn’t say that she was happy with how things were going. King Sombra was a big enough security risk, even without his powers he could still do damage. She hoped she wouldn’t end up regretting allowing him to leave the confines of Tartarus. It was quite enough to have to deal with his mother.
Yet Celestia had to concede that she just didn’t know Rabia well enough. She had never been a threat to Equestria. Few diplomatic visits so long ago had been hardly enough to consider oneself an expert on her.
The Celestial sisters had merely been seeking recognition for their young nation. The Queen had been happy enough to do that. The Dark Ponies had no real interests up north. Their focus lay to the south, where their enemies were.
Saddle Arabia had changed though since those times. Now they had an entire museum dedicated to what they regarded as their Great Shame. Detailed, accurate depictions of what was known of Dark Pony culture, well-preserved artifacts on display. Only allowing the descendants to enter the lands once belonging to the Dark Ponies to go on a pilgrimage in their ancestral lands.
Celestia frowned a little harder. She had a feeling Queen Rabia would not care about that. Like her son, she no doubt held a powerful enmity towards them for the heinous acts of their ancestors.
The princess was brought out of her thoughts when there was a knock on the door. She glanced over, inviting whoever it was to enter. A guard peeked in, bowing his head.
“Your highness, Doctor Whooves here to see you,” he announced after rising again.
“Show him in.” Celestia nodded and rolled up the scroll and put it on a side table next to the couch she lay in.
The guard bowed again and backed out of the doorway. Soon after a light brown pony with a darker brown mane and tail and an hourglass cutie-mark entered. Though looking like an earth pony, Celestia already could feel the deep temporal magic within. This was a time pony.
“Your highness,” Whooves bowed deeply. “You wished to see me?”
“I did indeed. Please have a seat, Doctor.” Celestia gestured to the available seats.
Her guest rose from the bow and trotted to a nearby chair and sat down on it. Whooves nodded his head when the princess offered him tea. Once he had a cup in his hooves, the time pony looked at her curiously.
“So how my I serve?” he asked and took a sip.
“As I understand, some time ago, you, Private Iceland and his marefriend, Dew Doe, travelled to the Dark Pony Empire,” Celestia said and noted that the time pony got a little uncomfortable.
“Yeah… yeah we did…” Whooves nodded and had a nervous smile on his muzzle. “Not intentionally, but I sometimes took Private on historical tours through time as a favor. Dew, Foxy and her daughter Coal sometimes came along.”
“Aren’t trips like those discouraged by the Time Pony Council?” the princess wondered, her brow rising a little.
“They are, but, pardon the language your Highness, I don’t give a damn what the Time Pony Council thinks.” Doctor Whooves rolled his eyes, causing Celestia to smile a little. It was no secret that this time pony was no fan of his own secretive government.
“Private was one of my most gifted students of history in the university. The obscure facts he could remember amazed even me. He’s not judgmental, heck he disproved the notion that the Spartacorns hated anypony who wasn’t an earth pony. He’s dined with King Horsneidas himself, a unicorn sitting at the table with one of the most powerful earth pony kings to ever have existed,” Whooves continued and smiled a little in pride. “Private built his historical career on it that there was always another side of the story and it’s no wonder. His parents proved without a shadow of a doubt that the Dark Ponies where not the demon-worshipping cannibals that so many ponies thought they were.
“So at first, I started to reward him by showing him that, yes some of his theories were right. Then I asked him to help me on a few missions. His friends joined in and well, it just went from there. Foxy did travel less after Coal was born, and of course I helped them deal with Barricade when he was at his worst. I was myself proving that our method of travel was safe, time is more protected than the Time Pony Council likes to think. It’s far more sturdy than they pretend,” Whooves explained and shook his head. “But no, they just refused to see it.” Whooves grumbled and drank some of his tea. “Anyway, about the Dark Pony Empire?”
“Yes, we do not have too much time. I do have to leave soon for Fillydelphia,” Celestia chuckled, quite used to how much this pony could ramble.
“This happened before Private was possessed. I believe Twilight and her friends had finished defeating Discord. I started to detect strange energies further down the time stream and decided to investigate it,” the time pony began telling her.
