Holy early chapter batman! Hurrah for sleep deprivation, if anyone catches any major mistakes (I know that there have to be some) feel free to post them in the comments section below or send me a PM!

I stared dumbfounded at her and, for a moment, I imagined that she was just as I remembered her. Flawless and kind, eyes that sparkled with compassion and mischief, a smile never far from her lips or a laugh from her voice.

But she wasn't, she was different. Her coat was pale, no longer the rich forest viridian I remembered, it looked washed out and stale. Summer's bronze mane was the same eerie combination of familiar and dissimilar, it was messy and unkempt as usual, but in a way that seemed more slovenly than coquettish. She wasn't the same, there was something very... no... inherently wrong with her.

“Heh, you never change, Captain. I think you had that same gobsmacked look on your face after we spent our first night together,” her voice was the same but different, much like her appearance. It had a strange tonal quality I couldn't place, but one that I was sure was alien from My Summer's real voice.

“Who... who are you,” anger had its grip on my throat as I cursed myself for a foal for leaving my weapon behind. I couldn't very well retrieve without being entirely obvious so I began moving towards my wardrobe, never losing my gaze on her so it seemed like I was just taking her measure.

“Oh come on, that's just mean Captain,” she slunk off of the bed in a sultry fashion and slid closer to me. A curious smell followed her that I didn't recognize, it wasn't the scent of windswept leaves I'd always associated with her though. “I come all the way out to this little backwater and you say you don't even remember me?” It hurt, seeing her but knowing it was a lie, that it had to be a lie. Whoever was responsible for this would suffer, I would make sure of it. “What? Did the sun-witch take those memories of me away from you in the name of 'national security' too? That's just too cruel.”

Her casual mention of my memory seal rocked me back on my hooves, nopony should know about that, only the Princesses, Celestia and her sister Luna, I wasn't even sure the Princess Cadence knew about me.

“You're not Summer,” I hissed biliously, “Summer died in Bunker Bridge, in the final push out of that hell hole. I saw her die.”

She moved sinuously around me, brushing her fetlocks against mine in the way she used to during operations when she wanted to subtly, but affectionately, remind me of her presence. As if I was ever unaware of it.

“Oh, yes... I do seem to recall something about that, something about two blade nearly cutting my ribcage in half I think. It certainly sparks a memory or two,” her voice was positively caustic.

“Then you know there's no way I'd actually buy that you're her,” I said flatly, “I buried her, I mourned her, I...”

“YOU WHAT?” Without warning, Summer's voice became hollow and hateful, behind her eyes I could see a lambent glow behind her eyes, pain blossomed in my mind as memories tried to surge to the surface. “You... What...?” suddenly all reason and understanding, “Hmmm... Lover?” I shivered as she traced her muzzle up my neck, “You buried me...” she mocked as she pranced away from me, “you mouuuuurned me?” she draped herself dramatically across the foot of my bed, before snapping back up and glaring insidiously into my eyes. “And then what!? You moved on? On to your little book-loving skank? Or maybe that prissy fashionista? Or that shy, pretty little creature you met this morning?” she clipped her hooves against the floor as she counted out my new friends, Twilight's friends. “Or maybe you spent all day railing that pink little number in the bakery,” her words slithered venomously out her mouth.

“Who. Are. You,” her words were getting under my skin, slicing and writing, and my head was pounding, I just wanted to make her go away.

“I'm your one true love my dear,” she said oh-so-pleasantly, “Or did you forget all the plans we made as well? Of course you didn't, after all, didn't we talk about getting a little cottage in the country, just for us?”

My anger fell away like a molted snakeskin. We had talked about getting a little cottage, even getting married once all that hell was over with. And it was true, I'd specifically requested this little cottage rather than one closer in town because it was so close to what she and I had talked about. But what rocked me to my core was that nopony could know about that, it was impossible for anypony but Summer and I, we'd been entirely alone that night.

“How could you possibly know that?” I'd stopped inching towards the wardrobe out of shock, and my voice came out as a whisper.

“Because, stupid, it really is me,” that was my Summer's voice, that 'honest to the point of bordering on insubordination' confidence delivered with a straight face. She even looked a little bit hurt.

