Chapter Ten
Nightmare Moon wandered around the halls of the "Castle of Friendship." Twilight insisted that it was called that, but it sounded to Nightmare Moon like the name of a really creepy museum. It had been two months since the barrier had started to let light through it, and the dark mare was determined to memorize the entire castle from top to bottom. She blamed getting lost as the reason for being stuck here for so long, but when she brought it up with Twilight, the lavender alicorn had quickly pointed out that those few seconds might have saved her from being split in half by the barrier.
The mental map in her head was almost complete, but there were still some gaps that needed to be filled. The section she was in was probably the largest of them, and thus had priority over the others. The castle was certainly complex, but it had a pattern that Nightmare Moon had eventually caught on to, in spite of the fact that it was remarkably plantlike. She checked every door she passed, even though they were all the same, a bed, writing desk, dresser and nightstand, always in the same formation.
It was in a room at the end of the hallway that she discovered something different, the furniture was arranged differently, and the desk had some quills and ink, still in prime condition courtesy of the castle's maintenance magic. Also, there was a mirror hanging on a wall, photos attached to its borders. Upon closer inspection, Nightmare found that each picture featured the six Elements of Harmony, and a pink unicorn with a green stripe running through her purple hair. This must have been Starlight Glimmer's room.
Nightmare Moon's eyes gleamed as she realized how much knowledge could be in the bookshelf across the room, another unique item that wasn't in the other rooms. As she skimmed the titles of the books, her spirits sank. All of them, literally every last one was another section of the deceased unicorn's notes on friendship. Nightmare picked a few of them up and flipped through the pages to make sure that the titles weren't decoys. "Maybe there's something in the dresser." She thought, and proceeded to walk over to the previously mentioned object.
The bottom of the dresser had something that truly piqued Nightmare's interest; a book without a title. As she cracked open the cover, it immediately became apparent that this wasn't Starlight's hoofwrithing, and the black alicorn wondered how it had gotten there. The book was quite thick, but only the first few pages had been used.
1st entry- Today marks the beginning of the end. I have lost pets, family, and friends, but the pain I feel today is greater than all those combined. Rarity is gone. And now, I can clearly see the magnitude of being an alicorn. I will live for eternity, watching friends leave. How many funerals will I attend, until I finally must relinquish my title as Princess of Friendship? I don't think I will be able to make many more friends.
2nd entry- Fluttershy died today. I was going to visit Rarity. I've been doing this daily for a few months, and today, I saw Fluttershy lying in the grass in front of the grave. I thought nothing of it until I saw Angel Bunny the third feverishly trying to wake her. By the time I got Fluttershy to the hospital, she had left us.
3rd entry- The funeral for the Element of Kindness had more animals than ponies. This almost made me smile, but the weight of my loss held my lips down. I can't bring myself to speak in front of the ponies attending the funeral, not because I might break down, but because I will.
4th entry- I knew it would happen, but being prepared has not reduced the pain in the slightest. The resident party planner of Ponyville, Pinkie Pie, has passed away. She left while writing a letter to me, but never got past writing my name. I wish I knew what her last thoughts were, even if they were just the number of balloons she wanted at the ceremony.
5th entry- One more. One more friend gone, and one more friend remaining. I've decided to accompany Rainbow Dash everywhere she goes. Applejack died alone. I wasn't there when any of the others died, but I'll be there for her.
6th entry- Rainbow dash has agreed to let me follow her, on the condition that I go home while she's teaching at the Wonderbolt Academy. I can understand why. An alicorn princess would distract her students.
7th entry- I have started attending Dash's classes. Originally, I intended to only keep an eye on her, but learning the finer points of flying is proving to be a bonus. She doesn't know I'm there, I used an illusion spell attached to a sweatband to make myself look like an ordinary pegasus.
8th entry- Rainbow Dash caught me. The student behind me decided it would be funny to swipe my headband. The look on his face when the illusion wore off was almost worth it. Almost. Apparently, Dash was suspicious from the beginning, because she only knew of two ponies with that much interest in flight physics; Me and Scootaloo.
9th entry- Death is cruel. I have now lost all of my friends. I am completely alone. Spike left after Rarity died, and I do not blame him. Pity is not something I want following me around either. What's worse, Dashie died while she was sleeping, and I now feel that my friends fault me for becoming an alicorn, staying behind while they go on a new adventure. I need to make it up to them somehow.
10th entry- I have come to the conclusion that my duty as princess of friendship is to ensure that friendships are strong and that they last as long as possible. So, my mission is simple, I will gift all the ponies in Equestria with a greatly increased lifespan, therefore lengthening friendship durations. This will be my final act before following my friends.
