//------------------------------//
// When Day Turns To Night 
// Story: CSF: Celestian Special Forces 
// by XeRom 
//------------------------------//

	I was sitting in our house near the Ever Free forest when it happened. It was a sunny afternoon day, Shadow was out hunting for food while I stayed back and waited to see if Celestia had any orders for us. All of sudden, the sky turned black. How this happened I don't know, but night had come early today and I knew something was going to happen.
I hopped out of my chair and rushed over to my locker, hastily putting on my vest, belt, and arranging all of my utilities and ammo. I slung my second rifle, a Hoofington Tac-50 with a suppressor, across my back, and fished out my pistol from my bedside table, shoving it into it's holster. Not long after I had finished my preparations, Shadow got back, flying in through the door.
"Aces! Good you're already ready. I don't know what this is, but it doesn't bode anything good." she said, rushing over to her locker and replacing her hunting rifle with her HiR-550 which was also suppressed along with her ever present shotgun. Once she was ready, we both left our home, locking it magically from the air. We flew as quickly as possible to Canterlot, when we got there, Princess Celestia was pacing around her throne, a worried expression on her face.
Bowing quickly, Shadow and I approached her. "Princess, do you have any idea what's going on here? One minute it was a normal day, the next it turned to night!" I said, panting from our dash over here.
"I'm afraid the situation is grave. Nightmare Moon has returned once again, only this time she has inhabited the body of an ordinary citizen. Using his naturally evil side, she has magnified her power ten fold and is probably on her way here right now." she paused, looking at us. "You two must not be here when she arrives, for if she learns of the CSF, all hope of stopping her madness will be lost."
With both nodded at her, "Roger that Princess. We'll fly above the castle and keep a watch on it. No matter what we won't be seen."
Briskly nodding at us, she returned to her pacing, gathering a note and pen. "Now go, I sense she might be coming here as we speak!"
Bowing quickly, we rushed out a door to the side of the throne room, quickly taking flight to an altitude most pegasi can't reach. There, we hid ourselves from view with magic, flying wide circles around the palace ground, alert for any activity. Not soon after we reached altitude did I see a yellow pegasus pony fly into the palace courtyard. The Royal Guards quickly scattered at the sight of this new comer which quickly confirmed my suspicions on who this was.
Calling out with my mind to Shadow I said, 'I bet that's Nightmare Moon. I wish we could do something, sitting up here makes me anxious.'
'I know, me too. But we have to obey the orders the Princess gave us. No matter what are we to reveal our existence to Nightmare Moon.' she thought back at me, the edge in her voice clear. I sighed inwardly to myself, this inaction was killing me. Although I kept where I was, watching the inside of the palace as Nightmare Moon confronted Celestia. Soon enough, a flash of orange and yellow light emanated from the throne room and when I checked again, the Princess was gone!
I started to fly down, but Shadow stopped me. 'Aces no! We can't go yet, not until we hear anything from the Princess or Nightmare goes away!'
'Let go! I have to help! The princess just disappeared!' she didn't let go though, her grip was firm on my forelegs. She brought me up to her, facing me to her.
'No Spade, you can't. We have to wait.' I sighed to myself again.
'You're right...' I stopped myself and flew back up to her level. 'All we can do is wait now.' Shadow and I waited what felt like an eternity, but in reality was only about five minutes. A Royal Carriage was being flown into the palace grounds with five out of the six mane five there. Also with them was a... A Diamond Dog.
I felt Shadow's hatred for them as much as my own through our link. Although he was with the mane five, so whatever he had done must be important. I followed their progress through the palace, seeing as they found the throne empty and the note the princess left. The mane five just didn't know what to do with themselves... These are the ponies that saved Equestria twice?
The Diamond Dog however looked like he was keeping himself together. From nowhere, Nightmare Moon appeared again, scarring them all even further, but not the Diamond Dog. He charged at her like a wild animal. 'I've got to give him credit, this dog has spunk.' I thought to Shadow who agreed with me.
No matter what spunk he had, the Diamond Dog was quickly stopped just feet from Nightmare Moon. What happened next, I can't quite explain as they are all transported somewhere else. 'Where in the hay did they go now?!' I thought, quickly finding the trail of magic and diving towards where it was headed... The Imperial Gardens.
Close behind me was Shadow who shared my concern, 'Nightmare Moon must be pulling another Discord move, putting them in a maze to pit against their fears.' Oh no. If that works it'll be just like Chaos Day all over again.
We flew over the maze, spotting as each of the ponies, including the Diamond Dog swept their ways through the maze. First we noticed the fact that Fluttershy was surrounded by all her friends, bleeding, dying, unable to help them. This didn't make sense though... That's when I saw it.
'Hey Shadow, you see that? Surrounding Fluttershy, that haze.'
'Yeah I see it, it's almost like... It's the same type of magic illusion Discord used. She's tricking them all into seeing things that never really happened.'
'Yeah, she's trying to drive them insane through the use of her tricks.'
Next was Rarity, who went inside her salon. All we could hear from the inside was a scream, then rarity running out tears stinging her eyes. After Rarity was Applejack, who was wandering through a wilted Apple Acres to go into a rundown barn. Only to run out after a second at full speed. The next one was Pinkie Pie, who went inside Sugarcube Corner and after a party cannon and several minutes, she came back outside her hair deflated... Uh-oh. After Pinkie was Twilight, who was in the midst of her friends, all reading letters from her about them. The look on her face could break a heart. Lastly was the Diamond Dog, who at first was surrounded by gems of all sorts. It looked like he didn't know what to do... Which was odd. But he quickly succumbed and ran after the gems, only to have them turn to dust in his hands. He roared, as loud a roar that I've heard from a Diamond Dog since that day long ago....
