With a thundering crash, an ornate pillar comes crashing down on to the marble floors sending chunks of stone flying. The shattered base burns and melts with a blue, sparking fire. A terrible, maniacal laughter echoes through the hallowed halls of the palace.
“Where are you dearest sister?” calls out a deep, husky voice dripping with malice. A tall, jet black mare walks slowly through the halls, her reptilian eyes searching the shadows between the pillars. “Wasn't it you who said there was nothing wrong with a little rivalry between sisters?” A figure darts from one pillar to the next behind her. She whips her head around and blasts the columns with another beam. Another thundering crash resonates through the halls, and another pillar burns blue.
“I did, with Luna,” says a voice from above. Nightmare Moon looks above her, surprised just as a blast of golden energy strikes her. From the side. The massive mare goes careening into another pillar, sending it crashing into the ones behind it.
“You may inhabit her body, but you are not my sister, beast.” Celestia calmly strides out from the shadows, her face contorted with anger. “My sister is loving,” she lowers her head and fires another blast setting fire to stone. “She is just,” she fires again and a terrible, pained shriek rings out. “She is kind!” She blasts the beast again, the rubble it writhes under starts to melt and bubble.
With a beat of her wings, Celestia takes to the air. Her eyes radiate a pure white light as her horn burns ever brighter. “What ever you are,” She shouts, “You are not my sister!”
As she readies to finish off the monster, the blackness that covers Luna twists and recedes, and she cries out, “Sister! Please! Cease this!” Surprised, Celestia loses the spell she was casting and stares wide eyed for a moment. She hit’s the ground and levitates the molten rock off her sister. As she walks over to help, the shadows from behind the pillars whip out and engulf Luna’s burnt body
“Luna!?” Celestia calls out, whipping her head left and right. The shadows writhe out from the corners of the room and slowly over take the windows one by one.
“Did you really think it was going to be that easy, Celly?” Nightmare’s voice whispers at her from every direction. As the hall darkens, Celestia’s horn bursts to life, lighting a small circle around her.
“I had hoped,” she said. “Though it was clearly foolish of me.” She started backing up, whipping her horn around, her eyes wide. “So now you hide? Again you prove to not be my sister.”
“But sister, you hardly know me.” the voice whispers, this time in Luna’s voice. “You pay me no heed. You shove me to the side to bask in the praise and glory alone.”
“Sister, I have never done su-” Clestia starts to say.
“Glory that should have been shared!” Luna shouts so loudly as to shake the palace. “I never asked for much. I never asked to be exalted above you. I never wanted to be your greater.” she says calmly and evenly. “I only wished to be your equal.” She whispers sadly.
“Lulu. You have always been my equal.” Celstia pleads, looking every which way trying to catch a glance of her sister in the blackness.
“Lies.” she hisses. “You have never once treated me as an equal. Every idea. Every plan. You have shot them all down. Relegated me to simply fighting the creatures of the night.”
“Luna, what of the Dusk Court? You rule just as I do!”
“That empty mockery of my birthright!?” Luna shouts as a tendril of darkness whips out and slams into Celestia’s side, sending her skidding into a pillar.
“Should I ever hold court, I sit alone on my throne with only my own thoughts to converse with.” She growls out. “I have never once levied a judgment as you have. I have never once created a law.” More tendrils slither out and wrap around Celstia’s throat and wings, hoisting her into the air.
Celestia starts struggling wildly, her eyes bugging out. “L-Luna,” she barely croaks out.
“If I rule as you do,” Luna says as she steps out of the blackness, her face framed by her silver-blue helmet. The dark tendrils drag Celestia’s face down to Luna, her eyes bugging with fear and pain. An inky blackness rolls over Luna‘s fur as her eyes twist and contort into that of a reptile's before her sister's. “Then you do not rule at all.” she whispers gently into her sister's ear.
Celestia’s struggling starts to slow, her eyes flutter. Luna reaches up with a hoof and runs it gently over her sister's jaw line. “And now sister, the night you so derided will rule your precious little ponies. Forever.” With a thin grin, the tendrils close around her neck harder. A sickening crack rings out through the halls as Celestia’s head twists at an odd angle. The tendrils recede and let her body slam to the ground unceremoniously. Luna, kicks her sister's lifeless body. Her smile fades quickly. “I was always the better warrior.”
“And I the better magician.” Celestia’s voice calls out from behind her.
“What?!” Luna shouts, whipping around to find her sister, alive and unharmed standing in the grand golden arch way to the palace. She looks back at the body she left behind her only to find it replaced with a stone statue.
“I grow tired of this, Luna.” Celestia said evenly, her face impassive. “Will you not surrender to me?”
Luna’s face contorted with anger as she fired another blast. The blue beam streaked towards its target only to dissipate harmlessly before Celestia. When the energy clears, a single, tiny gem floats in the air in front of her.. One by one, another five gracefully float out from her mane and begin to orbit her head.
“You bring out the elements, sister?” Luna laughs derisively. “Have you forgotten? You cannot control them alone!”
“Then so be it.” Celestia whispers, her head hung low. The elements begin to spin rapidly behind her, glowing with a prismatic light.
“You must be desperate, Tia. Here,” Luna turns around and raises her backside. “Have an easy target for the weapon you cannot use!” She continues to laugh, looking back over her shoulder.
A shaft of light opens up above Luna, burning a hole in the ceiling. The moon, sitting at the apex of the sky, directly above her. Motes of dust start to float in the shaft of light and Luna’s already weightless mane and tail begin to drift upwards.
“As now sole Princess of Equestria, I find you guilty of the highest treason.” As Luna begins to float off her hooves, her eyes shoot open.
“What is this!? No!” she cries as she starts to flail wildly. Her wings beat, her legs pump and she simply floats upwards.
“I will not kill you Luna. I still love you, despite what you have done to my little ponies.” She says, still as calm as ever while tears begin to roll down her face. “I will instead leave you to the mercy of the elements.”
With a thunderous crack, a solid white beam of light crashes down from the moon. The marble floors burn and crack under its force. A powerful gust of wind whips up stray chunks, some of them bouncing off the golden barrier Celestia rose. Through it all, the halls echo with the terrified screams of not a monster, not a princess, but a young mare. Afraid for her life and at the mercy of powers beyond her control. Celestia collapses to the ground as the beam of light recedes, her body wracked with sobs. Where Luna stood, now remains only a scorched crater, still smoldering and cracking with energy.
The lonely moon, hanging in the sky, drifts back down towards the horizon as a face is burned onto its surface. As the sun finally rises on this longest night, the only sound that can be heard are the sobs of a mare who destroyed everything she loved.
