Lesson 2: It isn't always Darkest before Dawn?(Part 4: Don't Doubt Loyalty even in the foggiest of times.)/(Pulling at your Heartstrings. ;3)

Dusk and the others tredged on unaware of the failing defense line back at Ponyville, though Dusk likely had a feeling that the guards at Ponyville with two square stable knights or not were no doubt outnumbered ten to one. Nevertheless Dusk had a great task before him his steely gaze of intelligence pointed clearly forward or it would if they had not entered a fog filled valley.

"Girls, girls? Oh great I have been sepereated this-this isn't good."Dusk shivered a bit not enjoying this one bit. "Oh great I'm all alone out here nopony around at all." Just then Dusk saw a shilluoette thinking it was one of his companions he rushed at it ramming right into a small withered ponyshaped tree getting his horn stuck in it. "Oh great now this happened!" Poor Dusk tried his best yet due to a lack of forward body strength he was stuck and all alone.

Dusk lay there in the dark fog feeling completely helpless. He remembered how this all began, how quick he was to trust those wacky mares. "Heh its funny here I am all alone, just like before and again talking to myself maybe Spike is right maybe I am crazy?" The purple pony closed his eyes remebering back more and more before this all started, back to Canterlot.

~One Week Ago~

Spell Nexus Nebula head of Celestia's school for Gifted Unicorns smirked wirely as he adjusted his glasses, leaning forward onto his desk looking over Dusk's finding.

"there is something I would like you to look into for me, I recently got ahold of some very unique pieces of literiture from Princess Celestia's private study I was wondering if you could look them over for me. Knowledge moves ponies, it moves countries. From ancient days many have sought knowledge, and at times fought to gain it, perhaps these old tomes of Celestia's are such knowledge?"

A few books were levitated over to the desk one was large with a red cover, gold binding and bearing a regal unicorn head on it. Dusk looked the pile over intently facinated by the books. "wow Professor these are Celestia's personal books, Alchemy, Sorcery, Runes, Bestiaries, Diary's and Storybooks this is really something and you want me to look them over instead of my cousin the royal librarian?"

"I trust you dear boy, if anypony can cataloge these and get me a report posthaste its you, after this I am sure to have finished my preliminary review of your research projects at most it will just take a few day for you to read all these and write the report." Spell Nexus levitated over some orange juice pouring himself and Dusk a glass. "Oh I also need you to speak with another student, a I understand your associates with her and she has been getting other sutdents a bit nervous with her crack cryptid research."

A loud facehoof echoed out all the way into the hall at Dusk hearing that. "Oh great the crazy Cryptid chaser again? Just because we sometimes are project partners everypony thinks we're friends we're not I don't have any friends and I couldn't be HAPPIER! Dusk shouted the last part Lyra was a constant annoyance to his usually quiet life for some reason Lyra always bothered him with her conspiracy theories and Cryptid ideas, the mare had an unhealthy obession with the mystical bipedal creatures called humans which Dusk thought nothing more then a fairytale.

Dusk trotted over to Lyra's place ringing the doorbell by pulling on the doorbell cord. "Heartstrings get out here Professor Nebula wants me to speak with you? HEARTSTRINGS COME ON YOUR TESTING MY PATIENCE!" Howled out the young stallion wanting to get going on his archieving.

Dusk annoyed at this rolled his eyes and used his magic to turn the doors knob cantering in the hourse the young bookworm looking around seeing several harps on her mantle, and a picture of a young Earth-Pony mare with pale yellowskin and blue with pink mane, a heart on the frame. Dusk raised a brow then began to follow some odd laughter up the steps to the second floor.

Dusk came upon several charts, blueprints and such strung out on the floor as he came upon a door that read:HUMAN CONTROL CENTER!

The door was flung open by Dusk's magic he gave a leer seeing Lyra chuckling as she was painting minitures with her horns magic manipulating the brush and arranging several miniture pony toys all over a large tabletop model city that resembled Canterlot however it was surrounded by three large walls each lager then the last with the largest being the furthest one out. Lyra quickly turned grinning rather insanely and wide at seeing him. "Oh Dusky hows it going? I've been a bit busy I recently discovered new ancient tomes from Neighpon that have allowed me to learn so much more about humans, now I know what I need to do, what needs to be done."

To this Dusk just rolled his eyes with a rather loud and grumpy sigh. "Heartstrings your just building more models and playing with more of your pony toys, also you know that the Japony's love to embelish things with their crazy myths and stories!" As usual Dusk had to try and buzzkill Lyra's playtime she would often get lost in her human fantasies sometimes she wished she had been born a human and some nights she dreamed she was and fell through a mirror that led to the Ponyverse cursing her as a baby with now being a pony.

"Dusk you just don't get it humans are real, they left this world a long time ago and remember in the book of Zacherly there is M'gaan the savior who rescued all those ponies from Midnight castle right? So your gonna go all athest again and say the Pony-Bibles are just hogwash aren't you?!" Whined out the aqua colored mare, she found Dusk to be a fellow conspiracy nut but she disliked how he would shoot down all her humaniac theories and constantly say how religion was just mythology.

