//------------------------------// // Early Years // Story: Beacon // by shadeofthenight //------------------------------// Celestia stared at the unharmed foal, who had only minutes ago had been in the center of an elemental disaster. At the moment, the small unicorn was sleeping blissfully in a mound of blankets, completely oblivious to the hustle around him. Several doctors were checking his vitals, casting various spells that scanned for anything out of the ordinary. Celestia was completely baffled at how the filly had survived a disaster like that completely unscathed. From what her guards had told her, the foal had been at the exact middle of the disaster when it happened, only inches away from his former parents’ stone corpses. “Your Majesty?” Celestia turned toward the unicorn doctor that had addressed her, momentarily tuning out her train of thought. “Is he going to be okay?” She immediately asked. “Well, yes but…” The doctor hesitated, then continued,”That’s what the problem is.” While she was overjoyed to know that the foal was okay, she was curious about what the doctor had just said. “Continue.” Celestia replied, a little firmly. “From where the guards informed me that they pulled the child, then by all means, this one should be dead, or mortally injured at the least. Not to say that I’m not glad that at least one pony survived, but my professional opinion is that…” “Is what?” The doctor gave her a grim look,”This is not an ordinary foal.” He gestured her over to near where he stood. The doctor cast a spell, and it showed the skeletal structure of the dozing foal. Almost immediately, Celestia could tell something was wrong. Instead of the normal white hue of bone, the skeleton gleamed with an unnatural metallic blue hue. “According the Royal Guard Blacksmith, this metal is some form of admantium, one that is light and flexible.” The doctor explained, “Yet that is not even the half of it.” The image faded, and the doctor tapped the sleeping child’s left forelimb. “Please don’t be alarmed about what I am going to do Your Majesty.” Levitating a scalpel with his magic, the doctor moved it over to the forelimb. “Before you start, tell me so there is less of a chance of me being alarmed.” Celestia ordered, her curiosity tempered with caution and concern. “I am going to make a large incision, and hold it open to show you what I am talking about. Don’t worry, as long as the foal doesn’t wake up, he should be fine.” He replied, carefully setting the blade against the lower part of the forelimb. The doctor slid the blade, waiting until he had made a cut two inches long before raising the blade vertically. Keeping the tip in the cut, he gestured with his hoof at the wound as he gently peeled the skin back. Celestia peered close, and saw an inky black substance coating underneath where blood, muscle, and tissue should have been. No blood was seeping out, probably because of the substance, However, as Celestia peered closer, she found that hairlike strands of the substance had lashed themselves to the peeled back skin, and were trying to force it back to its original place. “What is that?” She asked the unicorn, who was now trying to keep the tip of the scalpel in place as half of the strands were now actually pushing the blade away. “It seems to be a form of regenerative magic skin, most likely placed soon after birth by somepony….At least, that is what we guessed anyway.” He grunted, as the strands actually forced the blade up. Giving up, he pulled the scalpel away, and the substance closed the wound shut in two seconds. Sighing, he put the tool away and focused his magic on the foal’s eyelids, gently lifting them up to reveal the blank white pupils beneath. “He’s blind?!” Celestia gasped. The doctor nodded,”As far as we can tell, yes. After we did several magic scans on the foal, we discovered that his eyes are attached by metal piping and strands of odd materials that didn’t show up like the rest of the metal when we checked his skeletal structure for damage.” Releasing the eyelid, the doctor turned to face Celestia again. “I’m going to assume already that we are going to find more. Rather than further keep you from your duties, I will simply give you the full medical report in a few hours.” Celestia nodded, knowing full well that she had to still run the courts for the day, and she was already late. Turning away, Celestia headed out of the infirmary and towards the throne room, doing the best she could to mentally prepare herself for the day ahead. The day went by fairly quickly, since Celestia had a lot to ponder. Retiring to her chambers after her duties, Celestia sat in solitude to think. While she was glad that the foal was unharmed, she was still shocked about what she had heard from the doctor. A metal skeleton, a regenerative black substance under the skin, and eyes that served next to no purpose? These were the least of the thoughts that plagued her mind, since now she was also faced with another problem: Who would take him in now? Celestia knew that a few of the servants in the castle as well as some Royal Guards who had brought the foal out of the disaster would not be able to resist gossiping about his miraculous survival and strange anatomy to the other ponies in their life. Briefly, Celestia thought about sending the child to an orphanage, but quickly dismissed it. If no parent would adopt him, then what reason would an orphanage have to take him in? Now she only had three options: Send the foal to Ponyville, force and orphanage or family to take him in, or raise the child herself. Almost immediately, Celestia ruled out the first and second options, since a detachment of Royal Guards was being sent to deal with the monsters that had been raiding from the Everfree Forest. It probably would not be the safest environment for the foal for a while. There was also the issue of rumors spreading to Ponyville because of that. The second option was not going to happen, since Celestia