A New Starting Point

by Lunar Flarion

Chapter 21: Must Come Down

BANG!

The sound of the castle doors being forcefully opened caused the remaining guards to charge at the intruders. Though they all fell when sleeping darts hit their exposed body parts. Six figures carrying blowguns walked in, their king behind them. The royal vampony family had scattered except Tattered Moon and Midnight who rallied the remaining troops to fight the heavily armored werepony troops. They only lasted a few minutes until they were both captured, tied, and thrown into the main lobby.

Flare, Prim, and Night ran towards the back of the castle, three of the six guards ran after them. One of them was the female werepony named Jewel Digger. They couldn’t aim their blowguns accurately enough to hit them so they had to resort to chasing them down until they tired. The group got to a split in the path and Night split off and went right, while Prim and Flare went left. One werepony broke off and chased the mare to a dead end. She tried to fight her off but the werepony was stronger and finally tied her down to be put with the others.

While the three ran away, the King and Queen fled in the opposite direction. Despite their age, they ran faster than the wereponies. Whenever one of the two wereponies got too close, Blood Moon shot a beam of magic at them, which struck them in the chest. However, the wereponies bulldozed through it, barely affected by the blast. As their run was throughout the castle continued, they called upon guards that have not fallen, which were few in numbers. The wolf guards were slowed down but their darts knocked them out. Even though the wereponies were outnumbered, the vampony guards fell like flies. The two were captured shortly afterward, hoping that the rest other their children are safe.

---

“Give it up!” The female werepony roared as Prim and Flare neared a locked door.

“Prim, I need you to get behind me!” Flare commanded as they stopped.

The two female wereponies stopped a few steps away from the two. Jewel grabbed her blowgun as her friend did the same. Flare glared at the two as his horn glowed a dark blue. They took aim and shot the darts at Flare. His glowing aura grabbed the darts which turned them around and chucked them right back at them. The two dodge them and took aim again with the same result. The two wereponies looked at each other and nodded, they had to charge and overpower the unicorn.

On three, the two charged him, Jewel, slightly behind her friend. Flare’s aura wrapped around the friend and slammed her into the wall. Jewel jumped and grabbed the stallion around the neck. He shook violently, trying to get her off. In response, the mare jumped onto his back, she tried to grab a sleep dart so she could jam it into his neck. She soon was stopped by the stallion standing up on his hind legs and rammed his back into the wall. She didn’t let go, even as he kept ramming her against the back. She grabbed the dart and was about to do the deed, but she felt something violently yank her arm. She looked over and saw that her arm was engulfed in a dark orange color. With a quick and much more powerful pull, she flew off the stallion’s back and into her friend’s body, who had started to get up.

“Oh ho ho! I don’t think so!” the stallion’s voice was different, it was cockier.

Prim looked at what she assumed was Flare. Though there was a difference that she could not ignore. For one, Flare’s left ear was back, his coat was lighter, while the blue in his mane was a darker blue than before. He was slightly shorter than Flare, but that didn’t make him any less imposing. Prim scooted to the side to see the side of his face, and sure enough, his eyes were different as well. Instead of one glowing red eye or two little red ones, he had two bright orange eyes that glowed like fire.

“Man! It feels good to use this body again!” ‘Flare’ said.

“ W-what?” Prim said with great confusion. The two wereponies looked at him with the same confusion. However, unlike Prim, the two wereponies recovered from it quickly.

“Oh, Flare never told you about me did he?” he asked,” Well, the name Solar Eclipse! Nice meeting ya!”

*Fwoomp!*

The sound of the blowgun being used grabbed the two’s attention. Mainly Solar’s since he felt a sharp pain in his chest. He looked down to see a dart in the center of it. He looked up to see the two wereponies advancing slowly, for which he mentally chuckled,’ How adorable, they think I’m going to be affected by that~!’

When the two got in range Solar struck. A large white, sharpened spear-like object burst from the ground in front of them, causing them to jump back. This elected a loud laugh from him, his orange eyes now settled upon Jewel’s friend, who started to load another dart into her blowgun. Quickly, a blinding white figure rammed against her and pinned her to the wall nearby. She looked down to see a large skull with three horns, two on the sides and one in the middle. The middle one was hooked underneath her armpit while the other scraped dangerously against her armor. Jewel didn’t look at her friend as she aimed her own blowgun. She had a clear shot, with one puff of air the dart flew out... but it was blocked. A similar spear-like object burst from the ground and stopped the dart dead in its tracks. A loud metal pang was the only noise the pole gave off.

