Celestia sat on her pedestal in the throne room of Castle Canterlot. Thoughts of what had occurred with her son a few days ago occupied her mind. She had wanted to take her time to explain it all to him, but on the other side, it was his own damn fault for not knocking as was right and proper. Surely something he had learned under Luna’s influence. Her little sister could be so carefree sometimes.

In the corners of her eyes, she saw one of her guards looking at her and motioning with his eyes in front of her. Ah yes, there was something. One of her subjects was there to talk about better resource management in the distribution of fertilizer in the surrounding farming villages. The brown stallion looked at her expectantly. At the door behind him stood Captain Sparkle, who just nodded briefly. Apparently, he had listened better than she did.

“Very well, we agree, Mister Field.”

“Thank you, your Highness. I will take immediate action.” He bowed, took the parchments he had rolled out over the floor, and quickly went away. The captain closed the door behind him and stepped in front of the throne.

“What did we just approve?” she asked curiously.

“Well, he thought it would be more efficient to use the new technology of the trains not just to transport ponies. He was asking for money to construct a wagon that could transport various goods, including fertilizer. This way, we no longer need hundreds of ponies with carts who visit the villages around Canterlot.” Yes, she could see the advantage such a wagon could have. “If you allow me to say, you look a bit distracted, your Majesty.”

She smiled softly down at him. “Thou may, Captain. This is why we have chosen you as my companion. And yes, we are thinking about our son and his visit two days ago. He has changed so much in Amissa Heaven.”

“You don’t trust the humans?”

“No, but we trust our sister. She can be a bit hot headed sometimes, but—” The doors to the throne room slammed open, and two agitated young royal guards burst into the room, both completely out of breath.

“Princess!” one of them shouted.

“The moon!” the other added and gasped for air. With a raised brow, Celestia stood up from her throne and slowly stepped down on the pedestal towards the two.

“Speak! What is with the moon?” their captain demanded to know. But it needed no answer since the throne room was turning dark already.

“Oh Luna. What has happened?” Celestia said as she looked out of a window and saw the watcher of the night moving in front of her sun.

Blue Light sat in the archives of the Children of the Night, hidden deep in the mountains north of Canterlot. Echidna had chosen this place since no one would search for the enemy directly in front of their nose. It wasn’t finished yet, but it soon would be. The entrance was hidden, and only someone who knew the oath could enter. This and the fact that the place was very well hidden would have to be sufficient for now.

“Master, you should take a break like Sir Antheon suggested,” Index’s voice came out of the computer.

“The stone is locked away in the vault below us. I’m just going to install your picture emitters and then I’ll be on my way. You should be able to move between here and Amissa Heaven then. This way, none of us has to go here every time to save your data. It will only be a few more hours.” His hooves moved over the specially adjusted keyboard of the computer. Designing a keyboard for ponies was a challenge for the engineers in the Tower back then, and even today, where he could do it himself, he found no way of improving the design. “So, your subroutines are now connected to the server. Index, please create an image for me for testing.”

“Yes, Master,” the AI acknowledged, and a load of commands instantly appeared on the screen. After about a minute, Light thought that she should be done soon, but the information didn’t seem to end. It took almost half an hour until she spoke again. “Image number four created. Release follows.” A drive at the hull of the terminal opened, and Blue Light carefully levitated the little crystal out of it. It wasn’t larger than a common pebble stone and contained a copy of the entire knowledge and personality of Index. “Version four listens to the name Sophelia.”

Surprised, he stared at the terminal. “You gave her a name?”

“She is an improved form of myself, a successor. Under the organic life forms on Albion, it is common to give your successors a name,” Index answered in her monotonous robotic voice. The alicorn was flabbergasted. The AI was only a few days old and was already thinking of her newer versions as children. A mechanical being seemed to grasp that she was a mother. “Confirm connection to Amissa Heaven. Confirm connection to archives of Canterlot.” Light blinked a few times and confirmed the connections. The last one was possible because he had put a little transmitter at the archive’s crystals. For the scrolls, they were still going to need Echidna’s daughter, but with the access on the thousands of years old crystals deep below the castle, they had made a huge step.