would never force anypony to do something they didn’t want to. So that left only one option left. Celestia sighed. The final option was not going to be easy, While most of her subjects would be fine with this, as they saw her as a god, the majority of the nobles wouldn’t stand for it, especially if it cut into court. They would most likely view the child as a threat to their political power. Still… Celestia found herself walking swiftly towards the infirmary yet again. She arrived, briefly musing over raising the child in secret. Arriving, she nodded to the mare on duty there as she bowed. Stopping at the bed holding the baby unicorn, she found that he was awake, and staring at her with his blank eyes. She sat down next to the bed, the foal’s head following her movement. He can see….But how?, Celestia thought. Celestia’s horn glowed, and a beautiful golden light encompassed the foal, who showed no reaction. The spell she was casting targeted the pony’s soul she was casting it on, and would bring up a general image of it. Celestia had also modified the spell to inform her of any evil influences over the soul. In her mind, the image began to form swiftly, but what she found perplexed her. The image that appeared was of the unicorn, with a brilliant white soul, but had threads of different colors attached to it. These threads spiraled off in different directions, one thread was rainbow colored, another was more like a metal cord than anything else, and the other two were both jet black. Curious, Celestia shifted the scope of the spell to follow one of the threads. Choosing one of the black threads, she followed it until she reached its end. She found a sphere, matching the thread’s color almost completely, except for the bright symbol in the center. It glowed bright blue, and surrounded the sphere in its glow. At first, Celestia wasn’t sure what it meant, but as she kept looking at it, she noticed a few things. The first was that the blue aura stretched down the thread, but was only faintly visible at that point. The second was that the aura around the sphere seemed to expand and contract in certain areas, Almost like something was trying to free itself. The final thing, the one thing that disturbed Celestia the most, was the fact that red eyes bared in hatred would flash across the sphere every couple of minutes. Moving her focus away from the sphere, she followed the other threads to see what was at the end of each one. The rainbow colored thread had an amorphous blob consisting of shifting elements at the end, the grey one had a ring with several square ridges on the outside, and the final black one ended in absolutely nothing. However, all of the shapes had the same symbol and aura around it. Celestia ended the spell, having seen enough. From she could gather from the spell, was that the unicorn was connected to three objects or creatures, one of them obviously malevolent. However, the other two that she could see didn’t seem to represent malevolence or benevolence. Celestia looked at the foal, who was staring back at her, a small smile present on it’s face. However, it wasn’t the smile that caught Celestia’s attention. No, it was the look in the newborn’s eyes which despite being milky white, still managed to convey a message of loneliness and despair. A look that Luna had often given her many times before….. Without even realizing it, Celestia had pulled the newborn into a tight hug. The faol squirmed for a second, but slowly nestled into her embrace. She looked the newborn in his eyes, and leaned down to whisper in his ear. “I’m not going to abandon you.” She soothed,”Not ever.” The foal smiled, and nuzzled her cheek affectionately. Celestia closed her eyes, having thought up a name for the child already. It fit his Cutie Mark and, to a much darker extent, the column of light that shone from the elemental disaster: Beacon Several Years Later “Mom, are you sure I can do this?” Beacon asked, worriedly. Celestia and her son were sitting near the entrance of the palace, waiting for the two Royal Guards to arrive to escort him to his entrance exam. Celestia nodded,”Of course, but I thought you were looking forward to this?” Beacon shifted nervously on his hooves.”Well yes...but now that it’s actually time for me to take it, I just...:” Celestia smiled. Even though he had gone through some rough years, with the nobles either threatening or trying to pressure him into winning his favor, he was always worried about normal things. She frowned, remembering the first year that she announced she was taking in the child. During that day alone, she had received over several hundred complaints and arguments as to why she shouldn’t have adopted him. Most of these, were unsurprisingly, the nobles. Over time, the general public of Equestria did come to accept Beacon, mostly because there really wasn’t anymore destructive incidents. The noble houses on the other hand, took a lot of convincing. Even still, some of them kept up the complaints. How Beacon could keep a level head for a colt his age, Celestia had no idea. However…. “Mom?” Celestia shook herself out of her thoughts. Beacon had just asked her what he should do to pass the magic test to enter her school. “The instructors will tell you what they want you to do.” Celestia replied, “But I need to warn you now, they might ask you to complete a more difficult task because you are my son. Now, it doesn’t matter if you succeed or fail, because I will still love you.” Beacon nodded, calming down noticeably quickly,”Okay, that makes me feel a little better.” The palace doors opened, halting anymore conversation as the two Royal Guards assigned to escort him arrived. Celestia nuzzled her son, “Good luck today sweetheart. I love you.” Beacon nodded, smiling brightly at her as the two guards led him away. “I love you too!” He called back as the doors swung shut. Beacon arrived at his mother’s school, unable to admire the structure since the guards were in a