//------------------------------// // Chapter 1 // Story: Light's Shadow // by Jorofrarie //------------------------------// Chapter 1 Search Party Somewhere in the Center "Okay, so, what do you think of the plan. Give it to me straight." Fire turned towards me. "Honestly, I think it's a load of bull-shit. But knowing you, it'll be great." Fire and I were standing in a small alley off the main street. The moon was out and shone brightly, lighting up the world as if it was day. I looked around the alley and saw Water and Air sitting down chatting while Earth sat off to the side, thinking. Earth was always that way, never got involved in the conversation, instead preferring to listen and wait. Air was obviously leading the conversation, chatting away furiously, gesturing wildly and sometimes floating in the air for no apparent reason. Water could only try to keep up. She looked over at me and, seeing me staring at her, gave a little smile and a wave. I blushed furiously and quickly averted my gaze. Water always had that effect on me. Her bright blue eyes twinkled so beautifully, her hair the deepest violet, lips like- I broke off my train of thought to return to the task at hand. Fire had watched the whole exchange and was now looking at me with a little smirk on his face. I glared at him. "What?" "Well, are you going to tell her how you feel?" I blushed and quickly shook my head. "She would never like someone like me. She is so free and alive. I'm barely a ghost. I mean, look at me!" I looked at my body. As usual it was shifting slightly, as if my whole form was underwater. No one could ignore the sheer strangeness. Fire just shook his head sadly. "You really think that she cares about what's on the outside? Dude, Water likes you, a lot, and it's blindingly obvious for everyone else." I merely stared at him. I started to form a response but was interrupted by a little beeping noise emitting from my watch. Fire and I both glanced at each other and nodded. Now was the time to be serious. I watched as Fire got up and walked over to the others, alerting them to the fact that it was time to start. The five of us walked out of the alley and turned to face our objective. The recruiting centre. This was where ordinary people were converted to the armed, cold, ruthless force that was supposed to defend everyone. This was to be our first major target. It looked like a skyscraper crossed with a bunker, all made out of bulletproof glass. This was going to be difficult. It was sitting in the centre of a large, circular clear area, dedicated solely to this one building. Before this, the five of us had only done little attacks on shops and hotels, spreading a little anarchy, nothing large. But this was to change everything. We stopped and, looking around, nodded to each other. We all knew what to do. It was simple, cause as much chaos as possible. I immediately phased, turning into the form that was my nature. Moving quickly, my form, or lack of, flew into the building and tore up the doors, setting off a blaring alarm. The others followed me in. Air summoned a contained tornado that destroyed the entrance and the front wall of the building. She looked like she was having fun, going mental as she bounced around furiously. I continued on my way to the stairwell. I flew up to the very top floor of the building, breaking out of the stairwell and surprising all of the staff that were still there after the siren had sounded. Before they could react, I had flown past and barged into the areas that were restricted access. There my purpose became apparent as I destroyed everything that I could, or rather couldn't, get my non-existent hands on. These areas were full of safe-like computers, but they shattered like glass as I tore into them. My objective complete, I turned into a whirlwind of death and faced the armed guards that had just arrived, spreading like an infection across all of the floors. I felt no regret as I tore them up, spattering blood across the pristine grey walls. These things could barely be classified as human anymore, so I saw them as rabid animals. The rest of the non-armed staff got the idea and ran away from me screaming. My work here was done. I quickly flew down to the lobby which was by this time unrecognisable. Earth had torn up the foundations, exposing the four levels of basements, while Water had sent liquid into every crevice of the building. I phased back into my 'physical' form and grabbed the two. I quickly rounded up Air as well (She was having a bit too much fun letting her tornadoes destroy the building) and got the three of us out of the building. I looked around, suddenly worried, for Fire, and noticed him just inside the building, running after us yelling something indistinguishable. The whole building suddenly burst into flames and started to collapse. There was a stream of people exiting the building through the fire escape. He sure did like drama. Fire ran up beside us, panting. He motioned for us to go, but before I left, he grabbed my arm. "Light." He panted. "Yeah?" "The conversion section is still there, we need to destroy it." He paused for breath and continued before I could interrupt. "It's in the lowest section of the basement, separated from the rest of the building. It's not destroyed. But we can't bring the others, it's too dangerous, I don't think they'd be able to survive." This was bad news. The conversion section was where most of the work happened. It was where the people 'recruited' where transformed into the monsters that I had fought too many times to count. It was going to be tough, and this place, even in the state it was in, would be a tough nut to crack. I slowly nodded my head. Fire and I were the two most destructive of the group. I stared into his eyes. He was serious about this addition to the mission. We both turned towards the wreckage of the building and ran towards it. Fire ran ahead and