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// Chapter 5 
// Story: Losing Power 
// by Ferntail12 
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	When the train reached Canterlot, the ponies disembarked with their cargo and headed toward Canterlot Castle. Now they did get some strange looks from the upper-crust citizens of Canterlot due to the six cages, but Twilight, who was leading, paid no attention. The guards surrounding the drawbridges lifted their spears upon seeing Princess Twilight in the lead, and the group continued toward the castle. They encountered no opposition as they entered the castle. Trotting into Celestia’s courtroom, Twilight dipped her head to the guards, who responded in kind. 
“Ah, Twilight,” said the Princess of the Sun kindly. “How nice to see you. And who is here with you…” she trailed off as she saw the Elements, the Wonderbolts, and the six caged Shadowbolts. “GUARDS!” she cried. “Cancel my audience with the Prench Ambassador-tell him I will see him in two days. A serious matter has come up. Summon Luna too.” Half the team of guards that had seemingly materialized at their Princess’s call rushed off toward the quarters of the Prench Ambassador, Green Clover, while the other half headed for Luna’s room. Celestia concentrated hard, her horn glowing a brilliant gold, and a speaking pool appeared in front of her. Cadance’s image filled the pool, projected from the Crystal Empire, but before she could say a word of welcome, Celestia said urgently: “Cadance. Come to Canterlot at once. A dangerous group of ponies has been captured.”
“Celestia, what…?” said Cadance. 
“No time to explain. Come!” replied Celestia. About thirty seconds later, Cadance arrived in a blaze of blue light. Luna burst through the doors at about the same moment. 
“Tia! Twilight! Cadance! Sister, what is thy meaning of this meeting?” asked Luna. “Why art the Elements here? And the Wonderbolts? And those… what do you call them? cages?”
“Luna, Cadance. We have an important decision resting in our hooves. The Elements have captured one of the most reputed mercenary teams in all of Equestria-the Shadowbolts.” Luna’s face had become whiter and whiter as Celestia’s explanation continued. 
“They...what...Sister, dost thou speak in jest? That foul demon Nightmare Moon created them as an illusion when she inhabited Our body. Art thou meaning they are… real?” she said, her voice getting higher pitched in panic with each word she spoke.
“Yes,” Twilight said simply. Luna’s jaw dropped and she began to mutter an incoherent series of curses under her breath, slipping inadvertently into her native tongue, Ancient Equestrian. Cadance, however, seemed perfectly calm. 
“So, I presume we’re here to give them a fair trial and then sentence them, right?” she said. 
“Correct, Cadance,” replied Celestia. Anticipating the need, Twilight cast an awakening spell on the Shadowbolts. Her control over her magic seemed to have improved after she became a Princess, seeing as her spell did not misfire. Awaking sluggishly, the Shadowbolts looked around them in confusion as the realization dawned on their minds: they had been captured. Before they could react, the princesses had magically subdued them. 
Princess Celestia summoned a judge’s gavel and six chairs with built-in chains, and the Elements started setting up the throne room for the trial. Within a span of about fifteen minutes, the throne room had been transformed into a replica of a courtroom from Ancient Equestrian times. Celestia and Luna’s podiums stood at the front of the room, the six chained chairs, now binding the Shadowbolts tightly with their chains, sat three to a row in front of the podium, the Wonderbolts and the Elements were arrayed in a half circle around the prisoners, and the other two Royal Princesses had podiums beside Celestia and Luna, one to each side. The ponies took their seats, the Princesses stepped up to their podiums, and the trial of the infamous mercenary team, the Shadowbolts, began, with Cadance taking notes for the records.

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It was one for the books. Celestia and Luna, well trained in debating by their parents almost three hundred years ago, attacked every angle of the Shadowbolts’ actions that day and the century before. Every fact they stated was backed up by either Dash, Spitfire, or one of the Wonderbolts. Nightshade and Blueball Blitz seemed to be the only Shadowbolts who could go head to head with the Princesses and hold their own, even turn the tide of the trial in their favor. As soon as Spitfire noticed that the trial was heading in the Shadowbolts’ favor, she sent a panicked thought to Dash, who relayed it to Princess Twilight and the other Elements. It said: The Shadowbolts cannot be allowed to be granted a pardon!!! They have wormed their way out of many a punishment that I have seen over the years. Help us, Twilight. You’re our only hope. Turn the trial toward us. Quickly! There’s not much time left. The clock is ticking…. Princess Twilight vanished in a flash of magenta light, returning a second later with a tottering stack of old records from the Canterlot archives suspended in her magic. Princess Celestia was so surprised by this that she stopped speaking in the middle of her sentence, Cadance looked on with wide eyes, and the Elements sighed in relief. 
