• Published 15th Mar 2017
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Of Heaven and Earth - Garuda IV



It's been over a thousand years since Sol was hidden away and sealed in crystal. Now freed by Twilight and her friends, he must readjust to the present while also having to deal with old grudges both from and against him.

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Chapter 39- Dinner with the Parents

Sol fidgeted as he dried himself off from his shower. While he didn't mind that she'd made plans for them while he was away, the thought of going out to dine with her dad didn't inspire much confidence that this would go very well. As he continued to think about it, he finished drying himself off and began to use his magic to comb through the feathers on his wings, searching for any that might've been out of place or loosened. Finding a few that were crooked, Sol nudged them back into place and combed down his mane. Looking in the mirror and seeing that he was now presentable, Sol left his bathroom and made his way out of his bedroom where Twilight was waiting for him in the hallway.

"All set?" she asked, looking refreshed herself.

"As ready as I'll ever be, I guess," Sol said with a small grumble, which Twilight picked up on.

"Look, Sol, I know that you and dad haven't gotten along very well in the past, but he's trying to make an effort to make up for his mistakes. It is my hope that the two of you will get along tonight, and hopefully mend things between you two. So please, try to be nice, okay?"

Though he himself wasn't completely convinced, Sol surrendered himself to Twilight's will and gave an agreeing nod.

"Alright, Twilight. I'll try," he said with a heavy sigh.

Though she could tell that he was struggling to accept this decision, Twilight was still thankful that he was at least willing to put in the effort to try and make things better between him and her dad.

"That's all I ask," she said, placing a thank you kiss on his cheek. "Well then, if we're all ready, then let's go."

"Wait. Do the guards know?"

"Don't worry. I already informed them that we would be going to my parents' house for dinner, so they won't be raising any alarms and scouring the city for us in a panic."

"That's good. They aren't going to forward anypony to watch over your parents' house while we're there, are they?"

"... that I don't know," she hesitantly replied. "They might, but then again, since it's my mom and dad we're visiting, they may just leave us be."

"Guess we'll just have to wait and find out then."

"Mhmm."


In a flash of light, Twilight and Sol appeared on the sidewalk in the residential district of Canterlot. Looking up from their spot on the sidewalk, Twilight smiled as she saw the house that she and her brother grew up in.

"Well, here we are."

Looking at the house himself, Sol saw a violet two story house with pink shingles.

"Nice house."

"Thanks. I should really think about coming back here more often. I'm sure mom and dad would like it."

"I'm sure they would."

Taking the lead, Twilight led Sol up to her old home and up to the door. After giving it a few good knocks, she took a step back and waited for somepony to answer it. Immediately they could hear voices coming from within, and a few seconds later, the door opened up to Velvet who, upon seeing who it was, smiled widely as she pulled both Twilight and Sol in for a hug.

"Ohh. I'm so happy you two could make it," Velvet said.

"So are we, mom."

Giving them one last squeeze, Velvet let them go, but not before planting a kiss on Twilight's cheek.

"Well, come on in. Your father is just checking on the pasta."

"Pasta? Are you guys making Itailian tonight?"

"We are and we also brought out the wine."

Sol looked at her in surprise. "Well, now I'm beginning to wish that we brought something to contribute."

"Don't you worry about that. Night and I have everything covered," Velvet said, smiling at Sol. "Oh, and before I forget, welcome to our home, Sol."

Sol gave a small bow. "Thank you for inviting me. I'm sorry that I wasn't at the castle earlier to help greet you."

"It's alright. Twilight told us what happened." Velvet stood off to the side and motioned for the young couple to come inside. "By the way, how did it go?"

"It went well," Sol replied, following behind Twilight into the house with Velvet closing the door behind them. "It didn't go very smooth, much like I'd expected from what the ponies told us, but by the time I was finished, the timberwolves understood and agreed to leave the White Tail Woods and nearby towns alone."

"That's good to hear. So, how did you do it? Did you use some special dragon magic to make them leave?"

"... in a way, I suppose I did. The timberwolves were of my father's creation, and were tasked as guardians of the Everfree Forest and the castle. Though they seem to have lost their sense of duty over these last thousand years, deep down they still seem to recognize me as my father's son, and will obey me just as they did father. Of course, it tends to take a while to get through to them and remind them of whom they serve."

