The Shadow of Sombra

by Lupus_Umbra

Chapter 4

Let it be a known fact that I have never been a big fan of sweets. Not to say that I never liked them, but they never really grew on me as I grew up. With all the training and the missions that I would go on, I learned to pretty much live off of dried meats and never really caring about much else. So when I saw Mrs. Cake walk out of the back room with a plate full of freashly made chocolate muffins, I almost flinched at the thought of eating them, and I'm sure that I winced when she put them down in front of me.

"Eat as much as you like sweetie." She said to me, still smiling as she placed down a glass of cold water on the one good table. It almost hurt to look at the muffins she made for me along with the excited look she had. Big Mac had left while she was making them, but not after making sure that she was fine and offering her and her children a ride to the hospital when she was done. The only reason she didn't take it was because she said the visiting hours were over.

"I'm beginning to wish that you took that ride"I got up from my seat and looked to her. She had a confused look, wonder why I was standing.

"Do you think that I can get these in a bag Mrs. Cake?" I asked, picking up the glass and take downing it in a couple gulps. Once again she looked at me with confusion.

"Of course, but is there somewhere that you need to be?" She asked, taking the plate around the counter and grabbing a small paper bag.

"Yes, I'm trying to find a library so that I can study." I answered, watching her bag the brown pastries.

"But it's already so late dear, the library won't be open until tomorrow morning." She said while reaching handing me the bag. And she was right, as I looked out of the cracked window and saw nothing but a few house lights on.

'Damn, have I really been here that long. 'I supposed it made sense, seeing as when I was leaving the forest the sun was barely going down. "But there were so many people outside shopping when I got here." I said, mostly to myself. But Mrs. Cake answered anyway.

"Some of the shops want to get rid of the produce that they have, so they sell it for a lower price around closing time, for fresh food tomorrow. You must have came around the closing rush." She explained.

"I guess, you know this place better than I do." I shrugged, before two voices had began to cry upstairs almost demanding their mother to come upstairs.

"Oh my! It's their feeding time." She gasped, before looking back at me.

she reached over the counter and for the second time today, pulled me into a hug. "Thank you so much, you've helped us more than you'll ever know." She said, this time the hug was over in a couple seconds. When the hug was over, she handed me the bag and started to go upstairs to tend to her children's needs.

"I hope everything works out Mrs. Cake." And with that I had begun to take my leave. As I walked down the road, I heard the sound of rapid steps behind me, when I had turned around, I saw the same group of girls who nearly ran me over early, along with the children I saved, with the pink haired one leading them. Following them was two women clad in golden armor, and armed with spears. They didn't seem to notice me though as they all had their eyes set on the gingerbread house.

"Mrs. Cake!"The girl screamed in obvious panic, before slamming into the front door. An audible gasp was heard from all of them, before she, a long with the others, ran in.

'they must be close to the Cakes.'I concluded, before I continued to walk down the street, hoping to find somewhere to stay the night.

About ten minutes of walking, and a few late walkers and some gaurds giving me questioning looks. I had found a bridge that had been a top a small river.

"That should be a good spot." I mumbled, before looking around. After waiting for two guards to round a corner and making sure no one else was around, I had ducked underneath the bridge. Fortunately, I saw no one else under it and had sat down on the cool grass, wincing as my leg had suddenly cramped.

"Damn." I grunted, massaging my leg until the cramp went down. "Over forty year of mercenary work, only to go back a weak teen." I sighed, the fight with those...'timber wolves' had nearly done me in. I had forgot what I was, and thinking that I was in an adults body, I thought that I would have a better chance at beating them.

'Guess I thought wrong.' A sudden growl had pulled me from my thoughts, reminding me that I still hadn't eaten. Although the dark had made it hard to see, I didn't have any problem finding where I had placed the bag. I opened it and grimaced at the thought of eating the chocolate muffins. Reaching in the bag, I pulled out one of the five muffins and for a few second just held it, before sighing.

"Well beggars can't be choosers." And without a second thought, I took a bite. There was only two word that came to mind as I tasted the muffin

'Holy shit'

Spike's POV

The crusaders and I were gasping for air as we had waited along with the rest of the girls for Pinkie, and Twilight to come back down the stairs. The other girls were looking around the dining area with shocked looks on their faces. Except for Rainbow Dash, who wore a angry look on her face. When she had first saw the destruction, she almost flew out the door to go on a man hunt to find the things who did this. She probably would have if the two guards hadn't left to help other gaurds find them first. They had been apparently looking all over town for more than an hour and were still searching. Not like that did anything to calm Rainbow Dash.

