NaNo2014: Shadows of Friendship: Part 3

“No problem Twilight!” Spike nodded, keeping a tight grip on the saddle bag as he returned to Dark Moon’s side.

“Since this is just a demonstration duel and apparently your letter is so important, how about we both start with just a thousand life points?” Lightning asked as he stepped into the red circle on the other side of the grid and stepped on his sigil. His side of the grid lit up in a blue that was so light it was almost white, the same colour that White Lightning’s magic had always been before his horn had snapped. “Mares first, of course.” He gestured to her in a mocking version of a bow.

“One thousand points is fine by me.” Twilight agreed, only to become startled when the box in front of her circle lit up with the number ‘1000’ in it.

“No more having to do life points manually.” White Lightning boasted to the crowd, “The DuelRune grid does that for you.”

Twilight was actually impressed as she placed her deck on the square of solid light that had appeared in front of her. It was hard enough to make runes do anything like addition or subtraction without manually putting in the input, yet alone making them remember things. Somehow he was literally getting the runes within the grid itself to change in order to provide the life point counter and while it would mean that you would have to reset the grid for every duel, which meant a little more maintenance, the purple unicorn could quite easily see the benefits and doubted that many people would object.

“Two cards face down.” Twilight informed Lightning, “And I summon the Coltic Guardian, in attack mode!”

The DuelRune grid shone brightly for a moment, then a young Eath pony stallion appeared before her in a swirl of autumn leaves, with a deep, mossy green coat and long, neatly platted, yellow mane and tail, protected by impressive looking silver and green armour and holding a sword between his teeth, over which he glowered at White Lightning.

“Since my Guardian can’t attack this turn, it’s your move.” Twilight continued, gesturing to her former classmate.

“One move is all I need.” White Lightning smirked at her, “Come forth, my might Blue Eyes White Dragon!”

Twilight gulped as her Coltic Guardian was dwarfed by the huge white scaled dragon that appeared in a blaze of light and a crackle of electricity. The mighty dragon seemed to peer down at the opposing creature as if contemplating whether to eat him for lunch. To her Guardian’s credit, he did not do anything more than peer up at it in reply as if considering the best way to strike the beast down.

Though Twilight did not appreciate the difference, the crowd did and while some outside the ring of spectators were terrified of the dragon, those who knew enough about the DuelRune grids to know that before the monsters had always been kind of static and nowhere near this interactive, were impressed.

“Blue Eyes!” Lightning called, over confident grin plastered across his features as his three thousand attack point beast stared down at Twilight’s fourteen hundred attack point Warrior, “Destroy her Guardian and end the game!”

The huge dragon, which was easily the same height as the nearby buildings reared back it’s great head and opened its maw, building up a blast of light and electricity before loosing it to strike the Warrior below who did not stand a chance.

Or would not have done if Twilight had not called out, “I don’t think so!” with a grin as she activated one of her face down cards, “Magic Cylinder! It negates your dragon’s attack and you take the same amount of life point damage as its attack points!”

The beam of light entered one of the two multi-coloured cylinders and exited the other, shooting straight back at the dragon, who let out a furious roar and shattered into a million tiny, shimmering pieces.

White Lightning’s life points hit zero almost instantly.

“I don’t remember that being in your deck.” Lightning commented, his tone neutral though his expression was anything but. Instead an odd mix of curiosity, anger and excitement featured prominently upon his face as Twilight stepped off of the sigil and packed away her deck.

“I might not have played much since you left school, but I’ve kept upgrading my deck.” Twilight replied with a nervous smile before turning to her companion, “Spike, we need to go.”

“But Twilight…”

“Now, Spike.” Twilight’s tone brokered no argument. The dragonet scurried to Twilight’s side as she settled the saddle bag back on her rear. Before he could climb up the unicorn levitated him onto her back and the crowd parted for her again, this time more in awe than anything. Before anyone could say anything about how easily she had won that duel, Twilight galloped away to somewhere a little more private.

“You know,” Spike commented when Twilight finally slowed down, “We could have done the letter there rather than racing away like that.”

“I didn’t want to cause a panic.” Twlight shook her head, using that as the excuse rather than the fact that she had felt awkward being stared at by that many ponies and that White Lightning had creeped her out a bit. It did not help her mood at all that seeing his broken horn reminded her that while her special talent was magic, it could be taken away from her just as easily as Lightning had lost his and she did not know what she would do if she ever lost it. “Now please Spike, take a letter.”

“Fine, fine.” Spike grumbled, pulling out a quill and parchment and putting it to paper. “Ready.”

