Nightshadow's eye twitched as he put a hoof to his head and sighed. He was about to ask his sister what she was talking about when a loud scream caused them both to cringe.

They recognized the voice's owner.

A rainbow streak shot through the night sky, heading towards Nightshadow's cloud.

Shadow and Shade were there in an instant, along with a furious Rainbow Dash.

Or at least, who they thought was Rainbow Dash.

"What did you do?!" The mare asked. Her voice sounded like Rainbow's... but different. Deeper? Her coat was a dark blue and her mane had developed a grey stripe running along with the usual assortment of colors. She was several inches taller than a normal pony, though not nearly as tall as one of the siblings.

Her eyes had narrowed onto Nightshade, who looked back smiling. "Hey Dash! You look.... taller!"

Rainbow Dash was not amused. "I know you did something, Shade! This isn't funny!"

Nightshade frowned. "Rainbow, I didn't do anything!" Suddenly Shade's eyes widened. "Oh! I know! Stay here you two, I'll be right back!" In a flash of light, she was gone. Rainbow Dash turned her gaze to Nightshadow.

"What did she do?!"

Nightshadow  shrugged. "She usually doesn't lie, despite her... eccentricities. Shade would rather you know so she could laugh freely than keep it to herself."

Rainbow Dash went from looking very angry to very worried. "What's wrong with me then?"

Nightshadow opened his mouth to answer when a flash of light interrupted him.

"OW! Those guardsponies are mean!" Nightshade had returned, holding a book with her magic, and a gash on her side with her hoof.

"Are you alright?" Shadow asked, his usually neutral demeanor faultering somewhat.

Shade smiled and nodded. "Just had to take a trip to the library!" She held the book out in front of her. It was titled: Healing Magic- Known Side Effects and Possible Treatments.

Nightshade turned the book back towards her and sat down on the cloud, humming while lazily flipping through pages with her hoof.

"Uh... are you sure you're alright?" Rainbow asked tentatively, gazing at Nightshade's wound. Shade didn't seem to hear her, she just kept humming to herself as she stopped on one page.

"Ah! Here we are! I remember because I wrote it down here in case I forgot!" She began franticly flipping through the pages. "There we are!"

She cleared her throat before she began reading from the book. "'As a pony is dying or having an out of body experience due to a catastrophic injury, and is than pulled back due to their wounds being healed, a fragment of their soul may be shut out on accident as it returns to the body, usually due to the trip it takes. Normally the soul can regenerate on it's own, however in some small cases the body pulls in radiant energy to make up for the fragment lost, integrating it with the rest of that pony's soul.' Wow, that's complicated!"

Rainbow Dash's tilted her head sideways in a scowl, making it clear that she didn't understand a word.

Nightshade giggled, prompting Shadow to give her an annoyed look. "OK then! 'This is a fairly rare occurrence, but symptoms include the pony subjected to the healing magic adopting physical traits similar to those of their healer. Over time they will also develop similar mental faculties as well. Unfortunately, all known occurrences of this phenomena have resulted in the subject in question dying. Their original soul attempts to regenerate. The body attempts to reject the magical energy. The resulting conflict causes the magical energy to take on the form of a cancer, slowly eating away at the subject physically and mentally until that pony dies.' That sounds... bad." She said, her face scrunching back up into a frown when she finished reading.

"And the cure?" Nightshadow asked.

Nightshade flipped a page and chuckled. "Actually, that's the end of the book. Pretty silly of them not to put in how to fix it, huh?"

Rainbow Dash hadn't understood the majority of what Shade had just read, but understood the word 'dies' very clearly. She looked down towards the town below, horrible thoughts passing through her mind.

Nightshadow's brain began to wrack around possible cures, non-magical wards, spells that might reverse the effects, even time-travel. Anything that might be a solution.

He sighed, defeated. "I can think of one pony that might help..."

Nightshade's eyes widened, knowing what her brother was implying. "Oh! Are we finally gonna get to visit-" a pained yelp cut her off as she suddenly tensed.

Nightshadow frowned. "You got that from the royal library, didn't you?" Shade nodded before collapsing on the cloud.

Dash was momentarily shocked out of her stupor. "Is she OK?"

Nightshadow nodded. "The royal library is guarded by Eclipse at night. They use rune-poison on their blades, it stops magic from flowing." He looked down at his sister, who was now lazily snoring. "It's not very strong when used as a coating. She might wake up with a headache in the morning, but otherwise she'll be OK." He looked towards the moon, which was now beginning to dip below the horizon.

"Too late for tonight, it seems." Nightshadow said as he levitated the book in front of him."OK. It says here that the process is slow, so we just need something to hide the condition until we can cure it."

"HIDE it? We need to FIX it!" Rainbow Dash said, giving him a worried look.

Shadow did not falter."I know a... friend. I wont be able to set it up tonight, though. The day after tomorrow, I promise we will fix this." His thoughts shifted to Red for a fraction of a second. 'You won't die because of me. Nopony else will.'

Rainbow Dash hung her head dejectedly. Nightshadow began to focus his magic in front of him. A loud crack was heard and a wooden mask appeared where his aura was focused.

"Put this on." He said as he levitated the mask to Dash. She grabbed it in her hooves and struggled with it a bit before she managed to get it to fit over her face.

"Good." Nightshadow began. "Hold still."

He touched the mask with his horn. Suddenly Rainbow felt a tingling feeling on her forehead, which rapidly spread throughout her whole body as the magic began to take effect. The sensation stopped and Nightshadow looked at her with a slight grin. A mirror blinked into existence in front of him.

Rainbow looked at her reflection with awe. "Wow. I look..."

"Normal? It's only an illusion, but it will work as long as you wear the mask." She put a hoof up to her face and felt the skin and hairs. "Yes, it's supposed to feel real too. Just in case."

Rainbow had momentarily forgotten about the danger she was in. A smile grew on her face, giving Nightshadow a momentary feeling of relief. "OK. Now that that is taken care of... what exactly have you gotten my sister into?"

Rainbow Dash gave him a confused look before realization hit her. She gave him a sheepish grin before answering. "Well, you see..."

Earlier that day.

"Wow! These are awesome!" Rainbow Exclaimed while looking at the local scenery through the glasses.

"Pretty cool, huh?" They had found a small river, where the water was clear enough that they could see their reflection. Shade had wanted to show Rainbow her little 'collection'(at least, a part of it): An assortment of enchanted glasses that changed the way the eyes of the wearer either saw things or looked. Right now Rainbow was looking through a pair that made everything look like it was underwater.

"Awesome! Oh! What about these?" She put them on and looked at her reflection, frowning when nothing happened.

Nightshade chuckled. "Give it here!" She said, yanking the glasses off Rainbow's face with her magic. She put them on her head, and in a flash of light her eyes were now ordinary pupils, pink in color.

"Hey! Your eyes look like..."

"Your's? Exactly! That's what these ones do!"

"Rainbow? Where are you?" Rainbow Dash and Nightshade froze.

"Pinkie? I'll be right there!" Without warning, Nightshade found herself on the recieving end of a powerful kick as Rainbow Dash pushed her into a bush. She made a motion with her hooves, indicating that Nightshade should be quiet before flying off.

'I've heard about that pink one before... she's funny.' Shade thought to herself.

'Maybe you should introduce yourself?'

Nightshade jumped and turned to meet the pony that scared her. She was a bit surprised when that pony looked alot like her. And was inside a mirror.

"Wow! Who leaves a mirror out in the middle of a forest?"

"Focus now! We're talking about the pink mare... what's her name?"

"I'm sorry?"

'I'm just saying, she sounds nice enough, why don't you meet her and try to make more friends!?'

"Oh! Great idea! But I can't do that! I'd just scare her away!"

'You know spells-'

"Oh right! Thanks Miss...?"

Oh, me? I'm no pony. Now, go have fun!

"OK!" As she finished speaking with the strange pony in the mirror she began casting the spell she wanted...

Rainbow Dash flew out towards the sound of her friend's voice before finding her waiting on the road back to town.

"Oh Dash! It's good to see you! I need your help finding somepony!" Pinkie exclaimed. Suddenly she began to vibrate faster than Dash had ever seen . "There's that weird feeling again! It's like the feeling I get when a new pony comes to town, but a lot... more! Like I forgot somepony! But that's never..."

"Hi!" A voice exclaimed. Both Dash and Pinkie turned to meet the voice and saw a black coated unicorn with dark green eyes, wearing odd, blue tinted glasses.

Pinkie grinned widely and began her introduction.

"Hi! I'm Pinkie Pie! I don't think I've seen you before! What's your name? Oh! Let me guess... Night Eyes? Shadow Star? Lulu?"

The unicorn chuckled. "Nope! My name is..." She hesitated, wondering if she should use her real name."Nightshade!" Rainbow Dash visibly recoiled upon hearing the unicorn's name, but said nothing. "Nice to meet ya Pinkie Pie!"

Pinkie chuckled, than gasped. Her eyes widened to the size of saucers. "WE HAVE TO THROW YOU A PARTY!"

Nightshade gasped. "A party!? When!? Where!? OH! Can my brother come too? Oh this will be so fun I've never been to a party before and I've always wanted to-"

Pinkie was somewhat surprised by the unicorn's response. Most ponies asked what the party was for, and the subsequent rambling was usually something expected of her. She shook off her surprise and smiled at the unicorn. "Of course your brother can come along! The more the merrier." She took off in the direction of Sugercube corner before gasping and spinning back around. "I almost forgot! What's your brother's name?"

"Nightshadow. But I always call him Shadow. We look REALLY alike, so don't worry! You'll know him when you see him!"

Pinkie chuckled. "That's not why I asked! I have to know for the party!" For the third time today, she gasped loudly. "I gotta go start planning, I'll see you later, Nightshade!"

"Wait!" She just barely managed to stop Pinkie from running off.

She shot Nightshade an annoyed look."What?"

"Can it wait till tomorrow night? Shadow and I will need to get ready and stuff, so we can have fun!" Pinkie gave her a smile, which Shade returned weakly.

"Of course, if you have to! I wouldn't want you to show up and not have any fun! OK, gotta go!" In the blink of an eye she was gone, leaving behind an excited Nightshade and a flabbergasted Rainbow Dash.

Present time

Rainbow Dash finished telling Shadow of Nightshade's encounter with the element of Laughter. "I don't think I've ever seen anypony talk like that other than Pinkie. I didn't really want to try to talk her out of it, since she seemed so... happy."

Nightshadow sighed. "Well that's just great..." He thought about whether now was the time to leave. "It would look suspicious if we didn't show up, wouldn't it?"

Rainbow nodded in response. "Why wouldn't you go anyway? You two have those glasses and that magic thing. I don't see what the big deal is."

Nightshadow had almost forgotten about the glasses entirely. He carefully levitated them off of his face and sighed once more as his eye returned to their natural design. " It wouldn't take much for us to be discovered. We've tried very hard to hide from Celestia, and being found out amongst her personal student and the elemental bearers might set off alarms I'd rather we avoid."

Rainbow shot him a confused look. "Why would you want to hide from Celestia? I mean, I've heard from Shade what happened to you guys, but the Celestia I know doesn't seem like the type to hold a grudge."

Nightshadow squirmed uncomfortably. "Despite that... I'm worried about what she might do."

"What would she do?"

Nightshadow remained silent and looked up towards the sky. "Do you have any siblings, Loyalty?" He said, adopting his more regal stance; a defense mechanism he had used before to detach himself from uncomfortable conversation.

"No." She said sullenly. She didn't know for sure actually, but that wasn't something that she would talk about now.

"Then you wouldn't understand. My sister and I are all we really have. I know Celestia has always been portrayed as kind, and has shown such in the past millennium, but I can't take that risk."

Shadow looked back towards Rainbow. "We used to try to make friends in places we went to. It was before we started... borrowing books from local libraries, books on magic. We didn't really know how to disguise ourselves. I used to have a cloak I found that would hide my wings and eyes, but I lost that a long time ago. Over the years we both agreed that it was best not to try to make friends. Better to just not socialize with other ponies, they all die in the end anyway."  Shadow took in a deep breath."I guess I'm just nervous about trying. To socialize with... others."

He looked back up at the night sky. The moon had gone far out of view by now. Soon the sun would rise. Soon his time would be over. "Go home. Get some sleep. If my sister doesn't seek you out later, you know when to expect us."

He didn't see her nod as she flew off towards her cloud home.

Simply talking with her reminded him of Red. Nightshadow never got the same feeling when he saw Applejack, they were different enough from each other that he simply couldn't make any connections between them. With Rainbow, the connection was drawn through her situation.

A very familiar situation.

'It took four days for her to die.' He thought to himself. 'According to the book, it takes months for a pony to die from this... affliction. There is still time.' He would not admit he doubted himself.

He would not admit that he doubted her.

Earlier that night at the local library

The identity of the creature ate at Twilight's mind. She had spent the better part of the last few nights searching through history books, catalogs of vairous creature's living in Equestria, even a few ancient prophesy compendiums. Nothing gave her the identity of the strange Alicorn or Alicorn-like being that she saw in the forest that day.

'It appeared right after Rainbow's wings got hurt, so it can't be good! Magic caused the wounds, so it must have had something to do with it... but why would it help her if it caused her injuries in the first place? And major healing spells are banned in Equestria! How could it possibly know any magic that would be powerful enough to regenerate tissue that fast and on that scale, and not cause any side-effects aside from that black streak on her wings?'

Twilight decided, despite everything in her nature telling her otherwise, that she would need help. She would not let this turn into another one of her 'episodes'. She began to write a letter...

The next night...

"Shh... be quiet everypony... they're coming!" One of the guests whispered as he peeked his head out the window. Two black coated unicorns with oddly identical cutie marks were walking side by side towards Sugercube Corner.

"OK! Places everypony!"

It was just after the sun began to dip below the world's view that the two guests of honor would arrive.

Nightshadow walked with his sister towards the baker's shop. It was oddly quiet, but he could feel the presense of multiple ponies on the other side of the door.

He didn't like being visible. It was something he had figured out for himself as they walked into town. Being visible made him feel... exposed. Unsafe. Still, maybe things wouldn't be so bad?

Shadow heard giggling, whispers, and arguments from the othe side of the door. He didn't like it.

"Shade, please stand back." Nightshade frowned and shook her head as she stepped backwards a few paces.

Shadow slowly turned the doorknob with his magic. Suddenly the door burst open and they were greated with a loud chorus of voices.

"SUPRISE!".

Nightshade jumped up in the air and laughed while Nightshadow barely contained a sudden urge to incinerate everypony in the room.

There was a huge banner above the crowd that read "Welcome to Ponyville!"

The pink one emerged from the crowd at a speed Shadow had never seen from an earth pony before.

"Hi! I'm Pinkie Pie and I threw this party just for you two! Were you surprised? Huh? Were ya?" Nightshadow placed his hoof to his head. The pink mare began to assault his ears with questions, while his sister disappeared into the crowd, which had quickly dispersed from their originaly planned position after Pinkie had left the middle.

'This is going to be a long night...'

Authors Note: I don't consider this chapter done, not by a longshot. More work must be put forth, but I felt bad about not meeting my earlier deadline. I know there are problems, they WILL be addressed as I become aware of them. So, make me aware of them! Comments and criticisms are appreciated.