//------------------------------// // Chapter - 3: A Past // Story: Sunset’s First Friend // by rpglover //------------------------------// Standing in the dim light hallway confusedly is a lone human girl with a swirling red and yellow hair as she looked at the place she found herself to be in. Questioning how she had got here, a place that looked to be familiar, but she could not put a finger to it why. Getting a better view through the glass pane that shone the moon’s light through, her eyes widen in both wonder and confounded. Wondering why she was back in the only place she wished to be as far away from as possible, the Canterlot Castle. She looked up at the moon which looked to appear full; but with a closer glance, there was just a sliver of shadow on the edge of the right side of the moon. The silhouette of an Unicorn could be seen clearly on the surface of the moon. That was but another question she had, having heard from Twilight that the mare of the moon had been freed and the silhouette was all but gone. So then why was it there? Why was she here and why was she not a pony? Questions only grew as she tried to look around for any sign of an answer before she heard a familiar voice that ached from the back of her mind. “Sunset Shimmer!” She out of instinct, turned nervously towards the harsh tone of the voice to find who called out to her. Finding a pale white alicorn standing as tall as her with a flowing mane of multitude of colors, her eyes widen in awed at the glory of this pony. She had an air of authority; her stance was without flaw as she stared harshly towards her. “Princess Celestia! What happened? Why am I here, and why am I not a po-“ her voice was shortly cut when another pony walked through her, paying the human girl no mind as if she were a ghost. Sunset’s eyes widen in more surprise as she saw who was the pony that had walked through her like a ghost, a filly with an orange coat and red and yellow mane down to her tail. That’s me! “Y-yes Princess?” The filly asked nervously to the alicorn that towered over her. Celestia took notice of her nervousness as she slowly dropped her anger demeanor just enough to ease the scared filly of any fear she may have. Calming herself with a sigh before returning her attention to the filly, “Where were you Sunset Shimmer?” Sunset watched in bewilderment as the scene playing out looked familiar to her, looking over towards her younger pony counterpart to confirm her suspicion to find what she was looking for; on the filly’s sides were what you would never expect to find on a Unicorn. A pair of wings, though they were not feathery as any normal pony’s, for these were transparent like shadow and if it wasn’t for the lighting of the room, others may have noticed them as well. She followed the filly’s shadow that shines against the wall parallel from the window. Instead of finding the shadow of a unicorn like one would come to expect, she saw a shadow of a pony with not a horn, but a pair of wings stretched out, there was someone else here, or rather somepony. ‘Nightcast!’ she thought in surprise, unaware of a small shed of tear peering through a corner of her right eye. Her attention fell back on the two ponies as they played out a scene that she could recall every moment of. “I was in my studies” the filly and Sunset both said in unison, the filly stumbled backwards when she heard a hoof slamming into the floorboard from across her. “Don’t lie to me!” Celestia’s voice boomed through the hallway that both Sunset had to block their ears to not have them burst. Seeing the filly’s frightful scene, Celestia calmed her rage as she regain her composure, “A guard had informed me that they saw you sneaking out.” Sunset struggled to explain her reason for leaving the castle in the middle of the night, something that the current Sunset was aware of the reason of. The filly gave a sigh as she gave the Princess a concerned look, “Sorry, I was wanting some fresh air.” She hoped that Celestia would buy this excuse, whether she had not wanted to try and press further and gave up questioning or her lie had managed to fool the Princess, even the current Sunset could not figure out. Why she snuck out was because no pony would believe her if she had told them that she was wanting to soar through the skies with shadow like wings. It was something she had questioned how they even worked, being able to carry a physical creature of mass with something made of reflection of a light. But that question paled in comparison to having the chance to soar like a Pegasus or for her case, an Alicorn. They watched as Celestia trotted towards the filly, to which she flinched back in fearful of what punishment she would receive from the Sun Goddess. Her fear was unfounded when the Princess pulled the filly in to a warm embracing hug. “I was worry for you my faithful student. Next time, inform me if you wanted some fresh air.” She whispered softly to the filly, it felt like a motherly comfort to the filly, one that she returned with embrace. The human Sunset looked at this achingly as she clenched her chest as if it were in pain, struggling to fight back from collapsing in tear at this. She had almost all but forgotten what