"I see."

Seemingly satisfied with his explanation, Velvet led Twilight and Sol further out of the entry way and further inside the house. Following after them, Sol walked in after the others, noting the staircase leading upstairs to his right, before he was led into the open living room to his left. It wasn't anything too special for such an esteemed family as Twilight's, with a fireplace sat against the far wall with a shelf with pictures of their family sitting on top of it, a window looking out over the streets on left side of the room, albeit with the blue curtains drawn for privacy, and an opening to the kitchen to the right. And there, sitting on the purple carpet floor facing the fireplace, were a few reclining chairs, a love seat, and a comfy-looking couch.

"You two go on and make yourselves at home. I'll go see how Night's doing."

As Velvet left the living room, Twilight and Sol made their way over to the furniture. Knowing the perfect spot, Twilight walked over to the loveseat and sat down on one side, patting the empty space next to her, until Sol joined her and sat down next to her.

"So, what do you think of my old home?" Twilight asked.

"I like it," he said, looking around the room. "It's simple and has a warm, homey feeling to it."

"Good. I'm glad you like it." Twilight let out a sigh as she leaned against Sol, reminiscing her foalhood days living in this house. "I know it's been only a few months, but I'm surprised of how much I've missed this place."

"Perhaps you should plan on making monthly visits here, then?" Sol suggested. "Besides, it's not that far of a trip from Ponyville to Canterlot. Especially for somepony like you who can teleport as far as you can."

Twilight smiled. "I suppose I should."

"Good, because your mom and I would love to see you more often."

Surprised by the new voice, Sol and Twilight looked behind them to see Night walking out of the kitchen.

"Hi, dad."

"Hello, sweetie."

"So, how's dinner going?"

"It's almost done. About another five minutes I'd say. And before you ask, it's Carbonara."

Twilight licked her lips. "Mmmm. I can't wait."

"I know. It's been too long since I've made it," Night replied, glancing between her and Sol. "Twilight, would you give Sol and I a moment? I'd like to talk with him before we start dinner."

"Oh... sure."

Noticing the unsure look on Sol's face from her dad's request, Twilight placed a reassuring kiss on his cheek before moving from her spot on the loveseat. As she left to join Velvet, Twilight walked over to Night and exchanged a hug, who planted a kiss on her forehead before she left the room to the two.

Now alone, Night made his way over to his recliner chair and sat himself down with a sigh of relief.

"Feels good to finally get off my hooves," he said. "That's the thing about cooking with pasta. You can never leave it alone, otherwise, if it's not stirred consistently enough, it'll start to bake against the heated pot and begin to harden. And believe me, nothing's worse than overcooked, hardened pasta noodles in a soft pasta dish."

Not having expected Night to open with that, Sol gave him a curious look. "I wouldn't know. I don't recall ever having this 'pasta' dish."

"Well that's a shame," Night said with a frown, actually finding it rather disappointing that Sol had never had pasta before. "Hopefully after tonight, you'll find an appreciation for it."

"Perhaps."

Noting the skeptical look on Sol's face, Night let out another sigh. "I take it that you're wondering why I asked Twilight to leave us?"

"I am, yes."

"I suppose that's fair enough," he sighed. "The reason why I wanted us alone is so that I could properly apologize to you."

Sol blinked in surprise. "I'm sorry. What?"

Night took in a calming breath for what he was about to say. "For how I was acting and treating you before. I wanted to apologize for it. Despite her inexperience with romance, I should have trusted in Twilight's intellect and smart mind to make the right decisions, and given you a fair chance. Not to mention that you also had the support of her friends, Spike, the princesses, and most surprisingly of all, Shining Armor. He was always protective of his little sister, so seeing him not acting protective of her against you, I should've known right then and there that you were a good stallion."

Sol remained silent as Night continued.

"I know that what I did wasn't exactly fair to you or her, Sol... but, I do hope that you can see it from my perspective as well. I love my daughter. She is, and forever will be my little filly, and I will do whatever I can to help keep her safe and happy. So, you could imagine my concern when I heard that she was dating a stallion who would consistently lie to me about his background, which even then tuned out to be fake. When I first figured it out, I was immediately worried that she'd been tricked into falling for some sort of con artist, and would end up betrayed and left with a broken heart. After that... I panicked and went into a sort of protective father mode."

