Chapter 69- Dual Shadows
Dark and Sombra stood off against one another as they awaited to see who would make the first move. While Dark was pointing his sword at Sombra and flicking his tail in anticipation, Sombra's dizziness from his impact to the ground began clearing up. And while he was mad about how Dark had tossed him like that, he was more impressed that he'd reached into his own shadow and plucked him out of it.
He never mentioned anything like this, Sombra thought to himself, trying to figure Dark out.
"I don't think that I've ever seen a kirin quite like you before," Sombra spoke. "Tell me, you are Dark Flame, correct?"
Dark maintained his posture as he gripped his sword tighter. "So what if I am?"
"Then am I to assume that you are Princess Twilight's betrothed?"
Dark arched an eyebrow. "How did you know that?"
Sombra snorted. "I saw the ring that she wore. Last I heard of you two, you were still courting one another. Tell me, when did this happen?"
"Just moments before your army showed up actually," he smirked.
Sombra gritted his teeth and roared as he fired a beam of magic at Dark, who stood there and parried it with his sword.
"It's his fault!" Sombra shouted. "If he would have returned on time, then this could've been over with and she would be mine by now!"
Dark glared at Sombra. "Come again," he dangerously said.
"You listen to me, peasant," Sombra spat, "you have no business being with somepony like her. Now, as a king, I would have every right to make her my queen... after I conquer the Crystal Empire again of course."
Feeling a spike of anger, Dark's eyes briefly flashed red as he fired his own beam of magic at Sombra. However, Sombra didn't pay much mind to it as a crystal wall sprouted up in front of him.
"Did I touch a nerve?" Sombra knowingly mocked. "Face it, Dark, you are a nopony. Your only purpose in life is to serve your superiors, like the king that I am. Either as a slave, or as fodder for-"
"You are no king," Dark growled.
Sombra glared at Dark. "It would be wise for you to chose your words carefully if you wish to continue living-"
"Suck it, Sombra!" he interrupted again. "A king without a kingdom is no king at all. All you are is a fallen tyrant who's returned because he doesn't know when he's beaten."
Lighting his horn again, Sombra created a pillar of crystal before shattering it, revealing the black crystal-like scythe it held. Pulling it free, Sombra turned his hateful gaze back to Dark.
Careful, Dark, Nocturne spoke in his head.
Why? Dark questioned. It's just a crystal scythe. And to be honest, it actually looks kinda weird with that bladed-head on the end of it, instead of it having the usual point.
Don't you remember you idiot? That's my Living Weapon!
You mean the one that he stole from you all those years ago? Dark asked, looking over Sombra's weapon. But it doesn't look anything like what it was before. Wait a second, if your Living Weapon was still here, then why did that undead thing happen when I was sent to that other world?
Because I didn't insert a piece of my soul into it like you did yours, that's why. And yes. Though twisted and malformed it may be, that is my Death Reaper.
"I was going to let you live," Sombra began to threaten, pulling Dark from his inner talk with Nocturne, "but now that you've tried my patience, peasant, you will die."
"I am no peasant, Sombra," Dark said.
"Really now? If so, then what are you? Because other than a lowly commoner, you are nothing more than the dirt beneath my hooves."
Dark flared his wings and began seeping his shadows from them. Within seconds, Dark had covered the entire ground around them in a shadowy fog with Sombra looking around.
"I am a lord, Sombra," Dark told him. "And as far as I can tell, I am your superior, Apprentice."
With a roar, Sombra charged Dark with his scythe held high above his head. Using his magic to boost himself, Sombra turned into a blur as he closed in on Dark and swung his scythe. However, his swing missed as Dark sunk into the shadowy fog beneath them. Seconds later, Sombra heard the snow crunching behind him and turned around just in time to block a vertical slash from Dark's sword.
"You will pay for what you've done, Sombra," Dark growled, forcing Sombra down with one claw on his sword. "You will pay for the pain that you've caused, for all the remains you've twisted to form your army, and for threatening Twilight!"
With his free claw, Dark took a swipe at Sombra, barely missing his cheek as Sombra turned to shadows and disengaged. Seeing the body of shadows gliding around him, Dark shrouded his left claw in shadows before charging after Sombra. Grabbing ahold of him, he pulling Sombra out of his shadows again and threw him off to the side.
"What is the meaning of this?!" Sombra shouted. "I am the King of Shadows! The shadows are my ally, not yours!"
"You think the shadows is your ally?" Dark asked with a chuckle before he Shadowported inches in front of Sombra and lifted him off the ground by his throat. "You merely adopted the shadows, Sombra. I was reborn in it!"