“Dear Princess Celestia,” Twilight started, smiling slightly as Spike started scribbling it down, rather proud of the young dragonet who had worked so hard to learn how to write. She had been studying under Princess Celestia for as long as the baby dragon had been alive and Spike had been desperate to help her in any way he could. In the end she had caught him copying her written work in a rather sloppy scrawl and had started teaching him in what little spare time she had. “I have been diligently continuing my studies and have found that we may be on the precipice of disaster...”

“Pre-ci…” Spike looked at her in obvious confusion causing her to sigh and remind herself that he was still learning the language. He was a baby dragon after all.

“The edge?” She tried instead, discarding some of the bigger words she had been about to offer in the place of ‘precipice’ and nodding when Spike wrote that down without a problem. “I have found evidence that the Mare in the Moon is in fact the Alicorn Sorceress, Nightmare Moon and that she plans to return during this Summer Sun Celebration to try and bring an eternal night.” Twilight dictated slowly enough for Spike to keep up with her. “Something must be done before this disas… can happen.” She changed what she was going to say midword, reminding herself that Spike wouldn’t be able to spell it, “I await your reply, your faithful student, Twilight Sparkle.”

“Twi...light...Spar...kle.” Spike finished the letter off with a flourish and a grin.

“Alright, Spike, send it.” Twilight ordered, only to frown when her companion hesitated, “What?”

“Now?” The purple dragon asked even as he rolled up the letter and sealed it with a thin red band. “I mean she’s going to be really busy with the celebration, it’s only a couple of days away.”

“I know, Spike, but that’s the point. If Nightmare Moon is returning, then the Princess has to be warned.” The mare replied, frustrated, “I’ve wasted enough in responding to Lightning’s bait as it was and it’s imperative that she gets that letter right away.”

“Imperative?” Spike asked confused.

“Important!” Twilight exploded in frustration, trying not to take it out on Spike but unable to bottle it up much more when she knew she had taught Spike the meaning of ‘imperative’ last week.

“Alright, but you’re allowed to have fun.” Spike objected, before loosing a small green flame that seemed to burn up the letter. The ashes floated in the air for a moment before becoming sparkles that shimmered as they shot upwards, over the rooftops and headed towards the palace. “And I bet she already knows. I mean its Princess Celestia. She knows everything.”

“Even if she does, at least I’ve sent my letter. I couldn’t just find out that without trying to warn her.” The filly replied, feeling a weight lift off of her shoulders as she trotted towards the library that was home. It had not started that way. Originally it had been her and a few books, but over the course of her studies she had steadily built up her own personal library of research texts and copies of books she had found interesting in the stacks of the school and palace libraries.

She always felt more comfortable amongst the lengthy volumes than she did amongst other ponies and after running into the one pony she had both looked forward to seeing again and dreaded meeting once again she wanted nothing more than to return to her beloved books and hide until she was certain he was gone.

Spike seemed to know what she needed and the moment they were through the door, he cleared a space for her on the desk and pulled a golden box down from its hiding place behind a huge text on dragon care that Twilight had memorised years ago when she had first hatched him.

Twilight herself dumped her bag by the door and flopped down on the cushion next to the rather worn wooden desk, staring at the box for a few moments before seeming to make up her mind and opening it.

Spike knew why she had hesitated before opening the golden box. It contained the fragments of an Ancient Equigyptian artefact that her dam-sire, Treasure Trove, had brought home from one of his many trips abroad. Supposedly it was cursed but neither Twilight nor Spike had seen evidence of such a thing. Inside the golden box with its odd eye like symbol were about fifty pieces of an ancient puzzle that Treasure Trove had said was ‘the ultimate test.’ Twilight had been trying to complete it for about eight years.

NaNo2014: Shadows of Friendship: Part 2

Canterlot; Current Day.

“Please, Twilight?” Spike begged, the purple baby dragon fell to his knees, his forepaws coming together in front of him in a pleading motion as his bright green spikes quivered in time with the excited trembling of his body, “White Lightning never, ever shows off his new stuff in Canterlot. He ALWAYS does it in Manehatten. I know you don’t duel much anymore but can I go, please? Please?”

“Spike...” Twilight hesitated. She knew how much her friend and in some ways child, enjoyed it when her former classmate released the new DuelRune packs for public use. Before White Lightning had invented them, the card game she had enjoyed as a training tool at her mentor’s school had been nothing but a simple game to anyone who wasn’t using its summoning techniques, spells and traps as a way of fine tuning their control over their magic.

Ever since the DuelRune Grids had been released, however, Duel Monsters had exploded in popularity right across Equestria. The grids allowed non-unicorns to do what the more magically inclined had been able to do for years and the ability to see and hear the monsters battling as the two players duelled had pushed what had been an offshoot training tool into an insanely oft played thing.