Sol winced as the scene of Twilight sitting there, broken and weeping, played out in his mind.

"I would never do something like that to her, sir," Sol spoke, his voice soft as his mind lingered on the mental image. "I care very deeply for Twilight. She means a lot to me, and I too would do whatever I can to keep her safe and happy as well. And I would never betray her like that. Even now as I'm thinking of how she would react to it... it hurts to think about."

"I know... and I know that you do. Care for my daughter, that is. Believe me, Cadence gave me quite the verbal lashing already about the connection between you two. Scared me a bit too that Princess Celestia and Princess Luna were both silently glaring at me," he added with a shiver.

Though he tried to hold it back, Sol couldn't help it as the corner of his lip twitched in a split-second smirk. A few seconds of silence later, Sol spoke back up.

"... so, you know about my true past now, and thanks to Cadence, how Twilight and I truly feel for one another. The question now is, knowing this, where do you and I go from here, and were do we stand?"

Night let out a tired sigh. "Now, I should do what I should've done in the first place."

Sol looked at Night questioningly. "And that would be...?"

"From what I've been told by just about everypony close to you and Twilight, I'm going to trust you as her coltfriend... but on one condition."

"... yes?"

Getting out of his chair, Night walked over to Sol and extended out a hoof. "I'm hoping that we could start over, put the past behind us and perhaps start over."

Despite his initial apprehension, Sol knew that things between them likely wouldn't get any better unless he accepted Night's offer. That, and he also knew that it would mean a lot to Twilight if he did. So, it was with her in mind that Sol slipped out of his seat, and met Night's hoof with a claw, albeit hesitantly.

"For Twilight, I am willing to start over," Sol said, eliciting a small smile from Night. "However, I still don't quite trust you, completely."

Night's smile faded into a frown for a brief moment. "... I suppose after how I acted-"

"Actually, sir, it's not really you, per se," he interrupted, shuffling a claw nervously on the carpet.

"Then what is it?"

Sol gave Night a nervous look. "... did anypony tell you about how my last relationship ended?"

"No, I haven't heard. What happened?"

"... it was because of her dad," Sol solemnly answered. "I won't go into details, but it was because of him that I've been so cautious of you."

"I see... but by my understanding, that would've happened over a thousand years ago, correct?"

"Yes, but remember, I was sealed away during that time. Those thousand years sealed in crystal, for me, was more akin to me having fallen asleep and waking up the next morning, so the memories from back then are still fresh in my mind."

"I see."

Now it was Sol who let out a sigh. "I'm sorry, sir, but it's just something personal that I'll need to get over with in time."

"Hopefully not too much time. I would honestly like to get to know you a bit better. I mean, you are my daughter's first coltfriend after all." Night smirked, "Speaking of which, I am feeling a little disappointed."

"Hmm? What for?"

"That I won't be able to be the big bad dad who gets to have 'the talk' with Twilight's coltfriend."

"... what talk?"

"Just the usual father threatening to break the coltfriend's spine if he broke my daughter's heart, threat," Night said with a chuckle. "Besides probably being impossible for me to do to you, I'd rather not see what Princess Celestia or Princess Luna would do to me if I did."

Feeling a sense of mirth from Night's comment, Sol couldn't help but chuckle along with him. As the two of them laughed, neither noticed the two heads peeking from around the corner, both wearing pleased smiles on their faces from seeing the two stallions starting to get along. Even though things weren't completely good between them yet, Twilight and Velvet were both happy that their talk had at least brought them a little bit closer.


In a dark alley in Canterlot, three ponies wearing cloaked hoods huddled with hushed, panicked whispers.

"This isn't good, guys," the first one said. "We failed our mission."

"But we need to tell the boss," the second insisted. "If we don't, then who knows what he'll do to us."

"I can't believe that didn't work," the third muttered to himself. "That was the strongest poison we had."

"Well, how were we supposed to know that it wouldn't work? I mean, we infiltrated the castle, spiked his food with enough nightshade to kill four fully-grown elephants, and he just shrugged it off! How can somepony like that digest and resist that much toxin?!"

"Obviously, his draconic stomach is far stronger than we had been led to believe," the first one muttered.

