The Night Mare's Nightmare Night Nightmare

Chapters

Prologue - A Small-Town Haunting
I - Confection Defection
II - Overlooking the Obvious
III - Seeking Her Champion
IV - For Nightmare Night!

Prologue - A Small-Town Haunting

In all the years of her life, Princess Luna had never dreamed a dream of her own. Sleep had been silent. Blank. Her eyes shut and then opened hours later. Only as she grew into her alicorn powers did she learn of dreams.

They were wild things to her, and her first experience came as quite the surprise. She knew Celestia to act odd on occasion—pranks and mischief never outside the realm of reason—but at the time had never stopped to consider just how absurd it would have been to turn the entire castle into a giant ball pit. Their conversation the morning after was one she would never forget—much less her ability to peer into others’ dreams.

From that point on she came to realize her powers, seeing and manipulating the dreams of the ponies she ruled. All their night terrors, all their business meetings, all their school attendances in their undergarments. Always a pony slept somewhere in Equestria, and she lived their dreams every waking moment, relishing both the wacky and the worrisome.

But worrisome had been her own opinion on recent dreams. For never in her thousands of ruling years had they borne a collective narrative—a hive mind, even.

It started just a day ago, in the children. They dreamed of empty bags and unfilled buckets. Door handles towered, and parents towered further with shouts of anger and punishment. Dentists… the bane of all children.

Luna smacked her tongue, relishing the taste of their silly, little nightmares. Mmmm, bubblegum.

Though the children’s dreams tickled her palette, combined they left a certain leafy tang to the aftertaste, like parsley. It dwelled on the back of her tongue, a morsel that refused being swallowed. She figured the sudden upsurge in collective dreams must have been the culprit.

But why now? On the eve of the Nightmare Night season, what could be the explanation for such specific nightmares? Often she gave a nudge in the right direction to certain dreams, but never had she played such a direct hoof in so many, nor so near together. These were of the children’s doing.

Were they afraid of Nightmare Night?

Luna opened her eyes. She sat on her throne, the room a soft crystal blue in its want for light. Night Eye and Leather Wing stood at attention at the foot of her throne, unaware of her stirring. She glanced up at the stained glass at the far end of the hall. The sun had set. The moon was full.

It was time to hunt.

≈≈≈×≈≈≈

Come the turning of the leaves, Luna made a habit of slipping away in the deepest hours of the night. Her shadow slipped across Equestria in search of unsuspecting ponies. A couple on a moonlit stroll. A gang of curfew-breaking foals. It didn’t matter, so long as it wouldn’t lead to harm. In the season of Nightmare Night, everypony enjoyed a good scare. Or, at least, deserved one.

Nightmare Night had grown from a nation-wide respect for life’s delicacy, highlighted by what could have been a much darker reality. Luna had taken up the mantle—though in levity—as testament to her repentance, preserved the spirit of her past demons in hopes her transgressions would never be forgotten.

That, and scaring the withers off ponies was just plain fun.

That night’s withers of choice awaited her in Ponyville. It had been a while since her last Ponyville haunt, and the sight of the town brought a smile to her face. Its little thatched houses huddled together to stave off the autumnal chill, and their windows glowed warm with candlelight. The scent of the hearth lilted above their roofs as she glided over them, a shadow among shadows. The night was her talent, and it hid her well.

She moved invisible between buildings, nothing more than a wisp of smoke, prying, peeking in, searching for a mark. Under her domain the ponies of the town one by one retired to bed or were otherwise preparing.

One such pony turned out the lights and had just closed his eyes. He was a quick sleeper. Already she could feel him falling into the depths of her soul, his mind merging with hers—a fiddle player on a sailing ship.

A flicker of magic and Luna would have been inside to conjure her haunt, but the laughter of children caught her ear. Down the street, around the corner. Three or four of them. An opportunity she couldn’t miss.

She stole away in her shadow form to snake across the ground, the back of her mind twisting the dreams of the lucky stallion with thunderstorms and black cats.

The laughter grew louder at the corner of a flower shop, and she waited for them to near, poking a tendril around to see. There were indeed four of them. Happy, jaunty, without a care in the world. They each wore a mask: a goblin, a jack o’ lantern, a gargoyle, and a bat. It warmed her heart to see them enjoying the season, the night for the thrill of life it brought. But though she held it dear, she knew that little children had no place being out after bedtime. She withdrew and listened carefully.

The foals passed her by, their laughs and ‘rawr’s like music in the stillness of the night. Had she a mouth in her shadow form, Luna would have smiled.

She slipped around behind them, and with her magic conjured clouds to blot out the moonlight. They stopped in their tracks, looking up. The joy in their faces had evaporated like water in a desert, and their mouths hung open as if praying for rain.

A crack of thunder highlighted the worry growing on their faces, and a spark of magic brought mist rolling in through the streets. The children bunched up, back to back, teeth clenched. Luna needn’t look to know their fear—yellow eyes in the darkness, things skittering beyond sight. The imagination—daydreaming—was still within her realm, and she could see the images flashing through their heads as if they were her own.

Luna rose from the shadows, her magic projecting her size as a tide rising over them. Her eyes shone brighter than the full moon to their screams, and she crashed down upon them, dispersing into the mist.

Their shrieks abated as she reformed at the edge of sight, stepping forward with shining eyes. “Who dares disturb the sanctity of the night!?”

All but one of the foals trembled at the sight of her. The gargoyle leapt forward, a great, big smile behind his mask. “Princess Luna!”

She would have recognized that Trottingham accent anywhere, not to mention his tobiano coat. Though the frights were over, she continued her guise regardless.

“Pray tell, little Pipsqueak,” Luna commanded in a lower Voice. “Why art thou skulking about at such an hour? Thou shouldst be in bed.”

Pipsqueak turned his little gargoyle face back to his friends, shoulders slouched, then turned back. He rubbed his foreleg. “We… we snuck out.”

“Snuck out?” Luna questioned. “And disobeyed thy parents’ wishes of sleep?” Her voice, though booming, echoed only within the enshrouding mist, her magic maintaining the solemnity of the night outside.

“Y-yeah.” He cowed as if standing before the chopping block, but courage resurged. Every bit of him bespoke that he was in the right. “But we did it for a good reason!”

“Yeah!” his compatriots chimed in. A short glance silenced their cheers.

“We are listening,” Luna said.

His courage seemed to waver, turned more into desperation. “My mother says there won’t be another Nightmare Night!”

Say what? The veils about them collapsed, and Luna stared blankly at him. She spoke in a normal voice. “No Nightmare Night this year?”

“No! No more Nightmare Night ever!”

The others shouted their complaints, their ruckus causing a few nearby windows to light up.

Luna smirked. “Little Pipsqueak, that is absurd. We—err, I haven’t decreed anything of the sort.”

She felt her smile become strained. The collective dreams. Were they connected?

“Well, my mother says they’re going to partition the mayor and get rid of Nightmare Night!”

Partition? No, he must have meant ‘petition.’ Regardless, he seemed genuinely frightened, and not because of her.

“That’s why we snuck out of Sherry’s house,” he continued, pointing at the bat-mask filly. “We’re starting our own partition to keep Nightmare Night!” He grinned to the cheers of the others.

Luna smiled. Whatever was happening, she was glad to hear they were all for the season. But bedtime was still bedtime. She would figure out what he meant in the morning, when Celestia woke. “Nay, children. The dark of night is no place for you. I must ask that you return to your beds and await the morning.”

Her words ripped the wind from their sails. They ‘aww’ed in unison. “Do we have to?”

She nodded, her voice sympathetic but firm. “I am afraid so, children.”

“Um, Princess Luna.” Pipsqueak looked up at her with puppydog eyes. “We kind of snuck out the window, and we’ll get caught if we go back too early.”

“Yeah,” Sherry said. “My mommy said we had to be extra quiet tonight, because she drank too much mommy juice today.”

Luna blinked. Is that what they called it these days?

She shook her head. “So thou must sneaketh back in?” she said, changing the subject. Pipsqueak nodded, smiling. She could arrange that. “Show us the way.”

The children were more than happy to lead her home. They crossed a river, the cool churning of its stream a welcoming sound in lieu of the insects’ slow seasonal regression from the nightly atmosphere. Not far from it, they stopped before a small house. Luna guessed it to be a shade of red, what for the way the moonlight stripped away the colors of the world.

“We climbed down from there,” Pipsqueak said, pointing to a window. A rope of towels dangled from the open window, fluttering in the breeze. “You can just fly us up, can’t you?”

She could. But that would be too easy. Besides, this mommy juice mare needed a lesson in moderation, especially for her lack of it in front of the children.

“I have a better idea,” Luna said. “Wait here.” She stole into her shadow form and slipped beneath the cracks of the doorframe. The children gathered at the window to watch.

Inside, a gramophone crackled a slow, solemn tune. Old for sure, but not old enough for her to recognize. She flipped the lock open on the door and swept into the living room, where she found the mare dozing on the couch, floating on a cloud of tapioca pudding and cotton candy. What silly dreams some ponies had.

Behind the couch stood the liquor cabinet.

Soundless magic opened the glass doors, and out rolled a bottle to thud onto the carpet. The mare snapped to, staring apprehensively at the cabinet. Luna took form behind her, letting another bottle slip from its shelf to thud and roll away. Out the corner of her eye, she saw the children sneaking toward the stairs.

Concern grew apparent in the mare’s thoughts, smoke and shadows swirling in Luna’s breast. She took a tentative but wobbly step toward the cabinet, eyes dancing between the bottles still on the shelves, not seeing Luna’s reflection in the decorative mirror in the back of the cabinet. Another step. Just a little closer.

Luna let loose a bolt of lightning outside the window. The flash illuminated her in the darkness, a stark figure in the mirror, and she was gone from the house before the screams split the night.

Sobriety for the masses. A real-life dream she sought in passing. Accomplishing it while on a haunt was coincidental—two birds with one stone. Time to finish her rounds and then pay Celestia a visit. As absurd as Pipsqueak’s claim had sounded, it would be worth clarifying.

I - Confection Defection

It was still dark when Luna landed on the front steps of Canterlot Castle. Fillydelphia and Manehattan had provided no end to potential scares, and the clocktower belted out the three-quarter hour. A quick glance at it told her the sun would be rising shortly. The night guards stationed on either side of the door saluted her. She nodded at them, lighting her horn to open the great doors. She could have easily flown to Celestia’s balcony, but as the Princess of the Night, she was still in charge so long as the sun remained below the horizon, and there might have been business that needed tending to since her departure. She made a round to the great hall to check for visitors.

As it happened, a mare sat on one of the stone benches lining the great hall atrium—mid thirties if Luna had to guess. She was a plump, grumpy-looking thing. A wool houndstooth sweater hung about her like linen wraps about a mummy. Keeping in spirit with the season, it seemed; though, Luna couldn’t decide whether or not the white-and-green pattern did better or worse at accenting the pale green of her fur. The cane leaning against the bench had seen lighter days, and laugh lines abounded on her face. Or perhaps they were scowl lines, given the massive scowl she had fixed upon Luna. Any larger and it wouldn’t have fit, even with the extra room her jowls provided.

“Good morning, dear citizen,” Luna said. “May I assist you with something?”

“Where’s the princess?” She rested a hoof on top of a cream-colored box beside her, as if warning Luna it wasn't for her.

Luna did her best not to appear offended. The question was to the point, something she could appreciate despite her poor observations. Perhaps she simply forgot to wear her glasses. “Dear citizen, I am Princess Luna, Regent of the Night. Did you come for a hearing?”

“Where’s the real princess?” Somehow, she managed an even bigger scowl.

Luna’s mouth fell agape, but she recovered. One of Canterlot’s ‘finest,’ it seemed. She wondered what festering underbelly she had crawled out of to find herself here. Sewer rats made better acquaintances. And Luna hated rats. “Celestia will begin day court shortly,” Luna said, stoic. “She will be in after the sun rises.”

The mare humphed, turning away. Luna pursed her lips, glaring death upon the ungrateful swine. The desire to turn her into one wormed into her head, but Luna instead made for a side hallway before doing something she might have regretted. Better to simmer before bed than reignite old fears in the citizens. There was no changing some ponies. Some simply held onto their hatred till the very last.

The hallway took a roundabout path toward Celestia’s chamber. Portraits, doors, and suits of armor marked arbitrary distances along each bend. Though it had been two years, Luna still wasn’t familiar with her new home. She could have strolled through the old castle blindfolded, but Canterlot’s had been designed with servants and other personnel in mind. Too many side passages, not enough prank traps.

