The wind lashed Luna's face like a whip as she soared through the midnight sky. Its sting was bitterly cold and the rain it bore had frozen to sleet at this altitude. Moisture condensed on the Alicorn's, heaving flanks and evaporated into steam, making it appear as though she were wreathed in mist. Some of the moisture began to freeze, turning almost to snowflakes on her coat and ice was beginning to build up on her wings, but Luna cared not for these minor trivialities. She was an immortal Princess, one of the last true Alicorns, Master of the night! She laughed aloud as the wind tried futilely to blow her out of the sky. Though the pegasus ponies controlled the weather during the day, the night was hers to command. She could choose to make it beautiful and calm, with a softly glowing moon and hundred thousand stars to fill the sky, or, like tonight, she could summon a tempest of such incredible force as to make ponies all over Equestria tremble and the very foundations of the Earth quiver at its might. It was on such nights that Luna could truly be herself. The truth was that no matter how she tried to deny it, Luna was Celestia's opposite. Where her elder sister thrived on light, Luna needed darkness. Where Tia wanted order, Luna rather preferred chaos. And, like tonight, where the day created, furnishing the plants and animals with the light they needed to grow and thrive, so the night wrought storms of incredible destruction. Luna was finally beginning to accept this and at last starting to understand why it was necessary for her to be the way she was. After all, true Harmony required first and foremost, a balance between light and dark.
Glorying in the sheer destructive power of her storm, Luna circled lower, abandoning the stinging sleet of high altitude for the pounding rain lower down. As she dropped below the lowest layer of cloud cover and saw whet lay below her, she realized that she had come much further than she realized, buoyed along by the violence of the wind. She had left Canterlot far behind and indeed, most of Equestria as well. She was near the northern edge of Equestria now, but many miles west of the Crystal Empire. This part of Equestria was bordered by a massive body of water known as the Sea of Lost Souls. It was said that many a foolish pony had drowned in its bottomless depths. From this height, Luna could see the coast and the dark water beyond. She hadn't been to the Sea of Lost Souls since before her thousand year banishment and she had many fond memories of flying over its endless waters. She lowered one wing, raised the other and banked towards the dark line on the horizon. As she flew out over the water, Luna stared as far into the night as she could. She saw nothing, but black waters, roiling beneath the fury of her storm, as far as she could see until they merged with the pitch black night sky. Luna whooped with exhilaration and did a barrel roll, glorying in the pouring rain, the howling wind, the seething mass of blackness that was the water beneath her. She hadn't felt this good in a long time and her almost euphoric state made her reckless. She folded her wings to her sides, pointed her nose down and dove straight down towards the sea. The wind screamed in her ears, the smell of seawater assaulted her nostrils, the sheer speed was incredible! The water grew closer and closer, larger and larger until it all but filled her field of vision. Then, just as she was about to pull out of her dive, a massive tentacle shot out of the water with allarming speed, headed straight for her! Instinctive panic surged through her, blocking out all, but the need to escape. She jerked awkwardly out of her dive, barely avoiding the massive tentacle, twice as wide as she was long and impossible tall, only to find another tentacle reaching for her. She swerved to avoid it and suddenly the water was alive with wriggling, writhing, grabbing tentacles, each trying to snatch her from the air and drag her beneath the surface. Suddenly, she felt a sharp yank behind her; a tentacle had grabbed hold of her celestial tail! She flapped her wings furiously, trying to get away, then, finally thinking clearly, she turned and shot a blast of dark magic at the tentacle holding her. There was a horrible shrieking sound, like nothing she had ever heard, and the tentacle released her. Luna flapped her wings furiously, making for the open sky. She glanced below her long enough to see the many tentacled creature, whatever it was, rise partially up out of the water in a last desperate attempt to grab her. All she saw was a massive gaping mouth filled with more razor sharp teeth than she cared to count and a forked tongue, like a serpent's, which shot up after her and lashed her on her flank, drawing blood. Then the monstrous creature sank back beneath the roiling waves as though it had never existed.
Flanks heaving, blood dripping from her side, Luna stared, open mouthed at the place where the monster had disappeared. It was the pain in her side which finally roused her from her state of shock. She was certain no monster like this had ever been seen in Equestria. Whatever it was might be the first of an invading army. She must alert her sister to the impending danger! Luna trimmed her wings and whirled about in the night sky, heading at top speed back towards Canterlot.
She was halfway home when she started to feel odd. Not bad exactly, mostly just numb in her extremities and a little dizzy. The cut on her flank was burning. That wasn't right. Luna was sure it wasn't that deep, in fact she thought it had barely broken the skin. She couldn't have lost enough blood to affect her like this. There was only one explanation- the creature was venomous- and very much so, if it was affecting her. It took very strong poison indeed to harm an Alicorn Princess.
