Nightmare's End

by Iamawesome

Rating: everyone
Tags: Adventure, Sad
Length: 1631

When Nightmare Moon enters Ponyville at the end of her banishment, she is not alone. Deep inside her consciousness the remnants of Princess Luna remain, hopeless and unnable to interfere.

The day Luna dreaded for a millennium has come: The thousandth Summer Sun Celebration. The time of a Nightmare once again set free.

Luna's only hope is a quick end, for there is no reasoning with the Nightmare: She is everything Luna is not.

Luna is sure that Celestia knows so. She will strike both of them down, given the chance. And if there is anything Luna can hope to accomplish in the time left to her, it is providing her that chance.

With what is at stake, Celestia wouldn't try something foolish, would she?

Cover Art by Cherkivi

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2014-11-03 21:32:51 UTC

The Stars Shall Aid In Her Escape

For the first time in decades Luna stirred.

Slowly her consciousness came back from the deep meditational sleep she had seccludet to during her banishment.

A brief moment long she tried to shift her weight and get up from sleeping position.

She couldn't. Even if she had a body - which she had not, since her essence had been merged with her celestial sphere - she would have had no control.

She used to have control, once. Once before she had given in to her foolishness. Once before she had let jealousy and hatred take over her actions. Once before she had willingly handled her body to what had been her downfall:

The Nightmare

Now she could only watch. Watch and talk. Not that it made much sense talking to the Nightmare.

Of cause she had tried it.

As soon as the full extend of her actions had hit her she had tried to talk her out of it. She had begged her to leave her body, to spare Equestria, to spare her sister. But it was of no use. What could she possibly offer the Nightmare? She had control. She had a body.

And Luna... had nothing.

Persuading her was of no use either. Luna had made sure of that herself.

The darkness had given her power, but the being it had created was a poor, grotesque image of herself. It had inherited some of her minor attributes, but in every way that mattered it was her exact opposite.

Thus the problem wasn't that she despised Celestia too much. On the contrary. Had Luna truly hated Celestia, then maybe the Nightmare wouldn't have been as bad.

The truth was that despite her former words and actions she loved her sister as much as one could love a sister. If only she had realized this earlier, when she could still change things.

Instead, in her fit of jealousy she had had given birth to to an abomination that twisted Luna's love into the worst hatred possible.

Luna could only watch and talk.

And since she could not talk the Nightmare out of an hatred that made up the very core of her existence, she had watched.

Watched as the Nightmare had first refused to lower the moon.

Watched as she, despite her pleadings attacked Celestia in an attempt to kill her.

Watched as she had driven Celestia up to the point where only one option was left:

Destroying the Nightmare, even if that meant killing Luna with her.

Or so she had thought.

Celestia had brought up the Elements of Harmony against them, a weapon that even the Nightmare was powerless against.

But then in a moment of weakness, she had let mercy rule her actions and imprisoned them in the moon instead of ending them.

Luna knew she should be grateful, but she couldn't.

Her sister's act of mercy had only delayed the inevitable and given the Nightmare a second chance for Equestria.

Even worse, this time they could not count on the Elements, since they had been rendered to useless stones. In fact, that they had worked in fist place was a miracle itself. The Elements were no conventional power enhancing artefacts. They required friendship between two or more ponies to actually work. Since she could not do much else in her trapped form, Luna had pondered for decades about how Celestia had been able to banish them without the help of a second bearer. Her best shot was that her own consonance with Celestia's goal had created the necessary harmony for the Elements to work, but she had a feeling that she would never really know.

No matter why they had miraculously worked the last time didn't matter though, since they had gone inert. Their connection to her and Celestia had snapped. This time they wouldn't be there and save the day.

This time Celestia would have to do it the hard way and fight the Nightmare herself.

Luna had made a plan to make sure she would succeed and if it was the last thing she did.

On a rather sad note, it probably - and hopefully - would be the last thing she would do, even if she succeeded.

Soon

At the back of her mind, in the place where dreams are born, Luna felt the Nightmare awaken.

She too must have felt their prison fade. Luna could feel her quivering with anticipation.