A few minutes found her before Celestia’s room. She rapped her hoof on the door and listened patiently for hoofsteps, though pretty certain they wouldn’t come readily. The sun still hadn’t risen yet, which meant neither had her sister.

She tapped her hoof on the marble floor. The sound echoed down the hall, and the pegasus guard stationed at the door—a wall of muscle, rare among pegasi—glanced at her. It was a quick glance, so quick that she wouldn’t have noticed had she not been idly staring his way.

All guards were supposed to maintain a fixed gaze ahead, barring sudden intrusions. He had broken protocol, and by the tightness of his face, he knew she had seen. Celestia hardly cared for minor slip-ups, but Luna had built herself a reputation for running a tight ship. Even the quietest noises readily echoed through the castle halls, censure moreso. She again knocked on the door, but held her gaze upon him. There was always time for a little bit of fun. Besides, she could wait. A thousand years could do that to a pony.

She kept her face calm—stern, but calm—chin slightly raised so as to appraise him down the bridge of her nose. Give the air of discontent, yet also the hope of questionability: had she really seen? Never had a guard stood so still, so exact. He could have passed for one of the suits of armor lining the hallway, except for the fact he was sweating rather profusely, and his lips were starting to crack at the edges under the pressure.

Finally, the door creaked open, and Celestia stepped out, yawning. The guard gave a sigh of relief, but snapped to at Luna’s returned stare. Slowly, she shifted it back to Celestia.

Celestia rubbed her eyes and made a rather dramatic show of smacking her lips. Her aurora of a mane seemed more a solar flare for all its split ends. “Ungh, Luna, what are you doing here so early?”

“It is seven twenty-two,” Luna said. “The sun was scheduled to rise nine minutes ago.”

Celestia raised a tired brow before looking over her shoulder at the mantelpiece clock. She jumped, and the hairs of her nape reached for the stars.

The door slammed shut in Luna’s face, and she had only a moment to blink before a blinding light flooded in through the stained glass at the end of the hall. Within, something heavy and wooden jostled, and dishware clattered to the floor. Luna heard a muttered curse, then: “Philomena, pick up your trash!” The door opened, and a fully-dressed Celestia poked her head out, all smiles, voice like bells. “Come in, sister.”

Luna had to squint when she entered, so bright was the sun through the open balcony doors. That wasn’t so much new as the fact the sun itself seemed a little too bright, as if making up for its nine-minute absence. The morning breeze drifted in, chill, and it fluttered the doors’ sheer curtains.

Wrappers gathered around a small box of chocolates on the floor like ponies around a stage. Philomena poked her head out, the box’s pink ribbon draped over her beak. A purr, a cock of the head, and she dove back in, the lid shutting tight. Luna could hear her gnawing on something.

“I apologize for the mess, Luna,” Celestia said. “Philomena isn’t always the cleanest phoenix in Equestria.”

That might have been true, but Luna noticed only a hoofful of the wrappers were covered in crumbs and beak bites. She smiled. “It is no concern of Ours, dear sister.” She took a seat at the near end of Celestia’s tea table. Celestia sat on a cushion opposite her. “But for what We have come to speak with thou is.”

It was Celestia’s turn to smile. “For who to speak with whom?”

Luna rolled her eyes. “For me to speak with you.”

Celestia nodded approvingly. “I was going to ask why you are still up, Luna. Usually you are snoring away in your chambers by this time of the morning.” She lifted a tea kettle toward a cup in front of Luna, who waved it away.

Celestia’s raillery would have ruffled Luna’s feathers in their younger years, but she had learned fighting fire with fire fared better. Keep a running tally. When to even the score depended on the situation. On its rare occurrences, morning tea time often sufficed.

“I am sorry, dear sister,” Luna said as Celestia filled her own cup, “but it is by thine own snoring that I know when to sleep.”

Celestia smiled warmly after a sip of tea. Whether from the tea or the retort, Luna didn’t know. Judging by the lumps of sugar Celestia then added, she assumed the latter. She set her cup down. “So what is it I can help you with, Luna?”

“Mere hours ago, I paid a visit to Ponyville. And I met the little Pipsqueak.”

“Oh, your friend from your first Nightmare Night?” She took another sip of tea, this time smiling without a retort to confuse it with.

Luna nodded. “The very same. But he came to us—me—with distressing news. There are some who wish to see the dissolution of our most sacred Nightmare Night? I mean, such an outrageous claim surely couldn’t be true, could it?”

When it came to information, Celestia did well at casting a wide net. True to her social knowledge, she closed her eyes, smiling. She nodded, an ‘mmhm’ on the tail end of another sip of tea. “Yes. I’m afraid so, Luna. It’s the P-B-WAY-F-C.”

“The… what?”

Celestia looked at her matter-of-factly. “Ponies for the Benefit and Well-being of All Young Fillies and Colts. New group. I know they aren’t official yet, but you haven’t heard of them?”

Luna frowned. “I apologize, dear sister, but I cannot say that I have.”

“Hmm.” Celestia took another sip of tea. “I heard about them myself on Wednesday. I’ve been meaning to tell you, but haven’t been able to catch you before Lights Out.”

“Sister, you and I both know crises such as this supercede Lights Out.”

Celestia raised a brow. “Luna, do you remember what happened the last time I came to your room while you were sleeping?”

Ears flattened, Luna slanted her mouth, looking away. It was a rather expensive vase. “Th-this would be different.” She pointed her ears forward, her sense of urgency restored. Celestia chuckled.

Another sip. “But since you’re here now, I can tell you what I heard yesterday: they’re organizing a petition.”

Luna stood, her voice rising with her. “A petition? So Pipsqueak spake true? And thou didst not think it of import to notify us immediately?”

“Luna...” Celestia said in her ‘you’re doing it again’ tone.

Luna huffed. “You did not think it important to notify me immediately?”

Celestia smiled into her tea, content. “It's all pretty silly if you ask me. I really don’t think it’s anything you should be worried about. Besides, the SPCCPANA is already poised to counter-petition. And as far as I know, they have a perfect track record." She brought her smile and an eye up to Luna. "They'll buy you some time.”

“Buy me... Who—" Luna sighed, rubbing her temple.

"Dearest sister," Luna said flatly, retaking her seat. "Please refrain from these... absurd acronyms. They are hardly informative.”

“Of course, Luna,” Celestia said, her smile turning into more of a smirk. Though learned in her art of annoyance, Luna didn’t think she would ever become accustomed to Celestia’s brand of humor. She still had a few hundred years to catch up on.

“But as I said,” Celestia continued. “The Society of Ponies Concerned for the Concision and Precision of All Names and Acronyms will be petitioning against them.”

Luna blinked. “And what, pray tell, will they be petitioning, exactly?”

“The name, of course. It’s far too long.” She took a sip of tea.

Luna sighed, closing her eyes. “Forgive me if I do not appear amused by this, sister. But what of this Fillies and Colts—” she twirled a hoof in the air “—organization?”

“Conglomeration.”

“Con…glomeration?”

“Or they might be going for an LLC...” Celestia tapped a hoof to her chin, then shrugged, muttering something about ‘ponies’ and ‘political correctness.’ Silence hung heavy between them for a moment while Luna gathered herself.

“These ponies,” she continued. “Why is it they are petitioning?”

Celestia refilled her cup. “I believe it’s because of all the candy. Foalhood obesity, diabetes, cavities, that sort of thing.”

“And they believe the candy to be the source?” Luna heard her voice climb. “Surely, this cannot be the case.”

Celestia shook her head. “I’m afraid it’s true, Luna. I received the papers yesterday morning. That’s how I heard about it.”

Luna gawked at her. “Thou hast received the papers? Nightmare Night is Our holiday. Those papers should have come to us.” She stood, the muscles of her legs too tense to remain seated.

“Luna—”

“It should be Our call. Our say. And We say nay!” Philomena poked her chocolate-caked head out of the box.

“Luna.” Celestia held up a hoof. She waited, letting the air drifting in from the balcony cool the tension in the room. She took a deep breath, releasing it slowly. “Please, Luna.” She gestured at the floor across from her.

Luna complied, but was no more comforted. “There is far too much tradition in Our…” she cleared her throat. “My holiday to simply dissolve it.”

Celestia nodded. “I understand Nightmare Night is special to you, Luna, but the choice isn’t ours to make.” Luna’s gaze hardened, but she said nothing. Celestia continued, “Nightmare Night isn’t a holiday by legal definition. It’s a festival, and under national law is subject to each individual settlement’s jurisdiction.”

“Nightmare Night is not a holiday?” Luna stared at her as if she had six heads. “If it is not, then pray tell what is.”

“Oh, you know,” Celestia said. She started counting on her hoof. “There’s Hearth’s Warming, Labor Day, Winter Wrap-Up, The Canterlot Confection Carnival, National Random Holiday Party Day, The Summer Sun Celebration, The Winter Sun Celebration, The Sunny Sun Celebration, National Sleep-In Day—my favorite—The Harvest Sun, Arbor Day, Dawn Wednesday, Holly Day, All Sun’s Day, All Sol’s Day, Nothing of Particular Importance Day, and Ugly Sweater Day. Oh”—she brightened at the thought—“and don’t forget, that’s tomorrow.”

Luna’s ears drooped. “But... thou hast named every celebrated calendar day except Nightmare Night.”

Celestia’s smile deflated at the sight, shoulders slouched. “Luna...”

Luna gazed back, numb. “Thou art serious when thou sayest Nightmare Night is not of equal or greater import to Ugly Sweater Day?”

“Of course not, Luna, I would never say anything like that.”

“Then why, dear sister,” Luna said, voice rising, “in the last fifty-score-and-two years hast thou not made Nightmare Night a holiday?”

Celestia gave her that motherly face again.

Luna growled, cursing the heavens. “Why have you? Honestly, sister, my speech is not the problem here!”

Celestia sighed. “I’m sorry, Luna, but the ponies themselves came up with Nightmare Night, not me. I never thought I’d have to declare it an official holiday.” She shrugged. “They were happy, who was I to object?” Another sip of tea. She set it down and stared into it, ears flattened back.

“Then let us declare it a holiday now and be done with it,” Luna said, stamping her hoof. Celestia slanted her mouth and set her eyes. “I meant that as the two of us, sister.” Luna pointed between them.

“We can’t, Luna,” Celestia said in a tone that screamed ‘you should know this by now.’ “It’s in the rules.” She pointed a hoof at her bookcase. On one of the shelves sat the offending book, titled The Rules, whose single spine spanned half the wall. Its shelf sagged to the point of giving the impression it was smirking at her. “We can’t amend or create new laws without having first established a clear and appropriate resolution to a defined problem.”

Luna's expression turned sour. “What kind of a rule is that? So we are not allowed to take appropriate measures before a problem arises? How does your phrase go, ‘nicker in the butt?’”

Celestia, in the middle of a sip of tea, snorted it all over the table. She held a hoof up to her lips, swallowing what she had managed to retain. Coughing laughter, she wiped the table clean with a nearby handkerchief.

Luna grimaced. “What did I say wrong, sister?”

Celestia tried and failed to hide a smile. “Nothing, Luna. But yes, while that may be true, hindsight is twenty-twenty.” Her smile turned bittersweet. “That was a lesson I learned the hardest way.”

Luna opened her mouth to reply, but refrained. The sentiment was there. Whatever the case, Celestia was after something. Luna knew her well enough to see it from a mile away. Her games twisted like the roots of an old tree, her prior levity merely a staged rough patch for her to smooth over in one fell swoop on the tail end of their conversation. Tie it all up in a neat little bow of her choosing. The proposition was short to come. Well, Luna could play that game, too.

“You know how much Nightmare Night means to me, ‘Tia,” Luna said, returning to her seat, hopeful the nickname would find effect.

“I do.” Celestia raised her cup from its plate, but seemed to think better of it. She set it back down, closing her eyes. “There is much behind the season that ponies respect. Most still do.”

“But calling for its removal because they believe the candy is at the root of the problem? Do they not understand moderation? The lessons—my mistakes—they would lose to the passing of time?”

“Luna, everypony sees the world through a different lens.” She turned her gaze to the sun, which sat squarely in the middle of the balcony doors. “And sometimes, it’s hard to see what’s fogging it when you’re looking so hard to find the cracks.”

“Sister.” Luna set a hoof on the table, leaning forward. “Don’t tell me you are actually siding with their argument.”

Celestia shook her head. “Not in the least. I would never do something at your expense. Like I said before, I’ve learned my lesson.”