it was like having a motherly figure or the feeling with it, something she had thought that she could live without knowing. Having lived her life alone for four years after leaving Equestria behind; leaving the Princess who she thought of as a mother; and the first friend who had ever accepted her. Having remembered, she looked over to the shadow to find that it had changed from a Pegasus back to a Unicorn. She looked confusedly at this moment, having not remembered that he had left; though she hadn’t been paying attention of him back then when she had been caught sneaking out by Celestia, but it begged the question to her of where he had gone too. Having look around for possibly finding the shadow of her friend; she spot something that appeared unusual from what she had remembered. A picture frame of an elderly stallion with a light blue coat and grey wild mane and mustache. The plaque that reads below reads, Albert Hoovenstein. What was unusual about this painting was that within the picture was a silhouette of a shadow pony with red eyes glaring back at her, as if it were following the human Sunset. She walked over towards it to examine it only to see it continue to keep its gaze on her. It gave her an eerie feeling, as if the creature that was looking from through the picture. As she was reaching a hand out towards the picture, moments away from touching it, a sound of broken glass quickly pulled her attention away as she turned around towards where the sound came from. She found not what caused the sound, but that was nothing to what she found; or rather couldn’t find. All around her, there was an empty black void; she looked around to find what happened to everything around her. The only thing she could find was the small patch of marble like floorboard below her, turning back towards the painting to find that it had disappeared along with the rest of the room. Questions only continued to run through her mind at full speed as she tried to come to term with what was happening. Her time questioning was drawing short as the ground below her was slowly fading from existence, fearful of falling into the dark abyss below; A pair of teal color eyes like her own appearing in the dark abyss below. The eyes glaring back towards her felt familiar; the laughter the abyss made were similar to her own, “Thinking that you could be rid of me, but you can never be free from your Nightmares!” it spoke with a scratchy demonic voice. Her eyes widen in realization to who it was, before having a chance to speak or react; the floor had all but disappeared enough to make her lose her footing. Causing her to stumble and fall into the dark abyss. Screaming loudly as she disappears into the distance of the darkness. Sunset woke up, having found that she had fallen off her bunk bed completely wrapped in her blanket. Removing herself from the blanket and raising to her feet as she placed a hand on the small bump on the back of her head. She glanced around the room for any signs of anything unusual, though she could not understand why; she felt the need to confirm that everything was as it should. Having find her bed behind her where she had just fell off; her desk to the left of her in a corner of the wall with a desk lamp and two books on top of it; her backpack hanging off the chair’s backrest; her closet on the opposite direction of the desk; next to its’ doors is her red electric guitar and a broken down sound speaker; a small shelves with a few knickknack drilled onto the wall; and hanging against her bedroom door was a single silver skeleton key. Her eyes widen as she took notice of the key, it is a keepsake to remind her of the one who gave it to her. The design was of it was like any other skeleton key, but on it were designs put with the most care by some craftmanship. On the shaft of it were equestrian ancient rune writings engraved into it, something which Sunset had struggled in deciphering their meaning with her limited knowledge of ancient equestrian magic. At the bow of it were a professionally design look of what seems to be a white star. She rose the key into her hand to get a look at the old thing, she had wanted to know what this key was for and what mysteries it held; but the one who had given her this key had warned her to never let it out of her sight and to not tell anypony else of its existence. Watching the key for a few extra minutes before her cellphone started to buzz, alerting the girl of an incoming text message. She headed towards it to glance at who could be sending her a message this early of the day, speaking of time; she looked at it curious to know for herself what time it was. It shown in a bright white color 3:21 AM, “Great, who could be sending me a text at three-twenty in the mornin’?” she asked out to no one with a deadpan tone. Looking to find that it was a message from Pinkie Pie; “Got great news to tell everyone at Sugar Cube Corner at 11:45. Be there for a big surprise!” and she looked confusedly at an emoji of a pink earth pony throwing confetti over her. She questioned what Pinkie had to tell them, but she was too tired to care and went to return to sleep. She’ll find out whatever she has to tell them in the morning.