'I don't blame her.' I thought as I looked around at what used to be the dining area of sugar cube corner. There was very little that was not destroyed, even the stuff that wasn't destroyed was barely useable. Surprisingly the only thing that wasn't smashed was the windows.

"Dang it!" I heard Rainbow say, turning around I saw that the angry look she had turned to a dark look. Although Rainbow Dash is known for having a temper when I comes to anything that involves the people she cares for, nothing before had ever been this bad.

"Rainbow, dear." An elegant voice said, Rarity came into view a moment later and walked right in front of her. "I know what you're thinking and we both know it's a bad idea." She explained, but that didn't do much to calm her down.

"I know it's a bad idea Rarity, but I'm sick of this." She said, not even trying to hide the anger in her voice. "This the fourth time this month that those Dogs destroyed someone's business. And this is the second time that it has involved one of us!"

I shivered at the thought of the story that Applejack had told us. How Applebloom was playing with Winona after finishing her work and ran into a group of Dimond dogs stealing from their trees. If Big Mac hadn't been there to call her back for dinner, who knows what would have happened to her. I looked to Applebloom to see how she was and she looked stiff as a board. Applejack seemed to notice and walked behind her and put her arms over her. Applebloom seemed to lean into the hug, looking less stiff, but still nervous.

"We know that Rainbow, and as much as ah hate to say it, theres nothin' we can do." AppleJack said, looking up from Applebloom and into Rainbow Dash's eyes. "The Gaurds have been searchin' everywhere both inside and outside of town and they haven't found anythin'."

"Then they aren't looking hard enough!"

"You know they're looking dear. In fact, it's probably because they're trying so hard that those ruffians were able to get in." Rarity started, causing Rainbow to flinch. "Right now isn't the time to be shouting, there are more important things at the moment." Rarity finished, causing Rainbow to shoot her head up.

"What can be more important than this?" She said, sweeping her arm around to show the room as if it was hidden in plain sight.

"We need to support Pinkie and the Cakes through this." Fluttershy said, walking her way around the shattered remains of a table. The realization made Rainbow's eyes widen. As if on cue, we all heard footsteps coming from the stairs. Soon she came into view and we all crowded her.

"Twilight, where's Pinkie? How's she doing? Does she need help?" Rainbow asked, grabbing her shoulders, Twilight gently grabbed her hands and took them off of her.

"She's up stairs helping Mrs. Cake put the twins to sleep and she's fine." She answered, Rainbow sighed as if she was expecting a worse answer. We all stood in silence for a bit, the air was heavy as we all wanted to ask something, but something was stopping us.

"What going to happen Twilight?" I suddenly asked, the question that everyone wanted to ask but know one wanted to say. "Are they going to close sugar cube corner?" We waited, holding our breath to hear what she was going to say.

"Yes, they are going to have to close down." She answered, but before an the uproar could start. "They're going to close down for a week or two at most before they open up again."

"Really!?" We all shouted, waiting for her to explain, she nodded.

"Yes, Mrs. Cake told me that after the dogs destroyed the store, someone had come with Big Mac while he was making a delivery and had given her a large amount of gems. The gems she has are rare gems so she has enough to pay for all the damages and the hospital bills and still have a lot left over." She said, a smile came to her face, we all followed soon after, relieved that Pinkie and the Cakes were going to be fine.

"Someone just gave her a bag full of rare gems?" Rainbow said in a suspicious tone. "Who would just give away a bag full of gem, do we know them?

"Yes Rainbow, he just gave it to her." Twilight replied, losing her smile and replaced it with a worried look. "And as for who, I don't think we know him, but we definitely know the name."

"And that would be?"

"A guy named Sombra." The moment those words left her mouth, everyone lost their smiles.

"Sombra did this?" Sweetie Belle said, standing up from the booth she was sitting at, before clamping her mouth with her hand.

"Sweetie you know him?" Rariry asked, walking up to her. We all looked to each other, this didn't go unnoticed by the older girls. "You all know him?"

"Well not really." Scootaloo said, the girls then pushed us into a small row of chair that were useable before continuing. "We meet him in the forest while we were being chased by the timber wolves." The girls had already known about us being chased, but they still didn't know how we escaped.

"He helped you get away from them?" Twilight asked, looking at me.

"Not really."

"Then what did he do? Theres no way he could have killed three grown timber wolves by himself."Rainbow asked, almost demanding an answer with her looks alone.