Luna grew weaker by the minute. Her night vision, usually powerful enough to see through the deepest of shadows, began to dim and her wings grew heavier and heavier. Soon it was even an effort to draw breath, let alone fly through the wrath of the storm. She struggled on for another half hour, then was finally forced to admit that she couldn't make it home on her own. At her top speed, she was still at least a half hour away from Canterlot and she was the fastest flyer she knew. She estimated it would take even the Wonderbolts almost an hour to cover the same distance and that was without the wrath of the storm. Still, she needed help, even if she had to land and wait on the ground for someone to pick her up. Luna shut her eyes so that she could concentrate; she didn't really need them- she could fly on muscle memory alone and besides, there was nothing for her to fly into way up here. She summoned the powers of night to her, her mind slipping effortlessly into the dream world while her exhausted body flew on. It was easy to find Celestia's dream, not that she spent much time spying on her sister's dreams, but even in sleep, Tia was familiar. Tonight, the sun Princess's dreams were peaceful, if a bit odd. Celestia's dream self was casually back-stroking her way through a swimming pool filled with chocolate milk while Discord and an odd-looking grey pegasus mare with a yellow mane and tail and bubbles for a cutie mark played vaguely Caribbean sounding music on a set of neon coloured anvils. Luna banished the bizarre apparitions, leaving Celestia and herself standing on the pool deck.
"Oh, hello Luna," Tia said, "Discord, Derpy-hooves and I were having a delightful pool party, but it looks as though they've gone home. Would you like to join me for a swim, the chocolate milk is delightful!"
"Nay, dear sister." Luna replied, she appeared in the dream as she was; bedraggled, exhausted and bleeding. "Though it pains me to tear thee away from such pleasant fantasies, I must for my need is great. You must awaken and come to my aid, or I shall surely perish."
Celestia finally noticed her sister's condition: "Luna! You look awful, what has happened? Where are you?"
Luna could feel her strength fading now, even in the dream world. She had very little time left. "Thirty- nay forty miles north and west of Canterlot. I shall light my horn as a beacon. Please sister, hurry! I grow steadily weaker!"
Her magic spent, Luna faded out of the dream world and back into her own mind.
Miles away in Canterlot, Celestia awoke with a cry. It took her a moment to realize what must have happened, that Luna had sent her a message through her dream, then she bolted to her feet and, ignoring her crown, collar and sandals launched herself off the edge of her balcony into the fury of the storm. It took her well over an hour to spot the dimly flickering light of Luna's horn. By then, the moon Princess was nearly falling from the sky with exhaustion. Her head hung down by her knees, her tail drooped and her wings flapped only enough to stay aloft. Celestia had never seen her sister so weak.
"Luna!" the sun Princess called to her.
Astonishingly, Luna heard her over the howling of the wind. and raised her head briefly. Upon seeing her sister, the exhausted Alicorn finally gave up, her body going limp as she lost consciousness and started to fall. Celestia swooped under her and caught her before she had picked up to much speed. Celestia turned and headed back towards Canterlot as fast as her wings could carry her.
By the time they reached Canterlot Castle, the night was waning. It would soon be time for the moon to be lowered and the sun, raised. Luna was in no condition to be controlling the Celestial bodies. Celestia had raised both the sun and the moon for a thousand years, she could do it agin for a day or so. She landed on Luna's balcony and carried her unconscious sister out of the raging storm and into the warmth of the castle. Immediately, she called for the guards. Luna's Noctus guards burst into the room at Celestia's call.
"Quickly," she urged the burly stallions, "Summon the royal physician; Princess Luna is very ill!"
The guards raced off to save their mistress, leaving Celestia to examine her sister. Luna seemed unhurt except of a cut on one flank, but her body was hot with fever and a scent hung about her. It took Celesta a moment to recognize it: dark magic- extremely dark if it had poisoned an Alicorn. Alicorns were extremely tough and hard to kill. Things which would destroy most ordinary ponies barely even fazed Alicorns. There were very few poisons strong enough to affect Alicorns. The one downside to being essentially indestructible was that no Alicorn had ever been particularly good at any of the healing magics, perhaps because Alicorns seldom needed them. Still at that moment, Celestia would have given all the magic in Equestria for the power to heal her sister. Instead, she was forced to wait, helplessly watching as Luna's condition worsened, her only hope- that when the royal doctor finally arrived, she would have some way to make Luna better.
