A War for Friendship

Chapter 6 - The Darkness, Light, and Friendship

The destruction of the Elements hits a heavy blow to the ponies’ confidence. It happened before: by the hooves of Night Mare Moon. But could the Elements receive another hit by a more powerful force than hers and still be able to be restored? One thing remains certain: Ignis feels more confident than ever, knowing that he prevented history to repeat itself. He won’t stop at nothing until he has defeated Princess Celestia in a duel, willing to take everything from her.

But with her plan busted, will the princess still have a chance against him?

'Princess Celestia, I just can’t let you continue with this! At least let us help you!' Twilight begs to her mentor. It is a hard thing for Twilight to accept that everypony’s beloved princess is really going in combat with this brute, without a back-up plan.

'No, Twilight Sparkle. You and the others must stay here,' Celestia makes clear to her and the others. 'Stay with your friends.'

She looks over her shoulder to her loyal student, who looks desperatly in her eyes. Twilight has already seen how her friends and her brother have bitten the dust before Lord Ignis. She cannot accept the chance that it could happen to the princess as well.

'As long as you have your friends, and won’t give in to despair, Ignis will never succeed,' Celestia assures her and shows a smile, hoping to have comforted her pupil enough. Twilight shakes her head in denial, still unable to accept that Celestia plans to do battle with this warhorse. Celestia gives Twilight a slight wink before she turns her attention to the impatient Ignis. 'It will all be alright,' she whispers to the purple mare and starts to walk towards the armored alicorn, ready to face him.

Twilight still worries for the sake of her mentor, but also has faith in her promise. If the princess promises that everything will be rigth, it WILL be alright. Taking a deep breath, Twilight calms down as her friends hurry to her side, worried for Twilight's health. 'Ok…, we won’t interfere,' she whispers.

The friends stand close to each other for moral support, while they are forced to stay and watch at how their princess will take on the monster that managed to beat five of them, ten royal guards and Shining Armor without any effort.

'Still eager to take me on? If you would just surrender your rank, I wouldn’t feel forced to harm you… much. he jokes, making him laugh of his own cruel joke. 'Take a final look around you, Celestia. It’s the last time that you will see Equestria at peace! We both know that you can’t rise above me in combat! History will be justified for what you did to me!'

Celestia shakes her head in dissagreement. 'I did what I had to do, for the sake of my sister, the ponies of Equestria and myself,' the white mare claims. 'And I would do it again just as easy! You will never take this land back, Ignis! Now that friendship had the chance to bloom after you were gone, it will never be pushed away by you!” she shouts from her heart, believing every word that she just spoke.

Ignis responds by spitting on the ground. 'Maybe it will, maybe it won’t,' he grunts. But like friendship: hatred will never disappear as well. So I’ll take my chances.'

'Now show me! Show me all the cunning you learned these past centuries! Prove to me if you can truly rise above me, or fail trying!' he shouts at her and begins to charge, pointing his horn in the princess' direction.

Just as the stallion gets close to the mare, they both take off, ready for a duel that will result into one of the two futures of Equestria.

***

The battle of Equestria takes forever. A duel of immeasurable levels, preformed by the Princess of the Sun and the Harbringer of Hatred. An alicorn of darkness against an alicorn of the light: Both desperate to claim victory. Ignis’ impenetrable armor gives him a huge advantage, making him invincible against physical combat. But it gives the advantage of speed to Celestia, no matter how quick the stallion still is. The mare's advanced knowledge of magic also gives helps her to fight from a distance, giving her a fair chance against the brutal alicorn, that fights solely on his own rage.

Their conflict is so enlightened by their power, that the pitch-black cloud start to create a crimson-red hue, affected by the magic powers that clash with each other in the air. As the opponents fly in circles in the sky, Celestia uses magic to keep Ignis distanced from her, creating several flashes of light that fend off her pursuer. At the same time, they must both look out for the solid-hard clouds that hang in their way. Completely focused on their goals, they parry and fight with all they have to offer, while maneuvering around the clouds in speed and elegance.

Celestia starts to realize that simply keeping him at distance will not end the battle in her favor eventually, only making her exhausted from staying one hoofstep ahead of the stallion. An unexpected move: Celestia suddenly changes her direction and charges towards Ignis, clearly leaving herself open to an attack of the speeding crimson stallion.

'Tired of running, Princess?' Ignis asks with a smile, expecting that she made a big mistake by closing their distance like this.

