Luna sat down on 'Celestia's chair' in the throne room and began to think. Why was Tia so upset over our bird friend? she wondered. If anything, we should be upset being her friends and all. As far as we know, Tia didn't even like her, let alone miss her when she was gone. Suddenly, the door creaked open, and Celestia walked in slowly, freezing Luna's thoughts. She looked at Luna.
"Move," she commanded softly but seriously. Luna just stared at her at first, but when Celestia gave her a glare that would not allow any contradictory words, she galloped away from the chair. Celestia sat down on the chair and put her one of her hooves to her cheek. She sighed.
"What will I do, Luna?" she questioned. "Equestria depends on us finding this bird. I can't rest thinking about the power she has..."
Luna blinked. "Pardon?" she asked, tilting her head. "She's just a bird."
"She's not just a bird," Celestia said bitterly. "She's a very powerful bird."
"She's a hatchling," Luna argued back. "Not a pony-eating phoenix."
"Yes, I know... But when she grows up, she will become powerful. And we need to teach her to use it for good instead of evil. We don't want her to kill everpony, do we? As it is, she already knows plenty of magic, both good and evil. Soon, once we find her, we will need to reform Discord also, just in case if she does get out of hoof. I can't even imagine how much damage she could do to Equestria if she turns against us."
"So, thou will be using Discord, Discord of all things, the master of chaos, as an item to stop her? Pfft..."
"Yes."
"But, Tia, how could thou use him if he attacks thou?"
"Don't worry, Luna" -She put her hoof up to her mouth to quieten her down- "I have a plan."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Cindy woke up to see light blinding her eyes. She moaned. Fluttershy was standing beside her, blocking out a little bit of the light.
"Good morning, Sleepyhead," Fluttershy smiled. "You slept in a little more than usual, so I was going to wake you up, but you looked so happy, so I didn't. At least until it got a bit too late, then I did."
"Five more minutes," Cindy moaned, pulling the blanket over her head.
"But it's so late already," Fluttershy sighed. "You'll be late for school."
"Why didn't you say so?!" Cindy gasped, jumping out of the bed. She galloped as fast as she could, found a hairbrush and combed her mane. She rushed out the door with her saddlebags floating in front of her with her magic. Fluttershy dashed after her, telling her softly to wait, but she didn't hear.
At school, they learned much more maths than usual, because yesterday was History Day and they learned a lot of history. They learned a little bit about Ponyville today too, but no where near as much as yesterday. The day seemed to fly for Cindy, but that's because they were actually off school early. Fluttershy was nearly inside the classroom instead of outside when they finished up.
"Cindy," she said quietly. "The princess is here to see Ponyville,"
"She is?" Cindy implored, looking at the chariot arriving in Ponyville. "Don't worry, Fluttershy. If we go, she'll just think we're a face in the crowd."
"I hope so, Cindy."
As the chariot landed in the middle of Ponyville, crowds of ponies gathered around from all around Ponyville to greet the princess. The third pony to greet the princess, was in fact Cindy. Cindy had tried to hurry as fast as she could to make herself seem like a noble pony who loved Princess Celestia. She couldn't help but shake in her presence, however. Celestia noticed, but fortunately decided to think that it was nothing. When the ponies finally stopped bowing before her, she went to the library to talk to Twilight and her friends together. Cindy came too, but stayed outside, looking in the window.
"Any luck with finding the bird, Twilight?" Celestia asked hopefully.
"No," Twilight admitted solemnly. "It's useless. It could be anywhere!"
Celestia's horn glowed with magic and started dragging her towards Fluttershy. Fluttershy stepped back a little, but the more she moved back, the more the magic brought Celestia closer.
"Did you see the bird, Fluttershy?" Celestia asked, looking down at her seriously.
"N-No," Fluttershy insisted, looking behind her, guiltily.
"Don't lie to me, Fluttershy."
"I didn't see her..."
"Fluttershy"-Celestia sighed.-"It's really important that you tell me! It's more important than you think. Please?"
"No!" Fluttershy said as loudly as she could, galloping over to the window, raising her hooves violently, but opening the window gently and galloping out.
Celestia flew after her. In Fluttershy's house, Celestia managed to persuade her to tell her where she was.
"Fluttershy," she said, hugging her with her wings. "You need to tell me. I won't hurt her or kill her or anything like that. I just need to take her with me. Please?"
Fluttershy didn't want to betray Cindy, but she had to tell. "She's in the library, on the window."
