It was a very sunny day and Twilight Sparkle was walking through the streets of Ponyville humming a song as she walked. There was no real destination in mind she just wanted to go outside and get some fresh air. That and to get off the rest of the hangover from Pinkie Pie's party. Twilight giggled to herself, the last thing she remembered from the party was having a conversation with Fluttershy and then ended up dancing like a madmare on the dance floor.
Wait.
The party.
Wasn't that a couple days ago?
It felt like it was, so why is Twilight here and not....
Where was she supposed to be?
The last thing Twilight remembered was the party, so why is there a great sense of deja vu here? Twilight continued her walk while lost in her own thoughts with a million questions going through her mind. Until she stopped at a group of ponies in the middle of Ponyville. They all gave her waves and hi's to which Twilight replied to them with a simple wave, this feels familiar.
What happened next?
It was the lake.
Yes.
It was the lake!
Twilight walked faster to the lake hoping to remember what happened next. Once there, she gets a good glimpse at the lake and at the grass, this is where she fell asleep. Then Spike came with a letter a couple hours after sleeping. What did the letter say? It was a letter from Celestia wasn't it? The letter said something about an "extreme emergency."
An image popped into Twilight's head for a fraction of a second, it was an image dark stallion and a little foal. An They both looked familiar, where had she seen them?
Before Twilight's questions were answered, the sun started setting quickly and extremely early from its scheduled time, this was very odd considering that it was still morning time. The sun slowed down setting in the sky and it was beginning to get dark, time has seen to pass quicker than usual.
"Twilight."
"Twilight!"
"TWILIGHT!"
Twilight's body jolted that the sound of a voice calling out to her. It sounded like a young male voice. The princess looked frantically around to find the voice, only to be met by a purple blob running towards her from a distance. Immediately she knew that the blob was Spike.
"Twilight!"
"Spike!"
Twilight waited patiently for Spike to reach her. Once Spike had reached Twilight, he doubled over in exhaustion and sweat. Twilight asked if he was okay, to which he replied with pants of fresh air.
"You've got a letter from Celestia!" Spike breathed through pants.
It was that moment that Twilight's mind clicked and this confirmed all her suspicions. Something was wrong.
"What does the letter say, Spike?"
"Don't know, I thought it would be better to give it to you first."
Twilight levitates the letter from Spike and opens it. Immediately, Twilight recognized the contents of the letter, everything from the beautiful cursive writing and to the pony who sent it. Twilight's eyes read over the two most important words, "extreme emergency."
Twilight's mind snapped and the returning image of a stallion covered in darkness flashed in her thoughts. However, this time, the image was a lot clearer. she immediately recognized the stallion and trembled.
Sombra.
Celestia's letter is about Sombra and his son!
"Spike, I know what this letter is about!"
"You do, what?"
"Princess Celestia wants me to come to Canterlot because King Sombra returned."
Spike couldn't believe what he had just heard.
"Are you sure, Twilight."
"Spike, I know it sounds crazy, but I feel like we've been through this before and Princess Luna--"
Twilight was cut off by the sound of a blood-curdling scream from what sounded like a mare. Both Spike and Twilight turned to see the horrific scene of a mare being consumed by a dark shadow. Her body, or what's left of it, was being held completely by both of the shadow's claws and chewed on by the sharp teeth of the shadow which looked like a monster from the Everfree Forest. Other ponies were ran away from the monster and the poor mare he was feasting on. Twilight instinctively, ran towards the shadow and tried to hit it with her magic. Surprisingly it didn't work. Instead, the shadow seemed to have grown after Twilight hit it with her magic. The screams from the mare didn't stop either, that is, until her head was completely bitten off by the shadow and Twilight couldn't do anything about it. Blood sprayed everywhere, it was sickening. The poor mare was dead. Twilight was too shocked to even move. She and Spike were completely stunned by the scene, and before they realized it, more shadows had emerged from the ground and started attacking ponies.
Twilight tried her best to shoot her magic at the Shadows, even though there was a small bit of doubt in her heart that her magic wouldn't work. As she predicted, it didn't. The Shadows didn't even pay attention to Twilight's effort at stopping them, they just continued eating ponies left and right with blood spraying everywhere. It was then that one of the Shadows in emerged right behind Twilight and Spike from the lake. The shadow behind them grabbed Spike with both of its claws.
"Twilight!"
The princess in question immediately turned around and realized her worst fear, she saw Spike clutches of an evil Shadow. However, the shadow didn't attack Spike immediately like the other shadows were attacking other ponies. It was simply holding him as waiting for something.