“May I speak?” asked Twilight. Celestia nodded, followed by Luna a few seconds later. Twilight proceeded to read off a list of each of the Shadowbolts, their crimes, and a detailed description of each. It took nearly half an hour to read through more than 100 pages of information, compiled over a century, mostly in a dialect of Ancient Equestrian. More than a few times, she had to ask Princess Luna for help in deciphering a particularly difficult rune, but she forged on determinedly. The Shadowbolts’ eyes grew wider and wider as all their crimes were revealed, the Elements were shocked at everything the mercenaries had done in the last hundred years, and even the Princesses looked mildly surprised. When Twilight finished, a clamor broke out as ponies fought to speak. Celestia exploded a firework from her horn and yelled “Silence!” The room went deathly quiet. 
“ I have one question, Twilight. Where did you find all this useful information?”
“Oh, I was in the Canterlot archives, reading about Starswirl the Bearded, and I came upon this stack of scrolls. I opened them up and read a few, and it didn’t seem to be much more than a stack of old records, so I put them away. But when I got Spitfire’s thought-message a while ago, I immediately remembered them,” replied Twilight with a smile. 
“All right then,” said Celestia, winking at her former student. “Attention, everypony!”
The heads of everypony in the room turned toward her, and they waited anxiously for her verdict. 
“Due to the new information now available to us, the jury has decided that the pegasi now before us are guilty of all pressed charges. 	The jury will now proceed to discuss the penalties for these actions.” The Shadowbolts’ jaws dropped, and Twilight, noticing the fact, quickly tightened their bonds and gagged each of them as to prevent any retaliation. Then she turned and joined the circle of alicorns that were waiting attentively for her to make the decision. After a quarter-hour spent in a furious debate, in which Princess Celestia finally came out on top, the alicorns headed to their podiums to deliver the verdict. Banging her gavel on the edge of her podium, Celestia declared in ringing tones that symbolized the moment, even though her crown was lopsided from the debate: “The jury has decided the punishments. Nightshade Fyre the Second, please step forward.” When Nightshade had done so, Celestia continued. “Due to the crimes the pegasus that stands before you has committed, Nightshade Fyre the Second is sentenced to death.” Before anyone could react, Princess Luna stepped forward, and then a series of disjointed events happened. There was a flash of bright blue light, Nightshade slumped lifeless to the floor, and a bloodcurdling scream filled the courtroom. 
“NO!” It was Blueball Blitz. “NO, NIGHTSHADE! No…” She rushed to her former leader’s side, a panicked look on her face. “No, no, no, Nightshade, please be okay, please, Nightshade…” Her voice faded as the truth overtook her, and a look of pure hatred twisted her face. 
“You,” she growled at Luna. She lunged at her, and then Celestia was there, and it was all over. Blueball Blitz’s body hit the ground with a thud, Celestia standing over her with a soft, menacing hiss still sliding from between her teeth. For a moment Celestia’s eyes glowed orange, then it faded and she regained her composure. Using her magic to pile the bodies in a corner of the courtroom, she stalked back to her podium. 
“Blackwing Thundercloud is to serve a life sentence in the Canterlot dungeons. Guards, take him away.” Seven guards rushed to obey, picking up Blackwing in their magic and carrying him away. Evidently, the loss of Nightshade, Blueball Blitz, and Darkfire had finally broken Iceheart, for she broke down in tears in her chair. She then started rocking back and forth, muttering no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. After fifteen minutes, during which Iceheart continued muttering long strings of words over and over again, Twilight whispered “Mental breakdown” to Luna, who passed it down to Celestia and Cadance. 
“Um...Iceheart Thunder is to serve a life sentence in the Canterlot dungeons. Guards, take her away,” said Celestia. She seemed a bit startled by the fact that Iceheart’s mind had snapped, but she tried not to show it. The remaining Shadowbolts saw their chance, and leapt for it. With one fluid motion, they broke free of their chains and soared out the window as one single entity instead of three ponies. Everypony in the room froze. The silence dragged on for what seemed like forever. Then the Wonderbolts, Spitfire, and Rainbow Dash jumped to their hooves and zipped out the window in pursuit, but to no avail. The Shadowbolts had so much of a head start that not even the Princesses, when they awoke from their stupor, could catch them. A while later, the pegasi returned from their fruitless search. Celestia spoke for a while, waxing eloquent about how the Elements and the Wonderbolts had captured the Shadowbolts. She apologized for losing the three Shadowbolts, and reminded them to keep a close lookout for them. Finally, Cadance stopped taking notes, and court was dismissed. The trial of the Shadowbolts was over.