The Truly Terrible Tail of Troublesome Tropes Terrorizing Terrestrial Equestrials

Celestia wandered through the streets of Ponyville, her soulless eyes transfixed on the ground as her head hung in sorrow. Though her eyes appeared blank, her mind raced as quickly as the light from her sun as she tried desperately to come up with any solution to the situation her world was in. But just as the sun’s rays failed to break through the overcast sky and shed light on the world, none of her thoughts succeeded in giving her any hope. Somewhere in the back of her head though, a small, nagging feeling held onto that hope. If this could be brought on, it could be stopped. She just needed to figure out what or who was responsible.

“Celestia!” a voice suddenly yelled in both anger and excitement.

The princess looked up as a distant explosion sent a certain mayor flying overhead and into the distance. Standing before her was a… something. It was a mare – at least she thought it was – that looked like some sort of amalgamation of different ponies. Her head was pink, her long neck an ugly swamp-green, her masculine-looking body a deep red and each of her legs were different shades of purple. She had a black tail and a yellow mane. One of her wings was orange and feathered while the other was bat-like and brown. She also had a large horn on her head that protruded in a helix.

Celestia looked to her more with curiosity than anything else. “Who exactly—”

“Bwah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!” the mare interrupted.

After a moment of silence between the two, Celestia decided to try asking again. “Who—”

“Bwah-ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha ha-ha ha-ha!” the strange creature interrupted once more.

“W—”

“Bhah! H—”

“Enough!” Celestia screamed, a little bit of the old Royal Canterlot Voice shining through. “Who are you?!”

“Do you not recognize me? Do you not see the face of your downfall?” she said, waving one of her forelegs theatrically. “Hmm-hm. Ha ha ha ha ha. Bwah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!”

Celestia let her eyelids droop as boredom set in from listening to the endless, maniacal laughter of the thing before her. A small noise somewhere in the distance that she couldn’t identify caught her attention and was, quite frankly, much more interesting than the mare who seemed only to want an audience for laughing practice. The princess turned, ignoring the mare, and started to walk away.

“No, wait. Come back,” the mare said pleadingly as she ran in front of the princess.

Celestia stopped, a bit surprised that the mare was actually going to do something.

The mare examined her own body for a moment. “H-hang on. Let me just…” Her horn began to glow and suddenly she was engulfed in a green fireball that disappeared just a suddenly as it came leaving behind a new form made up of new pony parts and colors. “Wait, I’ve almost got it.” She tried again, this time only succeeding in switching the placement of her horn and tail. “No, wait…” One last attempt turned her into a tall, black, insect-like pony with a dark indigo mane and holes randomly pierced through her flesh. “Ha-ha!”

“Chrysalis!” Celestia shouted, taking a defensive stance. The noise in the distance began to get a little louder as if something were coming closer at a rapid pace.

“Yes, it is I, Chrysalis, queen of the changelings, master of disguise and stealth!” she screamed loud enough for half the town to hear.

“What are you doing here? Are you the one responsible for all of this?”

“Ha-ha ha-ha! Once I take you down, I will be the supreme ruler of the world! And then all your tedious paperwork shall be mine! Bwah ha ha ha ha ha!”

That… was a strange thing to desire… Regardless, Celestia stood at the ready as she watched Chrysalis laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh. Seriously though, was the changeling ever actually going to do something or was she just going to keep laughing? The distant noise drew closer. By now, Celestia could tell what it sounded like. It was like a series of gears and cogs horribly grinding together in an ancient machine that desperately needed repair.

Chrysalis finally stopped laughing and, with a big grin, aimed her horn at Celestia. “Now I can finally have my reven—”

Just then, a large blue box fell out of the sky and hit the ground hard, skidding and tumbling as it slammed right into the changeling queen, only missing Celestia by a few feet. Chrysalis was sent flying miles and miles through the sky and into the distance. Celestia could’ve sworn she heard her yell something about blasting off again, but she was far too shaken up from nearly being pummeled to have a reaction. Her body, trembling with shock, grew a bit weak and she fell to her haunches.

After a moment, the airborne dirt that the box had kicked up cleared away. The rectangular box must have been at least twice the size of Celestia. It appeared to be on its side. Suddenly, a pair of doors opened inward on the side facing up and out climbed a pony. He was a brown earth pony with a black mane and tail. He wore a blue tie, an impractically long multi-colored scarf that wrapped around him multiple times and still dragged on the ground, a black suit jacket with a celery stalk pinned to it and a fez. He also held an umbrella under one of his forelegs, a recorder under the other and a strange, metal tube in his teeth.

