//------------------------------// // (Bonus #2) No breaks allowed // Story: Horsemen and Ponies // by Dark Krystal //------------------------------// “Mnnnnnn….” Cadence slowly opens her eyes. She finds herself staring up at the familiar crystalline ceiling of the hospital. “Huh? What am I doing here-” Cadence’s eyes widen as she remembers, the strange bipedal creature that broke into the crystal empire. She remembers her attempt to stop it only for it to grab and throw her at the group of guards. That explained the pain she felt throughout her body. Cadence groans and slowly rises only to fall back onto her bed and grit her teeth in pain. “Princess?”  Cadence turns her head to look at the see a crystal pony doctor stopped at the doorway, seeing her awake he rushes over immediately. “Doctor Girasol.” Cadence gives a warm but pained smile, the doctor gives a loud sigh of relief before giving his own smile. “How long have i been out?” Cadence gives him a look of worry “Only for two hours, princess. You’ll be up in no time though! You just have some bruising and minor fractures.” She sighs, happy that she wasn’t in a coma just because she was thrown into a group of guards at high speeds.    “Thats Good… Where’s Shining Armor?” Upon saying his name the doctor demeanor changed, he looks away and rubs the back of his neck. Clearly trying to find the words that won’t worry her but failing. “.........Doctor Girasol?” “I… I must apologize, princess. Prince Shining Armor received more… crucial injuries than uh... you .” Cadence eyes widen. What happened? Did Shining fight that creature!?  Cadence felt her heart start to speed up as fear started to take hold of her heart. She quickly sits up and puts her hooves on the doctor's shoulders and glares at him. “Take me to him.” Girasol shivered slightly at the seriousness of Cadence’s voice but nodded his head. Cadence gets up off the bed with some struggle but her determination to find out about her husband made the pain fade. Girasol leads her out of the room and down the hallway. As they walk by the passing nurses and doctors are shocked before quickly bowing as Cadence passes, happiness and relief appearing on their faces.  Going to the end of the hallway Cadence finds a room guarded by two crystal guards who bow down to Cadence and open the door for her.  Walking in Cadence sees her beloved, laying on the bed. Bandages wrapped around his torso and bandages wrapped around his head to his bottom jaw to help support it. Cadence gasps and rushes over to him and places her hooves on the bed. “Shining!”  Shining Armor turned his head over and looked at her, the tired look in his eyes showed she’d just work him up from a nap but the small smile that formed on his lips showed he was happy to see her.  “I’mn gwad yu’re oawy, Cdene.” Shining armor spoke before wincing a bit in pain. “No, no! I’m glad you’re okay!” Doctor Girasol stared at the couple as the assigned nurse walked in but stopped seeing the couple reunited.  “Dwo’t woarry, i’vwe taken wnorze hitzs thawn dis! ...Ow” “Oh hush, don’t speak, you dolt.” Cadence gently smacks him andsmiles. “She can understand him?” The nurse looked at Doctor Girasol with shock. “It seems so… We should leave them be for now.” The two nodded before taking their leave. Cadence sighs and nuzzles Shining, she couldn’t describe the worry she felt when seeing the doctor's reaction. She wondered if the creature also threw him at the guards but when he healed she’ll find out… ah that's right…. The creature. Cadence demeanor changed from relief to anger making Shining tense up. ‘That creature… If i see it ever again. I’ll… I’lll…’ Cadence furrows her brow and never feels this angry before... Being unfamiliar with  this much anger she expresses her anger through pouting. She honestly didn’t know what she’d do if she saw that creature again, her citizens always followed the law except for a few petty crimes or accidents and the big ones were usually big villains like Sombra or Chrysalis. She had a dungeon… would that work? Maybe some jail time will teach the creature a lesson? Cadence pouts more as she grows frustrated at her inability to decide a punishment if she saw that creature again.  “Cdene?” Cadence snaps out of her frustration and looks at shining, concern on his face as she realizes her mistake. “Ah… Sorry. I’m not upset at you.. It’s just…” She sighs. “That creature.. Just makes me so…” Cadence grits her teeth before shaking her head. Shining reaches over and wraps an arm around her neck to bring her close for another nuzzle, making her relax. “Sorry… I'm just upset that this happened to you… I'm glad we weren’t out with Flurr- '' Cadence and Shining’s eyes widened as they realized they left their daughter alone for an hour… with that creature running about. “FLURRY HEART!” “FWURWY HWERT!” “She’s okay!”  Cadence and Shining turn their heads to the familiar voice to see Sunburst walking in the room with a nervous look. “I heard about the incident and checked with the guards. She’s asleep according to t-them.” Cadence gives a sigh and warm smile to sunburst before noticing the arm brace around his right foreleg. “Sunburst! What happened to you!?” “Oh… uh……………” Sunbursts looks at his leg and opens his mouth to find the words but ends up walking over to the window and looking out.  “That.”  Cadence raises a brow before walking over and looking in the same direction. In the distance she could see Sunburst’s house with a crystal heart from one of the many spike statues embedded in it. “Oh.” “Yeah…” The two stared at it in silence for a while. Cadence knew she shouldn’t have approved of using the hardest crystals in the empire for the spike statues. “I’m sorry…” “I-it’s not your fault… it was … probably an accident i’m just…” Sunburst sighs and looks down. “A book I ordered months ago that kept getting delayed finally came in and the statue…. Destroyed it…” Sunburst looks down for a while. Cadence frowns seeing Sunburst like this, just as she reaches a hoof out to console the bookworm he turns awya and heads to the door. “I-i need to be by myself f-for a bit…” “I… understand.” Cadence watches as Sunburst leaves the room. Cadence looks back out the window to Sunbursts home one more time and then down to see the large gathering of her citizens waiting in front of the hospital. She knew they were probably worried and scared, after all their leaders were taken out  by a strange creature. ‘I should address my citizens.. But first i need a report of what happened…’ Cadence could feel the upcoming headache from both the injury and the additional  work she now has to deal with. She just wanted a moment to herself and Shining today.. Not this.  