“What the!?” Jewel yelled,” What is that thing!?”

“Sharp!” Solar roared as the object rose out of the ground. The back of it was in a diamond-like shape with a strange blue jewel in the middle. With great force, the thing flew towards her, she ducked out of the way, barely dodging it as it clipped the top of her ear.

The other mare tried to push the heavy skull away with little to no progress. She looked down at the floor, her Blowgun just out of hoofs reach. She mentally face hoofed at how blind they were, attacking a unicorn with nothing but blowguns. This thought only fulled her rage as she started to kick and hit the skull, hoping that it would back down from the blows... it didn’t even budge. Jewel looked over at her struggling friend, and when she saw that she didn’t have her blowgun, she looked for it whilst dodging Solar’s attacks. When she saw it, she dove for it, narrowly dodging another sharp spike. She picked it up, tossed it to her, and dodged another spike.

The trapped mare reached for the for another dart. Though it was harder since her right arm was pinned upward so she had to grab it with her left hoof. When she finally felt it, she grabbed it but it slipped out of her grasp. She growled lowly as she went to grab another one. She looked up to see how the fighting was going on, and she wasn’t sure who was winning. Jewel had gained some ground, Solar Eclipse had lost some, and Prim was cowering behind him. Once again, she dropped the dart, furious, she slammed her hoof onto the skull creature, earning herself a loud crack. She looked down and saw tiny fissures climbing over the top of the skull. With that, she heard a loud grunt come from it. She hoped that now it would back off, and it did... until it opened its mouth. She watched on in horror as the skull charged up something.

*WHIRL... BOOOOOOOOOOM!*

She barely managed to dodge the beam of pure death as it punched a hole through the hall where she once stood. The skull glared down at the mare. Jewel, Solar, and Prim looked over at the large hole in the wall.

“Shiiiii-,” Solar looked back at Prim and changed what he was going to say,”-z... Three! YOU SHOULDN’T BLOW HOLES IN THE WALL!”

‘That’s 3.14, not 3...’ Flare’s voice echoed to Solar,’ And I would suggest looking at the mare with the blowgun cause...’

*Floomp!*

Another dart flew and hit Solar dead in the neck. He reached up and quickly pulled it out, his mind becoming slightly foggier than before. Another dart hit him, this time in his shoulder, he then started to stumble slightly. Solar heard voices, but they became more and more muffled as the final dart slammed into the base of his neck. His vision started to darken as he felt hooves on his side. As the world turned and grew darker, he looked back at where the two wereponies were, hoping to get a last hot on them, but all he saw were three or four thick black shadows coming at him. That is when he fell to the ground, unconscious.

...
In Flare’s Mind
...

“WELL! THAT DIDN’T WORK!” Flare yelled angrily as he helped the wonky Solar Eclipse up.

“Be thankful that they didn’t kill anyone,” another voice echoed.

“VAT NOESN’T EAN DA DTAY WON DU IT!” Solar said, the darts took effect rather quickly.

“Is... is he... drunk?” the voice asked as he walked into view.

“No, he’s just having a bad time with the darts...” Flare responded.

Flare looked over to one of the many, MANY, empty spots of his mind and thought of a couch. In a second, a dark red couch appeared and Flare guided his inner demon to it. Solar took the couch happily and passed out because of the darts. Flare looked up from the sleeping form and to the darker figure. His eyes glowed brighter as the dark figure grew closer.

“Listen, I can help, give me control and I can help them!” the figure said.

“No, not after what happened last time!” Flare said with a pointed gaze.

The figure’s eyes glowed a dark blue as he said,” I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to do it!”

“But you still did! Even after I told you not to!” Flare argued back.

“I couldn’t help it!” he argued back.

“No... Yes? I don’t know, I’ll have to think about it!” Flare said back as he turned his back.

“Fine, then I guess this conversation is over!”

---

“W-what do you want from me!?” Prim asked as she watched on. Flare or Solar Eclipse was now tied up by the head of the group while the other walked towards her with a rope in her mouth.