Dark pulled his sword back, engulfing it in his shadows as he readied to pierce Sombra's chest. Soon as he thrusted his sword, Dark was parried by a swing of Sombra's scythe. Seeing an opening from his parry, Sombra kicked Dark's chest with his back hooves and freed himself. No longer in Dark's grip, Sombra began spinning his scythe in an attempt to slice Dark apart, but for every swing he made, Dark sidestepped him, or either blocked or parried his attacks with his sword.
Not gaining any ground against him, Sombra got some distance between them and began spreading a layer of crystal beneath them while also creating spikes to impale Dark. Creating a fifty foot wide crystal platform below their hooves, Sombra rose it up while also sprouting crystal spikes up all around the risen platform. Once a good hundred yards around the platform were covered in spikes, Sombra looked around to the spot where he last saw Dark to see if he got him. To his disappointment, though, he couldn't find any trace of him.
"Looking for somepony?"
Spinning around, Sombra found Dark materializing from the shadows of the night. Wasting no time, he fired a beam of magic at Dark, only for him to block it with his free claw until Sombra stopped firing it.
"What are you?!" he shouted in confusion and fury. "You claim to be a kirin, but none of the ones that I've met could even withstand half the amount of power I put into that. And yet, you blocked it with a single claw like it was nothing!"
"You don't get it yet, do you, Sombra," Dark said. "The one who made me wasn't exactly a normal dragon, so I'm not what a normal kirin would be."
"Well then," he darkly chuckled, "why don't we have a look inside your mind and find out?"
Engaging Dark, Sombra brought his scythe down in a downward slash before being blocked by Dark's sword. With them locked, Sombra pushed closer to Dark with a grin on his face with his eyes glowing green. However, to his surprise, Sombra was blocked out by the same familiar power. Recognizing it, Sombra canceled his spell and looked Dark straight in the eyes.
"So, you too have been blessed by Nocturne's powers like Princess Twilight," he growled.
"Blessed wouldn't exactly be the word that I would've chosen, but sure, let's go with that."
Rotating his scythe, Sombra knocked Dark's sword up and bashed the pommel of it against Dark's snout. With his eyes blurred by the reflexive tears that appeared from having his nose struck, Sombra swung his scythe at Dark's neck, only for it to be gripped by a flaming tendril that sprouted from Dark's flaming mane. Seconds later, nine more sprouted up from within until Dark's entire mane consisted of ten fiery tendrils.
Twisting his scythe, Sombra sliced through the tendril holding onto it and backed away before it could reform itself. Once he was far enough away, Sombra sent crystal spikes flying up from the ground beneath Dark. However, before his spikes could run Dark through, he'd withdrew into a ball and covered himself with his wings, using them as a shield and breaking the spikes that tried to penetrate his draconic hide. Frowning at failing to impale him, Sombra pulled a few of the crystal spikes surrounding them up from the ground before throwing them at Dark, each ending up breaking against his durable wings. Completely focused on wearing down Dark, Sombra yanked more crystal spikes up and began to throw them too. But, before they could get far, they each bounced off of a golden barrier surrounding them.
With him not being in any immediate danger, Dark opened his wings and stood back up on his hooves with his horn alight. Smirking at Sombra, Dark combined his ten flaming tendrils into a single mass of fire and sent it forward. While it missed Sombra, as soon as it connected with his barrier, it erupted, covering the entire inside of the barrier in flames and forcing Sombra to seek shelter in a tepee of crystals to keep himself from being burnt alive.
Trapped in his little safe zone, Sombra wildly looked around at the firestorm brewing outside of his crystal walls. Hearing a tapping against the crystal behind him, he turned around to see Dark giving him a fanged grin.
"You can't hide in there forever," Dark said, using his magic to rotate the fires around them faster to increase the temperature. "I'll give you thee options, Sombra. Either you surrender and face everypony, continue fighting me and be incinerated by the flames, or stay in there until you succumb to the intense heat."
While he was cornered, Sombra wasn't out of moves. Roaring out loud, he lit his horn again and began to once again try and impale Dark in crystal spikes from the ground, which was proving difficult with the lack of vision the flames were providing. Starting to feel uncomfortable from the heat of the fires, and now from his own crystals surrounding him, Sombra began taking the crystal spikes he'd created within Dark's barrier and began hurdling them all in the same spot in an attempt to break Dark's barrier. After a minute of throwing his crystals and enduring the almost unbearable heat now, Sombra heard the shattering of Dark's barrier and watched as the flames slowly began to receded.
Once they were low enough, Sombra was met with Dark suddenly standing up from the nearby fires with his sword raised high above his head. In slow motion, he watched as his sword came down upon his crystals and sliced through it with little resistance. Shattering his own crystal walls, Sombra leaped away from Dark before his sword could strike him. However, when he landed, he was greeted with not only the remaining flames, but also the near-melting crystal floor.
