"Why do I have to do this?" Twilight frowns as she rides upon a chariot pulled through the air by two pegasi.
"Celestia wrote it in the letter, you need to get out more Twilight." Spike answers as he looks down at Ponyville, scanning the new scenery.
"Ugh, I have studying to do and contraptions to build! This is wasting my time." She complains. The chariot lands in an empty street and she dismounts it, scoffing at the pegasi, they glare at her and take off.
Spike follows her, "Well then let's just do this as fast as we can, Celestia arranged for you to stay in a library, so she's probably expecting you to take no time at all."
"Good, first objective?"
"To Sweet Apple Acres!" Spike announces and points northwest.
Twilight turns to lead the way, but a bouncing pink pony bounds at her from that direction. A shiver runs down her spine, her breathing picks up, "Spike we have to hide." She states calmly, while looking around frantically for a good spot.
Spike raises a brow, "Why?"
Twilight grabs Spike and dives into an alleyway, holding a hoof around his mouth until the pink pony passes them by. "You know that really annoying pony I try to avoid?" Twilight releases Spike.
"Minuette?"
"Yeah, that one has the same vibe, like if she notices me she'll never stop trying to be my friend until I eventually just have to accept that they will be there in my presence, talking about nonsense until I come up with an excuse to be away from them." Twilight glares into the distance for a moment before her vision is filled with pink causing her to scream at the top of her lungs.
The pink pony joins her in screaming, until Twilight calms down, with a giggle the pink one introduces herself. "Hi, I'm Pinkie Pie, I saw you run off and I couldn't tell who you were which meant I probably hadn't met you yet 'cause I can tell who somepony is with just a glance and if I haven't met you that means you're new here because I know everypony in Ponyville and- ... where'd you go?"
Twilight had galloped most of the way to the orchard before slowing down, "Well, good thing that mouth running of hers covered her hearing."
"Man I'd think you practiced watching ponies eyes but you rarely ever make eye contact."
"Peripherals Spike, you can see things without looking directly at them, I had to watch for the moment she looked away and to be sure nothing suddenly blocked our escape." She trots up to Sweet Apple Acres, "Now let's handle this quickly."
"Sweet Apple Acres is handling banquet preparations, sounds like we get to taste some food." Spike smiles.
"Yee-haw!" An orange pony calls out as she bucks a tree, shaking every single apple loose in an instant. They all fall perfectly stacked into containers placed below. The mare stands there proud of her accomplishment.
Twilight approaches her, "Excuse me, I'm Twilight Sparkle and-" The orange mare interrupts Twilight by grabbing her hoof.
"Howdy there... uh," Twilight keeps her foreleg rigid and firmly planted to the ground while glaring at her, the orange mare takes a step back with a concerned look, "Sorry, I was just trying ta shake yer hoof. Anyhow, pleasure ta make your acquaintance Miss Twilight, I'm Applejack, what can I do ya for?"
"Your farm is overseeing the food preparations for the Summer Sun Celebration, I'm here to make sure you're doing your job."
"Yeah, can we sample some of the food?" Spike asks excitedly.
"'Course!" Applejack runs over to a triangle sounding it off and calling out, "Soup's on everypony!" A mass of ponies flock from every part of the farm. Twilight is once again filled with dread as she seeks an escape she scrambles to avoid getting run over, a table is shoved in her path and the many ponies gather around. Applejack takes the spot by her side. "Now, lemme introduce you to the Apple Family!"
"I'd rather you didn't" Twilight frowns.
A pony holding a plate with an apple fritter darts in from the group, "This here is Apple Fritter." Applejack introduces as the pony darts away leaving the plate on the table, another pony darts in with a pair of caramel dipped apples on a stick, Applejack turns to introduce her, "Apple Bumpkin." She says as she turns back to find nopony by her side.
"Are we going to sneak away from everypony we meet?" Spike asks.
"They obviously had the food handled, I can't be bothered to stick around any longer than necessary." Twilight reveals an apple she snagged from the farm and hands it to Spike, "Sorry we didn't get to taste anything."
