The time had come to smash Creator.

It was confident in its ability to put her and her two cohorts back into nightmare. Equestria belonged to it, after all. And with the griffons all asleep and dreaming of their society falling apart into raw anarchy, with each individual receiving the worst end, there was nothing stopping it from returning to Equestria. Creator could not wake up anyone. Creator could run nowhere. And even better, Canterlot was on its route anyway. There were still a few countries it had not ensnared, and Equestria happened to be between it and the next one.

Its colossal hoofsteps caused no shockwaves, shattered no stone. Clouds broke across its body, and it moved its gaze all over the surrounding landscape. The sun was rising, casting light upon the land. Soon, it would be in Equestria and soon, Creator would be back in endless horror. Once done it could stop diverting so much magic to the dreams, the act was taxing even for it. But it could hold on for just a few more hours. Equestria was very close.

.......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... ..........

Celestia

Everypony else's nightmares had grown stronger. Every pegasus, every earth pony, every unicorn, none of them were within Luna's ability to aid. The Tantabus had shut them out, and shut them in. Their only hope was that the trap had been correctly made, and that they could spring it on the monster.

Celestia stood alone in the Grand Atrium of Canterlot Castle, inspecting the trap from a safe distance. It had taken them most of the night to set up, but the snare was complete. Dainn had inscribed a series of invisible paralysis runes, with Luna's assistance to attune it to the Tantabus, and Celestia had supercharged it. The Sunstone and Moonstone, which were fist sized gems polished to perfection, were hidden under two chairs, each of which had cloths draped over them. All they had to do was lure the Tantabus there, and the power to move the sun and moon would be restored to them.

She nodded grimly. This would not destroy it. This would not free everypony. This would not give her back all the time she had lost in the nightmare. But depriving the monster of its resources was the first step to destroying it.

Celestia turned from the Grand Atrium and walked through the halls. Her robes fluttered around her in the stagnant air, and her hoofsteps were deafening on the marble floor. She walked and walked until she found herself on a balcony overlooking Equestria.

There she found Luna, who gripped the handrail as if it had personally offended her. Her sister was busy staring at the sunrise, her breaths even and strong. "How long do you think it'll take to get here?" Celestia asked.

Luna shook her head. "I do not know. That's not exactly anything I ever measured."

Celestia walked over and also rested her arms on the rail. "I doubt it will take long," she said. "It must've sensed us waking up, correct?" Luna nodded. "It must be very far away then if it is taking so long to arrive, but I can't imagine it was too far away."

"Hmm."

They were silent, and watched the sun climb higher and higher. Celestia, even without her ability to move it, had no trouble with its light and it seemed Luna didn't either. She turned her head north, and frowned. To the north were the mountains, the Crystal Empire, Yakyakistan, and Griffonstone. The curvature of the planet hid everything from view except for a few mountain tips, but Celestia swore she saw...

... no, she wasn't crazy. That was something. Far in the distance a triangle was rising up. It was hard to make out anything from their distance, but it was a triangle. Not much more than a black silhouette, but there it was, and it was getting taller. It almost looked like... a unicorn's horn. But it was so big!

The astronomical, distant horn lifted higher and higher, and then it suddenly opened up into a circle, like it was atop a head. "Luna, are you seeing this?" she whispered.

Luna nodded. "I am, sister," she said faintly, her hands trembling.

The creature grew taller and taller, showing a pitch black mare's head pointed at them, with a long alicorn-length horn sprouting from its head. Then something else appeared. It looked like an arm, but instead of fingers there was a single sphere. Almost as if somepony was throwing a ball at a target...

Celestia gasped, realization dawning on her all at once. "Oh no!" Her horn lit up, gripping both herself and Luna. She yanked them through space and reappeared in Dainn's guest chambers.

He'd been sleeping in his bed fitfully, but the flash and bang of her appearance startled him awake. "What's going on?" he asked, already summoning his armor and weapons.

"We're leaving!" she shouted in panic. "Right now!" Without waiting, a yellow aura flowed forth from her horn and wrapped around all three of them. She wrenched them aside again, this time much further to where they'd hopefully be safe.