Roaring in pain, Sombra jumped up into the air and turned his body to shadows to try and find a safe place to land. As he rose, he looked out and saw that the field of crystal spikes surrounding the arena platform he'd made were now accompanied by a sea of fire. Distracted by what he was seeing, he cried in surprise when he felt Dark's claw reach into his shadows and drag him out by the neck again. Being thrown down, Sombra had just enough time to see the now fireless crystal platform. Bouncing off of it from the impact and rolling off to the side, he just barely dodged Dark as his sword's blade was buried deep in the crystal, sending a large crack across the platform and splitting it in half.
I was mislead, Sombra mentally growled, watching as Dark pulled his sword out of the ground. Not only is he powerful magically, but also physically. I swear, if I get out of this fight alive, I'm going to kill that partner of mine for this.
Taking a page out of Dark's book, Sombra used the shadows in his mane and sent a pair of shadowy tendrils out towards Dark, who used his sword to backslash through it with little effort. Unwilling to lose, Sombra spewed shadows from his mane until his vision of Dark was blocked by the thick shadowy fog. With a chuckle, Sombra used his magic to detect Dark's location through the shadows and created several shadowy tendrils all around him.
Ordering them to attack Dark, Sombra silently made his way around to where he was standing behind Dark. However, when he raised his scythe after getting close enough, Dark spun around and blocked it with his sword before swiping Sombra's face with his claws. As Sombra cried in pain, the shadows he'd created dissipated, clearing the platform once again. And while the pain did subside a little bit, his pupils shrank as he saw that he wasn't regenerating the claw marks across his face, and that there seemed to be shadows seeping from the wounds.
"What did you do to me?!" Sombra shouted, wincing from the pain.
"Draw first blood, apparently," Dark responded, flexing his claw. "Now, do you want to continue this, or are you willing to surrender?"
Snarling, Sombra used his magic, causing three crystal pillars to erupt around him. Seconds later, they all shattered, revealing crystal clones of Sombra, each with a crystal scythe of their own.
"Don't think that I'm finished with you yet!"
Rainbow was hot on the tail of the thief who stole the Crystal Heart, thanks to Soul who was directing her from his spot on top of her back. They managed to get close enough to where Rainbow had actually been able to touch him a few times, but every time she did, a blinding flash of light made her lose her grip on him and having to continue all over again.
To avoid being blinded again, Rainbow decided to trust Soul by letting him take control. Closing her eyes, she allowed for him to grab her mane and steer her towards the direction that the Crystal Heart was at. After the first time they got close, it was Soul who was blinded by the light. But, after a quick suggestion from Rainbow, Soul opted to close his eyes too, letting his sense of emotions lock onto the Crystal Heart again and using that as his guide. Of course, while this also meant that they would run the risk of running into buildings, with how close behind they were, Soul was able to steer Rainbow to match the flightpath of the thief as he guided them with the Crystal Heart.
"Are we close yet?" Rainbow asked, her brow furrowed in annoyance. "While I don't really mind this, I'd really like to get my hooves on that guy and be able to see again."
"I know," Soul replied, "but we can't look or else-"
"Or else we'll just get blinded again," she groaned knowingly. "Really, it's too bad that Flutterbat had to go like that."
"Well somepony had to go help Twilight, and it couldn't be you since you're our best choice for catching this guy."
"And you couldn't because I need you for tracking the Crystal Heart."
"I guess we make a pretty good team, huh?"
Rainbow laughed. "Of course we do! But then again, I am awesome, and awesomeness goes well with anything."
"I know, so why don't we put that awesomeness to finally catching this guy?"
Rainbow smirked. "You bet. Alright, let's get that jerk and return the Crystal Heart!"
With a powerful flap of her wings, Rainbow gained a burst of speed as Soul felt them closing in on the Crystal Heart once again. Gently pulling her mane to steer her, Soul guided Rainbow until they were a few feet behind the thief.
"We're almost there," Soul told her.
"I known," Rainbow said. "I can feel his draft coming from his wingbeats."
"Do you think you can follow him without me guiding you?"
"This close to him I should. Why?"
"I have a plan. Instead of us trying to fly up and grab it from him again, you stay on him and I'll try using my magic to pull it away from him. What do you say?"
With her eyes still closed, Rainbow looked up towards the top of her head where Soul was leaning.
"That would be a good idea, but unless you changed back into a changeling and I didn't notice it, you're still a pegasus and don't have a horn."
Soul snorted in frustration as his plan was crushed. "I wish I knew how to gain control over my changeling powers, then I wouldn't have to worry about them going off on their own and could shapeshift freely."
"In that case, I have an idea of how we can get it. Are you with me?"