For Twilight herself the DuelRunes did not mean much. They were well made and she enjoyed looking them over and trying to work out exactly how her former classmate had managed to make them work. However she had stopped playing the game for fun about a year or so ago, unless it was against Spike and she no longer needed the game to help teach her control over her magic.

For Spike however, who had enjoyed the game back when it had just been a simple card game, it was a huge step and he wanted to be there every time an upgrade was released. “Please, Twilight?” The baby dragon begged. “We’re supposed to be on holiday anyway.”

That made Twilight grimace. It was true that the school she attended, ‘Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns’ had let out so that everyone could go home for the Summer Sun Celebration, but her elder brother was Captain of the Palace Guard so he had not been able to come and see her and her parents had gone on vacation for it. This meant that she and Spike were on their own for the celebrations, which, in all honesty she planned to sleep through.

“Spike, it’s...”

She did not get to finish her sentence before Spike produced the book she had been searching for from the library and grinned at her, “You could take it with you.” He pointed out, knowing exactly which buttons to push, “And I wouldn’t be too far away if you needed me to take notes. It might be fun.”

Technically her baby dragon friend was right, he would be right there with her if she needed him. However she knew full well that if she tried to catch his attention once the display had started, she might as well be talking to a brick wall.

“Spike this is really important.” Twilight tried again. The purple unicorn flicked her multishaded tail in her irritation that no one seemed to understand that for her research was fun. Bar a good, challenging game of Duel Monsters, there was nothing she enjoyed as much as burying herself in her books and learning new things. “I know there’s something about this Summer Sun Celebration that...”

“Please?” Spike latched onto her left foreleg, “Please, please, please, please? I won’t ask you for anything for a month!”

“If I ask you to take a note or a letter will you actually pay attention to me?” Twilight asked him with a sigh, “And when I say it’s time to leave will you actually come with me this time?”

Spike blushed as much as a purple dragon could and scuffed the floor sheepishly with his foot at the reminder of the last time that they had gone to one of these demonstrations and he had successfully kept them out until late into the night.

“I swear on my comics.” Spike told her, his tone solemn as he crossed his heart.

“Alright, but let me pack my saddlebag.” The delighted cheer and momentary tightening of Spike’s grip before he darted off to grab his deck was reward enough for conceding and she let out an amused, yet exasperated huff before using her magic to pack the bag which had the same pink star surrounded by darker purple ones as her cutie mark.

In went the book she had been after, closely followed by quills and parchment so she could make her own notes while Spike was distracted. However she hesitated before packing the small fabric case with her cards in. She still enjoyed the game, but it was a distraction that she did not need.

“Ready Twilight?” Spike asked, practically bouncing in his excitement. She jumped a mile, shoving the last few things into her bag without looking and levitated it onto her back. Spike jumped up next, his own deck strapped to his hip via a holster she had had made especially for him for the previous Hearth’s Warming Eve.

“I still don’t know if this is such a good idea.” Twilight told the baby dragon clutching onto her sides as she cantered towards the door. “It would be much easier to do my research here.” She hesitated by the door, almost loath to exit into the bright sunlight outside.

Spike almost complained. He would have done in fact if he had not noticed the slight tremble under him, as if Twilight was shaking. “Twilight?” He asked, worried for his friend and the unicorn who had hatched him. “Are you okay?”

“Fine, fine.” Twilight took a deep breath and stepped out into the sunlight. It was not that she was agoraphobic by any stretch of the imagination. In fact she enjoyed curling up under a tree with a good book as much as the next pony. However it had been years since she had seen White Lightning in the hoof. The white unicorn stallion had been a fellow student at her school and had forever been battling her for the top spot. Right up until the accident, Lightning had been one of the most competent wielders of magic and had matched her in almost every subject, especially in Duel Monsters though he had never quite managed to defeat her in either marks or at the card game.

Then then accident had happened. No one was quite sure what had happened, but she and White Lightning had been duelling in the school courtyard when his step-sire had interrupted and at some point during the conversation the two stallions had had afterwards, Lightning’s horn had been broken and his access to his magic lost.

She had not seen hair or whisker of White Lightning since that day. He had withdrawn from the school the next day and his step-sire had passed away soon after, leaving the young stallion in charge of the massive company that his step-sire had run.

She had not duelled anyone but Spike since that day and it was slightly nerve wracking to think that Lightning was in her neck of the wood again. Still she knew she was being silly. He probably did not even remember her and she had much more important things to worry about, like why this Summer Sun Celebration, the thousandth in Equestria’s long history, worried her so greatly.

The crowd had already gathered when they arrived in the plaza at the centre of Canterlot and Twilight was more than happy to drop Spike off at the crowd’s thinnest point and retreat to a nearby café to have a bite to eat and read her book. The baby dragon weaved amongst the hooves of the excited crowd with practised ease and found himself a perch at the front of the gathered horde that would allow him to see everything perfectly.