Right before the moment of impact, Celestia avoids him, having missed the painful spikes of Ignis' armor by mere inches. In the split seconds that she passes him, she uses the magic from her horn to scrape over his armor, resulting in a large cut of white energy. She has thrown an attempt in crushing the armor. The light is so intense, that it lights the plains in a bright white radiance, causing the mares below to cover their eyes. When the light fades, Celestia looks behind her, noticing how Ignis is surprised and staggared by her move. The dark alicorn looks at his armor, afraid of the same result as Celestia hopes for. But as they watch at how the white slash vanished, it's clear that Ignis is still unscathed, proving it's power against magic as well.

'What is this, Celestia? You’re not holding back on me, are you? Or have the years of peace taken its toll on your skills?' Ignis laughs at her, making a fool out of her by her failed attempt.

But Celestia remains focused, thinking of making her next move.

'Don’t you hate me enough?' Ignis teases her. 'It’s thanks to me that little Luna sealed you away and destroyed the Elements of Harmony for the 1st time! You should be furious to see me turning your kingdom into my personal playground!'

Celestia is still quiet, while her horn starts to glow faintly again. She focusing on a new spell. Ignis makes one more attempt to provoke her, wanting her to try and get close to him again so he can strike back. 'If that isn’t enough to make your blood boil… Then maybe I should brainwash your little protégée next?'

That last sentence was the last threat that makes Celestia go into action, feeling furious about the alicorn's wish to make everything she cares for bitter. The royal mare vanishes in a flash, similar to the teleportation technique that Twilight knows. It has effect; Ignis is once again surprised by the same technique. He knows that Celestia hasn't left the area, simply from the fact that it would mean she forfeits. When he listens and hears a sound behind him, he turns around to see. It was Celestia, waiting for the moment that Ignis would turn around, making him vulnerable to the blinding radiance that she radiates from her horn.

'-Argh!-” he growls, blinded by the bright light.

Before Ignis even gets a chance to recover from the blinding, Celestia starts flying in rapid circles around him, while shoots magical chains from her horn. The chains don't seem to have an end, continuing to spew forth out of Celestia's magic spell, entangling Ignis completely from neck to hoof. Unable to see or flap his wings, the stallion is back in the merciless grip of gravity, causing him to fall down.

The young mares can't keep their eyes of the heated battle, feeling joy when Celestia has managed to turn the tables so suddenly.

'Wow! D-Did you see that? That move looked so awesome!' Rainbow Dash jumps in the air cheering with her friends, who also look happy at how Celestia is standing her ground flawlessly.

But Celestia knows that it wasn't enough assure her the victory. While Ignis plummets down to the ground, he blinks a few times to get his eyes adjusted from the light that blinded him. When he looks up in the sky, at the way Celestia continues to watch at how helpless he is, Ignis has had enough of these jokes.

'Pitiful…,” Ignis sighs unimpressed, beginning to resist the chains that bind him. the stallion breaks his chains effortlessly and stretches his wings to bring a halt to his fall, right before he hits the ground.

Rainbow Dash stops her cheering, along with her friends, when she sees how Ignis recovers unscatched. The blue pegasus quickly lands back on the ground before anypony notices her, knowing now that this fight is far from over. Ignis hurries back in the air, hoovering just like Celestia at the same height.

'That was ineffective, yet an impressive move, Celestia. It brings back memories: A backstab… something you’re so good at,' Ignis compliments her, being snappy about their past. 'How did it feel? To let out that hatred you harbor for me?'

Celestia gently shakes her head in denial. 'I don’t hate you, Ignis. It’s true that I will never forgive you for what you did to my sister, and what you would do to anypony else just as easily. But every time I picture you, I’m reminded of what hatred leads one to...,' she sighs dissapointed in the stallion's nature. 'You will never learn from your mistakes... You will always remain alone until the end of your days… Theoretically speaking: you are nothing but a parasite now…The only thing I feel for you, Ignis, is pity…'

Ignis looks like he’s struck by lightning: His ears twitch from anger, his muscles flex out of rage, and his eyes glare in immeasurable fury at her. Celestia has managed to enrage the Harbringer of Hatred.

'Pity… Pity? PITY?!' he shouts at her with ear-deafening volume. 'How dare you pity me! I should be the one to pity YOU! I will take you and your kingdom down to rubble, just like I did with those blasted Elements!'