"That's okay, I know you hate crowds." Spike takes the apple and bites into it, looking at the list he swallows before speaking, "Next is weather. A pegasus named Rainbow Dash should be working on it."
Spike and Twilight scout the cloudy sky, "Wow she's terrible." Twilight looks down just in time to see a blur of colors flying toward her, she jumps aside and it slams into a nearby puddle spraying her with mud.
"Ugh, gotta work on the landing." The blur turned out to be a pegasus with a rainbow mane.
Twilight wipes mud away from her eyes and glares at her, "Would you happen to be Rainbow Dash?"
The mare looks back and jumps to her hooves, spraying a bit more mud around, "The one and only! Why, you heard of me?" She asks with excitement in her eyes.
"No, I'm here to make sure you do your job, so get to clearing the sky." Twilight demands.
"Yeah, yeah, I'll get to that once I'm done practicing." Rainbow Dash darts up through a low cloud, clearing the mud from herself before standing atop it.
"No. Now. Before I report you for your lackadaisical behavior." Twilight stomps to make her point clear.
"Woah, take it easy, I'll have it done in ten seconds flat. Check this out!" Rainbow Dash darts from her cloud which dissipates and begins rapidly destroying every cloud in sight.
At about the five second mark Twilight shakes the mud off herself and decides to move on, "What's next Spike?" But he was too distracted by Rainbow Dash to notice the question.
Once Rainbow is done she lands on a nearby bridge, "See? ...uh, were you even watching?"
Twilight ignores Rainbow, waiting for Spike's answer. "Oh, heh, decorations." Spike gives Rainbow an apologetic look before leading Twilight to the town hall. Rainbow rolls her eyes and takes off back to her practice.
Once inside the hall Spike's eye lock forward, "... Beautiful."
"Oh, good, I don't care about aesthetics so you're a better judge, guess we're done here." Twilight turns about and heads out.
"No! I meant, uh..." Spike says, flustered.
"Nope! No time, next thing!" Twilight calls as she walks away.
Twilight watches from the bushes as a yellow pegasus gets a flock of birds to sing, but she notices one of them is off rhythm. "Do you hear that?" She asks Spike.
"Hear what?"
"One of them isn't singing right, stay here I'll fix it." Twilight marches forward grabs a rock and lobs it at the off rhythm bird. Narrowly missing, the rock hits the branch just under the bird and they all disperse. The yellow pegasus looks back to Twilight in shock. "Well, singing birds was a dumb idea anyway, get some better music before the Summer Sun Celebration."
"Twilight!" Spike catches up and tugs on her tail, "You can't ask her to do that!"
The pegasus turns from looking shocked to amazed in a flash, "I-is that a talking baby dragon!?" The pegasus bolts toward Spike only to find herself muzzle to muzzle with Twilight.
"Fix. Your. Birds." Twilight growls.
She gulps and backs off in fear. Spike looks out from behind Twilight and waves, "Hi, my name's Spike."
"Uh, hi Spike. I'm Fluttershy." She waves back, still nervous about the pony between them.
Twilight turns away and heads toward the library.
"Not another step." Twilight throws a hoof out in front of Spike.
"What now?"
Twilight examines the library, "That sound isn't the rustling of leaves from the tree."
"Sound?" Spike tries to listen for anything unusual but doesn't pick up a thing.
"There are ponies in there." Twilight crouches down and sneaks towards the nearest window.
"Well it is a library."
"Are you going to tell me they are in there reading with the lights off?" Twilight scans the room from the window but can't see in the darkness. Her keen hearing is still picking up whispers and hushed laughs from within. "Hmm, every town should have a siren system, I could rig it to-"
"Maybe something less extreme Twilight."
"Fine. Remember back when you started breathing fire you sometimes only got smoke?"
"Yeah?"
"Can you do that on purpose?"
"There go the fire ponies, looks like they figured out it was a false alarm." Spike says as he keeps on eye out the window.
"Great, good job today Spike, we finished our chores and there's plenty of time for reading while we wait for the celebration to start." Twilight picks out a lot of books from the shelves and begins looking through them.
"Yeah, are you sure we did everything right? I mean we really did seem to spend no time at all checking up on things."
"We found the errors and made the corrections, there was nothing more for us to do. Just eat the cupcakes those ambushers ditched and don't think about it." One of the books catches Twilight's attention, "Super Naturals, interesting."
"Finally, I'll get to go home after this." Twilight finds a place in front of the crowd gathered in town hall.
Small murmurs fill the room which Twilight found acceptable until a higher pitched voice broke the atmosphere. "Hey it's you I'm sorry about the library I was planning this huge surprise party but I think somepony knocked over a candle? We got the fire ponies as quick as we could but the smoke went away really fast then you were already inside so if I -"
Pinkie Pie is interrupted by a team of birds singing a short tune before a spotlight descends and points towards the town's mayor. "Fillies and gentlecolts, as mayor of Ponyville it is my great pleasure to announce the beginning of The Summer Sun Celebration!" Happy cheers fill the room.
Twilight becomes somber and tunes out the mayor, before the incident this was supposedly her favorite event of the year, but now it just seems dumb. She didn't have a care about how long the days and nights were. Celestia can raise the sun without much effort and once a year she makes a show of it like it's something special. She can't imagine what all the other ponies are excited about, it doesn't make any sense to her. She wonders if when her previous self took that magic test, she got any warning of what would happen, that her memories would be erased and she would be stripped of all her magic.
"...Princess Celestia!" Twilight is brought out of her daze and looks up to the opening curtains. The room falls silent as it's revealed there's nopony behind them.
"All that work and she doesn't even bother to show up." Twilight sighs and walks to the door as the hall fills with panicked whispers. Twilight leaves, shutting the door behind her, then taking a seat on the steps.
Spike sits beside her, "Well, you never liked this sorta thing anyway, let's go home."
"Yeah, never did..." Twilight stands solemnly, her ears perk up as light flashes and thunder sounds from within the town hall. A maniacal laughter fills the air. Twilight knows something is wrong and turns to head back in, but the doors burst open and a shimmering could of purple smoke wisps off towards the Everfree forest.
"Come back here!" Rainbow calls out and attempts to give chase, but it's too fast.
Twilight's eyes look to the moon, the shadow of a mare no longer upon it. "No... Spike, steel yourself!" Twilight sweeps Spike up and puts him on her back, she then goes into a full gallop towards the Everfree.
"Where are we going!?"
"Where are you going!?"
Both Spike and Rainbow ask in bewilderment.
"Nightmare Moon cannot be allowed to do as she pleases. Celestia used the Elements of Harmony to banish her to the moon but if Celestia didn't show up here that means Nightmare already got her. We have to defeat her before she finds the Elements and destroys them!"
"How do you know all that?" Rainbow asks.
"I'm Celestia's personal student, I know a lot."
"Cool, so you know how to stop her?"
"Take Spike and meet me at the castle, you should be able to see it from there."
"I can, you sure you don't want me to go with you?"
"I'm sure, if I'm by myself I can travel freely."
Twilight feels Spike lifted from her back. "But Twilight, I-"
"I need you in the sky Spike." Without another word they separate and Twilight is left to traverse the Everfree Forest alone.
The most dangerous place in Equestria, capable of controlling its own weather, every animal fends for themselves, and once home to the two royal pony sisters. Twilight had many theories as to why it turned out like this, seeing Celestia's garden the variety of creatures loose in the Everfree Forest is likely her fault, as well the weather may have been a spell of hers that she lost control of.
One thing Twilight didn't expect is the mountainous terrain, she found herself on the edge of a cliff in no time. A slight wind blows past as she scans for a faster way down, the easy path would take far too long. However, the cliff decides her path for her as the edge crumbles under her weight.
"Wha-!?" Twilight tries to grab anything she can as she tumbles down, just as a stray root passes her eye she reacts and bites down on it. With a quick assessment she realizes the cliff is too steep to climb back up but she should be able to safely slide down. She lets go and rolls over to she where she's headed, keeping a grip on the ground to slow her descent. Her eyes go wide as she looks down, noticing that she's sliding towards a sheer drop. She scrambles to grab at something again but it's too late, as her lower body drops she desperately clings to the edge securing herself for only a moment. With just a glance she finds a platform she can land on safely, with what's left of her grip she swings towards it.
Not able to get enough swing she reaches for it only to realize she's falling too fast as planting her fore-hooves does nothing, her head meets the platform.
'Well, you usually practice your magic around this time... Hey, don't worry, I'll show you some things the Royal Guards practice.'
Twilight shakes her head and stands up, wondering why her brother's voice rang out in her head. Still against the cliff face she looks around to find she landed on another platform and that there are in fact a series of such that can be easily descended. She makes her way down.
At the bottom she looks to the stars to assess her direction, with a keen eye a pony can find stars that Celestia puts in each cardinal direction. By the looks of it Nightmare Moon has only succeeded in delaying the day and has done nothing to the night sky thus far. A roar breaks Twilight's focus. A manticore stands before her, blood-lust in its eyes.
"Hey there, -" Twilight leaps back to avoid a sudden swipe of the manticore's claw. "- I don't think you want to fight me." It makes a lunge leading with its other claw, Twilight sidesteps it, whirls around and bucks it in the nose. The manticore reels back, giving Twilight the opportunity to spot a handicap, a limp in his right foreleg. "Good thing for you, -" It leaps at Twilight, she darts forward through the space under it, a shiver runs through her and she jumps to her left as the manticore's tail slams the spot she was in. "I'm in a hurry." She goes into a full gallop, planning her path of escape where the tree are thickest.
She could hear the manticore's paws strike the ground as it ran, it was easily avoiding anywhere it might get trapped between the trees whilst keeping up with Twilight. Twilight looks around frantically, she has to lose it. Whenever she has to choose a direction through she goes right to give the beast trouble, but it wasn't enough. around a large tree she came upon a gaping maw with sharp teeth ready to snap down. She leaps back, "A tree!?" She refocuses and can no longer hear the manticore coming towards her. Then the branches above her collapse in mass, revealing the manticore had flown above and planned to land on her. She jumps into the tree as it lands, then the moment it finds her she leaps back out onto its head then to its right, it staggers in its attempt to chase her as she makes her way through even more trees sporting the same threatening looks.
Twilight makes little progress in losing the manticore, but with her sense of direction she knows she's on the path to the castle. A river comes into view and a sea serpent seems to be minding its own business just lounging in the river. Twilight approaches to ask for assistance but a cloud of purple smoke wisps by and tears a side of the serpents beautiful orange mustache clean off. The serpent is easily defeated and with a dramatic groan it slumps over. Twilight is too focused on the cloud to be concerned, she jumps on the serpent and runs across its body which extended to the other side of the river. "Oh, what a world!" It cries as Twilight touches land. She turns around to see it thrashing about, making the waters too dangerous for the manticore to follow.
She takes a breath, "One last stretch." She finds a path weaving through the trees, likely one of many roads to the castle. Following it she comes across a large ravine with a rickety bridge leading across.
Rainbow Dash is just above with Spike asleep on her back, "Took you long enough, your buddy's been drooling on me!"
"Nightmare Moon's been trying to stop me, we still have plenty of time!" Twilight dashes across the bridge and towards the castle ruins.
"Wait, really?" Rainbow keeps up beside Twilight.
Twilight doesn't respond, instead she looks up at the Elements of Harmony, large stone orbs held high by their altar at the castle's entrance. Twilight looks to Rainbow to let her know what they are but a purple cloud flies between them and begins to circle them creating a wind that lifts them up. Twilight makes a leap for them, not knowing exactly how she could even save the Elements at this point. She's sucked into the whirlwind before a large flash blinds her.
Now in the throne room, realizing she's been teleported Twilight gets a sense of her surroundings, Nightmare Moon stands across the room, the Elements at her feet. Twilight lowers her head, taking up a charging posture. Nightmare Moon lifts and eyebrow, "You're kidding. You're kidding, right?"
Twilight charges at her and she charges back. Just before they clash Twilight dives between Nightmare's legs, stands up and bucks her hind legs. Nightmare crumbles to the ground and Twilight makes for the Elements. Standing in the middle of them she tries to find out how they work, moving them around, checking for marking other than the shapes upon them. A blast of lightning sends Twilight to the wall.
'C'mon Twilight, when you think you're at your limit that's only thirty percent of what you can really do.'
Twilight stands and looks up just in time to see Nightmare slamming her hooves at the center of the Elements, shattering them all. A maniacal laugh escapes her, "Did you really think you could defeat me?"
"I know I can." Twilight charges once again and throws herself head first at Nightmare, landing a direct headbutt onto her muzzle. Nightmare reels back and snarls. "I just didn't want to bust you up." A dark cloud forms above Twilight and lightning strikes her again and again, sending pain throughout her body and making her unable to move.
With another laugh Nightmare speaks, "You're quite the persistent one my little subject, unfortunately that sort of behavior will only bring you pain." Twilight stands tall, resisting the urge to fall and curl into the fetal position as lightning rains down on her. "Now the moment I let up, you're going to bow and apologize or else you're going to have a really bad time."
"Ee-yah!" Rainbow shouts as she dives in from above planting a hind-hoof into the back of Nightmare's head bringing it into the ground and breaking the stone floor below. Rainbow then grapples one of Nightmare's forelegs and bends into back, pinning her to the ground. Dazed from the blow Nightmare is unable to keep up her magic.
Once the cloud above Twilight dissipates an uncontrollable anger surges through her, she picks up a sharp piece of the broken Elements and walks toward Nightmare, holding it high. Rainbow looks on with fear, knowing what's about to come next, but unwilling to stop it. Twilight brings the stone shiv down towards Nightmare's eye.
"Stop!" A blinding flash fills the room and Twilight is thrown back, but she refuses to let go of the shiv, she lands on her hooves and nearly charges again before realizing who the voice belonged to.
A glowing yellow shield protects both Nightmare Moon and the alicorn who now stands above her, Princess Celestia. "What, why?" Twilight yells in frustration.
Celestia flinches, not fond of her student's rage. "This is my sister." She states solemnly, "I can't let you... do that, even if it means Equestira is trapped in eternal night, I just..." Celestia falls silent for a moment, "The Elements of Harmony are not gone, if you find the right ponies, befriend them, and bring them here they can be restored and we can finally free my sister from her nightmare. Please Twilight, I know you can do it."
"But, I can't, I don't know how to make friends!" Twilight shouts, a pit forming in her stomach, "Spike is my only friend! And I know that's not enough! I can't-"
"Please!" Celestia pleads, "I can hold her for a few days, you have plenty of time."
A weak laugh comes from Nightmare, "She won't be making any friends... much less leaving this place." Dark sentient clouds descend from the sky, bearing monstrous faces.
Twilight locks eyes with one, prepared for a fight, it zooms at her with unparalleled speed and her vision goes black.
"Huh, that's it then? You really did waste both our lives, how could you not have figured out the Elements of Harmony?" A unicorn stands before Twilight in a large white space, that unicorn being Twilight, the real one, the purple one that had been in all those family photos. Twilight looks over the the real one's flank, still blank like hers. "What you thought I'd at least have one? No. You stole that moment from me, just like everything else."
"I didn't have any control over that!"
"But you did have control over what happened after, do you think I would've spent my whole life cooped up in my room all alone, studying and building nonsense contraptions until I withered into an old mare!?"
Tears welled up in Twilight's eyes, "I... I- no, but..." Twilight couldn't breathe, she had no excuses.
"No we're dead and Equestria is doomed to eternal night! All you had to do was make a friend!"