“Alright, let’s make a test run. Index, search for ‘Crystal Empire’ and everything related to it.” Again, huge amounts of code ran over the terminal. With the increasing size of Index that she was showing, she would soon surpass the capabilities of this simple data terminal.

With a small signal tone, she ended her search. “One relevant entry found.” This was far less than he had hoped. “Placing material on screen of terminal one.” Again, the eyes of the pony in front of the computer widened as he saw the map that Index was showing him.

It was land masses he had never seen before, with places on it he had never heard of. And in the middle was a gigantic place with the name Crystal Empire. This map must have been older than everything he knew. How many million years must have passed for the tectonic plates on Albion to shift this much? Then he noticed something. “Index, open a three dimensional map of Albion and put it over the map.”

“Calculating picture parameters.” Light nodded, satisfied. This would take a little while. He stepped out of the archive into the cave behind it. Echidna had her changelings put their beloved moss everywhere. It lightened up the room in a smooth green light, and in combination with the waterfall, this was one of the most wonderful places that Light had ever seen. Happy with his idea to come here, he stepped at the fresh spring water and took a few sips. As he looked up again, he saw a small green flame coming towards him before it manifested into a roll of parchment. Echidna had sent him a message.

He grabbed the parchment out of the air with his magic and opened it to read what stood on it, but all that fell out was a crystal. “A hologram?” Light checked the parchment again, but nothing else was in it. Slightly confused, he walked back to the archives and closed the heavy iron door behind him. “Index, please stop the procedure,” he ordered the AI and placed the received crystal in the terminal.

The room around him darkened, and Light turned around to the middle of the room where a picture appeared. He knew the place where the hologram was taken. It was Antheon’s office on the upper levels of Heaven Tower. But what he saw in the room stole his breath. His friend, the long-time fiancé of his aunt was lying on the ground. In his chest was a bolt from a crossbow that must have directly hit his heart. In front of him stood a pony, one that couldn’t be. “Index! Check the hologram for manipulation!” The AI didn’t answer but went to work. It was one thing to analyse data, but magical recording were a bit more complicated. Light’s eyes fixated on the pony in the picture. Everything was correct. His mane, his blue coat, even his eyes. He stood in this picture above the dead Antheon, a crossbow in his magical grip next to him and a grin on his lips.

“Authenticity proved.” No, that couldn’t be. Was this Echidna’s work? No, she was fighting with them, not against them. One of her daughters? No, impossible. He had only met two of them but they were all a hundred percent behind her mother. No changeling... maybe an illusion spell? But that would have been detected by the cameras in Heaven Tower. He had added it to the security systems himself. “Incoming message.” A window opened on the terminal.

“Light, Luna is on a crusade. She is out of control. She is looking everywhere for the perpetrator. Hide. I could hide the recordings from her, but just in case. We were tricked. Echidna,” he read the text himself.

“Captain, prepare everything for our immediate departure.” Celestia went with quick steps through the corridors towards her quarters. “We will leave towards Amissa Heaven immediately. Something horrible must have happened. Thou will follow with a company by airship.”

“Your Majesty? Will you not travel with us?” She opened the door to her room and quickly turned towards the captain again.

“We have our own method to quickly travel from place to place. Have no fear; we know how to take care of ourselves.” The captain saluted and galloped off into direction of the airship bay. Celestia closed the door and sealed it. As soon as she had finished the spell, she was grabbed by a strong magic and thrown against the wall at the other end of the room. Pictures fell to the ground where the glass shattered, and the table she landed on collapsed under her weight. Blurrily, she looked at her attacker but at first couldn’t believe her eyes. It was Luna, but not the Luna she knew. Her little sister had charged her body with magic and her otherwise bright blue mane was like the night sky in the darkest of all hours. Her bright coat had taken an unsettling dark tone.

“Why, Sister?!” Luna roared at her. “Why?!”

“Luna? We don’t understand, what has happened? What is…?” Celestia didn’t get any further as a bolt bored into the wall next to her. Her eyes looked at it briefly. The bolt was soaked in deep red blood and wore the sigil of her Royal Guard in its wood.

“We should have known that thou and that guild are working together. It has always been thy game.” Her eyes were glowing in a dark black light. “Why, Celestia? Why my Antheon? Why did my loved one have to die?”

“Luna, we have nothing to do with it!”