vanished through a gap in the rubble. I phased again and followed him. Past the crack there was a small cavity, which lead to the almost intact bottom level of the basement. Fire was already down there somehow, and I saw him look behind for me before vanishing down a hatch in the floor. I reached the hatch and jumped through to catch up with Fire. I stopped for a second. I was in a large cavern, beneath the lowest level in the building, with Fire already on the other side, about fifty metres away. He quickly disappeared around a corner on the other side of the large area. I flitted across the cavern to follow him. There was another, even larger cavern. Fire was standing at the entrance staring ahead. I followed the line of his view and froze. This was the conversion section. The walls of the cavern were lined with small pods, filled with a weird liquid. Computers filled almost any spare spaces, blinking in the near-darkness. Power failure. Fire snapped out of his shock first and whacked me in the arm to get my attention. We didn't waste any time. We both started to destroy it. Flames were shooting from Fire's whole body, lighting up everything around him, while I flitted around, whipping Light and Shadow across everything. In mere minutes, it was all over. We turned to leave, and I phased back into my human form. We glanced at each other, but quickly snapped around as we heard a faint tapping noise. Looking across the section, my blood froze. All of the walls still had the pods, each fitted with weapons and equipment for instant use by any new recruit, and most were still intact. But one was open. Standing in the opening was a single man pointing a gun towards me. I knew that I was about to die. I wasn't in my Other form, and even Light had it's limits. I closed my eyes to face my fate. The gun fired. Fire jumped. He took the bullet in his chest as his flight took him into the path of the bullet. Rage overtook me. The man died before he could even realised what was happening, slice clean in half by the Shadows. He had a surprised look on his face as the two parts slid apart, leaving a bloody stain on the wall behind him. Quickly, I bent down to help Fire, but it was apparent that his wound was to grave. His chest was ripped apart, and I could almost see his insides. The bullet must have fragmented inside him judging by the damage. He opened his eyes and gasped for air. He started to talk, fighting against the flow of blood that threatened to drown him. "Light, you have to get out of here." He could only manage a harsh whisper. "I'm not leaving you Fire!" "You have to, I'm dead anyway." "Don't talk this way, you're going to be fine." By this time I could feel hot tears dripping down my face. "Light, who are you trying to convince." He weakly chuckled at this, but it turned into a coughing fit. Then suddenly he was deadly serious, "You have to promise me something." "Anything for you." "Keep them safe." He stopped at this, trying to draw breath, and continued. "Now go. I'm gonna blow this place soon, and you have to be out of here." "But Fire, I can-" "GO." Fire roared at me, before dissolving into another coughing fit. I took the hint and phased, moving as quickly as I could out of the building, moving up through the hatch, out of the rubble, and into the night air. I barely made it outside before it felt the beginnings of an enormous explosion, a violent suction, followed by the eerie silence, the calm before the storm. I dodged around the back of a building to protect myself from the impending blast. I collapsed, knowing what was going to happen next. Tears covered my face as I sobbed uncontrollably into my arms. Fire He coughed a little as his vision started to fade. He could hear the sound of conversion pods opening, the footsteps of the new recruits, the distinctive chick chick! of a gun being readied. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the massive number of recruits, framed by the flickering fire of burning hardware. They had their guns pointed at him. Fire knew that his time was up, all he could do now was face the music. "Goodbye guys." He had one last thought. "Goodbye Light." The conversion section detonated with the force of an atomic bomb. It was concentrated in the basement, instantly vaporising everything, the subsequent shockwave blew apart the foundations of the building, leaving nothing but a black crater in its wake. Fire was gone, all evidence erased. Ponyville Library Twilight Sparkle was frantic. Something had appeared from her portal, and she was going to get the blame for it. She was pacing the ground floor of her Library, frantically trying to think of a solution to the problem that she had created. Her mane was tangled and frizzed and she had dark bags under her eyes from a lack of sleep. Sitting on the stairs of the library, not at all worried, was a tired looking Spike. He was sitting back on the stairs, slowly cleaning his claws with the ease of someone who doesn't care at all for what is happening. "Twi, I still don't see what the big problem is. I mean, We don't even know if something came out at all! There was only a flash, that's it." Spike reasoned. Badly. Twilight turned on him with panic, and a little big of anger, in her eyes. Slowly walking towards Spike, she started to mutter something, but all that Spike could make out were some choice words that should probably not be mentioned around civilised people. She stopped just next to Spike and thrust her head towards his face, stopping mere inches from his. Another one of her hairs flew out of place in her mane with a distinctive TWANG! She glared at him. "Spike, this is a very big problem. I have possibly just introduced a new, and possibly quite dangerous, thing to Equestria. After this, Celestia will never want to see me again, and will probably banish me!" She paused turning around and walking back to the centre of the Library. Upon reaching