Twilight tried to tune out the excited hum as she ordered a daisy sandwich, settled at a table and pulled her book out of her saddle bags. It was not easy, as every so often she would catch a word here or there that would catch her interest. However once her sandwich had arrived and she had found the section of the book she was looking for it was almost like the world around her melted away, leaving her in a little bubble of just her, her sandwich and her research.

The roar of the crowd as the demonstration started went completely unnoticed as Twilight read through the section on the Elements of Harmony and found that, frustratingly, there was not much written about them. Instead it recommended she turned to the section on ‘The Mare in the Moon.’

That proved much more productive. It spoke of the fact her mentor, Princess Celestia herself, had defeated a wicked mare of darkness, known as Nightmare Moon, using the Elements of Harmony and sealed her away on the moon. However the dark and powerful Alicorn had sworn that when a thousand years had passed she would return and bring night time eternal.

Her defeat had heralded the very first Summer Sun Celebration and it had been celebrated on the longest day of the year every year since, right up until the modern age and as Twilight was already aware, this year was the one thousandth celebration of that day.

“Oh…” Twilight breathed when she realised what that meant. “Spike?!” She asked, wanting him to help her confirm her findings. She glanced around and grimaced when she could not see the petite dragon for the horde of ponies gathered around the glow that could only be an active DuelRune grid. “Oh horse feathers.” She grumbled as she gathered up her things and ate the last bite of her sandwich before taking a deep breath and diving into the masses in order to try and reach her friend and scribe so he could send a letter to the Princess for her.

“Excuse me, pardon me,” Twlight apologised as she tried to squeeze her way through the crowds. It was almost impossible to see someone as small as Spike for the herd of ponies and no one wanted to move and possibly lose their vantage point. It was good for her in one way because it meant that there was no way her former classmate would be able to spot her. The problem was it meant that Spike probably would not be able to either. Not only that but she was a little worried, considering that she got stepped on twice while trying to find her friend. Spike was much smaller than most of the ponies here and it was quite possible that he would get trampled.

“Twilight!” Her head snapped towards the sound, which, both thankfully and frustratingly was coming from a certain baby dragon who was across the other side of the crowd from where she had left him and was waving at her from the back of another of the colts in her class. She could not help but wince and shy away from the hissing and complaining at the noise, which carried over the sounds of the demonstration. “Twilight, over here!”

A gap opened up in the crowds, allowing her to get to Spike’s side easily. She took advantage of it, well aware of the eyes on her as she made her way across to him, including one set that she had really hoped to avoid.

“Ow.” Spike’s ride was complaining as Twilight reached them, the black furred pony with his silvery grey mane and tail and his white crescent moon cutie mark, had his hoof covering his ear and looked pained, “I do need to be able to hear Spike.”

“Sorry Dark Moon.” Spike apologised, looking sheepish for all of about two seconds before grinning at Twilight. Before he could say anything or Twilight could ask him to take a letter for her, another voice broke into the conversation.

“Twilight Sparkle?” The young mare flinched at the sound of her name and turned to face the speaker, coming face to face with a pure white stallion of about her age with a short, tidy, brown mane and tail and the picture of the back of the Duel Monsters card for a cutie mark. He smirked as he looked her over, “It is you. Oh good, I needed someone to demonstrate my DuelRune grid on. You do still play, don’t you?”

“Well, not for a long time and I really need…”

“Go on Twilight.” Spike jumped down from Dark Moon’s back and pushed her forward towards the runic grid on the floor.

“Spike!” Twilight yelped, embarrassed and trying not to pay attention to the mutterings of the impatient crowd, “I don’t have tim…”

“What’s the matter Twilight?” White Lightning interrupted with a slightly vindictive chuckle, “It’s just a short demonstration. I would have thought Celestia’s prize pupil would jump at the chance to show off a new training tool.” He turned away, his tone turning nasty, “Unless, of course you don’t think that the Princess is a very good teacher…”

There was a sharp gasp from the crowd before complete silence fell.

“One game.” Twilight glared at the white stallion before her, using her magic to plop her saddlebag down next to Spike, “Just one.” She snapped as she lifted her deck box from her bag, “And you’ll see how good a teacher the Princess is!”

“Then step into the grid.” White Lightning gestured to the blue circle on the left of the runic grid taking up a lot of floor space, “And show us.”

“Once I’m done,” She told Spike as she cantered into the circle and put her hoof on the right sigil, causing the circle around her to glow and activating her half of the DuelRune grid below her, which lit up the same purple as her magic, “I need you to take a letter.”