He begin to ascend quickly, flying to a height where the mares on the ground can barely see him, while Celestia doesn't hesitate to give chase. When he has reached the pinnacle of the air, the border of the dark clouds, Ignis halts in mid-air. Breathing deeply by the uncontrollable rage that crawls through his head, the alicorn's horn begins to glow.

'I will turn Equestria back-' he gasps and snarls, as a flame-shaped radiance starts to grow around his horn.

Celestia doesn’t stop speeding towards him, knowing exactly what Ignis is up to.

'-into a raging wasteland!' the stallion shouts, launching an enormous fireball, the size of a house, towards Celestia.

The flame is so bright, that it could rival the sun's rays. The entire area is lit up in a fire-red hue as the fireball speeds down to the ground, with Celestia flying between it. It doesn’t stop the mare from charging onwards though. She keeps flying up, right towards the incoming danger. Before she gets too close, she uses her time to channel a new spell, causing her horn to glow bright-white.

'WATCH OUT!' Twilight shouts, terribly afraid for the princess' fate. Her heart is pounding without control in her chest. Her friends share her fears, all sweating by both the heat from the flame and the stress.

With a mighty swing of her glowing horn, she strikes the fire, causing it to splice into several smaller flares, which rain into all directions. The fireballs move towards the surprised mares, making them gasp in panic. As they are ready to jump around to save their skin, Twilight steps in with her magic. Though panicking for the princess' well-being a moment ago, she manages to douse the flames before it gets the chance to get close to her friends, keeping everypony safe.

Before Celestia has time to turn her attention back to the her opponent, she is struck by Ignis, who bashes his shoulder plate against her side, causing the princess the fall several feet down before recovering.

'-Ah!-' she gasps, reaching the limit of her power.

When Twilight managed to prevent the fields to become a raging hellfire by the few remaining flares, with the help of her friends, she looks back at the princess, growing more and more worried for her sake. While the mares continue to look at the possible endless fight, anxious about how their beloved princess is fighting a losing battle, they don’t notice a small figure approaching them.

'T-Twilight!' a voice yells to the six friends.

They all hear the familiar voice and look over their shoulders, notice the little creature that approaches them.

'Spike!' Twilight gasps, both happy and worried, seeing how the exhausted dragon carries a box all the way to this desolated place.

They all forget about the battle for a moment and hurry to the young dragon, surprised to see him here.

'What are you doing?! It’s dangerous here!' Twilight scolds him.

Spike ignores her for a moment and drops on the ground, catching his breath. 'B- *pant* But I had to! Princess Celestia asked me to hurry to here!' he coughs. 'This-This fight. It was all part of her-' he tries to explain, only to be interrupted by a loud crash that is heard behind the girls.

Twilight is afraid of the possible reason, slowly turning her head around to look. Though everypony else gasps, Twilight is speechless, realizing that the crash was caused by the white mare, who has lost the energy to keep herself in the air. Princess Celestia is nearing the point where she can barely stand, let alone fight anymore. Coughing from the dust that gets in her lungs, the white mare looks at her faithfull subjects.

'Pr-Princess Celestia…,'Twilight whispers softly, as a tear rolls over her cheek.

A shadow of the terrible stallion descends to her, laughing about the tragedy. '-Hahaha!- What’s wrong Celestia? You sounded so confident a moment ago. Has despair finally caught up to you?' Ignis pesters the exhausted princess.

In a second of time, Twilight wants to rush to Celestia. She wants to do SOMETHING. But Spike quickly grabs hold on her tail purple with pink tail, attempting to stop her.

'Let me go, Spike!' she whimpers. 'I have to help her!'

Spike is keeping her away from the tall alicorns, using the last bits of energy he has left. 'And you can! You all can!' he shouts to her. 'Just calm down and hear me out!'

Twilight is at a breaking point where all the nerves in her head feel shattered, preventing her to think straight and struggle any further. She gives in to her assistant's efforts, turning around to him.

'Wh-What do you mean?' she stutters.

Spike takes a deep breath before he begins to explain everything. 'Princess Celestia foresaw that Ignis arrived, when he used the Royal Canterlot Voice across all of Equestria. The moment you went to search for Celestia, you couldn’t find her at Canterlot-'

'Yea, because she went searching for us in Ponyville,' Applejack interrupts him. 'We passed each other unnoticed.'

Spike shakes his head. 'She didn’t miss you. She avoided you on purpose!'

The mares can hardly believe their ears. Why in Equestria's name would the princess avoid them in a time of crisis? Right now she's about to lose a fight that means the end of peace as they all know it. Then what is it that makes her avoid them and keep Canterlot uninformed?

