Stories of a Shade

by ConfettiColored

Chapter 11

"Alright, we're....um, what happened?" Roam asked as he came into my room, with me still a little unnerved about what I had seen, and apparently it showed on my face.

"I saw something I'd rather forget. Why are you home early?" I said simply in reply, trying to steer the conversation away from the nightmare.

Roam and Artemis seemed to understand that I didn't want to talk about it, and explained how Winter Wrap Up went ahead of schedule.

"Good. We need to go to Twilight's castle," I said calmly. Now that I had my siblings with me, I felt much better.

"Uh, Luna is coming in five minutes. We have to be here," Artemis said.

Right. Even better. I could ask her if she knew anything about the pony I saw. After she had been aquatinted with my family, of course. That was what she was coming for, after all.

"Let's clean the place up," I said, walking past my siblings and using my magic to get the place in a better condition for our guest, but more so because giving myself something to do would help alleviate my stress. And before you say anything, I was actually stressed about Luna coming, and not the blood-stained pony. After all, what harm could a hornless unicorn do? Oh, how naive I was. Anyways, with our combined efforts, the castle was in pristine condition in two minutes.

Three minutes later, Luna teleported in front of the castle and knocked on the door. Alright, it was actually a drawbridge, but you catch my drift.

I took a deep breath, put on my best smile, and pulled the lever that lowered the drawbridge.

"Hi, Luna!" I said cheerfully. Immediately Luna frowned a bit. It was clear that I had tried to hard to seem happy, that the fact that I was just putting on an act showed through. Thankfully, she brushed it off for later.

"Hello, Vortex. Am I correct to assume that this is Roam and Artemis?"

"You are indeed correct, my lady. A pleasure to make you acquaintance," Roam said with a bow.

"Gag me," Artemis said.

Luna chuckled and said," We're not in a formal setting, Roam. Just be yourself,"

"He is being himself. A suck-up," I wisecracked, earning a thumbs up from Artemis and a glare from Roam. Heh, um, sometimes I go a little too far with my jokes.

"As I was saying," Luna said, breaking the tension. "I'm glad to meet you,"

"We're glad to meet you to, Luna," Roam said. "Um, I guess we'll show you around the castle now?"

"I guess so,"

We gave the premium tour of the Almighty Castle of Awesomeness, as I liked to call it. Roam wouldn't let put up a sign saying that outside. Killjoy. There were the bedrooms, kitchen, living room; really, for the most part, the place was just a regular house, but on a much bigger scale. But every now and then, you'd come across the stuff that only a guy with way too much time on his hands would build, like a whole room dedicated to sitting. I should probably get out a little more.

Luna squealed in delight once she saw the game room, which had almost every game ever made. I was quite the collector back then.

"Alright, there you go. This is where we've been holed up. Do you like what I've done with the place?" I asked.

"I love it! Wait... You fixed this place up all on your own?" Luna asked, very shocked.

"I have no life. That gives me plenty of free time," I said in mock depression.

"So..." Roam said slowly. " You think you could maybe...I don't know, use your royal status to help us get accepted within society?"

"I've never met someone as unsubtle as you in my life, Roam," Artemis said.

'Well, I'll certainly try. I'll talk to Celestia about it," Luna said. "As a matter of fact, I have to help her out with something now. You can come if you want," Luna said kindly.

"Well, we wouldn't-" Roam started, before I cut him off.

"Sure!"

"Vortex, I don't want to impose," Roam complained somewhat shyly.

"If Luna invited us to come, it's not an imposition," I said simply.

"Well, then... OK, what's the harm?"

With that, we were all teleported to the capital city of Canterlot, inside the throne room, no less. There she was. The pony that every guy seemed to have a crush on, the pony who drew her power from the sun itself, Princess Celestia. I was prepared to launch headfirst into a speech about how we weren't here to cause trouble, but this time I didn't have to.

"Hello, Luna," Celestia said calmly. "Am I correct to assume these are the Shades you were speaking of earlier?"

"Yes, sister. Meet Roam, Artemis, and Vortex," Luna said, while gesturing to all of us in turn.

"Greetings. It is a pleasure to meet you all," Celestia said kindly. You know, whenever she spoke like this, it didn't seem weird like when Roam was trying to act formal. With her regal voice and posture, it just seemed natural.

"So, what's this problem you were talking about?" I asked.

The temperature in the room seemed to drop thirty degrees when I said that.

"Follow me," Celestia said grimly, using her magic to push the throne to the side, revealing a narrow staircase illuminated by torches along the way.

"Sister... we're not going there, are we?" Luna said hesitantly.

"Unfortunately, yes,"

The passageway was hot and stuffy, not to mention dark. The torches helped a little, but I still felt like I couldn't see my hand in front of my face. It also took a painfully long time to reach the bottom, and when we did, I assumed we had to be at least fifty miles underground, which makes me glad I don't have claustrophobia. The area around us when we exited the staircase was a long hallway resembling Aperture Science from Portal, but with giant glass display cases that had counters up against them. Some of the glass had been blackened out, with ponies in lab coats at the counters in front them doing all sorts of stuff. They seemed so invested in their work that they didn't even see the two Alicorns and three Shades walking down the hallway to a big, red, circular door at the end of it. As we approached the door, it slid open automatically, revealing a gigantic glass dome, with splatters of what looked disturbingly like dried blood covering every a lot of the lower portion of the dome. Celestia used her magic to clear out the red substance, and what I saw behind the dome shocked me.

It was the blood-stained pony from my dream.

Author's Note:

Cliffhanger, hanging from a cliff! And that's why he's called cliffhanger!!!.....I hope someone gets that reference.

Comments

[Doukzor]

This was awesome. Can't wait for the next chapter!!!

[ConfettiColored]

6844559 Did you get the reference in the author's note?

[Doukzor]

6847346 nupe

[ConfettiColored]

6847419 Between the lions.

[Doukzor]

6847446
6847446 ooooooooohhhhh