The stallion completely disregarded any damage he might have done to the area, only staring intently at Celestia. He ran right up to her and held the metal device in one hoof, his muzzle mere inches from hers. “Forgive me for this,” he said as he waved the device in front of her eyes.

It made a gentle whirring noise and a small light on the end made Celestia start to see spots and she tried to blink them away. “What in Equestria are you doing? Who are you?”

The stallion stepped back, a confused look on his face. “No. No no no no no no no. It isn’t her. How could it not be her!?” he asked, clearly talking to himself. “Come on, come on. Think! There must be some way to fix all of this. But if it isn’t Celestia then who?”

At this point, Celestia wasn’t about to pay any mind to somepony’s random rambling, but something about what this stallion just said caught her ear. “Excuse me. What do you mean ‘fix this’? Are you still… yourself?”

“Of course I am. Who else would I be?”

Celestia dared not smile just yet, but a small feeling of relief overcame her. “Please, what is happening to my subjects? Can you help me stop all of this?”

“Wait a moment,” the stallion said, turning to face her and donning a pair of glasses with green-tinted lenses and examining her all over. “You aren’t even infected. How are you not even infected?”

Celestia watched, a bit uncomfortable, as the stallion circled around and looked her over. “I don’t know. How is that you are not—”

“I am infected,” he interrupted as he returned to her front to face her directly. “But it hasn’t taken hold of me yet. I am old, Celestia. So very old. And I have seen things you could not possibly imagine. I’ve witnessed the rise and fall of creation. I know secrets that must never be spoken. A mind like mine is not an easy thing to control. But it’s only a matter of time… before… Argh!”

“No! Please, stay with me. I need your help!” Celestia said as she watched the stallion hold his head just like Rarity did before her change.

“Argh!” The stallion started talking a mile a minute saying all kinds of things Celestia couldn’t begin to understand about light speed, black holes, something apparently called an exphinyinisyphious. Suddenly he hit his head and gasped.

There was a small pause before Celestia spoke. “Are you… alright?”

“For the moment,” the stallion answered. “But we don’t have much time. Here, put these on.”

He tossed the tinted glasses to Celestia and she did as she was told. Through the lenses, she could see little green bits that looked like tiny, pulsating bubbles floating around the stallion, a particular concentration around his head. Every now and then, a small arc of energy would bolt from one bit to another. Celestia peered over the glasses and looked back through the lenses to be sure it wasn’t a trick.

“You see all those little bits? Those are called tropes,” the stallion explained.

“And they are what’s causing this?”

“Yes and no. The tropes are what controls an individual, but what controls the tropes is something completely different. You and I live in a three dimensional plane of existence. The being that controls the tropes is a creature of the abstract; it exists on a four dimensional plane.”

“Your words mean nothing,” Celestia said simply.

The stallion shook his head and quickly sighed. “It doesn’t matter. The point is that all the ponies are being manipulated by this one creature.”

“How can one creature control so much?”

“Like I said, it’s a creature of the abstract. It doesn’t follow the same rules of reality and logic that you and I do. Once the tropes take hold of a pony’s mind, it writes his or her actions like a character in a play,” he said before turning his head in thought. “Trouble is, it’s a very terrible writer. I mean really, everypony just acts like some poorly made caricature and things just happen out of nowhere for no reason. By that logic I suppose I would be the exposition then.”

“Please! You must focus.”

The stallion inhaled and looked back to the princess. “Right, world coming to an end. Back to that.”

“What? What do mean coming to an end?”

“Yes, if this creature wins, the whole world will literally come to an end. Once it has control over every living thing on the planet, it will drain them of all their life force and destroy the planet itself in order to harness enough power to jump to the next planet.”

Celestia stared, wide-eyed, at the stallion for a moment. She wasn’t sure if she could believe any of this, yet something told her she had to. “How do we stop it?”

The stallion frowned and wore one of the most sorrowful expressions she had ever seen. A pegasus pushed a raincloud directly over the stallion, kicked it so the water would pour down over him for extra dramatic effect and quickly flew away.

“I’m sorry,” he said, ignoring the water running down his face and making his mane flat against his head. “I’m so so so so so so so so so so sorry. But I don’t know. It’s never been stopped before. I’ve seen entire galaxies devoured by it. There may be no stopping it.”

“But there must be something. We cannot simply give up!”