My throat choked and my eyes burned with unspent tears. I couldn't accept this, the dead couldn't get up and walk again. It was impossible, utterly and absolutely, it couldn't be...

Why. The Hell. Did my head hurt so sun-damned much?

Summer closed the distance between us, nonthreatening, and without any malice in her eyes or movements. She pulled herself close to me a tight embrace and, Celestia help me, I returned it, entirely desperate to believe that the mare I loved was back in my arms.

“Jasper...” her voice was husky with longing and sadness, “please... it's me.”

Then she pressed her lips against mine, a heated hunger driving behind them, I matched the hunger and need with three long years of sorrow and guilt, assuaged in an instant.

Except there was something wrong.

I tasted ash and blood.

My eyes snapped open, the smell suddenly struck me like a warhammer swung at my skull. That faint smell that hung around her was chemical. It was formaldehyde, methanol, and synthetic dyes.

In other words: Embalming Fluid.

I broke the sickening embrace, seized the thing in front of me by the foreleg, and pivoted, swinging her, no, IT, into the wall behind me. She screeched with an unholy fervor, the lambent corps-light lit behind her eyes. The pain in my head was torture but I pushed it was as she came at me. I was too close to the wardrobe though, I swung the heavy oak door open as she approached and I heard a sickening crack as it intercepted her charge and dropped her to the ground. I reached in, drew out the long, loaded instrument, slammed the door shut, and pinned her head to the floor with the barrel of the long-arc.

The report of the firearm in the tiny room was deafening.

I let our a shuddering breath. She was dead, but walking, moving, even talking. Hell, she wasn't just talking, she had been reminiscing. It had seemed so real, how could...?

The corpse twitched.

“Impossible” I muttered, pulling the long-arc out of the gory mess I'd made of its brainpan. The entire left hemisphere of her skull and scalp was a ruin, bronze strands hanging by loose and bloody flesh, the stench of embalmed flesh and organs filled the room. It must have spoken volumes that my stomach was only mildly unsettled.

It stood on shaky hooves as I rapidly seized a corner of bedsheet and unclogged the gristle that had been caught in the barrel.

“How... dare you... shoot me...” it hissed, it's voice completely inequine now, there wasn't even a hint of mortality. It was a type of voice I'd grown accustomed to though. The voice of a vengeful specter. “I LOVED YOU!” it screamed balefully, in a voice that echoed with unnatural strength, as though it was coming from across a great distance.

“I loved you too, Summer,” I whispered, another Crack-Crack sent an arcane bolt tearing through her left foreleg knee, dropping to her to the ground.

She shrieked like a banshee, dragging herself bodily across the floor and leaving a smear of rotten blood behind her.

Crack-Crack

Her right knee exploded, eliciting another howl. Not of pain but of the kind of manifold rage you'd expect from an animal, or a daemon. Still she advanced on two obliterated limbs, pushing herself forward with her back legs and desperately scrabbling with the splintered bones of her front.

I waited, taking aim, for the moment to fire, I knew where to put the next shot. Somehow I knew.

She reared up, her face lit with lambent balefire, an unearthly green in the darkness of the night.

Crack-Crack

Summer froze, what was left of her face twisted in pain and betrayal, she looked down at the gaping hole I'd shot through the brutalized scar tissue on her chest. I could almost see the unwelcome power leaking out through from her body.

With a curious sound like a sigh she collapsed, and her body began to rapidly decay. In moments there was nothing left but a viscous black tar to prove anything happened at all. A part of me wished it had just gone away completely and I could collapse, wake up the next morning, and pretend it was some kind of horrific delusion my sadistic subconscious had whipped together.

Then I saw the note.

It was a small bar of ceramic that must have been lodged inside her body. Disgusted, I still fished it out of the mess, gingerly, wondering if it was some foul focus for whatever had brought that specter to my doorstep. It looked like a fragment of pottery, on one side were inscribed runes, they seemed to writhe and twist on their own as I looked at them. I turned away, not because they were vile, although they were, but because for some reason they were also achingly familiar.

I turned the piece over, on the other side was a message is common Equuish: Welcome Back Number 109.

