For her entire life, Twilight Sparkle had looked up to Princess Celestia. She revered her as the model of a wise and competent leader. For the first time ever, she now had her doubts.
Twilight sat off by herself aboard the Crystal Express. Celestia’s journal lay open on the pillow next to her. The writing was a mess – all sorts of things thrown together on the page. What seemed to be marks left by tears from long ago stained the paper. It felt to her like Celestia had regurgitated her entire emotional state into the book and left it there for her to sort out.
A thousand years had passed since the trifecta of events occurred leading to the banishment of her sister. Although she did her best to hide them, Celestia still bore the scars of that traumatic day. Reading her journal, Twilight found a completely different side of the princess she never knew existed. The insecurity, self-loathing, and constant reminders that she had failed in her duties as princess peeled back at the layers of the complex monarch. It must have been especially hard for her to share this personal record with any other pony.
Twilight’s concentration in trying to make sense of the smeared and nearly illegible writing was suddenly shattered.
“Wha’cha doin’?” Pinkie Pie leaned over the top of the book and stared into her face.
Twilight recoiled in shock – “ahhhhh… Pinkie, you can’t sneak up on a pony like that.”
Pinkie’s smile turned upside down as she apologized. “I-I’m sorry Twilight. I didn’t mean to bother you.”
The balloons on Pinkie’s cutie mark seemed to deflate just a little as she wheeled around and made to head off in the other direction. Twilight stopped her by quickly placing an outstretched hoof on her flank.
“Wait, Pinkie.” Twilight had a twinge of remorse in her reply. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you like that. – I’m just a bit stressed with this dark magic hunt we’re on and all.”
“That’s what I figured.” The bright and cheery smile of the party pony quickly returned in all its glory. “I just came over to see if I could help cheer you up.”
“That’s a pretty tall order, Pinkie.” Twilight gave a little crack of a smile in her otherwise stress-lined face. “I don’t even know if one of your infamous parties could help me now.”
“Well….” Pinkie trailed off a bit in a contrasting start to her reply. “I did happen to pack my Ultimate-Pinky-Party-in-a-Box party package – you never know when you’ll need to throw a super duper party, and I came prepared.”
“I think I’m good for now,” chuckled Twilight not doubting for a moment that it all made perfect sense to Pinkie Pie to pack an entire party-to-go on a mission to recover the element of dark magic. “How about you save that super party of yours for after we get that last element and set things straight again?”
“Okie dokie!” Pinkie bounced off to join the others.
Twilight closed the journal and decided to go spend some time with her friends. It wasn’t very often that she had the whole lot of them together like this. Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie and Rarity were all fairly common fixtures in her day-to-day life in Ponyville. Spike was pretty much her shadow. Having Discord, Celestia and Luna all along for the trip as well made it a fairly exceptional event – one she probably shouldn’t miss with her head buried in another book.
Although most of the ponies laughed as Discord entertained them all with his silly antics, Twilight kept her eye on - a much more real to her now - Celestia. The princess kept mostly to herself staying just to the edge of the main flow of conversation. Twilight managed to catch her attention and she politely excused herself from the circle and walked over to have a little one-on-one with her former student.
The train bumped along the tracks in a steady rhythm. In the case of the Crystal Express, the regular tap-tap-tap was replaced with a tip-tip-tip-tip-tip-tip – this was, in fact, an express train. Princess Celestia and Princess Twilight moved to the back of the car before starting their own conversation.
“Thank you for allowing me to read your journal.” Twilight was sincere in her comment. “I never knew how much you went through in having to banish your own sister – it must have been hard.”
“It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.” Celestia looked down at Twilight with a somber expression. The pain of her past deeds left her vulnerable and naked. “I hope I never have to make that same choice again.”
“How did you overcome it all? How did you cope with the pain and the loss?” Twilight probed for answers to questions that may have none.
“The one thing that kept me going all those long years – the knowledge that I was able to work a failsafe into my spell. I was encouraged by knowing that one day I would see my sister again and I would have the chance to try and undo the damage I had done. For a thousand years, it was the one thing that kept me going… until you came along, that is.”
“Why do you say that? What’s so special about me?” Twilight looked up at her mentor. A gentle smile had had appeared on her face as she looked down on the young princess.
“Because, Twilight, you reminded me of my dear Luna and everything I cherished about the sisterly bond I had with her. You also reminded me a lot of myself growing up – so inquisitive, so studious. I had a feeling that you were the key to unlocking the secret of the elements and helping to reunite me with my sister.”
“But didn’t you already understand how to use the Elements of Harmony? You did use them to defeat Discord and Sombra, right?”
“In a way, yes. But, in all my years of studying the Elements of Harmony and the Elements of Disharmony, I discovered the one thing that I had failed to understand when Luna and I had used them to defeat the powers of chaos and evil. We lacked that unity of friendship that I see now flourishes among all of you.”
“But aren’t the two of you friends?” Twilight was puzzled.
“In a way -- we are sisters and that does come with a certain degree of friendship built in. What we lacked was a true friendship beyond just being related. There is a difference, and you have proven that time and again. True friendship is something that, no matter what darkness assails, will always shine. It’s not just a big sister defending her little sister. It’s true friends standing side by side, ready to help and support one another in any situation.