the centre she turned back to Spike. "Is this what you want to see happen to me?!" "N-n-n-not at a-a-lll Twilight." He stammered. "I just think that you m-might be over-reacting a little bit... Remember last time this happened?" Twilight turned a bright red and quickly turned away from spike, clearly embarrassed. Spike looked at her retreating form with a look of satisfaction on his face that he had evaded his timely demise, albeit barely. "Well, what would you suggest I do" She mumbled as she turned back to face Spike. "Hmmmmm..." He thought a little at this, but then snapped his claws and jumped up from his position on the steps. "I know, why not just get your friends to help you? You can do anything if you all work together." Twilight looked doubtful at this, but decided to humour her little friend. "Okay Spike, let's go and find the others, I'm sure that at least one of them will know what to do... Maybe..." She didn't sound very hopeful. Spike ran over to the door, suddenly incredibly enthusiastic. "Hey, Twi? Do you think that we could go and get Rarity first?" Spike practically yelled in his excited state. Twilight turned to Spike, confusion in her eyes. "Why are you so enthusiastic all of a sudden Spike? This isn't like you." "No reason, no reason whatsoever..." said Spike, silently thanking Celestia for letting Twilight be so oblivious. Twilight glanced over at Spike doubtfully, but chose not to pursue the subject. "Ooooookay then, let's go get the others," said Twilight as she walked towards the door. Light I was confused. Very, very confused. This wasn't at all helped by the fact that I still felt the after effects of my electrocution and had recently suffered a massive concussion. I tried to remember the events prior and, after a moments thought, gleaned a few bare facts. The last things that I had experienced were the pressure of a gun against my nose and the flash of light that would accompany my death. Or at least, would have accompanied my death. Obviously something had gone wrong in the process. But I could have sworn that he felt the bullet against him, ripping through his head... I tried to sit up from my position in a Light shaped hole in the ground. Luckily the ground was covered in leaf litter and I, due to his semi-solid state, had minimal injury on my part. I quickly phased and flitted out of my indent, reforming on the outside, ready to fight. I then stopped as he realised that I had no idea where I was and what was happening. I wasn't in the Hub anymore. Taking stock of the situation, I realised that I was in no immediate danger and relaxed from my stance. Looking around, there only seemed to be a few strange brown things growing from the ground with bits of green on them. I thought, and eventually came to the conclusion that I had absolutely no idea what the hell they were. I made my way towards one to see what exactly it was, and found that it felt rough and strong, but still had no idea what the hell they were. Looking around, I saw that these, things, were the only things in any direction spreading as far as the eye could see. "Well... This is... interesting..." I looked back to the spot where I had woken up. The only distinguishing feature was the indent in the ground and a small tear in the canopy of... green things... I slowly twirled around to look for the route through this mess of tangled brown and, on not seeing anything good, started to walk through the tangled labyrinth. Twilight The frantic unicorn knocked on the door to the boutique. "Rarity, I know you're in there. I need your help! It's urgent!" She stood back from the door and only had to wait a few seconds before it swung open with an unimaginable force. Physics was currently distracted at the time by a pink menace, so payed little attention to the events occurring around Twilight. Rarity appeared in the doorway, hair in rollers, with an annoyed look on her face, and some green facial cream. Twilight quickly backed up, gulping. Spike, as usual, became unaware of anything but Rarity and so just stood there rooted to the spot with a dreamy look on his face. "Twilight, darling, I simply must know what you are doing outside my house at this unholy hour of the morning and shouting to see me." Twilight looked up to the sky, searching for the sun, and noticed it already high above the horizon. Her expression changed to one of confusion as she turned to her fashionista friend. "Rarity, it's after lunch." "And?" Twilight sighed and decided not to argue. "Anyway Rarity, last night I was experimenting on some, things, and I maaaaaay have just made a liiiiiittle portal and brought a strange and possibly dangerous creature into the Everfree forest..." Rarity stood there with her mouth hanging open, eyes wide. "Whaaaaaaa?!" "Well, last night I was experime-" "No darling, I heard what you said. What can I do to help, this sounds like it's very urgent." Rarity wrapped a hoof around Twilight and rushed her into the boutique, slamming the door behind her, leaving a very upset Spike outside. He swore under his breath and walked off to search for the rest of Twilight's friends, all the while mumbling about Rarity not paying him any attention. Five minutes later, Twilight was seated inside the boutique, exposed to Rarity's enthusiasm. "But Twilight, this is terrible! Why didn't you come to me immediately! I could have done something to help you!" Twilight had just finished recounting her tale to Rarity, to be greeted with only silence and a stunned look. They sat in Rarity's kitchen, Rarity herself leaning over the table to make her point more clear to Twilight. Rarity continued. "And that's not the worst part!" Twilight looked at Rarity over the kitchen table. "How so?" "Well, I mean, just look at your mane! It looks terrible! Split ends everywhere! I simply must do something to get th-" "Rarity..." "And your face, it will need a complete makeover. A full day at the