One Small Step, One Giant Mistake

by Dat Dash

Rating: teen
Tags: Other, Nightmare Moon, Thriller, Science Fiction, Adventure, Princess Celestia, Main 6, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Alternate Universe, Human
Length: 2521

What if Celestia banished Nightmare Moon to OUR moon, and she awoke during the Apollo 11 moon landing? An AU retelling of the Nightmare Moon two-parter. (Ponies belong to Hasbro. We don't know who real life belongs to yet, but we're working on it.)

Alternate universe retelling of the Nightmare Moon two-parter. My Little Pony belongs to Hasbro. Real life's creator is as yet unknown.

It has been 1000 years since Nightmare Moon's banishment. On the longest day of the thousandth year, she was supposed to return to Equestria.

But she did not.

Instead, she awoke on another world's moon entirely. And that world's inhabitants had just set foot on it.

It's one small step for a man, yet one giant mistake for mankind, as Nightmare Moon decides that she wants this new world instead. It's up to Twilight Sparkle and five other ponies she just met to stop Nightmare Moon and save this new world.

Published 2016-03-10 00:20:02 UTC
Last updated 2016-05-07 07:03:10 UTC

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Author's Note

Well, this idea came to me all of a sudden and I couldn't get it out until I wrote something down. I was browsing TV Tropes (that site will ruin your life) when the idea hit me. This was the result.

Hope you liked what I've got so far. If not, that's okay too. Just don't be a dick about it in the comments.

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“Where is she?”

Princess Celestia glared angrily at nopony in particular, as she stood atop the balcony in Ponyville Town Hall. The Summer Sun Celebration had come to a crashing halt.

“P-princess,” stammered Twilight Sparkle, a visiting unicorn from Canterlot and Celestia's protégé, struggling to comprehend what was happening.

“WHERE IS SHE?!” Celestia demanded at a deafening volume, her voice reverberating intensely.

“Where is who?” asked Twilight meekly.

“I THOUGHT SHE WOULD COME BACK, TWILIGHT SPARKLE. I THOUGHT I COULD FINALLY SAVE MY SISTER!!”

This prompted the heads of many ponies to turn in shock. Celestia had a sister?

“You m-mean Nightma—“

“I WAITED FOR HER. ONE THOUSAND LONG YEARS!! FOR NOTHING!!”

“Princess, perhaps you didn't sen—“

“I KNOW WHAT I DID! YOU WEREN’T THERE!!”

“ARE YOU SURE YOU KNOW?!” Twilight had finally lost her patience with her mentor. She had to get her attention somehow. Celestia had never seen Twilight so much as backtalk her, let alone yell at her. The look on her face shifted from rage to shock quickly.

“You know her?” asked Rainbow Dash, a local weather management pegasus.

“She's my teacher. Now, like I was trying to say… have you considered that when you banished Nightmare Moon, you didn't specify which moon to send her to?”

“Whaddya mean, ‘which moon?’” asked Applejack, an earth pony apple farmer from the outskirts of town. “There ain't no moon other than ours. Ah though you, of all ponies, would know that.”

“That's not really true,” said Twilight.

Celestia pondered for a moment, then said, “Actually, perhaps I didn't specify which moon I sent her to.” She then buried her face in her hooves. “Now I’ll never see her again…”

Ever since that fateful night a millennium ago, she wanted to bring her younger sister, Luna, out of the jealous rage that had consumed her and transformed her into Nightmare Moon. But now, she couldn't, because she had made one simple mistake.

“Maybe we could try to find her somehow?” asked Twilight.

“Well, if she isn't imprisoned in our moon,” asked Rarity, a local seamstress unicorn, “then where is she?”

“That's one small step for a man… one giant leap for mankind.”

As he took his first step onto the moon’s surface, Neil Armstrong knew that today would be an important day, not just for America, but for humanity as a whole. He just didn't know how important.

He was slightly surprised by how much less he seemed to weigh, even though his training had prepared him for this. It hadn't prepared him, however, for what happened next.

A powder-blue beam of light struck the Eagle landing module, taking out one of the legs of the craft and causing it to tip.

“Houston to Tranquility Base, what the hell happened up there?!”

Oh great, thought Michael Collins as his orbiting craft, the Columbia, received this transmission from Mission Control, out of all the moments something could go wrong, it had to be now…

“Houston, this is the Eagle,” replied Buzz Aldrin from within the now-damaged lander, “We seem to have run into a bit of a problem.”

“The lander was just attacked by something, and you call it a bit of a problem?!”

“I want an explanation, Tranquility Base, and I want it fast,” asked a gruff voice on Mission Control’s end. It belonged to none other than the President of the United States himself, Richard Nixon.

“Mr. President,” said Collins, “it would seem that the Eagle was hit by some sort of energy weapon, vaporizing one of the support legs and toppling the LEM.”