"Sure."
"Okay, in that case, when I say, you grab the Crystal Heart and get it back to that pedestal thingy that it was sitting at when we first got here."
"What about you?" Soul nervously asked.
"Don't worry, I got this guy. Just hold on tight for now, okay?"
Nodding, Soul lowered his forehooves from on top of Rainbow's head and wrapped them around her neck as he laid down on her back. With him low and secured, Rainbow gave another boost of speed and began flying above the thief. Hearing the wingbeats below her, Rainbow suddenly dove down and clung her forelegs around the thief's barrel with his wings pinned down against his sides. With her having a strong hold on the thief, Rainbow tried hovering in place while the thief tried hitting her in the face.
"Go!" she shouted, realigning herself after taking a hoof to the muzzle. "Grab the heart!"
Even with his eyes closed, Soul could still see the flash of bright light that the thief was trying to blind them with, but it wasn't enough to disorient them. Carefully crawling off of Rainbow and onto the thief, Soul felt around for the Crystal Heart while trying to avoid the two hooves that he felt trying to grab at him. Sensing it a little lower, Soul reached down until he felt something hard against his hoof. Flapping his wings, he flew down, grabbed ahold of it, and yanked it away from under the thief's cloak.
"I got it!" Soul exclaimed, flying out of the thief's reach.
"Then go and return it!" Rainbow shouted.
Opening his eyes again, Soul turned towards the castle and flew with the Crystal Heart in his grasp.
"NO!"
Immediately after hearing the stallion shout, Rainbow's muzzle was met with the back of the stallion's head as he threw his head back in a headbutt. Releasing him, Rainbow brought her hooves up to her nose as she felt it starting to bleed. Opening her eyes in fury, she saw the thief starting to get away from her to retrieve the Crystal Heart before she zoomed towards him. Despite the few seconds head start he had, Rainbow managed to catch up to him in less than half that time.
Tackling him from behind, Rainbow drove him down until they crashed into the ground with her using his body to soften her crash. Jumping back up into the air, Rainbow hovered as she delivered a series of kicks, punches, and the occasional buck to the stallion as he tried to charge his horn to cast a spell. However, her recklessness got the better of her as one of her kicks left her wide open and allowed for the stallion to take a few hits in on her already-bleeding muzzle.
Growling angrily, Rainbow flapped her wings and delivered a headbutt into his gut. Knocking him back from the force of the impact, Rainbow wiped the blood from her face as she watched him being sent tumbling across the crystal floor until he came to a sudden stop by one of the houses aligning the street.
"You picked the wrong pony to mess with, bud," Rainbow snarled, spitting some of the blood that had gotten into her mouth off to the side.
Slowly and shakily, the stallion got back up to his hooves as the tattered cloak's snap around his neck came undone. His cloak falling off of his body, Rainbow was able to see the horn and wings on him, along with his pained face as he panted for breath.
"You bitch," he growled. "You have no idea who you're dealing- ooph!"
The stallion was interrupted by Rainbow tackling him to the wall and pinning him up against it.
"If you're smart at all, you'll never call me that again," she hissed.
Despite him being in pain from the hits he'd received, and being pinned up against the wall, he simply grinned at Rainbow. Closing his eyes, the stallion flared his horn in a blinding light. However, Rainbow wasn't so lucky. With her being that close to his horn when it went off, she was unprepared for it. With her eyes still wide open, she cried out in pain as the light blinded her eyes before falling to the ground with her eyes clamped shut and her hooves covering them.
Sliding down against the wall, the stallion watched as Rainbow writhed on the ground in front of him. Taking a few moments to regain his breath, he stood back up and walked over to Rainbow. Once at her side, he used his magic to clamp her mouth shut and hold her hooves down.
"You little bitch," he seethed. "I was going to leave you be and go after the brat and the Crystal Heart, but after that little stunt you pulled, I'm just going to have to take you back with me instead."
Preparing to pick Rainbow up in his magic, the stallion suddenly stopped when he heard something coming quickly towards him. Turning to see what it was, he looked just in time to see a wall of light rushing towards him. Once it reached him, it felt like a wall had crashed against him. Losing focus on his magic, he released Rainbow before shouting as he was expelled from the Crystal Empire by the power of the Crystal Heart.
Over by the Crystal Heart, Soul groaned as he tried to crawl away from the overabundance of love that the Crystal Heart was inadvertently force-feeding him. Of course, with how fast he flew, along with not being used to flying that fast that much, Soul was having a hard time as he panted with each crawl.
"This sucks," he muttered, trying to keep himself from blacking out from the excess love intake. "I swear, I'm never getting anywhere near that thing again after this."