Luna slanted her mouth. “I apologize, but part of me still can’t help but believe you had a hoof in this.”

“Now, Luna, that’s just ridiculous.” Celestia chuckled, a hoof waving away the notion. “I would never sell myself out—”

Muffled shouts came from the hallway, followed by a heavy toll of metal. Both princesses turned in time to see the door burst open. The plump green mare from the great hall atrium strode in, cane in hoof, box swaying on her back. Somehow, she had turned her scowl into the largest smile Luna had seen since meeting Twilight Sparkle’s pink friend. The door guard instead wore her scowl as he stormed in after her, rubbing his forehead.

“Princess Celestia!” the mare belted in the worst indoor voice Luna had ever heard.

“Pea Body,” Celestia replied cheerfully, extending a hoof in distant welcome. “You’re looking well.” To the guard, waving, “It’s fine, Stone Wall.” Stone Wall looked between Celestia and the mare. He saluted and turned for the door, grumbling under his breath.

“Oh, you’re too kind, Princess.” Pea Body strode up beside Luna without so much as a glance.

“I assume things are going well for the P-B-WAY-F-C?” Celestia offered the mare a cup of tea.

Luna’s face darkened at the conversation. She made no attempt to hide it. Anypony fraternizing with this nefarious scheme deserved their own place in Tartarus—this mare especially for her earlier rudeness.

Pea Body laughed, waving away the kettle. “They most certainly are.” She set down her box. Little Bite's Bakery had been inked around the lid in a manner resembling a pie crust. Philomena perked up from within her chocolates box.

Celestia put a hoof up to her chest, regarding the box like a little treasure. “Is this for me?” Philomena flew over and perched on her shoulder, leaning dangerously in toward the box.

“Just a little something for our number-one supporter.” The mare’s smile practically outshone the sun.

Celestia opened the box, and her eyes lit up like fireworks. She shut the lid, hooves greedily shielding it from sight, a wild grin on her face. She exchanged the look with Philomena, who had raised her crest feathers in her own form of a grin. “No... you shouldn’t have.” She peeked inside again. “Is it—”

“Banana cream, your favorite—I know, I know.” Pea Body waved away her gratitude.

The forced generosity in the air could have throttled a manticore. Luna was lucky enough to escape with a scowl. “Sister, she is with—”

Celestia took a deep whiff of the cake, Philomena pantomiming. They each sighed and purred, respectively, melting in bliss.

Luna raised her voice. “Sister, do you not see—”

“It smells heavenly, Pea Body. Did you make it yourself?”

Luna bit her tongue, glaring ice between them. So that was their game. Ignorance and conspiration. Fine. She would wait. Patience would find her turn, and hell would be paid soon enough.

Pea Body blushed like a school yard filly. “Well, I would love to take credit, but Cookie Dough was running the shop today.”

“Well, I’m sure it will be just as wonderful. Thank you again,” Celestia said in a voice warmer than the sun.

Pea Body curtsied, blushing anew. “It’s an honor simply to speak with you, dearest Princess.”

Luna’s eye twitched, and a sensation grew in her stomach, much like her first and only experience with raw Nickeraguan turtle eggs. She had refused the role of emissary since.

“I must be off,” Pea Body said, heading for the door. “I still have to collect Bushel Brow’s signature before we can continue the petition. I do hope to see you cast your vote at the proceedings!”

“You’ll see me there, for sure.” Celestia waved her off. “Best of luck with everything.” The door shut, and the princesses sat in momentary silence.

“So… Pea Body.” Luna turned to Celestia. “A form-fitting name.”

The motherly stare returned in full. “Luna, stop.”

“Ugly Sweater Day arrived early.”

Celestia tried holding back a snort, a smirk growing despite her attempts. “Luna, please. Why do you have to be so dour?”

Luna narrowed her gaze. “Because thy knife in Our back is longer than thine horn.”

Celestia took a breath, looking down. “I told you, Luna, I’m not selling out.” A knife and fork levitated toward her from a china cabinet along the front wall. The knife cut a slice of cake, set it on a plate, and the fork brought a piece to her mouth. An invisible wave seemed to wash over her, and the room practically sparkled in the warmth of a brighter sun. She savored the bite as if it was the last she would ever eat. “I’m capitalizing.”

“I hardly can see the difference...”

“Luna, you—” She held up a hoof to catch an escaping cake crumb, then swallowed. “—You really need to lighten up.”

Luna gawked at her. “I should lighten up? She is the one who should lighten up—doubly so.” Celestia glowered at her, but she ignored it. “Have you not said yourself what they desire? Nightmare Night stands for more than just candy and scaring children. There is tradition in its very name. We do not want to see the lessons learned from Our mistakes forgotten.”

“And they won’t be.” Celestia dabbed her mouth with a napkin between bites.

“Yet thou sit there and gorge upon their offerings, making promises to this mare who loathes us for the very thing We represent?” Celestia raised a brow over deadpanned eyes. Luna rolled hers. “I cannot see why you would parley with somepony of such… consistent perspective.”

Celestia cleared her throat, wiping away a smear of icing. “If I recall, Luna, not long ago, you yourself had been rather single minded.” She took a bite of cake. “I have my ways.”

“Clearly.” Luna eyed the cake, despising all it stood for. A most distasteful bribe with a most distasteful motive. Whatever the cost, Nightmare Night had to be preserved. She needed information.

“So she mentioned a vote?” Luna asked.

“Hmm?” Celestia regarded her with wide eyes, plucked from a waffle-cone canoe floating down a river of banana-cream frosting. Even Celestia’s dreams—both day and night—drifted on the tides of Luna’s soul. “Oh, yes. The P-B-WAY-F-C has convinced the Board of Trustees: they’re going with a layland vote.”

“As at the founding of Equestria’s borders,” Luna added, nodding. Each city-state—or city, as they had become—chose a representative to cast a ballot on behalf of its citizens. It was all or nothing, which simplified things. Either every city continued celebrating Nightmare Night, or none did. Still that brought up concern on the integrity of the vote.

“Sister,” Luna said. “Are you not worried they may try to elect their own representatives to the vote?”

Celestia let out a quiet chuckle. “Dearest Luna… As I was going to say before…” She leaned in, a mischievous smile peeking up the corners of her mouth. “I have my ways, and you have yours.” Another bite of cake. “You’ll figure it out, Luna.” She winked. “You’ve always been the smarter one.”

Luna unfocused her gaze, thinking on her words. A layland vote meant the organization must convene to voice its petition, as was customary. Organize a party, voice a petition, appoint representatives, cast ballots. The four main steps to any layland process. If Pea Body had yet to speak with Bushel Brow, then the representatives hadn’t yet officially been appointed. The papers Celestia had received must have merely been a notification, and, given the mare’s parting words, a request that she be a representative on behalf of Canterlot. Hence, the bribe.

But Celestia knew of the constraints their office placed upon them, that they as rulers of the realm weren’t allowed to partake in layland votes. Certainly, then, her snake tongue had merely been for the cake; she had stated twice she had no intention of actually voting.

Split the difference, earn her cake, refrain from offending anypony. That meant Celestia banked on her ability to disrupt the vote itself. If Celestia believed that their weakest link, then she had no reason to doubt her.

The organization was working fast, however. If Bushel Brow in the Laws and Corrections office was Pea Body’s next stop, then that meant they must have elected heads of their organization-to-be and were ready to request the right to be officially declared a political party. Or something like that. It was all rather wordy and confusing.

“So, sister,” Luna said. “If she is heading to Bushel Brow now, then how close at hoof is their petition?”

“Pretty close, if I had to guess,” Celestia said through a chunk of cake. She dabbed her lips with her napkin, taking the time to swallow the morsel. “All they need is a signed petition for party rights, and they’re official. Knowing Pea Body, I’d expect them to be ready by tomorrow.”

“And if they were to obtain this documentation, then what?”

Celestia shrugged. “Then they’re free to petition for petitioning powers.”

Curiosity got the better of her. “Petitioning powers?”

“Mhmm.” Celestia had taken an unflatteringly large bite of cake. Her cheeks resembled those of a squirrel. “They have to petition for the right to petition for petitioning powers, and then they can petition for their layland vote.”

Luna nodded. Very slowly. So it was true: the ponies had indeed gone insane. She wished for the simpler days when laws were written in blood, sweat, and or common sense—when a hoof stamp held the equivalence of an inked stamp in this day and age.

No matter. Adapt or die, went the old adage. She could play this game.

“Sister,” Luna said in a hopefully introspective tone.

“Hmm?” Celestia had completely forgone the fork, banana-cream icing caked to her muzzle like a mud mask.

Luna blinked. “You mentioned an organization intent on stopping them?”

“Yes, the Society of Ponies Concerned for the Concision and—”

“Yes, yes. That one.” Luna struggled not to roll her eyes. “Where can I find them?”

Celestia looked up in thought. “I think Rhetorical Rhetoric III was in charge. He lives on Andalusian, in the Hackney House.”

Luna peaked her brows. “Rhetorical Rhetoric? The one who spake down the Bloodbeak tribe from attacking the northern homesteaders last spring?”

“Mhmm.” Celestia nodded, busy chewing a mouthful of cake. She swallowed, then said, “Best tautologist Equestria has seen since Hoodwink the Hoodwinker.”

Luna stared blankly. Tautologist? Did she earnestly mean that? “Right.” Anyway. If the PBWAYFC were wasting no time, she had no reason to, either. Best get to it. Luna stood and bowed. “Thank you, sister. This has been an invigorating chat, but I must be off.” She headed for the balcony. The sun seemed to have redoubled its efforts upon setting her hoof on the railing, and all things crystal and gold below flashed in its brilliance. She squinted, already feeling the headache coming on.

“Oh, Luna,” Celestia said, her voice trailing out sing-song, like a mother’s final reminder to a child.

Luna turned to regard her sister one final time. “Yes?”

Celestia lifted the empty box of cake, Philomena poking around her shoulder, bearded with frosting. “Could you pick me up another? That was really good.”

Luna glowered at her. “You can raise the sun itself on a whim, sister. Surely you can raise the servant bell beside you.”

She leapt over the edge in a sweep of her wings and was off, silent as a shadow.

II - Overlooking the Obvious

The Lingerlight District was so named for its unique place in Canterlot. Positioned on the northernmost end of the city, it caught the final rays of the evening sun as it dipped between the peaks of the Splithoof Mountains across Canterlot Valley.

The jagged shape of the southern peak allowed Lingerlight a quarter of an hour more daylight while altogether thrusting the rest of Canterlot into the crystalline beauty of night. From her viewpoint in the topmost towers of the castle, Luna had the luxury of watching the scene unfold every sunset since her return.

The sudden enshrouding of Canterlot always played a smile on her lips. It fed an almost primal aspect of her mind, that her night was cast upon the still-awake ponies of the capital, that they would see and relish its wonders in the final hours before sleep—her turn in the spotlight. In counter, the fading sun over Lingerlight acknowledged a sort of restraint, a reminder that both moon and sun ruled. Perhaps she gave Celestia too much credit for coincidence. Or too little.

Regardless, it was a beautiful event to witness, and flying over the district in the daytime made Luna wish for the other end of the sun’s arc. Windowpanes flashed, fountains shimmered, even the ground glass of the mortar between cobblestones sparkled like miniature suns. It stung the eye worse than anything.

She had tried acclimating herself since her return, though fruitlessly. A migraine throbbed behind her eyes. She would have to make this quick, or at least arrange a night meeting once she had gotten a few hours of sleep.

Luna passed over the district forum and its marble Summer Sun monument. A hoofful of peddlers had set up shop around it, and already the crowds were thick. To her surprise, a separate gathering clogged the Hackney House’s courtyard on the far end.

She spied picket signs and poster boards lining the façade of the building. ‘Down with the PBWAYFC!’ some had been painted. ‘PB-NO-WAY-FC’ others read. Ponies ran amok, exchanging papers and shouting orders. They each sported a simple blue uniform, though she used the term loosely. Bandanas, t-shirts, even body paint—as long as it was blue, it seemed fair game. Luna landed among the crowd, deciding a direct approach the most appropriate. No point in skirting the issue.

Those nearby jumped in surprise at her appearance and either bowed or scurried off to whatever it was they were doing. Luna stared down one particular pony who hadn’t run off in time, and she approached the trembling mare.

“Dear citizen,” she said. “Where can I find Rhetorical Rhetoric? We request an audience with him."

