//------------------------------//
// Chapter 2: The First Mysterious Spirit 
// Story: Luna Just Learned About The Play "A Hearth's Warming Carol" 
// by Singularity Dream 
//------------------------------//

The clock Celestia didn't know she had ticked in the darkness. It seemed like she spent hours waiting and dreading the promised apparition, even though only a few minutes had truly passed. The silence of the room was ended by an unseen presence.

"I am the spirit of Hearth's Warming Eves past," a completely unfamiliar voice spoke to Princess Celestia. A moment later a unearthly spirit appeared from the darkness.

It could not be any mortal being. Loose cloth of some unnatural material shrouded its exact form, but what few details could be determined showed it was no creature of this world. The sides of its shroud billowed even with no wind present. Its head towered over any normal pony and came to a sharp point at the very top. It moved towards the bed with supernatural grace no mortal pony could match.

Princess Celestia tried to plead with the unknowable forces of the great beyond. "Luna, I know you want to play but I had a really long day and--"

"Silence!" the very mysterious spirit commanded with a voice used to shouting royal orders. One shrouded leg lifted in proclamation. "Your wealth and power have blinded you to the true joy of this sacred holiday. I have come to show you a vision of the past, to remind you of what happened to those who didn't understand what you have forgotten."

Princess Celestia and the impossible to identify spirit were engulfed in darkness. Celestia let out sound that could possibly be mistaken for a sigh, but obviously must have been a gasp of terror at being taken from the world she knew to the distant past.

"See what happens when the leaders of ponies forget the joy of harmony," the clever and mysterious spirit whispered as a window opened in the darkness to show three mares sitting around a heavy table. A pegasus in ancient armor, an earth pony in hoof-stitched clothes, and a unicorn in crown and fur cape. "This was back when you were enjoying the simple pleasures of long nights with your sister, instead of ruling as these ponies did, as you do now."

The three ponies below were arguing loudly when first seen, then fell into silence to glare at each other across the table. All three were familiar to Princess Celestia, as she is the patron of many alternative theaters in Canterlot, and all three were actors at one of the few places that would be putting on a pageant this late tonight.

"Luna, do you know what the term ‘avant-garde’ means?" Princess Celestia asked in a very casual voice.

"The spirits know all," was the only reply to occur before the scene below changed dramatically.

The pegasus jumped onto the table with an electric guitar, he stood expertly on his hind legs (using his wings to help maintain his balance) and dove into a blazing heavy metal guitar solo that represented the pegasi independence and determination to never surrender. Princess Celestia could almost hear the spirit beside her blink at the unexpected sight, and a second blink when the ponies representing the windigos came out to tapdance in a circle around the table. The other two ponies that had been at the table were nowhere to be seen.

"Oh yes, the memories are coming back to me." Celestia draped a foreleg across her forehead dramatically. "Those simple days of my youth. When the nights were full of happiness. Happiness and kazoos."

"Wait, what? Kazoos?" The calm and collected spirit sputtered.

Any further speech was drowned out by the tidal wave of sound from dozens of kazoos. The earth pony chancellor marched back onto the stage leading the earth pony chorus in a stirring buzzing rebuttal to proclaim earth pony resilience and honor.

Knowing her time was at an end, and assured that Princess Celestia had learned the intended lesson, the spirit pulled the darkness around them both to return Princess Celestia to her own time. Both of them got only a glimpse of the smoke, lasers, and disco ball of Princess Platinum's entrance.

"Two more spirits will visit you before the night is done," a totally spooky voice spoke when Princess Celestia found herself alone in her bedroom once more. She had no way of knowing the voice, so the tone of annoyance in it must have been her imagination.

"We should have stayed longer," Celestia said with a smirk. "I'm not sure I learned my lesson yet. They hadn't gotten to the silent interpretive dance of Pansy, Clover, and Cookie lamenting their ruler’s mistakes."

A low sound, which some poor unbalanced psyche might think was an angry grumble, filled the air. As the spirit had already vanished into the mysterious cosmic emptiness from which it came.