'No breaks allowed I guess...' She groans internally before walking over to Shining and kissing his cheek. “I wish i could stay by your side longer but… i need to make sure everything is okay…” Shining Armor nods and kisses her cheek back making Cadence smile. She wishes him good recovery as she heads out. Standing between her guards she frowns and turns to the guard on her right. “Get me a piece of paper and a pen. I need to send a letter.” ...Three hours later… Celestia and Luna look over the two letters from their younger princess’s both bearing heavy news laid out on the table, the sisters sharing looks of concern. Ember was defeated by a non-pony and their tool to decide new leaders was destroyed, now some dragons seek to attack Equestrian towns. The Crystal Empire was invaded by a creature and received some damages which was nothing but Cadance and Shining armor were attacked by the creature leading them to discover a rising issue. The descriptions of the beings behind these incidents.  Going over the sketch Twilight sent and the description of the invader that Cadance wrote down, they seemed to be the same species. A species neither Celestia nor Luna has never seen nor head off before. Luna looks away from the letter to focus on her sister. “Two leaders were harmed by the same species… and the one that attacked  Ember hath set its sight upon us, Dear sister.”  “Yes… this looks like a group effort to take over Equestria.” “If we’re dealing with stray dragons and these two creatures then we need to increase our defenses.” “I agree. We should focus on Canterlot and the most populated locations in Equestria.... Though…” Celestia furrows her brows as she looks back over to Cadence's letter. Luna raises a brow “Is something amiss?” “Yes… Cadence said the creature arrived from the northern gate.” Luna stares at Celestia for a bit with a raised brow before it clicks. “Yakyakistan…” Celestia nods. “If the creature came from the northern gate... It is possible that it went through Yakyakistan. However I received a letter from Prince Rutherford yesterday about the meeting to restart our trade again. It is possible it didn’t visit Yakyakistan but even then straying from the main path is a fatal endeavor…” “Do you believe the yaks have met and perhaps sent the creature to the Crystal Empire? Are they conspiring to take over Equestria?” Luna scowls. Celestia couldn’t help but chuckle at that, it could be possible but the… yaks? Celestia couldn’t help but laugh further. “Sister! ‘Tis possible!” “Hahaha!  Perhaps but unlikely…” Celestia lets out one last chuckle before looking at her sister. “We can ask Prince Rutherford during the meeting this weekend but for now we must focus on our security and ensure our little ponies can sleep and go throughout their days peacefully.” Luna nods in approval but the frown sticks to her face. “Which brings another issue… Should we issue warrants? We do have the supposed image of one and we’re sure with Cadence's description we can possibly  make another sketch but….” “...It would make the public aware…” Celestia chimes in. “Indeed, it could cause a mass panic… but could help capture these two quickly.” Celestia’s frown returns.  “While you’re correct, Luna. I believe we should keep this hidden from the public for now.” “Why? ‘Tis clearly a grave issue! We mustn’t delay their capture!!” “Luna, think about it. If we placed these warrents out and let them spread throughout Equestria as dragons attack… Our interspecies issues will only increase.” “Ah…” Luna opens her mouth but closes and lets out of a sigh.  “Correct… the incidents with Tirek and Chrysalis thou have noticed our ponies are very wary around the other creatures… sometimes even “rude” We shall put it lightly.” “Yes. With the elements help we were able to start to fix the issues between yaks, dragons & ponies and if we were to post wanted images of two non-equstrian creatures while start dragons attack us...” Celestia puts hoof on her head and shakes her head. “Maybe that's their goal… to divide us even more…” Celestia and Luna stand there in silence, for a bit before Celestia speaks up once more. “We can wonder about their goals later.. Right now we need to start sending letters and orders in preparation.”   Luna nods. “We agree, we shall give new orders to the guards and send small levies to towns. We shall also check our security measures once more.” Celestia nods. “I will send responses to Twilight and Cadence in return.” With that settled Luna starts to leave the room when Celestia calls out to her once again. “Ah! Luna, did you send a diplomat over to Griffonstone? This is a crucial time for us to start foraging stronger bonds with other kingdoms so we won’t fall apart easily.”  Luna freezes in place. She had forgotten and the meeting between them and the other kingdoms was soon. Luna curses internally and turns her head to look at  her sister. “Ah Yes. We have already sent a d-diplomat over to Griffonstone for the invitation.” Celestia smiles oblivious to her lie. “Good! That’s all, i‘ll see you at dinner, sister.” Luna nods and exits the room and starts to speed walk down the corridor. She’ll speak and organize the guards and security first and find a suitable diplomat that can be sent to Griffonstone ASAP. Luna thinks over her options and scowls, most of their diplomats needed at least a couple days or a week to prepare before travelling and she only had two days. Luna wanted to hit her head against the wall for forgetting something so important. Thinking over her remaining options she finds one that she can “force” to go immediately. Griffonstone was now a weak kingdom after all, her sister might not like it but Griffonstone isn’t THAT important for the meeting. “Little Blueblood has some Diplomatic experience... Right?”