//------------------------------// // 1: New // Story: One Moon // by Lord_Artemis //------------------------------// Silence. A muffled cry. A panicked gasp abruptly issued out into the darkness. Prince Artemis jerked awake and flailed two sweat-soaked hooves into empty space. As his eyes grew accustomed to the gloom of the royal bedchamber, familiar blues and purples comforted his wide eyes, and a second, more controlled breath, was issued. Though he was supposed to be the lord of dreams, that didn’t seem to stop him from being haunted by terrors that lurked beyond his control. Artemis pushed away the sweat twisted sheets, and mentally stabled himself by looking around and assuring himself on the lack of monsters in the room. He stood, his long blue legs blending with the dim swirls of blue that covered the floor of the camber, and he begrudgingly plodded over to the heavy purple drapes that concealed the only window in the room. He squinted his eyes in preparation as he carefully nudged heavy cloth out of their position and, despite his efforts to ready himself, jumped back as harsh sunlight blasted through the small crack in the darkness, nearly blinding the night-eyed alicorn. After a moment or two of shocked penalization as his retinas screamed at him, he once again gazed out the tiny orifice to the outside world and gauged the time, seeing that the sun was lazily lounging on the orange horizon, and beginning to dip further. As if alerted to his waking, a sharp rap on the door preceded a parade of guards and servants entering the previously dark room, accompanied by a measured amount of reflected daylight and soft torchlight that always was present in the night wing of the royal palace. Artemis turned to greet these intruders and immediately noticed that they all wore a look of worry that they were trying, to varying degrees of success, to hide from him. He sighed quietly and decided to try yet again to comfort these ponies. “Good evening, my little ponies. I am glad to see you all here on the night of Hearts and Hooves day, even though you were welcome to take the day off!” He grinned to his staff, and as his grin was partially returned, he turned to the nearest pony to his right, a night guard mare, with a stout shield as her cutie mark, and decided a little more banter would be necessary to dissipate everypony’s doubt, including his own. “Iron Shield, I know normal procedures and all, but could you reduce my guard to minimal, and ask for volunteers? This is a night to be enjoyed by young ponies like yourself, and not locked up here with me” He smirked at the last comment, and the look of concern faded to one of appreciation, as she bowed her head and retreated from the room, followed by the three other guards. He turned to his group of servants, still slightly uneasy from his unusual enthusiasm, and requested that he would require only one or two to help him for his nightly duties, and the others might take leave for the night, to desired effect. After the emptying of the room, he eyed the two unicorn ponies left and swiftly walked toward the adjoined bathroom to take a quick shower before beginning his nights work, followed by eight light hoofsteps. As he entered the marble room, the faucets were magically activated, his servants used to his wordless routine, and quickly beginning without a question. His mind, now soothed by routine, turned inwards. 'He had hooves enough... but what did this old alicorn know about hearts?' ~~~ He stepped forth into the darkened atrium of the castle, his Moon slowly climbing carefully past his sleeping shroud of stars into the deep blue of his sky. His hoofsteps resounded slightly against the marble pillars as he entered the throne room, and as he seated himself atop the lofty throne of Equestria, he magically unfurled the banner behind him, baring a resemblance of his cutie mark, and announced “Night court is in session!” to the massive crowd assembled before him… …Which consisted of the two guards stationed at the throne and the four at the door. The well trained ponies couldn’t help themselves from glancing at him, and he gave a nervous chuckle that did little to help with the awkward tension that filled the air. Inwardly facehoofing, he recomposed his look of regality, and gazed at the far wall sternly. Embarrassment flowed through his mind, and he blushed ever so slightly at his bone-headedness. Night court was only a fantasy he had been harboring, one that would undoubtedly receive laughter from his older brother Prince Solaris, and the stupidity of his shouting it out to the empty court room had not been apparent to him before, in his thoughts, but it was very apparent now. His guards long since locking their stares forward, Artemis schooled his mind and cleared away distracting thought as he started his actual duty, that of walking the dreams of ponies and protecting them from what they fear. The Lunar Prince bowed his regal head, closed his dark teal eyes, and his horn flashed a dark azure fire that engulfed his entire body, consuming his form and leaving nothing behind but an empty throne. ~~~ Artemis tugged his hooves firmly out of reality and stepped out into the ephemeral dreamscape and beheld the sprawling and twisting world of dreams before him. With a contented sigh, the tall alicorn made his way seamlessly through the ghostly realm, casting a gaze around in search of any alarming dreams that stood out in the nigh incomprehensible cloud of sleeping ponies’ consciences and immediately caught sight of a