Continuing to crawl away, Soul released a loud breath as he felt as though he was far enough away from the Crystal Heart that the affects it was having in him were bearable. However, the damage was done as his intake of love all but exhausted him.
"Hope Rainbow doesn't mind me taking a nap," he said with a yawn. "Really hope she's alright."
With those last words, Soul's hooves slid out from under him, leaving him sprawled out as his exhaustion drove him to sleep.
Over on the battlefield, Shining and Luna led the crystal guard as they began to pick off the remains of Sombra's undead army. Thanks to the Rage Pellets that everypony but Luna ate, the crystal guard were able to wash over them like a flood as the increase of power, and durability to their crystal coats, had practically turned them into high-damaging tanks. Of course, while Shining didn't get the durability they'd received, his magic more than made up for it. With the same level of power during his Coliseum match with Dark, Shining stood ahead of his guards and laid waste to every undead that stood in his path with a massive beam from his horn that he'd dragged across and them cut them down.
With the Rage Shift ending for everypony, Luna covered them with tethers of lightning that arced in front of them, allowing them a break to recover. Once they'd recovered enough strength, they returned to using their weapons as they began to end the battle. Ten minutes later, the last of Sombra's army was wiped out with Shining blasting the skeletal minotaur into pieces. Looking around, everypony searched for any signs of any that might've been missed. After a few moments of not finding any of the undead rising again to attack, each of the crystal guards raised their weapons and cheered in victory.
"That was quite a fight," Shining commented as he met up with Luna.
"That it was," she agreed. "It was fortunate that we had Dark here to revive our fallen. Otherwise, I'm sure our forces would've suffered great losses, if they even survived at all."
Their attention was drawn to the distance in the east as they saw a pillar of fire erupt from a platform surrounded in a sea of fire and spikes. Hearing the laughing and clashing of steel that accompanied it, Shining and Luna shared a knowing look.
"Dark," they both sighed together with a headshake.
"Think we should go help him?" Shining wondered.
"Considering how exhausted and vulnerable Dark will be once his Amplify wears off, I would think that assisting him would be wise."
"In that case, let's go."
"No," Luna said, blocking Shining with a wing. "You will accompany your guards back to the Crystal Empire."
"But-"
"You yourself are tired and exhausted from the aftereffects of your Rage Pellet. While it is admirable that you would want to help him, it is also foolish in your current condition. As soon as you got there to help, I have no doubt that Sombra would immediately target you with how weak you are. No, Shining Armor. Right now, it would be best for you to accompany your guards and see to your wounded. Let me help Dark."
Though he didn't want to admit it, Shining was feeling tired at the moment. With a reluctant nod to Luna, Shining sighed before addressing his guards.
"That's it, everypony, we're heading home!" he shouted. "Those who can, help carry our wounded back to the castle."
Smiling at his crystal guards, Shining went to assist one of the wounded back to the castle with the rest. While they gathered their injured and began to return back, Luna watched for a moment before she flapped her wings and few off to assist Dark.
Dark laughed as he pulled out a crystal scythe that had been impaled through his gut as he cleaved through the last of Sombra's crystal clones. While it started out fun at first, Dark soon found himself further enjoying the fight as he was dodging scythe strikes left and right. He took out the first one by shrouding his claw in shadows and swiping its head off, and then the second one later on by erupting in a pillar of fire. Now, with the last of them gone, it was back to just Dark and Sombra, the latter having backed away from the flaming-maned kirin approaching with a bone-chilling chuckle.
"What's the matter, Sombra?" Dark darkly chuckled. "Why are you so weak?"
"Weak?!" Sombra barked in offense.
"Yes, weak! When Twilight, Spike, and the others told me about you, I thought that you were this super powerful unicorn king. But, after fighting with you, I can say that I'm kinda disappointed with you."
"How dare you insult me!" he shouted. Charging Dark, Sombra swung his scythe in an attempt to slice him up. "I am a king and a Agent of Death! You have nothing-"
Sombra went silent as Dark grabbed Sombra's scythe in his free claw instead of blocking it. Raising his sword, Dark brought it down on where Sombra stood, only to miss as Sombra released his magical hold on the scythe to dodge it. Flipping the scythe around in his left claw, Dark took his stance as he began to dual wield the scythe and sword. Seconds later, Sombra began to chuckle before it escalated into laughter.
"What's so funny now?" Dark asked him.
Sombra ceased his laughter and gave Dark a fanged grin. "What you're holding there is what is called a Living Weapon, you fool. It-"
"It's a weapon that's bound to the one who created it," Dark interrupted, "and it can only be wielded by either its owner, or those whom were giving permission to wield it by said owner. Which, in this case, would've been Nocturne, making this mockery of a scythe his Death Reaper."