But whatever he did worked, for it broke each of them out of their trances. 'Good, they're free.' I thought.
'Yeah, now they can get on through the rest of the maze,' Shadow thought back. Which they all did. They all quickly trotted through the maze, only to come to the center of a dead end. Almost as soon as they were there, an argument broke out between them all about each of their visions.
'I knew this would happen. They're already fighting about what they saw.' Quickly enough though, Nightmare Moon made another appearance, after a brief flash... The Princess was there again! 'Shadow! The Princess is back!'
'I know!' she thought gleefully, 'although I don't think this is the end of it.' Nightmare Moon had then summoned the Elements of Harmony, but as quickly as she made them appear, they soon disappeared. With a maniacal laughter that we could hear from our height. Celestia regained her footing and began addressing the mane five as well as the Diamond Dog. Soon enough I received a dispatch from her.
'I need you both down here now, I have important instructions that I must relay to you both. My power is weak and I can't keep this connection for long...' and as soon as she said it, our connection dissipated.
Diving like hawks, we both arrived at the ground, our cloaking spell going away as we got within see-able  distance. We landed with a flourish, sending up as little dust as we could from a fall from that height. We bowed quickly to the princess, as soon as we got upright, the Diamond Dog said,"I didn't think you had guns, Celestia.  Being peaceful and all." He was the most well speaking and grammatically correct Diamond Dog I have ever seen. Celestia reared her head as if bit, turning towards the dog as he said again, "Where I come from, they're common tools. Anyway, care to explain the two before us?"
"They are just some ponies here to help." she said. If ever there were a bad excuse, it would be that. After another moment, she nodded, probably some mental conversation between them, and directed her attention towards us. In a mixture of telepathy and whispering she said, "What I need you two to do, is to help the Diamond Dog and the others in their attempt to find the Elements. With how attuned you are to them, that shouldn't be difficult. Once you have found them, bring them back here to me in the throne room, there you will have to protect me for as long as you can while I merge their power with my own." Shadow and I nodded sharply at the Princess.
Turning towards the Diamond Dog, I extended my mind towards his in attempt to gain on what his personality was. The first things I heard was, 'Good luck, buddy. Just cause Celestia can, doesn't mean I don't have my methods of blocking you out.' Ha, I laughed inwardly, no matter how prepared he is, he can't keep me out fully. I tried to dig further, to very little success though, as his thoughts were a jumbled mess of inversion. What little I gained from it was that he wasn't the same as regular Diamond Dog's... He was different somehow, which only confirmed my suspicions about him. That's something for later though.
Shaking my head, I moved back towards Celestia, disusing what our plan would be with Shadow. 'What we're going to have to do is break off into two separate groups, you and the five to search through Canterlot, while me and the dog go down to Ponyville.'
'Wait!' she thought worried, 'are you sure it's safe to go with him? You remember what happened the last time we trusted them...'
I smiled at her, 'Yeah I'm sure. I can't put a hoof on it, but he's different somehow...'
Still not assured, she unslung her shotgun from her shoulder, 'If you must, take this. It protected me the last time there was trouble them.'
I immediately took it, kissing her gently. 'Thank you, I'll take good care of it. And myself.'
Turning away, I moved to look at the Diamond Dog as he continued talking with the mane five. "Or an alicorn or two..." he finished before turning towards me. He eyed me suspiciously, especially the rifle across my back. Good, I thought, this will mean less trouble. He spoke to me then, "Alright, you already heard my plan, what were her orders to you?"
I grinned at him, "First things first, we need to get introductions out of the way." I said as Shadow moved up next to me. "My names is Aces, you can call me Spade. This here is Shadow," she made a polite bow. "Who we are and what we do I cannot tell you, any of you." I said addressing all of them, "But what I can tell you is that we will help you all find the Elements of Harmony."
"Call me Zin. I can tell you more about myself when this whole ordeal is over." Zin gave me what looked like it was a smirk, but acted more like a goofy grin. He removed something from his back... A guitar. Odd sort of thing to be carrying around, especially at this time. He started inspecting it like he'd never seen it before.
"What exactly is that?" I started but he payed no attention to me, hitting a button on the side of the guitar. The v-neck of the guitar shifted inwardly, then outwardly again as it formed the blade of a short-sword. Shadow and I looked wide eyed at each, then I turned my attention back to Zin.
"That's new..."  he said, looking back up at us, his expression becoming confused as he looked from us to his guitar. "Uhhh...Carry on.” he said haltingly. He slung his "guitar-sword" across his back, giving both of us a shrug as he did so. "That's never happened to me before."
Pulling myself back to reality, I spoke loudly addressing Zin and the mane five, "Here is what the plan will be." looking at Zin I say, "Zin and I will head over to Ponyville and using my magic, will locate whatever Elements that Nightmare Moon might of hid there.”
Shadow spoke up, addressing the five, "You five and I will stay here in Canterlot and using my own magic will search for any of the Elements that she may of hid up here." All of the five nodded their agreement towards Shadow, while I looked Zin in the eyes, nodding at him. He nodded back. I'll keep my eye on you, I thought, no matter how different you are it appears as if your instincts can get the better of you.