In spite of the coat of fur surrounding my body, and the thick robe on top of it, the cold night air seemed to chill me down to every drop of blood in my body.
The sky above was mostly clear, with the glowing moon and stars revealing a jet black sky with a few clouds slowly floating across the open space. The hard wooden walkway and trees surrounding it were blackened in the darkness, the moonlight twisting the dark colours into shades of grey. From the darkest parts of the woods came the usual hooting of Bay Owls and calling of Crickets and Grasshoppers.
Wet wooden boards creaked as I walked, seemingly colder than the surrounding air. It was almost painful to touch them, but any pain the cold inflicted on me wasn't important.
There was another pain I was feeling. One far greater than any freezing temperatures or sharp blade could inflict.
I trotted over to the nearby rails, and rested my front hooves on them. Recent rain had kept them wet, giving them a similar freezing touch. This particular spot was the farthest that the tree walkways took you from the village. It was free of any pony made sound and light, giving the best view of the moon and night sky.
The moon was why I was here. It had been a week since the mission. A week since I had slit the throat of Harmonious Melody. Seven whole nights, and none of them were without nightmares.
I would see him in my dreams, his neck split open, blood pouring out like a creek of red. I would see his eyes, filled with fear and sadness, before going empty. I saw the picture of the mare and filly that may have been his family, a family I could have destroyed. My hooves were stained with that which gave him life, and there was nothing I could do to change that.
My head tilted upwards, eyes locked on the glowing moon. It had guided me through my life, gifted me with my cutie mark, and answered the questions that simple words couldn't answer. But there was one question still left unanswered.
"Where do I go now?"
Looking at the moon itself, there was no answer for me. Looking ahead at the forest beneath it, I saw a large open space between the trees. The shadows cast from the trunks cut the light into a shape that made it look like a path headed north.
My head dropped, my eyes staring at the wooden boards as a sigh left my mouth. I didn't know what to think of my connection to the moon. I had heard many stories of it being the home of god like entities, and tales of the moon itself being some kind of spirit. My whole life, it seemed to personally guide me, but what if it wasn't? What if it was just a big white rock, countless miles from Equestria.
"What is troubling you Night Glider?"
A gasp left my mouth as my body jolted in surprise. I turned around to see my father standing behind me. I would question how I didn't hear him coming, but I had to remind myself that he was a ninja Grandmaster.
"Dad..." I turned my gaze back to the moon. "...its nothing. I just needed a little walk."
He didn't seem satisfied with this answer. "You haven't slept much for the past few days daughter, do not try to fool me into thinking that everything is all right. I asked what troubles you?"
I closed my eyes for a second, feeling the weight of my breath as it left my body. "When I realised that I would one day be Grandmaster, it became the one thing I would think about. Leading the clan, bringing justice to Equestria, it all sounded so easy..."
"I take it that you feel intimidated by the thought of taking the role?" He presumed.
"No..." I answered. "Its not that. Not that at all..."
"Than what is it? You killed your target. You accomplished your mission. You have proven yourself as a ninja of the Uma No Yoru. There is nothing threatening your status as future Grandmaster. What about this could possibly bring you any distress?"
"Its how I earned it!"
That sounded more emotional than I intended.
"What..." He began to say.
I turned around to face him. "It all sounded so simple. Kill the target and the title of Grandmaster would be mine to keep. But it wasn't that simple dad. It wasn't that simple at all."
He stared at me for a moment, expressionless. "You feel guilty about killing him, don't you."
Of course he'd recognise what I was feeling. He'd probably dealt with plenty of others who'd dealt with similar trauma.
"Every...every time I close my eyes, I can see him. The blood running down his throat, the life dying in his eyes. Every time I fall asleep I'm brought back to that night. And...I can't go through that again."
"If the client wanted him dead than there was clearly a good reason for him to die."
"I KILLED HIM!" I snapped, only then realising that I was crying. "With the stroke of my knife I ended all the years he lived and prevented any other years he could have lived! Doesn't that mean anything to you?!"
"It means that you aren't ready yet!" He replied, raising his voice at me. "In order to send Equestria down the right path we must be prepared to do whatever it takes! Killing is no exception! If you aren't prepared to kill than you can't be a part of the clan!"
"Than I don't want to be a part of the clan..."
He flinched back as his face turned to shock, as if he wasn't expecting me to say such a thing.
For the next few seconds we stared at one another silently, letting the words we had just shared with each other sink in.
"Goodbye father."
Before he could react in any way, I quickly spun around, letting my robe fall off me, and leaped over the railing. I spread my wings out and thrust them against the air, the wind picking up around me as the village behind me grew further and further away. In the distance I could hear my father calling after me.
"Night Glider!"
Was he shouting more in anger, or heartbreak? I didn't know. And I didn't care.
Blinking back the tears, I went north, hoping that the moonlight was truly guiding me to my destiny.
***
Leave your talents behind.
Join in the unity.
Let yourself become one with society.
Click
With a push of the button, the radio was silenced.
I pushed my body upwards, sitting up in the bed. My focus returning to me, I saw that it was the middle of the night, as the entire room was cloaked in darkness. Preventing the room from going completely dark was the moonlight shining through the window.
Pushing the blanket off my body, I shifted myself out of bed and trotted over to the window. Outside, the rest of the village was completely silent, with no ponies outdoors and no light originating from the cottages. Such a sight should have felt lonely or depressing, but instead it felt...peaceful.
Up in the sky, the moon and the stars were shining bright as always.