The second stallion nodded. "I heard that he had a minor upset stomach for a little while after breakfast, but that was it. If we doubled the dosage, or even get our hooves on some cyanide, then perhaps we could fix this and-"

The stallion paused as his ears twitched, picking up on the briefest of sounds.

"Did you two hear that?"

Alerted, the other two began to look around for anypony who might've stumbled upon them. However, all that they saw was the darkness of the alleyway, and heard the occasional clop of hooves echoing from somewhere far down the street.

"Guess it was nothing," the first one dismissed. "Now then, back to-"

He paused when he saw that one of the two stallions he'd been conspiring with had suddenly vanished.

"Wha- Cloak? Where'd you go? We weren't done yet!"

Suddenly, a brief gust of wind swept up from behind the stallion, causing him to spin around to see who it was... only for him to see nothing behind him.

"Alright, Cloak. If you're playing games, then knock it off. We've got a contract to-"

"MMmmph-"

Hearing his other comrade's muffled yelp, and suddenly going silent, the stallion spun back around, now finding his other companion gone, and him alone.

"Dagger? Come on! You and your brother better get your flanks back here so that we... can... finish..."

The stallion's voice faded as he suddenly found a pair of slitted, golden eyes glaring back at him. Seconds later, those eyes were accompanied by another, and another, until he found himself completely surrounded by dozens of pairs of eyes... and the faint sound of hissing.

"... buck."


Above them, standing on the edge of the building's rooftop, a thestral wearing dark-blue armor stood overlooking the scene from below with a frown on his face. After hearing about how Sol had a stomachache after he ate breakfast, he found it unusual that a kirin with such unique and exotic parents like him, wouldn't feel good just because of a bad breakfast. However, having known the cooks for years since before he became Captain of the Night Guard, he knew that their food was always prepared well within the safety requirements, even on the rare occasion when sushi was prepared, and he knew full well how toxic that stuff was to eat when not properly prepared. So, as soon as he found out, he had his ponies look into it and all who were involved. Much to his displeasure, he found out that the pony who delivered the food that morning wasn't the usual pony. Having found that suspicious, he sent a few of his ponies out to find and scout this unknown pony, which lead them to here.

"Captain Night Wing?"

Ears perking at his name, the stallion's eyes darted to the thestral guard who'd silently landed next to him. Recognizing her as Lieutenant Crescent, he gave her a polite nod as she threw him a salute.

"Yes, Lieutenant?"

"Sir, we have apprehended all of the suspects, and are transporting them to the castle for interrogation."

Despite the good report, Night Wing couldn't help but maintain his frown. "Good."

"... permission to speak freely, sir?"

Having known her since their time in the academy, Night Wing had little to no problem with her speaking her mind.

"Granted."

"Forgive my saying, sir, but you don't seem very pleased by this."

"Because I'm not," he snarled, revealing his fangs. "Princess Luna gave us orders to keep an eye on Princess Twilight and Prince Sol while she and Princess Celestia are gone, and we have failed."

"With all due respect, sir, it wasn't us who failed."

"I know, and believe me, I'll be having some harsh words with Captain Iron Guard once we return to the castle. Still, Princess Luna will not be pleased once she hears that somepony tried to assassinate the Prince."

"Not to mention what Princess Celestia will do to them."

Night Wing gave a nod of agreement. "By the way, what is the current status of the Prince and Princess?"

Crescent saluted as she reported, "According to the last report, Prince Sol is with Princess Twilight at her family's house, and are currently sitting down and having dinner with them."

"And the guards that have been assigned to them?"

"They've remained unseen thus far, sir, are keeping hidden and out of sight from everypony, and have the house completely surrounded. Nopony will be able to get in or out without us knowing about it first."

"Good. The last thing we need right now is another assassination attempt, and while on our watch no less." Night Wing looked back down to the dark alleyway and saw that his guards' cleanup was complete, and had left no trace of them having been there. Satisfied with how quickly and silently his guards were, he turned to face Crescent. "We are done here. I'm heading back to the castle to talk with Captain Iron Guard. As for you, Lieutenant, I would like for you to oversee the safety of the Prince and Princess while I'm busy."

Crescent gave a sharp salute. "Yes, sir. I won't fail you, sir."

"I know you won't. It's why Princess Luna entrusted you and I with Prince Sol's true identity. Now go, and may the light of the moon guide you."

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