Sombra froze briefly with his mouth slightly-agape, surprised by the knowledge that Dark possessed before composing himself with a scowl.
"How do you know about my former master and his weapon's name?" Sombra growled.
Smirking, Dark encased his left claw with his shadows before sending them up the scythe. Several seconds later after shrouding the scythe, the shadows retreated back into Dark's claw as the crystal scythe began to crack. Shattering apart, the falling crystal revealed the Death Reaper scythe as it was restored to normal, causing Sombra's eyes to widen in shock and fear.
Examining the scythe, Dark gave Sombra a fanged grin as he began to approach him while dragging the scythe's blade along behind him.
"Remember when I said that I was a lord, Sombra?" Dark reminded.
"What does being a lord have to do with how that weapon isn't consuming you?!" Sombra demanded.
"Because I am the Lord of Death." Seeing the look of disbelief Sombra was giving, Dark continued. "Yes, Sombra. I defeated Nocturne and took over his job in maintaining the balance of death in the world."
"You lie! Nopony can defeat Death Incarnate!"
"Well I did." Dark turned inwardly. Nocturne.
Yes?
You know what I'm thinking, right?
Yes.
If I gave you control over my right half, could you get past his mental defenses?
Of course I can. Who do you think was the one who taught him how to do it in the first place?
Mentally nodding to Nocturne, Dark flared his mane into several flaming tendrils and sent them all out at Sombra. Dodging around his crystals and beams of magic, Dark wrapped his tendrils around him tightly before pulling him over towards him. With Sombra now sitting before him, Dark pressed his Death Reaver to the front of Sombra's neck, while the blade of his Death Reaper was pressed on the back of his neck.
With Sombra secured, Dark surrendered his right-half to Nocturne, allowing for his blaze-orange coat to turn to black. A few moments later, his right eye was turned red and began glaring heatedly at Sombra.
"We meet again, my old apprentice," Nocturne growled.
Gasping from hearing his former master's voice again, Sombra had only a second before he was incased in a pair of massive wings that blacked out the light of the fires around the platform they were on. Feeling a pressure in his mind, Sombra looked up at the glowing gold and red eyes that were glaring at him before feeling something in his mind snap.
Sombra didn't know where he was. One moment he was face-to-face with Dark and Nocturne, and the next he found himself standing on what felt like dead grass in the pitch-black darkness.
"Nocturne!" he shouted. "What did you do to me?! Where am I?!"
Hearing a low, rumbling growl echoing across the sky, Sombra began making his way towards the direction of its source. Still blind by the darkness, Sombra tried lighting his horn to provide him some light, but was surprised when his his horn failed him. With no source of light to provide, he continued blindly through the darkness until he bumped into something solid. Rubbing the soreness from his muzzle, Sombra then brought a hoof up to feel stone. Gliding it across the surface, he followed the outline of it as he began to feel what this was. A few seconds later, Sombra realized what he was touching, just as the ground beneath his hooves began to quake.
Seeing a pale-blue glow off to his right, Sombra looked to see the ground cracking with the light shining from it, along with what appeared to be spirits escaping from the crack. While the crack continued to widen, Sombra heard a similar sound off to his left and saw another crack rapidly growing. Soon enough, several more showed up, all converging at the same spot. As the fissures converged, the pale-blue light they provided lit the area up enough for Sombra to see. And while a location like this wouldn't pose much of an issue with him, Sombra couldn't help but shutter, not by the graveyard he was standing in, but by the tombstone he'd ran into with is own name on it.
"What is this?" Sombra whispered, his voice laced with a hint of fear.
"Your grave."
Snapping his head up, Sombra's eyes widened as he saw Nocturne towering over him, the pale lighting giving him a more haunting appearance than normal.
"But I'm still alive!" Sombra shouted angrily. "And where am I?!"
With the biggest grin he'd seen on Nocturne, Sombra watched as he spread his wings, causing the clouds overhead to disperse, and for the glowing fissures in the ground to snake outward like individual rivers until the rest of the area was lit up. Now that he had plenty of light to see, Sombra saw that from one horizon to the other was one massive graveyard. Other than the pale-blue moon shining high above, Sombra could also make out the variety of tombstones, ominous statues, mausoleums, dead trees, and of course, the gallows right behind him.
"I have taught you much during your studies, Sombra," Nocturne spoke, "but you left too soon for me to teach you everything. What you see before you is my world."
"What exactly do you mean by that, Nocturne?"
"Perhaps that was a wrong choice of words. You see, while Dark and I share a body, and by extent, the same mind, we both have our own personal minds as well. And this here," he gestured with a claw, "is what's in my mind, my world. A little bland, but I personally like it. Granted, I can look through Dark's eyes as though they were my own, but it's only to watch. I cannot interact unless I try to force myself out, or if Dark let's me out."