"Wait..." A spark ignites in Twilight's head, "I did make a friend! You're wrong!"
"What?" The real Twilight steps back.
"This isn't real, I'm not dead!"
"Oh, you're in denial -"
"Out of my way!" Twilight punches the image of the real Twilight and it bursts into a dark cloud. The white space fades back into the throne room, the monster stunned before her, she lunges at it and bites down on its tail.
"Yeow!" It tries to shakes her off, "Stop that!" It flails furiously to escape Twilight's teeth, but in doing so Twilight is able to dig in deeper. "Please, I give up!" Twilight lets go and the creature flees into the sky.
Twilight looks past Celestia to find Rainbow lying on the ground mumbling, "Can't fly... but they... need me..." A cloud monster hangs above her with a malicious grin across its face and its eyes locked to hers. Twilight charges it, leaping and body slamming it down from the air, knocking it unconscious. However, this didn't seem to help Rainbow as she paddles her legs like she's trying to swim.
Twilight walks over to her, "Rainbow, spread your wings."
"But-"
"Just do it!" Rainbows wings spread out. "Now flap!" She does so, bringing her off the ground. "Feel the air beneath you?"
Rainbow shakes her head and opens her eyes, "Woah! Thanks!"
"That's it!"
"Huh?" Rainbow looks confused as Twilight heads over to Celestia.
"The tale of the two sisters, Nightmare Moon, she was afraid of living in your shadow."
Celestia looks down, "I know, I didn't realize it in time and I couldn't save her." A tear falls from her eye, she turns her head away to hide her anguish.
"Save her now." Twilight states, "I'm sure she's in there, she can hear you, you just have to tell her how you feel and what you can do to help."
Celestia looked down to her student, amazed, tears still flowing from her eyes as she closes them, "I didn't mean to leave you in the dark, all the ponies of Equestria kept me so busy I couldn't see that you were always, always alone as they slept. I let them all adore me while they ignored you. I couldn't even save you from these nightmares when you needed me most. I'm so sorry Luna!"
"None of that is going to work, your sister is mine!" Nightmare shouts, she begins to stand but Celestia holds her down.
"I can change this! We can have a parade in your honor the moment this is over! We'll sit side by side at every royal summit! I'll introduce you to all my friends! I'll show everypony how wonderful you are!" Luna's pupils begin to round up, her coat lightens in color. Celestia takes a deep breath, releases Nightmare and brings her into a hug, "There's a holiday in your honor you know... I established it shortly after I banished you... I'm so sorry, all those years alone must have been so hard... can you forgive me?"
"You're not... going to... get rid of me!" Nightmare shouts, dark clouds burst from her and encase Celestia.
Celestia releases a young looking alicorn from her grasp and tries to shake away the dark cloud, "No! You can't do this!" Celestia falls onto her rear, "What did I do wrong? Why is this..." Twilight grabs the cloud with her teeth and yanks it away, as the monster takes form and turns to Twilight, Rainbow flies into it, smashing it into a nearby wall.
Twilight grabs Celestia's head she couldn't tell what her mentors fears were but she spoke anyway, "Hey! You didn't do anything wrong! Everything's fine, nopony is doing anything bad! Celestia!"
Celestia's eyes open and look to Twilight, "Everything isn't fine Twilight." Celestia looks over to Luna and smiles, "It's perfect." Celestia throws her forelegs around Twilight. Twilight somewhat grudgingly accepts Celestia's hug, knowing the she herself needs one too.
"Sister?" Twilight looks back to see Luna standing up, seemingly intimidated by Celestia.
Celestia puts Twilight down and walks over to Luna. "It's been a thousand years Luna, will you still be my friend?"
"Of course!" Luna exclaims, they embrace in a heartfelt hug.
Rainbow scratches the back of her head with a hoof and flies over to Twilight's side, "Looks like we saved the day."
"Literally." Twilight turns toward the exit, "Let's go get Ponyville ready for a parade." Twilight looks around. "Where's Spike?"
"I left him at the entrance, didn't want to drag to little guy into a fight."
