Sunset Shimmer and the Holograms

by ratedoni

Three Years Ago: The Midnight Year

The monitor was beeping, keeping track of the heart of the man on the bed and its beep echoed across the hall; the reason of why the man, or better said, young boy, was in the bed was all due to a car, at least that’s what they thought, but Dr. Hope wasn’t quite sure. Over and over again she took a look at the resonance images and was perplexed; there were no broken bones, no internal bleeding, the boy didn’t even need any respiratory assistance, he was just healing by himself; outside of the external injuries there was no way to explain why the boy was on a coma.

As she kept looking at the studies, a man of pale skin entered the room in silence and quietly hugged her from behind.

“You do realize that this kid is not your only patient, right Hope? You have already seen others like this, you need to rest, just give it time,” at these words, Hope turned around and looked at him with tired eyes; the man could see the disappointment in those dark and beautiful eyes of her, but it was disappointment in herself.

“I know Sombra, I know, is just… this kid shouldn’t even be alive, now, don’t get me wrong, I’m happy that he survived, but seriously, being run down by a trailer and he just receives minor injuries? This doesn’t add up,” she got up and walked to the window of the room, she then once more looked at the file, thinking about the other thing that was so perplexing about the patient; the kid was a ghost. He had no name, his fingerprints were useless since they couldn’t be found in the database, and with no id and no license in his pockets the boy was a ghost. Without anything under his name or even a name, the system could just very well shrug its shoulders and Hope wasn’t sure what could happen to the boy.

“I suppose we can only wait, have some patience.”

“Don’t you have a class to teach back at High School Sombra?”

“Why do you always have to bring me down woman?” If anyone would see them or the way they interacted with each other they wouldn’t think that they were together, hell, they would have thought they were old friends. Their relationship was a strange one, but it worked for them.

With a small smile on her face, largely due to her teasing, Hope went back to the young boy’s bed and put a hand on top of his head and at that moment, her smile grew even bigger as an idea crossed her mind and just by looking at that smile, it made Sombra get worried.

“I know that look Hope, what exactly are you planning?”

“Don’t you think he looks a little bit like you?”

“What, do you think he is my long lost son Hope?”

“Don’t be so dramatic, is just that it would be a shame if he falls through the system,” at those words, Sombra rolled his eyes knowing exactly what was going on with Hope; she always had such a big heart, always being worried about every single person that she saw in the hospital; she had the kid on her sight and she was not going to let him be abandoned and she was not going to rest until the kid was whole again and with a family. Sombra knew that he was not going to make her change her mind so he just kissed the top of her head and turned around to leave the room.

“Guess I’ll have to make some calls if we are going to have extra rooms in the house, isn’t it?” Hope was surprised and it was clear on her face that she wasn’t expecting that answer “I know you well my dear and there is no way I’m going to make you change your mind, but you need to promise me one thing, take a rest, you are working too hard, you need to take care of yourself.”

Hope was an amazing doctor, but she always worked way too hard, but Sombra was right, no matter how much she wanted to help everyone all the time; she looked at her body and had to be sincere and acknowledge the fact that she had lost weight due to how much time she had spent being stressed or working.

“Alright, I’ll go back home after the night shift and I’ll finally take a vacation, since I believe I’ve saved enough for several months.”

So it was with these thoughts that as she was working on her desk, looking at some files when one of the nurses working the night shift too appeared at her door.

“Dr. Hope, the patient woke up!” it was all that she needed to hear as she went up and began to run in the direction of the young man’s room; knowing that the next few moments would be important for the patient and indeed, he could act disoriented or confused, maybe even a little shocked, but instead of that they found the boy sitting up on his bed, inspecting his hands with a look that could haunt her night. It was filled with rage and confusion, it was like looking at a pool filled with nightmares and she was paralyzed by the spectacle; the boy then turned his head took at them and it was as if the room had disappeared and the only thing remaining was darkness and rage. Then, he talked and everything went back to normal.

“Where am I?” she blinked and the sensation of nightmares was vanished; she took a long look at him and was confused, weren’t his eyes green before? Now they were grey so there was something strange in all of this.

“You are right now in the hospital after being hit by a truck, do you remember the accident?”

“What’s a truck? Wait, that huge thing is called a truck?” well, things were definitely worse than she thought at first; he was either showing signs of amnesia or he just didn’t know modern vehicles “it doesn’t matter, I need to go back to Everfree, my friends were there, I need to check if everything is alright?”

“You mean Camp Everfree? That’s pretty far away from here.”

“Wait, Camp Everfree?” he showed confusion on his eyes and as interesting the talk was, Hope knew there were more important stuff to talk about, like the fact the kid still was a ghost on the system.

“Now, I know you must feel confused, but tell me, do you remember your name?”

“Yes, is Midnight Shade, who are you?”

“I am Doctor Radiant Hope, I’ve been taking care of you since your accident,” the kid was grateful about it at least and after taking his vitals, which only made him look even more confused due to the strange items she was using -which only made her believe more in the fact that he had lost most of his memories- she decided to left him rest while she did a quick investigation on his name.

Sadly, after introducing his name in the database there was nothing, no records, no family, no nothing; the only thing she could find was a small link in the internet referring to the name after she avoided the fairy tales or trash. It was a link to an old reference, a registry about a so called mage that had studied alchemy and magic; feeling intrigued she clicked on the link to an old portrait and couldn’t quite believe how similar the crazy magician was to the young boy on the hospital bed; the same dark look and hair, just a little bit older. Besides the looks, the name matched completely, Midnight Shade, alchemist of the fourteen hundreds, executed after presumably destroying a whole castle. Nothing was explained except for his last words.

