Pages from Another Equestria

by SasayakiYoru

01 - Crystal Prep

Every night the same nightmare, the same dream that haunted his nights; the same images in his head, showing erratic and fleeting images; a spectacle of destruction and chaos, showing what seemed like pieces of crystal slamming against each other on the void, like a sea filled with fragmentes, shattering apart at each impact. Reflecting on its sides he could see his friends, lost like him among the multitude of worlds, trying to solve a problem without solution.

In the dream, in front of him, he could see a shadow that grew every second, encompassing eternity with its power, smiling down on him and mocking him at every turn, enjoying the spectacle around him. And like that, Midnight woke up on his bed, his head filled with images of his father and his bangs stuck to his forehead due to sweat.

“The nightmare again?” Sombra asked him on the threshold of Midnight’s new room “wanna talk about it?” the young man looked at his foster parent with trepidation, remembering the image of Sombra blowing up in pieces due to an unknown force, but he simply shook his head in a negative

“You’ll be fine, I know that when you enter school you won’t have enough time to worry about your past,” the stoic man said trying to make a joke “besides, Crystal Prep is one of the best schools in the area, I should know, I studied there before and now work there.”

“Sombra,” a voice behind him interrupted the two; Hope looked calm, with a radiant beauty that had been restored thanks to the vacations that she so deserved “You both need to rest since tomorrow is the new school year and you both are going to need all your energy to survive it,” the three laughed at Hope’s humor, or at least Shadow laughed quietly while Midnight softly smiled; Hope was a natural caretaker and midnight was grateful for her efforts in trying to get him used to living with them

Once again, Midnight was left alone on his room, contemplating the less dark sky due to how close sunrise was according to the clock on Midnight’s new desk. Sadly, he couldn’t find rest for tonight, knowing that his true father, Noche, was still free out there, after all, if Midnight and the rest of his friends had survived then it wasn’t a stretch to believe someone as dangerous as Noche could survive falling into another world.

Midnight had to be sincere with himself and confess that no matter how much he enjoyed living with Radiant Hope and Sombra, he had to complete what he had promised that night and finally put a stop to Noche’s plans of conquering everything; sadly, he was stuck in a world with absolutely no magic and will have to find a way to replicate the powers he once had as a pony. He needed resources and information for that kind of thing and if radiant and Sombra were correct, then Crystal Prep would be the perfect first step on his plan.

In the previous months, that same social worker, the so called Cherry Mystic, arrived at their house at the same hour, sometimes by herself, a couple of those accompanied by a co-worker, a woman as mysterious and disconcerting as Cherry Herself. Miss Feather Pen had long hair and she looked at Midnight as if she was capable of looking right through him; she had also interviewed him, but unlike Cherry, she was more thorough and Midnight had the suspicion that she knew more about him than she let on originally; whatever the case, Midnight always answered in the same way, that he couldn’t remember except his name. In their last visit, before he went to Crystal Prep for the first time, Feather arrived with a package for Midnight; that was the last time he saw her.

Inside, the only thing was a book filled with photographs, all people that he didn’t recognize; it apparently was a yearbook, with some miscellaneous information about the students.

“Sombra, what’s this?” the other dark haired man in the house took a look at what Midnight was pointing at and he saw five young girls standing in front of a horse statue, he then smirked knowing exactly what the place was.

“Oh, that will be Canterlot High, a high school in the suburbs, nothing impressive, they always lose to us.”

“Sombra,” the voice of Hope was the one of someone who had listened to something way too many times.

“What do you mean by always losing?”

“Every so often there is a special event called The Friendship Games between the two schools, something of a two school academic Olympics in a way,” Midnight smiled a bit at the name, of how ironic it was considering that most events with two different sides on them were all but friendly. Looking at it a little bit more he noticed several more students, especially one with fluffy pink hair; she remained him of Jade a bit. Among the students he also noticed a girl with fiery red and golden hair, but he didn’t put a lot of attention to it.

“I don’t understand why Feather gave me this book, it is worthless” he put the book aside, without noticing that a note felt from the book, it then floated outside of the window, its message never known by Midnight.

