The Crystal Guard stared at his icy breath in the cold night air. He breathed in deeply, letting loose a slow escape for his breath. He continued to do this for several minutes until he began to feel woozy. He would stop and rest a few moments, then continue after his break.
That was his entertainment. That was all he had from falling to insanity.
His job was true, his job was pure. He would protect Princess Cadance and Prince Shining Armor with his life. He just wished he got a promotion. Instead, the poor guard, along with seven others, was stationed at the bottom of the Crystal Castle, protecting the Crystal Heart.
Now the job wouldn’t be so bad…if it wasn’t freezing.
The guard didn’t need to be reminded that the Crystal Empire was located in the heart of the Frozen North. He just wished that the Crystal Heart’s powers used to protect the empire from the ravaging forces of nature and villains beyond imagination could also bring some warmth to the nights.
But again…that was just a wish.
He faced the road leading out of the empire and to the train station, his eyes moving from house to house. The guard breathed out again, watching his breath fade away into the ripping cold. He gripped his spear hard as a cold wind sent a shiver past his face, somehow crawling down his armor and sending coolness throughout his freezing body.
The guards behind him were caught up in small conversations of their own. He didn’t bother to hear what they were saying, nor did he care. His only focus was protecting the castle and the heart from whoever might be out there, watching their every move with vicious eyes.
He felt a tap on his shoulder. The guard spun around, gasping in surprise. His eyes calmed down, as did his nerves when he saw the friendly face of his fellow crystal companion in arms.
“Slow night, huh buddy?” his friend asked, stepping forward to be by his side.
The guard chuckled, his grip on the spear weakening. “You don’t know the half of it, Spark,” he whispered, his lips practically frozen.
His friend, whose name was obviously Spark, breathed out of his nose, a small smile on his face.
“I think I might know, actually,” Spark said, “considering I’ve been standing out here in the cold…in the dead of night…with no warm anything just like you for the same amount of time. So…yeah…I might know half of it…maybe all of it.”
The guard bumped Spark’s shoulder playfully, earning a few chuckles from the said stallion.
“Shut up,” the guard said.
Spark gave a good laugh before falling into silence. Instead, he stood by his friend’s side, staring off into the dark streets of their safe empire. A sudden thought occurred to Spark, bringing his attention to the shivering stallion.
“So…Mist…how’s that mare of yours treatin’ ya?” Spark asked, receiving a small blush from the guard, now known as Mist.
It had only been a few dates, Mist imagined, but all of his friends and members of the guard kept on razzing him on not sealing the deal with her. No, Mist wanted to take it slow. She was something different than the mares he’s dated in the past (he hasn’t actually dated before until now, but none of his friends knew that), she was somepony he dreamed he would spend the rest of his life with. Just staring into those shimmering diamonds she called her eyes made him lost, his only hope of escaping her beautiful gaze is her eventually shaking him to gain his attention. That led to some pretty awkward moments in their past dates.
But for now Mist only wanted to take it slow. Sure, he’s gotten a few nuzzles and a kiss here and there, but nothing too…vivid. He didn’t want to pressure her into doing things she didn’t want to do, which was perfectly fine with Mist, considering he’s never really done that before. But if he would, he would wait until they were married, then they could share their love to one another, becoming one true couple.
Mist shook his head, raising his cracked voice so Spark could hear him. “She’s treating me just fine, Spark,” he noticed a sly grin growing on his comrade’s face. “And no, we haven’t done anything!"
“Pfft, you’re weak, dude,” Spark muttered.
“Oh, really?” Mist asked with his eyes now turned to face Spark, completely ignoring the road ahead. Unfortunately doing so allowed four silhouettes to advance upwards towards their position. “And what exactly happened between you and that mare you said was ‘absolutely the one?’”
Spark waved his hoof in front of him, his eyes closed. “The same thing that happened to the other five mares I’ve dated before: I took them to a nice restaurant, ordered them too much hard cider than they wanted, brought them to my place, and then I-”
Sadly, Spark could not finish his story of how he tamed several mares with his gentlecolt-like behavior, because a purple light soared from above and hit the stallion right between the eyes, the back of his head exploding with bright red liquid splashing against the crystal ground.
Mist’s first reaction was jumping to the side, gasping in a large breath of air. His next reaction was releasing the air in a scream of anguish as the body of his dead friend fell to the ground, his eyes open and his face paralyzed in a look of pure shock. Mist’s scream caught the attention of his fellow guards, but even they weren’t prepared for what followed.
The stallion crying for his dead friend was pushed to the bloody ground when something large and quick pounced over him. His head hit the crystal floor beneath the castle pretty hard, his vision now blurry and his hearing slightly off.
He watched his spear fall right in front of his eyes. The sound of the sharpened metal against the crystal came later, as well as the screams of pain. Two more dark figures ran past his vision, as well as a flyer too fast to describe.
Mist’s head was still groggy from impacting the crystal, but his hearing had recovered rather quickly, and he could clearly understand what his fellow guards were saying.
“What are those things?!”
“Get back! They’re coming right for us!”
“No! We have to protect the Cry-GACRACCCKKK!”