I hope that, if nothing else, my journal has shown that I cared deeply for my sister and was devastated by her loss. I also must say that the most glorious day of my entire life was when I was able to once again hold her in my hooves and tell her how much I loved her. Our friendship grew over those years apart – I never knew what I had until I lost it.”
“Thank you for sharing that with me, princess.” Twilight approached her for a hug. “I know it wasn’t easy, but I hope I’m better prepared now for whatever is waiting for us in the Crystal Empire.”
“I hope so as well, my good and faithful student – I mean – princess.” Celestia gave Twilight a hug and the two of them rejoined the group a short time later.
Celestia had sent a magically sealed letter to Princess Cadance ahead of their arrival. It served to testify to the importance of the situation. Cadance was already aware that something seemed - off - and was already making preparations to charge the crystal heart to maximum power just in case its powers were needed. Her reply was near immediate - she, herself, had been in the middle of writing to Celestia to see if she could make sense of it all.
The Crystal Empire was a pretty normal place, if you count having an entire city of crystal ponies vanish for a thousand years and then reappear as though not a day had passed as normal. Currently, something was happening that was not part of that normal. The problem started with minor hints but was getting more pronounced with every passing day. Dark crystals had begun to infest the town. They signaled a return to dark times – a return of the influence of King Sombra.
The train pulled into the station as it was coming up on mid-morning. The incredibly long journey had taken a matter of hours on the express trip from Canterlot. Waiting to greet them at the terminal was Twilight’s brother, husband to Princess Cadance, Shining Armor. He and a group of Crystal Royal Guard ponies stood at attention as the train pulled up to the platform.
The regal stallion gave a deep bow to the princesses as the Canterlot forces exited the train car and walked out onto the platform. A number of royal guards helped them with their gear. Pinkie, however, refused to let anypony handle her party package saying it was far too fragile and could be accidently discharged if mishandled. The guards backed off like she was carrying a doomsday weapon of sorts and let her have her space.
Shining Armor led the way through town and up to the foot of the Crystal Castle where an anxious Princess Cadance awaited their arrival. The royal pleasantries aside, they all quickly relocated indoors to discuss recent events. The guards kept a short distance, mainly mindful of the presence of Discord and the general uncertainty that afforded.
The summit came to order and they got down to business right away. Twilight and Celestia brought everyone up to speed and laid out their plans to go about searching for the last element. Cadance informed them of everything that she had noted as being odd around town that could potentially lead them to their target. The signs of Sombra’s dark influence were spreading rapidly.
“We’ll do anything we can to assist. I’ve powered up the crystal heart just in case we need it.” Cadance addressed the group as they wrapped up their meeting.
“Good luck everypony!” Twilight called out as they went about putting their plans into action.
They had divided up the city into four quadrants. Each princess would take a small number from their current ranks along with a contingent of the royal guard and go shop to shop and house to house in search of anything that looked or felt out of place. At the first sign of trouble, they were to send up a beacon alerting the others.
Celestia, Rarity, and Applejack went together into the Northwest sector. Luna, Rainbow Dash, and Fluttershy covered the Northeast. Although he would have rather gone with Twilight, Discord hooked up with Pinkie Pie and Cadance to search the Southeast quadrant. That left Twilight, Shining Armor, and Spike to head to the Southwest district.
The groups headed off in their separate search patterns. Twilight led the way as her group marched off into the Southwest zone. The trail of dark crystals seemed to intensify as she led her brother and their team further away from the castle. It was almost as if they were following a path of breadcrumbs.
“When did these crystals start appearing like this?” questioned Twilight.
“We’ve always had to deal with a rogue crystal formation or two, but they haven’t been this bad until very recently,” replied Shining Armor. “The black ones are especially troublesome since they tend to form in the worst possible places and are the hardest to remove.”
“Any idea what could be causing them to form like this?” Twilight indicated the trails of black crystal leading off in multiple directions – the largest of which led on ahead.
“No idea, little sis.” Shining Armor shook his head. “We were hoping you would be able to help figure that out.”
The small team trotted on ahead as the trail intensified. As they approached the edge of town, the crystals seemed to lead up to a solitary little shack that looked completely out of place itself alongside the regular homes and shops of the Crystal Empire. It was surrounded by dark crystals. A simple thatched roof basically sat on top of a mesh of black crystal walls that lay over an upside-down ‘V’ of a doorway covered only by a sheet of thin, red cloth for a door.
“Well, that definitely qualifies as odd,” said Twilight. “Do you happen to know who lives there?”
Shining Armor thought for a moment as he stroked his chin. “I’m not really sure. I think that pony is new in town – can’t have been more than two or three weeks ago that they moved in – she’s definitely not a local.”
As they all approached the hovel, Twilight called out to everypony to be cautious. She, along with her brother, walked up the simple path toward the door. Before they reached the opening, however, a small blue pony in a purple robe and hat poked her head through the makeshift door hanging.
Twilight recoiled as she recognized the mare and called out her name, “Trixie!”