Days like this weren't supposed to happen.
Shining Armor had got it. His happy ending. He worked hard all of his life in the Royal Guard and he finally made it, he was the captain. He had married the girl he crushed on since he was a teenager, (though he had to blow apart a Changeling army to finally get there). His sister had been elevated to ROYALTY. His family was set for life. He and Cadence were trying to have a foal. He thought he would make a good Dad, even if he didn't his wife would DEFINITELY be a good mom.......
So why? Why did he feel this uneasy?
He was alone in the Crystal Palace's throne room. He had no one to talk to. Cadence had left the Empire to visit his sister.
You're BORED Shine He thought to himself. You are bored out of your skull. Just take a walk outside. Clear your head.
The Crystal Empire's courtyard was usually very peaceful. Shining Armor liked to take a walk every so often clear his head. Keep himself calm. He liked those moments where he could just enjoy the silence.
That silence was broken in less than a minute.
"COME ON!"
"What in Tartarus dude?"
"No one? No one had Ponyville for the medal count?!"
Sentry.
"Sorry guys but that's where it stands. The pot remains where it is. Sudden death round is on the Wonderbolts training race next week, and the betting opens now."
Lieutenant Flash Sentry was standing in a ring of other guards. At their hooves was a bag that had to have contained over 50,000 bits.
Flash had only been in the Guard about a year. Shining armor liked him.... for the most part.
Shining had always kept things informal, allowed a certain amount of insubordination, but Sentry seemed determined to push Shining's tolerance to it's limit. Whether it was paying other guards to take his shifts for him, fraternizing with some of the female nobility that came to visit....
Or indeed running an illegal betting pool on the outcome of the Equestria Games.
But Shining Armor knew that if it ever came down to it, Flash would take an arrow for him. And really that's all that mattered.
"SENTRY!" Shining Armor barked.
Flash leaped with a start. "AH!" He turned around to face his commander. "Oh Cap! Hi, were just-"
"I shouldn't have to remind you soldier that taking part in a gambling ring is against regulations, right maggot?" Shining Armor was directly in his lieutenant's face now.
"That was in no way what we were doing, SIR!" An idea slowly dawned on Flash. "Unless, you know, you want in?"
"SENTRY" Shining Barked again. That was Flash's cue to stop. He was about to cross the line.
Shining Armor turned to face the other Guards. "I'm glad I caught you guys together. See if I caught Mr. Sentry ALONE I would have demanded that he divvy the pot up and returning it the people who bet. Since I now know that you all ALSO took part in this pool, however, I'm confiscating the pot for myself. I'd like to thank all of you for contributing. I really don't buy Princess Cadence enough nice things."
There was a general groan of discontent from the Guards.
"Dismissed! Sentry, you're with me. Help, me lug this bag to my office."
Flash hefted the bag onto his back and kept pace with his commander. When the other guards were out of earshot, Flash asked the question he asked all too often.
"Am I court marshaled?"
A familiar defeated look ran across his captain's face, "No, Flash, but honestly what am I going to do with you? The pranks around base are bad enough, but it's like you have no respect for me or the uniform."
"You know that's not true sir. I do respect you." This was true. To Flash, if you weren't worthy of respect, you weren't worth screwing with.
"Your oh so subtle backhanded insults to the Aristocracy don't go unnoticed."
"Most of them are too stupid to realize what happened and ALL of them deserve it"
"Agreed, but there is a way to these things. Do it behind their backs, like servants have done for centuries."
"Who says I don't?"
Shining Armor stopped outside his office and gave Flash an earnest look. "You're a good soldier, Flash. There's a reason I haven't busted your flank down to Sergeant yet. I just need you to-"
He was cut off. A guard was running in a panic toward Flash and Shining.
"Flash! We need to get to the-
The guard screeched to a halt in front of the Captain.
"Too late, man." Flash said, "We've been busted. All bets are off."
The Guard was out of breath. "That's not- Captain, Flash, we need you at the Town Square as soon as possible!"
"Slow down, private." Shining armor said. "What in Celestia's name is going on?"
The Soldier looked bewildered. "I don't know....."