"So back there-"
"Dark let me out, yes. However, I can only ever have control over his right-half."
"He must be quite powerful if he were to stop you from taking him over."
"I tried once after he killed my body, but failed."
"And how did he defeat you?"
Nocturne gave an amused, throaty chuckle. "Don't you try and wheedle answers out of me. I know that you would only try and use it against us if I told you."
Sombra frowned for having been found out so quickly. "Fine. So, why am I here? Are you going to kill me in here?"
"No. That will be left to Dark to take care of," Nocturne grinned.
"So you're going to pawn off your responsibilities as a failed master to him then," Sombra smirked.
His grin quickly turning to a scowl, Nocturne slammed his claw down upon Sombra, crushing all but his head before gripping him and pulling him up to his face.
"Be fortunate that it is him that'll be finishing you off and not me," he growled. "I'm sure that while he'll probably make it fairly quick for you, I wouldn't mind enjoying myself in taking my time with you."
"Wh-What's stop-ping you then?" Sombra choked.
"I have just one question for you, and I want you to answer me."
"What?"
"What happened after I sent you to kill those gryphons? You were almost happy when I sent you off on your mission, then you return with this new attitude and those eyes. What happened?"
Despite his body being in agony, Sombra maintained a stoic look on his face from being asked that question. Remaining silent, Sombra merely glared back at Nocturne's glare. After a few minutes of silence had passed, Nocturne gave a snort, knowing that he wouldn't be getting any answers from him.
"Very well, then," he said. "In that case, we are done here."
Feeling the pressure of Nocturne's grip loosening, Sombra quickly found himself falling down towards the ground. However, instead of coming to an abrupt stop, he kept falling and falling until he was surrounded in darkness again.
Sombra blinked his eyes a few times as he regained his senses. His vision returning, he glanced down to see Dark's sword still pressed up against his neck while Nocturne had receded back into Dark, leaving him fully in control. Not wanting to give up, Sombra began to charge his horn to blast Dark in the face, but didn't feel a hint of magic from his horn. Glancing up at it, Sombra's pupils shrank as his horn had been removed.
"So you've noticed," Dark said, seeing Sombra's gaze and expression.
"MY HORN!!!" Sombra cried in fury. "WHEN DID YOU-"
"You may be immobile when Nocturne dragged you in, but I wasn't. When Nocturne brought your consciousness into his, I was still free to move as I saw fit, which involved removing Nocturne's fang from your forehead and placing it in my Shadow Storage.
"Nocturne told me about what you two talked about before you regained consciousness," Dark added, gently pressing his sword and scythe tighter against Sombra's neck, all but threatening to behead him.
Though he was prideful and unwilling to surrender, Sombra knew that he was beat. With his horn gone and a pair of blades ready to take his head, he sighed in defeat.
"You win," he conceded. "Go on, finish it."
Dark furrowed his brow. "Princess Celestia said that the death sentence is banned in Equestria. However, we're in the Crystal Empire, so I don't think that that rule applies here."
"Then get it over with already. I would rather not continue bearing with this defeat longer than I have to."
"... while I should make you pay slowly for threatening Twilight and attacking with that undead army of yours... that's not me. I'll try and make it as quick and painless as possible."
Resigning himself, Sombra gave Dark a curt nod in thanks and understanding. "Then farewell, Lord of Death."
Nodding in return, Dark breathed in deeply for a few seconds before letting it out. Breathing shadows from his maw, Dark watched as Sombra's form vanished in the shadows that had consumed him. And though he heard a gasp, it was brief before just as quickly ceasing. Several seconds later, Dark ended his shadow-breathing as he regained his breath. When the shadows he'd breathed out had begun to disperse and fade, Dark looked solemnly at Sombra's skeleton that had collapsed onto the ground.
Returning both the Death Reaver and Death Reaper into his right and left arms respectively, Dark knelt down and reached towards Sombra's skull. Plucking the crown off of his head, Dark looked at it with a sigh.
"Too bad," he said to himself. "If only I'd somehow met him before he turned evil, then perhaps we could've been friends... maybe-"
Dark suddenly collapsed as he suddenly became fatigued. Groaning, he caught a glimpse as his fiery mane had reverted back to its normal blond color.
"Heh, that lasted longer than I thought I would," he weakly chuckled. Rolling onto his back, Dark let out a long sigh as he looked up into the night sky. "I think I'll just lay here and rest for a little while before going back. Doubt that I could even make it that far at the moment anyway."
As Dark continued to lay and rest, he tied Sombra's crown to his belt before he caught something moving in his peripheral vision. Tilting his head to look, Dark saw something fluttering within Sombra's ribcage. Reaching for it with a claw, Dark carefully extracted it from Sombra's chest and brought it over for him to look at. When he did, his face contorted in confusion.