“We need to bring you and lug nut back to the lobby,” She said as she pinned Prim down.

“N-no! Let me go!” Prim struggled but the mare pinning her was far larger and heavier than her.

The mare grabbed Prim’s wings and soon began to wrap the rope around them and the rest of her body. Throughout that, Prim continued to struggle, blocking out most of what the two were talking about. Even as she heard something about an overthrowing, she continued to struggle, believing that they were talking about her families overthrowing. Though the conversation that the two where having wasn’t about the vamponies being overthrown.

“So... you’re saying that the stallion is the key to getting rid of the prince?” Jewel asked.

“Not a doubt in my mind, it said in the old text of the alicorns, something dark shall free the light!” the mare exclaimed happily as she finished tieing Prim Bite.

“You sure... he looks to be a dark blue, not dark, Bones...” Jewel replied.

“Hush, who read the ancient text? Me or you?” Bones asked.

“Um... I did, you just took it as fact even though the book is hundreds of years old!” Jewel said with a deadpan stare.

“Hush! Don’t worry, if that doesn’t work, we have enough in our pack to take down the prince himself- HEY STOP STRUGGLING IT'S GETTING ANNOYING!” Bones snapped at the princess.

Prim whimpered and looked at Flare’s body, hoping silently that he was fine. Bones noticed this motion and leaned down to whisper into her ear,” He’s fine, trust us.”

Prim looked up at the mare with a confused expression. She opened her mouth to speak but Bones’s hoof rested on her lips, silencing her. She shook her head, telling Prim to not say a word when they would enter the lobby. Prim merely nodded as she was taken away to the lobby. Flare and Jewel were left behind for Jewel had to wake up the stallion. She had to be honest, the whole chasing thing was really just to throw off the prince, but she guessed she got caught up in it and let her body go into auto pilot, cause this only made her job more difficult.

She rolled her eyes in annoyance, cursing herself for letting her instincts drive her into this delicate mission. She looked for an anti-sleep dart, something that sounds fake, but is real. It’s a dart jack-full of everything that can wake somepony up. She searched her armor for it, but didn’t find it, she thought it may have come loss during the fight. So, she looked for it, overturning some wall that had been blasted. To both her luck and horror, she found the dart, but it was broken into pieces.

“No... NO NO NO NO NO NO NO!” She begged as she picked up the broken pieces,” NO! That was the only one!”

---

“You hear that?” Flare asked the dark figure.

“Yes, I hear a distressed mare...” the figure said,” It’d be a good idea if we act now!”

“Er... just... no! Yes? I still can’t decide... I... can I trust you?” Flare asked.

“Yes,” the figure said with a smile,” If anything goes wrong, you can blame me.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll already do that,” Flare said with a dark smile.

“Alright, give me your hoof...”

---

“Okay! You can do this the old-fashioned way!” Jewel said with an awkward smile. She walked over to the stallion and got sat on top of his belly. She raised her hoof and slammed it against his cheek. The heavy sound of it echoed off of the walls and Flare’s head slammed sideways onto the floor.

When she did this, a small amount of black fluid sprayed from his mouth and eye sockets, which splashed onto Jewel. She gagged as she felt the cold and thick fluid hit her face. She tried to shake it off but it wouldn’t budge, so she reached up and forced it off of her face with a hoof. The goop slid off onto her hoof, which she held up to her nose to smell. One sniff was all it took as she gagged louder, it smelled like burnt rubber with a side of decaying wood. Two smells she thought could never go together to make something worse.

Leaning as far as she could away from her hoof, she wiped it onto the stallion’s chest. That is when something caught her attention, the black fluid/ goop started to gather around the stallion’s head, slowly moving down to her back hoof. Noticing that the thing was alive she jumped off of the stallion and almost bolted out of the room... yet something stopped her. The same smell and cold feeling hit her hard as the black mass grabbed onto her leg. She looked back to see it covering the stallion, the blackness turned his fur void black, and the strip of black in his mane had vanished and turned a dark blue.

She heard a sicking pop and crack as the body started to spasm uncontrollably. His head cracked with each violent tremor, and with each movement, she tried harder and harder to move away from him. She then heard a voice in her mind as it’s growl turned into a horrid whisper. Its voice grew distorted after each second, and after each second, the stallion grew less and less twitchy. Then, it roared into her ear, and she screamed. This time, she pulled herself out of the void and began running, running faster than she has ever ran before... only to be stopped by the black void wrapping itself tightly around her chest and stomach. She was forced to look back as the void turned her around.

