The Blackened Skies

by gosha305

Meeting in Canterlot

This night wasn't an easy one. In the land of Equestria, nopony could sleep. There were several reasons for it. Of course, the sight of a giant eye above their heads and the dark smoke outside didn't help. Panic and paranoia have settled in the streets and wasn't about to leave them. The constant screams and hoofsteps of the ponies fearing their certain doom gave no assistance to those that tried to rest their overwhelmed minds. The final reason was less obvious, but nonetheless a problem: there were no sun or moon visible so nopony even knew when to go to sleep.

---

The Elements of Harmony accompanied by Spike and Starlight were waiting at the Ponyville train station. They all looked tired even though, some of them actually managed to get some sleep. The trip to come was somewhat a relief after hours of waiting for the seconds to pass, and they all were thankful for at least something other than the sky to occupy their minds.

---

The ride to Canterlot wasn't very eventful. The mares remained silent most of the time, because any conversation was unwillingly drifting towards the celestial events and stopped after the mention of the eye. For the duration of the entire trip, this very eye was unalterably fixing the six friends and this didn't seem to be about to change. Its bright pupil followed them all the way from Ponyville. Twilight was starting to wonder if this wasn't just an optical illusion. But even if it was, the impression of being observed stayed quite disturbing.

After arriving to the castle, the six mares were greeted by a large platoon of royal guards who led the way towards the room where the meeting was about to take place. Apparently, they were the last to arrive and everypony was waiting for them. This news caused the six friends to feel uneasy as they tried to hurry towards meeting room.

The Canterlot castle didn't have a specific room meant for meetings, but it had several rooms large enough to replace one. This time, the meeting was held inside the throne room. In fact, there were only nine mares that were part of the current assembly. The Royal Sisters, were sitting upon their thrones as they usually did when receiving important guests. Princess Cadence, was comfortably lying on a stack of pillows brought in the room for the occasion. The main six, had a similar setup waiting for them. Once all were comfortably positioned, the meeting could officially begin.

"You all know why we are here today and I agree that the events that brought us in this room are by no means pleasant." stated Princess Celestia, thus officially starting the meeting.

"This black fog is indeed a great mystery and most importantly a great threat." added Princess Luna.

"Do you have at least an idea of what we're dealing with?" asked Twilight with great worry.

"I fear not, my dear student." responded the Sun Princess "This meeting has for objective to determine the nature of this Entity, because we, ourselves do no have an answer to your question."

After she finished here sentence, everypony's attention was caught by a strange humming noise that started to fill the room. It seemed to have originated from the sealing but rapidly spread and was now coming from all directions at once. Through the windows, the ponies could see that beacons of blue light were now starting to appear all around the city. One even ascended from the center of the room they were in and was quickly gaining in diameter. At the same time, all ponies in the room started feeling weak and this feeling only gained power with each second. Soon, streams of blue light started to flow from the horns of those possessing one towards the blue beacon. The Royal Sisters understood what was going on: they were being drained of their magic. Sadly, there were no way of preventing this from happening. To their great relief, there were no need to. The beacon in the middle of the room started becoming smaller and soon faded away completely. Even though, everypony felt as if they have just run a marathon, their magic wasn't drained entirely. The process just stopped for no reason and this at least, was a good thing. Nonetheless, a panic started to settle among the mares. Was all this of Tirek's doing? If it was, he has made great progress since their last confrontation and last time the fight was far from easy.

While everypony was starting to lose their resolve, Twilight had an idea. She knew a spell that let anypony using it to communicate with any sentient being. This fog was surely somewhat conscious of its acts. She shared her thoughts with the others, and they agreed with this plan. Twilight would cast this spell directly at the celestial eye. It seemed dangerous, but what else could they do?

After they all walked outside, they saw something unexpected. And it wasn't good. The eye wasn't alone anymore. Smaller eyes could now be seen around it. They were a total of five and their collective gaze was as before focused on the Princess of Friendship. She could feel the cold light of their stare on her skin, it was indeed quite unnerving. She steadied herself and concentrated on the spell. It took several minutes before she could recall its formulas properly. Finally, she concentrated all of her remaining magic in her horn before casting a beam of glowing light towards the biggest eye. The celestial Entity didn't seem to be bothered by the beam in the slightest. The eyes continued staring towards Twilight as if waiting for something to happen.

However, when the spell reached the central eye what happened wasn't what the ponies expected. Instead of hearing a voice or seeing the thoughts of the Entity, Twilight felt a terrible pain in her horn. It was as if it was being separated from her skull with a rusty saw. The pain was unbearable, but she couldn't react to it in any way. Then, the ache was replaced by a great feeling of fatigue. I was similar to the moment the beacon of light appeared in the middle of the throne room. Her magic was being absorbed.

After several seconds of this excruciating torture, the pain stopped as the grip of the Entity let her go. Her friends gathered around the purple alicorn trying to help her as much as they could. This was the moment they all heard it. A spine-chilling laughter filled the air. It seemed to come from the sky as well as from a black corner of your own mind. It took over your head banishing all other thoughts and feelings. Only this laughter subsisted and it was unbearable. Its alien tones were indescribable even by those who heard it. And yet, there was something beneath this eldritch sound. Something... familiar. It was as strange and unnerving as the rest of this laughter but it was still here.

Several minutes passed while the Entity laughed. When it finished, it was a relief to everypony. But what was even more of a relief, was an unexpected event in the skies. The Swirling clouds started retracting themselves from the atmosphere. Even after the recent events, seeing the warm beams of sunlight brought a form of serenity to the hearts of the ponies. The only thing that stayed as a reminder of the wicked haze was a single eye. It was one of those that formed after the Entity absorbed magic from the ponies and it seemed very much out of place in the bright blue sky. Its cold gaze was still watching Twilight as her forces started returning to her...

Author's Note:

If you're reading this, THANKS! I know that about 2 people will see this message and I would like to thank you as you are one of them. Thank you for bothering to read my shitty story but I would like you to know that it is far from being finished. I am planning on having this fic be about 10 chapters long and I hope I will manage to finish it before I get bored. I will try to do longer chapters in the future, but I think that they will come out about once a week.

If you are still considering reading this... thing, I'll be very happy to know your opinion on the first 2 chapters! Any form of constructive criticism is very much welcome.