“Could it have been the Soviets?” the President asked, in a desperate search for answers. What had started as a day of hope had quickly turned into a terrifying attack, and being the President, Nixon wanted to know exactly who could have been responsible.

“Negative, Mr. President,” said a NASA operative, “Not even they have that sort of weaponry. Even if they did, we would have known if they had launched a craft recently.”

“Well,” said Armstrong, attempting to relieve the tension, “let's hope it's just the Klingons.”

No one noticed a shadowed creature slowly approaching the Eagle.

Suddenly, a voice played through Armstrong’s headpiece, as if someone or something was attempting to make their presence known. It was a woman's voice, and it was cold, deep, regal, and commanding.

“May I ask why you have trespassed upon my domain?” it asked, seemingly originating from the Eagle’s attacker.

Armstrong’s joviality turned to panic. “Houston, what was that?”

No response.

“Do you read me, Houston?”

Still no response.

“Houston, come in!!”

On the ground, Mission Control was attempting to reach the Apollo crew. All contact, visual or audio, had been severed.

“I’ll ask you again,” the voice said, “why are you here?”

Armstrong knew he was alone. “What's going on? Who are you?”

“You're kidding,” was the reply, “Don't you know who I am?”

“No idea.”

Something leapt into his field of vision. It looked like a horse, or rather a unicorn. Specifically, it had wings. From what Armstrong could make out, it had a pitch-black coat, powder blue armor, and piercing blue eyes with slits for pupils.

“Where do you come from?” the voice asked, as the creatures lips moved to form those words, glaring in what appeared to be inquisitive anger.

Armstrong’s blood stopped cold as it hit him: THIS was their attacker. He wished that he was seeing things or dreaming, but this was actually happening.

“What the hell are you…?” Armstrong’s fear had kicked into high gear. Every instinct in his body told him to run, while his brain was trying to remind the body that it wasn't able to run in this type of gravitational field.

The creature seemed to smile for a moment before she responded.

“God,” it said.

Armstrong’s eyes widened.

“I’ll ask you one last time,” the creature demanded, “WHERE? DO YOU? COME FROM?!”

Armstrong’s fear was so intense that he couldn't even speak, simply pointing in the direction of Earth instead.

“Very well,” the creature said, smiling intently. “That is all.” She then fired another beam of energy at Armstrong, vaporizing him.

The audio transmission was restored. Aldrin could now hear Mission Control, and he was grateful. Having witnessed Armstrong’s death at the hands, or rather, hooves, of a strange winged unicorn, he was sweating and panting heavily.

“—Base?! Come in!!”

“HOUSTON?! DO YOU READ ME?!”

“Yes, Tranquility Base, we read you loud and clear.”

“OH, THANK GOD!!” One could hear the panic in Aldrin’s voice. “WHATEVER IT IS THAT ATTACKED US KILLED NEIL!!”

“Please calm down. Can you describe the thing that attacked Armstrong?”

“IT LOOKED LIKE SOME KIND OF BLACK WINGED UNICORN, I SWEAR TO—“

The transmission stopped.

“BUZZ, NO!!”

Collins could not move. He heard one of his partners die, and from what Aldrin had said, the other wasn't lucky, either.

“Columbia, this is the President. We are aborting Apollo 11, I repeat, we are aborting the mission. Return to Earth immediately.”

Collins plotted a course for home into the navigation equipment, as something moved towards his craft at a high velocity.

“IT’S COMING RIGHT FOR ME!! TELL MY FAMILY THAT I LO—“

And the transmission ceased, only for a hiss to be heard, followed by a voice, the same voice that was the last Armstrong had heard.

“Is this where the trespassers came from?” she asked in a demanding, threatening tone.

“If by ‘trespassers,’ you meant ‘explorers,’ then yes,” replied Nixon. He attempted to sound defiant, but one could see his sweat lining his twitching skin.

“Such arrogance. I demand to speak to your ruler, so that I may punish them for their hubris.”

A few of the Mission Control employees chuckled to themselves upon hearing this. One of them even muttered, “Did she really just say that?”

“You're talking to him. I am Richard Milhous Nixon, President of the United States of America. Who the hell are you?”

“SILENCE!”

Nixon attempted to reply, but words failed him, as his voice seemed to have stopped working entirely, not out of dumbfounded shock, but by some external force.

“You have meddled in affairs that are not yours to concern yourselves with,” the voice continued, “and I will not tolerate insolence. From this moment forward, your world belongs to me… and the night… shall last… FOREVER!!”

Then the voice laughed. It was a harsh, vile, psychotic laugh, cold, melodic, and seeping with malevolence. After two minutes, the laughter stopped, as did all radio transmission.

Nixon was at a loss. He felt truly threatened. “Get Brezhnev on the line,” he ordered, “We're going to war.”