She squeaked loudly at what she saw. She was face to face with what looked like a demon made of shadows.

“Well well well~, what do we have here?” the voice of the demon was deep and had a lighter-voiced echo to follow it up.

“Please! Don’t hurt me! I’m trying to help!” Jewel squeaked as she covered her eyes to hide from the creature’s completely white ones.

“Help?” the creature mused,” You are doing a rather sh!@#@ job of DOING IT!”

“Please! I need your help!” Jewel yelped.

“Why should I help you? A pony that invaded and took Flare’s... friend?” he asked dangerously.

“So that we can end a tyranny!” Jewel said, giving the demon a large yet obviously forced smile.

“That doesn’t mean I should help you, cause I don’t trust either!” the figure smiled as Jewel’s faded, he was enjoying the worry that she was giving off, she could tell.

“Okay... okay... I’ll give you a short version!” Jewel took a deep breath and started,”I and a pack called the Outcasts are trying to get rid of Saber Tooth, the prince of the wereponies. We don’t trust him and we don’t believe he deserves to be crowned king... So I started a pack with wereponies who thought the same way. We infiltrated the palace and I found myself looking at plans for an invasion, so I’m here now to help stop it!”

“I’m just going to say that is barely believable...” he replied.

“LISTEN! I CAN GET YOU THE PRINCESS AND FAMILY BACK!” Jewel yelped in desperation,” All you have to do, is scare the king into leaving and get rid of the prince!”

“... Fine, since I don’t have any other options...” the figure slowly put the mare down, but the darkness kept hold of her.

“Thank you, mister...?”

“ The name is Forbidden Light,” he said,” Now tell me, where did they go?”

...

“What are you going to do with us now that we are defenseless?” Blood Moon asked.

“Well, you serve no purpose to us! So we are going to throw you into the dungeon and let you wilt away with no food or water!” Saber Tooth said with a sly smile.

“I have a feeling that you’re going to eat those words!” Prim said.

“Really now?” Saber said,” Who can stop us!? There aren’t any magical skeletons in that flimsy book of yours to come and stop us!”

‘That’s where you’re wrong, fleabag!’ was the thought that ran through the whole family’s mind.

“You know what? I don’t have time for you filthy things. GUARDS! Take these prisoners to the darkest cells they have!” Saber ordered, not looking back at the two guards.

No movement... no noise. The prince turned back to see why the guards haven’t moved, only to find that there weren’t any there.

“WHAT THE-!?” He shouted, but a deep voice cuts him off.

“I’d suggest you surrender now, you have no one to protect you...” the voice sounded from every corner of the room.

“What the!? Who’s there!? By my royal blood, you will show yourself creetin!” Saber ordered.

“I don’t normally take commands from a RUNT, but I guess I can do that for you.”

The echoing of hoofsteps sounded behind him. The prince turned around and grabbed his sword. He froze at what he saw, and the vamponies looked on in both horror and happiness at the black figure. Happiness because it was a familiar face, but horror, cause he looked evil. He was taller than normal, his eyes glowed an eerie white as they could see his pointed teeth. Saber unsheathed his sword and pointed it at Forbidden Light, who merely laughed at it.

“You think a simple sword is going to stop me?” he asked.

Saber roared and charged at him without a second thought. He reached the figure and swung the sword to the side, hoping to cut the fiends head off in one swipe. That is what he expected, but what happened was that a thick black shadow shot up and wrapped itself around the sword. With a single movement, it shot away and slammed into the crystalline wall, embedding itself deep into it. The royal family and werepony looked at the sword with fear. The prince slowly backed away from Forbidden Light but his attacks weren’t done yet. He bared his teeth and lunged forward bite down on the unicorn’s neck.

“Nope,” Forbidden Light said, he stopped the prince in mid-air, just before he slammed him into a nearby pillar. The stallion let of a groan as he tried to stand back up.

“Listen, if you don’t give up I’m just going to wrap you up and let the royal family decide what to do with you,” he said,”So be the bigger stallion and give up.”

