Lunar was running.
But not on the grass she was used to.
In fact… she wasn't sure this place was even part of the world she knew.
The ground beneath her feet was a vast, endless plane of obsidian—smooth as polished glass, yet soft enough that her steps made it pulse faintly. Each time her hooves touched the surface, a ripple of pale, silvery-white light shimmered outward, spreading like rings on still water before fading back into pure darkness.
It felt less like she was standing on earth
and more like she was standing on the shadow of the sky itself.
Above her, the sky was swallowed by a single ring of dim, eerie radiance.
a sun smothered by a perfect, unmoving moon. A solar eclipse frozen in eternity
And yet, she felt no fear. Only the familiar warmth of someone.
Her mother ran just ahead, gliding through the dark as if gravity did not touch her. The faint, eclipse-lit glow caught in her silver hair, turning it almost white, and when she glanced back, her soft black eyes shimmered with tenderness.
"Come on, little moon. Keep your rhythm."
Lunar pushed forward, grinning, tiny feet tapping lightly against the darkness. "I'm right here, Momma! See? I can keep up with you!"
Their steps synced. Light pulsed lovingly beneath them. And for a fleeting, perfect moment... the world felt whole.
But then— something shifted.
The pulsing light beneath their feet trembled, its usual rhythm slipping out of sync. Overhead, the eclipse narrowed to a thin, strained ring of gold, tightening as though the sky itself were holding its breath.
Lunar felt her mother's pace ease. "Momma…?" Lunar murmured.
Her mother looked back at her, soft concern in her eyes. She reached out—not in alarm, but in reassurance, and brushed her fingers gently over Lunar's arm.
"Easy, Lunar," she whispered, "Slow now."
And so they slowed. Then stood still.
The obsidian plain quieted, becoming so silent that Lunar could hear her own heartbeat echo faintly in the vast darkness.
And behind them—
far, far across the endless black—
a spark flickered. A shape stepped out from the endless darkness.
At first, it was only a silhouette. Tall, poised, utterly unmoving— as if carved from the eclipse itself.
And then it approached.
Not with a step.
Not with a leap.
But with a sudden, razor-clean burst of motion.
The silhouette vanished.
A streak of gold tore across the obsidian plain behind them, the non existent-air came to be, trembling from speed alone. Rings of pale white light erupted under her feet, rippling outward faster than sound. Lunar barely had time to gasp.
In the space of a heartbeat, the streak stopped. The black-clad figure stood before them, her boots made no sound as the last shards of speed dissolved around them.
Her hair, long and midnight-dark, flowed behind her like a trailing cloak of ink. But most striking was the single band of gold running through it—glittering faintly, never bright, always shimmering as though catching a light that wasn't there.
Her eyes were strange. Dark and quiet, like two pieces of a starless night sky, but holding a thin rim of molten gold around those deep black pupils— a subtle glow that flickered like the edge of a dying star.
She wore a black, sleeveless runner's dress that clung tightly to her tall, sleek form, the fabric stretching just enough to follow every movement with perfect precision. Beneath it, slim black pants hugged her legs.
Her boots were high, black with subtle gold trim along the seams, polished yet flexible, built for silent, lightning-fast strides. A long, dark scarf—or perhaps a narrow cape, flowed behind her, trailing like a stretching shadow.
Immediately, Lunar's heart caught. She had seen her before—or, more accurately, thought of her. But only in fragments of stories her mother would share and the vivid images her imagination had painted. And now, standing here, so real, so striking, it was beyond anything Lunar had conjured in her mind. It was her. It had to be.
Eclipse.
The girl that raced the sun.
Eclipse came to a stop just beside them, her gaze resting on Lunar with a weight that felt ancient and impossibly gentle. There was something in her eyes, a subtle flicker, almost sorrowful, something foreign—but Lunar, caught in awe, could not place it.
Eclipse's gaze then shifted to Lunar's mother. For a heartbeat, she held her eyes on her—calm, steady, almost reverent. Then, after a single, deliberate nod—quiet, measured, full of unspoken acknowledgment, she turned back to Lunar.
And then, in a voice soft as low thunder carried on a breeze, she spoke;
"Little moon, One day, you'll run there. With us."
Lunar's breath caught. The words settled into her mind like warmth and cold all at once.
"M-Me?" she whispered. "Run… where you run?"
Eclipse tilted her head, she seemed to smile, not with her lips, but with her eyes.
She did not answer in words.
Instead, she began to run.
A single step, and the darkness seemed to shiver. A shimmer of gold traced her path. Breathless, impossible speed carried her forward, swallowing the distance in an instant. Twenty lengths gone by in an eyeblink.
Lunar's mother followed, smiling back one last time at Lunar before she matched Eclipse's impossible stride. Their figures grew brighter in the vast darkness.
One silver, one gold, each step pulling them further away. The distance widened like a deepening fault line.
"Wait!" Lunar cried, pumping her legs harder. "Momma—! Eclipse—! I can run too! Don't go so fast!"
She reached out— desperate fingertips stretching toward light, but they slipped away.
Her mother's silhouette thinned into a silver ribbon.
Eclipse's golden streak flared like a comet's tail.
"Please—slow down! Don't leave me behind!"
But those lights only ran faster.