“Private jumped at the opportunity, wanting to see what time period we would end up in. Dew Doe floated along, mostly probably just to be with Private,” Whooves grinned a little and Celestia chuckled.
“We landed in the Dark Pony Empire, late in Queen Rabia’s reign. I decided to allow Private and Dew to explore alone, let them determine when in her reign we had landed. Oh boy did they deliver on that. They met Queen Rabia herself and were hosted in her palace, I think for two or three days.” The time pony spread out his legs to emphasize the time period.
“That was not part of the plan. We the Time Ponies already knew that Private had been abducted by King Sombra back when he was a colt, using time scrolls written by us. That is another reason I went to teach at that University. We were keeping a subtle eye on him, knowing he would meet King Sombra again. What we didn’t expect was that he would meet Sombra before he was king,” Whooves continued and cringed a little, indicating that had clearly not been part of the plan.
“So, he did meet him as a prince,” Celestia frowned slightly, remembering King Sombra’s words earlier. This she had actually known, but it was good to have it confirmed from someone else than Sombra.
“He did and oh boy was he jumping off the walls when we finally met up again. He had always been fascinated with the legends of the Lost Son of Queen Rabia and he was pretty positive that he had just met him,” Whooves chuckled at the memory before becoming sadder. “I just didn’t have the heart to tell him that he just met the pony who had abducted him when he was little.”
“Oh?” Celestia tilted her head when hearing that.
“Yeah, Private was in love. He was completely and utterly smitten. He tried to ask if we couldn’t stay a little longer, kept talking about the prince, kept caressing that necklace Prince Sombra gave him,” the time pony’s voice lowered, then he sighed deeply.
“When we got back, we didn’t even return to the same spot we had travelled from. We landed right in the council chambers of the Time Pony Council. They were furious. Private and Dew had to wait outside while I tried to argue with them, but they wouldn’t even listen to me. They were too stuck up, too worried what might happen when Private would eventually be possessed and remember Sombra as Prince Sombra and thus reveal he was a time traveler.” Whooves narrowed his eyes. “They ordered me to lock their memories of the events. That was the worst thing I ever had to do to my friends. Before the lock, Private was heartbroken that he wouldn’t be allowed to remember his time in the empire. He was devastated.”
“I have forbidden them from doing these memory locks on my subjects again,” Celestia assured him with a sharp nod.
“And I thank you for that. As far as I’m concerned, that was an abuse of power. The worst thing was they absolutely forbade me from interfering with Private when he finally would encounter Sombra. I listened the first time, but after seeing Private in the hospital in the Crystal Empire, I didn’t listen for the second time. I broke protocol and restored those memories, hoping they might help him, if just to cope and remember who Sombra used to be.” Whooves looked up, there were tears in his eyes.
“I’m still too scared to go to them and apologize for my part in this. They should remember now how angry they were at the Council and me. I still remember that hateful glare Dew gave me when I locked the memories inside Private, watching him slowly go from heartbroken and pleading not to take those memories away from him and right back to his usual neutral, bored expression, having no idea what was going on anymore. This was no better than doing non-consensual lobotomy on him,” the Time Pony sniffed and sipped his tea. Celestia watched him sympathetically.
“What about the energies you detected?” she asked, a little curious on what that had been about. The princess became a little concerned at the dark look that came over Whooves.
“They were proof. Proof of what I had always been telling them. The time stream was mending itself without any input, repairing the damage King Sombra caused when he was pulling ponies back in time. Me going back in time with Private and Dew was actually part of that mending. The time stream itself wanted us to be there,” Whooves growled and almost threw the teacup to the floor, but the Time Pony held himself back, took a deep breath and calmed himself down.
Celestia shook her head sadly, glad that now that she had forbidden this now. She finished her tea and put the cup down on the table.
“Thank you for telling me this. It gave me a certain perspective that I needed,” the princess said, smiling at the Doctor who just quietly nodded.
“I have to go to Fillydelphia now. You are aware what Private has agreed to?” she asked. Again Whooves just nodded.
“They can do it. We have faced worse together. Queen Maxilla was once hunting us down,” he chuckled weakly.
“You are going to have to tell me that story at a better time,” Celestia smiled and started to rise up, as did the Time Pony.
“I will, your highness,” he assured her and put his own cup down on the table.
End chapter 5