When the flash of teleportation faded, they found themselves huddled in bushes on the outskirts of the Everfree Forest, facing towards Canterlot and its mountain.

"Sister what are you doing?" Luna hissed.

Then the magic attack struck Canterlot.

It was much, much larger than it had appeared from a distance. The spell took the form of a massive sphere of deepest black, with clearly cut boundaries. It was enormous, slightly larger than even the mountain upon which Canterlot rested. It impacted like a cannonball and came apart like a water balloon, wrapping around the mountain, spilling into Canterlot, and stretching off the other side. Then it paused, leaving what amounted to a black inkstain on the world that completely hid Canterlot from view.

"Oh," Luna whispered, still hiding in the bushes. "That's new."

None of them dared move an inch, lest the Tantabus notice them even from far off. So they stayed in their cover, so paralyzed Celestia hardly even noticed Dainn next to her. Before too long the Tantabus came into their field of vision as it strode towards Canterlot.

Luna gulped nervously. "Heheh, it's bigger than I remember."

And that sentence was probably the understatement of the century. On first glance, the Tantabus vaguely resembled a unicorn mare. But its stature was too strong, the horn too tall, the face too angular, and a chill ran down Celestia's spine as her mind drew connections to a wingless Nightmare Moon. The Tantabus was absolutely colossal. The mountain was like a foal's toy, barely reaching what amounted to its fetlocks. Clouds broke around its waist and shoulders, and its stratospheric horn scraped the ozone layer. There was no actual 'detail' to it. No fur or eyes or mouth, no clothing, nothing to hint at being a pony.

However, its body was amorphous and everflowing, the backs of its legs and spine reached out behind it like it was a dripping slime being dragged across the ground. The mane and tail, like an alicorn's usually did, flowed in an invisible breeze, but also streamed straight behind the Tantabus as if somepony were holding them back. The body was actually almost painful to look at, because its body resembled a night sky with a light-sucking void and stars that floated like hanging bodies. No, that wasn't correct. It wasn't a night sky. It was a hole, a gaping wound in the waking world that opened up to reveal a defiled night sky behind it in spite of the daylight, and as it moved and shifted the 'hole' revealed and hid stars behind it.

Dainn swore in his language. "That's the Tantabus?"

Luna whimpered and nodded. "Last I checked it was shapeless and the size of my fist, but that's definitely the Tantabus."

They watched in muted horror as the Tantabus loomed above what was once Canterlot. From its left fetlock, it began stretching relatively minuscule tendrils out, which revealed more of the twisted night as they moved. The tendrils plunged into the magical stain, impossible to follow.

"It's looking for us," Celestia whispered.

At length, the Tantabus retracted its tendrils and brought its monolithic hands closer to each other. From the atmosphere, vast streaks of black magic formed from nothing and snaked to the gap between its hands. A pitch black orb formed in the Tantabus's hands, growing larger and larger until it was the same size as the one it had thrown earlier. Magic stopped flowing into it and the Tantabus raised its arms high above its head. The orb followed them, like it was gripping a ball. Then the Tantabus threw its hands straight down, and the ball of magic crashed into the concealed mountain beneath it.

The orb burst like a bubble, and the magic held within flowed out. It spread across the grass plains of Equestria, filled in the bizarre craters, and stopped, clinging to earth and sky like tar. By then, the Tantabus was already preparing another magical orb. Once it was done forming it with both hands, it lifted it into its right and threw it. Their heads pivoted to follow the ball as it crashed into ground and engulfed the sleeping town of Ponyville.

"Merciful heavens," Dainn whispered as he started to remove his armor. "We need shelter, right now."

The Tantabus turned towards the Everfree, and began to form another orb. "On it!" Luna hissed, flaring her horn. Behind them a massive chunk of soil and stone shimmered with blue light, and then was jerked up to form a cave. Luna threw it aside and the three of them ran in.

The Tantabus lifted the orb in one hand.

"Go go go!" Celestia shouted, her body numb with horror as they slid into the hole and she pulled the earth back over them so that the only light was their magic.