The silver and gold streaks cut across the black world like twin blades— bright, brief, unstoppable, until they vanished into the frozen eclipse beyond.
Lunar stumbled. Her legs gave way. She fell hard, hands scraping the cold obsidian. Her breath caught, broken and ragged. A sob tore free, swallowed immediately by the vast darkness.
She reached for them—her mother, Eclipse—but there was nothing. Only empty black. Above her, the ring of eclipse-light hung frozen, silent.
And the black world, once warm and alive, felt suddenly enormous.
And empty.
_________________
Lunar jerked awake.
Her lungs scraped for air, her small hands clutching the blanket as if the dream were still pulling her backward. The room was dim—too dim. The sunlight should've been streaming through the curtains by now. Momma always opened them first thing in the morning.
"Momma…?"
Her voice was tiny.
She slid off her bed, her bare feet touching the cold wood with a shiver. The silence pressed in around her, thick and unfamiliar. She stepped close towards the door—and immediately sensed it.
People.
Too many people.
Voices murmured in low, uneven tones. The kind adults used when something was wrong, something they hoped children wouldn't hear. Lunar's ears twitched toward the sound, her pulse quickening with a fear she didn't understand.
"Mama?" she called again, louder this time, heart pounding as she pushed open her door. She took a hesitant step forward.
The hallway was crowded—neighbors, familiar faces, adults who never came this early. They all turned at once when they saw her. Their eyes widened, their expressions shifting, softening, cracking.
"Oh—Lunar, sweetheart—wait—"
A woman reached for her arm. But Lunar moved before she finished the sentence, squeezing past her legs.
"Don't—don't go in there just ye—"
She slipped past her.
A man tried to block her path. "Lunar, child, listen to us—"
She darted under his arm, too small, too quick.
Hands kept trying to stop her. Voices kept calling her name. Every adult suddenly wanted to hold her, to shield her, to keep her back.
Someone else tried to scoop her up. It was her neighbor. The one that makes those delicious carrot pancakes momma loves.
"Sweetie, please—"
She twisted out of the elder woman's grasp, her breath sharp, frantic, terrified.
"Momma!" she cried, voice breaking as she ran, tears already slipping from the corners of her eyes. "Momma, where are you?!"
The adults followed helplessly. But the adults were humans. Humans are slow. She was a filly. She is fast.
And fear made her faster.
"MOMMA!" she cried, her voice cracking as she twisted away from another pair of arms. "Answer me!! MOMMA!!!"
The hallway blurred. The adults blurred. The entire world narrowed to one desperate need.
"I need Momma.
Momma will fix whatever this is.
Momma always fixes things."
She sprinted into the living room, and stopped so abruptly she almost fell forward.
The room was silent. Painfully, unnaturally silent. A silence thick enough to swallow her whole.
There, Lunar saw her mother lay on the old sofa, the one they used to curl up on during stormy afternoons. The familiar worn blanket was draped over her legs, the same one they shared while reading stories. But nothing else was familiar.
Her mother's chest didn't rise. Her soft hands lay still, too still—folded loosely at her sides as if she'd drifted off mid-sentence.
But her skin…Her skin was pale in a way Lunar had never seen before, so pale it seemed to dissolve into her silver hair rather than rest against it.
And along the edge of her mouth, a thin dark trail of dried red traced downward, staining her clean cream shirt, stark against that cold, unmoving face.
Lunar's breath faltered. "…Momma…?"
The word broke from her like a fragile twig, thin and trembling, as though speaking it too loudly might shatter what little remained.
She took a shaky step forward. Then another.
"Momma…?" she tried again, forcing a wobbling smile. "See? I'm awake now. You can get up…"
A soft sound rustled from the far side of the sofa—someone's muffled breath catching, a choked sob quickly swallowed. Lunar barely registered it. A glint of blue caught at the edge of her vision, the shape of a woman bowed low beside her mother, shoulders shaking quietly.
But Lunar didn't look. Couldn't. Look. Her world had shrunk to the still figure on the couch.
She reached out, her small fingers brushing her mother's arm.
Cold.
Lunar flinched, not understanding, her fingertips lingering as if they could coax warmth back into the skin.
"Momma…?" Her voice cracked painfully, "Momma, please look at me…"
Silence.
Not the gentle kind that came with sleep. The harsh kind, the hollow kind. The kind that echoed too loudly inside her chest.
In the hallway, the adults' murmurs died away. The house seemed to hold its breath. No one moved. No one dared interrupt the moment unraveling before them.
Lunar leaned forward until her forehead rested against her mother's still hand—the same hand that used to guide her steps, ruffle her hair, cradle her gently after a fall.
Her shoulders trembled.
"Momma… you promised we'd run today…" she whispered, voice breaking. "You said we'd finish that story…"
Still nothing.
Her tears slipped free, quiet as falling dew. They dropped onto her mother's fingers—cold, unresponsive fingers that didn't curl around hers anymore.
Behind the sofa, the blue figure's quiet sobs trembled through the room, a soft, breaking sound that should have drawn attention. But Lunar couldn't turn toward it. Her world refused to widen beyond the lost love in front of her.
The morning sun finally crept through the curtains—
but it felt wrong, unfamiliar, as if the warmth she knew had been extinguished along with her mother's last breath.
"Momma… please.."
"Dont leave me behind…"
"I want to run with you to…"