Tale of a Comet: White Light

by Ashfur

The Imposter's Rulebook

Flurry Heart was awoken to a chorus of "Awww"s and mentions of what a cute scene it was, as well as a camera flash to capture the moment forever. Groggily looking around, she saw her family and friends fawning over her, and whatever she had under her wing. She lifted it to check what she was next to, but when she did a hoof grasped it and pulled it back down like a blanket.

"Mph... five more minutes..."

"COMET!" The colt didn't get his extra time. As a consolation, he received a mighty hug from the young princess as she jubilantly exclaimed, "You're okay! You're okay!"

"Ow! Feathers?! Watch it, that smarts!" as she loosened her grip but refused to let go, Comet glanced at the gathered ponies. Cadence, Shining, Twilight, and two who he had only received letters from welcoming him as a citizen of Equestria: Celestia and Luna. All that was overshadowed, though, by a loud grumble from his stomach. "Oog... how long was I out for? I feel like I haven't eaten in days."

"You haven't," Twilight replied. "But we can fix that. Come on! I'll send an order for all the flowers and hay you could want." Twilight was too inexperienced of a princess still, but Celestia, Luna, and even Cadence caught how he quickly scanned the ground they stood on, almost imperceptibly. He shrunk back under Flurry's wing ever so slightly.

"Nuh-uh. Not unless you go stand in that sunbeam over there," he replied, pointing to the rays of the mid-morning sun pouring through the window. "You, Miss Cadence, and Mr. Armor."

"Forgive my interruption. Astral Comet, correct? I am Princess Celestia. Might I ask why you are making such a... peculiar request?" Celestia's voice was warm, calming, peaceful. Centuries of being the mother figure to so many ponies had such an effect. Comet almost relented, but held firm. He did, however, lean forward and allow Flurry to pull her wing away for a much needed stretch.

"Uh... h-hello, your majestyness," He bowed his head directly into the cushion of the chair, muffling his voice a bit. "Did I get that right?"

The solar princess giggled at the colt's antics. "Almost. It's pronounced 'your majesty'," she replied putting emphasis on the proper pronunciation. "But a friend of Cadence, Flurry and her family is a friend of mine. Please, call me Celestia."

Comet raised his head back up. "A-alright, Miss Celestia. And you wanted to know why I want those three to be in the light, right?" Upon receiving a nod, he continued. "Well, they don't have shadows. That means any one of them could be... uh... you-know-who."

The three semi-accused ponies stood stock still for a moment. Shining reacted first, casting a soundproof spell on the room. "You think... that one of us is that Exterminatus monster? We've had reports of ponies losing their shadows all over the city, is that related somehow, Comet?"

Flurry Heart looked at Comet, scooching away a bit to get a better look at her friend. "Wait, does this have anything to do with that thing you told me to do if anypony was in the shadows? Here, let me just-" Her horn lit up, and with a strong illumination spell she bathed the room in bright light. Everypony had to shield their eyes slightly from the flash. "Did that work, Comet?"

"Yeah, they're the real deal. Can we get food now? I promise I'll explain the rest over breakfast." He hopped off the chair and trotted over to the hallway door, ready to go, then paused. :Hey, wait a minute, where's my neckerchief and goggles?!" That scored a round of laughter.

---

The group, plus Starlight and Sunburst (after another light flash test from Flurry), gathered around a table in a secure room of the Crystal Palace. Between bites, Comet told them all he knew.

"So, what exactly is Exterminatus, anyway?" Starlight asked, hoping to get the major facts out of the way. "And why did he take our shadows?"

Comet swallowed his daisies and gave his answer. "Well, it's hard to say exactly what he is. When I was really young, I used to get teased a lot. Nopony wanted to be with me on the playground, or anything. So I used to hang out with myself... and my shadow. That's what Exterminatus is... my shadow, brought to life. And he hates me for it.

"When I was... I wanna say seven, mom told me not to keep everything that the kids at school were telling me under my skin. So I pretended that they were saying it to my shadow, and I didn't feel so bad. Eventually, I started calling him Echo. Echo the shadow. I decided that since he was a shadow, he needed to eat darkness to live. So the teasing was like food to him. And that made me feel better about my place in school. Eventually, summer break came, and all of a sudden he didn't have any negativity to eat anymore.

"So one day... he 'talked' to me. Not really, I was just feeling upset over not getting a new toy. But I blamed it on Echo, and fed him the sadness and anger I felt over not getting what I wanted. It made me feel better... until he started eating more. He started telling me I was weak, useless. He was worse than the bullies at school because he knew me, he WAS me. So he knew what to say to make me upset. But I never told anypony about it because he said they wouldn't listen, and call me a crybaby. And I let him do it, because I thought that if I could put up with Echo, I could handle the school bullies' mocking words easily! And I thought Echo would stop when school started again. He didn't.

"He started haunting my dreams, pretending to be other people I knew to use their words against me. So I came up with rules to know where he was, and who he was. It just seems that here, he's broken out of my mind, and it's...it's...it's all my fault!" Comet slammed his face into his salad bowl and wept loudly. It took the combined efforts and reassurance of everypony to calm him down, and another salad was ordered.