young foal being chased around by what seemed to be a bipedal garbage bin. Shaking his head in disbelief, he grinned and stepped through the membranous barrier into the dream and adjusted his tall helm to not snag the illusionary doorway of the child’s room. Leaning down, he poked his snout under the posh bed and located the small colt, panting in fear and obviously shaken from the trauma of a waste container pursuing him around his house. “Diamond Crown?” Artemis whispered calmingly, though the foal still jumped, to the greatest degree he could, given the cramped space under his bed, and turned wide eyed to him “What are you doing down here? Brave stallions like you are not usually the type to hide, are they?” With that remark, the pink cheeks of the young colt tinted a deep red, and a surprised look of indignation lit upon his small face, as he huffed slightly, before sassing “I am not hiding, just… uh… waiting to get the drop on it!” “Well then, here it comes back, are you ready?” Suddenly the bed vanished to reveal to the foal the large trashcan walking towards him. “Iiiiieeeeee!” The colt had somehow manage to scale the side of the Prince and was squealing from the back of Artemis’ neck before the bed had completely vanished, much to the surprise of both of them. A wry grin played across the alicorn's face as he set his hooves wide and confronted the walking trashcan in all of its ridiculous fearsomeness. A flash of magic ushered in a large sack of rubbish, which the Prince levitated over to the hungry opening of the waste can, and the young foal watched in awe as the mighty beast was tamed by being filled with trash, and his young eyes gleamed and turned to look at the face of his savior. “Trash cans don’t eat up little foals and fillies; they are for filling with… well… trash. You, Diamond Crown, must do this, and you shall be tormented by them nevermore!” As Artemis was saying this, the young colt had resumed his place on the floor next to him, and drank in every word with a stunned look of admiration. When the Prince had stated this, he bowed his head to the foal and stepped backwards out the dream door, and out of the dream itself, leaving an awed and comforted conscience, and smiled at a job well done. As Artemis once again gazed into the mist of vaporous- seeming dream worlds, something seemed amiss. A powerful amount of magic was flowing from a nearby dream, and it was warping the fabric of the dreamscape around him. He felt a powerful presence that he recognized as his brother Solaris, but when he looked for the dream, it was as if the world was bending to conceal it from his sight. With this, he realized that a spell was being used to shroud the dream from his eyes, which was well within the abilities of his brother… yet there was more than just his dream hidden in the enigmatic absence he gazed at. It seemed to occupy more room than just one dream, but could never hold two individual dreams, that would be impossible… The Lunar Prince, now curious and anxious, magically began unweaving the spell that prevented his view of this mysterious dream, and as his horn glowed, the warping of the dream affected him even more. Then, as if tearing open a cloth bag, the dream suddenly exposed itself, and he immediately saw the dream was much different than he expected. More than that, it seemed like the dream was a conglomeration of Solaris’ dream and… somepony else’s. At this, cautious curiosity turned into unabashed probing and Artemis quickly moved to enter the dream. As he pressed his snout to the membrane-like barrier that defined the dream, he almost could have sworn he saw, through some strange prismatic twisting of the dream world, a distorted reflection or refraction of himself entering the dream opposite him. He shook his head, steeling his resolve to figure this mystery out before something happened to him or other ponies’ dreams, and dove straight through… Back into his throne in Canterlot Castle. ~~~ Artemis blinked, and looked around in surprise at the throne room, which was exactly how he left it except for the irksome fact that all of his guards had evidently deserted him, leaving him utterly alone. The Prince of Dreams wondered how he had suddenly lost connection with the dream world, and decided to confront his brother Solaris about it. He was also incredibly curious about the mysterious and powerful dream that the Solar Prince was having, and began to stand up. At this, his first question was answered, for when his hoof made contact with the marble floor, a ripple of concentric rings emanated from his hoof, shaking the walls and even ceiling of the massive chamber. Artemis then more carefully examined the room and noticed some of the tell-tale signs of a dream: the details of the room seemed somewhat hazy and ill-defined; the torches cast no shadows on the now-ethereal floor; the slight shifting of the world as the fabric of the dream wavered. Despite these factors, the dream seemed much more detailed and defined than any dream he had entered before, and if this wasn’t even the room the dreamer was in! This was highly unusual, and Artemis’ inquisitiveness was piqued even further. He quickly departed, each hoofstep bringing him closer to the private chambers of the Sun Prince. ~~~ Thundering hoof falls announced the galloping entrance of Artemis into the highest corridor in the Day Wing of Canterlot Castle, and a dozen meters or so before the ornately gilded door he managed to rein in his enthusiasm enough to slow, and magically cloaked himself