Final entry- What is better than long life? Eternal life. And I will succeed. Since when does Twilight Sparkle ever fail?
Nightmare Moon, after reading what had turned out to be a private journal of Twilight Sparkle, felt a twinge of pity for the fallen Princess. She had watched her entire world crumble, and couldn't do anything to stop it. The black mare pondered this for a few moments before walking towards the door to resume her walk through the castle.
Closing the door behind her, Nightmare Moon was at a turn in the hall when, without warning, her legs buckled beneath her and she blacked out.
As Nyx and the others returned to the castle, Cadence decided to strike up a conversation with Spike, asking, "So, Spike, you never got around to telling me how you avoided our tracking spells. How did you do it?"
The dragon looked down at the pink alicorn, and said, "it was simple. Do you remember how Shining
Armor couldn't use his magic while his horn had black crystals covering it? Well, I did some research, and found that the crystals create a small field that swallows up any kind of magic, other than the dark magic used to create the crystals. I had some crystal armor custom made for myself, and had Twilight change the crystals into the black ones. I tried to be subtle about it, but it turned out that she already knew what I was doing, and surprised me when she let me leave anyway."
Cadence looked confused, and said, "But, Twilight never stopped trying to find you. Do mean to tell me that she was in on this?"
"yes, and she was probably waiting for me to take off the armor, but I only took it off when it was too small for me, several years after I left."
Nightmare Moon found herself on an island with many luminescent plants on various parts of it. It was her dreamscape.
She felt a presence behind her, and turned to face it. The "presence" was none other than her alter ego; Princess Luna.
The Princess of the moon stepped forward, saying, "After a thousand years of waiting, I had begun to think you weren't capable of feeling sorrow. I will make this brief, you must relinquish your hold on me."
Nightmare Moon chuckled, a laughter that soon grew in volume, till it was a fitting reminder of how twisted the black mare actually was. When she finally calmed down, Nightmare Moon said, "and on what grounds do you make this demand? You have no power, why should I take the back seat again and watch you be the pushover you always were?"
This time it was Luna's turn to laugh, though it was just a tiny smirk. Looking her nemesis in the eyes, she said, "Actually, you are the one without power. I can take everything you have, after all, it belongs to me. This time around, I didn't submit to you, instead I was transformed unwillingly, and now I can eradicate you myself."
The twisted mare looked at Luna as if she had grown a second head, "You can't destroy me! We are both bound together. If I go, so will you!"
The Princess of the Moon wore a very grim face as she said, "A price I am willing to pay for the pain I have caused. Today, I will right the wrong that I created two thousand years ago. All nightmares must end eventually."
Twilight Sparkle bolted upright in her bed, something was wrong, and a sixth sense had woken her. Checking for Nightmare Moon's magical signature nearby, she found nothing. Expanding her search, she sent her magic all the way to the barrier, and still, the mare in the moon was gone without a trace.
Using a different spell, Twilight instead searched for physical objects. Starting at her bedroom and working methodically from there, she finally found something irregular in the shape of a collapsed alicorn. It was difficult to judge size with this spell, but Nightmare Moon looked smaller.
Twilight exited her bedroom and turned on the crystal lights set into the ceiling of the hallways and headed towards the collapsed pony at the edge of the castle. Upon reaching the alicorn, she noticed two things. The first being that the mare's magical mane was thin and sickly looking, not flowing in the manner that it usually did. The second… that pony on the floor wasn't Nightmare Moon. It was Princess Luna, and she was dead.
It was as if all the color, sound, and feeling bled out of the world, leaving behind one simple truth for the fallen princess to face. This was her fault. Luna had died to rid the world of a villain that she, Twilight Sparkle, had brought back. Not only that, but she had brought the twisted mare back to entertain herself, not even thinking about the pain she had caused one of her only remaining friends. And finally, as a cruelly bitter icing on the cake, Twilight Sparkle realized that she had pushed her remaining friends away while trying to find satisfaction in her revenge on an unstoppable force; Death.
She had attacked one of the royal sisters, and forced the one pony in Equestria to which she owed everything to use a tactic reserved for the most dangerous enemies of Equestria. This was unforgivable.
She knew what she had to do. It wouldn't even slightly make up for her crimes, but Luna deserved a proper resting place.
Twilight created a walk-in tomb solely for the princess. After placing a crystal coating over the deceased pony to preserve her long enough for the barrier to come down and let Celestia say her goodbyes, she left to go think about what Celestia was going to do when the barrier came down.
