Labouring alone in the dark, Bucky found himself far too focused on everything he had learned earlier. His mind reeled from everything he had taken in, and he felt overwhelmed and slightly panicked. He pushed those thoughts and tried to focus on other things instead. He thought about his magic, the act he was doing right now, at this moment. Magic scratched the itch. It was his to command. It was his to control. It was his expression. He could do terrible or beautiful things with it, or even terrible beautiful things with it. He always felt a sense of rapture, a joyous surge of wonder when he conjured the deep magic. Even the dark magic now called to him, singing a siren song to his soul, urging him to use more and more, to satisfy his itch. It didn’t matter which type magic he used, all of it made him gloriously happy.

He teased it out of his body, pulling it forth from the deepest parts of his being, sometimes it flowed forth and sometimes it spurted violently, rushing out in nearly orgasmic bursts. Magic had been his first true love, and while he was still very fond of it, he had other loves now. He shivered as he called forth a sizeable gush of raw energy, shaped it in his mind, and then released it in a steady spine tingling flow that caused his breath to catch in his throat.

It ached to hold the magic back and release it in a steady trickle.

All around in his glass domed office were sixty four glass orbs, all of which were swirling around in a careful waltz, never colliding with one another as they darted to and fro. Streams of raw magic trailed between them. In the center was Bucky, hovering, airborne, transfixed in the eye of the storm.

He needed harmonious magic, and he needed deep harmonious magic, the kind he could only summon now while he focused on those he loved to purify his Tainted essence. He let his mind wander as he continued to channel energy, drawing from the nearby ley line nexus where the Tree of Harmony resided.

Golden eyes that glittered with loving merriment, fine thin strands of straw coloured hair that spilled down her neck in a cascading flow of sheer beauty, a pelt that was grey with just a hint of blue, these were the things he focused on to purify his essence. He felt a warm tingling in his balls that throbbed all the way into his dock and made his barrel hitch with every breath. The way she smelled. She was an electric creature, and there was always a faint hint of ozone hiding coyly in the feathers of her wings. The way she smiled, the little crinkles that formed in the corners of her eyes when she was radiantly beaming with unbridled joy. She was his laughter.

There was a thunderous crackle that echoed through Bucky’s tower as he began to summon dangerous levels of magic. The stone walls began to take on an eldritch glow, a faint blue-green faerie fire burned over every surface around him.

His mind turned to another pony, the first thing coming into memory was her come hither stare, the way her eyelids lazily lingered half closed as she longingly looked at him. The solid stockiness of her body. Her fine plum wine coloured pelt. The way her curly mane the colour of crushed raspberries tumbled and bounced around upon her brows as she pranced. The way her face changed so quickly, going from anger to happiness in the span of seconds. While she was beautiful, he didn’t value her for her body, but for her mind. She was his intellect, she was his wisdom, she was everything he needed but lacked between his own ears. He would be lost without her.

The glass globes around him took on a strange glow, the glass itself swirling with a rainbow sheen, like soap bubbles reflecting in the summer sun, a slick shimmering prismatic spectrum of colour was now infused into the glass. These orbs were going to be special. Bucky was deeply in tune with the ley line now, having surrendered his will. A portion of his own life essence was going into these orbs, sacrificing his own lifespan so Equestria could have a better future. The ley lines knew what needed to be done.

His thoughts shifted once again, and he thought of the third mare he had fallen in love with, she with two forms, both beautiful. She was smaller and delicate, not quite a mare, but on the verge of being one, and she was a gorgeous monument to fertility at the moment, her belly swollen, her body fat with foal. Her eyes were the colour of the sea during a storm, an almost incandescent shade of green. He thought of the flowers that grew in her mane of water weeds, and how everywhere she went, she brought the scent of springtime with her, the heady aroma of new growth that inspired a pony’s mind to think of love and foalmaking during the season of renewal and rebirth.

Eldritch lightning sprang from his horn and struck the glass globes in orbit all around him, crackling and bursting with raw harmonious thaumaturgical fire, each orb being touched in turn. Bucky curled into a fetal position as he floated, unaware of his body curling up, lost in magic, floating in a womb of blazing, burning spellfire.

An image of a rose and cobalt coloured mane flashed in his mind, flowing large wavy curls that spilled down over a pair of eyes as blue as sea ice. A pelt that was the colour of fresh cream. Her body was stocky and broad, a solid creature, a beast of burden that held boundless beauty that could be found on every cushioned curve, and could be witnessed watching every rippling muscle. She was a physical creature with earthy wisdom, and she was as honest as she was beautiful. She was a rare treasure, a mare who loved him with every fibre of her being, and, although there had never been deep physical intimacy between him, he had never cleaved apart the secret places of her femininity with his own flesh, somehow she was as precious as the air he breathed. She kept him true.

A low orgasmic moan escaped Bucky’s lips. He was lost to the world now, his body and mind consumed with magic. The whole tower vibrated now, it had become like a living thing, and the walls reverberated with magic and the thunderous crackles of the eldritch lightning flowing from Bucky’s horn.

In his mind’s eye, he saw a pair of orange gold eyes staring into his own. They were merry, but occasionally flashed with grief and sadness, eyes filled with secret hurt that tried to act as a whole with the rest of her fine features to offer a brave face to the world. Orange gold eyes that burned with mischievous fires that matched his own inner chaos. Her body was fine, delicate, she was not solid nor sturdy like the others. He had her trust, his reward for overcoming her sense of hurt and winning her guarded affection. It was one of the things he valued more than just about anything else, what he considered a true treasure worthy of his royal blood, she was one of his five crown jewels. They shared a bond through magic, and, as unicorns, both knew an intimacy that the others would never know, having bared their minds to one another. She had let him in to touch her deepest and most hidden innermost places, an act that went far beyond base physical intimacy.