The Mirror had risen from the ground in town square. Six feet tall, four feet wide. Taller than the average pony. The dirt it dug up around it was smoldering like hot coals. It seemed to be made of pure gold. The frame was covered in insignia. On the top was the Image of a male Alicorn raising the sun. On the side were two female Alicorns moving toward the bottom, where a group of ponies were cowering from the images above them.
It was a miracle that Shining Armor could work out that much, the light reflecting of the glass was oppressive.
Squinting in the light. Shining asked the pony who came across it some routine questions. The Mare had a grey coat, a blonde mane and...... interesting eyes.
"So Miss......" Shining Armor felt awkward not knowing which eye to focus on.
"Hooves" the Pegasus responded. "Derpy Hooves."
Shining Armor couldn't believe his ears. "So miss. How did you come across this artifact?"
"It was shining a bright light into my hotel room! Darn thing lit it up like a Hearth's Warming tree! I'll tell you this has been SOME vacation. First I'm insulted by the bellhop, crosseyed, pah, then I almost lose my Equestria Games ticket because some jerk tries steal my saddlebag, when I GET to the event I'm almost killed by a falling hunk of ice- it's been a mess. Honestly if my boss didn't force me to take my vacation days at the end of each quarter I wouldn't even BOTHER with-"
"Miss Hooves!" Shining Armor realized that if he didn't cut her off they could be here all week. "What prompted you to call for the Guard?"
"Well of course I tried to move the stupid thing MYSELF but when I touched it it was scalding hot! Thought it was going to burn my hoof right off. So I let out a scream. That called you boys over. The guards here are very efficient. I let out a little yelp and all of the sudden there's four armed stallions surrounding me! It made me feel safe. Though I think it was a bit of an exaggeration when he said 'bloodcurdling'-"
"Captain Armor!" Flash Sentry called from behind the golden mirror.
A wave of relief washed over Shining Armor. He could kiss Flash right now.
"What did you get out of her?" Flash asked his commander.
"Nothing that we didn't guess by looking at the thing." Shining sighed. "What about you?"
"Something I noticed." Flash said "Cap, where are we in relation to the mirrors lens?"
Shining Armor looked at his Lieutenant. "Behind it."
Flash Sentry pointed at the sky "And what's that right above us?"
Shining Armor squinted in the light of the sun. "Wait a minute...."
"You get it too, right?" Flash asked, "What light is the mirror reflecting? There's no source."
Shining Armor was all of a sudden very nervous. Something about this seemed familiar.
He and flash walked back towards the palace. "Contact Canterlot. Tell them what's going on. We're not going to call this an emergency situation yet, but keep watch on it. Don't let anyone touch it. See if Celestia can spare some Magic experts to help us identify this thing. Get some unicorns down here to see if a focused shroud spell can shade this thing so everypony can get some sleep tonight."
"Yes sir," Flash squinted in the light of the mirror. "No one will be able to sleep with this glare"
The word seemed to make Shining Armor stop in his tracks.
"What Did you just say?"
Flash paused, unsure of what he did wrong. "Nopony will get any rest because of the glare from the mirror?"
There was that word again. It all clicked at that moment. A campfire. A story he used to impress his girlfriend. A story he used to terrify his sister. An old mare's tale.
A look of horror came over Shining Armor's face. "Lockdown. No one comes near that mirror. No one uses magic on it. I want at least six guards around it at all times."
"Okay, what did I say?" Flash asked confused.
"Sentry, you tell my wife what's going on when she gets back, and make sure that you get my parents out of here."
"You got it chief," Flash said. "What are YOU going to do?"
"What we always do in this kind of scenario!" Shining Armor yelled as he sprinted toward the palace. "Call Twily!"
He had gotten his happily ever after. He was trying to become a father.
Days like this weren't supposed to happen
Miles away, in the Golden Oak Library in Ponyville Twilight Sparkle was reading three fillies a horror story her brother used to scare her with. It was about a golden mirror......
and a blinding glare.