sp-" "RARITY!" Rarity suddenly froze, part way through her rant. "Oh, right..." She paused, looking slightly abashed, and forced a cough. "Well, I guess we could go and find the others, and then we could go and look for this thing." She stood up straight with a new found determination. "Let's go Twilight, we have to go and find our friends." Rarity and Twilight both stood and walked down the stairs to the door. Twilight stood back while Rarity opened it. They both stepped outside of the boutique and stopped as they realised that three other ponies, and a very tired, very infatuated dragon, stood, and flew respectively, outside looking at them. The three ponies outside were Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Pinkie Pie. Applejack and Rainbow Dash both looked at the two ponies emerging from the boutique expectantly, while Pinkie bounced around chasing butterflies. Spike just stared at Rarity. Applejack was the first to break the silence that had fallen over the ponies. "So, Twi. Why am Ah here? Spike just said that there was something urgent that we all had to see." Twilight just stared at her hooves and silently promised to thank her assistant later for gathering her friends. Rarity nudged her, motioning for her to explain. Twilight took a deep breath. "OkaysoIwasdoinganexperimentinmyLibrarywhenthethinghatIwascreatingwentwrongitwasaportalbythewayandthenitwent-" "Whoa whoa whoa, slow down Sugarcube, just explain normally" Twilight sighed, "Well, in short, I may have brought a creature from another world to the Everfree and now we have to go and find it." Applejack stared, while Rainbow Dash only laughed, falling out of the air. The four other ponies just glared at Rainbow until she stopped. She chuckled awkwardly. "Wow, Twi. How the hay did you manage that one?!" Rainbow paused to see the other's reactions. They weren't good. "Come on Twilight, this can't be that bad. I mean, you've got me! Nothing can beat the one and only Rainbow Dash in a fight!" She took a dramatic pose in the air as if to emphasise her statement. She continued. "And with the six of us, anything is possible. Am I right or am I right?" She stopped, looking around her, as she realised what she had just said. "Wait a second, where's Fluttershy? Wasn't she supposed to be here too?" The five friends turned to face Spike, who had suddenly become very interested in a rock by his feet. He looked up with an embarrassed look on his face. "Actually, I couldn't find Fluttershy. She wasn't in her house or anything." Twilight looked towards her friends. "Huh, well, where could Fluttershy be? Any ideas?" Light I wandered on, continuing through forest, tunelessly humming a song that I had come up with a few minutes earlier. I was happy. There were things around me that I hadn't seen since I was just a little boy, since before, well, before the world had changed. Before the Director entered my life. I had even remembered that the things that surrounded me were trees. Although I never could recall exactly where I remembered them from... The humming abruptly stopped as I heard something he didn't think I would ever hear again. Birds. And something else similar to one. I span around looking for the source of the noise, and started sprinting through the forest. I barely even noticed when I stepped out of the bush and onto a path. I definitely didn't notice the huge difference between a bird and a chicken. What I did notice however, was the hissing noise that accompanied the chicken. I approached the spot where the noise was being emitted from. There was a bush there, slightly to one side of the track, and something was inside it. I was about to move closer when a chicken's head popped out of the undergrowth. I stood there, stunned. This thing was entirely unexpected. I was shocked. "Holy crap! I found an animal!" This was something rare, you don't normally find wildlife in a city... I ran closer to the bush to see if I could touch the thing when I noticed something odd about the chicken. Just below the neck, the body turned into scales. Even with my limited experience with living creatures besides humans, I knew at the time that this wasn't natural. I started to back away slowly as the Thing in the bush started to emerge. I tried to sneak away, but the Thing had noticed me. I could only stop and stare as the Thing slowly rotated it's head to face the intruder in it's territory. I felt shivers travel through my spine as I saw the eyes. They were a pure, blood red. I felt myself unable to look away from the thing. I was rooted to the spot by it's stare. Then I felt the change. My feet were the first to get affected. I could see what was happening to them out of the corner of my eye. They were turning to stone. I started to panic. I was being turned into something that was completely solid. For a being that was barely in a physical form this was the most terrible thing that could ever happen. I did what came naturally in a panic scenario. I started to phase. My whole body started to shift, my trench coat fluttering around my feet. I flickered in and out of sight and slowly lost all form. The stone sloughed off of my legs, while the Beast continued trying to transfix me with it's stare. It was failing. The fear was evident in it's facial features. I suddenly phased out of existence and flitted around the Beast, re-forming around the back with the lower half of his body still non-existent. Shadows flew out of me and smashed into the Beast, opening a million little gashes. I reached out and battered the thing's head, the shadows aiding me and throwing the Thing across the path until it hit a tree, knocking it unconscious. I flitted across the path, barely visible at all, with little form, and was about to finish the Creature when I heard a noise. It was a small thing, and something that would unknowingly irreversibly change my life forever. It was very quiet, and very nervous. "Eep..."