The blood in his throat never allowed the guard to finish the order.
More loud bangs, followed by the pains of pure, unfathomable agony coming from the soldiers he trained with since day one. Mist knew he had to get up and fight back, but the pain in his head and the dullness in his vision caused him to falter. He pushed himself up anyways.
When he finally placed two hooves in front of his face, the sounds of pain stopped, and a heavy body fell to the crystal ground, several bodies.
Mist’s breath was ragged, terrified. They come out in little puffs of white cloud. He looked up and saw the dead bodies of all the guards who were sworn to protect the Crystal Heart with their lives. The ground was no longer glowing with the light of the love and hope of the ponies in this empire, it shined dark…red. The shivers in Mist’s body were no longer from the cold.
No less than fifteen seconds ago they were under attack, and all his friends and allies were alive. Since that very short period of time, the air was filled with the scent of rotting corpses and blood. Mist was the only one alive out of all his comrades…but he feared he wouldn’t be for long.
Hidden in the shadows, two glowing yellow eyes appeared and stared down the shivering stallion. Mist stared back, though he felt like he was obligated to. It emerged out of the shadows, only intensifying the guard’s fear.
The creature was light purple in color, and resembled the body type of a Timberwolf, only its body didn’t appear to be made of wood. Its body was slicker, darker, and clanked against the crystal ground every time it took a step. The beast growled as it circled the stallion, growing ever so closer to the pony with every step. The last Crystal Guard swallowed hard when his terrified eyes spotted the glistening fangs of the predator. That’s when he realized it.
He was being hunted.
Mist looked over to his spear lying a few feet to his left. Still feeling a bit dazed, Mist ignored the headache he felt and lunged for his weapon, his only chance of fighting off this beast.
And then it struck.
It was faster than anything he had ever dealt with before. The beast pinned Mist against one of the legs of the Crystal Castle, lunging forward with its forward jaws and clamping down on the pony’s throat.
The guard screamed, but his mouth quickly filled with blood that poured profusely onto his chest and legs, even the top of the creature’s head. Low gurgling noises was the only sound he made, his hooves slowly falling to his sides as the beast continued to rip apart his throat. His eyelids began to fall, darkness soon to become his last sight.
“Back off, Ravage!”
The hunter, now known to the dying guard as Ravage, let loose his torn throat from its jaws and backed away a few feet. Mist looked over to Ravage and noticed his own blood dripping from the beast’s fangs. It growled at him, but turned its head to the right when a larger figure stepped forward.
Mist managed to grasp onto life for a few moments more to see the newcomer approach him slowly. It stood about six feet tall and on two legs, with the same glowing yellow eyes that Ravage had, but they didn’t hold the true “hunter” look that Ravage did. But this creature was unique to the pony, because instead of hooves or claws, it had large mallets for its hands.
This new creature stared down at the bleeding pony with a look of what appeared to be disgust on his face. Mist couldn’t tell, from the darkness of Luna’s black night and his vision slowly fading in and out. The creature shook its head and raised one of its big fists over its tiny head.
“Nothin’ but a dying breed,” it said, smashing its mallet into Mist’s face. The force of the hit crushed the pony’s skull inwards, killing him instantly.
Rumble brought his mallet back from the pony’s ruined face. What remained of the Crystal Guard leaned to the left, blood pouring from its shattered face with every puncture wound its broken skull had created.
“Disgusting,” Rumble commented, gently stepping over the bodies and pools of blood he and his team had left in their path. “Why can’t you guys ever just listen to me for once and take prisoners instead of just killing ‘em all?” he asked.
Frenzy pushed a pony with a red hole in his head into the shadows. He looked back at Rumble and chuckled, “Because your plans are stupid, Rumble! Besides, Ravage has been itchin’ to chew on some pony flesh ever since we got back on this rock!”
Ravage responded with a low growl, his claws scraping the crystal floor.
The blue one named Rumble stuck up his mallet over his mouth and whispered sharply, “Whatever, just be quiet! The last thing we need is any witnesses to this.”
“Then let’s get the job done and get outta here!” Frenzy whispered back, his tone equally sharp. The red one looked up at the metal bird hovering above the group. He said, “Laserbeak, quit sqawkin’ around and grab that glowy thing!”
Laserbeak let loose his common shriek before swopping downwards and capturing the Crystal Heart with his talons. He took off into the night sky, Ravage following right behind him. Frenzy was about to make his escape as well, only to turn back to see Rumble pushing more dead guards into the darkness the castle provided by the large legs.
“What are you doing?” Frenzy whispered, catching Rumble’s attention.
Rumble pointed to the dead bodies remaining around where the Crystal Heart once was. “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m clearing the area! You know, not leave any evidence for them to find?!” he whispered back.
“They’re gonna find it all anyways when the sun rises,” Frenzy retorted. “Now let’s get going before we get caught!”
Rumble looked back at their hideous crime, nodding once to Frenzy, but mostly himself. He turned around and ran by Frenzy’s side. They were already far behind Laserbeak and his ravaged companion, but they didn’t care. They would escape without anypony knowing who could have caused those murders.
