Midnight Starsong

by Pencyke

Chapter 6

In the library of a quaint little town sat a white unicorn filly with a book. Her green eyes flying across the lines, her developing brain gobbling up the useful information that lay upon the pages of the old tome. A purple baby dragon walked up to her from behind, "Hey Sweetie Belle, wha'cha readin'?"

"Slowly, ever so slowly, she turned her head to face the one who had interrupted her reading session." Sweetie Belle creepily monotoned, "I'm reading World Domination for Dummies explains Sweetie Belle while showing the curious dragon the cover of the book in her hooves."

"I thought Twilight disposed that book after Scootaloo tried to overthrow Princess Celestia."

"She did. I just pulled it out from the dumpster states Sweetie belle as she points to the garbage pile outside of the window."

The purple and green dragon just smacked his forehead with the palm of his claw, "Jeez, leave it to Twilight to leave it to me to clean up her mess. And why are being so weird?"

"The book states that those who dominate are unlike any pony else Sweetie Belle tells the annoying dragon while rolling her eyes."

The dark stallion was stunned, had this blue mare really heard nothing of him? He who had enslaved the inhabitants of the Crystal Empire, so many years ago. He who had threatened the fate of Equestria? "Who are you?"

"Tell you what, I'll make you a deal." Midnight Starsong began a slow walk towards Sombra as she spoke, "You answer my question and I'll answer yours. Easy peasy, right?"

The smokey unicorn's horn began to glow as he glowered at the red eyed mare walking up to him, "If any pony will be making deals it will be me."

The fanged mare tipped her nose up and adopted a more regal tone, "I am the one who will be the interrogator in this play! If you wanted that role, then you should have auditioned! That is what will become of ponies who procrastinate! They will be trapped for the rest of their lives under thousands of pounds of boulders, rocks, pebbles, sand, dirt, and dust!"

Suddenly the stallion summoned a cage of crystals out from underground to capture the posing mare. "Now you shall be taught obedience slave! Bow down to your master!" He then placed an enchantment of mind control upon the purple maned mare.

"Ah, no."

"What?! What did you just say?!"

"Don't you listen? I said no! Why would a prideful mare such as I bow to a creep like you? As a matter of fact, why would I bow down to any pony? Ah, did I also mention that I'm immune to mind tricks? I mean, come on! What kind of half dragon would I be if I wasn't immune to mind tricks?"

"Wait, did you-"

"Nope! No waiting!" With that Midnight struck the crystalline structure with the point of her hoof causing the entire cage to shatter into thousands of shards and slivers. A ball of fire materialized next to her, "Now then, I'd like to see how long it takes for a shadow to burn." With that she launched the fireball at the Sombra, unsurprisingly it went through him without the slightest amount of harm. Though the same cannot be said for the wall behind him which the flames clung to.

The dark stallion cackled at Midnight, "You think that you can defeat a shadow with physical attacks? Do not cause me to chortle."

"That was really old fashioned. I mean really old fashioned, but I guess that can't be helped, can it? Because you're just. A. Shadow." Midnight began to slowly stalk around the ring of dark crystals. Flames began to smokelessly lick from where her hooves touched the stone floor. "You do know what a shadow really is don't you? It's the absence of light, in the cut-out of an object that is in the light. A shadow is the epitome of nothingness." Midnight glared into the eyes of the dark unicorn as the light of the flames filled the entire cavern, enlightening all surfaces. "You are nothing…"

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO…"

King Sombra's shadow promptly shrank into oblivion leaving behind nothing but the tip of his horn which the red-eyed mare promptly burnt into nothingness. As the horn was destroyed the dark crystals also ceased to exist as they sank into their flickering shadows cast by the dying flames.

Midnight sat down on her hindquarters and let out a yawn, "Now that that's done, I think I'm going to nap for a little whi-" She was fast asleep before hitting the floor.

She felt the touch of cold grass on her back. It was soft, like a bed. The mare felt a breeze grace her cold cheeks as she listened to the sound of leaves rustling in the wind. It was nice, tranquil. She took a deep breath through her nose, crisp air filling her lungs. She began to mumble to herself, "Hmm, no scent. I wonder why?" She hummed a short tune to herself as she thought out loud, "Those trees sound pretty far off… Judging from the dampness of the grass it has probably rained recently, though for some reason I can't seem to find any mud underneath me. Maybe It's from a mist that blew over? It's possible with this breeze… Wait a minute. Wind? Grass? Trees? I didn't fall asleep in a meadow?

Midnight's blood red eyes shot open to find the full moon encompassing her entire field of view. She reached towards it with her hoof, as if to touch the lunar body. "It's so big." Was the only thing that the purple maned half-dragon could think to say.

"Beautiful, isn't it?" Midnight was startled by the sudden appearance of the princess of the night. Luna was laying next to her, both of them staring up into the moon filled sky. They were silent for a while, and then Luna spoke up, "We trust that you were successful in your endeavor to stop the source of the earthquakes, Midnight Starsong."

Midnight waited a moment to answer, "Yeah, It was a slice of pie. I only had do defeat the shadow of some 'King Sombra' dude."

"So, he had a plan to cheat death and reincarnate himself through the use of a shadow, a husk of the castor imbued with a small fragment of their soul." The princess frowned up at the sky, "He must have planned to use the shadow as an anchor to this plain of existence, his lifeline per se."

"That means that those earthquakes were most likely caused by him attempting to pull the rest of his soul through the barrier between dimensions. Right?" Midnight silently congratulated herself for her deductive powers.

"Not exactly, but close." Luna paused for a moment to doodle on the moon, "It seems he was holding open the gates of the dead by less than a hair because there was still a part of his soul on this side of the gates. The shock waves themselves were a result of the fabrics that line the space between dimensions to begin to loosen, eventually a hole would have appeared and then some…thing might end up pushing through the hole into our dimension."

"So basically if I hadn't gotten rid of the shadow then things would have gotten very bad."

"Yes, that is what would have happened to put it in extremely simple terms."

"Cool." The pair then went back to staring at the moon in silence. After some time Midnight spoke up again, "When I wake up, how will I get back to the surface?"

"No need to worry," Luna's voice said that there was a definite need to worry. "We decided to send Discord to retrieve you while you and I had a chat."

Midnight unconvinced as she was, said this next sentence with complete and utter calm. "So, what you're saying is that at this very moment I am both unconscious and at the mercy of that draconequus."

"Yes."

"$#!+"