"Thank you, Fluttershy," Princess Celestia added as she walked out the door to find Cindy. Fluttershy sighed. I broke a pinkie promise... she thought. Both Pinkie and Cindy will be upset with me now... She watched as Celestia walked away when she realized that she really shouldn't have told her at all. Maybe Cindy was right! Fluttershy thought. Maybe the princess did want to kill her or hurt her. Maybe she was just telling me that so she wouldn't try to stop her!
At the library, Cindy sat down, waiting for Fluttershy to come back for her. After a while of waiting, she saw Princess Celestia approaching her from the corner of her eye. Cindy pretended to be honored by her princess, bowing down before her.
"Did you see a small, red bird, little one?" Celestia asked, smiling at her.
"Nope," Cindy smiled.
"Are you sure?"
"No- Yes. But I can help you." They both started searching the library, inside and outside. After a while, Celestia gave up and started using her magic. Her magic tried it's best to locate Cindy, retracing everywhere she was. When she stopped in front of Cindy, she stopped her magic.
"What's this? My magic leads me to you, little one. That can't be right." She walked away to try again, not noticing Cindy's fearful eyes. As she tried again, the same result happened again: she was led to Cindy. "Strange," she said, peering at Cindy. Then she realized something. She started using her magic, directing it towards Cindy. When it reached her, it forced her to turn into a bird.
"Uh oh," she muttered to herself. Before Celestia could do anything, she flew towards to door as fast as she could. Celestia spun around and her magic closed the door shut just before Cindy reached it. The magic then reached out and grabbed Cindy, levitating her in front of Celestia.
Celestia grinned triumphantly at her. "I have you now," she said, opening the door and walking out, Cindy floating behind her. Cindy stared at the ground in defeat. She wondered what punishment would await her. As they went into the chariot, she noticed Fluttershy flying towards them.
"Fluttershy!" she cried out happily.
Celestia noticed Fluttershy and ordered the guards to go faster. The guards flew quickly into the air as fast as they could. Fluttershy couldn't keep up. Cindy's smile soon disappeared. Fluttershy tried to go faster, but as she did, Celestia turned around and blasted her with her magic. Fluttershy fell into a tree below, though she wasn't majorly hurt because it was only a light blast.
"Cindy!" she cried out as loudly as she could as she watched them disappear from her sight.
Looking down, she saw Twilight, Rarity and Applejack standing there, looking up at her.
"Are ya alright, Sugarcube?" Applejack asked, an anxious look on her face. "We saw ya falling into that tree and wondered if ya'll were okay."
"Yes," Fluttershy frowned, flying down to them. "I'm okay, but there's something wrong with Princess Celestia."
~~~~~~~~~
At Canterlot, Celestia jumped out of the chariot. With her magic still grasping Cindy, she flew down to the old cave beneath Canterlot which held Princess Cadence and Shining Armour when the Changelings attacked. "I love this cave," Celestia's voice echoed through the cave. "It's my favourite place to stay and think."
"That's... nice," Cindy smiled sarcastically.
"You don't like it?" Celestia asked, grinning at Cindy. "Well that's too bad, because this is where you will be staying!"
Before Cindy could reply, Celestia turned to face a rock behind her where Cindy saw a figure walking forward from. When it got close enough for her to see, she saw a small, white filly with a bright pink mane with her head down. When the filly lifted up her head, Cindy saw that she was just like her pony form. At first, Cindy was confused but then she realized. Before she could say anything else, she saw rock enclosing around her and everything went black.
A few years ago...
The hatchling hatched out of her egg. The mother bird looked at all her other hatchlings, then back at the newly born one. It didn't look like the rest. Maybe this egg got lost from another nest and rolled into her nest accidentally?
"Ma..ma?" the hatchling chirped. The mother bird took a few steps back. She was hopelessly confused. Not even her could speak the language ponies spoke, yet this new born could just magically speak? The mother bird felt as if something was breathing behind her, so she turned around quickly. Flying beside the nest was a pony. One with both a unicorn horn and wings.
"I think we found her, Luna," the pony said. A second pony came out, one that looked almost like the first pony, only dark blue and smaller.
"Finally," she groaned. "We've been searching for ages, Tia."
"I know," Tia replied. "But it might be necessary that we get this bird to use her powers."
"But..." Luna started, but she knew better than to argue with her sister. Using her magic, Tia gently picked up the hatchling. "Don't worry," she smiled. "We'll take good care of you, little one. You can come with us to our castle! We won't hurt you."
The hatchling agreed to go with them and after a few days, Celestia wanted to name her. But before she even chose a name, the hatchling refused to be named by her.
"Cinder," she chirped. "My name will be Cinder."
Cindy woke up and remembered her past, thinking that Celestia was nice to her. She knew that something must've happened to her. She wouldn't just act like this... Would she?