“And you’re sure you’re fine?”

“Yes, Feather Duster.” Eclipse moaned.

Feather Duster sighed. “I’m sorry. It’s just--”

“I’ll be fine.” Eclipse interjected. “It’s just an escort. Quick in, quick out, leave the hard work to them. I’ll be back before I’m even really gone.” Shining armor nudged Eclipse in the shoulder. “Hrm? Yeah, yeah, I’m coming.” He said, dusting himself off and turning back to Feather Duster. “Dinner when I get back?”

She smiled. “It’s a date.”

Shining Armor winked at Cadence before using his magic to imitate the sound of a horn going off twice in a row.

“Oh, shut up!” Eclipse said, hurling a random rock he found at Shining.

Cadence caught the rock in her magic, waggling it at Eclipse while wearing a mock disapproving look on her face.

Eclipse slumped. “Of course.” he drawled, rolling his eyes.

Feather Duster gave Eclipse a quick kiss on his cheek before flying back to the palace.

He sighed. “Okay, let’s get going. Geez, you act as if you’ve never had to wait on someone.”

Cadence arched an eyebrow. “You mean somepony?”

“No, I mean someone, pony or otherwise.” Eclipse sighed, explaining for the umpteenth time why he hadn’t reeled in his vocabulary to be more equestrian. “Now, if you would be so kind?”

Cadence and Shining stepped aside to allow him onto their train cabin. The train was empty except for the crew and the three travelers, due to the destination.

The frozen north was not a place many would visit, and none willingly. There were legends of a creature made of shadow which haunted the wide icy landscape, but Celestia believed them to merely be sightings of king Sombra, the evil unicorn dictator who had banished the crystal empire to only he knew where.

Cadence picked up a nearby newspaper. “Hmph. Another scientific breakthrough. Those have been a bit a dozen, lately, haven’t they?” She turned to Eclipse as she finished. "Though I doubt the best ones are so quick to find themselves on the front page of a newspaper."

“So, you were told?” He asked.

Cadence smiled. “Well, I am a princess. And my husband is captain of the guard. He gets to know about anything regarding equestrian security. Even you.”

Eclipse smiled back. “He didn’t know me until almost a week after I arrived.”

Shining armor raised a hoof in his defense. “I had been told about you, I just hadn’t met you yet, so I didn’t recognize you.”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night.” Eclipse replied, holding up his hooves.

Cadence bit her lip in anxiety as the train began to lurch forward.

Eclipse frowned. “Now would be a really bad time to say that you get train sick, Princess.”

“No, no, it’s just…” She waved a hoof, sighing. “Is it true?”

“Is what true?”

“That you’re a spectre agent in training.” Cadence blurted, losing tact for a moment.

Shining Armor immediately froze in his attempts to rummage through his pack for a drink. “Excuse me?"

Eclipse held up a hoof. “Hold up. One time Luna said something about ‘special tactics and reconnaissance’, but I really have no idea what she was talking about. It came out as odd blather to me. I just know that they were willing to train me into some sort of peacekeeper for Equestria.”

Cadence sighed. “So it is true. I…I didn’t know that things had really gotten so bad…”

“What are you talking about?” Eclipse turned to Shining armor. “What is she talking about?”

Shining rubbed the back of his head, thinking. “Ever since Luna returned, Equestria has run into one of its infamous ‘periods of disarray’. Don’t bother looking them up, as they don’t exist. Officially. They are points in Equestria’s history when disasters run rampant. Not just in one village, but everywhere. I was afraid of this ever since Discord’s attack and the changeling invasion happened so close to each other. The spectre unit is an elite soldier, trained to maintain and restore the peace. The thing about them is a ‘the ends justify the means’ philosophy. Not always, but typically, if you meet a spectre, you’ve been manipulated in some way to serve their needs to fulfill their mission, whatever it may be at that moment.”

Eclipse paused, taking in the massive amount of information that, until just now, he had not been privy too. “Well, I don’t know about all that, but it does sound really cool to do. Say, what kind of resources did the spectre agents normally have access to?”