Celestia's sun was barely emerging on the horizon by the time I found myself on the doorstep of the Golden Oaks Library. I caught a glimpse of myself in a few windows on my way here, I knew I looked like something hell had spat up after a bad night of even worse drinks. I'd spent the hours following the fight in my bedroom mechanically cleaning up the viscous foulness that the corpse-Summer had left on my floor after she/it had finally given up the ghost. I kept wondering if she would just show up again, after all, can you really kill something that's already dead? Those ideas teetered my mind on the edge of insanity and a part of me prayed that I was just relapsing into madness, and that I'd be shipped back off to Canterlot Sanitarium as a case study for PTSD of the most severe kind.

If only.

The small bar of ceramic mocked me with its silent and continued existence. Proof incontrovertible that something had happened. Something beyond the laws of sanity and nature.

Welcome Back Number 109

For some reason that moniker stuck to the back of my mind. Everytime I thought of it another blossom of pain would nearly blind me. Eventually I had to run on the assumption that whatever it was was related to the war, and per force, the memories which Celestia had walled up behind the suppression ward that kept whatever secret

After I'd cleaned the floor and laundered the sheets, an act that seemed incredibly important at the time although I imagine it was my minds way of trying to erase what had happened insomuch as it could, I had sat at the dinner table and thought long and hard about my next action. Eventually I decided that I was too far out of my depth, I was a soldier, not a scientist, or a scholar of magical lore, so I did what any good soldier was supposed to do in that situation. I drafted a report to my immediate superior. In this case, to Princess Celestia.

For the eyes of the Princesses only:

My Soveriegn, I've recently encountered something I'd long since thought impossible. This night last I encountered a member of my old regiment, Summer Withers, elder sister to Honey Withers, and my second-in-command during the events at Bunker Bridge. If you read the AAR for the operation, you'll know that her name was listed among those killed in the final assault. I can personally attest to this, as her manner of death at the claws of the Griffon General Phaestus directly preserved my own life. I also observed her funeral and interment in her family crypt in Trottingham in person.

Accordingly I need to know if it's possible to truly raise a pony from the dead. The entity in question possessed knowledge that nopony but I and Summer were privy to, nor could they have known. It led me to conclude that, even if it was not actually Sergeant Withers, it at least possessed a semblance of her memories.

During the conversation she mentioned numerous points that caused me a great deal of physical pain. I believe this was the effect of your suppression actively preventing me from remembering the points she was referring to.

Ever your servant,

Former Captain, Jasper Shale, 109th

I had considered sending along with the standard post but the letter would, at the fastest, reach her by tomorrow, and I needed the Princess to know ASAP. That and the mailpony didn't seem like the most reliable sort, she was pleasant enough and very friendly but I also saw her attempt to put the mornings newspaper in my mailbox the day before. She missed it three times before finally giving in and setting it on top of the box.

So it was that, in the wee hours of the morning, I found myself hammering on the door to the library, praying that Twilight had gotten out of her habit of sleeping like a sedated log.

She hadn't.

After four minutes of knocking a bleary-eye dragonling opened the door and glared out.

“Jasper?” His expression changed to one of concern when he saw the state I was in, my greatcoat haphazardly thrown on, my main askew with fleks of black tar still peppering my coat where it emerged from my jacket.

“Spike, I need to talk to Twilight, fast, please I heard she sent regular messages to her mentor and I need her to send on ASAP,” my words stuttered out in a rush as Spike backed up, letting me into the cluttered library.

“Uh, sorry about the mess, Twilight was reshelving fiction and... got a little carried aw- Wait, a message?” Spike finally caught up to my ranting and, mysteriously, actually grinned. “You're in luck then, Twilight isn't the one who sends them, I do. My dragonfire can send messages straight to the Princess herself!” he seemed overy proud though at that exact moment I would've personally sung his praises from the highest rooftops.

“That's perfect, please, send this to the Princess!” I pulled out the message I'd hastily written several hours ago and handed it off to the little dragon. With a flare of green energy that reminded me sickeningly of the energy that had bled from my dead comrade's eyes the message vanished.