Spike and the rest of the group returned to the C.R.E.D. room. It was getting late, and they gradually retreated to their rooms, even Cadence, who had simply created her own room for the night.
Nearly achieving sleep, Spike jerked awake when a knock at the door reached his ears. "Come in." he called.
Celestia stepped through the doorway, and said, "Spike, would you mind if I talked with you for a bit?"
"Not at all, Princess." The purple dragon replied.
The Princess of the Sun looked more tired and hopeless than any living being, be it pony or dragon, Spike had ever seen as she said, "What do you think we will find when the barrier fades?"
She was still standing at the doorway, and Spike gestured for her to sit down with him next to the fireplace. As she sat down, he said, "You fear that either your sister or your student is dead at the hands of the other, don't you?"
Celestia gave a weary nod.
"The same thoughts have been on my mind too. I have an answer for you, but it might not be as pleasant as you would like. If the Nightmare prevailed over Twilight, then without a doubt, the six heroes of Equestria have been united. But, if the opposite is true, we can only hope that our Twilight is not completely lost to us, and the shred of her that remains only imprisoned your sister as an alternative to the much darker alternative. The only consolation I can give you is that I cannot imagine anypony winning in a fight against Twilight, being as she is the Princess of Friendship, and Friendship is Magic.
Twilight wandered through the ruins of Ponyville, trying to think of a way to occupy herself until Celestia could administer justice to her, presumably through banishment to the moon, imprisonment in Tartarus, or community service. She shuddered at the last one as it entered her mind. She could bear losing a thousand more years, she didn't have anything or anypony to lose, after all. But the accusing eyes of ponies burning into the back of her head was one of the Nightmares that had haunted her since the death of Luna.
She stopped walking. "The houses!" Twilight almost smiled as she thought of something to do to distract her, almost. With a one-track mind, she galloped down the street. She would restore Ponyville. Beginning with Sugarcube Corner.
Celestia collapsed into her bed, exhausted from the emotions of the day. As soon as she closed her eyes, she heard a voice.
"So much hard work, and all in vain too."
The white alicorn was on her feet in an instant. The voice sounded like her own, but she herself hadn't said a word. "Where are you?! Show yourself!"
"Where am I? You present an interesting concept. You see, I am everywhere you are, where you go, I go. When you stay, I stay. To sum it all up, I am you, but while you try to see the best in everypony, I see the truth in them… their greed… their disloyalty… all of their… impurities…"
The voice was coming from the corner of the room, and as she approached it, she said, "And who would possess these 'impurities' that I have failed to notice?"
"Many possess them, but the most notable of them are the members of your precious inner circle. Spike and Nyx wish to side with their 'mother' against you. Night Study and Solar Ray will try to poison you with the armor they are making. And Cadence only wears the disguises so she can turn your subjects against you in secret."
"Those are harsh accus-!" Celestia cut herself short when she looked in the mirror, for what she saw drove a spike of ice through her heart. It was her, every motion she made was the same, every feature was identical, except… the eyes. It was as if the fires of the sun were burning there. Remaining calm, she continued, "Those are harsh accusations to be throwing around without proof."
The reflection laughed and said, "the proof is in front of you, dear. And besides, you didn't notice anything before your dear sister tried to kill you."
"Enough!" Celestia said as she raised a hoof and brought it down on the mirror, sending shards of glass flying from the force of the blow.
Immediately, a guard rushed into her room, and upon finding no threat to the princess, noticed the blood dripping from her hoof and escorted her to the castle medic.
Immeasurably far away, in another dimension to be precise, a draconequus was siting upside down in a rocking chair on the ceiling, anyone seeing this would think this was strange, but it only got stranger as the mythical being suddenly stiffened up and looked straight at… me?
Who are you!? And why are you talking about me like that?!
Um… I'm the narrator, and was doing my job…
I'm only kidding. I already know who you are. Shall we continue?
Of course, sir.
But it only got stranger as the mythical being suddenly stiffened up and-
Hey! A being of chaos does not 'stiffen up!' It's more like a wiggle.
Fine! But please, no more interruptions.
But it only got stranger as the mythical being suddenly made a wriggling motion and fell to the floor. Discord could feel magical disturbances, and he had just felt the beginning of a massive one.
AN: Hey guys, sorry for the massive wait time for this chapter, I got stuck with a very serious case of writers' block. I'm fine now, but the doctors tell me that there may be a relapse. Also, big thanks to Jatheus for the useful writing tips.