“Well…” Shining began. “They took orders directly from the princesses, like you, actually. I think they weren’t exactly lacking when it really counted.”

“Well, I’m sorry to say that I won’t be sticking around for too long.” Eclipse said, switching topic. “Celestia and Luna want me to head back to Canterlot on the same train the bearers of the elements will use to get to the crystal empire. I’m to avoid all contact, if possible. Probably because of my, uh…disharmonic nature. Were you were informed of that as well?”

Cadence nodded. “The chaos magic, yes. I trust you can control it?”

“Hah!” Eclipse laughed. “If I couldn’t at least stop myself from blowing us all up, I don’t think I would be on the train right now.”

Shining Armor pulled a black cloak out of a suitcase. “He’s got a point Cadence, we should trust the princesses judgment.” He handed Eclipse the cloak.

Eclipse accepted the garment. “Uh, thanks, but what’s it for?”

“Consider it a gift.” Shining replied, beginning to pull out various pieces of harsh weather clothing. “It’s going to get cold really quickly once we get to the frozen north. Wrap up as best you can, because you’re going to need it.”

Eclipse held the cloak in his hooves, turning it this way and that during an examination of it. “That awkward moment when you don’t know how a cloak works…”

Shining smiled. “For a spectre, you’re pretty helpless.”

“Humph.” Eclipse snorted, looking out a nearby window. “What? We haven’t even been on the train for an hour…”

Shining looked out a window for himself. Outside, it was a blizzard. Cadence blushed. “Oh, it’s actually been a day…and a half. We’re at the frozen north.

Eclipse and Shining Armor both gave her shocked looks.

“Luna cast a spell to shorten the time for us…” She explained. “I should have mentioned that.”

“Time magic?” Eclipse asked, but his question ran afoul of Shining Armor’s “She cast a spell without informing me?”

The result was the two stallions trying to speak over one another, culminating in a shouting match between them.
Cadence had her attention focused on another thing, but she couldn't concentrate with the two others so energized. “Shut up!” She screamed, trying to get them to calm down.

Eclipse and Shining stared Cadence, surprised. She was scanning the train, her eyes moving frantically about, searching. Suddenly, a black mist made its way into the train car.

“So, you want to see an empire…”

Eclipse gulped. “Actually, I’m not that big a fan of the cold, come to think of it.”

A pair of eyes popped out of the mist. They were quickly followed by a head. A head which lurched forward, turning into a dark mist which encircled and pressed in on the three passengers.

“Come into the crystal empire. My crystal empire. HAHAHAHAHAHA!”

The trio of ponies tried to escape, but the miasma was suffocating. Through the window, Eclipse managed to make out a train stop coming into view, the brakes on the train squealing as they brought the machine to a halt.

Shining made it to the end of the train car and opened the door, startling the train crew on the other side. Sombra caused a pair of shackles to materialize around Shining ankles before he could make it very far and dragged the stallion out of the opened door to the outside.

Eclipse managed to fire single energy bolt at the shackles, forcing Sombra to release Shining Armor.

While this was happening, Cadence had been smothered by the mist until she passed out. The pink alicorn was now being dragged out into the frozen north by Sombra's power. Several of the train crew tried to assist, but they were no warriors. Sombra quickly threw them back into the train and locked the doors, stopping any further assistance they might have provided.

Shining fired several blasts of magic at Sombra, but the bolts did little to stop the shadow that the unicorn was made out of. Eclipse flared his chaos magic, a wave of power blasting away from him as he tried to force the choking miasma away from the himself and Shining Armor.

While he was distracted, Sombra snuck up from behind Eclipse and grabbed him by the head, slamming the pony into the ground and beginning to constrict his airways. Shining fared no better, reeling from several of Sombra's blows himself. As he managed to reorient himself, Shining Armor saw Eclipse begin to lose consciousness. Charging to the pony's aid, he failed to notice Sombra as the unicorn slammed a solid block of shadow into his skull.

Shining fell to the ground, black creeping into his vision. The last thing he saw was Sombra dragging Eclipse off, into the snow.