The Ancient Lords...They called them gods once unknowing of their true nature beyond their perceptions. The being before her was older than all.

"Selene...Nightmare...Luna..." it uttered, the midnight blue equine flinching in surprise. "Goddess...Night-bringer...Usurper. What brings you to our Shimmering Void child?"

"Who...What are you?" she asked us, too scared for her speak to devolve into middle equish for the time being.

"You don't remember us...Few of your kind do. After all, your sister wouldn't allow it," it chided "You've met us before, less than a day ago in fact, you know us as Animad," her fear was apparent in her eyes as her irises contracted to pinpricks. She shook her head refusing to accept the truth before her.

"No...No. How could no one have known about you?" she screamed in frustration at more at herself holding her head in her hooves seeking comfort and refuge away from us and the piercing gaze of our slumbering eyes searching for any explanation for how this could have eluded her, the sovereign of dreams and keeper of night.

"We have been here longer than you believe Luna, we were there at your birth... We were there at the birth of Discord and the Age Of Chaos...And we were there when you and your sister struck us down and dragged our corpse across the void for the millenia since the end of our age,"

She slowly lifted her head from her hooves and looked at us. The stars shimmered upon us as nubulae came and went upon our ethereal wings, wings that enveloped the seemingly petite and fragile world she called home. In its orbit was two orbs of light surrounded by the remains of smaller but still vast creatures surrounding it. "Your...But your supposed to be dead...We killed you!"

"Even dead gods dream,". We couldn't help but laugh at what she had said. She had honestly believed for almost ten thousand years that she had killed us that day. That she had proven her power to us by robbing us of the night sky at the end of our forgotten war. "You believe yourself to be victorious? You believe yourself capable of even harming us? You are not the valiant hero in some grand tale that will win you back the love of Equestria. You are but a pawn shaped from the ashes of gods to fill a role. You believe yourself to be independent, even after you cast us out you have been nothing but a puppet to The Tree of Harmony and the Lord it embodies, kept around until you were no longer needed," we could feel her self-doubt and regret rush through her as she shook under the force of our words, the suppressed pain and anger of a thousand years of standing in the shadow of another, the anger at the knowledge that deep down she knew that what we said was true. A weak mind is so much easier to break.

Our mind stretched out towards hers, pressing against its cracks and faults forcing ourselves deeper into it tearing away at its supports and crushing its foundations. "The world you hold so dear will not last. You did not defeat us, merely slowed us down. The skies will burn bright as ashes fill the air, the dead and dying will rise thirsting for the souls of the living. We will rise to impose order upon your precious world through its glorious destruction. Our return is as inevitable of death...As inescapable as fate.Long after you have drawn your final breath we will endure, waiting beyond the veil to consume the mortals you guard. There is nothing you can do to stop the Blackmarch," The small shaking form of the Princess of night shook and sobbed softly.

"No!" she yelled in stark defiance "I will not let you hurt them!" her horn glowed shades of blue as she charged a spell intending to harm us in some way, hoping that she could in some way stop us.

What we said to her next crushed the sputtering embers of hope that still lived inside her. "Why bother? You have no purpose outside of what we give you," we said to her as tears flowed freely down her muzzle dripping into the nothingness below. "You are a loose end, a failure. We have no further use for you," her horn dimmed as her mind began to fade "Let go...And embrace the void", and at that moment we broke through into her mind.

She felt no pain, no want in heart and no need in her soul. For she had hidden herself away deep inside her psyche where the outside world could not hurt her, where our words could not burn her. Though her body remained her mind had run off to the darkest and most secluded parts of her mind, and outside in the world of the woken mortals her coat changed as its many shades of blue faded away. We had not broken her, we had merely applied pressure to the cracks in her mind formed by millennia of neglect and a want for love that she would never gain now. Her body drew breath, would respond to stimuli and digest nutrients, but she was anything but alive now. Her soul had moved on.

She was a husk, no more useful than she had been to us two minutes ago.

"Pathetic," that was all we said as we cast out the shattered remnants of her mind from ours own. One more annoyance had been removed. Another step in our plane completed. With one of the Triarchs removed we began the next step. We pushed our mind against the veil, prodding and twisting at it pushing our thought into the world. Across the continent ponies awoke, ponies descended from the Priests of Order. Throughout the continent our call was heard.

"Rise," that was all they heard before they vanished

Far across the land ponies were shocked from their slumber unable to resist the call of their Lord. Earth pony, pegasi and unicorn vanished as their marks changed to grey star bursts with a single unblinking eye formed over it. Wives and husbands disappeared from their beds, children suddenly falling from their mother's embrace as she vanished, law makers blinking from existence in the middle of planning their new laws. All of them disappeared only to materialise in the Nightmare Wastes near the abandoned temple within.

They began rebuilding. Boulders, rubble and bones were swept away to make room for new pillars and foundations, the sparse life their was removed to make way for new structures.Even half built it was a magnificent feat of architecture, great spires reached out to the heavens and spikes dug deep to the earth to hold it it in place, great black walls were raised to push back the world. Our remaining temple would soon stand tall in the great wastes of Draconia.

No thought existed outside of our own, they built and toiled to bring back our presence to the world. Our Cult of Order would be built anew guided by High Priestess Silver Script.

We awoke in our chambers, finding ourself alone, we looked outside and saw that it was still dark.

"Well, seems our work here is done" we said to ourself as we walked out of our room. "Now to make sure that we will be followed," we said as we made our way across the hall.

The sun rose slowly as Celestia gently pushed the solar orb into the sky bringing with it the start of the new day. We saw confusion make its way onto her face at the sight of the moon and stars still hanging in the sky. That confusion became concern as she made her way to her sister's chambers only to find her gone, after all it would make sense for her to sleep during the day when she had to raise the moon at the days end. Yet she wasn't there. We saw her start running from room to room looking for her unable to find her. She kept running until she happened to run into the elements minus young Rarity.

"Twilight have you seen my sister by any chance?"

The lavender mare shook her head in reply "No, have you seen Rarity?"

"I can not say I have, maybe their in the throne-" Before she could finish her sentence a piercing wail was heard from the aforementioned throne-room, the six mares ran towards the source to the scream. Celestia flew ahead of the rest and burst through the door hooves first, and immediately regretted it.

Scattered across the room were the bodies of Lunar and Solar guards lying motionless on the across the room, their eyes white voids, and their fur muted shades of what they used to be. Seated upon the throne was the lifeless husk of the princess of the night her hair lying limp against her face hiding the same void in her eyes that looked towards the body of Rarity lying at her feet. Their souls had departed, moved on from their physical shells to join us beyond the veil.

Celestia shook in place tears streaming down her eyes, sorrow and rage visible on in her eyes as she saw the symbol scorched into the wall above the throne. An eye imposed over a starburst with text written in bold capitals above it.

BLACKMARCH AWAITS

Author's Note

Why yes, I did just kill best pony.
Please don't hurt me.

Six little ponies who saved many lives
One was lost in slumber and then there were five