//------------------------------//
// Chapter 1 - A Dark Awakening 
// Story: All the King's Mares (Book 1/3) 
// by AdrianJNovelle 
//------------------------------//

	Darkness. Then a light. It was purple. And it emanated from the horn of Twilight Sparkle, who remained curled up in a corner of the colorless environment.
“Hello?...Anypony there?” she asked the darkness, her meek voice mysteriously echoing for what sounded like miles. She rose to her hooves weakly, as if she had not stood in quite some time. “Hello?” she called out with more enthusiasm. “Anypony there?”
There was no response.
Suddenly, a small creature – resembling a Parasprite – lit up as it came into view. It was orb-shaped and kept itself afloat with a pair of small wings which vibrated rapidly. It possessed no legs or arms or feelers of any kind, but just two circular eyes which never seemed to blink and a mouth looking like a hyphen written across its visage. 
“Huh?” Twilight asked as the creature neared her. It darted around her wildly. Then halted in front of her. She stared at it intently. “That’s cute,” she said. She outstretched her hoof, the creature darting right out of her reach. She tried again, but the creature zoomed beyond her reach once more. 
It started on a path through the environment, traveling through the cavern as if it could see brightness in the night. It soon came to a definite location, and flew around in perfect circles continuously, as if marking a spot. Twilight followed the creature, her hooves taking small, quiet steps through the darkness, until she reached the spot where the creature was. She looked down at her hooves to find a large, purple staff in the dimly lit dirt below. The staff curved into an almost-complete circle at the top, a quill sticking out of the top, a note – looking just like a letter from Princess Celestia – was strapped to the bottom. 
“Huh, what’s this?” she asked, sliding the note out of the staff, seating herself and reading it by the candlelight of the glowing creature. It read:

Twilight Sparkle,

I not have the time to tell you my story, but I am being imprisoned. I know not where I am. Whomever this note reaches, please use this staff to enhance your magical powers, so you may gain access to the outside world, and free me from this bloody hell. There is no light where I live: only darkness and bloodshed. Pinkie Pie would hate it here. Go! Time is short! Be on thy way! You are my last hope, Twilight! 

- Celestia

“Oh my goodness!” Twilight exclaimed. “Princess Celestia! She’s in trouble! I have to help her! But how?”
The creature which had been spinning in circles had retained a certain position in front of Twilight. It spoke not a word, nor made any noise of any kind: it just levitated in midair. Twilight looked down at the wand at her hooves again. She picked it up and held it in her grasp. She squinted her eyes as a fire sparked inside her.
“With this staff, and this magic floaty thingy, I, Twilight Sparkle, shall have the mighty super-villain rue the day they imprisoned Princess Celestia!”
A thought came to her.
“But…who is the super-villain?”
She eyed the floating creature.
It made no noise other than the scarcely audible sound of its flapping wings.
“You led me to this staff,” she began, pausing. “Surely you can lead me to a way out of here…right?”
The creature did not move.
After a moment, Twilight grunted.
“Fine, I’ll get outta here myself,” she said. 
As Twilight started on her way through the caverns, she began to feel a sensation of déjà vu come upon her. She reached a corner, her reflection staring back at her several times as she approached what appeared to be a crystal of some sort. The creature followed her shadow, bringing light to the environment. Its reflection appeared in the surrounding crystalline structures. A look around the dim place, and Twilight started seeing several exploded crystal structures, as if shot at by a beam. 
“I remember this place,” she said. “This is where Chrysalis imprisoned me when I tried to stop her from marrying my brother back at the wedding.” She browsed the vast room, eyeing every crystal and crystalized stalagmite in sight. “But how’d I end up here of all places? This doesn’t make sense!”
The Parasprite-like creature casually followed Twilight as she moved about the cavern.
“Wait a minute…that means I’m under Canterlot!” she exclaimed.
Twilight hurried through the cavern, to the wall where she discovered Princess Cadence way back when. She used her memory and the light of the creature behind her to find her way through the underground chasm. She came to the tracks of the abandoned mining facility, but not a cart in sight. She halted her exploration, unable to cross this obstacle.
“Shoot!” she began. “If only there was another cart here, I could ride along the tracks and break outta here, and I don’t know any spells for materializing objects!”
Twilight seated herself to ponder this puzzle. She only waited a mere second before the staff she had carried all this way illuminated. It just might work. She picked up the staff, closed her eyes, and envisioned a mining cart on the tracks in front of her. A mystical sound was heard. She opened her eyes. No new cart had appeared in front of her. But her hooves felt differently. She brought one up to her face to find it slick and slippery, and practically frictionless. 
“Okay,” she said doubtfully. She picked up the staff with her mouth. “If I understand this correctly, all I have to do is…” she took a few steps back and leapt into the air, landing right on the rails of the tracks, acceleration immensely as soon as her hooves hit the surface. She wanted to scream, but feared losing the wand in her mouth. Her widened, fearful eyes expressed her uncertain and frightful emotions. As she picked up speed, the wand began to tremble in her mouth, unable to stay balanced by the enormous amount of momentum she was building up. Finally, it just slipped out of her jaw and went flying down the shaft.
“Oh, no!” Twilight cried, watching in horror as the staff fell faster into the darkness than she was. It fell straight down into the black depths of nowhere, while Twilight – now unable to see – sped along the tracks of the shaft. At last she felt a break and was thrown off the tracks and onto solid ground. She was not hurt, but was considerably disoriented. She used her magic to enhance her horn to brighten her surroundings, for she had lost contact with the Parasprite-like creature and the wand. 
“Where am I?” she asked as she began to wander through the darkness. After a few moments, a dim light appeared before her. She picked up speed, and started galloping to her destination. Faster and faster she charged, closing her eyes from the intense brightness, but not stopping until she reached the light.
The light was outside, in the world of Equestria. 
Twilight had appeared in Canterlot; rather, a ruined version of Canterlot. The entire city was in rubble: debris everywhere, smoke emanating from every building which had appeared to have previously been on fire. Many smaller establishments were completely desecrated. The streets were destroyed and barely visible from the layer of black ash which had spread over the ground like a blanket.
Twilight wandered through the decimated city.
“Oh my gosh,” she said, her mouth gaped and her eyes suddenly transfixed with a sense of horrid fear. “What happened?”