The mare perked up at his name and seemed more than willing to point out a rail of a pony on the other side of the courtyard. Luna had never seen a skinnier stallion in her life. A stiff wind could have taken him on quite the adventure.

“Thank you, citizen,” Luna said. The mare squeaked a ‘you’re welcome’ before dashing off.

Ponies whispered amongst themselves, eyes wide at her passing. Rhetorical Rhetoric noticed her coming. A smile crossed his face, and he pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose before squaring his shoulders to greet her, pulling taught an already tight-fitting vest. Not that it did much for his frame, but such confidence deserved its own respect.

“My lady,” Rhetorical Rhetoric said, bowing. “My dearest princess.”

Luna returned it with a smaller, more formal bow of her own. “Rhetorical. I am told you are in charge here?”

“Yes, I am indeed so, your Highness.” He closed his eyes, giving a small nod before letting his smile return warmly.

Luna smiled. A tautologist, indeed. “Please, call me Luna. It is good to hear you are at the helm of this operation. Your reputation stands testament to my faith in the coming petition.”

A fluster overcame him. He again bowed graciously. “Like my father, and his father before him, I speak for what I believe true and correct. And the P-B-WAY-F-C is far from either. It is a horrible name.” He shuddered. “Simply terrible! We stand in disgust.” He gestured to the crowd and its preparations.

If he had said they were preparing for war, she just might have believed him. The ponies looked as though in battle formations, their signs weapons ready to plunge into the hearts of their enemies. A hardened look had settled upon them, like they had endured the twisting, shambling things of their waking nightmares brought to life and lived to tell the tale. There must have been more to business busting than she thought.

“I am glad to hear it,” Luna said. She stomped a hoof, spreading her wings, much to the surprise of those around them. “I stand by those that stand for what is just.”

Rhetorical had blanked at her sudden expanded presence, but recovered quickly. “Thank you, Luna. It means a lot to us, having your support, myself included.” Indeed, those around them still gazed at her in awe. Why she remained a novelty to them, she didn’t know. Surely, the citizens should have adjusted after two years.

“Pay it no mind, Rhetorical. It is thee that shalt surely win us the day.” He failed to hide a blush. “Thou art experienced with routing petitions, no?”

Rhetorical cleared his throat. “Erm, yes.” Confidence returned in full, his eyes closing above a smile. “Correct. We here at the SPCCPANA have successfully seen to the end of a number of poorly worded company names, Ambermane’s Better-Than-Kettlebottom’s Apothecarium being our latest victory.”

A store Luna had thankfully never heard of before. Poor naming choices must really have become a pandemic during her imprisonment. A shame the SPCCPANA went so far as to deny the actual establishment of the offending businesses and organizations. No matter. That was the exact kind of ruthlessness she needed this very hour.

“And you are certain we can overcome this Fillies and Colts group and secure Nightmare Night’s preservation?" Luna asked.

Rhetorical chuckled. “My dearest princess, have you heard of ‘The?’”

“‘The?’ As in ‘The’ restaurant? Yes, I have. Celestia and I have dined there on occasion. It really is ‘the very best restaurant in Canterlot,’ if I must agree with their slogan.”

“Only a slogan and nothing more, thanks to us.” His grin couldn’t have passed for anything but swelling pride.

Only a slogan? Perhaps a tribute to a past restaurant. “Right. So we are in agreement, then? This ‘P-B-WAY-F-C’ is to be dealt with.”

“And soon,” Rhetorical said. “We will set out forthwith. No name that long deserves to exist. We won’t let it see the light of day.” He blinked. “Err, or night. Night or day,” he added quickly.

Luna grinned, more in hopes of dispelling his embarrassment than for her eagerness. “They are planning to request party rights at the Laws and Corrections office within the hour. Surely, striking now will bring about a swift end to this charade.”

It was Rhetorical’s turn to grin. He nodded at the poster boards many of the ponies had already hoisted into the air, proceeding toward the entrance gate. They had taken up the chant: ‘No WAY! It won’t stay!’

“We’re way, way ahead of you,” he said. He lifted one from where it leaned against the wall, offering it to her.

Smiling, Luna took up the sign and marched after the crowd.

≈≈≈×≈≈≈

The chant echoed up and down the streets of Canterlot. “No WAY! It won’t stay!” shouted the crowd, poster boards raised high. Ponies looked on from windows and doorways, those of select businesses taking every precaution to appear closed for the day.

Luna stood tall at the head of the pack, her own poster board floating high above her, a determined grin on her face. Behind her marched an army, and, for all it was worth, it marched forward in her name.

The large, blocky face of the Laws and Corrections office grew nearer in her sights, its stone-and-glass façade a stately monument rising above the smaller buildings around it like a mother hen and her chicks. The many suited business ponies halted their busy lives to stare at the crowd as it filed through the front gates. They probably wondered how so many ponies would fit into such a crowded building. Or perhaps that was just an afterthought of Luna’s once she stepped inside.

The building was surprisingly expansive, but every nook and cranny had been overtaken by cubicles. Luna had the luxury of being taller than those around her, which allowed her to see just overtop the cubicles. Not that it helped. A maze would have been less daunting to navigate. She wondered where, if in any of the cubicles, she would have found a slice of cheese awaiting her.

The crowd’s shouts hardly put a dent in the din that pervaded the office like a low-hanging cloud. A hooffull of white-collared ponies poked their heads out from their little corners of the universe, phones wedged between the crooks of their necks, pencils in mouths, before ducking back in.

Luna paused, looking left then right for a sign indicating where they should go, but the crowd itself must have already planned their march, as they broke around her like water around a rock, Rhetorical Rhetoric III at the helm. She followed, observant.

Excluding the initial peeks upon their entrance, not a single pony seemed to notice the mob storming through the office. A mare at a copier stepped out of the way, yawning away the time and chugging coffee in quantities that would have sent Luna running to the bathroom all night long. The pair of stallions bantering at the water cooler acted as if nothing out of the ordinary was stampeding past them. One gave a ‘high hoof’ to somepony in the crowd, if she had that term correct. A managerial-looking stallion even squeezed his way through the mob to change the ‘days since last incident’ poster on the wall from five to six.

The march came to a halt outside a small, nondescript door. The crowd went unnervingly quiet, and the noises of the office regained hold of their element like birdsong after a thunderstorm.

Rhetorical knocked. Luna glanced around, grasping for information. No sign graced the wall as indication of who or what laid beyond the door, and the wall stood windowless from end to end. As did the other three. In fact, she didn’t recall seeing any windows since stepping inside, just featureless, white plaster.

The door opened on squeaky hinges, and the crowd erupted anew in shouts and chanting. It poured through the opening and practically overtop the wide-eyed intern who had been unlucky enough to answer, sweeping Luna in with the current. When the motion ceased, she found herself in the tiniest office imaginable.

Really, Luna had been expecting an auditorium, or at least a conference room of some sort. She wasn’t a claustrophobic pony—nothing of the sort—but sardines had it better than her. And probably more interesting things to look at.

If she had to decide, the ambience settled somewhere between grey slate and slate grey. The desk in the middle would have turned less eyes than a dust mote in a dark room. Pens and papers were lined in neat rows along the desk, beside two trays labelled ‘in’ and ‘out.’ Behind it, the first window Luna had seen—and probably only—in the building gave a wonderful view of the concrete wall next door. The room’s only picture framed a greyscale of a brick wall, and beside it hung a clock too standard to bother with numbers. There was a rather healthy-looking ficus in the corner, though.

The tight space magnified the crowd’s chants, and Luna had half a mind to command silence for the sake of her returning headache. She rubbed her temples, teeth clenching tighter. Three. Two. One.

The door opened behind her, and into the tiny room hobbled an equally tiny pony. Luna had to do a double take to ensure what she saw was really a stallion and not a child in costume.

White hairs sprung from his mane as if he had been electrocuted. A caterpillar of an eyebrow wriggled its way above squinted eyes as he stared head-on at the knees of those standing in his office. He tightened his already far-too-tight tie and flattened the wings of his shirt collar with perfect creases. A twitch of his moustache and he made his patient way through the quieting crowd, muttering words too muffled to hear.

Luna never realized how quiet a room full of ponies could get. She could have heard a pin drop. Every pair of eyes stared at the chest-high ball of fuzz parting a path toward the desk.

And they kept staring. His little steps were muffled on the carpet, and the clock ticked away what might as well have been hours. His muttering lilted above the crowd, just loud enough to notice, but too quiet to understand. The ponies on the right half of the room made way, and Luna noticed that one of them wore a particularly ugly houndstooth sweater.

She blinked. Pea Body? There were others around her lacking picket signs, and they all wore different shades of green. How many ponies were in this room?

A cough brought her attention forward. The tiny stallion had taken his seat at his desk, and he wriggled his moustache again. A second passed, and he straightened a wooden triangular block on the front of his desk, presumably jostled during the influx of ponies. It read ‘Bushel Brow.’

So this was Bushel Brow’s office. Though they had never officially met, they had corresponded in the past. Nice to finally put a face to the name. Or eyebrow to the name, more appropriately. The thing looked poised to swarm the rest of his face.

He cleared his throat, and a turn of the head spanned yet another minute of abject silence. His squinted eyes stopped somewhere to the right, where Luna noticed the intern who had been unfortunate enough to allow the mob entry plastered against the wall like a pony toeing a one-inch ledge. Bushel Brow gestured toward the door.

The mare looked as though she had been relieved indefinitely from lavatory duty. She scurried through the sea of ponies for the door as fast as her hooves would allow, head low, not caring for the papers falling from her folder. She hadn’t accounted for Princess Luna standing in the way, whose polished silver shoes she had just noticed.

She froze like a child caught out of bed, and slowly glanced upward, trembling. She had the widest eyes, and she used them to full effect. That effect being terror-stricken. Luna merely raised an eyebrow. ‘Pencil Pusher,’ her name tag read. She remembered the name from a nightmare a while back. Something to do with audits, red ink, and student loans.

Luna shook her head. She stepped aside, and the mare wizzed past with a speed that would have made a Wonderbolt blush. The door slammed shut, and all eyes turned back to Bushel Brow.

In the span of a breath, the room detonated in an explosion of angry shouts and jostles. The chaos heated the air, and Luna wouldn’t have been surprised if staplers and trapper keepers started flying.

Bushel Brow sat like a statue amid the dozens of ponies bumping into his desk, sending his pens and papers askew. He stared down at them and their disorder, and Luna thought she saw the faintest of twitches in his moustache. He heaved a large sigh. Luna took in a breath of her own to silence the crowd on his behalf, but he raised a hoof, catching her short.

Instantly the room fell silent again, and everypony gazed on.

Bushel Brow took the moment to straighten his desk, then harumphed, nodding. He turned toward Pea Body, extending a hoof, all eyes resting upon her. Luna had expected she herself would have lead the argument, considering her standing as the Princess of the Night, but nopony seemed perturbed by this turn of events. Defendant before prosecutor, she supposed. Fair enough.

Pea Body cleared her throat, much the way a librarian would have before lecturing a foal for returning a book to the wrong shelf. Luna could already feel her temple throbbing.

“Mr. Bushel,” Pea Body said. Bushel Brow raised a hoof. He set it firmly on the desk in her direction, his moustache dancing like a hedge in a windstorm. Something resembling a mumble barely reached Luna’s ears, so garbled by the forest beneath his nose that she wouldn’t have believed them words had somepony told her.

“Excuse me—Mr. Brow.” He nodded in approval. “We, the Ponies for the Benefit and Well-being of All Young Fillies and Colts, believe it is time for a change.”

Luna put a hoof to her temple. Indeed. High, trill voice. Assertive, yet expectant. If she started any sort of flattery, staplers and trapper keepers would start flying.

“Statistics show that there has been a two-fold increase in the incidence of foalhood diabetes, and nearly a forty-three percent increase in foalhood obesity over the last five years.”

A green-collared stallion raised a poster board for her. A line graph—whose y-axis, as Luna noticed, conveniently incremented by quarter percents—depicted a blue and red line ready to leap off the board in their race for the heavens.

“And this is a chart comparing the prevalence of cavity-related dental visits over the last three years.”

The stallion raised another poster board, a pie chart, whose title read Pertinent Pi Day Pie Purchases. Three quarters of the pie chart denoted the percentage of pies purchased on Pi Day, the remaining slice of those not purchased on Pi Day.

Pea Body snuck a glance at the crowd, confused by the blank expressions and hushed whispers. Horror overtook her at the realization, and Luna made no attempt at hiding a chuckle. “Why’d you even bring that one?” Pea Body hissed at the stallion. He made a face of wide-eyed confusion and jerked a shrug. He hid the poster and pulled out another pie chart, one correctly visualizing a number of reasons for foalhood dental visits.