As their tiny forms entered the blizzard, Rumble didn’t even turn around to notice the protective dome surrounding the empire fall apart, its brilliant neon lights returning to the castle.
Little did the Mini-cons know that there was a witness to their terrible acts, and he couldn’t get back inside the Crystal Castle any faster.
_______________
“Shining?”
“......”
“Shining, are you awake, dear?”
“…………”
“Shining…?”
“ZZZZZZZ!!!”
Princess Cadance reached back and grabbed one of the many pillows, slamming it against her husband’s muzzle. Prince Shining Armor shot up instantly, his head darting back and forth as the pillow fell into his lap.
“Shining,” Princess Cadance whispered to her husband. Shining Armor turned towards his wife, mentally chuckling at her bedhead. In reality, his eyes bore no emotion and his posture resembled a pony about to collapse from exhaustion.
It didn’t help when Cadance said, “I think I heard somepony running around in the halls downstairs.”
Shining laid his head back down on his pillow. “Let the late night guards take care of it,” he mumbled, his mind gently drifting off into slumber.
Her hooves pressed into his back annoyingly.
“I’m serious! Please, can you go check it out?” she persisted, presenting Shining her best begging eyes. He didn’t even turn to face her, his chest slowly rising and falling. Cadance breathed out, an unamused expression on her face.
She pressed her hooves onto his back forcefully, trying her best to push him out of bed. “I’m…serious…Shining… Go…check…it out!” she managed to push the stallion out of his resting position, his body falling off the bed with a heavy thud.
“Ouch!”
“Oh my gosh! Shining, are you okay? I didn’t mean to actually-!”
Shining Armor presented himself to the princess. His eyes stared her down with a heavy look and a deadly frown growing on his face. Cadance blushed a little, trying her best to pull the covers over her. Shining only rolled his eyes, a groan escaping his lips.
“Fine! I’ll check it out!” he said with anger clearly present in his voice. Cadance watched him to leave towards the door, his hoofsteps much heavier than she expected.
This was miserable. It was almost morning and now Shining Armor had to get up from his wonderful sleep to see what Cadance was so worried about. It could’ve been the castle itself making the noise, despite the castle being new since the last one was…incinerated.
He pressed his hoof on the door handle, a grumble he made clearly heard by Cadance.
“Oh, stop being so grumpy! I didn’t do it that hard!” Cadance said to him.
Shining turned his head back and said, “Yeah, then why did it hurt?”
“All I did was push!”
“All you did was-!”
The door swung open quickly, slamming against Shining Armor’s cheek.
The first thing Shining heard besides the yell of pain from himself was a voice on the other side of the door, the one who had forced the door inwards. It sounded panicked, heavy breathing accompanying the tone.
“Shining Armor, sir! I have something urgent to tell you!” the voice shouted. Shining backed away from the door, rubbing his cheek as the stallion in golden armor stepped into the room. It wasn’t a Crystal Guard. It wasn’t even a crystal pony.
Flash Sentry quickly saluted his superior, though his hoof fell when he noticed him in pain. His eyes widened in realization.
“Oh! Geez, sir! I-I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to push the door in your face!” Flash apologized, his voice shaky and unstable.
Shining stuck up his hoof, silencing the Pegasus. He took in a few deep breaths before lifting up his head to face Flash, his eyes as hard as stone. Flash found himself practically quiver under his commander’s stare.
“It’s quite alright, Flash,” Shining told him by his name. He memorized the pony before him ever since the day he joined the castle guard. He wasn’t very hard to distinguish from the others.
He closed his eyes and placed a hoof between his temples. “Just…what is it that’s so urgent?” Shining Armor asked.
Flash quickly began to explain. “I don’t know how it could’ve happened, sir, but-” he stopped when he noticed Princess Cadance at the end of the room sitting upright in her large king size bed, the blankets pulled upwards to cover herself.
Flash found himself growing redder, his eyes quickly falling to the floor.
“Um…I could come back later if you two want your privacy,” he stated politely, his eyes refusing to look up. Shining was confused for a few seconds, but quickly realized what he meant and shook his head.
“We weren’t doing anything , Flash,” Shining said to him, causing the Pegasus to bring his eyes back up.
Flash stuck his hoof out and asked, “Really? Because I heard you two talking before I pushed the door and it sounded like-”
“Yes! I know what it sounded like, but we didn’t do anything,” Shining Armor exclaimed, causing Flash to jump back in fright. Cadance was busy giggling, pulling up the sheets to hide her blush. Shining continued while ignoring his wife’s childish laughter, “Now, what do you want?”
The yellow-colored Pegasus brought his eyes up to stare right into his superior’s. Shining Armor noticed the worry his eyes held, but he also noticed something else…fear. It wasn’t something Shining appreciated his guards to shed. If anything, Shining Armor wished his guards didn’t show any emotion like the guards back at Canterlot.
But the reason for the terror in his eyes was clear when Flash Sentry told him what he saw…
“Sir…the entire squad stationed underneath the castle have been killed…and the Crystal Heart has been stolen.”
“Buck me.”
“Yes, please!”
“Cadance, be quiet!”