so as to be unseen by any wandering eyes. He cautiously approached the perpendicular running hallway and peered around the corner both directions. This close to the center of the dream, it was just nigh impossible for even he to tell it was a dream, and when he looked towards the door once again, he was hit by a powerful wave of magic that issued from within the room. The dream there seemed… twisted, strangely seeming as if the dreamer was in two different places at one, and yet in the same location. The source was definitely Solaris, yet it seemed… different somehow, as if he was dreaming the dream twice at the same time and folding them together in the most magically advanced dream spell he had ever seen. Artemis was not slightly infuriated at his brother’s knowledge over him in the area of his only real specialty, the dream world. Throwing caution to the wind, he spread his wings high and magically looked straight through the wall into the bedroom, and then stopped. Stopped moving, stopped breathing, stopped thinking. What he saw shut down all that he was at that moment, and a moment later, it hit him again. A cry of shock escaped his lips, his eyes slamming shut, and hooves clumsily turning around and his body shakily accelerating away from the sight. 'How could there be two…!?! What was… how… What?!? Does that mean…' Before the frantic thoughts could come to collusion, his long snout slammed into some unnoticed surface, the softness of which confounded Artemis, until he immediately flipped forward and landed with a solid thud on the illusionary floor. Wild eyes sprung open to asses their surroundings and saw… nothing. Artemis was alone in the hallway, and had seemed to have collided with nothing but thin air. His first thought was that he had been attacked by magic, but upon a second consideration, he realized that he was still invisible. Looking down at his hooves, he simply saw the smooth marble floor, and a thought hit him. 'What if I am not the only thing invisible in this corridor? But if that was true, then…' Horror flooded through the Lunar Prince as implications of these thoughtless actions rushed to him. He lifted an invisible ear and listened closely, and heard quick shallow breathing. That was not his own. ~~~ A shriek of terror erupted from seemingly empty space nearby and a bright flashed from the tip of a now revealing horn, and Artemis noted, as he matched the action, that this horn that ostensibly sprung into existence was quite long, and, as far as he could tell, was colored much like his own. This thought sprung him into action as he magically summoned a portal that would convey him to the waking world, and out of this nightmarish plight. As the tear in the world spread wide, he glanced to his left, and noticed an equal sized hole appearing, and the silhouette of a tall and graceful alicorn gradually fade into existence, and he thought back to the scene he had seen in Solaris’ room, but as this jarringly effeminate shadow quickly stepped through the portal, the shade of its coat darkened towards a familiar hue, much darker than the one he had seen before inside the far room. And, as the tall, shapely hindquarters were about to disappear through, Artemis’ eyes glimpsed the edge of this mysterious pony’s cutie mark, and his thoughts clicked as he recognized the dark cloud and white crescent. His cutie mark was perfectly reflected, though slightly closer to the ground, and mounted on a much… curvier background… The portal closed, snapping him into reality and jarring his thoughts into withdrawal, as his hooves met the cool metal of the throne. ~~~ Dusk Shine, I write to you now not as your prince, nor even the brother of your mentor, but as a comrade and confidant. The confidentiality of this letter is of the utmost, as I do intend that this message never be seen by any eyes other than yours. If you have spines reading this aloud, it would be prudent to take it now and read it in privacy. Since you helped free me from my curse me with your power over the elements of harmony, I have looked to you as a friend of mine and in our correspondence over magic that I have express realm to, I believe that I have built a strong colleague in you, and now I need your help with an issue that I am faced with. This past night, I was, as with every night, fulfilling my duties and safeguarding the dreams of all the ponies in Equestria, but last night I encountered something I have never encountered before. I came upon a dream that was somehow woven with magic that hid it from my sight, with a spell that I could not discern. I was able to uncover the dream, but when I tried to find its source, it seemed as if it was coming from two different ponies, from two different places. It was twisted and only one of the ponies was I able to recognize, which was my brother, Prince Solaris. The other pony… I was unable to find their location, as they seemed to be dreaming from beyond this world. I entered the dream, and found it to be simply too realistic and well imagined of a dream for even one as powerful as my brother to dream. As I searched this dream, I found the reason for this level of detail was that there were two dreamers, two actual ponies in the same dream… My brother and… Another pony. Artemis paused as he wrote this, his mind flickering with the image of the ivory alicorn standing next to his brother, his cutie mark mirrored on her flank, his mane extended down her neck and his eyes looked at themselves set in her… jarringly beautiful face. This pony was