So it was like this that Midnight’s first day at Crystal prep was… bizarre to say the same; his uniform was uncomfortable and he didn’t like the monotony of students that, even with huge differences in hair color and style, they seemed as if they were out of one of those assembly line factories he had read about in the last few months. Students of the school were as blind to others as many nobles back on the Crystal Empire.

Still, with all the greed and jealousy thriving in the halls of Crystal Prep, Midnight found someone wearing glasses and with black hair that made him think back on his good friend, Whisper; with that on his mind, he got close to her to start a conversation.

“Is like an anthill, isn’t it?” the girl turned around, completely surprised by hearing someone talk to her, her face turned red, both in shyness and not quite believing someone like the boy in front of her will start a conversation with her.

“Yes, although, I think ants are better organized than this, but I understand the comparison” a simple yes would have been alright, even acceptable since they didn’t know each other; Midnight liked that, but then, the girl’s bag moved “ah, sorry, I need to go,” she said and she basically ran away much to Midnight’s surprise.

“I suppose that when you gotta go, you gotta go,” the speaker on the wall then was brought to life, with a message to Midnight to go to the office, in there, he found a woman with beautiful, long, pink hair that reminded Midnight of the old queen of the Crystal Kingdom; he tried to dissipate that memory, knowing full well that she must be dead since she had been one of Noche’s ‘guest’.

Her name was Cadence and she was the dean of the school and after seeing the principal of the school he understood that he will like the dean more than the bespectacled woman at the other side of the desk.

Principal Cinch asked him to sit down and Midnight was on edge due to how the office felt oppressive, with the curtains closed and shadows playing around the walls; Midnight had started to hate shadows.

“Welcome to our school Mister Midnight, I must say that we are surprised that you not only scored well on the entrance exam, but that you aced it; in fact, only another student in the school has a higher score. That’s not the only reason why you were accepted, after all, that two of our own alumni were ready with letters of recommendation; it is truly a special occasion,” Midnight just watched her in silence, intrigued, but not really interested in her, he just listened “how a man that until six months ago was basically death could have a development this impressive? Who are you’ Do you want to sabotage this school?” Even if the movements of the principal were of a woman with power and of someone that ruled with an iron hand, Midnight was not impressed, after all, his own father was the darkest and scariest creature he had seen.

“Do you really believe that I came to this school just to sabotage it? What kind of principal are you? Really, you are a woman full prejudice,” if someone had seen close enough, they would have seen a spark of green energy sparkling on his eyes, but of course, Cinch was not very careful and instead started a debate with the young man and much to both sides, they found, if not an ally, at least someone that they thought they could manipulate for their own plans.

On Cinch’s side, she found someone smart, ambitious and charismatic enough that she could use to make the legacy of the school and of course, of Principal Cinch, even larger than it was now. Sadly for Cinch, he had no love for the woman, nor any hint of respect; he felt emptiness inside of him, a hole that couldn’t be filled, neither with books, nor with the maternal love of Radiant Hope. He had the hypothesis that the hole and his emptiness had something to do with the loss of the Element of Faith, that maybe it had vanished as he fought against his father back on Equestria.

Still, he knew that the woman could be useful; after all, she was the leader of an important school, with access to new technology and with a budget that he could use to find a way to regain his power. With all that out of the way, Midnight once more found Twilight, this time in classroom and he was… glad to see her.

“So, what’s your name?” Twilight was once more surprised that someone was talking with her.

“Well, I-I’m Twilight Sparkle; shouldn’t you be more focused on the class?”

“Maybe, so, interested in anything in this school?”

“Well, I am really interested in finding, measuring and obtaining new types of energy,” as the two worked on the classroom and finished the practice in record time. It was like this that his first day at school was over and he met with Hope back at their home… home, that still sounded weird to him.

“So, how was this day Midnight?”

“It was… interesting.”

Comments

[ValNitak Choas]

have to say I like the cover art, look like a demon twilight sparkle

[SasayakiYoru]

8690078
Almost, she’s a character from the serie Umineko No Naku Koro Ni, a Great Witch with a terrible power