Dainn's antlers shimmered with teal light and he magically lifted his armor up to the roof of stone. Bright blue symbols flared to life on them. "Put a shield between them and the earth, now!" Celestia and Luna had no time to argue. While still holding the stone in place, Celestia formed a yellow dome underneath it, which was soon joined by Luna's dark blue barrier.

WHOOSH!

Like a dim candle being snuffed out, hope died. The sunlight that streamed through the gaps in the stone was replaced by the void, and streams of the blackness instantly started to shoot through with surprising strength. Celestia's magical shield was riddled with holes as the more energetic jets punched through, and Luna's barrier wasn't perfect either.

By the time the rushing magic got through the stone and the two alicorns' shields, it wasn't much more than trailing smoke. The antimagic runes on Dainn's armor hissed and sputtered like burning metal dunked in water, and their light flickered dangerously, but the magic faded away before it could get to them as the three of them laid flat along the ground gritting their teeth.

Finally, the magical force began to let up. The magic stopped getting through Luna's shield - none too soon since the runes on Dainn's armor popped and died like faulty wiring - and then Celestia's magic alone was enough to protect them. After waiting a few more minutes to be safe, Celestia released her shield and stared at the roof of stone. None of the Tantabus's magic seeped through the gaps; it seemed it had run out of force.

With a sigh of effort, she pushed the stone back into the void and off to the side. Her horn went out, and they were plunged into absolute darkness.

A moment passed.

"AAAAAHHH!" they all shouted.

Luna's magic was the one that drove away the blackness. She quickly fashioned together a ball of cold light and let it hover in the middle of their impromptu cavern.

"Well," her sister said between heaving breaths. "That was close."

Celestia forced down a strangled laugh. "Yeah. Yeah it was. But now we're trapped."

"Let me try," Dainn said, now clad in only his shirt and pants. His antlers shimmered and the air seemed to grow dead. The wall of darkness started to shimmer as his antimagic went to work on it. Slowly, like rapidly melting ice, Dainn carved away a pocket in the abyssal blackness large enough for the three of them to comfortably stand in it. Of course, that just revealed even more of the dark magic in all directions.

She had a fairly good idea of what would happen if it touched them.

"Good news is, I can burn away this miasma. Bad news is, this is going to take a very long time. I think the best course of action is to make a small area within the forest for food, then extend towards the nearby village. Ponyville I think you called it," Dainn said, his antimagic slowly expanding their pocket.

"I was thinking the same," Celestia admitted. "Well, let's get started then."

Dainn began to carve away at the choking darkness the Tantabus had left behind, as if they were creating an underground cave. She and Luna provided light to see by, and let Dainn's air-choking antimagic slowly burn the miasma into nothingness. The process was sluggish, since the magic was so thick and they wanted to make absolutely sure that no thin wisps were left behind, not to mention Dainn's own limited magical reserves. Celestia forced herself to recharge him as they went, leaving a trail of magic lights behind them, but even so...

It took the rest of the day to make a field large enough for them to forage food. The Everfree Forest was silent and dark, but the vegetation was untainted. Grass was plain and tasted like dirt, and the few edible flowers that grew were about as appetizing as steak, but ponies had to eat so she and Luna ate from the ground.

And so did the caribou, she supposed.

Of course since Dainn was the only one with antimagic, Celestia and Luna didn't have much to do. She tried burning away the magic herself, but while her shield had stopped it before it didn't seem to be the case now. Either her shield had simply been slowing it down enough for the antimagic around the king's antlers to work, or the magic had 'solidified' and was harder to dispatch. Either way she couldn't destroy it, and the spell was as intricately woven as every nightmare spell they had seen so dispelling the miasma wasn't an option.

All they could do was set lights along the path, and tremble in fear at the prospect of the Tantabus right above them, unseen, charging an attack at any moment.

"So," Luna said eventually as all three of them took a lunch break. "I don't think we're getting the sun and moon back anytime soon."

By then, Dainn had made a slight path into the Everfree Forest and made a cavern large enough for all three of them to comfortably stand, move around, and camp in. Celestia, in her boredom, had made a primitive fire pit in the middle, but nothing burned at the moment. They'd sat around it, surrounded by the abyssal darkness that was punctured only by some glowing magical orbs. Dainn's armor - now charred and devoid of runes - was forgotten near the edge of the hole, and both Celestia and Luna's robes were covered in dirt.