almost identical to Solaris, except for the fact that it was a female. The two ponies seemed to be… fornicating to some degree which is highly unfit behavior for the Prince of the Sun to be committing. I know not what this means, and I need your assistance in finding out. This pony is not of this world, not of this dimension, and I need your help to find out what she wants with my brother, and what threat she poses. Do not contact Solaris on this matter, instead, come to Canterlot and contact me as soon as possible, my night guards will be sent to fly to your library, and will meet you at the earliest you can. Your friend, Prince Artemis Magically sealing the envelope, Artemis glanced out the window at the sun laying on the horizon, about to dip beneath the line of mountains framed by his platinum gilded window. A flash of magic shot up his fluted horn, and the letter burst into azure flames and magically trailed off in the direction of Ponyville. The Lunar Prince walked to his doorway, opening them and stepped outwards, toward his door guard, to whom he whispered a few short orders. The guard and his partner across the doorway locked eyes, and the sentry ran off down the hall, leaving the second guard at the door of the chambers of night. Artemis then walked down the hallways of the night wing of the castle with his single escort trailing behind him. As his routine kicked in, Artemis purposefully avoided his accustom evening meal with his brother by going directly to the royal kitchen, and received a finely arranged breakfast of hay bread and apple jam. He ate silently at a nearby open table in the chefs’ lounge, as his guard signaled all of the chefs to not worry and get to bed for the night. Artemis noticed none of this, as his mind raced through thoughts of worry and wonder. Images of the pair of alicorns were shocking enough, but the most shocking event of last night’s dreamwalking experience was his encounter with … His double. Their actions were nearly identical, and the more he thought of it, he realized that she was doing the exact same thing as he was, spying on their siblings in their magically enhanced dream, and being shocked by the discovery of a strange alicorn kissing their brother/sister. And the more he thought of it, he became more and more fascinated by what he felt when he thought of her… this dark and mysterious mare from another dimension. His thoughts were cut short by a sudden burst of magical fire and the rustle of a letter appearing in front of the Night Prince, and landing softly on a small smear of jam on his plate. Wiping off this blemish, Artemis unrolled the scroll with his hoof and eagerly read the response from Dusk Shine. Prince Artemis, This is Dusk Shine, and I received your note. I have packed and I am already on the way, your guards said that I shouldn’t bring spines, but I did anyways. Your discoveries are frightening, and I will help in any way to solve this mystery. I will be there just before midnight, if my calculations are correct. Dusk. As he read the word midnight, Artemis suddenly remembered that he needed to raise the moon, and he unceremoniously grabbed the note in his mouth and bolted out the door toward his balcony. His guard sprung up, surprised by the sudden change in mood of the Prince, and hurriedly followed the long strides of the cobalt alicorn. At the doorway to the cold night, Artemis dropped the letter from his mouth and leapt into the position for raising his celestial charge, willing the moon to climb from its rest beneath the horizon to its place in the sky. His horn glowed like a sapphire rod and his cerulean wings spread out and propelled him towards the heavens. His teal eyes closed and reopened a brilliant white, his wings flapping once, twice, and again spread out to their full extent as the moon was set in place in his night sky. ~~~ “Prince Dusk Shine has arrived to have counsel with the High Lord Artemis.” A guard called out from the door, as the great doors to the throne room opened to permit the entrance of the purple alicorn. “AH, DUSK, I AM GLAD THOU HAST COME BEFORE ME!” Boomed Prince Artemis, his mighty voice echoing throughout the great hall, as he formally greeted his guest in the traditional Canterlot voice. Dusk held a hoof to his ear and grimaced at the prince until he saw the wry smile that had cracked upon Artemis’ face. “GOOD TO SEE YOU TOO!” he shouted back and the Lunar Prince let out a bark of laughter and quickly descended from his great throne to join the alicorn. “It is good to see you again; I do believe I have been doing well with adjusting, thanks to the tips you gave me.” Artemis joked as he jabbed at his companion humorously, and was met with a chuckle from the alicorn. “Yes, much better” Dusk responded. “Though voice training is not the reason I and Spines are giving up a night of sleep for, is it?” He joked, glancing behind him to see a small dragon, curled up behind him on the soft rug. “Well, at least what I am giving up a night for” The two stallions chuckled as Dusk levitated the slumbering baby dragon on to his back, and they began trotting together down the side hallway of the throne room that lead to the night wing and Artemis’ chambers. As they walked, Artemis and Dusk began discussing in detail the alarming experience that the night prince had endured the night before, and what magic spells could have been responsible. Artemis, though he trusted his friend, kept from mentioning any details of the second female alicorn he met, and thoughts he had on her.