"Look the book of Zacherly, the book of Faust, the book of Hasbro, the book of Kendell, and the book Penstoke are all magnificent works of fiction, but thats all they are just fiction the things they talk aboutwhile fantastic are just that fantasy, Tirek has historical basis but he is not how that ridiculous book portrays him at all, he is just some greedy centaur from the Centaur Empire who went down the dark side route not some all powerful embodiment of darkness, its just not scientifically possible Heartstrings."

Lyra in a huff got right in Dusk's muzzle now shooting him a death glare. "Well then explain the stained glass windows in that section of the castle where Celestia keeps her artifacts M'Gaan is shown clearly in one of them you stick in the mud!"

"Look, look Heartstrings thats just art we all know Celestia is a supporter of the arts and loves mythology so there is that, but seriously is worried about you so you need to report in and finish your assignments instead of doing all this weird stuff your gonna get kicked out of school if you don't!" Dusk lectured trying to cut straight to the point to avoid further arguments, as a debate with Lyra could go on for hours if he didn't stand his ground and cut through to the point.

"Oh then what is this?!" Lyra pulled out something from a desk something covered in cloth, she pulled the cloth off revealing a human skull. "See, see, see its proof!"

Dusk's jaw dropped at seeing this completely shocked at seeing this, was he wrong?"this-this is impossible how did you get ahold of this Heartstrings!"

"The pony I got the tome from had this too he was a Japonyse picto writer named Isayama, he also gave me a jacket." She levitated over a tan denim jacket slipping it on and wrapping a big red scarf around her neck. "Apparently this is what a human hunter would wear when going out a long, long time ago see humans came in three kinds:Zombie, Giant and micron's, Micron's were only a few feet tall and were nice, docile and smart, this made them prey for the zombies and the giants, the giants ruled society and were between 5 to 8 meters tall usually with the goddess of freedom ruling all of the east coast and stood 60 meters tall!"

Lyra sketched out some humans drawings with her horn. "See, see they had giant deformed heads and legs with big evil grins and would eat ponies and the shorter micron breed, so some humans fought with ponies against zombies and giants but the giants were just to powerful and nearly unkillable with superhealing and strength they had to build giant walls to protect themselves, this is the skull of a micron so Dusk believe me now?!"

Shortly after Dusk had dawned a coat like Lyra's and the two were outside her place shouting about the fate of Equestria and the human threat. Dusk had even made Spike research all he could on humans, Celestia soon appeared with Spell Nexus the duo raising a brow each and then lecturing Dusk and Lyra for several hours after about how trying to cause a mass panic over some moldy old books aquired from a clearly deranged Neighpon writer was such a poor idea. "Oh my dear faithful student I love you but you must not let yourself get so frazzled by conspiracy theories and focus more on reality, please remember this in the future." After being lectured as such by Celestia Dusk tossed the jacket on lyra trotting off in a huff. "Heartstrings never bother me again, infact I'm done helping you so I'm going back to my studies and you, you just go back to yours or whatever I don't care!"

Lyra looked rather sad and depressed now nearly teary-eyed. "Fine you jerk I won't bug you again, but your still my friend."She said underbreath quietly to herself, she could have sworn Spell Nexus nebula had a smirk on his face as he was leaving with Celestia.

After that Dusk went back to studying, sequistering himself inside his library-like dorm room forcing spike top run errands with him. After nearly a week inside Spike made him finish reading in a sunny hill nearby, Dusk however ignored all attempts at communication from other students including a party invitation from Moondancer tha most adorkable young Unicorn in the entire school for gifted unicorns, which Spike despised how could dusk ignore a chance to hang with Moondancer? Dusk as he studied began to read a legend which would set it all in motion:The legend of Nightmare Moon.

That was a week ago, yes thats when it all started, now however here he was seperated freom his crazy mare adventure party with his horn stuck in a tree while trying to stop endless night. "I'm all alone...I used to love that but-but now I don't want that whats wrong with me? Their all crazy, YOUR ALL CRAZY DO YOU HEAR ME!" Cried out the young Stallion there was no answer as his voice echoed out into the abyss.

"I-I knew I should have done this by myself, they all just got in the way it would have been a lot easier I could have just teleported past all those dumb traps." Tears were running down Dusk's cheek as he talked about how much he despised all of the five mares.

"Yeesh you really are such a crab Dusk Shine." A voice spoke, a mare in a cloak walking out from the fog. She lowered her hood revealing Lyra much to Dusk's surprise and behind her was the same mare from that picture the odd maned mare with the alabasta coat.

"Heart-Strings why are you here?"He sniffled rather confused, as he said this Lyra pulled him free with her magic.

"Well its because I heard about a mysterious creature here, possibly a human so I came this way remember I told you earlier I was here to search not just direct the string choire at the celebration. Oh this is Bon-Bon my BEST friend, since you didn't want the job."

Dusk looked down somewhat ashamed now. "I cast you aside so much growing up and you still see me here and save me th-th-THANK YOU HEARTSTRINGS!"Dusk shouted out which stunned Lyra in all her years of knowing him he had never said anything like that before.

"Sure its no problem anyway those girls you were talking about Bon-bon and me can help you find them if you want?"She reached out a hoof to Dusk to help him up.

Reluctantly Dusk took it and was now standing looking around at all the deep fog. "Yeah I guess but we need to hurry I'm sure they are all nearby somewhere Heartstrings."

"Yep lets go for the wings of freedom, we are not cattle!"Laughed Lyra as the trio rushed into the fog to find the others.

to be continued...