“Well, now that you mention it,” he said, perking right up as a gust of wind took the raincloud far away, “this is rather odd, more so than I would expect. See, the creature will take a single host body in order to initially spread the tropes. It normally goes after the most powerful and influential being it can find in order to move freely. I thought for sure it would have come for you, but somehow you seem to be immune to it. The tropes can’t even touch you.”

“Then there is hope.”

“Oh yes!” he said with a big smile. “We may be dealing with an impossible enemy, but right now you are also impossible. I don’t know how to stop it, but if you can find it, there may be a way. If you can manage to draw it out of the host and destroy it…”

“Yes, I see.”

“Argh!” The stallion held his head again. Celestia could see the tropes through the glasses as they tried to force their way into his skull. “There’s no time anymore… Find the host… Run. Run. Run!”

The stallion ran off deeper into Ponyville repeating ‘run, run, run’ over and over.

Celestia took a deep breath and removed the glasses. The creature was supposed to take the most powerful and influential being in the world. If it wasn’t Celestia, there was only one other it could be. Suddenly, the princess felt a tug in her horn. Something was interrupting the normal flow of magic. She looked to the sky and saw her sun wavering and slowly setting beyond her control. Once it dipped below the horizon, bathing the land in darkness, the full moon rose and supplied a dim light.

