The Angel

by Nexas_Valentine

Star Ocean

“How many times is this now?”, inquired a young human man, with black spiked hair and burning, deep red eyes, dressed in a long black coat.

“Lost count, huh?”, replied an identical looking young man, with the exceptions of long white hair a white coat and luminescent icy blue eyes.

“That’ll happen after... lord knows how many reincarnations.”

“I can’t imagine all the times I beat the crap outa ya helped yer memory.”

“As if, those were draws.”

“You wish, you were stone dead every time,” the white haired man laughed then donned a serious expression, “now, let’s quit wasting time talking, I’ve got a world to save and a monster to kill.”

“Fair ‘nough.”, replied the black haired man. He then summoned small black flames that swirled furiously around his forearms and hands. “Let’s get started then.”

The white haired man responded in kind, conjuring ice crystals that created a vortex of ice and mist around each of his arms. Suddenly a massive torrent of black flame began to descend on him, he quickly leaped back as the entire wall turned into a glass-like wall of ice, then he rapidly propelled himself over the wall generating six very large shards of ice behind him. He stopped his descent as he launched each shard directly into the black haired man, who seemingly refused to move out of the way. The shards continued to make their way through his body puncturing him repeatedly.

The black haired man dropped to his knees, as each wound leaked out a thin black smoke instead of blood.

“You could have easily dodged that. what are you playing at?”, the white haired man yelled.

“This.”, he said as he removed a small spherical device from inside his jacket.

“What the...”, the white haired one began but was cut off by a sudden blinding light. The source was the sphere in the other one’s hands, it hummed and droned as the light grew larger and stronger and the world around them began to vaporize, even themselves.

The last thing either heard was the black haired man laughing wildly and the few spoken words, “See you on the next battle field, old friend.” Then one more intense flash of light occurred, afterward there was nothing but a large hole in the ground and melting ice.

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“This is so boring without somepony else to enjoy it with.”, a violet unicorn pony sighed with exasperation as she dropped onto her back. “At least the stars are pretty.”

Like every night Star Ocean, a typical, young unicorn pony mare, went to the outskirts of Canterlot and admired the night’s beauty, from Luna’s moon to the nearly infinite little sparkles, from which her name was derived. As an assistant at the Canterlot observatory this was the only time she could watch stars completely uninterrupted, doing so there often got her in trouble.

As she lay there staring off into infinite space she saw a sudden light streak across the sky, “Ah! A shooting star! Hmmm... I wonder.” She took in a deep breath and scrunched her entire face as she made the wish silently in her head, “Weird... I haven’t been compelled to do that since I was a filly. Oh well, that’s not important.”, she said, gasping lightly just realizing then that she didn’t breath while making the wish. She sighed again, this time out of contentment as she closed her eyes and enjoyed the cool night breeze brush it’s way through her coat and mane. Her peace was violently interrupted by a sudden explosion and several subsequent shock waves only a few miles away.

She struggled to regain both her senses and her balance as the shock waves finally subsided, “What in the hay was that?” As if expecting an answer she stood in silence for awhile, finally she magically levitated her saddlebags onto her back and thought very intently about her next action, yet before she knew it she was going in the direction of the previous blast.

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She whistled, “Wow... That is one big hole, but beside that very obvious crater there doesn’t seem to be any signs of destruction. No debris, no impact fractures, no burn or scorch marks, and even more oddly the entire crater is completely smooth and spherical. Hmm...”, She dropped down onto her haunches and began rubbing her chin with her hoof, “And, the most perplexing thing is the lack of material of any kind in or out of the crater like it just vanished.” She sat longer pondering and examining, she knew she had to be able to understand this, she was a scientist after all, but she just couldn’t which only aggravated her. “Stupid hole! What are you hiding?”, she screamed in frustration. After some time she realized what she had just done and smacked her forehead with her hoof, “Really Star? Yelling at a hole, wouldn’t your teachers be proud...”, she sighed for the third time that night. “I guess I’ll just tell the royal guards and let the princess deal with this, I’m just a nopony anyway. What do I know?”