Celestia sighed. "I'm worried about as much," she said, placing another leaf into her mouth. Blegh. It was better than the 'food' she'd had in the nightmare, but compared to the vegetables and such that she'd been having while awake it was quite a step down. "There's also the matter of this magical tar. From what I can tell there's nothing powering the miasma internally, either the Tantabus is actively pouring its magic into it, or it will decay on its own with time."

"Any idea on how long it'll take?" Dainn asked, scraping lichen off a tree that apparently his species could stomach. "We're getting nowhere fast and the less time we can see the easier it'll be for it to ambush us."

"Maybe it thinks we're gone," Luna supplied. "If it could sense us removing its magic then it would have caught us already. For now we at least seem to have a moment free from its sight. Which brings me to this next point. Dainn." She fixed the caribou with a steely look. "Can you teach us to wield your antimagic spell?"

He tapped his chin with one finger while chewing the slimy lichen he'd gathered. "Probably. I don't know how to explain the basics though. In our land magic doesn't form as freely as it does here, we could never manage more than basic levitation with pure magic. All of it was runes made to help bypass the magical instability, and direct antimagic is rather far removed from standard spellcasting." He shivered and rubbed his arms. "Not that it helped much," he muttered to himself.

Celestia gestured at the dome of darkness around them. "Well we're not going anywhere soon. Might as well."

He sighed. "Right." Dainn swallowed his food and Celestia - saw -

It was awful it tasted bitter and she couldn't breathe around its girth and he was telling her to swallow or he'd let her suffocate but she wouldn't give him the satisfaction she'd show him she couldn't be broken but black spots were dancing in her vision and -

Luna's arm shook her shoulder. "Sister! Snap out of it."

A shiver ran the length of her entire body. She looked over at Luna, at her worried and caring face and forced a smile. "I'm fine. I just... nevermind." Abruptly she stood, doing her best to keep him in her peripherals. "I think I need to be alone for a little," she said, trotting away with limp muscles, into the tunnel they had carved from the shadows.

She just needed to calm down a little. It was only a relapse. It was to be expected after undergoing something so horribly traumatizing, that had directly picked at her brain. Celestia would recover. Eventually. She just needed to be as far away from him as possible.

.......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... ..........

Luna

She hoped Celestia would be fine. She was a big pony, she could take care of herself and wouldn't do anything stupid, but Luna had a very good idea of what had happened to her.

"We should give her some space," Luna said, adjusting her seat to stare at Dainn. If she kept looking at him, in increments, she could get over her fear. Just giving into it and constantly flinching away would get her nowhere. "As we were saying, can you teach us the antimagic? It would go much faster with three of us working instead of only yourself."

"Right. So anyway, you know the main vectors for magic? The whole... " He waved his arm. "Direction, magnitude, resistance, all that. The long and short of it is that you just make them negative instead of positive. Doing what I'm doing has a lot of tricky details."

"We're in no rush," she said evenly.

And so they weren't. Dainn spent the better part of the next few hours helping Luna figure out the antimagic spell, while using his own glowing antlers to keep making a tunnel though the darkness. They revealed more and more of the Everfree forest, and even stumbled across some slumbering wildlife that they gave a wide berth. Once deep enough, they set to making a large camp where they could rest and eat with relative peace. By that point Celestia returned and Luna had a handle on the antimagic. She wasn't nearly as adept with it as Dainn, and having more magical power didn't actually help, but all the same she helped increase their territory and, as they worked, began teaching her sister.

The darkness was absolute and everywhere. It felt like she was at the bottom of a sea, with the vast ocean threatening to implode upon her. She experimented with it some. She couldn't teleport things into it, nor could she teleport them out. Her magic couldn't move anything inside the blackness, and indeed she couldn't sense anything at all. It was like the world simply ceased to exist inside, as if space-time were no more. That was ridiculous though, as they cleared it away they could see the Everfree that had been hidden. The spell must simply have had an advanced concealing mechanism.