“I had to find a way to kill him, but nothing can stop Noche,” it was probably a wrong translation and didn’t have much sense, who was Noche after all? It didn’t have much sense, so it was with these word sin her head that she went back home. Next morning there was a social worker in the hospital and even Radiant Hope was surprised in how fast they worked.

As she saw the woman she could only thing of one thing; that the kid was going to be separated from her, taken away by the system like many kids before him; he would soon disappear in the system of adoptive houses and temporal families and the kid needed help with his memory loss. Still, she was a doctor first in the hospital so she walked in her direction and shook hands with her.

“Dr. Hope, it is a pleasure to meet you, my name is Cherry Mystic and I am here to ask you a couple of things about your patient,” the woman seemed pleasant enough, with short black hair and very chic glasses; with a beauty mark on her left cheek close to her lips, beautiful smile and the modest, but very flattering suit, Cherry was enchanting and Radiant needed a second to get her mind working at full power again, after all, she looked almost inhuman in a way, but radiant couldn’t put her finger exactly on why.

“What I can tell you is that he has not fully recovered.”

“I still cannot allow you to take him into the system like that,” at those words, Cherry smiled in a way that made Radiant stay rooted to the place she was standing; it felt as if she was in front of a very dangerous predator and the shark was starting to circle around her.

“I heard some people talking this morning, something about you finally taking a very well deserved vacation, is that right? Well, since you are going to take some time for yourself, why don’t you also keep an eye on the kid? I mean, the boy has just woken from such a horrible accident, he probably needs people that could take care of him at this point in his life.”

“I haven’t told the hospital about me taking my vacation, who-”

“You know how rumor works, don’t worry, besides, I’ll have the kid’s documents ready this afternoon,” the woman said with that same mysterious smile of hers that just made Radiant be worried, very, very worried. Radiant still had the feeling that there was something about that woman, this Cherry Mystic that just made her feel fascinated and scared of the woman; it was not the way she looked, it was just something on her head that told her there was something strange on Cherry.

“But the kid is still a ghost; he has no id or any kind of documentation.”

“Now, don’t worry about that, finding all that is my job, you keep taking care of him and soon everything will be alright,” and with that, the woman turned around and walked away, with Radiant feeling as if she had dealt with a natural force instead of a person and the woman truly did it. Just several hours later, Cherry Mystic came back as Radiant visited Midnight once more; she was surprised about the way in which the boy absorbed information.

Cherry came back and with a full folder, with information of Midnight, like his birthday, his mother’s information, which was Moonlight by the way, but his birth place was unknown, the same as his father. Besides all this, with the information and with social worker on her side, that meant that Midnight left the hospital and moved with Sombra and Radiant Hope.

Just as she thought, the two of them quickly became friends, talking for hours and becoming something like a family, but there was still something dark growing inside Midnight, a part of him that made him part of the darkest race in all of Equestria’s history, the Umbrum.

Even in this new world, he felt the dark power in him calling him; make him remember his father and all that he represented. As he had been thrown into another universe, then that meant that his father, Noche, was still out there, somewhere else, but how to find him? How to make true on his promise to him? That he will be the one that will destroy him?

As he started to plan, Radiant came with some news to him, the fact that he will be attending school, not too far away from their house, a school named Crystal Prep. And like that, the wheels of destiny turns, sometimes with help of some very powerful entities that make sure the pieces are in place.

Back then, when Midnight was still on a bed at the hospital, the social worker left the building and with nobody around, her clothes began to shift, then transform; instead of a rather modest suit, it became a rather impressive silver armor, her glasses became a masquerade and like that, Cherry Mystic had vanished and Madeleine was already making plans.

The first piece on the war against Noche and the survival of the multiverse was in place, now, they'll see what Midnight will do and if he will be like his father or he will embrace the powers of the Elements and help them soon, if not, well, her new spear was ready, she could see if it worked against Umbrum, or at least, Umbrum turned human.

Author's Note:

This happened three years before the creation of Jem and if you don't know who the woman was at the end, just read Princess of Lordran, also, remember that all these stories exist on a massive multiverse.

Also, the original chapter is not mine, it was done by a friend of mine,

SasayakiYoru

and we basically created the idea of this multiverse, but he is the owner of both Midnight and Noche so if you have any question you can go to his fimfiction account.

Comments

[AdverseFlower95]

Since this seems like it would belong better in The Many Destinies of Sunset Shimmer, does that mean that Midnight is in the Holograms' dimension or what? That is the only reason why you would introduce a cross author continuity into this story from my perspective but actual clarification would be appreciated.

[ratedoni]

It is the same dimension, in fact, this is the oldest point chronologically speaking; part of this universe reason is that, well, see how everything started and not only is important to the multiverse, but also affects the story of Jem, since Midnight has a hand on its creation and the creation of Synergy itself.

[Void Runner]

Would Maddie's new spear happen to be forged from the soul of a certain Dragon Slayer?

[aceina]

i am very confused by this chapter

[FluryHeart]

Plz update its been 2020 now and i really love your work of this book

[FluryHeart]

its 2021

[PonyofEntropy]

Alas, more has not been written….