“Luna…” Celestia muttered. Just as Celestia was connected with the sun, Luna was connected with the moon. Using that connection, Celestia could locate her sister quite easily. With a moment’s concentration, she activated her magic and teleported away.

~~~~~

Luna stood in an ancient, deteriorating, stone castle deep in the Everfree Forest. The walls – at least what was left of them – were wrapped in vines and moss. Large pillars that once stood as monuments to the throne room in which she stood lay crumbled on the floor. There was no ceiling. Luna peered up at the moon and smirked. She wore the armor of Nightmare Moon but had not yet transformed into her alter ego which made the helmet shift around on her slightly smaller head.

A small ball of white light appeared a few yards away. Luna kept her smirk as she watched Celestia materialize and give her a glare she could swear said, ‘You will die.’ The two princesses did not speak as they slowly walked closer to one another, only stopping when there horns crossed.

“Such a pity, mine dearest sister. For it would seem mine spell wouldst not be most powerful enough the first time,” Luna said as she noticed the glow still surrounding Celestia’s backside. “But still thou hast not overcome it we see.”

Celestia was only glad that she wasn’t being assaulted by the Royal Canterlot Voice. “Leave my sister’s body this instant and face judgement.”

Luna looked surprised for a moment before smirking again, turning and walking away a few feet. “Clever girl. It would seem thou hast uncovered something most interesting. But we shall not be doing that.”

“You will leave her or—”

“Or what? Wouldst you stop us? Ha! We would have taken thine body for our own, but this one was so sure of her own superiority and power. She even showed us a scene most damning. One thousand years prior when she bested thou with ease. All thou could do was resort to those little trinkets thou no longer can use.”

Celestia didn’t like being reminded of the time she had failed to save her sister. She vowed never to let that happen again. “I will stop you, whatever the cost.”

Luna charged her magic. “We think not!” she screamed as she turned and unleashed a blast that hit Celestia.

Celestia was mentally prepared and managed to get away without any serious damage by taking to the sky. Luna gently flew up and the two floated above the old castle for a moment. Celestia breathed deeply. She knew it would come to this. It always came to this. Villains simply had to do things the hard way, didn’t they?

Celestia charged some latent magic in her horn as Luna charged at her quickly. Just before Luna’s pounce could connect, Celestia performed a quickstep teleport which allowed her to shift to Luna’s side in the blink of an eye and kick her younger sister. The possessed princess groaned, though not much damage was done through her armor. Luna quickly countered by letting loose a pulse of magic in all directions that was designed to push away anything too close.

The pulse threw Celestia off balance for a few seconds which was just enough time for Luna to quickstep above her. She noticed, however, and the two unleashed a blast of energy that, once collided, mixed and erupted in a large explosion that sent Celestia straight to the ground and Luna up into the air.

Celestia coughed as she picked herself off the ground. Looking up, she failed to spot her sister anywhere. She looked around the forest, but Luna was nowhere to be seen. Unfurling her wings, she forced her body to go onwards and flew up. Luna certainly had the advantage fighting in the darkness, but the moon provided more than enough light to see the surrounding area and Luna just wasn’t there.

Suddenly, Celestia heard a loud whistle come from the direction of Ponyville. She flew closer and saw Luna floating over the buildings and carrying the town’s mayor in her magic. Celestia went wide-eyes as she realized what Luna was up to. Before Celestia could say or do anything, Luna launched the pony like a missile. Celestia only had a couple of seconds to react but managed to open a portal and send the mayor away. The mayor crashed into Celestia’s royal bed, bounced a couple of times and landed on the floor. It may not have been the most graceful landing, but at least she was safe.

The princess of the sun didn’t have any time to think about the mayor as her opponent held up a dozen more ponies in her magic. Luna wasted no time in rapid firing pony after pony. The unicorns were thrown horn-first, earth ponies were thrown butt-first for some reason and pegasi were thrown spinning with their limbs splayed out like ninja stars. Celestia reacted on instinct, creating portal after portal for each pony that came at her. Small bodies of water, bales of hay, bushes, beds, anything that Celestia could think of that might make for a soft landing is where she opened the portals as the ponies were scattered across Equestria.

Celestia grit her teeth as she focused all of her power on the portals. She didn’t have the time to create one big portal for all of them. Calling this task of transporting ponies so quickly difficult was an understatement. Luckily, Luna was running out of ammunition. The onslaught came to an end and Celestia began panting. The two alicorns stared each other down for a moment as Celestia caught her breath. Suddenly, Luna picked up and threw a small building. Celestia gasped and braced herself as the house collided into her and soon smashed into the ground. She was sent tumbling quite far from the wreckage. Luna teleported over Celestia and smirked.

Celestia, bruised with a few cuts and scrapes, picked herself up and looked to her sister. “You will not win. I will not allow it!”

“Ha! We have far more power than thee. What could you hope to accomplish?”

It was true that Luna was far more naturally astute at magic than Celestia. Luna had even created her Nightmare Moon transformation spell one thousand years ago in order to push her capabilities further. Back then, the only way for Celestia to win was with the Elements of Harmony. But in that thousand year timespan, the princess of light had practiced and perfected a spell of her own. A spell only to be used in times of dire emergency. Now was the time.

Celestia rose into the sky, her horn and eyes glowing. She raised the sun alongside the moon, splitting the sky into day and night. The sun shone brightly over her and a swirl of fire suddenly came from it and wrapped around her. Luna shielded her eyes from the brightness as Celestia was enveloped in a ball of fire. The fireball dissipated quickly and Luna looked at what was before her. Celestia was clad in golden armor not unlike Nightmare Moon’s armor. Her mane and tail had turned into mixture of blue, violet and green fire that danced about with a mind of its own. Even though Luna was a good thirty feet away, it felt like she was standing three inches from a raging bonfire.

Luna reeled back and flew to the ground, backtracking into Ponyville. Celestia followed on hoof. Any plants that she past began to wilt from the unrelenting heat. Luna unleashed a powerful blast of energy. Celestia summoned a shield of blue fire that devoured the magic and used it like fuel for the flames. The possessed princess began to sweat as she backed away, unleashing blast after blast after blast, all of which were harmlessly absorbed.

Finally, the two reached an open field and Celestia charged at her sister. Lunging her head forward, she let loose a blazing swirl of violet fire. Luna raised a shield but was unable to withstand the attack for long and was knocked back when her shield shattered. She wasn’t beaten yet. Transforming herself into shadow, she quickly surrounded Celestia in darkness. The green flames grew brighter as the shining alicorn yelled and increased the heat of her body close to that of the surface of the sun for a moment.

Luna was forced back as she took solid form again. “Wouldst thou destroy thine own sister!!!!!!?”

This gave Celestia pause. With one deep breath she declared, “I will do what I must to save my subjects and this planet.”

Celestia quickstepped directly in front of Luna and let loose another violet blast at point-blank. Luna had no time to defend as she was sent flying. She landed hard quite some distance away. Bruised, singed and a bit bloody, she found it difficult to move as she lay on her back. Celestia quickstepped over Luna and placed one hoof on each of her legs, pinning her to the ground. The two stared into each other’s eyes. Celestia charged her magic as she prepared to finish it, tears evaporating out of her eyes.

“I surrender,” Luna said simply.

Celestia was taken by surprise. She let her charging magic dissipate. “You surrender?”

“Yes. I can see that you are the more powerful. Continuing would be pointless.”

“Then leave my sister at once!”

Luna smirked. “As you wish.”

The princess of the night grunted and a black blob started seeping out of her eyes and mouth. Suddenly the three dimensional shadow shot forth and entered Celestia’s eyes and mouth. The transfer took mere seconds and both alicorns fell unconscious.