“This,” Pea Body said, pointing robustly at the poster, “is a chart comparing the prevalence of cavity-related dental visits over the last three years. As you can see, cavities are by far the most prevalent—nearly fifty-five percent!” Murmurs of agreement rippled through the crowd, heads nodding at one another.

“What’s worse, the figures are projected to possibly triple within the next two years.” Pea Body stomped a hoof, puffing out her chest. “And we simply cannot stand for such an unhealthy trend in society.”

The murmurs continued off the tail end of her closing statement, and it was a moment before they quieted at the gesture of Bushel Brow. His moustache danced a jig on his face, muffled murmurs of his own barely heard over the crowd. He waved his hooves eloquently, as Luna would have expected from any experienced orator. But she didn’t speak ‘Mrphrlmrph,’ and it gave her quite the surprise when she noticed his hoof pointing directly at her, all eyes magnetizing to hers.

Her turn to speak, then? A rousing introduction if she ever heard one... No matter. It had been millennia since she had considered herself a novice at public speaking. Here was her moment to give voice to a season that had none of its own. And she had readied many words in preparation.

She cleared her throat, but as she drew breath, Rhetorical placed a hoof on her chest. The smile on his face practically screamed ‘leave it to me.’ Luna grinned. Very well. Let the professional handle it. A slight nod.

Rhetorical turned his smile toward the crowd. “Fillies and gentlecolts. Mares and stallions... I must first begin by saying that I admire your dedication for seeing through with what you believe is right.” He cast a glance at Pea Body, who had only the nerve to glare back. “And your commitment to doing good I applaud. But there simply stands a gross wrong that you so blatantly ignore.”

The left crowd rumbled with agreement, their heads bobbing like leaves on water. “Preach it!” one of them yelled. “You can say that again!” shouted another.

“Our children deserve proper care and, as you put it, well-being. They merit your—our—attention, simply for who they are: our children.”

A fine statement, if Luna had ever heard one. She could see in the eyes of both parties that his roots were taking hold, had softened a hoofful of stony faces among the PBWAYFC. The more stubborn of the lot remained unfazed, but she could tell Rhetorical was just warming up.

“Love, patience, love.” He gestured to the open air with each word, a wistful gaze fixed upon his hoof. “These are things we all must nurture within ourselves, see that they flourish inside us, for they are the foundation upon which we lay the bricks of our children’s lives.

“We shape them based upon our values, all the things we hold dear to our hearts, not because we want to, but because we have to, we need to.” His voice rose with his eyes toward something above that only he could see. “They are everything we hold dear, deserve every fiber of our desire to see the world a better place."

Rather flamboyant, but it seemed effective. Tears welled in ponies’ eyes, some sniffling and wiping their noses. Others tried hiding their crumbling masks of stone. Had ponies always been so easy to compel?

“Therefore,” Rhetorical continued, “it is with great pride in our fine and glorious nation of Equestria that we stand against the abhorrence, the terror, that is ‘P-B-WAY-F-C.'"

Luna smiled, could feel her teeth sinking deep into the throat of Pea Body’s argument, all without lifting a hoof. That’s right, Rhetorical, go for the kill.

The crowd had parted as little as it could to make room for Rhetorical. His was a passion that rivaled even Luna’s, shone like the full moon in his stance—tall and purposeful. “No foal deserves to live in a world so markedly criminal, where companies of such under-hoofed titling besmirch the goodness that is ‘Equestrian.’”

An odd statement. Since when did ‘titling’ have to do with anything? A glance around. Everypony wore their hearts on their sleeves. They lived and died by his every word.

“Children deserve concision.” His gaze had returned to Equestria, swept between each and every pony in the room, a fire within intent on spreading.

Expressionless, Luna raised a hoof, hesitation clenching her jaw. He was getting a little off topic.

“What they do not deserve is excessive and unnecessary language.”

“Um, Rhetorical?” Luna said.

“We are the ones responsible for fostering a well-worded society. It is our duty to see that they come to know only the precise and uncluttered language Equestrian is and is meant to be.”

“Rhetori—”

“And by this statement, we, The Society of Ponies Concerned for the Concision and Precision of All Names and Acronyms, cannot allow such an enormous and erroneously large title to stand head of your organization.”

“Rhetorical, we—”

“So what you’re saying is,” Pea Body said. “Is that you want us to change the name? And that‘s it?”

“Precisely.” Rhetorical nodded, wearing a simple smile like a trophy. “That is all we want.”

“Oh,” Pea Body said, suddenly rather satisfied. “Well, okay, sure.”

“Excellent.” They shook hooves. Bushel Brow harumphed again and ink stamped the paper laying before him, declaring the no-longer PBWAYFC into legal existence.

“Say what?” was all Luna could manage before the room erupted in cheers and celebration. Confetti burst from somewhere, and it fell thick upon the ponies marching for the door. They took up a joyous tune in time with their march.

“The P-B be no WAY no WAY!

The ugly name is done.”

They bumped and jostled their way past Luna. Her tiara jerked askew. Somepony stepped on her hoof.

“The S-P-C-C-P-A-N-A!

Concision it has won!”

The final stragglers slipped past her, and Luna found a chance to shake her head of the ruckus that had set her a-kilter. She felt like a bride’s garter after it had been tossed to a crowd of bachelorettes. Down the hall, faintly:

“Equestria won’t have to hear

A too-longname, won’t have to fear!”

Chairs lay upturned, the brick-wall portrait hung crooked, and confetti littered the carpet and desk, mingling with strewn papers and pens. Luna felt a pang of guilt at the sight of the ficus. Knocked over, dishonored by a careless society member, its leaves did its best to hide away the blanket of confetti, faithful to the last.

Amidst the chaos sat Bushel Brow at his desk. Like a statue, he stared down at the mess of papers and pens, and his upturned ‘in’ and ‘out’ trays. Luna had never seen a longer face. Apparently he, too, had not expected even a shadow of what had just happened.

He gazed longingly around the room, barely managing to shake his head. Luna took a step forward, biting her lip, unsure how to apologize on behalf of the others.

Bushel Brow looked up at the sound of her hoofstep. He held his gaze upon her. Though his expression hadn’t changed, she could see gears working in his head. He tapped a hoof to his chin, and a light bulb went off, if she had the saying right. A spin of his chair, and he opened a filing cabinet behind him. He rummaged through it, his mumbling like a fly bouncing off a windowpane. Spinning back, he held a folder before himself like some holy relic.

Out of it he drew a single piece of paper. He tri-folded it, and after brushing from his desk all the confetti in hoof’s reach, he hopped from his chair and waddled around the desk toward Luna. The paper squares of confetti crunched under his tiny hooves like newly fallen snow.

Not even as tall as her knees, he stared her in the eyes and thrusted the tri-folded paper at her. There was an intensity to him, a sort of trickery unbecoming of a stallion with an office job such as his. All the more reason Luna didn’t hesitate in taking the trifold.

He pointed at the calendar on his desk. If she wasn’t mistaken, she could have sworn he just winked at her. It was hard to tell, though, the way he always seemed to squint as if staring into the sun. His little legs padded past her, and he had started a little tune of his own, in time with the wiggle of his moustache. A pause to flip a door sign to ‘Gone Filing,’ and he stepped out.

Luna didn’t wait to open the letter. For all she could make out, he had practically beamed at her when she took it. The second she read the title, she beamed as well.

A requisition for privileges to petition for party petitioning privileges.

A sly one, that Bushel Brow. Luna blew a flake of confetti off her nose. If a petition he wanted, a petition he would have! She scanned down the page, taking note of the labyrinth of boxes and dotted lines that crammed every inch like a minotaur’s lair. Yes, yes, sign and date everywhere. She had learned the game well enough since her return. Why did the days of a stamp of the hoof have to leave her well behind?

She shook the thought from her head. Prerequisites. There had to be a list of prerequisites somewhere. Ha! Bottom left. Three bullet points: Title, Reason, 10+ participants. There was a note beside the participants bullet. The more the better, it read.

Luna flipped the page over to check for any additional requirements. None? Truly? “Huh.” She stared at the page, as if to ask it ‘are you sure?’

The page stared back, unamused by such a silly question; it was one of Bushel Brow’s, after all. Well then. She had her work cut out for her. Not that she feared failure. She had overcome greater tasks. Even the most coiled of political hang-ups was peanuts to Discord.

What bothered her most, though, was figuring out where to gather ten ponies willing to stand against this assault on tradition. If an organization like the PBWAYFC held such sway, how many ponies out there would care enough to see Nightmare Night live on? And the note on participants concerned her, like it was a hidden requirement that she have a substantially larger number of signatures at her back.

She hummed to herself, bringing a hoof up to her chin, giving the paper itself another once-over. A title would come to her eventually, and the form would take some time completing. But they were the easiest places to start—wrap up loose ends before they become a problem. They would be child’s play next to finding signatures.

Luna looked up from the paper. Child’s play. A grin swept her face, and she let out a chuckle. Oh yes. Child’s play. This petition would be child’s play, indeed.

She refolded the paper, and then folded it again to slip it into her silver shoe for safe keeping. Out the door, through the maze of cubicles she strode. The office ponies took no notice of her, their eyes glued to their glow-screens and spreadsheets. Only one pair stared at her, and it took all her power not to grin as she stopped before Pea Body and the water-cooler stallions. She allowed Pea Body the first word.

Pea Body wore a smug grin, like a hyena circling its prey. “Nightmare Night is done for. Children don’t need tummy aches and cavities. I’ll make sure it’s stamped out for good.”

Any number of ancient and equally colorful insults sprang to mind, but Luna held them at bay, deferring her trouncing to the time of the petition. More ammunition now meant bigger fireworks later. “Life is a fragile thing, Pea Body. That is why we celebrate the Nightmare Night season.”

“By slowly killing that ‘fragile thing’ with sugar? Not my children, not anypony else’s.” She grimaced as if she had gotten a whiff of the Royal Guard’s locker room. “And who knows what else they put in those diabetic cancer treats.”

Oh... a parent, then. Not just any parent, though—one of those parents. The infallible, imperious child-rearer. Wonderful.

Luna gave a reminiscent smile. Deflect, don’t fight. Goad with passivism. “A symbol of life’s... sweeter moments. Children find reward in candy. There is nothing wrong with that.”

“Did you not hear a word I said in there?” For once, her face took on a look other than scorn. Concern? “Foalhood obesity is up nearly—”

“Fourty-three percent,” Luna said. “Yes, I was listening.”

Back to scorn. “But you’re insistent on continuing this worshipping of junk food and your—" she grimaced, "—horrid past?”

Luna could have back-hoofed her on the spot. She managed to restrain herself to only a glare. “There are many lessons to be learned, and many more traditions to understand. It is not about worshipping my past mistakes; it is about embracing them so that they are never repeated. There is much symbolism to every part of it.” She leaned in, electing for a smile that hedged the line between snide and condescending. "Even the candy."

Her words seemed to have little effect on the mare. She continued scowling as if she were still Nightmare Moon incarnate. A rebuttal might have been ready on her lips, but Luna beat her to it, her time already too short as it was.

“Think what you will,” Luna said, stoic, straightening herself. She slipped some magic into the air around her, dampening the light of the office, enough only for Pea Body to notice. “The sun always sets, and there will always be nightmares.”

Her words wiped the grin clean off the mare’s face. Luna set forth for the exit, having earned her desired effect. Hopefully Pea Body would see reason before the layland convened, but Luna couldn’t leave the fate of Nightmare Night to chance. Her heart was possibly in the right place, but her mind was in orbit somewhere around the moon.

The sun greeted her with its headache-inducing glory, but she spited it with a smile. She took flight, south, over the rooftops of Canterlot, her gaze lying beyond the shimmering, glinting windows and water features.

Ponyville emerged from behind the final mansions of the Southern District, far in the distance, and it held her grin. Because there in that little town awaited her brave, unsuspecting champion.

III - Seeking Her Champion

Luna probably should have planned everything out better. She had arrived in Ponyville expecting the streets to be empty. Subtlety was on her mind. Get in and get out. What she hadn’t counted on were all the ponies pointing and shouting at her as she flew above. The daylight didn’t hide her as well as the night, for obvious reasons. That’s what she got for only travelling in the dark.

How eager they seemed to speak with her, beckon her down to engage in chit-chat, as they called it. Idle talk would not fit in her agenda. She compromised with a smile and wave.