In a few minutes, they would be let loose on Equestria once again.

Her gaze drifted down towards the continent.

During their absence Celestia had created a paradise. The land thrived. The ponies were happy. The three races almost equal.

It all hurt even more than a sunburned dystrophy would have had.

She doesn't need me for ruling. She probably did a better job alone than both of us together all the time.

Still, this was not the time for jealousy. After all, Luna had turned down the road to darkness by herself.

Maybe, Luna thought, if she managed to stop Nightmare Moon from destroying Celestia's world, ponies would be able to remember her for something good too and not just her crimes.

Soon! Free!

So she had fully awakened too. Luna kind of dreaded it, but she would have to hold this conversation. It was better to start by her self that wait for her counterpart to make her move.

**Nightmare Moon!* Are you really that excited about going down there and get your ass kicked once more?*

Oh? Our sweet dinky princess Loonie has something to say?, the answer shot back, just as Luna had expected

Don't belittle us when we are more than twice as old, Nightmare.

In years maybe, but not in experience. You are pathetic!

You are one to talk about experience. You spend about two days before you got banished up here.

At least I didn't spend a millennium sucking the hooves of Celestia.

You didn't? Maybe you should. It might teach you a bit humility

'Humility' Such a fine word. And yet it means nothing. What use is it to be humble when both of us know, that I am the rightful ruler of this world.

Dream on Nightmare. The right to rule comes from acceptance of the ruled, not from power.

You are such a hypocrite. If that were true, I wouldn't even exist. You yourself created me to take Equestria for you, so do not come me with Celestia's false justifications for her weak rule.

It was not exactly my proudest moment. But at least I learned from my mistakes and did not spend a whole millennium trapped, just to repeat them the moment I get set free again.

My only mistake was to - Nightmare Moon's attempted retort was cut short when the last remnants of the magic binding them to the moon faded.

Finally free again!

The wave of euphoria from Nightmare Moon was strong enough to spill over through their mental connection. Had she inhabited a body that moment, Luna would have puked.

The dark craters that had decorated the moon's surface for a full thousand years and been the subject of endless stories, tales and dreams simply vanished when Nightmare Moon pulled their essence free from the celestial body.

Not a second later they appeared as a purple cloud of energy in the night sky above Canterlot, accompanied by a sonic boom. Nightmare Moon wasted no time and immediately propelled them on a step trajectory down to the palace hanging high above the city.

It took not long for her to make out Celestia's tower and rematerialize her pony form in front of the entrance. A powerful whip of magic send one of the two guards in front of the door tumbling aside.

The other was picked up by a cyan energy field and levitated right in front of Nightmare Moon's snout.

"Where is Princess Celestia?"

"I won't tell -"

Nightmare Moon slithered around his suspended form an whispered into his ear: "Oh. You won't tell. I believe you will. They all do, in time."

"No"

"You should reconsider your opinion. You really don't want to mess with me, my little pony" Her expression turned to a sneer at that last bit.

"I only serve her royal highness, Celestia! I am not afraid of you."

"So you are one of the brave ones. Not afraid of anything. Do you really believe, you can resist me? I am a Nightmare. I am not here to instil fear, I am fear itself. So tell me what I want to know!"

Her eyes began to glow with merciless white light while the pony in front of her struggled to escape the faceless horrors she had planted into his mind. She left him in this state for about a minute before ceasing her mental assault.

"Do you ant to tell me now? You really don't have to go through this. Who would Celestia be to ask of you to go through this pain anyway? Tell me and you will be released."

"Never"

"So it be"

She resumed her mind-magic.

This time it only lasted for a few second though, before Nightmare Moon somehow felt her grasp on his thoughts slip.

"What -"

"I've been expecting you, Sister."

Nightmare Moon whirled around to find Celestia standing not twenty meters behind her, with her wings spread out and her horn alight with the same golden glow that covered the closed eyes of the now sleeping guard.

"You!", Nightmare Moon snarled while sending the guard still suspended beside her into the the next wall with a telekinetic burst. Yet before he hit, he was caught in another golden field and levitated behind Celestia.

"Cease this foolishness at once."