“Then tell us where they are. Where are the murderers? Where are they hiding?” Luna pushed her against the wall again.

“Sister, we assure thee…“ Luna increased the pressure.

“Don’t you play your games with me! I know that you always know more than you tell me. Speak!” Celestia saw, now that her sister’s face was directly in front of hers, that even her teeth had changed. No longer had they belonged to a pony, but to a bloodthirsty monster. “Speak!”

“North. Our agents are watching the Chain for a while now.” Luna released her back on the ground, Celestia gasping for air. As she opened her eyes again, she noticed that she was alone in her room.

“Index, seal of the room as soon as I leave it. Let no one past the checkpoints. No one. Not even me.” They were beaten in their own game. “Keep up all connections as long as you can. When someone notices them, shut them off. We have achieved too much to lose it all now.”

“What are you going to do, Master?”

Light sighed and put on the armor he had stored in his glider. It was the formal golden armor of the prince of Equestria, with his sigil as well as his mother's and aunt’s. Their cutie marks were covering his own now, while the two crescents and the bolt were on his chest now. “I’m going to face Luna. She is more powerful than Echidna thinks. I don’t think she has realized yet what we alicorns are. Luna is the avatar of darkness. If she really wants to find someone, she will. This is why the Children of the Night would take a break after every mission. Would she have found our trails, she would find us. As long as we are just a nuisance at the corners of her mind, everything was alright.” A loud explosion roared in his ears, and he knew that she had arrived. “Remember. Let no one past the checkpoints.” Then Blue Light stepped out into the well-lit cave.

He took in a deep breath and prepared for what was coming for him. For a moment, it was quiet in the mountain, but then a large piece broke out of the ceiling above him and shattered to the ground. With slow flaps of her wings, Luna landed in front of him, but her form only distantly resembled what she once was now. Now he knew why Echidna had described what had happened in the facility back then so vaguely. And with all that he knew, this side of the alicorn of the night was not be trifled with.

“You!” she hissed between her sharp teeth. “I should have known that the fine descendant of my sister was playing the same game as she did.” He had gotten to this conclusion as well years ago. In some things, he was just too much like his mother.

“Luna, I can assure you that we have nothing to do with this. We were fooled! Someone wants us to fight each other.” Her look grew even darker.

“Yes, the Children of the Night were causing troubles on Albion for many years now, and now I find my own nephew in one of their hideouts. It is time to end this.” She stood up tall, now as tall as his mother. “As regent of Equestria and Amissa Heaven, I will bring you to justice for the murder of General Field Marshal Antheon of Amissa Heaven.” Two magical swords that were surrounded by blue mist appeared next to Luna. “And for all crimes that have been done in the name of this guild. Feel my wrath!” Light managed to dodge the attack of his aunt just in time. She whooshed past him with insane speed and rammed both her swords into the rock wall behind him.

Light knew that words would be useless new. She was in a blind rage. The Luna he knew would have never attacked her own family. It was time to fight back. With all his magical power, he manifested his own weapon. The scythe swirled around his body a few times before he grabbed the astral body with a foreleg. Unlike her, he didn’t have the magical power to create a weapon out of pure magic and have it levitate at the same time. Luna pulled her weapons with a quick move out of the stone so that a few smaller rocks fell into his direction. He raised his weapon to protect himself, which turned out to be a huge mistake. Luna was directly behind the stones and brought both her swords down on him again. This time she hit.

Everything went so fast that Light didn’t even feel the first moment as his left wing was severed and fell into the moss and began to color it red. Adrenalin was pumping through his body as he saw the grinning creature in front of him. Luna had gotten some of his blood on her muzzle and now seemed to enjoy licking it off her face. Heavily breathing, he noticed that now every last bit that had been his aunt had left the creature in front of him. Her eyes were glowing in a dark red; nothing was left of the kindness she used to spread. “And now… DIE!” Light closed his eyes as both swords went down on his head.

Author's Notes:

And that was act 11. Gron said it was the best act so far, but there is a lot more to come.
I would like to hear your opinions and thoughts about the act as well.

Until next week for : Intermission 11 - Catch Me If You Can

JBL added his own music video this time.

Thanks to Gron for translating this chapter.
Special thanks to JBL for proofreading and editing.

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