First on the list, she had to find Pipsqueak. Such a vivacious, young colt couldn’t be too hard to find, but the problem remained: she didn’t know where he lived. And while Ponyville was no Manehattan or Canterlot, it still boasted an impressive number of houses, any of which could be his.

She spotted the river that cut through town. Nearby would be Pipsqueak’s friend’s home, if she remembered correctly. A bank around to find her bearings with the river, and she spotted the house.

The crunch of gravel welcomed her hooves like a long-lost friend. The door’s frame washed full with magenta now that it stood in the light of the sun. Off to the side of the house sat a trash can full of unopened and unfinished liquor bottles. Smirking, Luna cleared her throat and knocked.

“Sherry Surprise?” somepony inside shouted. “Is that you? You better not be playing hooky again!”

The mother? The little one was not home? Luna grimaced as hooves clomped their way toward the door. She hadn’t expected the mother.

The magenta door opened, and a much more magenta mare met her gaze. Indeed, it was the 'mommy juice' mare. Luna flicked her eyes to the trash can, then back at her. Act natural. Hopefully she didn’t remember anything.

Luna attempted a smile. “Hello, dear citizen. Is your daughter available?”

The mare kept staring, wide eyed, her jaw working all sorts of motions. She managed a sound not unlike a squealing hedgehog, and she promptly tumbled over backwards, tongue lolled, legs splayed in a most risque manner.

Luna winced. She remembered at least a small fraction, it seemed. A push of a leg for dignity’s sake and Luna shut the door. So yes. School. That was a daytime thing. She had seen a school bell somewhere nearby. Shouldn’t be hard to find. She took flight.

She found the school on the south side of Ponyville, its bell tower distinct among the buildings around it. Luna remembered hearing it was run by a single mare: Cheerilee, which brought with it a slew of non-memories of her own. Spit wads and whoopee cushions were apparently fears to harbor in the darkest recesses of the mind. Luna sometimes wished life could be that simple for her.

The doors of Ponyville Elementary seemed to have taken up the seasonal festivities. Glitter-glue ghosts and patchwork pumpkins had been taped up beside macaroni monsters and feltwork frankenponies. And bats. But they were just plain, old paper bats. They didn't even have googly eyes! How come the bats never got any love?

The others, though, smiled happy, bright-eyed smiles that Luna found positively cartoonish, and she couldn’t help but chuckle. Yes, indeed, she would have her petition. A clearing of the throat, and she knocked.

Within, she heard what sounded like a mare quieting a group of foals, and hoofsteps grew louder. The door opened, and Cheerilee cast a smile her way. The smile was short lived, however, turning into the kind of face Staunch Ascetic had made the time she caught him in the romance section of the Canterlot Library.

Clearly she was not on the list of expected ponies around here. Nevertheless, Luna put on her best smile, hoping it didn’t come across fiendish, something her guards had once mentioned. She strained harder not to look so.

Cheerilee gave an exasperated chuckle. “Princess Luna! My... um, we weren’t expecting a visitor.” She smiled sheepishly. The classroom rumbled with the whispers of children.

“Yes,” Luna said. “I apologize for arriving unannounced. But I have business with the little Pipsqueak. Is he available?”

“Pip?”

“OoooOOOOooo,” Luna heard from the classroom. Tiny hooves clip-clopped on the hardwood, and somepony else inside made kissy noises for some reason. Cheerilee glowered toward the back of the room. Pipsqueak hopped out from around the corner, smiling from ear to ear.

“Princess Luna!” Stars practically sparkled in his eyes. “Is it really you?”

“Yes, little Pipsqueak, it is me.” Her voice bounced with a softness she herself rarely noticed. Something about the little colt got to her the way no other pony did. That wide-eyed wonder, like she was the greatest thing in the world to him.

“Wow,” he said. “What are you doing here?”

Luna lifted her head high, taking on a regal pose worthy of her office. “That, I’m afraid, little Pipsqueak, is confidential. May we speak in private?” She gestured around the corner. He saluted and practically skipped toward the playground. “I won’t be long,” Luna said to Cheerilee, who gave a tentative smile.

“Um, is everything alright?” Cheerilee asked.

“Yes, Miss Cheerilee. I need but only a word with him.” She turned to follow him out back.

Pipsqueak was bouncing circles around a patch of dirt when she rounded the corner. Luna smiled, ever amused by his excitement. She took a seat and bid he calm down. He plopped to the dirt. “I have come on a very important errand, little Pipsqueak.”

“What’s an errand?”

“A… a mission. Something that must be done, and is of utmost importance.”

Pipsqueak edged closer. “Well if you think it’s important, it must be the most important of all important things ever!”

Luna held back a chuckle, keen on maintaining her air of urgency. He really was too cute for his own good. “Yes. It is very important. And it is something I cannot do alone.” She straightened herself, closing her eyes, speaking from the heart. “We come—”

There was a noise at the window. Luna glanced up at the windows lining Ponyville Elementary, and pressed against the glass were dozens of little snouts, each beneath a pair of curious eyes. The foals jumped upon being spotted, and they scrambled to hide from view. In the silence, somepony inside coughed.

Luna let her gaze linger for a moment. Anyway. “We come seeking a champion,” she continued as if the interruption had never happened. “A virtuous soul whose heart burns with a roaring fire to see Our wish fulfilled. Who knows Nightmare Night is to be cherished as a reminder of life’s sacredness. A champion who fears not litigation and laughs in the face of bureaucracy. And that champion, little Pipsqueak, is thou.”

Eagerness sharpened her smile to a finely pointed grin, but Pipsqueak seemed less than enthused. “Um, Princess Luna?” Pipsqueak looked up at her, concerned. “My mother says I’m not to play with fire, or I’ll end up like Uncle Kaboom at last year’s fireworks competition.”

“What happened to your Uncle Kaboom?”

“He went kaboom.”

Luna stared at him. Something in the back of her mind told her to console the poor child for his loss, but another something wondered just where in the wide realm of Equestria he had gotten that in his mind. It clicked, and Luna put her head in her hoof. She was getting carried away with her old tongue again. “‘Tis a metaphor, dear child. Nothing more. I will see to it you neither play with fire, nor go kaboom.”

His face lit up. “Oh, well in that case I’ll do it! Whatever a litigimation is.” He hopped up to all fours. “Anything for you, Princess!”

Luna smiled warmly. “We—Iknew I could count on you.” She nuzzled him on the cheek.

He blushed furiously, scratching at the dirt. “What do I have to do?”

“All you must do,” Luna said, “is tell every filly and colt you can that we cannot let Nightmare Night—” she paused to dig for a word better suited to his age, “—disappear. Spread the word. Have them implore, err, tell their parents to protest the P-B-WAY-F-C. Nightmare Night must be saved.”

He looked at her as any wonder-filled child would. “Protest? You mean you’re going to fight them?”

Luna smiled. “Not I, little Pipsqueak. We.”

“Wow! You really must be the greatest princess who ever lived!”

This time, Luna couldn’t contain herself. She let out a laugh, happy for the first time since last night’s full moon. “Can I trust you with this most urgent quest?”

Pipsqueak snapped a salute worthy of her personal Guard. “I won’t let you down, Princess!” He raced for the door of Ponyville Elementary. “Guys! Guys! You’ll never guess what Princess Luna said!”

Luna blanked. Well, she had expected a little more tact than that. Oh well. Her champion would perform valiantly, she had no doubt. Word would spread, and if all went according to plan, every parent in Ponyville would back her. She only needed one dissenting vote in the Layland to secure her victory.

She rose from the grass, shaking away the stiffness in her legs. Into the air she climbed, back for Canterlot Castle. Her job here was done.

She had formed the snowball. That night, she would roll it down the mountain.

IV - For Nightmare Night!

The afternoon passed in a blur. Preliminary forms and notifications had come and gone in a whirlwind, and the sun sloped toward the edge of the sky far faster than Luna would have hoped, against all usual desire. The time to take her seat on the throne as Regent of the Night drew too near too soon. She had much yet to prepare if she was to petition against the PBWAYFC in the morning. But the sun sang no sorrows for her plight, and as it slipped beyond the furthest reaches of the world she withdrew from her plans to shoulder her nightly responsibilities.

Luna sat upon her throne in the darkened silence. She afforded herself an itch of the collar, her yellow sweater not one for comfort. In her tradition, ‘days’ began at the stroke of night’s first hour, so that her holidays passed into the first morning light of the true day, Ugly Sweater Day no exception.

Hers was an itchy thing, a present from Celestia upon her return. Its little pink, smiling hearts and balloons were the first indication her sister hadn’t changed one bit in her thousand years away. Insulting at first, Luna had come to understand it as an apology, a wish for things to return to the way they were. So she wore it, once a year, itches and all.

Night Eye, standing at the left foot of the throne, scratched an itch beneath his yellow-and-orange polka-dotted sweater. At least she wasn’t the only uncomfortable one in the room. That, though, was almost a fact by default.

Predictably, the night was her lone charge in the lonelier hall, as nopony bothered appearing before her, instead electing for Celestia’s less stringent view on life and law. So it behooved her to take advantage of the stillness. Luna centered herself with a sigh, closing her eyes.

And she dreamed.

She was a beggar on a rainy Manehattan street. She was a soldier sheathing his blade after battle. A princess. An athlete. A mother.

She swung through the tallest treetops with the nimblest of monkeys and swam the deepest depths of the ocean, where the bug-eyed and ripple-finned dwelled. Laughter bubbled from her lungs in the wake of a friend’s unexpected belch. She snoozed by the hearth, cuddled up in her favorite blanket. A firefly alighted on her nose, and a million more lit up the expanse of meadow beyond her mind’s comprehension.

She dreamed. And it was with all of Equestria she drifted in sweetest slumber.

She spread her wings wide, bent her head low. The faintest trickle of magic she let slip into her mind, dribble its way down to her heart and into those of the ponies she cradled within her breast.

It tasted like nectar as it took hold of their dreams, formed them to her bidding. She became more within them, drawn out from the modest shells that bound her in forms both terrible and great, humble and beautiful.

She became the blazing sun, the vociferous general, the howling wind through crag and grotto. A whisper in the darkness, a quiet smile on the other pillow. But all forms heeded the same voice:

The Night is fading. The little ones know. Listen.

And with that, her power faded. She receded from her dream forms—infernos to candles, floods to trickles, all as they should be.

Luna opened her eyes. Still the throne room sat in silence. The moon’s glow had disappeared from the stained glass across the hall, already low toward its resting place beyond the horizon as the slimmest trimmings of dawn’s purples and pinks encroached upon the sky.

Dreams were captivating things, and even she held no control over the ebb and flow of time within them.

She glanced down at the tri-folded paper beside her throne. Tentatively, she picked it up. Best get started on what she could.

First thing’s first: the application. She righted the page to better size up the maze of boxes and dotted lines. She grimaced. Such superfluous details. Name and date she could understand, but age? How exactly did that apply to her? There weren’t even enough digits, come to think of it. Why the box had four to begin with confused her to no end.

She produced a quill from the folder and paused, its feather to her chin, brows steepled, before squeezing in her details. She took care in rounding down. Nopony would know.

Second, title. Easy. Ponies of the Night. Simple and to the point. Moreover, it shouldn’t raise any fuss with the SPCCPANA.

Next, social security number. Luna rolled her eyes. She scratched in the number ‘2.’ Honestly, none of this was really necessary. Well, no. It was, because the ponies seemed to love making simple concepts overly complicated. But as far as true necessity went... References? Did she even need references? Certainly, her name would be sufficient. She put Celestia down anyway. Hopefully they wouldn’t gripe over the immediacy of their relationship.

Luna scratched and muttered her way through the remaining fields on the page, silently wishing with each and every box and line that she had conquered Equestria all those years ago and saved it from such a ludicrous state of affairs. A poor taste in methodology, perhaps, but her heart was in the right place. Nopony could disagree with that, except maybe Bushel Brow.

It was as she punctuated her signature on the line titled Terms and Services that she heard a bump against the throne room door. She glanced up, expectant.

The doors swung open, and the first sounds Luna had heard since taking her seat filled the room. In streamed ponies of every color, less for their coats and more for the ugly sweaters they had been festive enough to don.