"Do you yield, princess? "
A dark voice was heard and Twilight knew who it was. A shadow appeared a couple of feet in front of her and it quickly transformed into a stallion and a foal. It was Sombra and his son, Choron.
"Sombra."
"In the flesh." Sombra gave the princess a warm but evil smirk while his son had an unreadable expression.
"How could you do such a thing!" Twilight screams while tears were threatening to spill out of her eyes.
"Simple, I decided to come to a town that is less defensive. However, I've also come to realize that you have become a princess and I thought that this would be the perfect opportunity."
Twilight sniffed.
"An opportunity for what?"
"An opportunity to steal your throne after I take your throne, next will be Princess Cadence, the Celestia." Sombra replied coldly as he walks over to the shadow holding spike hostage.
"Now, this can be easy or very difficult for you, princess. Surrender your throne to me or you can watch as I kill your companion."
"I....I," Twilight I could come up with any words.
"Don't do it ,Twilight you've worked so hard to become a princess, you don't need to waste it on me".
The tears in Twilight's eyes spilled out of her, she didn't want to lose Spike over her royal throne. She looked around Ponyville to see that the Shadows were still consuming everypony and she couldn't stop them.
Unless.
"If i give you my throne, will you promise to stop your shadows and release Spike"?
"You have my word, princess."
"Fine, take my throne." The former princess bowed her head in shame.
"Twilight, no!"
"Hmph, I am disappointed in you, princess, I was expecting a bit more resistance from you. You have vanquished villains more powerful than I, yet you give up if one of companions are in danger. Pathetic."
Sombra's horn flared and a shadow emerged from the ground and grabbed Twilight.
"Devour him," commanded that the king of darkness and the shadow immediately heeded his master's words. The shadow sunk his teeth into Spike's little body, he screamed in agony.
"You promised!" Twilight shrieked.
"I did, but I lied."
Spike continued to scream in agony as he was quickly being eaten alive. He was silenced before he said his final word.
"Twilig--"
*chomp*
At that moment, everything became meaningless. Twilight lost her will to fight back and everypony she knew was dead. With the last of her willing voice, she lets out a scream.
SPIIIIIIIIKE!!!!!
With a gasp, Twilight opened her eyes and quickly sat up in her large bed. She was covered in sweat and fresh tears rolled down her face. Her hooves quickly met with her face, wiping off the liquids. The princess took deep breaths and she looked around the room and concluded that she's in a room but not her's. Memories of yesterday flooded in Twilight's mind, specifically the conversation with Sombra. She took one last breath, it was all a dream. Twilight smiles, none of it was real.
Twilight's body was hot with overheat and she got out of the bed to cool off. It was quite dim in her room due to the curtains that covered her windows, shielding her from the sunlight. She didn't know what time it was until she looked at the grandfather clock in her room it, was about eight in the morning. The princess walked over to the curtains that reached the ceiling and pulled them apart with her magic. The blinding light burned her eyes and she shielded them with her hoof. After a while of getting used to the light, she removed her hoof from her face and begin to neatly make her bed. After making her bed, she headed for the double doors that led to the castle hallway. She opened the doors and walked out of the room. In the hallway, she was immediately greeted by a maidpony, the same one that let her to her room last night.
"Good morning, Princess Twilight Sparkle." The maidpony had a beautiful smile on her face.
"Good morning", Twilight replied back, she was still slightly damp from the nightmare, but it wasn't something easily noticeable.
"Come now, Princess Twilight, Princess Celestia has requested your presence for breakfast time.
"But I haven't even brushed my teeth yet."
"That's okay, you can do it after breakfast." The maid pony reassured the princess of friendship. Twilight didn't have a problem with that, after all, she was getting kind of hungry.
The maidpony and the princess walked down the hall in silence, the walk wasn't that long, only about five minutes. During those silent moments, Twilight's mind couldn't help but to replay the horrid nightmare from last night, silently thanking Celestia that it wasn't real. Then both ponies reached the dining room, there was a long table with different arrays of food. Then Twilight's eyes caught the site of three other ponies, two of them sat together, while the third one, sat as far away from them as possible.
"Princess Celestia, I have brought Princess Twilight as you requested."
"Thank you, you are dismissed." the maidpony turns and leaves. Twilight now has three sets of eyes on her. She quietly walks toward the long table and sits in between Celestia and Sombra with his son.
"Oh, boy," Twilight said to herself.