She couldn't see the sun. She couldn't see the moon. The darkness made it feel like it was nighttime, and it rapidly sapped her allies' energy at the same time it tried to keep her up far later than she should've been. Progress was accelerating though, and their agonizingly monotonous work paid off when, as they decided it was time for dinner, they'd cleared an area the size of Canterlot's grand hall deep in the Everfree.

At that time, Luna was busy rooting through the soil for any edible roots. She found a few brown-looking things that a quick magic scan confirmed were edible, and she even found some pears that must've been brought into the Everfree. She carried as much as her arms could carry, then some more in her magic, and returned to the center of their camp.

Celestia had busied herself with gathering rocks into a large ring, followed by pulling together some dry sticks and setting it ablaze with spellfire. Dainn meanwhile, had retrieved water stored in hollowed-out rocks - courtesy of Luna - and he'd also smoothed out three areas around the campfire where they could rest.

"Here's dinner," she said, laying the roots and fruits on a flat rock. Celestia stabbed some of the roots through with a stick and started roasting them on the flame.

Dainn's water was already boiled to safety, so he took a long gulp. "Ugh, that's warm," he said, placing the makeshift bucket aside. "So, which way is Ponyville from here?"

"That way," Celestia said as she pointed a finger in a seemingly random direction. She remained intensely focused on the cooking roots. "It should take us a day to get there. Half that if we want to make the tunnel narrow, but I don't think we want to rush this. Once we're there we can set about looking for the other Element bearers."

"What about Princess Twilight?" Luna asked. "She is still in Canterlot is she not? It's a long trip there with this miasma hindering us. To say nothing of how we can possibly awaken them." She grabbed a pear and bit into it, shivering a bit at the flavor. Much better than the canned stuff. "All of us combined haven't the power to free them. So let's think. What is there that could?"

"Antimagic doesn't work," Dainn said. "It's too tight and the Tantabus keeps repairing it."

"The Crystal Heart perhaps," Celestia suggested. She pulled the roots off the fire and began distributing them. "It disintegrated Sombra, but it's outside Equestria's borders so I don't think we can get at it. There is also Discord, but I've no clue where we'd even begin looking for him. After all, it's not as though he gave us keys to his pocket dimension. He may very well have no idea of the tragedy that befell us."

"Or maybe it befell him too," Luna said ominously. "That leaves the Elements of Harmony."

"Fat chance," Dainn countered. "They're the ones asleep in the first place." He threw his hands in the air from exasperation. "Now what?"

Luna and her sister shared a look. "Not... entirely," she explained. "The bearers no longer wield the physical elements. Those were returned to their source, a construct known as the Tree of Harmony. In return it, after time, granted them the Rainbow Power, but the Tree itself has the elements now. Maybe... "

Celestia finished her sentence. "... it can awaken them if we bring them to its roots. It's a stretch though. If it doesn't work then we'll be without anything. And the Tantabus may know we moved them there and come for us." She shook her head. "We should sleep on this."

They murmured agreement and finished up their meager dinner, washing it down with lukewarm water. Luna pulsed her horn and placed an enchantment on all three of them to block out nightmares. She had a feeling that without it, none of them would get any rest. Then they went to sleep.

At least, they did.

But Luna... Luna couldn't. Call it nerves. Call it insomnia. Regardless, she laid on the uncomfortable dirt, staring up at the cavernous, engulfing darkness, for what felt like hours. Slowly but surely, her stomach began to sink and her heart felt like it was being squeezed in a vice.

She had seen the Tantabus. It had come, and with so much more hideous power than she had dared dream. The little ball of smoke had grown so much. If it hadn't been for Celestia's quick reflexes, then its magic orb would have swallowed her whole and she'd be back in... there. But even if they'd dodged it, it had so casually put all of Equestria under its poison. They were working on the assumption that the fumes would clear, but would they really? The Tantabus had strengthened the nightmare spell on everypony to make freeing them impossible, who was to say this wouldn't be the same, and they spent years trying to hollow a path while the Tantabus rampaged unopposed around the planet?

There was nobody out there who could stop it. Tirek was locked in Tartarus, and getting him enough magic to oppose it might not even be possible. Discord was nowhere to be found, and the Elements were shattered. Meanwhile the Tantabus was the size of the very sky, and if she remembered its design it would only be growing stronger by the minute. Who was going to put it down? The minotaurs? The griffons? The changelings? Nobody could challenge that sort of power.

Why had it even let them go? Did it think so little of them? Did it think they were dead? Did it think they escaped its attacks and were running free, far away from it? It had placed up a shield, hadn't it?

Luna, Celestia, and Dainn were trapped inside Equestria, forced to tunnel like dogs - the diamond dogs are also probably lost, she thought. They had no Elements, no Discord, and no way to get help. This was hopeless. She might as well have never woken up. She might as well have just accepted the lies her sister's imitation put forth and stayed there. It'd make no difference after all.

And the worst part of it all? It was all her fault. She created it. She fed it. She allowed it to grow stronger, in the hopes that its nightmares could improve to punish her more. Luna had let her guard down, maybe even for a second, and in that moment of ineptitude the Tantabus had gone from a little cloud of regret and spite to... that. It was her fault her sister was traumatized. It was her fault that everypony was. It was her fault that ponies and caribou would never be friends. Everything, like always, came to rest squarely on her shoulders and it made her want to, want to... !

Instead of screaming, she turned from her back onto her side, facing the smoldering campfire. Maybe she should just use a sleep spell. Luna expected to see the others sleeping, but instead her eyes met with Dainn's steel blue ones.

He huffed through his nostrils, also laying on his side. "Can't sleep?"

Luna sighed, but gave up on sleep and sat. "Sadly no. You neither I presume." It wasn't a question.

With a pained grunt, the bull pushed himself up and rubbed his eyes. "Too much on your mind?"

"Far too much." I did this to you, she remembered, and the thought burned like acid in her gut. "I was just thinking of what we'll do. Truth be told I do not truly know how we can possibly prevail. It may be hopeless." In her heart of hearts, she didn't believe for a second the Tree of Harmony could help them. The Elements were lost. This was their life now. "The creature could do this after all," she said, gesturing around them. "I know of few powers that can oppose such wrath, and those that I do know are likely out of our reach."

He nodded, but crossed his legs and frowned grimly. "I hope you are not suggesting we give up."

"Of course not," she lied, snapping her gaze at him. "I'll fight to my last breath, and if it comes down to it?" She hesitated, but thought back to what she endured in the nightmare and nodded. "I would sooner lay my soul to rest than allow it to claim me a second time. After all, my sister and I are unaging. You may find respite after a few decades." Assuming the Tantabus couldn't stop aging. "But we would never be free again."

He shuddered. "An eternity of that." His gaze drifted from her, over to the campfire, and to the blissfully sleeping form of her sister. "Hmm, at least someone can get some rest," he said ruefully.

"My sister has always been able to catch her rest well, I'm certain it to be a skill she acquired during my exile," she huffed. "Goodness knows she needs it after what happened earlier."

Dainn's mouth pressed into a line. "A flashback I presume. Gods above, what did it show her?"

"I can make a guess," she grumbled, crossing her arms and looking away from him.

They sat in silence. Then:

"What did it show you?" Dainn asked. She snapped her head over to look at him with wide eyes. He looked away meekly. "No, no, you're right. It's still too soon."

She considered it, and shook her head. "No, it is not. We might as well clear the air now while we're awake. Tis only reasonable, there is no sense having this hang over our heads while we try and do battle with the monster. I'll tell you and you'll tell me?" she suggested.

He nodded. "Fair trade." The king gestured at her with an open hand. "Whenever you're ready."

Luna sighed and laid back down on her patch of earth. "Here, you came to Equestria as refugees seeking shelter. In our nightmare though, you came to Equestria as conquerors seeking servants. Your society was built entirely around the subjugation and sexual enslavement of females of all races." His eyes narrowed uncomfortably.

Luna continued. "With the aid of dream logic, your conquest was swift and without difficulty. You corrupted the minds of Princess Cadance and Prince Shining Armor, and through them defiled the Crystal Heart into a symbol of your dream self's depravity. The magic within it was twisted, and it released a pulse that enslaved the minds of every stallion in Equestria to your cause." She shuddered. "And you, yourself? You gained wings like an alicorn and the power to match. With ease you battled, defeated and broke my sister. My mind-wiped guards ambushed me in my slumber and brought me to you." Her voice grew increasingly bitter.