“There you go, it usually takes her a few hours to respond though so how about I make a cup of coffee? You uh, well, kind of look like sh-”

Without warning the light from the sun that was filtering in the window went from pleasantly ambient to utterly blinding in the space of seconds, I tasted ozone for a brief second that I used to seize Spike and hurl ourselves behind the nearby couch. It was followed by a sound reminiscent of a massive tree being struck by lightning as the air in the library was violently displaced, which itself was accompanied by the shattering of glass. I recognized the effects, it was an unfettered, long-distance teleportation spell. It seemed that my warning and request for aid had not fallen on deaf ears, I idly wished for a moment that the military had been so prompt six years ago.

As the light and noise subsided I heard a high pitched squeal from upstairs and a dull thump, most likely Twilight being unpleasantly awoken by the clamour. In the midst of all the chaos stood the resplendent alicorn to whom I had sworn my devotion and allegiance.

Princess Celestia, the Goddess of the Sun.

“Jasper, come out, we must speak,” her voice, unlike her entrance was almost mellifluous, light and pleasant with a maternal warmth to it. I stepped out amidst the wreckage in time to see the Princess idly cleaning up the mess her entrance had made, seemingly without even thinking about it. A soft golden glow reshaped the windows, repositioned the furniture, and, I noted with amusement, finished alphabetizing the fiction section.

I bowed low and Spike did the same, “Princess,” I said without lifting my head, “everything in the letter I sent was absolutely true, and I need to know what to do next. I...”

I felt her approach me, more than saw or heard it. Unable to resist I looked up and for just a second, all my trauma, fear, and panic, subsided. Her presence was more than material, Celestia was lit from within by the light of the sun, not the physical light, but the light it represented. The warmth of comfort and succor, the vital and pure energy that gave life to the world around us.

“Calm yourself, Captain, I know what you say is truth. I-”

“P-P-P-PRINCESS?!” Twilight's voice split the air from the middle of the staircase, the purple unicorn was staring, mortified, at the mentor's unexpected visit. She also had the spectacularly adorable case of bed head I'd seen in years.

Celestia giggled in an almost fillyish manner, “Oh, hello my faithful student, I'm so sorry I woke you up, haste was the order of the morning I'm afraid,” her genuinely apologetic tone reminded me why she was the ruler. Not because of her power of presence, but because more than anything, she truly cared for each and every subject from the depths of her heart.

“N-no! Not at all! I just.. Oh... uhm... I just wish I'd had known, I could have cleaned up or... or... OMIGOSHILOOKAWFULPLEASEWAITASECOND!”

Twilight vanished in a pop and a flash of mulberry colored light For several moments Spike, the Princess, and I listened to her flailing helplessly in the upstairs bathroom before turning and meeting each others eyes and bursting out in peals of laughter. For all of the seriousness of this meeting, it seemed Twilight had, albeit inadvertently, disarmed much of the tension.

Out of silence I voiced the question that had been on my mind since that thing had attacked me in my bedroom.

“Was she real?” I asked soberly, darkening the atmosphere just as quickly as Twilight had lightened it. Celestia regarded me thoughtfully for a moment before answering.

“Yes, she was, I'm sorry Jasper.”

I bit my lip hard enough to draw blood as a wash of unidentifiable emotions pulsed through me, “You know, Princess, I had almost hoped that I was just going crazy again...”

She nodded gracefully, although I couldn't imagine her doing anything that wouldn't involve that descriptor. “I understand, in truth, I think it would have been easier if that had been the case but...”

“But what, Princess?”

“Before my student returns I need to ask something of you, something very important,” the severe expression on my face stilled my any response on my tongue. “I to ask you to forgive me.”

Whatever I'd been expecting it hadn't been that.

“B-beg your pardon, Princess, but what am I forgiving? Most rulers would have either had me quietly 'disposed of' or kept me locked in the bin for the rest of my natural life. You personally ensured that my memories would harm nopony and let me out so I could live my life.”

Celestia shook her elegant head in denial, “No, that is what you saw, but the reasons I had were far less altruistic. I let you go for one reason, because you were the only living pony I knew of whose presence would be able to draw one of the worst war criminals in our history out into the open again.”