Frills of white and blue. Checkers and stripes of all the rainbow. Plaids and spirals intent on hypnosis. A lopsided daffodil. Family crests with block letters. The sight would have made her smirk had she not known who they were. Though light chatter bubbled among them, there remained a purposefulness to their stride, the way they looked at her, stared her down from afar. The PBWAYFC—or whatever they called themselves after the agreement at Bushel Brow’s—seemed ever intent on destroying her Nightmare Night. Bright and early. Must have been how they organized so quickly to begin with.

Rhetorical Rhetoric III walked among them. Ever one for proper appearance, he busied himself with flattening his tie beneath his sweater vest, into which had been knitted a dashing portrait of himself. He, at least, didn’t seem to hold the same fire in his eyes the others did. Rather, his was the sparkle of pride, of a job well done.

“Night Eye,” Luna said, her gaze still locked on the crowd. The guard saluted her, climbing the steps to her throne. “Take this to Bushel Brow immediately. It is urgent.” She trifolded the application paper, signed and sealed the outside, then floated it before him.

“Who?”

She afforded him a stare. “Bushel Brow. In the Laws and Corrections office.” He still appeared confused. “The one who hath the whole of the Everfree upon his brow?”

He lit up in recognition. “Oh! Right away, Ma’am.” He snatched the form, stowed it, and was off.

Luna scanned the crowd for want of spotting Pea Body before rising to address them. To her surprise, the mare was nowhere to be seen. She stepped down from her throne.

The crowd stopped as she descended, and Rhetorical came forward, an eager smile on his face.

“Good morning, your Highness,” he said, bowing. “A wonderful start to this fine day, don’t you think?”

“Quite.” She reserved for him no softer gaze than she had prepared for the rest of the lot. It might have been her fault for not realizing the angle of his counter petition, but she still held him accountable for never clarifying.

He wavered under her stare, tried smiling through it, and failed, glancing away. A cough and a cinch of his tie. “The PBFC are here to petition for the removal of Nightmare Night.” He smiled, but blanked at her continued stare. “Y-your Highness,” he added.

Forever a spokespony. She wondered why he bothered doing their dirty work when Pea Body seemed so eager to do it herself. Gleaning whatever information she could would prove useful. For effect, she feigned omniscience in the hardness of her face, hoping he would see it as a test of honesty. “I know who they are, Rhetorical. What I am curious to know is why you speak for them. Is Pea Body not of the mind to stand for herself?”

He opened his mouth, wanting to speak but apparently having lost his words. His ears fell back against his head. “Ahh, yes." He coughed into a hoof, recovering some semblance of himself. "I’m here because I enjoy watching the closure of my work. I find pleasure in seeing my labors come to fruition.” He scratched the back of his neck. “Pea Body, however… I was, um. I was asked to speak in her stead.”

“That does not answer the question.”

He looked over his shoulder at the crowd, where many helpless ponies shrugged back at him. He gave his own shrug toward Luna. “Her whereabouts are unknown. We don’t have any idea where she is. We were hoping she would be here already with the city reps.”

Certainly odd. Yesterday, Pea Body had been more than early by morning’s standards. Luna had half expected the mare to have barged into the throne room well before dawn, gloating up a storm. But all had thankfully remained quiet until the crowd had entered.

“I am sorry to say that she is not yet here, nor have any of the layland representatives arrived. You are, however, welcome to—”

A loud bump came from the side hall. She glanced, curious what the noise might have been. Some among the crowd had looked as well, so indeed it wasn’t simply her lack of sleep playing tricks on her. The castle servants preferred the outer shortcuts and the kitchens to the hallway lining the throne room, and it was far too early for any other pony besides those present to be about the place.

A plate clattered to the floor, again from the hallway. Hooves took off into the silence. She looked to Leather Wing beside her. “See what is going on.”

The guard rolled his shoulders, perhaps to settle an uncomfortable sweater tag, before starting forward, hoof at the hilt of his blade. He hesitated at the door, his hoof resting on the handle, preparing himself for what might lie beyond. He pushed it open, and immediately something metal crashed to the ground.

“Hey! Get back here!” he shouted, lunging through the door.

Luna ran after him, through the doorway in a flash. A suit of armor had been knocked over, all its pieces splayed out on the floor except the head. Down the hall, she saw Leather Wing wrestling with a tiny pony in a suit of armor whose helmet was much too large.

As she ran to catch up, the tiny one conked Leather Wing on the knee with a pointed stick. “Ow!” He dropped the pony with an ‘oof!’, and he clutched at his knee.

The little armored pony bounced to its hooves. “Take that, you scurvy dog!” came the most valiant Trottingham accent Luna had ever heard. Stick gripped between his little teeth, he swung wildly at the air, the massive helmet shaking back and forth as if wishing it had never been knocked from its stand.

“Why, you little...” Leather Wing bopped him on the head with the flat of his sword.

“Stay thy blade!” Luna strode forward, gaze set on Leather Wing, the air darkening behind her with the power of Night.

He stepped away, frightened, an accusing hoof pointed at Pipsqueak. “He-he hit me first!” Her gaze became a glare, darker than the blackness between stars.

Dying plants withered less than he did at that moment. “I’ll just—” a weak smile, eyes darting about “—go guard the throne again.” He dashed past her in a rush of wind.

Luna knelt beside her wobbly champion. She steadied him with a hoof, and lifted up the over-sized visor to see a silly, cross-eyed smile on his tobiano face. He shook it off.

A salute and a triumphant smile. “Pipsqueak the Partisan, at your service, m’lady!” His ‘armor,’ she noticed, had been made from cardboard and duct tape.

“And quite the partisan, indeed,” Luna said, smiling. “But tell me, little Pipsqueak, why do I always find you skulking about after bed? And why in Equestria are you in Canterlot? How, even?”

“Conductor Full Steam brought us on the midnight train. We came to fight for Nightmare Night!” Pipsqueak lifted his spear high. “Just like you said!”

Luna blanked. “Fight? We?”

A guard shouted down the hall. Around the corner popped another colt—no more than four years—dashing their way. The bells of his green-and-red jester costume rang a high frenzy as he neared, and louder so when the red-sweatered guard snagged him by the hind leg. He thrashed about in the air. “Nightmare Night! Nightmare Night!” he chanted in defiance.

The guard looked thoroughly confused, holding the colt away from his face, more as if the sound hurt his ears than for avoiding his flailing hooves.

Pipsqueak glared righteous fury and flipped down his visor. “Nopony messes with Nightmare Night, you dirty swine!” Pipsqueak rushed him, and the guard stared at him as a wolf might a charging rabbit. “Have at thee!” He poked the guard in the ribs with his stick.

“Ow!” The guard dropped the jester-colt, and the two made their escape past Luna.

Luna watched them dash into the throne room with the most confused of expressions. When she turned it to the guard, he looked just as perplexed. She shrugged, and the two followed Pipsqueak into the uproar of the throne room.

The first word that came to mind was ‘pandemonium.’ But Luna remembered Celestia’s constant nagging about archaic words and settled on a more modern ‘bedlam.’

Children. Everywhere.

Running around the pillars. Clinging to the tapestries lining the walls. In and out of the hallways running the length of the throne room. Their costumes of giant fruits and monsters and nurses and gargoyles and all sorts of other things of both mare and magical origin danced a colorful chaos as they screamed and shouted over each other. 'Nightmare Night' made up the bulk of it, and were the only words Luna could pick out of the tangle.

The guards were having a field day of it, their own ‘costumes’ of minimal help in their attempts to round them up.

Polka-dots of green and blue. Snowflakes and reindeer. Cotton balls made to resemble marshmallows inside crocheted cups of steaming cocoa. Even a striped turtleneck among one of the pegasus guards. Not even the travelling circuses of Old Equestria could have put on a performance the likes of this.

Thankfully, the guards had the sense not to draw their weapons in such a situation. But by the moon, they needed something—and the PBFC wasn’t of any help.

The children had them outclassed. Criss-crossing their paths, tripping their hooves, kicking the shins of those who had captured fellow foals, setting them loose again. One guard staggered about, struggling against the tangle of a fallen tapestry, before smacking into the wall and falling over. He laid still, apparently giving up on life. A mime-filly hopped on top of him and roared her loudest roar—which was to say, more of a growl.

What little of the Guard and PBFC that had managed to outdo the children simply had their hooves too full of them, unable to manage the numbers. It was evident on their faces, like prey backed into a corner.

Luna turned to the guard who had entered with her. He had paled at the sight, and Luna already saw nightmares of unruly triplets back home flitting through his head. “You’re excused,” she said in the most dignified tone she could manage.

He smiled as if Hearth’s Warming had come early. Quick as lightning, he took off before she could change her mind.

Luna turned her attention back to the chaos around her. The children still dashed and weaved every which way. She watched as a pair of guards chasing two different colts collided and fell in a heap. She winced. That’d leave a mark.

“So I thought I heard Philomena jumping up and down on my bed as I was out on my balcony raising the sun,” came Celestia’s voice from the hallway behind Luna. She strode through the door, a worried eye taking in the scene around her, and in she towed a yellow filly dressed as a flapper girl—black forehoof stockings, feathered headband and all—intent on never letting go of her tail, face dragged flat against the floor. “Needless to say, it seems the castle has been breached.” There was something about her voice, the way it hovered flat rather than floated, that conveyed more than her incriminating stare.

Luna cut in before she could make another witty comment. “I assure you, sister, I am just as surprised as you are.” Celestia’s stare became even more level. “Truly! It must have been the little Pipsqueak’s doing.”

“Luna, this is no time for games.”

“By the stars, sister, I had no hoof in this.”

Celestia’s stare turned weary. She let out a long sigh, lowering her head toward the floor. “Well, whatever the truth is, Luna, at least it can’t get any worse than this.”

A few of the children halted their romp and turned their little heads toward the door. Luna followed their gazes, swivelling her ears at the faintest of noises. Slowly, the noise grew—chanting, indecipherable through the doors.

The adults noticed, too, their eyes turning, hearts dreading. Drums thundered in the cavernous dark of their minds. The children scattered in the stillness as the chant outside reached a rolling boil.

A massive thud reverberated through the hall. The door lurched as if beneath the force of a battering ram, but its weight held firm. It settled back into place before another jarring slam pushed the door to the point of opening.

The princesses exchanged glances. Luna shrugged. A roll of the eyes, and Celestia cast her magic about the door. It swung open, and in cascaded a pile of goblins and ninjas, jack o’ lanterns and police officers, astronauts and zombies, who it appeared had stacked atop one another to push open the door with all their foalish strength. The children gathered themselves to their hooves, and their chant back to the tops of their lungs.

“Nightmare Night! Nightmare Night! Keep the season full of fright!”

They marched into the hall, those inside parting to make way. Behind the vanguard entered a column of foals carrying a pole over their shoulders, ropes winding around the middle like those about a mast.

Hog-tied beneath the ropes, Luna noticed, was a pony who looked as though she couldn’t have dreamt a worse nightmare—Pea Body, whose eyes practically popped out of their sockets upon seeing her.

The children stopped before the throne, dropped the pole, and scattered every which way, cheering and jumping off pots and steps and other things that children had no right jumping off.

Celestia was the first to step forward. Her horn shone golden, and the ropes about the terror-stricken pony fell away. Before even shrugging off the limp coils of rope, Pea Body struggled backward, away from Luna, eyes fixed wide upon her.

Somehow, the mare had found an even uglier sweater for the occasion—robin’s egg blue, with cherry-red candy buttons sewn along green stripes like Hearth’s Warming lights. Though, her mane looked as if she had been dragged out of bed rather than of her own choosing. Perhaps ugly sweaters were merely pajamas to her, Luna ventured.

“Keep her away from me!” Pea Body shouted. “That she-devil put them up to this! She cursed them, I tell you! Cursed them!” She tripped over backward on a lump of rope. A satisfying thud echoed off the walls.

Luna stepped forward, amused. “I did nothing of the sort.” She curiously eyed a filly that scurried between her legs, out of reach of a pursuing guard and his skull-and-crossbones sweater. “This is of the children’s own volition.”

“Liar! I saw you in my dreams!”

“I’m afraid I must agree,” Rhetorical said, stepping forward. “I saw you in my dreams as well, I did.”

Luna could feel Celestia’s gaze on the nape of her neck. Many times she had promised not to interfere too strongly with dreams. Their wild nature lent to their unpredictability, and it became apparent that her magic had seeped into one she hadn’t intended.

“Luna—”

“We did not incite this riot, sister.” She closed her eyes, taking a deep breath to calm herself. “That message was to the parents of the children and the parents alone. I am no stranger to being cryptic. No, I did not command these children to assail our walls, nor foalnap this one… however much I am enjoying it.” She let slip a smile—with just enough teeth—at the one cowering before her.