Spike tries to tell them, growing annoyed by the interruptions. 'She came looking for me to hand me this!' the purple dragon tells them as he opens the box he was carrying with him, which seems to contain five necklaces and a crown.

They can't believe their eyes: In the box are the Elements of Harmony, intact!

'Spike, Why- How?' they ask in wonder, baffeled and confused.

Spike takes a few seconds to catch some more air, still tired of the extremely long distances he's been running.

'B-because she knew that Ignis would never keep an eye out to me! The princess entrusted me the Elements and told me to go to this place as quickly as possible,' he gasps. 'Princess Celestia made him think that he destroyed the Elements, the only things that ever defeated him, to lower his guard! She thinks that if Ignis knew, he would be far harder to be stopped with the Elements’ power! But now that she distracted and tired him down, YOU get the chance to stop him!'

Celestia's brilliance and cunning has once again been proven to the mares. The girls are silenced by the positive realization that they still have a chance to stop Ignis. This whole time, Celestia knew what she was doing, and devised this plan to make sure that Ignis would be stopped for certain. Her trust in everypony has led all to this: the point where friendship can defeat its opposite: hatred. Twilight looks behind her at Ignis, who continues to gloat over his victory.

'Let’s do it,' Twilight tells her friends, showing them a grin on her face. Lord Ignis won't know what hit him, until it's too late.

Ignis finishes laughing. 'All these years… I couldn’t think of anything but how I would take you down,' he sighs.

Celestia raises her head in order to look him in the eye. 'You... always were a hothead, Ignis. You were always so full of yourself.... Always believing that you’re invincible…'

He gives a chuckle in satisfaction, believing that the white mare would only speak like this when it means her defeat. 'As of today, Celestia, you will address me as LORD Ignis,' he corrects her. 'You outsmarted me last time. And now you thought that I wasn’t smart enough to devise a scheme to draw you out, destroy those pesky Elements, and succeed in dominating this land once more,'

While Ignis continues to gloat and cheer about his victory over the princess, the Mane Six put on their respective element. The stallion is completely vulnerable: Drunk with power and tired from the fight.

Applejack puts on the Element of Honesty.

'I always was the greater alicorn. The only reason you beat me was by suddenly betraying me with Discord’s help! Without the Elements of Harmony, or even the element of surprise, you are nothing against me!'

Fluttershy puts on the Element of Kindness.

'Night Mare Moon may have failed to take out the Elements. But at least I learned through her eyes how to crush them for good! Your sister proved most useful as my binoculars! -Hahaha!-'

Pinkie Pie puts on the Element of Laughter.

'But no worries, my dear Celestia... You and your sister will be together forever… in a dungeon! Let’s see how you will feel to be sealed up for so long!'

Rarity puts on the Element of Generosity.

'Discord, the rat, will be a useful tool again… as stone doorstopper for my front door!'

Rainbow Dash puts on the Element of Loyalty.

'Face it, Celestia-'

And finaly: Twilight puts on the crown of the Element of Magic.

'-You lose.'

When the princess suddenly begins to smile at him, Ignis is caught off-guard. He notices the six bright lights that appear in the corner of his eyesight, originating from behind him. Before he even gets the chance to look, chains of different colors shoot out to Ignis from all direction, ensnaring him around his legs. Ignis gasps in surprise at the chains, unable to comprehend what is happening.

'Wh-What in the blazes?!' he gasps, unable to break the colorful chains.

He looks away from Celestia, checking over his shoulder what is going on, and notices how the six young mares are channeling the power of the real Elements of Harmony, ready to save Equestria from the Harbringer of Hatred. His yellow eyes widen from horror, unable to accept the truth.

'I destroyed them! I DESTROYED THEM!' Ignis screams in denial, using all his might in an attempt to free himself from the powerful chains. The harder he pulls, the stronger the grip becomes. Eventually he has to give in, causing him to be pulled to the ground.

Celestia slowly stands up again, still a little dizzy from the beating she got. But aside her injuried, the princess can only smile, glad to know that the danger has been stopped.

'You destroyed a fake. You made the same mistake like when you used my sister as your puppet,' she sighs and continues to stare down at the struggling stallion. 'YOU tried to turn my sister into an even greater monster than you. It was YOU who forced her to become Night Mare Moon when she had that one moment of anger. It was YOU who forced me to banish my own sister for a thousand years... I will never forgive you for that, Ignis.'