“Not... until... I WIN!” Saber roared as he lunged towards Forbidden Light again, this time, the black figure had enough, and did simply what he told Saber he would do.

...

Saber Tooth, now wrapped up in rope, the werepony king now retreating, and the pack that revolted cheering, Forbidden Light felt that the day was almost complete, but one thing was getting to him. Flare’s body was low on energy, so he had to find a place to rest soon, but he couldn’t leave the royal family tied up, so he walked over to them to set them free. Midnight, Blood Moon, and Honey Glow grew slightly fearful as he got closer, but Prim and Night grew more comforted, and Tattered Moon... he didn’t know how to feel.

With a sharp flash and the glow of his horn, the ropes fell to the ground cut to ribbons. Prim got up and ran to hug the pony she believed to be Flare, Night looked on at him, her mind filled with questions. Tattered helped Midnight up while the two parents looked on at the Forbidden Light.

“Thank you Flare!” Prim said happily.

“Nope, I’m not Flare...” Forbidden Light replied.

*Squeak!*” W-who are you then!?” Prim asked as she jumped away from him.

“My name is Forbbiden Light, I’m a friend of Flare,” He said, he gave a small smile.

“That's... nice...?” Honey Glow asked as she stepped casually towards him. She stopped when he looked directly at her.

“If you think I’m going to hurt you, don’t. First off, Flare would have my head if I did anything to hurt you. Two, I may look evil, but I’m not,” he said calmly.

“Yeah, sure,” Midnight said with a scowl,” Listen, it may just be me, but I don’t trust DEMONS... anyone else agrees?”

“He’s not a demon!” Prim argued.

“How is he not a demon?! Tall, evil-looking, powerful, scary! He has it all!” Midnight pointed out.

“Yeah, but he isn’t evil!” Night rebuddled.

“You don’t know-!”

“Midnight, calm down, please?” Tattered asked.

“... Fine... but I’m not done with you yet!” Midnight growled.

“Well... that was interesting... I knew I would cause alarm but I didn’t think I’d cause this much alarm...” Forbidden Light said before he got hit with a wave of nausea,” Ah...”

“Is something wrong?” Prim asked.

“Yes... I need to... need to get to a... bed...” Forbidden stated wearily,” Before... I use up the rest of... of Flare’s energy...”

“Oh! Head to my room, it’s not far from here, just go down the hall and to the left!” Prim said.

Forbidden Light nodded then walked off to the location. Midnight glared at him as he left, then glared at her sister, saying firmly,” You are letting him, sleep. in. your. ROOM!?”

“Yes, I am!” Prim shouted back,” He needed a place to rest, so I gave him a place to go to!”

“Prim, please, understand that I want to keep you safe, and I trust Flare, I really do! But I don’t trust that thing that has control over his body!” Midnight said honestly.

“Well, if you trust Flare, then you should trust his decision to trust Forbidden Light!” Prim replied back calmly.

“I just... don’t want to you get hurt!” Midnight replied, her parents, Night, and husband stood by and watched.

“I won’t... cause I know Flare would never hurt me,” Prim said with a cheery smile.

Prim smiled and walked off to her bedroom. The others looked at each other awkwardly, feeling that the tension from the fight was still there. Night smiled calmly and said,”Welp... it’s late so... imma head to bed! See you guys in the morning!”

“Yes... I believe that sleep is the best option right about now...” Tattered Moon replied as he nuzzled Midnight whole softly nuzzled him back.

“You go on ahead... we need to give our new guests a place to rest then we’ll be heading there ourselves!” Honey Glow said with her usual chipper smile.

...

Prim opened the door to her room slowly. Her mind replaying the events of today and how Flare sent two powerful creatures to protect both her and her family. Once she opened the door she stepped in and closed it, her body now begging to go to bed since of her close proximity to it. Following her bodies command, she turned around and walked towards the bed. Of course, there was already sompony on it, but it wasn’t Forbidden Light, it was the pony she knew and loved. Happily and with a newly found tiredness, she hopped up on the bed and snuggled closely against him, her wing wrapped around his back as her head rested next to his.

She soon started to doze off, and with her final amount of consinceness she cooed softly,” Good night... my knight in shining armor...”

Author's Note:

I’m tired... Imma gonna go to bed now...

...

Forbidden Light REF sheet, for those who want to see the character up close!