"Well that's what he did." Scootaloo answered in an excited tone. She then went on to describe every moment that happened in the fight. From the beginning when he had slammed a wolf mid-lunge to the ground with his knife, to the gruesome end when he tore the last wolf's head off its shoulders. "It was so cool, he was so strong, and fast and it didn't even look like he had a fighting style, he just moved. It was almost as cool as seeing Rainbow Dash fight." She finished, which caught Sweetie, Applebloom, and I by surprise, she never compared anyone to Rainbow Dash as she was just in a league of her own, but he did seem pretty close to the girls skill.

"No no no this doesn't make any sense." Twilight mumbled, pacing around and biting her nail, a habit she has when she's nervous or about to freak out.

"What dosen't make sense Twilight?" Applebloom asked, looking over to Twilight.

"What doesn't make sense is that this 'Sombra' shouldn't have been able to damage a grown timber wolf." She said. "The wood that makes a grown timber wolf's body is magical, so him shoving a knife through its body would be like trying to put a knife through a rock. And to tear its head off its body should be even harder. That's why we use our exalted weapon on them or burn them, not regular swords, it's almost impossible." She explained, nearly ripping her hair out. The other girls nodded to her explanation, understanding what this could possibly mean.

"Really! So he's stronger than I thought?" Scootaloo said, not noticing Twilights frustration or the seriousness of the situation, before looking to Rainbow. "Can you do that?"

"W-Well," Rainbow Dash stuttered, looking around sheepishly. "I never really thought to try, but maybe."

"I'm sure you can do it, there's nothing you can't do. After all, you're one the strongest girls in Ponyville." She praised

"Why don't we call it a night." Aj said after noticing twilights ever increasing frustration. "We can talk more about this Sombra character after we have a good night of rest and we can meet up early in the morning, and tell Pinkie about this. For now we need a break." Everyone seemed to agree with that and one by one we had walked out the door without making a sound to not risk the twins walking up if they had been put to sleep.

"Let's meet at the library tomorrow morning." Twilight said, now looking less like she was going to blow a blood vessel. Everyone agreed and went our separate ways. When we got to the bridge, I spoke up

"So what's going to happen Twilight?"

"We're going to talk in the morning and see, but if Sombra even closely resembles that...mage, then we are going to bring the princess's in on this matter." She explained.

"Can he really be him Twilight, you said you girls destroyed him when you last fought him. And would he really do all the stuff he did if was that mage." I asked, noticing my own fear that was in my voice. Twilight shook her head.

"You've known for thirty minutes at most, and when it comes to cases like this, we can't take any risks." She said keeping her face forward. "We can't allow the shadow mage to exist once again."

Sombra's POV

"That old bastard." I mumbled to myself as I threw the last of the chocolate muffins in my mouth. All my life the only sugar that I had came from fruits that I had got from my travels and missions, and the only candy that I got was when I was ten from my teacher. It had been that dark chocolate crap that people ate when they wanted to feel healthy. It had completely ruined sweets for me from then on, thinking that all chocolate tasted like that. I was wrong.

'I'm going to need to go back there when I have the chance." I thought, finally laying back and try to get some sleep on this chilly night.

"So what's going to happen Twilight?" I heard someone say above me I perked up at the voice

'Spike'

"We're going to talk in the morning and see, but if Sombra even closely resembles that...mage, then we are going to bring the princess's in on this matter." A feminine voice said, this voice I thought was this 'Twilight' character.

'Princesses?' I thought, before realizing that the two of them were talking about me. I stood up and tried to listen to the conversation above me.

"Can he really be him Twilight, you said you girls destroyed him when you last fought him. And would he really do all the stuff he did if was that mage?" Spike said, sound like he was trying to convince himself more than Twilight.

""You've known for thirty minutes at most, and when it comes to cases like this, we can't take any risks." She said as she came to the end of the bridge. "We can't allow the shadow mage to exist once again." She said ominously, before she walk away, leaving me to my thoughts. I sat back down, thinking about what I just heard. For some reason, some people are scared that I might resemble this 'shadow mage' in some way. And said people have connections to the princess's. That could be a really big problem for me if I want to try to get by without being noticed.

"Looks like I might have to leave earlier than I thought." I sighed, laying back down on the grass and finding a good position.

'Who in the world is the Shadow Mage?' I thought, before shutting my eyes and letting sleep take over.

Comments

[Radnie]

Can't wait for the next chapter

[Ray MorningLight]

'Who in the world is the Shadow Mage?' I thought, before shutting my eyes and letting sleep take over.

Hmm...you?

[Thy Lord]

About ten minutes of walking, and a few late walkers and some gaurds giving me questioning looks. I had found a bridge that had been a top a small river.

I don't kow how you are about spelling but gaurds should be guards.