"A black feather?" he questioned. "What in the hay's a black feather doing in Sombra's chest?"
Before he could question if further, he heard the sound of wings flapping closer from behind before hearing hooves landing on the crystal platform and walking up to him.
Must be one of the princesses, Rainbow, or Twilight, Dark guessed, placing the feather in one of his pockets. Good thing too. I could use a hoof in getting out of-
"Why won't you die?!"
Surprised by the distantly familiar voice, Dark failed to react quick enough before he saw one of Sombra's crystal clone's scythes impaling him through his gut and into the crystal beneath him. Grunting from the pain it caused, he later cried in pain when a second found its way closer to his lungs and heart. Unable to remove them, Dark tried to Shadow Meld, but the two scythes kept him rooted in place.
"What will it take to finally kill you?" he asked as he walked up so that Dark could see him, making no more attempt to hide himself as the fires around the platform illuminated him completely. "Beasts, armies, banishment to another world where my hitponies waited for you, and now, the King of Shadows and former Apprentice of Death."
As he continued, Dark looked upon him for the first time and felt a torrent of questions and emotions running through him. But, of all the emotions he was feeling, the two that stood out the most were disbelief and sorrow.
"B-But... how...?" Dark tried to weakly ask, but failed to find his words.
"Am I alive?" he finished with a smug smirk. "Well, that's a question that you're never going to find out." He raised the third scythe in his magic, aiming it for Dark's heart. "Besides, you won't live long enough to remember when I finally kill yo-"
"Surrender your weapon and I may yet let you live, criminal."
Freezing in place, he turned his head around slightly to see Luna standing directly behind him with a sword of magic pressed firmly against his neck. When he didn't respond, Luna pressed her blade against his neck further, cutting into him enough for a trickle of blood to flow down Luna's blade.
"Fine," he said, tossing the scythe in his magic off to the side before giving her a glare. "But don't think that this means that I will surrender."
"You have nowhere to escape to this time," Luna growled.
He glared back at Luna. "Do you really think that I would've come out here without a backup plan?"
Before Luna could answer, his horn flared in a blinding light, forcing her and Dark to shield their eyes. A few seconds after hearing a grunt and the sound of crystal breaking, Luna opened her eyes to see that Dark had used his wing to shield himself from not just the light, but also the crystal scythe that had broken off against his wing. Standing beside Dark, Luna looked out around her and across they sky for the stallion that had tried to kill him... and escaped her again. Seeing no trace of him and feeling nothing from her magic, Luna cursed under her breath before turning to Dark.
"Come, let us get you back to the castle," Luna told Dark.
Waiting for a moment, Luna watched as Dark weakly tried to remove the scythes from his stomach and chest, but couldn't. Giving him a hoof, Luna grabbed both Dark and the scythes in her magic, and pulled them loose from the crystal platform. With Dark free, she watched as he slowly pulled them out from him and let them fall alongside him.
"Good to see your wounds already healing," she commented. "Now, let us go."
"I can't," Dark muttered.
"Pardon?"
"I'm too tired to fly. Just let me lay here and I'll catch up... eventually."
Luna shook her head as she picked Dark up in her magic. "My apologies, Dark, but I am not letting you stay with that stallion possibly lurking nearby, especially if I can't sense him."
Setting Dark on her back, Luna took off into the night sky for the Crystal Empire. As she flew, questions of who this stallion was ran through her mind. But now that she'd gotten a very good look at him and his cutie mark, identifying him should be much easier.
Continuing her flight, Luna felt Dark's arms wrapping around her neck as he held onto her. However, while that didn't concern her, what did was the wet spot she felt forming on her back. Maintaining flight, she craned her neck around and saw Dark's face buried into her coat. And though it was barely audible with the wind rushing past them, she could still hear the sounds of Dark sobbing.
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That made me really happy for some reason.
Was....that.......Darks Brother? Or whatever he was it's 3 in the morning right now.
Wow. Good job Garuda IV
Gotta farm those invasions and heirloom trinkets before xpac
Whaaaaaa?! What... that.. that was Dark's brother wasn't it?!
Gotta be his Brother. That's the only explanation of his reaction
Simple really young grasshopper. I didn't teach you everything.
Good author is great author
Are we ever going to find out what happened to sombra in the past that caused him to change?
7661459 Yes, but it won't be coming up for quite a while yet.
7827673 YOU BEAT ME TO IT!!!!
By 6 Weeks
I thin you meant "What did you do to me?!"
"So tell me..." extinguishing the two candles with his hands. "... are you afraid of the Dark?"