"Astral Comet, foal who fell from our night sky. Do you know of our transformation into Nightmare Moon and our desire to bring about eternal night?" He nodded at princess Luna's question. "We took those actions deliberately, and we were still forgiven. We hold thee in no ill will, little pony."

After more reassurance, Comet finally gained the mental strength to continue. "W-well, Exterminatus, as he now calls himself, has to folow a few rules I put in place to keep him from hurting my mind. First, He can perfectly copy the form of anypony, even thier voice, but only if he's stolen their shadow first." That earned a few gasps.

"Is that why those reports of me and Cadence staling shadows are coming in?" Twilight asked, worried.

"Probably. I wonder who that guard, Extrema Units, really was. Exterminatus isn't bound by names, although he never appears with a shadow either, since he is one. Anyways, the second rule is that If you don't know about him and his powers, there's no way to see through his illusion."

Another set of gasps. Sunburst responded first. "A royal announcement might help, but it might cause widespread panic, too..."

"I agree," proclaimed Starlight. "We should limit information to the Crystal Empire for now, and tell others if he moves on. what's the next rule?"

Comet didn't need to be told twice. "Rule three: If you know about him, you can see through his illusion, but only when he's in an area lighter than the one you're standing in. So if he's standing in a shadow or under an umbrella or something, you wouldn't be able to tell, but if he's standing next to you in the glow of a fire the illusion would be transparent and you could see him underneath. Oh, and one more thing: If he is in direct sunlight or hit with a blast of light, his illusion disappears, painfully. From what you said, Feathers, tossing him into that ray of moonlight must have been bright enough to do the trick."

Luna spoke up once more. "So this... Exterminatus is a loose shadow who steals the shadows of others and plays dress-up with them. We fail to see exactly how this is anything more than an inconvenience to the citizens of the empire, little one."

"Well... that's not all he does with them, Miss Luna..."

"He said something about not wanting to be an ineffective parasite," Shining remarked. "Then he taunted us about the fact we were going to die. I feel like that's important."

"He did WHAT?!" Celestia and Luna bellowed. The whole room shook, thank goodness for the soundproof spell.

"Yeah... so Exterminatus... may be a parasite, of sorts. But he doesnt live in you like most do. After he's stolen your shadow, it's still your shadow. And he can use some method similar to how we hide our darker thoughts to literally drain the negative energy from any bad feelings you get, making him capable of darker magics. His ultimate goal is to not kill everypony, but gather as much negative energy as he can. If he gets enough, he can summon his master."

"And his master is...?" Flurry questioned.

"Grand Nightmare, the Perfect Imperfection. When I was eleven I had a nightmare so bad that not only was I trapped in perpetual darkness being chased by a beast so massive I couldn't comprehend it, I was running around in the real world screaming for my mother... and when she grabbed me and stared me in the face saying 'I'm here,' I stared back and screamed 'I want my mom'."

Silence. The ponies had never heard of such a bad dream, mainly due to Luna guarding theirs. "That night, I realized there had to be something worse than Exterminatus. He never broke out of my dream and affected the real world like that before. So I called the... thing, Grand Nightmare. It was a perfect being meant to cause terror, but as it caused terror it was imperfect, not seeking peace. So it is the perfect imperfection."

"We... we would like to retract our statement on him being just a nuisance. Is there any way to beat him?" Luna asked.

"I came up with the power of the stars to fight him. Imaginary... until I got dropped here, I guess." The black section of his mane lut up white, and the shimmering white star appeared in his grasp. "They represent my... no, everypony's self control over our inner darkness, and the hope that even the darkest places can be lit with good things. This one is the main one. Light is its focus, and hope is what it stands for."

Luna and the others gazed at it for a while, enchanted by its glow. Luna, however, noticed something. "We know how it came to reality."

"You do?"

"Yes. It feels like it came from a dream. Once upon a time, We created the Tantabus, a creature in dreams that almost broke into reality. If Exterminatus is from a real enough dream, and thou seem to have given him enough to work with, it is entirely possible he broke loose into our reality, and from what thou told us of thine dream before landing here it seems the thou took the stars and followed him. Tell us about the other stars, Comet. It might help us."

"Actually, Luna, I think the poor dear has had enough for one day. Let's give him some time to recover. Perhaps you could tell us about the stars over dinner, Comet?" Celestia asked.

"Sure, Miss Celestia!"

"Good. It will give us time to prepare how we will inform the kingdom of this new threat. For now though, go with Twilight. She wants to run a few tests to make sure your body and magic are stable."

Comet nodded reluctantly. "Alright, I suppose. See you at dinner, Feathers. And keep an eye out for shadowless ponies! I don't want him taking my best friend, too."

"I will, Comet. Stay safe..."

Author's Note:

#Infodump

Wow, so we finally understand how and why Exterminatus works! He can pretend to be Comet since he is Comet's shadow, by the way.

Go back and reread the previous chapters if you want, he actually is in character and those rules hold true. You just didn't know what to look for.

Comments

[Mix-up]

Cute, getting better in your writing, interesting that his greatest enemy is his own shadow, there is a irony to that on it's own. Keep it up.

[Ashfur]

9249492
Yes, I have evolved from writing on my phone to my desktop! That and we are actually getting into the parts of the story I have been dreaming of for ages. Up to this point was my attempt at figuring out how Comet got there.