I saw you asking for critique, so I thought I'd give your story a look. Here's what I found at first glance:
0. Yes, point zero. Prologue is spelled wrong in the chapter title.
1. You don't get to chose how many dots an ellipsis contains: '...' is a thing, '..' isn't, and '.......' certainly isn't, too.
2. Your paragraphing is too random. Take this example:
This is all about Shining and his relationship with Flash Sentry, therefore, it should go in one paragraph. This makes keeping track of topics easier and makes the flow smoother.
3. Use sentence length to manipulate pace. Example:
The first paragraph is full of short, choppy sentences. (By the way, 'His happy ending' isn't one, since it doesn't contain a predicate. The predicate is in the sentence before, so in order for this to work you'd need to join the two.). You use this here to give us a lot of information in a short span of time, and the repetitive nature of that first paragraph is an effect you might even have desired. Know though that those short sentences create tension, that is released with the 'So why?' part. All fine so far. BUT THEN, you continue making these short, choppy sentences, whereas you clearly wanted to convey a sense of boredom. This doesn't fit at all.
After reading through the whole prologue, I start to think that you're not fond of long sentences at all. I don't know if you just didn't do them, but some punctuation errors made me think you actually have trouble constructing these. Try to get the hang of it, it will do your writing lots of good.
4.
This feels completely out of character for me. I don't see Shining Armor as a commander that would verbally abuse his subordinates.
5. Try to stick to one point of view. You've been sticking closely to Shining Armor's POV until:
This is from Flash's POV. A change of POV during a scene destroys immersion, so you should avoid it at all costs. Correct would have been: 'Shining saw an idea slowly dawn on Flash,' although this isn't really nice, either. Which leads me to my next complaint.
6. Show, don't tell. If you've read some advice on writing on this site (or any other, for that matter), you probably know the term already. The first paragraph with the short choppy sentences is all telling, but it's justified as spending more time on that information than necessary would just bore readers, but "An idea slowly dawned on Flash" is telling of the worst sort, as it creates no image in the reader's mind whatsoever. Instead, you could write something of the sort: "Flash raised an eyebrow and a mischievous grin crept on his face." Not the image you might be going for (since it's so telly, I don't even know), but at least an image.
7.
Whaaaat? So, besides calling Sentry Mr. (like since when do people in military organisation call each other Mr. and not by their rank?), this doesn't make sense to me. If Sentry'd been alone, Shining would've returned the money to the other guards that had placed bets. Now that they all stood around the pot when he caught them, he'll keep it himself? Again: Whaaaaat?
8.
Whaaaaat? Shining's wife and sister are aristocracy, so Shining agreeing to this is pretty out of character. Also, disregarding rules is something different from insulting aristocracy, so why are they talking about it in the first place?
9. Get a proofreader or try reading through your story more carefully. I didn't find typos but the one in the description, but capitalization and punctuation errors.
Alright, so that's it for the critique. Besides that, you seem to have a fair understanding of what information is necessary and what is not; you don't bore us with description of courtyards and somesuch, but give us a clear picture of the mirror. I liked that, although, again, this could have been done in longer, more luxurious sentences, instead of these short, chopchop snippets. I also liked your hook: "Days like this weren't supposed to happen." Very nice.
I won't be reading on, so this is all the critique you'll get from me. I hope it helps.
Alright, this has my interest now...
That line produced a chuckle from me.
There are a few small punctuation errors throughout, but this was the only one that was really glaring to me (pun may or may not be intended):
There is absolutely no need whatsoever for that comma.
As far as the other slight errors I think I saw or might see, would you prefer if I commented what they are here or send you a PM?
Why do I find that so funny?
Ohh, man! Intensity intensifies!
I will continue reading, thank you very much!
This reminds me of Machinations in the Dark on here. More intense in the intro, though.
Pretty good.
Ooh, ending the chapter with a cliffhanger! Now I MUST continue reading.
Ha, I think that might make Twilight jealous.
Any chance you'd let me copyedit? I like the way the story is going, even though I'm only on the first chapter.
4384036 Sometimes, content matters over structure. If it was really bad, then yes, structure is a problem.
What matters most is the buildup Light is going for here. So he has a few grammatical problems. What's important is how he creates and interprets story and flow of events.