'-Graagh!-' Ignis screams, unable to do anything but growl in rage, feeling how the chains bind him like snakes.

'You are still the evil stallion from when we last saw each other,' she continues to confront him. 'Magical banishment is the only way Equestria will ever be safe from the likes of you...'

Ignis stops resisting and glares at Celestia as he bares his teeth. He only has a few moments left before the Elements of Harmony will be unleashed. 'I hate you, Celestia! I HATE YOU!-' He shouts as his final word, cut off as the Elements unleash their power as a massive tower of light of a yard wide, exploding from Ignis’ footing. The beam of light cuts through the previously immobile dark clouds, purging the sky clean from their shadow. Friendship enlightens the darkness in a flash, bringing all hope and sanity back to Equestria. As the light of friendship slowly fades, a bright white moon fills the night sky.

Even Ignis’ amazing power has no chance against a force like this.

***

Loud coughs are heard in the dust, blocking the sight of every pony that stands in it. Unable to find each other, the mares and dragon are simply wandering around, trying to get the group back together.

'Is everypony alright?' Twilight shouts into the dust.

'I am.'

'Yes.'

'Yup.'

'I think so.'

'Me too!'

'-cough- yea.'

Six voices confirm.

'Good to hear,' Twilight sighs and smiles, glad to hear everypony is alright, even though she can't see further than a few feet distance. 'Follow my voice, girls. I am over-' she tries to lead, but gets interrupted by the cheerful voice of Pinkie Pie.

'Marco!' she shouts, making a game out of the situation.

'Eh... Polo?' a boy’s voice responds.

'Spike? Spike, Is that you?' Twilight continues to search.

'Yea, I’m right over- Hey! Carefull, Pinkie!' he tells the pink mare, after she accidently stepped on his spiky tail.

After a while of searching, they finaly manage to come to one point, all a still shaky of the previous event.

'Did…Did we win?' Fluttershy anxiously asks.

Applejack nods. 'I’d like to see that hothead come unscathed from this,' she tells her with a grin of satisfaction on her face.

'Then, it’s over! We won!' Twilight sighs relieved, glad to have no need to be so stressful and worried anymore.

'Yay! -cough cough-' Pinkie tries to cheer, but stops when she breathes too much dust in her lungs. Rarity hits her hoof a few times on Pinkie’s back in order to get the dust out of her system. She would like to suggest to get out of this mess as quickly as possible, mostly because she's afraid that it will mess up her mane.

'Let’s go,' Twilight suggest. 'We got to find Princess Celestia and-'

'I hate you…' the mare suddenly hears. The voice came from an unseen distance in the dust. Wherever it came from, it sonds very close by.

'I hate you…' the voice repeats. The other mares hear it too, feeling alarmed right away. they all recognize the voice, which causes a chill to crawl down their spines.

Fluttershy cowers and shivers in fear, knowing that it's not over. 'No…,' she whimpers.

'I-hate- you-all-SO-MUCH!' the voice screams, followed by a storm that razes through the dust.

The dust gets completely blown away by a strong current, having an unnatural timing. It's because it originated from the flaps of two powerful wings, attached to an exhausted, furious crimson-red alicorn.

'It’s Ignis!' Rarity shrieks, right before she faints from terror. Spike hurries to catch her before she hits the ground, feeling sort of glad to be of help to the pretty mare.

The others gasp in fright at Ignis, having endured the power of the Elements of Harmony, the power of friendship. Though it did seem that it did a number on him, because the stallion looks completely broken, lying on the ground between the fragments of his so called unbreakable armor. Coughing from exhaustion and unable to stand up, his yellow eyes glare at every individual that look at him. If they couldn't already read it from his face, they could already hear from his snarls that he is fired up with unbridled rage.

'Your friendships… It’s all a lie! Friendship is nothing but a TOOL to make others feel miserable!' the stallion shouts at them as he, unsuccessfully, tries to pull himself up from the ground.

The ponies breath nervously from the stress over how the evil alicorn could have possibly not been stopped by the Elements completely, a feat no evildoer has ever managed to do before!

The only pony that isn't as surprised as the rest is Twilight Sparkle, who silently looks at the alicorn. She isn’t truly shocked over Ignis’ insanity, his rage, or the intimidating yellow eyes. Neither is she shocked over his threats.

But she is HORRIFIED by the shattering of his armor, revealing his Cutie Mark: A palette with a brush.