hurry. The halls were mostly empty, since it was fairly early in the morning. In fact the only other ponies that were there were the exam overseers, a young lavender unicorn mare, and her parents. The family stared at him for a few seconds, then bowed as he passed. Out of both of these actions, only the bowing really bothered him now. The staring, not so much.A couple of years before, this would have bothered him. Now, it was just a common occurance. Still, after looking at himself in one of the many mirrors in the palace, he couldn’t really blame them. When compared to most ponies, he was the odd one of the bunch. His milky white eyes and metallic blue hooves were the typical cause of most staring, but beside having a physical strength that could smash through walls and being exceptionally powerful with magic, he was mostly normal. “Prince Beacon?” Beacon turned to the blue unicorn mare wearing an overseer’s uniform was standing in front of an exam room. “This way sir.” The guards escorting him saluted and took positions outside the door as he went in. The room had white walls decorated with banners depicting the sun, with several rows of seats in the back, a chalkboard at the front, and a small empty pedestal in the middle. Two other unicorns, a stallion and another mare, were seated in the back rowk. The blue mare took her seat in between the two, while Beacon moved to the empty pedestal. After a few minutes of silence, the blue mare spoke,”Prince Beacon, are you ready to begin?” Beacon nodded, mentally prepping himself for whatever test they could throw at him. The blue mare gave him a very smug grin, which sent a shiver down his spine. The mare levitated a large rock over to the pedestal, but did not put it down,”I want you to make our magic stop working.” She told him, never losing her smug smile. The rock was immediately surrounded by two other auras from the other unicorns. “How am I supposed to do that?” demanded Beacon, now a little pissed off. The mare shrugged,”You’re the one being tested here, unless you want to lose admission to the school, then I would make it happen. Of course, you can always give up…” Beacon rolled his eyes. Mother had warned him that they might test him harder than the others, but this was ridiculous! How could he make a unicorn’s magic cease to work? Beacon’s eyes closed as began to rack his brain for a solution. There was no way he was going to give up, not by a long shot, but….An idea popped up, but was quickly dismissed. There was no way he was going to use dark magic for that. Not ever, since Mother taught him how corrupting it was. There had to be another way though!. Beacon ground his teeth in frustration, but stopped. He felt something, building up inside of him. It sure didn’t feel like magic, but something told him to allow to charge. What was it though? Beacon felt his body heat up, and he glanced at his left foreleg. His eyes widened in alarm as he saw his bones through his glowing skin. The instructors were now staring at him in horror, except for the blue furred mare, although she did look a lot less smug now. Beacon flinched as he felt the energy rush straight for his horn. The and there was the sound of stone smashing from somewhere in the building, but Beacon didn’t pay to much attention to it. He was too busy wondering why the energy was now surging in his body again. His vision went white and his ears started ringing as the energy was released. When his vision cleared, he saw that the room was still intact. The only difference? The rock was on the pedestal. Grinning at the three instructors, who were sitting slack jawed at him, Beacon walked forward until he was a few feet away from the rows of seats. “Did I pass?” Beacon asked. The blue furred mare shook herself out of her stupor and glared at him. Turning to the stone, she stared at it intensely, sweat starting to appear on her head. Finally she stopped and looked at Beacon with shock. The other two overseers attempted to move the rock themselves, but ended up the same. “Y-You….passed.” She stuttered, completely baffled. “Thank you.” Beacon a smug smile on his face as he left the room. The two guards were not outside, and the only thing Beacon sensed were traces of powerful magic. Had something happened? Beacon’s panic was significantly subdued when he sensed his mother nearby. Sighing in relief, Beacon walked over to the room where he had sensed her and went in. Inside, was his mother, his two escort guards, the unicorn family he saw earlier, and four overseers that looked pretty shocked. The lavender unicorn filly was admiring her flank, which had a Cutie Mark in the shape of a light reddish star surrounded by white stars. She looked just about his age! Celestia turned and smiled at him, ushering him forward with a hoof. “Beacon, this is Twilight Sparkle. She’s going to be learning with you in school here.” She told him, her loving smile never wavering. The lavender colored filly looked at him, a little nervous. “Hi…” She half mumbled, half whispered. “Hello.” Beacon replied, a little nervous himself. One of the four overseers brought over a bag containing the textbooks for Twilight and set them next to her. Almost immediately, Twilight lost her antisocialness and dove into the bag, pulling out the class textbook immediately. Beacon was a little curious himself, so he looked at the page she was reading. “Oooh, advanced transmutation spells!” Beacon gasped. Twilight turned her head and looked at him with surprise. “You know transmutation?” She asked. He nodded,”Yep, I know a few of them, along with some advanced shielding spells. Want me to show you?” Twilight sprouted a grin that stretched across most of her face as she nodded. The two of them began to talk about spells and the inner workings of them. Celestia and Twilight’s parents smiled at the two. “I think Twilight’s found a friend.” Her father said. Celestia nodded. “Yes, I believe she has.” Celestia replied, smiling a little broader.