~~~~~

Celestia awoke in a dreamscape somewhere in the depths of her own mind. Nothingness surrounded her. There was no sound, no light, no external sensation of any kind. She looked around as the emptiness became a visible but hazy shade of violet. She noticed that, here, the annoying glow that Luna placed on her rump was gone.

Suddenly, a noise came from in front of her. She looked frantically for a source but only saw blackness before her. Blackness, a large wall of darkness… with a face. Her eyes widened as she realized what was happening. The darkness was the creature. It had invaded her mind and was trying to take over. Tendrils came forth from the dark blob and wrapped around her. She struggled and tried to fight back, but the creature was simply overwhelming. There was nothing she could do.

The violet world turned to a mixture of blue and yellow, much like the magic that once surrounded Celestia’s flanks. Just as the blob was about to pick up and envelop Celestia completely, the blue and yellow magic shot forth and severed its hold. There was no sound, but Celestia could still hear its screams of terror and pain as the swirl of magic worked to surround and contain the blob in a large bubble. The bubble shrank smaller and smaller, relentlessly crushing the entity until it finally could shrink no more and evaporated out of existence. Once more, Celestia fell unconscious.

~~~~~

“…ter! Sister!” a familiar voice called out.

Celestia slowly opened her eyes. Her vision was blurry for a moment, but a few blinks were enough to make things clear. Luna held Celestia’s head with care and smiled down at her.

“Luna. What—”

“Be still, Sister. You are badly injured. Well, we both are. How are you feeling?”

“Well enough, considering,” Celestia said as she slowly struggled to her hooves. She took a minute to evaluate her surroundings. The first things she noticed was that her fiery transformation had worn off and the magic around her butt was gone. She and Luna stood in a scorched field next to a half-destroyed Ponyville.

“I am glad that this is all over now.”

“How? It was inside my mind. How can it just be gone now? And how did it come to possess you in the first place?”

Luna shifted her gaze away as if she didn’t want to say.

“Luna,” Celestia said sternly, “what do you know?”

“Well, it… It tried to take Discord at first but could not hope to control him. Seems Fluttershy is the only one capable of that, eh? Heh heh…”

Celestia showed no emotion. Now was not the time for jokes.

Luna continued. “Once it gave up on him, it came for you. I know this because I could see into its mind just like I see into a pony’s dream. I convinced it to possess me instead, tried to make it think I was the more powerful. I just knew that if you were to fight me you would win. That’s all.”

Celestia wasn’t convinced. There was certainly more to it than just that. She looked her sister in the eye. “But why was I the only one not affected? How did it die after it tried to possess me?”

“Well… When I looked into its mind, I could see how it operated. It was strange, but it actually controlled things like it was writing a play.”

“Yes. A strange stallion appeared before me and told me the same thing. He even went so far as to call himself ‘the exposition’ of its play.”

“Indeed. But it was more than that. Whatever that thing was, it was actually forced to follow the story. It was more like it cast each pony and itself as a character and they had to fulfill those roles. I was the villain. You were meant to be the tragic hero and fail just before its victory.”

“Then why didn’t I?”

Luna looked away as if embarrassed. “Well…”

“Luna,” Celestia said sternly.

“When I burst into the throne room, I was still mostly in control of myself…”

Celestia raised an eyebrow as she realized just what that meant. “Then what was that first fight about? Could you not simply say something?”

“I was desperate. I couldn’t risk you becoming infected. It was a stupid idea and I couldn’t even be sure it would work…”

“Luna!” Celestia said as she made her sister look her in the eye. “What did you do?”

Luna blushed lightly. “I… I gave you a ‘plot shield.’”

Celestia gazed into the distance, a small, disapproving frown on her face as her eyes glazed over.

“…Tia?” Luna asked tentatively. “Are you alright?”

“I’m going to bed…” Celestia said as she turned and slowly made her way towards Canterlot.

Luna looked up to the sun and moon in the sky and took the liberty of lowering the sun. She looked to Ponyville and sighed. “I’ll start cleaning up then.”

~~~~~

At the same time in Canterlot, Mayor Mare awoke to the tune of several guards pointing swords at her. She put her forelegs up in surrender and froze in place. She had no idea where she was or how she got there or why her whole body ached and felt like the weight of an entire building had been placed on her back.

“What have you done to the princess’s bedchambers?” one of the guards demanded.

She looked around and noticed a bed that was just a mess. The rest of the room fared no better. It made no sense. Somehow she had apparently broken into the castle and wrecked Celestia’s bedroom and judging from the pain she felt, a whole lot more. None of which she could remember. But it wasn’t even a Saturday.