As she turned away from the crater with head hung low she suddenly heard a long chiming noise, her head immediately spun around to see an even stranger sight. A very radiant beam of white light was shooting out of the hole, burrowing it’s way through the sky and out to space. She started to speak until the beam changed, now it had little black balls of light swirling around it in a ring just at her eye level. She had never seen anything like any of this, and now no matter how hard she tried she couldn’t turn her body away from it, in fact it was driven against her will, closer and closer. She resisted as hard as she could as each hoofstep brought her closer to the core beam, as soon as the first hoof reached the bottom depths of the crater and stepped into the light she became lightheaded and weak and quickly blacked out.

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The first of her senses to return was touch, she had no idea where she was but she knew it wasn’t where she began she felt something very soft underneath her, like a cotton ball only more solid, she also felt a gentle warm breeze. Next was hearing, chimes, more specifically wind chimes and the sound of wind rustling through plants of some kind. Shortly after that was smell, it was the smell of flowers, answering just what the wind was blowing through, she was no botanist but by smell alone she knew enough to know that those flowers weren’t the kind normally found in Equestria. Finally, sight, as she slowly and tentatively opened her eyes as this new environment came into view, adding to the ever growing curiosity of her situation. She was lying down on a ground that looked like cloud and as far as she knew was, everything around was constructed of the stuff, much like in Cloudsdale or any number of other Pegasi hometowns. The structures around her were all, either towers that looked like they belonged on the palace back home or incredible circular gardens of glowing, white flowers surrounded by many stylized columns. The sky seemed, by all accounts, normal, a beautiful shade of blue and the brilliant sun beaming it’s light everywhere in it’s gaze. Putting aside that walking on a cloud usually was absolutely impossible for a unicorn, she began to wander around hoping to find any signs of life.

After several hours of searching each tower she came across, she found nothing, not only were the buildings empty of inhabitants but also of basic home furnishings, or any kind of decorational pieces, there was literally nothing.

“What’s up with this place? There is absolutely nopony here and even less objects, but someone has to be here, there wouldn’t be buildings here otherwise.”, She reasoned to nopony in particular, her agitation clearly audible in her voice.

“I’m sorry, I came as soon as I noticed you here”, a soft voice replied from behind Star.

“Huh?”, was the only thing she could formulate as she spun around to see a pegasus mare roughly her own age.

“I said, I’m sorry...”, the pegasus began, but was cut short.

“I heard what you said, I was just surprised, not to mention I didn’t fully understand what you meant.”

“Well... this is my home, and it’s very rare that anyone but ‘the other one’ comes here so I wasn’t expecting you.”

“’The other one’?”

“Yes, the owner of this world.”

“I thought that was you.”

“It is, but not.”, The pegasus replied matter of factly as if what she said made all the sense in the world.

Star sighed, “That aside, where exactly am I? And, just what is going on here? The last thing I remember is walking against my will into this weird light beam thingy.”

“I’m sorry about that, but I needed your help.”, the pegasus apologized, her penitence obvious in her voice and body language.

“Help? With what?”, Star inquired, forgetting entirely her initial questions.

“Only you have the power to unlock the gate and awaken the angel, so that it may restore it’s power and save your world from annihilation.”

“Annihilation?”, Star practically yelled in shock.

The Pegasus cringed lightly at the volume of Star’s outburst, “Could you please be more quiet, and yes. I’m afraid a very powerful and ancient evil has made it’s way to your world of Equestria.”

“Sorry.”, Star said as her face turned red out of embarrassment. Ok, Star. What do you do? I mean, not a bit of this sounds real and could just be a very vivid dream maybe one of those... ‘lucid?’ ones. But, on the other hoof if it’s real you could be the pony that saved Equestria and be among the ranks of Twilight Sparkle and the others. Plus you can’t let Equestria be destroyed think of all those poor innocent ponies just living there lives, suddenly ending. I guess, the real question is whether I’m ready to accept such a huge responsibility or not...

“Are you ok?”, the pegasus questioned after noticing the pained look painted across Star’s pensive visage.

“Oh, yeah. I’m fine. Sorry. So... what can I do to help?”

“Follow me and I’ll show you.”

Star Ocean followed the pegasus as they walked through the bizarre cloud world. This was the first time she could really study her guide, the pegasus had a pure white coat, a long and elegant pale blue mane and tail, both of which were obviously very well taken care of, icy blue eyes that seemed to shine lightly, and no cutie mark on her flank which made Star even more curious about this very unusual pony. They came to a sudden stop in front of a large gate.