“That still doesn’t answer why I returned from my balcony to children jumping on my bed,” Celestia quipped. She glanced at the filly playing with her tail as if it were a boa. “Philomena didn’t take too well to them trying to fit inside her cage, either.”

“I may,” Luna started, before Celestia could continue, “have an explanation for that.” She looked about, hoping for a glimpse of her champion and his shining armor. “Pipsqueak.”

Pipsqueak poked his head above a crowd of foals gathered around the tapestry-tangled guard. He galloped over, the visor of his helmet clanking up and down. A salute knocked it askew.

Celestia took the hint. She bent her head to his level and allowed herself a warm smile, despite the filly having found a friend to play jump rope with her tail. “My little Pipsqueak. How are you this morning?”

“Wonderful, princess.” He relaxed his salute, fixing his helmet.

“I’m glad to hear it. But tell me, why exactly are you and all your friends here in Canterlot?”

“Because we’re here to save Nightmare Night, just like Princess Luna said.” He waggled his stick in the air at an invisible enemy.

“I see. And were those her words?”

“Um...” He put a hoof to his chin.

“Did I not say to tell your parents to protest?” Luna guided.

He blanked in realization. “Oops.”

Celestia looked between Luna and Pea Body. “Well, there you have it. Thank you, Pipsqueak. Now run along with your friends.”

“Yes, Ma’am!” A final salute, and he was off to join the foals that had dogpiled on top of the tangled guard. Which reminded Luna—they should probably do something about that.

She stepped forward to intervene when a hoof tapped her on the flank. She turned, expecting Celestia, but was surprised by the fuzzy mane of Bushel Brow.

She hadn’t noticed him among all the helter-skelter children, and his shirt-and-tie sweater—complete with pocket protector—only served as camouflage. He thrust a tri-folded paper at her, wiggling his moustache and mumbling something she couldn’t hear.

She took the paper in her magic, unfolding it. It was her requisition for privileges to petition for party petitioning privileges application. The ‘additional signatures’ section was circled in red. Right. She had forgotten that part.

Luna opened her mouth to voice a question, but closed it. Looking around, there were no parents available to sign. None willing to, anyway. The PBFC members nearby afforded glares that were probably threats to rip the paper into tiny bits. She bit her lip.

Bushel Brow harumphed, tapping his hoof in impatience. She gave him a glance, unsure what to do. Then it hit her. Child’s play. That very idea was what had gotten her to this point.

Luna cleared her throat. “Children.” The chaos settled immediately, all eyes turned toward her. “Do you wish to save Nightmare Night?”

“Yeah!” they shouted.

Luna smiled. “Then gather ‘round.” To Bushel Brow: “We will be needing a new requisition form, dear sir.”

Bushel Brow snorted, the faintest trace of a smile evident behind his moustache. He drew a folder from his saddlebags and rifled through it. As the children circled around, he pulled out a clean requisition form.

Luna took it, drawing her quill from its place beside the throne and filled in its fields. All but title and signatures remaining, she paused, pondering a name befitting her little army. Ponies of the Night no longer worked. Children of the Night? No, too obvious, unbecoming of their valor. Guardians of Nightmare Night. That had a nice ring to it. She smiled, floating the paper and quill around to each and every foal.

“Signing your name indicates your bravery in the face of adversity, your triumph over the forces conspiring to bring about the end of our most glorious season.” Luna glanced about at the children, who stared back, clueless. Even Celestia looked at her funny.

“Err, thank you for your courage and willingness to save Nightmare Night. I am honored to call each and every one of you champions of Equestria.” The paper circled around to Bushel Brow, who scrutinized the myriad of scratch marks and squiggles that were the children’s signatures, nodded, and stowed it in his saddlebags. Another nod toward Luna, and he hobbled his way out the door.

“Y-you can’t be an official party.” Pea Body looked around at the children. “You haven’t elected any officials.”

“Of course I have,” Luna said. She gazed upon the children around her. “Sherry Surprise as treasurer.” The little filly, still wearing her bat mask, lit up at her mention. “Pipsqueak as vice president.” An ‘oh, boy!’ sounded from somewhere in the crowd. “And myself as president and speaker. It’s all in the paper we signed.”

Pea Body appeared no less than flabbergasted. “But you… but they...” She took a moment to gather herself. Slowly, she found her signature scowl, and she laid it dead on Luna. “I don’t care what you have done to poison the minds of these children. Candy and frights have no place in civil society, and we in the PBFC will not be bullied by the likes of you or these unruly mongrels.”

Every child stopped what they were doing, and Luna sensed a tension gathering in the air, a turning of bodies toward the one that so readily defamed their favorite holiday.

“If anything,” Pea Body continued, “this has only affirmed the need for reforming this... festivity and others like it. I will stop at nothing to see each and every last bit of disease-inducing trash removed from this horrible perversion of the word ‘celebration.’” Her glare bounced between each and every one of the faces before her, and slowly, realization dawned.

“Chaaarge!” Pipsqueak yelled, and the whole of the child army was upon her like a tsunami upon the beach, her flailing hooves useless against the force of the tide. The mass of costumes crashed overtop and swallowed her, again taking up their chant. “Nightmare Night! Nightmare Night! Keep the season full of fright!”

Luna smirked at the renewed chaos. Euphoric at best, cathartic at worst. Like waiting on the eve of a supernova, and enjoying the splendor of its faraway blaze—a glorious death into new life.

She could feel Celestia glaring at her, counting down the seconds until it was acceptable to reprimand her for remaining idle. As sharp as those words would be, she more than happily let the clock run its course.

“I hope there is a reason better than revenge for why you haven’t stopped this yet, Luna.”

Luna took a deep breath, savoring every last drop. “It pays to pay attention, sister.”

“Luna.”

A bit more. “Could we not perhaps let her learn that lesson a little first?”

“Luna.”

Luna rolled her eyes. “If you insist.” She stepped forward. “Children, that is enough.”

The shouts died down, and one by one their little eyes turned toward her. They backed away, the dogpile dissipating, a freshly hogtied Pea Body staring frazzled into space. She came to enough to notice Luna lording over her.

“L-let me go! This isn’t fair!”

“‘Not fair?’” Luna said. “‘Not fair’ is making a decision on behalf of but without the consent of the affected party. ‘Not fair’ is overreacting and attempting to destroy a time-honored tradition on your personal crusade for what is ‘right.’” She narrowed her eyes. “‘Not fair’ is neglecting—nay, refusing to voice your concerns with me before treading on hooves best left untread.”

Any ounce of fighting spirit fled in that instant. Given how her lip quivered, Luna wouldn’t have been surprised had she soiled herself.

“Perhaps, if I may, your highness...” Rhetorical stepped out from the crowd of on-looking adults trembling in the corner. He made nervous glances at the children he passed by. “May I bring the argument back to its original point? Come full-circle, if you will. I am for maintaining a proper dialogue, after all. Why—”

“The argument pertains very much to myself, Rhetorical,” Luna said. “I am The Night, and was once the nightmare for which this was all constructed.” She straightened herself for effect. “I am the argument.”

Rhetorical nodded away her statement. “Yes, but—”

“There is more to Nightmare Night than just candy. Surely a well-renowned tautologist such as yourself could plumb its origins. I fight for that and everything derived from it.”

He held his mouth open, then closed it. While he wrapped his head around her words, she noticed Celestia out the corner of her eye. Sternly she stared, and Luna knew it to be a reminder.

“But if you insist on returning to her original argument…” She turned back to Pea Body, making no attempt to hide her disdain. “The shoe is on the other hoof now, isn’t it?” The mare looked at her like she was the Grim Reaper come to drag her down to Tartarus. However much Luna would have loved to do so, she had something better in mind.

“Do not misunderstand me, Pea Body, when We say this: thou art by far the rudest, most insulting pony We have ever met. Everfree tree slugs have better manners, and meeting one would be far less repulsive.”

Pea Body had turned white as snow, and she trembled ever so slightly. Out the corner of her eye, Luna saw Celestia glaring hard at her.

“She needed to hear it, sister.” Luna said. She continued before Celestia could speak. “But hear this as well: there is no reason to target Nightmare Night as the culprit of your children’s health issues. You as a parent are in charge of all aspects of your children’s lives. That includes teaching them risk and reward, friendship and self-expression, the sacredness of life. Is it not your responsibility to see to that?”

Pea Body’s mouth hung open, seemingly no longer out of fear, but for lack of words. “I… I just wanted what’s best for my kids.” She hid her face. “I don’t want them to go through the things I did.”

Luna lowered her head to Pea Body’s, a tender hoof drawing her gaze back to her own. “Your heart is in the right place.” She offered a smile, reminiscent of days long past. “But sometimes the paths we walk to reach them only lead us further away.” A glow of her horn, and the ropes unravelled from her hooves.

She helped the mare regain her hooves, allowing a smile to grace her lips. And for the first time, Pea Body smiled back. Though weakly, it was a smile nonetheless.

Rhetorical cleared his throat, but Luna held up a hoof at him. “You already said it once, Rhetorical.” To Pea Body: “You desire better health for our children. I desire the preservation of Nightmare Night and all its symbolism. Those two ideals do conflict, but perhaps there remains a way that we can come to an agreement.” She shifted her gaze to Rhetorical just long enough for it to be apparent. He blushed, but seemed otherwise afraid of showing his embarrassment.

Pea Body rubbed a leg. “So, what do you suggest?”

Luna detected a slight shrug of the shoulders—a mare truly without ideas. “Perhaps shortening the trick-or-treating hours? More funding for healthcare and education?”

Pea Body paused as if surprised. “Those sound like good places to start.” She smiled, invigorated. “And maybe pushing for sugar-free bubblegum?”

The mare’s newfound enthusiasm brought a grin to her face. “We can discuss details tomorrow.”

Luna glanced past Pea Body to the adults still backed into the corner. A hoofful had the courage to break their gazes from the foals and stare intently at her.

“What should I tell them?” Pea Body had also looked. Apprehension pulled her features taut.

“Tell them the truth. The meaning and symbolism of Nightmare Night, our plans to compromise. You convinced them to loathe it. I do believe you can convince them otherwise.” She winked, a courage-inspiring trick she had learned from Celestia.

Pea Body looked down, at her hooves. Slowly, she nodded. Another smile. “Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow.”

They shook hooves.

Peabody turned, taking care to step around the children whose patience had run dry and had taken to ‘tag’ and other foalish games. Though knocked down a peg, Luna had no doubt in her mind Pea Body would come out on top.

“So,” Luna said, turning her attention to Celestia. “Is this ‘a clear and appropriate resolution to a defined problem,’ sister? And more importantly...” She raised a brow, the slightest smirk on her lips. “Was it worth it?”

Celestia glanced about the tattered and battered throne room, eyes distant, ears flat. There appeared an answer on the tip of her tongue, but whatever it might have been, she withheld it. She sighed, defeated. “I think we both know the answer to that, Luna…”

Yes. Yes they did. Luna gave Rhetorical and Pea Body across the room a quick glance, then back to Celestia. “It has been wonderful chatting with you all. But if you’ll excuse me, I have two days of sleep to catch up on.”

“I’ll be sure to wear my ear plugs,” Celestia groaned, still surveying in disbelief the consequences of her sweet tooth, shaking her head in a ‘never again’ manner.

Luna laughed, turning to leave. Through the door, down the hall. All was quiet, finally, and she listened to the ringing silence in her ears. A glorious sound it was, one that could be bested only by the nightsong of insects.

It followed her upstairs to her chamber. The drawn curtains glowed about their edges like miniature solar eclipses, and the silk draped about her four-poster bed twinkled a nighttime sky of its own, welcoming her back after far too long apart.

She slumped into the soft plush of her mattress, sighing, content. Although she had dreamed through the night alongside Equestria, she had not rested. Dreams were merely another state of consciousness for her.

As she lay in the darkened solitude of her chamber, she relaxed her mind. Tomorrow would bring another night busy with safeguarding Nightmare Night, but the worst had passed. She had earned her rest.

And so she heaved a final sigh and let herself slip into the deep, deep darkness of slumber’s loving nothingness.

Author's Note

Special thanks to Belligerent Sock, AugieDog, Csquared08, and Cold in Gardez for their input on this story.

Before the questions roll in: yes, this was intended as a Halloween story. I am disappointed I wasn't able to get it ready in time, but if I were honest, it would have been garbage compared to this version. So sorry it wasn't up then, but I'm more than happy with the result.

Onward and Upward!

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