I had to let the gears of my mind process that for a minute before muttering, “I... I was bait?”

Celestia nodded but forestalled my immediate response by raising her hoof, “I promise I will explain, my little pony, I swear this to you, but... I also need you to know how sorry I am that I had to use you like this. After all you have done for the crown you deserved so much better.”

A large part of me wanted to rage at her, that I had been used like a carrot on a stick to draw somepony out of hiding was more than a little humiliating, especially since I'd had no idea what kind of danger I was walking in to. Another part of my brain reminded me of something more important though. My oaths. My duty. My loyalty.

I cleared the bile from my throat before quietly giving her my answer.

“I, Jasper Shale, do vow upon the sun and the moon, upon the diurnal crown, that I shall uphold the laws of the Equestria, that I shall enter the field of battle with faith in the knowledge that I fight for every free pony in this realm. I, Jasper Shale, do pledge my life, my oath, and if need be, my death, to the defense of this nation, this I so swear.”

My oath of service, one that was sworn by each and every private on the day of their official induction in to the Royal Army of Equestria. It was also one that was repeated on the eve of a great battle, to remind everypony why that fought.

“My oath still stands to this day your Majesty, and I am still you loyal soldier, there was never anything to forgive.”

The Princess let out a breath of relief, and it looked as if a weight had been lifted off of her, I had the feeling she'd been holding that breath ever since she'd decided to use me to tempt her real quarry into making a move. A small fragment of my heart was still a little angry but I had enough experience with the insanely hard decisions that leaders had to make that the sympathy for her choice outweighed it.

With a sweep one vast wing she pulled me in to a close embrace, “Thank you, Captain Shale, you're a credit to the crown, I wish every soldier had your sense of loyalty.”

“Uhm, Princess?” Twilight's clearly confused tone sounded from somewhere to the Princess's side. With an embarrassed cough I pulled away and Celestia turned to regard her pupil.

“Yes, I'm sorry Twilight, I had some... personal matters to resolve with the Captain, I'm pleased to say they ended well.”

“Uh, yeah, I could see that, Oh! Spike! Please get-”

“Already on it Twi', keep your saddle on,” Spike answered from the kitchen, I hadn't even realized he'd left. In a moment her emerged carrying a tray, with a steaming pot of what smelled like Earl Grey tea, and four bowls of oatmeal topped with fruit, cream, and honey. It looked mouthwateringly delicious.

“Wow, that uh.. that looks amazing Spike.”

The little dragon grinned proudly, “Finally, someone who appreciates good cooking!”

“Hey, I appreciate it Spike!” Twilight countered as she scooped up a bowl and spoon.

“Yeah, when you aren't ears-deep in a book while you're eating, which is, like, all the time.”

They continued their bickering with the ease of friendly familiarity that reminded me of the nights I'd spent shooting the breeze with my comrades in arms.

Celestia interrupted the activity though, “I'm sorry, Captain, my faithful student, Spike, but we need to speak, and quickly, there is a grave matter at hoof that I need to bring you all up to speed on.”

Twilight and Spike ceased their little argument immediately, Celestia's voice carried a solemnity that instantly gave her the floor. A good quality in a leader, I mused as I nodded, waiting on her explanation.

“I will start at the beginning, then, this all started with a Doctor, now the most hunted war criminal in Equestria, named Silver Twist.”

Twilight gasped softly, “S-Silver Twist? Since when is he a war criminal? He's a celebrated scholar!”

Celestia answered in a regretful voice, “It has been kept a secret, he is, even now, being pursued by my sisters special operations team: The Nocturnae.”

“But why?”

Celestia looked pensive at Twilight's question and for a second I was sure she wasn't going to answer, but then she looked around suspiciously, and with a breath of magical, closed and sealed every single one of the doors and windows in the Library.

“What I tell you never leaves this room, not even the other Elements must know the truth, at least for now, are we clear?” The deadly timbre of the Princess's voice made clear in no uncertain terms what kind of damage could be done if we didn't adhere to her order, all three of us nodded soberly.

“The reason that Silver Twist was deemed a war criminal, is for his use of several Class A forbidden spells and incantations. Specifically, the raising of the dead.”