With a cry, Bucky released a massive surge of magic that caused the glass globes to glow from their own power, each now alive and radiating light that matched the colour of his magical radiance, a blue-green glittering shine. They were almost alive now, primed and readied for the final touches that would give them faint sentience, a gift of awareness.

With a savage growl that escaped from his lips, Bucky’s magic shifted, becoming black as the empty void. The room around him filled with streams of raw dark magic, Tainted essence mixed with the raw magic drawn from the ley lines. His own divine spark radiated its own signature energy, while he was not an alicorn in body, he was one in soul and spirit, and he was creating weapons for war. His inner nature manifested as he called upon the deepest magic within himself. The shadowy forms of two wings grew from just behind his withers, dreadful things, horrid things, the wings of nightmares lost in the shadows of Tartarus.

Just as he had focused on love to purify his essence, he now lost himself in hate, fueling his inner nature and giving strength to his divine essence as it manifested. For a moment, his wings seemed almost solid, it was as though they were just one overlapping dimension away, the next reality over, ready to come creeping and crawling into this reality if Bucky so willed it. For a moment, his flesh vanished and he became a writhing mass of black swirling shadow as his shadow nature manifested and merged with the dark magic he was channeling, two different types of magic infusing into one fiendish emanation of raw power.

He thought of his mother, and all she had done. Her tongue was as sharp as any axe, keener than any sword, and cut deeper than any surgeon’s scalpel. She always knew just what to say to bring the pain, her acid words lingered in his ears, caustically dissolving his will as they burned into his mind. Her face was always contorted with severity and cruelty. Her eyes blazed, burning with her inner hatred for everything. Nothing was safe from her ballistic cruelty, which always struck its targets flawlessly, always evoking hurt and helplessness when her heartless words invariably found their mark.

Faint sparks of dark energy now burned within the glass globes, the foundations for further dark enchantments. The seeds of hatred that would draw in further dark energy and give it a place to find purchase, gain strength, and eventually find balance with the harmony magic infused into glass. The darkness lurked in the center, inside the hollow of each globe, lurking just under the light, a hidden place of corruption and dread.

Bucky was now unseen, surrounded in a globe of blackness that shrouded his body and was rapidly growing and filling the room. No light from the moon that shone through the glass dome could reach his flesh. It was primordial darkness, the stuff that existed just before there was light. Only the glass globes, a fair distance away from Bucky, could be seen as they continued their orbits, moving counterclockwise around the unicorn shrouded in darkness in the center of the room, floating high in the air.

He allowed his mind to recall thoughts of his time under the mountain. The spirit lich trapped in crystal who sought to ascend, who wanted to become demon shadow. He thought of the long stairs, the seemingly endless stairs, all of Sombra’s descendants probably had an obsession with stairs and Bucky was no different, each step down made his heart heavier and heavier with growing hatred, the torturous lying words he had heard upon entering burning in his ears. He thought of how Lyra had been violated and a cold seething rage filled his bosom. Memories of laying in a vast pool of his own blood danced around in his mind’s eye. He allowed his mind to think of those black thoughts he had experienced when he believed that he was going to die down there in the deep dark, and how much hatred he had held in his heart during those moments, the hatred he had used to summon enough dark magic to give him the Taint.

With an explosive blast, Bucky channeled a powerful intentional surge of dark magic. It tore through his mind and devoured his consciousness. Agonising mana-fire burned through his body, consuming him from within, electric agony dancing along every nerve. A high pitched keening scream tore raggedly out of his throat. There was a pain in his horn, it was as if he was forcing his body to pass something too large out of a hole too small. He felt a ripping tearing sensation in the base of his fulgurite horn, down in the root, and an all consuming agony bubbled through his brain. Finally, the darkness in his mind matched the darkness shrouding his body, and the black flames of magic danced unseen along his body inside of the sphere of darkness all around him. A small piece of his soul tore free, and his divine essence sought out the glass globes circling around his writhing form.

Tasting copper in his mouth, Bucky awoke. His head throbbed dully as he realised he was laying on the cold stone floor. He opened his eye, which felt as though it had gummed over, and it was a struggle to pull his eyelids apart. He looked up and saw the moon directly overhead. He rolled over onto his back and rubbed his head, groaning and moaning from the hammering inside of his skull.

Letting out a startled cry, he twisted his head around trying to see if the torture he had endured from his own magic had paid off. He spotted a glass globe upon the floor, it was fine, it glowed with an eerie light, and he willed it to come to him.

It rolled over the floor, moved by some unseen force, pulled along by a blue-green manifestation that came from Bucky’s jagged blade-like horn. It clinked and it clattered as it rolled, rolling over tiny grains of sand that Bucky needed to clean up. He lifted the orb to have a look at his most precious creation.

Orbs of undead compulsion. He had found a way around using necromancy to detect the undead. Instead, he had enchanted the orbs to draw in anything that gave off a necromantic signature, overcoming it’s unnatural animation processes and forcing it to be drawn to the orb through a powerful compelling force of irresistible compulsion. Any location that the orb was placed the undead would gather, mindlessly milling about and herded together by a powerful dark enchantment.

He heaved a sigh of relief. Sixty four orbs that would gather the undead. Myrmidon units could use the orbs to draw in the undead for disposal. It wasn’t detection exactly, but it was unicorn cleverness. A solution to the problem, a workaround that bent the rules but did not break them.

Looking up at the shimmering prismatic orb that pulsated darkness, Bucky began to cackle as he lay in a silvery pool of moonlight. It wasn’t cheating when he did it.

Author's Notes:

A chapter with no dialogue, almost all of it showing, hardly any of it telling.

Just Bucky, alone, with his first true love, in a very intimate moment.

And I might have screwed it up with typos.