The gate was roughly twenty feet high, fifteen feet wide, and had no fencing or walling on either side. As far as aesthetics it was made of two distinct metals, one half seemed to be silver, while the other was gold, The silver side was decorated with a white stone, Star couldn’t place, in several intricate patterns and designs, the gold side was similarly decorated with black stone. In the center was a large lock, about the size of a stallion pony, the lock continued the pattern of the rest of the gate, but the colors and metals were reversed the gold half of the gate had the silver half of the lock, while the gold half of the lock was on the silver. In the center of the lock was a very unusual keyhole, a single vertical diamond shaped hole, with a smaller perpendicular horizontal one, through the middle.

“So how do I do this?”, Star asked, as she walked full-circle around the gate.

“Use your powers.”, the pegasus replied.

“What powers? you mean my magic?”

“You aren’t aware of them?”

“No? And, why does it feel so hot all of a...”, Star’s voice trailed off as she collapsed to the cloud floor. Right as her awareness began to fade she heard the pegasus saying something about being brought to the wrong half. Then it all went black.

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“I’m getting tired of passing out.”, Star grumbled as she picked herself up in yet another venue. Wrong side? So is this place the right side?

She examined her new location, now she was surrounded by several black skyscrapers, edged by neon lighting. The only lighting were those neon strips, and the occasional burst of lightning from the dark clouded sky. This place was a perfect contrast to her prior location, it was dark, cold, and had only the fragrance of oils and tar and the sound of humming electricity, and for some reason absolutely no thunder to accompany the lightning, but after all she had been through that really didn't surprise her.

She again searched her new location finding nothing again like last time, but this time she was more comfortable. She couldn’t understand it, it was close to below thirty, or at least felt like it, it smelled awful and was so dark she couldn’t see very well, yet despite it all she felt calmed and soothed by this odd black and neon town.

Her self evaluation was interrupted when she heard a low but audible bass drum beat, “What the? Drums?” She followed the sound to a building with the word 'club' written on it in neon, “Huh... that’s imaginative. Might as well have called it ‘Building’.”, she remarked as she rolled her eyes and stepped inside.

The interior was very plain, in the middle was a circular bar, directly between that and the door was a pit, Star assumed to be the dance floor, to the far back were the tables and a place for a dj. The turntable was playing a typical electronic dance song by itself, because like everywhere else there was nopony here. Star’s eyes wandered over the room, everything was black except the dance floor panels and the neon lights edging each and every wall, even the bottles behind the bar were black, each of which were rimmed by a neon light at the top of the bottle. “Someone should fire the decorator...”, said Star letting her tongue stick out to emphasize her disgust.

“You don’t like it? that’s too bad.”, said a familiar soft voice from behind her, the music cutting at the exact same moment.

“You again? Wait, how did you turn off the music?”, Star replied again astonished by the sudden appearance.

“We’ve met? Oh... You must mean the other one, and this is my world, I simply made the music turn off. Now, are you ready?”

“you aren’t...”, Star looked closer and realized this pony was slightly different, the eyes were the same but the coat was black and the mane was midnight blue. “This whole thing is very confusing, you know that.”

“It will become clear soon. Now, again, are you ready?”

“Ready for w...”, Star was cut off by the pegasus pony placing a hoof on her forehead. She felt a sudden flash of energy shoot through her body, it was hot and felt like lightning coursing through her veins. Her eyes began to glow a bright violet as lightning began bursting out of every inch of her body shocking everything around her, scorching or destroying everything in the club, she had no control over this sudden outburst and had even less understanding of where it came from. Then it subsided as soon as it began, as she crashed to the ground that she had been hovering a few feet off of a second ago.

“Your full power has been awakened, it will take time to control but eventually you will be able to help the angel awaken it’s full power. For now, we are trusting you with protecting it.”, the pegasus said to an exhausted Star, right before she blacked out again.

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“Ugh... my head, my hooves, ow... my everything.”, Star moaned as she picked herself up, parts of her coat still smoking from the lightning storm she had turned into not that long ago. She looked around and realized that she was back where she began. “The crater again. Whoa! wait a second... that wasn’t there before.”