Chapter 67: A Heated Argument

A glowing halo appeared on the horizon as Bat Team Alpha approached their destination. Within a short time, the lights of Canterlot became visible within the halo, like twinkling stars on the horizon. They were still twenty miles outside of the city, but Lieutenant Sirius could clearly see the outline of the castle spires, reaching high into the heavens. The visibility was excellent. As they flew closer to the city, the banners on top of the towers became visible, blowing lazily as if they were in a gentle, summer breeze. There wasn’t much wind then. Sirius grinned to himself as he increased his speed slightly, pulling up next to Captain Vega.

“Shall we wake them up, Sir?” he shouted to be heard over the wind noise.

“I’m sure nobody in the castle who knows about this mission is actually asleep.”

“True, Sir. But we could still give them a grand entrance. And wake up the rest of the city. I’ve got a little something special in my saddle bag. Blasting putty isn’t the only explosive I brought along,” he responded with a smirk.

Captain Vega turned his head looking at him for a moment, then returned his gaze forward again.

“We’re gonna get our tails chewed off if we do this. You know that, right?”

“Given who we have in the chariot, Sir? I rather think they’ll forget all about it within a few minutes of landing.”

Captain Vega appeared to think for a moment, then nodded his head slightly. With that, he banked sharply to his left, dropping down lower to the ground and increasing his speed. Lieutenant Sirius and the rest of the team followed, assuming a delta formation behind their Captain and darting towards the castle, picking up speed as they went.

o.O.o

James pulled his heavy robe tighter around himself and sipped his mug of hot cider. He was sitting on top of one of the castle walls along with Twilight and the rest of the Royal Council members. Like the others, he felt frozen to his core. But on this night, no amount of cold would have kept him inside. He scanned the sky, looking for any sign of bat ponies. But all he could see were the Pegasus Guard patrols.

The guards on the castle walls looked nervous, and they scanned the sky as well, although they didn’t know what they were looking for. Given the classified nature of the rescue mission, they hadn’t been told about it, and so they had no idea why the Regent, along with the entire Royal Council, was sitting on top of the wall watching the sky. Most of the castle should have been asleep right now, but word had traveled quickly that the Regent and the Council were on top of the wall. Because of that, the castle had emptied, and the courtyard below looked like a stadium of ponies waiting for a concert to start. All of the ponies in the courtyard looked nervous as well, also gazing upward. But like the guard, they didn’t know what they were supposed to be looking for.

James returned his attention to the sky, looking east in the direction Bat Team Alpha would be coming from. But he saw nothing. Despite all the ponies gathered in the courtyard, there was a nervous and eerie silence, as if the world itself were dead.

Suddenly, an ear-splitting CRACK, shook the night, impacting James with a powerful shockwave. A thunderous roar accompanied the noise, drowning out any other sounds. James could feel the sonic waves from the tremendous roar throughout his entire body. At the same time the sound had reached his ears, eleven ponies had shot passed the wall, then pitched up sharply, climbing straight up and out of sight. But still, the earth-shaking roar continued.

“What in the name of Celestia and Luna was that?” he barely heard a guard say, as he cantered out of the guardhouse, staring up into the sky. The roar was finally starting to fade.

“Sonic boom, Sergeant. Eleven ponies just buzzed the wall doing about eight hundred knots. I couldn’t see them clearly ‘cause they were moving too fast, but they looked like bat ponies.”

James felt his heart leap as the guard confirmed what he thought he’d seen with his own eyes. They must have Luna! They wouldn’t be showing off like that and breaking aviation regulations if they didn’t.

James turned and rushed towards the guard house now. The roar had stopped, and only the distant echoes of it remained. The bat ponies must have slowed down to subsonic speed, then. As he ran, he saw several bright flashes of light reflect off the polished, stone wall. He looked up again, seeing fireworks bursting overhead in brilliant flowers of purple, blue, and silver-white. The fireworks were all in Luna’s colors. A few seconds later, a series of loud booms reverberated off the walls and towers. Elated cheering erupted from the guards on the wall, and from the ponies gathered in the courtyard below as they began to guess what all of the commotion was about.

He rushed into the guard house, Twilight and the rest of the Council members rushing in with him. Quickly, they ran down the spiral staircase. On reaching the bottom, he shoved the door open and darted outside. But now, he and the others had to stop as a crowd of ponies blocked their way. Slowly, they made their way through it, ponies making a path as they realized it was the Council and the Regent. But in the excitement, it was proving difficult to get the attention of the gathered crowd.

Finally, they made their way to the landing area. Or at least, where the landing area was supposed to be. The ground crews and guards were having a difficult time clearing ponies off of it. James turned and looked at Twilight, about to ask her if there was anything she could do to help. But he stopped when he noticed her horn was already starting to glow with a spell.

“Fellow Equestrians!” her voice boomed out over the crowd with the aid of a sound amplifying spell. “A you have guessed, one of our elite Bat Team Alpha units has rescued our Princess of the Night!”

Thunderous cheering broke out among the gathered ponies, but Twilight quickly spoke again, regaining command of the crowd.

“But you all must clear out of the landing area so that Her Majesty’s chariot can land! So please, follow the instructions of the Royal Guards!”

Gradually, the gathered crowd moved off in all directions, and a square begin to open up in the landing area. James looked up at the sky again, and noticed a Royal Guard transport chariot hovering off to the east. In the commotion, he hadn’t noticed it earlier. How long had they been waiting?

Finally, the landing area was clear. One of the unicorn guards lit his horn, and a green flare shot from the tip, arcing into the sky and illuminating the gathered ponies with showers of flickering green light. The chariot began to move forward again, slowly making its way over the cheering crowd. Then, it stopped above the landing pad, and, like a helicopter, gradually made a vertical descent, before gracefully touching down. Again, the gathered ponies erupted into shouts of joy, stamping their forehooves on the ground in applause.

A few seconds later, another chariot touched down next to the first one. the door opened, and several bat pony unicorn guards stepped out of it. One of them walked over to the first chariot and opened the door. Then, as if stepping out of a dream itself, The Princess of the Night stepped out of the chariot. James had thought the roar of the crowd couldn’t possibly get any louder. But he was wrong. At the sight of their returning Princess, the noise of the crowd rose to rival that of the sonic boom the bat ponies had made earlier to announce their arrival.

Luna raised a forehoof, waiving to the crowd, although James noticed her eyes shifting nervously and her ears pointed forward as if on high alert. She turned her head to the unicorn guard that had opened the door for her, saying something to him that James couldn’t hear over the noise. The guard nodded, and then with a quick flash, Luna teleported herself away and was gone.

James blinked in surprise, and the noise of the crowd quickly died down to confused and disappointed murmurs. Like him, the crowd, had expected Luna to make some sort of speech. At least to say something to them. He knew Luna wasn’t used to being the center of attention and tended to prefer the company of just one or two. But still, he felt a rising fear that something much more serious was bothering her than just the eyes of the crowd on her. He didn’t have much time to think about it, though, before he saw another flash, and felt a wave of vertigo come over him.

When the vertigo cleared a few seconds later, he found himself inside the castle entryway, standing next to Twilight. He turned to her, about to say something in regards to giving him some warning before doing that, but stopped short when he saw Luna standing there as well, along with a small contingent of bat pony guards. Her muzzle still wore the same troubled expression. In fact, it looked even more troubled now. She looked at Twilight and spoke, somehow managing to keep the nervousness out of her voice.

“It would not be prudent for me to assume rulership of Equestria until I’ve been briefed on everything that has been going on, and have had some time to properly rest. So if you have no objections, I would like you to continue your duties as Regent for a few more days.”

“Oh … Of course, Your Majesty,” Twilight responded, the confusion evident in her voice.

“Good. Please schedule a Council briefing in one hour to fill me in on everything,” Luna added, then turned her attention to James. “But first, I would like to speak with you alone and in private.”

“Of course, Your Majesty,” he responded, casting a confused and nervous glance at Twilight. But her own perplexed expression offered him no comfort.

Luna nodded once, then turned, and began to walk towards the throne room, accompanied by two of her Lunar Guards. James followed, his heart thumping as he felt fear build up inside of him. Why did she want to talk to him in private? Worries raced through his mind as they approached the large, double doors leading to the grand throne room. Did she already know about his relationship with Twilight Sparkle? Or had she somehow found out about Theory Point’s betrayal already, and assumed he was in on it? He tried to tell himself it couldn’t be either one of those. After all, neither one was such an urgent matter that it would be the first thing she’d address when she got back to Canterlot. However, that only made his heart race more, since the one other fear that tugged at his mind was far worse than either of those. A sense of dread came over him as they entered the throne room and she lead him to a small, private meeting room to one side of the throne. She used a small amount of magic to open the door, and James followed her and her guards in. Once inside, the two guards took up positions at either side of the door.

“Your Majesty, shouldn’t you be—”

As soon as the door was closed, Luna rounded on him, and he stopped in surprise.

“You said you have a plan to rescue my sister?” she blurted out. The tension that she’d managed to keep out of her voice in the entryway was abundantly evident now.

“... Yes, we do, Your Majesty,” he responded after a brief pause while the initial surprise wore off. The sense of fear grew inside of him like a developing thunderhead.

“When?”

“Not for over three weeks. We have to wait for a dimensional alignment. We won’t survive that long. We’ll pass a point of no return in just a few days. After that, it will be too late. You have to raise the Sun.”

“Yes … About that …” Luna said, looking at the floor now, her look of nervousness changing to one of despair.

James felt as if lightning had just crashed through him from the developing thunderhead inside of him. His growing fear, the one even worse than the fear that she knew about Theory Point or Twilight, had just been confirmed: Luna couldn’t raise the Sun.

“Don’t tell me you can’t,” he said, shaking his head in denial.

“I’ve never tried it before.”

“Well, then you have to do it now.”

“I don’t know that I can try, James,” Luna responded, shaking her head slightly.

“You have to. Who else is gonna do it? Twilight can’t do it. I certainly can’t do it. You’re the only who can do it.”

“You say can do it as if it’s a foregone conclusion that I will succeed if I try.”

“I have faith in you. I believe you can do it. No … I don’t believe. I know you can do it.”

“Thank you for your confidence in me, James,” she said with a slight smile, which quickly turned to a frown again. “But it’s not that simple.”

“Yes, it is that simple, Your Majesty. We can’t survive long enough to wait for your sister to come back and do it. It really is that simple.”

Luna shook her head. “You don’t understand, James. Raising the Sun has to be done exactly right. If I make even the slightest mistake, I could incinerate our entire world.”

“I understand that if you don’t do it, our entire world will freeze to death before we get the chance to bring Celestia back.”

“Yes … but …”

“But what?”

“But …” Luna stammered again, as if she knew what she wanted to say, but was too afraid to say it.

“But if they freeze to death rather than burn to death, you think you won’t have to feel responsible for it,” James finished for her, a note of disgust slipping into his tone.

“Yes,” Luna responded quietly, lowering her head and pinning her ears back. “I almost destroyed the world once before when I became Nightmare Moon. I can’t face the possibility of doing it again.”

“So you’re just going to let everyone die then.” A mixture of emotions fought for control inside James. On one hand, he felt sympathy for her. But at the same time, he felt anger at her. The anger was winning out. Some of that anger had crept into his accusation.

Luna raised her head now, her ears still back, her tail lashing once and a hint of fire in her eyes over his pointed statement. Anger laced her voice as she responded.

“Don’t you dare speak to me that way, Councilor! Try to understand. If I make even the smallest mistake when attempting to raise the Sun, I could start the entire world on fire! But then again, I don’t expect you to understand! No, I will not try to raise the Sun!” she said with a shake of her head. “We will wait until my sister returns!”

But James wouldn’t back down. Not this time. There was too much at stake. Any fear he felt at arousing Luna’s wrath was completely overpowered by urgency, and now anger. He made no attempt to keep it out of his voice when he responded.

“Oh I understand now. I understand all too well. It was all an act, wasn’t it.”

“What?”

“When you appeared to me as Nightmare Moon in the dream. When you threatened me. When you tried to scare me into serving you. It was all an act, wasn’t it. It was all an act to cover up the fact that hiding behind your tough-girl facade, you’re just a scared little Princess who is too afraid to step up to the plate when she’s called upon to do so!” He was shouting at her now, he realized, but he didn’t care.

Luna laid her ears back on her head, her tail lashing angrily and her eyes narrowing as she shouted back at him.

“You will not speak to me in such a manner! I am still a Princess of Equestria, I’ll —”

“You’ll what? Threaten me some more? Throw me in the dungeon for the rest of my life? Do you really think that frightens me now? Because if you don’t raise the Sun, then I’ll only be spending about two weeks in the dungeon anyway. Because that’s how long we can go before everything in this world is dead!”

“I am still your Princess, and the one you swore loyalty to!” Luna shouted, stomping her forehoof.

“Yes, yes, I did! And part of being loyal to you means telling you what you need to hear! Not what you want to hear! And what you need to hear is that having the power to stop a tragedy, but doing nothing, is just as bad as if you caused the tragedy yourself! If you refuse to raise the Sun, you’ll be just as bad as when you were Nightmare Moon! You might as well turn into her again! Because the world is going to die in the exact same way it would have if you had succeeded in your plans then! And you will be responsible for it!”

“If I could raise the Sun and chose not to, yes! But I can’t! Not without destroying our entire world!”

“Yes, you can! But you’re a scared, spoiled little Princess who is too afraid to try! Princess Luna! The Princess who had the power to save the world, but let it die instead! The Princess who when it came time for her star to shine, refused to do what she had to do to save her own subjects!” he shouted, then added in a quieter voice, “It’s too bad there won’t be anyone left alive in the world to write that into the history books.”

With that, he spun around on his heel, and stormed towards the door.

“Where are you going?” Luna asked. Her voice still sounded angry, but less so than before. Now, there was a hint of uncertainty in it, and he could tell she was rattled by her failed attempts at intimidating him.

“To find Twilight, and Fluttershy, and Rarity, and Rainbow Dash, and Applejack, and Pinkie Pie. To spend what little time we all have left with my friends. Together, at the end.”

As he reached the door, one of the Lunar Guards stepped in front of it, blocking him.

“You will not speak to Her Majesty in such a fashion!” he said in a stern voice.

“Step aside, Sergeant,” James ordered.

“Not until you have bowed to Her Majesty and properly asked her leave.”

“I bow to leaders I respect! I bow to leaders who inspire me to want to follow them! Not to spoiled princesses who won’t even save their own subjects! Now step aside, Sergeant!”

“You are way out of line Councilor! I’ll —”

“You have been given an order by a Royal Council member! And in the absence of a countermand from one of the Princesses themselves, you will follow it or I will relieve you of duty! Now step aside, Sergeant!”

The two of them faced off against each other, neither one of them saying anything, neither one blinking. All the while, James waited for Luna to countermand his order. To order him taken into custody for gross insubordination and tossed in a dungeon cell. At least ten seconds passed, but Luna said nothing. Finally, the Lunar Guard stepped aside, and allowed James to pass. He opened the door, stormed out, and slammed it behind him, the sound echoing off the walls of the great throne room like the sound of doom itself.

He walked passed the royal throne, then turned and stormed towards the double-doors at the end of the room. Part of him regretted the way he had spoken to Luna. But those feelings of regret were completely overwhelmed by feelings of anger that boiled inside him, like a cauldron hanging over a fire, steaming and throwing boiling water over the sides. Anger mixed with despair as he realized that everything they’d worked for up to this point had all been in vain. Their victory over the gryphons, their alliance with the changelings. Gilda’s success at finding the secret prison, and the successful rescue of Luna herself. None of it mattered now.

He reached the doors, pounding on them once. The four Royal Guards stationed outside pulled them open and he stepped out into the large gathering area outside the throne room. He continued across it towards the hallway not acknowledging the four guards.

“Councilor?” one of the guards asked, confusion and concern evident in his voice. James stopped, and turned around, looking at the four of them for a few seconds. All of them looked as confused as the one who had spoken had sounded. He responded in a calm and compassionate voice.

“On behalf of the Regent and the Royal Council, I thank all of you for your service. And I hereby release you from it. Go, be with your families. Cherish them and tell them how much you love them. None of us have very much time left.”

“Councilor?” Another one of the guards asked.

“Just go. Be with your families,” James said quietly before turning around and making his way towards the hallway again.

He had almost reached the hallway when a roar from outside penetrated the walls. He stopped, listening, and it took him a few moments to realize what it was. Applause from the crowd of ponies? He looked up at the stained-glass windows rimming the domed ceiling now. The windows to the east were glowing with a dull orange glow. As he watched, the glow became brighter, and brighter. Suddenly, a shaft of bright light, so intense that it made him squint, pierced through the window and struck his face. The shaft of light rose higher, and he had to look away from it. The glass on the window split the beam into thousands of rays. He turned a circle, bathed in white light. It shined on the wall tapestries, reflected off the floor, and glinted off the armor of the guards.

“She did it,” James said quietly to himself. “She did it!” he shouted, sprinting across the gathering area and back towards the doors to the throne room, nearly tripping on the hem of his robe several times. “Cancel that order, she did it!” he shouted at the guards, who nearly jumped, then quickly moved to open the door for him, again, looking as if they feared he would run right into it.

He raced through the door and down the carpet, sprinting around the throne towards the door to the meeting room. He threw it open, and almost immediately, Luna plowed into him, knocking him to the floor. He blinked and looked up at her.

“I did it!” she shouted, a wide smile on her muzzle. Briefly, the smile turned to a sheepish look as she realized that in her excitement, she’d bowled him over. But the smile returned quickly as her horn glowed and she levitated him off the floor. But instead of setting him down, she pulled him into a hug, wrapping her forelegs tightly around him, nearly squeezing the wind out of him.

“I did it!” she said again.

“You did it!” he agreed, wrapping his arms around her. And as the two of them embraced, bright sunlight flooded through the skydome windows, showering over them. Outside, the crowd continued to cheer wildly. And through the windows, the fully risen Sun bathed them in a warmth that felt better than the warmest fireplace would feel after coming in from the coldest day.