The moon had done many things in my life. I considered it responsible for my best and worst moments. It seemed to be there for me when I felt lonely or sad, and had brought me here when I needed a place to go. But at the same time, it was responsible for me getting my cutie mark, which in turn lead me to commit the murder that had haunted me so deeply.
Once again, I looked at the village, surrounded by white light, like the moon too was edging me on to join the community.
I looked at my cutie mark, pondering what it would be like to give it up. It was a part of me. The part of me. It defined who I was. Represented my most important traits. How could I give that up?
But then I thought about what it really represented. It symbolised my relationship with the night. My ability to become one with the dark. The ability to hide. To sneak.
An ability that cost Harmonious Melody his life. An ability that made me a murderer.
It was then that I made my decision. If I was going to leave my past behind me, I was going to leave my cutie mark behind me as well.
***
The strong winds howled around me as my body was pelted with ice. My hooves trudged in and out of the thick snow, desperately trying to move onward.
For about two days I had been moving north, following the direction that the moon was leading me. The night I left the Uma No Yoru I flew towards the moon until daybreak. By then, my wings had grown painfully tired and I spent the entire day resting on a cloud that was slowly moving in the direction I was going. While it would have been nice to just stay on that cloud, I had no food, no money, nothing that could help me. I had to move on as fast as I could, to find wherever the moon was taking me. The following night I continued going north, through forests, hills, and rivers. I was unsure where I was going, but I had to put my faith in the moon.
After another day of rest, this time in a cold and wet cave, I followed the moonlight to a huge pass of snowy mountains. While I initially hesitated, what had once been my home was far behind me, and I had nowhere else to go.
As I hiked up the rocky terrain, the wind began to pick up and the air began to grow colder. It wasn't long before I encountered snow and ice, and it wasn't long afterwards that I found myself in this situation.
Through the raging streams of snow and ice that flew in the sky, I could only see the moon, as the stars had been blocked by the weather. It was all that was convincing me to go on. Frost had started building up on my fur, and my wings had gone stiff from the freezing ice. It felt like there were countless needles all over my body, painfully going in deeper as time passed.
I couldn't fly, I could barely walk, and I was struggling to stay conscious.
I was starting to feel regret for leaving my home behind. Had my faith in the moon all been nothing more than blind stupidity? Was I leading myself into a harsh endless wasteland that was slowly killing me?
As I continued on, the pain in my bones and muscles grew stronger as my body grew weaker and weaker. With my last few shuffles through the snow, I toppled over and collapsed onto the freezing ground.
My eyes closing, my mind going numb, I began to pass out. I took one last look at the moon as everything went dark.
Had it really abandoned me...
***
The Staff of Sameness became wrapped in turquoise magic as it was lifted off its pedestal.
I looked around at the crowd of ponies that had gathered around the sight. All of them looked positively elated at the choice that I had made. While I still hadn't managed to recognise most of them individually, excluding the occasional pony like Sugar Belle and Double Diamond, I still felt strangely close to them.
The staff floated over to Starlight Glimmer, whose horn glowed the same colour as she lifted the artefact. She made it do a little spin, as if to show off its power and elegance.
"We are so happy that you decided to join our little community Night Glider." Starlight said happily. "We're always excited to have new friends, and everyone has already grown very fond of you."
Among the crowd came murmurs of agreement and continued joy at my decision to join.
Starlight marched forward until she was face to face with me, the staff standing firmly upright beside her.
"Now Night Glider, do you promise to follow our philosophy and separate yourself from your unique talents and abilities, never to experience them again in order to maintain balance?"
There was a moment of silence as I finally let it all go.
"Yes."
The corners of Starlight's mouth went up in a closed smile. "Then as founder of our village and leader of this community, I accept your offer to join us in equality!"
She took a step back as the staff began spinning in the air. It quickly spun anticlockwise a few times, leaving a trail of turquoise light, before stopping, pointed directly at me.
Two beams of white light shot from the individual prongs, striking me on the chest and engulfing me in the turquoise light.
Starlight was right in her descriptions of the experience. It felt as if my entire body was my chest, letting out a deep breath through my flank. I felt a strange, yet pleasing stretching sensation above my hind leg, as my cutie mark was separated from my body. Once my cutie mark was off completely, it felt as if something inside me was gone, but not in a bad way. It was like my body and soul had been reverted to a much simpler and more relaxed form.
As the turquoise light faded, I heard cheering erupt from behind me. I turned my head back to see that everypony was celebrating at the site of my cutie mark being removed, and I looked down to see that in its placed was an equals sign matching that of all the ponies in the village.
I also realised that my mane had gone from a spiky set of hair curving backwards to a flat mop that partly covered my eyes.
"Fillies and gentlecolts!" Starlight announced. "Night Glider has officially joined us and our way!"
Another round of cheering erupted from the small crowd.
"Now..." Said Starlight, guiding me out the entrance of the cave. "You'll be staying in the same room in my cottage for a while until the rest of the town completes your own cottage."
"That sounds alright." I had gotten used to sleeping in her spare bedroom, so I could wait.
Leaving the cave, I saw that it had quickly gone from dusk to night while I was getting my cutie mark removed. The stars and the moon in the sky never seemed brighter.
"Lets get you home my friend." Said Starlight.
From the viewpoint of the mountain, I got a good look at the village. The white light of the moon shone upon it, and I understood what the moon had been trying to do, where it was trying o take me.
I had reached my destination. I was home.