"Me and my sister were your sex slaves under the dream, and my own sister surrendered and joined you willingly, aiding in my abuse. Princess Twilight was not far behind. For months I screamed and begged for aid, but nopony came. It continued like that until the day I broke free of the magic." She sighed, and wiped away some of the moisture collecting in her eyes. "Celestia dreamed much the same, but it was she who remained defiant, and I who gave in." She turned to the caribou and glared at him, the memories raw and painful and she didn't feel like she was getting enough air. "That is what we dreamed, King of the Caribou," she spat. All the same, airing her grievances aloud had felt... fundamentally good. Some of the strangling, guilty weight on her lungs had lifted, even if her breaths were short. Perhaps if she had relearned to communicate with her sister in lieu of creating the Tantabus, this all would have been averted.

Dainn nodded, sighing. He reclined onto his own 'bed'. "I see." There was a pause. Just when Luna was about to demand his own explanation, he spoke once again. "We arrived in a port town. Lindisbarne if I remember correctly. At first everything seemed fine. We had but stories of your people, but contact seemed fine at first. My consort and I made friends with the townfolk, and within a day we were invited to your capitol." He frowned. "Now that I think about it, it should not have been so brief. Hmm, dreams. At any rate, Hevra and I arrived in Canterlot with our council, neglecting to bring guards because we trusted in your benevolence."

He laughed bitterly. "It was a trap. Your dream selves captured us and broke our antlers like twigs, for the grave crime of not being ponies. Our antimagic, which I assume you dreamed as being all powerful, couldn't stop a foal. Our people left behind in the port town were, while we were away, subdued and rounded up. Your sister owned me, and you owned my consort." His muzzle wrinkled. "Though you two shared with each other. Unlike your dream, our enslavement was not sexual. That was a part of it, sure, but mostly it was menial and hard labor."

"You pushed us beyond our limits with ludicrous tasks. Sometimes they were outright impossible just so you could see us fail and then discipline me... " He trailed off, rubbing his chest and throat as though something were impaled through them. "Then once you were through, a process that could take weeks, you used your magic and healed us as though nothing had ever happened. And so it was until you came and freed me from its grasp."

"I'm sorry," she said reflexively.

Still on the ground, the caribou bull shook his head. "Don't be. It wasn't your fault."

Luna's smile was incredibly painful. "I suppose." She huffed. "Sometimes, people from outside our country judge us. Their citizens look in at us and, as outsiders who see so little of our ways, they 'know' us to be xenophobic specists. Just as some ponies 'know' the griffons to be bloodthirsty marauders. Perhaps there is some bias on the part of our little ponies but nothing like that."

"Caricatures then," he replied. "The Tantabus took the rumors of your specism and elevated it. It took our tendency towards male rulers to its extreme conclusion." He glanced over at her. "Don't give me that look. There is no law about it, but there hasn't been a cow in an upper position of power since Hel the Heartless. Though I imagine the Tantabus had fun exaggerating that."

"I wonder if it even can feel this 'fun'," she wondered. Then Luna nodded. "My thanks for confiding this in me. I hope you will not mind if I tell the tale to my sister."

"Go ahead. We're in this together. With that in mind, we should probably get some rest," he said, giving her an uneasy grin.

She smiled back. "Yes, we probably should. We're due in Ponyville tomorrow, after all." Luna relaxed her head and forced her eyes shut.

Now she knew why Dainn had looked as though she was about to impale him when he first woke up. And now he knew why she was always ready to impale him. Luna had no hopes of becoming friends with the caribou. They had simply suffered too much at the others' hand. But perhaps some understanding was the key towards being able to sleep easy in each others' presence. They had to, after all.

Because her greatest mistake was still rampaging out there, and it certainly did not sleep. And if it didn't sleep then why should she? In fact, Luna should be up and at it, using her newly acquired antimagic to carve a tunnel towards -

Exhaustion prevailed and she was out like a light.

Author's Note

Thanks to thtiger for editing.

Much to my disappointment, I don't own MLP. That honor goes to Hasbro.

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