Discovery

“So, um… how do you intend to find Nightmare Moon, Princess?” asked Fluttershy, a shy pegasus animal caretaker.

“A very good question, my little pony," Celestia replied, “With the right spell, I can see the whole of space and time.”

“Ooh, like some kind of telescope?” asked Pinkie Pie, an earth pony and party planner.

Celestia chuckled slightly. “Sort of.”

Her horn lit up, as her eyes glowed white. Celestia was scanning the entire universe for her sister, her determination for reunion and redemption fueling her.

“I found her,” she said, her horn and eyes powering down.

Celestia turned to Twilight and the five young ponies she had met earlier that day. “I will be sending the six of you to another world altogether. I want you to find my sister for me.”

“I appreciate it, Princess, but I’m afraid I won't be needing any help,” said Twilight confidently. “I’m sure I’m more than capa—“

“You say that now, Twilight… but there will most likely come a time where you are proven wrong.”

Twilight gave an angry sigh.

“In order to not arouse suspicion from the native population, I will be disguising you as members of the dominant species. And whatever you do, don't tell anypony who you really are.”

Celestia lit her horn and eyes up again, as a blinding flash of light engulfed their vision.

“My fellow Americans...” The President’s words were being broadcast to every television in the country, for the subject matter was much too important to be kept under wraps.

“It is with the deepest regret that I must inform you that yesterday, on July 21, at 4:19 p.m., Eastern Standard Time, our mission to place a man on the moon ended in tragedy. Three brave men, Neil Armstrong, Edwin ‘Buzz’ Aldrin, and Michael Collins, were attacked and killed in cold blood by an unidentified extraterrestrial being. We don't know what it is, or where it comes from. We only know that it intends to conquer our planet, and cover us all in everlasting night. As ludicrous as these events may sound, this is what actually happened. The threat to our national and global security is too high to withhold this information from the American people. Even at this very moment, we are negotiating a temporary alliance with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to protect ourselves, and mankind himself, from conquest.”

The President paused momentarily, knowing the weight of his words.

“Now, the way I see it, as of today, the word ‘mankind’ holds a new meaning for us all. For as long as he has walked this Earth, man has fought against himself for one reason or another. This conflict has taken many forms over the centuries; the Punic War… the Crusades… the War for American Independence… the French Revolution… the World Wars… the current conflict in Vietnam... no matter the name, war never changes. We have been too busy fighting ourselves to remember that despite the fact that we could potentially eliminate ourselves in indiscriminate retaliation, we are simply a minuscule part of a much larger universe that could destroy us all at any moment, and much more efficiently than we ever could. The time has come for us to put aside our differences and protect our survival as a species, so that our children can remember this day, not as the day man was enslaved by an alien conqueror, but as the day man rose up and declared to the universe that he will not be trampled upon by those who wish him to kneel at their feet.”

The President’s confidence and bravery could be heard in his voice as he concluded his speech. “Thank you, God bless you, God bless the United States of America, and God bless the human race.”

The Soviet government was in disarray. Some officials believed that the American claim of extraterrestrial sabotage of their moon landing was a plot to invade the Union, while others claimed that the Americans knew how unwise it would be to attempt an underhanded invasion, and thus they couldn't possibly be lying.

While this was going on, what appeared to be a young female military officer was approaching the Grand Kremlin Palace, where an emergency meeting of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union was being held. She was fair-skinned and about 6’ 5” tall, with defined muscles, sapphire blue eyes and a well-endowed figure. Her long, straight black hair was tied into a ponytail at the back of the head. Her uniform was rather tight to accommodate her physique, and her insignia indicated that she was a General of the Army, a high-ranking official that answered only to the Marshall of the Soviet Union, the highest-ranking military officer in the country.

“Halt!” ordered a guard stationed at the front door, “Identify yourself, comrade, and state your business.”

“I am Veronika Lunnimov, General of the Army of the Soviet Union,” she replied, in a deep, commanding voice, “I must speak with the General Secretary of the Party.”

“No one is allowed entry to the Palace at this time,” the guard replied. “An emergency meeting of the Supreme Soviet is in progress, and no one is allowed to interrupt the procee—“

Lunnimov gave the guard a piercing glare, her eyes glowing slightly and her pupils narrowing into vertical slits.

“You shall grant me access to the Palace and escort me to the General Secretary immediately,” she ordered. Her voice had gained a slight reverberation and melodic quality.

The guard’s mind went blank, his eyes glazed over and his expression dull and vacant.

“I shall grant you access to the Palace and escort you to the General Secretary immediately,” he repeated in a weak monotone.

Author's Note

Sorry for the delay, my senior year of high school kinda got in the way, and I also forgot this existed for a while.

No guesses as to who Ms. Lunnimov really is. :p

Again, comments and feedback are appreciated, but please don't be a dick about it. :twilightsmile: