Absolute Nightmare

Princess Celestia and Princess Luna approached the ancient crystalline tree. At the end of each of its five branches rested a hexagonal gemstone, each a different color. On the trunk were depictions of a sun and a moon, matching the princesses' cutie marks; at the center was a large six pointed star.

Princess Celestia flew up to it and channeled golden magic into the star. It opened up to reveal a gemstone similar to the others, though in the same star shape as the compartment that held it. Golden auras enveloped it and the other gems, and the six stones began to orbit the two sisters.

Celestia spoke.

“We have managed to discover the only means by which we can defeat Discord and free the citizens of Equestria. Even without these elements, the Tree of Harmony will possess a powerful magic. As long as that magic remains, it will continue to control and contain all that grows here.”

A little over a thousand years later, Sombra approached the same tree. At the end of each branch was a recess, matching the gems that had they had held a millennium ago.

He stepped forward, shaking a small chunk of timberwolf out of his mane. The Everfree Forest that contained this tree was filled with dangerous flora and fauna that discouraged visitation from most ponies. However, despite his outward unicorn-like appearance, Sombra was an umbrum, a shadow pony, and that came with enough magical power that he had made it to the tree with ease.

Among these powers was the ability he needed for his current task. As he charged his spell, his eyes glowed green and purple magic flowed from them and bubbled around his horn.

Dark magic erupted from his horn, an unpleasant mix of black, green, and purple, and shot straight into the star shaped mark in the center of the tree. From that point outward, the tree began to darken to a sickly gray. As the darkness reached the ends of the branches, the recesses began to fill with black crystal.

The star opened, revealing a black, six-pointed crystal star. The dark duplicates of the Elements of Harmony were enveloped in Sombra's red magic and floated into a burlap sack he had carried with him.

As he departed, green vines began to rapidly climb the now dark tree.

Princess Cadenza woke up on a hard stone floor. She had just a moment to contemplate how odd it was that ponies could wake so calmly from nightmares when she noticed the Pegasus standing before her, and all thoughts turned to survival.

“Good morning, Equestria!” Nightmare, in the form of Soarin, yelled enthusiastically. “Howdy, Dancing Queen! Do you like the accommodations? Want a drink? A snack? Continental breakfasts are available in the lobby.”

Cadenza examined the room. It was immediately clear, though she had never been there, that it was a cell in the castle dungeon. The floor and walls were made of stone and a castle door, almost definitely enchanted with numerous defensive and anti-magic spells, appeared to lead into the larger dungeon area. There was no window, and the only source of light came from gas lights on the walls.

“Nightmare!” demanded Cadenza. “What are you doing?”

Nightmare let out an exaggerated gasp and blushed until his face was literally glowing red. “You know who I am? Little old me?”

She stood up, legs wobbling. She couldn't see herself, but if she could she would have seen that her coat and mane had been burned and blackened by Lightning Dust's attack. “I've heard from Princess Hope about what you did to Discord and tried to do with Princess Luna. You're a manipulative monster.”

“Oh, you are too kind!” Nightmare said, looking flattered.

“What do you want from me?” Cadenza said through gritted teeth, her horn flickering weakly with a light blue aura.

Nightmare licked his hoof and tapped it against her horn. The magic immediately faded. She scrambled backwards but hit the wall behind her after a just few frantic steps.

“Oh, I just want to chat,” he said, a pink cupcake popping into existence in his hoof. He took a bite and mumbled under his breath. “Nightmare Cadance? Broken Heart? Hmm, I could focus on the music aspect…”

“What are you talking about?” Cadenza was becoming increasingly panicked, and her voice attempted to be aggressive but unfortunately wavered far too much to do so.

“Oh, I just think you'll make a wonderful queen. Oh, and don't worry, I don't torture people.”

Cadenza screamed in agony as her right hind leg snapped in two places.

Nightmare laughed uproariously. “See? Far too heavy-handed, too cliché, and frankly. Not. Enough. Fun.” He tilted his head more and more with each of those last four words, and when he was done his head was completely upside down.

He laughed a delicate but crazed giggle. “Hmm, you know, I've already got six independent agents in the field, and you do look like a fun little meat sack. I think I'll just add you to my little fledgling hive mind. After all, it's so important to support local businesses. Too bad though, I had a great name planned.”

Cadenza cowered against the wall as Nightmare approached. He was actually skipping, even doing a little twirl as he sang a little song under his breath.

“Da dum dum. Don't touch me please, I cannot stand the way you tease…”

Daring Do and Sweetie Drops were panting as they entered Ponyville. Daring had flown from Canterlot to there, and Sweetie had raced down the mountain below Daring using a collapsable snowboard included in her briefcase of secret agent equipment. They'd actually managd to beat the trains there, since those had to wind their way down the mountain. However, Sweetie had had to gallop from the base of the mountain to Ponyville on hoof, so she was almost as winded as Daring. Despite her physical exhaustion, she pressed on, running through Ponyville looking for her marefriend.

Daring, glad she'd had the foresight to throw on a big green sweater to cover her cutie mark before fleeing Canterlot, dropped to the ground to give her tired wings a rest. She looked back toward Canterlot and saw Wonderbolts approaching the town. Her heart dropped as she noticed a second group flying toward Cloudsdale. Most of the Pegasi who had managed to escape had flown there.

“Everypony run! Evil Pegasi are attacking!”

The voice had come from Sweetie, currently squeezing her way through a small crowd, but it was totally different than her usual speaking voice. Daring stood confused for a moment before realizing that it was probably something she was taught as a secret agent. Then she began to run, realizing that the small town was about to be under attack.

Panic broke out almost instantly. Ideally that could have been avoided, but considering the attackers were a beloved Pegasus flight team gone bad and with strange new reality warping powers, it was probably the best option. Daring wasn't sure what had happened to them, but her current assumption was possession. She'd witnessed it far more often than most ponies, and she was seeing some telltale signs.

Daring tried to catch up to Sweetie, but she was like a mare possessed. (Daring noted the irony in that observation.) Sweetie found her target trotting through the park and pounced. The poor mint green unicorn never saw it coming. Although, considering she was now receiving a passionate kiss from her marefriend, it didn't seem like she was upset by the tackle.

“Bon Bon?” Lyra asked as soon as her mouth was free. “What's going on? Why is everypony freaking out?”

As if to answer for Sweetie, a river of molten chocolate erupted out of the doors and windows of the local bakery, Sugar Cube Corner. Ponies took to the skies or climbed on whatever they could or ran into buildings to avoid the scalding chocolate torrent. The ponies in the streets didn't know it, but luckily the couple who ran the shop survived by virtue of having been in the walk-in freezer at the time. A blue-coated, blue-maned stallion wasn't so lucky, and was swept away in the boiling liquid.

Sweetie pulled Lyra up off the ground and the pair began running from the chaos. Their brief makeout session had allowed Daring to catch up.

“Bon Bon, who's this?” Lyra asked, motioning with her head toward Daring.

“That's Daring Do.” Bon Bon said flatly, leaping over a hot pink briar patch that was rapidly overtaking a large portion of the park.

“Sweetie Drops!” Daring hissed, looking around to see if anypony else had heard.

“Daring Do? Wait. Sweetie Drops?” Lyra looked more confused at this than she did upon seeing the conical roof of the town hall spin off the building and grab a herd of school ponies with a blue tractor beam.

“It's a long story,” Sweetie said, ducking under a flying sofa. Oddly, it seemed to be being carried by a flock of flying quills.

“It's really not,” said Daring. “I'm Daring Do from the books, which aren't fiction but are really based on my adventures. She's a member of a secret anti-monster agency, and her name is really Sweetie Drops.”

Lyra looked at the two ponies as if they'd just had a casual conversation about vacationing on the moon. Sweetie looked at Daring as if she'd very very much like to buck her in her face, but regrettably had to focus on not dying. Daring looked forward.

The trio reached the edge of town and began galloping down a dirt road.

It took Lyra almost a full minute to manage speech again. “I don't… You are… she just…” It wasn't coherent speech, but it was speech.

Sweetie sighed. “Lyra, I know we have a lot to talk about, but can we focus on staying alive for now?”

Daring spoke up. “Guys, sorry about the trouble in paradise, but I think we're gonna wanna find a safe place to hide. Look.”

Approaching from the south was a tornado. However, rather than reached down to the ground from the clouds, it appeared to be slinking across the ground like a snake. Even stranger and more upsetting than that was the rows of razor sharp teeth spinning around the mouth of it.

It was ripping whole apple trees, roots and all, out of the nearby orchard and then chewing them up. As the trio leapt a fence and ran to a farm for shelter, Daring was forced to admit something. In her adventures she'd seen ancient curses, bizarre creatures, mind control, evil spirits, and so much more. However, after all of that, she was still completely unprepared for a belching tornado.

A small group of ponies were gathered together in front of the farm house when the three reached it. Daring reasoned that three of them, an elderly green mare, a large red stallion, and an orange mare, were related, given they all had apple-themed cutie marks. There was also a cream-colored filly without a cutie mark who bore a resemblance to them.

In addition there were three other mares, all with musical cutie marks. However, they all seemed unrelated other than that, and Daring guessed they were probably simply musician friends rather than family. One was a white unicorn with a two-toned blue mane and purple sunglasses. Another was an elegant looking Earth pony, whose coat and mane were each a different shade of gray. The third was a pale blue Earth pony, with long, curly, gray-blue hair with streaks of bright blue.

“We're heading to our storm shelter,” the orange farmpony screamed over the roaring winds. “You three can join us. It's not safe out here!”

Sweetie, Lyra, and Daring shared a look and then joined the seven other ponies galloping toward their shelter. Daring and Sweetie both felt a tinge of failure. They'd fled Canterlot and made it to Ponyville safely, but ultimately all they managed to do was start a panic and then run for cover.

Mayor Mare had woken up to find the trees of Ponyville full of dead, skinless snakes. Presumably this was the work of a particularly malicious prankster or perhaps somepony trying to make some sort of statement. Of course, the general populace would have freaked out over this, so the weather patrol was called in early to clear it up.

Among these ponies was Ditzy Doo, a gray Pegasus mare and Ponyville's best mailmare. Ditzy suffered from strabismus, a medical condition that gave her a wall-eyed appearance. This unfortunately gave her some issues when it came to things like depth perception. As a result, she preferred not to fly within Ponyville, for fear of crashing into things. It was because of this that her hooves were hurting more than most of the other Pegasi who had helped clean the trees. After finishing her job, she rested her hooves by laying on a bench in the park.

She was still laying there when the sun rose, a little abruptly and with an odd red tint to it. Other ponies began to wake up and step out into the streets, a little confused about the unusual sunlight. Some ponies reckoned that it was caused by some strange abnormality in the atmosphere, while others assumed it was an intentional display by Princess Celestia, perhaps to show off for all the ponies that were visiting Canterlot. Whichever was the case, most ponies weren't worried by it.

The bizarre sunrise led to a few minutes of speculation, but ultimately the morning was a quiet one. Ditzy soon hopped off her bench and made her way to the Ponyville Post Office, ready to begin her shift. She knew that around this time her little sister, Dinky Doo, would be making her way to school. Her sister was adorable little ball of energy, a unicorn filly that shared Ditzy's yellow mane color, but who had a light purple coat. She was the most important thing in her older sister's life, and Ditzy would do anything for her.

Ditzy was sorting through her fourth bag of mail and eating her nineteenth muffin of the morning when she heard a pony scream something from outside the post office. She couldn't make out what the mare said, but whatever it was, it brought about dozens of screams from other ponies.

She ran out onto the street to see what was going on, and found the streets filled with screaming ponies running for cover and several Pegasi doing sweeps over the small town, leaving contrails of gasoline and blueberry scented neon green smoke.

The thoroughly confused Pegasus stood in the doorway, looking left and right over and over as if an answer as to what was happening would make itself apparent that way. After a few moments, rivers of steaming chocolate came bursting out of the nearby bakery, only raising more questions but at least giving Ditzy something to do.

She instinctively flew upward, avoiding the deadly concoction but slamming straight into the sign hanging from the front of the post office. She clumsily corrected course and landed with a thud onto the roof of her workplace.

Worry over what happened to Mr. and Mrs. Cake, the owners of the bakery, briefly crossed her mind, but that, and every other concern in her now slightly bruised head, was overridden almost instantly by a single thought.

Dinky!

She immediately leapt into action, taking flight and soaring at breakneck speed toward the Ponyville schoolhouse. This was a fortunate decision, as just after she left the gable roof it folded in on itself like a book slammed shut.

Ditzy's flightpath was more than a little irregular, but she was managing to avoid crashing, which was impressive for her. All around her Ponyville was going crazy. The three mares who ran the flower shop were currently being held in the vines of a large, singing begonia. Hoofer Steps, the pony who ran the town dance studio, was dancing wildly and uncontrollably, smoke rising from her. A yellow Pegasus stallion flew by several feet above Ditzy, followed by a ladybug the size of a small bear.

Ditzy wished she could help them, but she knew realistically there wasn't much she could do. Besides, finding Dinky was currently her biggest and only priority, and she wasn't going to slow down for anything.

She came to a screeching halt, almost crashing through the window of a small house, when her off-center eye caught sight of the familiar purple and yellow of her younger sister. She was with her classmates and her teacher, Cheerilee, running through the streets just like all the other ponies.

Before Ditzy could even call out her sister's name, the roof of the town hall began to spin, breaking free from the rest of the building with a cacophony of loud snaps as wood splintered. The windows all shown with a bright blue glow and the makeshift UFO flew toward the foals. Ditzy rocketed toward Dinky, screaming her name, but before she could reach her, or Dinky could do more than look up, the flying structure was pulling in the schoolponies and their teacher with a beam of blue light projecting from its underside.

Ditzy rocketed toward it, the roof spinning like an upside down top, but it paid her no mind, flying off toward Canterlot and knocking Ditzy out of the sky like a bug. She came crashing down into a flower cart, and in seconds she was back on her hooves, shaking off the dirt and plants. She had seen what had happened to the flower ponies.

She looked up at the thing that had stolen her sister, briefly considering going after it. She knew, however, that she wasn't nearly as fast a flyer as that was, and she also knew that it was very unlikely that she'd even be able to follow it for long before beginning to drift off course.

Instead, she took off down the street to the home of Ponyville's resident timekeeper. He was an eccentric stallion, and everypony referred to him simply as the Doctor. Over the years, Ditzy had become one of his closest friends. Given his somewhat off-putting nature, she as also one of his only. In spite of this, though, even she found him rather enigmatic. He was great at finding solutions to seemingly impossible problems, though, and so he was currently Ditzy's best hope.

She came bursting into his home to find him humming and woking on an unusual device, not a care in the world. The interior of his house was filled with strange and impressive looking machines and gadgets, and Ditzy always found herself thinking that his house didn't look like it could hold all that it did based on its exterior.

“Doc!”

His head jerked upward, apparently unaware until that moment that anyone had walked in. “Ditzy? What's the matter?”

Ditzy's mouth fell open, her look of shock made all the more effective by her mismatched eyes. “Do you not hear what's going on outside?”

The Doctor's ears perked up, and his eyes widened when he heard the panicked screams. “My word! What's going on out there?”

As he made his way to the door, Ditzy answered. “Some weird Pegasi showed up and now everything is going crazy! Things are coming to life and there was a chocolate river and…”

Her voice trailed off as the Doctor stuck his head out of the doorway and exclaimed, “Great whickering stallions!” His face was covered in ketchup, which would have been funny had Ditzy not just witnessed what she had.

He wiped his face with a nearby rag, and she continued. “They took Dinky! And like a dozen other foals! What do we do?”

The Doctor trotted over to a table covered in books and began to flip through several of them. “Hmm, I'm sure there's something in here…”

Ditzy looked over his shoulder and saw pages filled with mountains of tiny text and complex diagrams. “Doc? What are you looking for?”

“I'm sure I've seen it in one of these books. Hmm, I think it was Sun— no, Star…” He flipped his way through a dusty, purple tome. “Aha!”

He trotted over to a nearby coat rack and threw on a brown pinstriped suit jacket. “Come along, my dear. We're going to Canterlot.”

“Canterlot?” Ditzy asked. “We're going to go save Dinky?”

“No, no, dear. Well, not like that. Come along!”

Ditzy shook her head. She never really knew what the Doc had planned, but it always seemed to work out in the end. She took a deep breath and followed him out.

The last train train to make it safely out of Canterlot continued its winding journey down, passing through tunnels built into the mountain. After several tense minutes, the ponies inside began to calm down, sufficiently reassured that their train wasn't about to explode like the ones behind it.

Double Diamond and his new friends renewed their conversation, having spent the past few minutes anxiously awaiting a fiery death. They had until that point only established their names, Braeburn's hometown, and that Thunderlane and Rumble were brothers.

Double Diamond began. “…So, uh, it looks like we're okay for now.”

Rumble looked up to his injured brother, his expression making it clear that he didn't think Thunderlane qualified as “okay” at all. Thunderlane forced a smile for Rumble's sake.

Braeburn quickly came to the rescue. “Don't worry, we'll get you all fixed up when we get to Ponyville. Heck, when this is all over, I even bet Princess Radiant Hope will be able to heal your eye right up with her magic.”

Rumble looked a little reassured by that, and Thunderlane's smile adopted a hint of genuineness.

“So, we never really got to introduce ourselves properly,” said Thunderlane. “Who wants to start?”

“Well, I'm Double Diamond.” He cringed, realizing he'd already made that much clear. He pressed on. “I'm a professional skier. I travel around a lot, looking for new slopes to, er, ski on.”

Double Diamond wasn't the most socially gifted pony, but luckily Braeburn stepped in to cover for him for the second time in the past minute. “Well, like I said before, I'm from Appleoosa. You probably haven't heard of it. It's a brand new little town. We Earth ponies built the entire thing over the course of the last year.”

Thunderlane whistled, impressed.

“The town's got an expansive apple orchard, and I'm the pony in charge of it.”

Thunderlane had just whistled, so he complimented Braeburn with a simple nod as he began his own introduction. “We're from Ponyville. I'm a member of the weather patrol and Rumble here is in school, of course.”

“Thunderlane is gonna be a Wonderbolt!” declared Rumble.

A faint blush developed on Thunderlane's face. “Well, maybe. I'd love to be a member, but I'm not sure I've got what it takes.”

Rumble looked completely taken aback by that statement. “No way! You're the fastest pony in all of Ponyville!”

“Well, second fastest, officially,” corrected Thunderlane. “Rainbow Dash is faster.” Seeing the lack of recognition from the Earth ponies, he clarified, “She's the head of the Ponyville weather patrol. She can actually perform a Sonic Rainboom.”

“I thought that was an old mare's tale!” said Double Diamond, clearly quite impressed.

“So did everypony else, myself included, until we saw it happened. She did it last year at a contest held by the Wonderbolts. As you can probably guess, she won, and was actually supposed to perform at the show this morning.” He looked up toward Canterlot. “I don't guess that matters now.”

Rumble's mood wasn't soured by that. “And Thunderlane finished in second!”

“Third, Rumble,” his older brother corrected.

“No, second!” assured the little Pegasus. “The mean lady who finished second got disqualified so you got it!”

“Uh, guys. You might want to take a look at this.” Double Diamond pointed out the window.

The train had just exited the last tunnel and the disaster that had befallen the little town of Ponyville came into view. In less than a minute the train would be passing right by it. Judging from the it's increasing speed, it had no intentions of stopping.

Braeburn jumped from his seat and galloped over to one of the train doors. He threw it open, and rushing winds filled the car as the terrain outside sped by. Braeburn's Stetson flew off and out the door, but he caught it with his teeth and slung it into an overhead luggage compartment.

“C'mon, guys! We've gotta save what ponies we can!” he screamed over the wind.

Double Diamond jumped up and ran to help. Thunderlane also began to stand, but Rumble pulled him back into his seat, and he relented, looking worriedly out the window. Across the train, other ponies realized what was going on and similarly opened doors and windows, prepared to help.

The train tracks skirted by a comparatively small portion of Ponyville's perimeter. There would only be a brief window of time for ponies to hop on, and a small crowd was already forming, ready to do just that.

The train reached the town and the Ponyvillians hopped on. A brick red stallion hopped into the door Braeburn had opened, followed soon after by another stallion in a colorful sweater. Across the train, other ponies were hopping through the open doorways as they passed by. Pegasi landed on top of the train, or flew into windows that the passengers had raised.

In virtually no time at all, the train reached the station where it had intended to stop, and the ponies who had been waiting to board had to leap into action to make in onboard in time. A light green mare with a pink and white mane jumped aboard through the entrance by Double Diamond and Braeburn, and another green mare, this one with a pepper for a cutie mark, made it in next, pulled into the train car by Braeburn.

A brown Pegasus stallion in a wheelchair cart ran for the train, and might have made it, if a Nightmare Wonderbolt hadn't turned his attention to the station. Stone spikes began to shoot up through the wooden platform, and one of them stabbed through one of the cart's wheels, pulling the cart into two twisted pieces. The stallion would have fallen forward and gotten a face-full of spikes, but before he could, his wings puffed up and he took to the air.

Double Diamond ran to the next car, the caboose, and opened the rear door, allowing the Pegasus a way in. When he landed, Double Diamond helped him move to a seat.

“Double Diamond.” The white stallion said, sticking out a hoof for a shake and hoping that for once he could have a non-awkward introduction, the situation outside notwithstanding.

The other stallion blew his black and purple mane from his eyes and opted for a hooftbump rather than a shake, inciting a light chuckle from Double Diamond. “Stellar Eclipse.”

Double Diamond's warm smile turned to a panicked frown when he looked out the window and saw that the Wonderbolt hadn't taken its focus off of them. Stellar Eclipse noticed it as well a moment later, as did a number of other ponies on and in the train. They all braced themselves for what he had planned (the few ponies still unaware looking around in confusion), but before he could do anything, a jasmine-colored blur tackled the Wonderbolts out of the air and into a tree.

The blur was a Pegasus mare that Thunderlane and Rumble recognized as Sunshower Raindrops, an aggressive member of the weather patrol. The fiesty Pegasus got in a few good hits on the Wonderbolt, but then she got ensnared by the suddenly sentient branches of the tree. She fought her way through them, landing several more kicks on the laughing stallion, but in moments the branches overcame her, engulfing her like a cocoon.

Her effort wasn't in vain however, for by the time the bloodied but giddy Wonderbolt freed himself from the tree, the train was out of sight.

Shining Armor woke up on a warm wooden floor. He had just a moment to contemplate how odd it was that pain could vanish so quickly after waking from nightmares when he noticed the crowd of ponies around him, and all thoughts turned to protecting them.

“Wake up!” he screamed, shaking the sleeping pony lying nearest him. Those that had already fallen asleep jolted awake, quickly adopting a look of alarm, while the ponies that were still awake jumped up, unsure of what was happening to cause the outburst.

He took a moment to observe his surroundings. They were in a small cabin, a green, smokeless fire crackling in the fireplace. A dozen or so ponies were there, sitting in chairs or on benches and beds. After a moment, he recognized them as the ponies he'd pulled out of the train with him before it went up in flames.

Spitfire was laying nearby, her Wonderbolts outfit removed and laying in a heap in a dusty corner of the room. Flash Sentry was helping bandage the foreleg of a burly gray Pegasus, apparently having found a first aid kit somewhere in the cabin. Spike was stirring from a nap in front of the fireplace; Shining noted that he was almost certainly the source of the fire. Cherry Fizzy was sitting on a bench between two other well-built Pegasi stallions, each a different shade of brown.

Taking up the entirety of one of the cabin's two beds was a white unicorn stallion that Shining recognized immediately; he was wearing what must have been an expensive and regal suit, before it had become dirtied and torn by the events in Canterlot. An Earth pony mare with a similarly disheveled dress and mane, both cherry red, was more considerate with the seating, and shared the other bed with three other ponies. Those ponies were a Crystal pony mare in what appeared to be a mailpony uniform, a pink Earth pony mare with a cherry blossom branch for a cutie mark, and a brown Pegasus stallion with a build similar to the two sitting by Cherry Fizzy, but with a blond mane.

An Earth pony mare dressed for much colder weather was sitting in a chair near the door. Another, this one an eye-catching mix of white, pink, and purple, was sitting on the floor, glumly playing with the propellor of a beanie hat lying in front of her. A blue Earth pony stallion with a bandana around his neck sat in a chair close by, looking at a pair of broken sunglasses with a similar expression.

Shining realized, counting himself, he'd only saved fifteen ponies (plus Spike.) Guilt washed over him thinking back on how crowded the train had been, but he shoved that feeling to the corner of his mind. He had more important things to deal with.

“We can't fall asleep,” Shining said to the crowd of drowsy ponies.

“Why?” asked the bandaged Pegasus skeptically.

Before Shining could answer, the white unicorn— Prince Blueblood, thought Shining, unable to do so without tinting the name with more than a little distaste— spoke up, sounding a little shaken. “I actually wouldn't be opposed to that.” He shuddered at what he had just experienced during his sleep.

Virtually all of the ponies who had been sleeping agreed, either through nods or grunts.

Shining answered the Pegasus, noting somewhat incredulously that Prince Blueblood, of all ponies, had helped him make his point. “A dark force calling itself Nightmare, the same being that possessed the Wonderbolts and attacked Canterlot and the train, is entering everpony's dreams. Based on what I just experienced and what happened to the Wonderbolts, I think it can take control of ponies who succumb to the bad dreams it creates. It's in the best interest of everypony here that we not fall asleep while that monster is loose.”

The Pegasus went to argue, but shut his mouth when he saw one of the Pegasi sitting by Cherry, specifically the one who had been asleep, shoot him a glare.

“Where are we?” asked Shining.

“It's some old cabin in the woods below Canterlot,” answered Flash. “We carried you after you passed out, and when we found this place, we saw it as a good place to hide out.”

Before Flash had even finished his statement, Shining stood up, his legs wobbling a little, and made his way to the cabin door. He exited to the woods outside and looked around, but saw nothing noteworthy in the forest or in the sky.

Grunting through the pain of using magic so soon after nearly overchanneling, Shining erected a pink protective bubble around the cabin. He grit his teeth and his eyes began to water, but his horn continued to glow, and a ripple passed through the bubble, followed by the whole structure shimmering out of sight for a brief moment. Exhausted, the stallion hobbled back into the cabin.

“I've cast a protective spell over the cabin,” he explained to the concerned ponies. “It should also prevent anypony outside from being able to see or hear us.”

After allowing Shining Armor a few minutes to recover, the ponies gathered together in a circle to introduce themselves. All but Prince Blueblood that is, who not only refused to leave his comfortable seat, but insisted upon going first.

Shining didn't listen to a word of it. Every member of the royal guard, and indeed virtually every royal servant or staff member could attest to the Prince's remarkable abrasiveness. He was surely talking up his royal importance (which was minimal), his blood relation to the Royal Sisters (which was incredibly distant), and how charming he was (not enough alcohol in all of Equestria!)

His introduction took the better part of ten minutes, and by the time he finished, everypony seemed as done with him as Shining Armor was.

The next pony to speak was the mare with the cherry red mane. She had discarded the matching dress and tossed it into the corner with Spitfire's Wonderbolts flight suit. She spoke in an accent similar to that spoken by cowponies, but with a hint of sophistication, like one might expect of a Manehattanite.

“Well now, I'm not sure if I can follow an introduction like that, Prince Blueblood, but my name is Cherry Jubilee.”

The majority of the listening ponies gasped at her name, Shining Armor included. None of them had met her personally, but everypony was aware of her products. Shining was particularly fond of her Cherry Jamboree energy drinks, which he drank to stay alert during his O&O games.

She seemed a tad surprised by the recognition, but she continued on about her cherry company based out of Dodge Junction. Shining missed most of what she said, as he'd become curious about the pink and purple mare, still sitting in the corner and playing with the propeller on her beanie. She hadn't spoken a word ever since she got on the train, and she refused to leave her seat to join the others. Shining didn't know what to think of her, but he found her cutie mark, a screw and a baseball, to be very unusual.

Next was Spitfire. Judging from the looks she was receiving, her status as a Wonderbolt made her very suspicious with the other ponies. She spoke with complete professionalism.

“Hello, everypony. I am Spitfire, the captain of the Wonderbolts. The only Wonderbolt, as I'm sure you're aware, not to fall victim to Nightmare.”

One of the beefy Pegasi, the one with the basketballs for his cutie mark, eyed her with obvious distrust. Fury rose in Spitfire, and she jumped to her hooves, retreating into drill sergeant mode. The Pegasi jumped up as well, but Spitfire refused to let him get in a single word.

“What! You don't believe me? Do you realize those ponies were my friends? Do you know what it is like to see your friends overtaken by evil, to see them attacking you and countless other ponies?” She jabbed him in the chest hard with her hoof, sending him sprawling back onto his flank. She pressed her muzzle up against his and growled, “I hope you never do.”

Everypony in the room was staring at her. She sat back in her place, her face void of emotion, and stated simply, “Who's next?”

Next was Flash, and Shining was of course familiar with all he had to say. Flash was probably one of Shining's favorite guardsponies to work with, despite his rookie status. He was loyal, hardworking, and refreshingly enthusiastic among the older guards, who tended to become somewhat apathetic over time. He was also surprisingly competent on the job, given his otherwise clumsy and emotional nature.

After him came the Pegasus who had angered Spitfire minutes before. He and two of the other Pegasi seemed to be very close friends, and they introduced themselves together. The Pegasi in question revealed his name to be Hoops. His darker brown friend with a dumb-bell for a cutie mark was creatively named Dumb-Bell. The third Pegasi, the shortest of the three and with a gray coat rather the brown coats of his friends, was named Score. His cutie mark depicted a trio of hoofballs. They didn't have anything particularly interesting to say about themselves. They were all members of the Cloudsdale weather patrol, they had been best friends since foalhood, and they had an obnoxious sense of superiority.

Next was the only Crystal pony among them. Her name was Mercury and she was a mailpony in the Crystal Empire. She was apparently the best mailpony in all of the empire, but considering the source Shining took it with a grain of salt. Regardless, the other ponies vouched that she was very fast on her hooves, as she was the one who scouted ahead and watched for danger as they made their way through the forest after the crash.

Shining Armor came after her and decided simply to give basic facts like his career and his hometown. He avoided everything related to his personal life and his family, considering what happened to his sister. He felt a sudden wave of several complex emotions hit him at the thought of Twilight, and he shoved them away to join his guilt.

The pony in the bandana was next. His name was Fashion Plate, and the energetic stallion was a writer for Cosmare magazine, a fashion magazine stationed in Canterlot. The blond Pegasus stallion was also in the journalism business. His name was Big Shot, a freelance photographer who specialized in wildlife photography, but usually sustained himself by snapping pictures of celebrities. Shining idly acknowledged him to be a rather attractive stallion, but of course had no plans of acting on that, given his newly rekindled relationship with Cherry Fizzy.

Cherry was actually the next to speak, and as his exposition reached the point that he and Shining Armor had broken contact, Shining was shocked to realize how little he had reconnected with his old flame, particularly considering the events of the previous night. Cherry's military career had taken him all over Equestria, and even out of it. Cherry had actually been in a serious relationship with a griffon until recently.

Shining reflected on all of this as the next two ponies spoke on themselves, missing most of what they had to say. The pony in the bomber hat and thick winter jacket was March Gustysnows. She had been in Canterlot to represent her hometown of Whinnyapolis in the summit. Her Whinnyapolitan accent was thick enough to cut with a knife, and it gave her an almost sickeningly sweet atmosphere. The pink pony was, matching her cutie mark, named Cherry Blossom (how many Cherries were there in Equestria?) She was a professional wrestler, and a few of the other ponies, as well as Spike, actually recognized her. She and Big Shot had actually met before, but she had a pretty negative outlook on paparazzi, and that extended to him.

Spike was the last to speak, and just as Shining had, he kept Twilight out of it. He simply stated that he did jobs for Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, and that he'd done so since he born in Canterlot. The other ponies met him with either wonder or trepidation or a mix of both. In particular, Big Shot and Fashion Plate both seemed utterly fascinated in him.

As the ponies broke into separate, more casual conversations, Shining made his way over to the silent pony in the corner. She didn't look up from her little hat as he sat down beside her, but he began talking regardless.

“Hello there. What's your name?”

The mare didn't respond.

“Are you okay? Do you need anything?”

Nothing.

Shining sighed. “Did something happen in Canterlot? Did someone hurt you? Did something happen to somepony you know?”

At that last question, the mare kicked her hat across the room and into the wall. She started squealing a high-pitched, ear-splitting shriek and began bucking and jumping wildly. Shining would have sworn, if he hadn't know better, that she was beginning to rise into the air. He placed a soundproof bubble around her, his horn still stinging from the use of magic, and soon she tired herself out and fell limply to the bottom of the bubble, crying.

He dropped the shield and placed a hoof on the poor mare's shoulder. Slowly the conversations the other ponies were having recommenced. Even more slowly, the mare's tears began to cease. After she had cried herself out, Shining stood up to give her her space, but before he could go join Cherry Fizzy, she spoke.

“Screwball. I'm Screwball.”

Hours had passed since the Royal Sisters' sunrise ceremony had taken a dark turn, and the capital city had returned to a state of relative calm. Relative being the key word. Though the mass hysteria and brutal attacks had ended, the city itself had adopted a wildly chaotic appearance. Towers had been reshaped into spirals and corkscrews, streets now twisted to climb up walls or plummet twenty pony lengths, and the city, usually a mostly uniform mix of vibrant white, purple, and gold, had become recolored into a hodgepodge of blinding and clashing colors.

Despite this, the city was a ghost town. A hill of ashes outside the city walls was all that remained of the casualties of the day. Virtually all of the survivors had already been integrated into Nightmare's hive mind, and were exploring the castle and the buildings, giving the maniacal overlord the full lay of the land.

With nothing else going on, the silhouette of an alicorn flying toward the castle was quite conspicuous, but luckily nopony was outside to see her. Around the princess of the night orbited six gemstones. Princess Luna scanned the castle with her magic sight, sensing all the sources of magic, and seeing alicorn magic and chaos magic together in the tallest dungeon tower, she set course for there.

With a powerful blast of magic, impressive had it been from a unicorn but foal's play from an alicorn, she created a huge hole in the side of the tower. Inside was the surprisingly imposing form of Soarin standing over a burnt and bloodied Princess Cadenza. Princess Luna roared internally at the sight, and landed in the tower with a loud and purposeful thud.

“Why, if it isn't Loony Lulu!” said Nightmare excitedly. “Remember me? Well, I was a bit taller and my hair was a bit longer… Hmm, just imagine me a bit bigger and with blood dripping from my teeth!” The mental image was enough to make Luna cringe in spite of her rage. “Mmm, Cloudsdale cuisine. You know, Pegasus doesn't taste that bad. Bit gamey…”

“ENOUGH!” Luna roared with the full force of the Traditional Royal Canterlot Voice. She stomped her forehooves, cracking the stone floors and sending dust cascading down from the ceiling. “You have terrorized this land for the final time, foul beast! You will pay for your crimes, and you will never harm another living being again!”

The Elements of Harmony circling her began to pick up speed, creating a colorful spinning ring. A sphere of bright light radiated around her. The star-shaped gem, the Element of Magic, stopped in place in front of her, and the other elements settled around it and began to channel energy into it.

“Wait, wait! I wanna get a good quip in! Hmm, should I go referential? An 'I'll be back' or a 'Strike me down, et cetera, et cetera?' Maybe something punny?”

A rainbow-colored surge of magic erupted from the Element of Magic and began to encircle Nightmare in a multichromatic whirlwind.

“Whoa, whoa! Hold your horses! …Oh haha, that has to be how you go out, doesn't it, ya dolt.”

The brilliant tornado completely engulfed him. After a few seconds, it dissipated, leaving Soarin lying on the floor, awake but utterly exhausted.

The elements clattered to the ground, and Luna immediately turned her attention to the injured alicorn beside her. “Cadenza?” She shook the unconscious princess, gingerly but urgently. “Cadenza? Cadance!”

Princess Cadenza's eyes flickered open. Nopony called her by that nickname other that Radiant Hope and, infrequently, Luna and Celestia. “Luna?”

“Oh, Cadance!” Luna nuzzled the younger alicorn and then helped her up onto her hooves. “Are you okay?”

“I… I'm fine,” she stammered, “Just a little weak.”

Luna helped her toward the hole she had made. “Can you fly?”

“I think so,” she said, opening her wings and standing on her own as best she could. “Luna?”

“Yes?” Luna spread her wings and gathered up the elements in her telekinesis.

“What's black and blue and red all over?”

“What in the—” Luna's eyes grew wide in realization and she turned to Cadenza just in time to be struck by a blast of magic and thrown against the wall.

“You don't really grasp the whole hive mind concept, do you?” Nightmare taunted.

She launched more magic at Luna, the arcane energy arcing around her body and feeling like fire everywhere it touched. Luna forced her eyes open despite the pain, and in a truly impressive display of will, the six elements vanished in flashes of blue light. Her horn glowed a second time, but this time it seemed the only effect was that her eyes glazed over briefly.

Before she could cast any other spells, Luna's horn popped off like a cork from a wine bottle. Nightmare caught it in her hoof and examined it casually. Then, she slid her own horn over as though it was simply laying on her forehead rather than part of her skull, and attached Luna's horn next to it, the two horns positioned like a goat's.

“Fun. I'd start a collection, but since pretty soon I'll be everyone and everything, it seems weird to decorate this skin suit any more than anyone else.”

As Nightmare set to work on Princess Luna, Soarin was fleeing down the tower, certain that as soon as his adrenaline ran out, he'd pass out. He was barely managing to stay on his own two hooves as he galloped down the long stairway, but his fatigue was too great to rely on his wings at the moment.

He was able to make his way down the tower without encountering anypony, but as he made his way through the spacious castle halls, he soon had to skid to a halt and hide behind a pillar to avoid being spotted by two passing unicorns.

“Okay, I've got a good one. How do you fit fifty fillies—”

“With a blender.”

“Ugh, yes. Oh, but how do you—”

“With chips.”

“You know, dead filly jokes are a lot funnier when you aren't telling you to yourself.”

“Ah, the tragic downside of our eternal reign.”

The two unicorns walked in silence for a bit, but as they turned down a corner, the first spoke again.

“What's worse than finding a worm in your apple?”

Sighing, Soarin walked out from behind the pillar and straight into another pony. He would have screamed, but the other pony pressed a hoof against his mouth and shushed. Soarin almost began crying at the prospect of having to endure what he just had a second time, but the strange pony merely gave him a warm smile and motioned for him to follow her.

He stood in place for a moment, weighing his options, and then trotted after the gray, wall-eyed Pegasus.

The Apple family's storm shelter was simply a small wooden room buried in the ground. The only things in the way of furniture were two benches which lined the longer opposing walls. It was on these that its current occupants were sitting. On one side sat the Apple family and Lyra, and only the other sat Sweetie Drops, Daring Do, and the trio of musicians. Daring and the musicians, familiar with Lyra and Sweetie and their passionate love for each other, all expressed concern at Lyra's insistence on sitting as far away from her marefriend as the enclosed area allowed.

Introductions had already been handled. The elder green mare was Granny Smith, the grandmother of the other three ponies and the official owner of Sweet Apple Acres. The large red stallion was named Big McIntosh, though it seemed all who knew him well preferred to call him Big Mac. He did the majority of the actual manual labor and farm work alongside his sister, the orange mare, Applejack. She was also in charge of most of the advertising and sales for the farm, which was fitting given her older brother's less than talkative nature; most of what was said about Big Mac actually came from her. The little cream-colored filly was their younger sister, Apple Bloom. She was an adorable and sweet little filly, though she was energetic to the point of annoying at times.

The three musicians were all friends rather than family, as Daring had guessed, and they were also friends with Lyra and by extension Sweetie Drops. The mare with the curly mane was named Rara; actually, it was Coloratura, but she insisted on being called Rara. She was Applejack's marefriend, which was why she and her two friends had been present on the farm. Applejack had urged her to sing for them, and her voice was beautiful. Rara mentioned that she preferred Applejack to play accompanying guitar when she sang, but it was in the family home at the moment.

The unicorn was named Vinyl Scratch, though apparently she was more famous under her stage name, DJ PON3. She was actually even less talkative than Big Mac, and her friend and roommate, the other Earth pony, Octavia, had spoken on her behalf. Octavia was a cellist, and she possessed an air of refinement more typical of a Canterlot resident than a Ponyvillian. Daring would have guessed that they were marefriends as well, but according to Sweetie, they were only friends. However, she had also said they probably had some feelings they were oblivious to.

On the subject of unaddressed feelings, the only acknowledgement from Lyra that Sweetie Drops even existed was a loud grunt when Sweetie introduced herself as Bon Bon. She was sitting up on her flank, with both her hind legs and forelegs crossed. It was an honestly painful looking way to sit, but it did a good job of expressing her anger.

They only had the sounds to go by, but the tornado had been gone for a few hours. However, after that there were noises of explosions, and then of thunder, and then of some absolutely atrocious piano music. There had currently been about twenty minutes of silence, but they were still wary about leaving.

Their conversations had turned into idle chitchat, and Daring was mostly sitting quietly and dwelling on the unspoken animosity between Lyra and Sweetie.

“Rara, you should sing em that song you've been writin',” encouraged Applejack.

“I haven't finished that song,” said Rara. “Besides, I wrote that with your guitar playing in mind.”

“Aw, Ah'm not that good. Nothin' compared to your singin'.” Applejack blushed lightly.

Her marefriend placed a hoof on her chin comfortingly. “AJ, you've gotten really fantastic with your guitar. I'm proud and I want these ponies to hear you play as much as you want them to hear me sing again.”

“Vinyl!” chastised Octavia. “Turn down your music. We can hear it coming out of your headphones. How you haven't gone deaf by now…”

Vinyl responded by turning her music down by the most minute degree. Octavia facehoofed and slowly dragged said hoof down her face, but didn't press the issue further.

Apple Bloom, in spite of her bubbly personality, had spent most of the time looking toward the door with a look of anxiety and fear. Big Mac had his foreleg around her, but it sadly wasn't doing much to comfort the scared filly. Meanwhile, Granny Smith was talking his ear off about potential damage to the barn and how they would make up for the uprooted trees and if there was time to plant new ones and a multitude of other topics that probably did nothing to ease Apple Bloom's spirits.

Daring, still feeling the weight of Lyra and Sweetie's silence pressing down on her, decided to take a risk and do something proactive.

“So, Lyra. Bon Bon told me a lot about you. How did you two meet?” She winced as she said Bon Bon but she couldn't use her real name in front of the other ponies.

“She saw me perform at a student concert in Canterlot. Said she liked my music, gave me a gift card to her candy shop,” she answered dismissively. “That's what she said. Dunno if that's true. Maybe she was giving those out to everypony. Who knows, really.”

One could hear a pin drop in the hush that followed. When somepony spoke again, it was Sweetie. “I'm sorry Lyra. I didn't mean to hurt you. You know none of that's true. Your music was absolutely divine.”

“I thought I knew a lot of things. Clearly, that's not the case.” Lyra never looked at Sweetie, instead reclining with her nose upward and her eyes closed.

Sweetie wished desperately that Lyra would just look at her. “Lyra, come on. You know that I had to do what I did. It was for a good cause, and it was bigger than either of us.”

“You know, I never thought there was anything bigger than us. I guess that was just another thing I was wrong about.”

Sweetie glared at Lyra. Daring began to worry for everypony present. “You know that isn't what I meant. Have you given a single thought on how I feel about this? This has been torture for me!”

“And yet you did it.”

Sweetie screamed in anger and kicked the door open. “I'm going out to see what's happening. Stay here.” That last statement sounded oddly threatening for what it was.

Lyra's eyes shot open, and she looked toward the open door, her face betraying her concern. She buried that concern back under her anger, but she also stood up and galloped out the door. “Wait! We're not finished here!”

Daring flew out after them, hoping to help but also a little happy to the leave the little room. She felt very much the outsider among all the close friends. She didn't expect to see Applejack following close behind her.

“What are you doing?” Daring asked, looking around at the wrecked landscape.

“Ah thought you might need some help. Plus, Ah needed to check the farm…” She trailed off as she examined all the damage. Dozens, maybe hundreds, of trees had been uprooted and torn apart. One tree had crashed through an upstair window of their farmhouse. Several fields had scorch marks where crops had been. Perhaps the oddest change was that many of the remaining trees had oranges where they had earlier had apples.

Sweetie ran all the way to town, Lyra shouting after her the whole way. The Wonderbolts had reshaped Ponyville in much the same way that they had done in Canterlot, and just as with Canterlot, they had flown off for the next town, leaving behind a multitude of possessed ponies. Those that had yet to be turned were being “educated” in the Ponyville schoolhouse, while those that had were roaming the streets.

Sweetie fled into her candyshop and slammed the door behind her. Lyra charged the door, knocking it straight of its hinges, an impressive display of strength from a unicorn, had it not been for all of the damage already done to the property.

“Sweetie Drops!” Lyra screamed, the name tasting like bile in her mouth.

“Lyra, leave me alone!” the Earth pony yelled back, throwing a pack of jelly babies at the panting unicorn.

The bag bounced ineffectually off of her chest. “Really?”

“Lyra, I am sorry. I'm really, incredibly sorry. I don't know what to do.”

Daring and Applejack entered the shop, and were immediately met with the bickering marefriends staring daggers at them.

“This is really not a good time,” growled Lyra.

“Sorry, but given the tornado with teeth and the molten chocolate flood, it seemed worthwhile to make sure you were okay,” said Daring.

Applejack gave a confused look. “Chocolate?”

Nightmare ponies had begun to surround the building, but they never got a chance to attack.

Crazed wildlife began to flood into the town from within the Everfree Forest. Swarms of ravenous parasprites flew into the town and began consuming the food from the shops and carts and the flowers from the gardens and the flower shop. Ferocious timberwolves began to prowl the streets, eyeing the ponies with hungry eyes. An enraged manticore stalked after a pink-coated mare, licking his lips.

The Nightmare ponies did their best to fight off the beasts, but for once they seemed to be at a disadvantage. They used their powers to light parasprites on fire or trap them in cages, but the little pests continued to multiply rapidly, beyond what the ponies could handle. Everytime they blasted a timberwolf apart, it reformed moments later. Even the manticore was proving to be more resilient than they expected.

Their conflict raged on for several minutes, but came to a halt when a brilliant purple flash lit up the sky. Twilight Sparkle floated above the ruined town, suspended simply by her magic. Her coat had become a deeper, darker purple, her mane resembled a star-filled night sky, and the two color streaks in her mane glowed brightly, like the tails of comets. Even her cutie mark had changed. The pink six-pointed star shone just like a real star, and it was surrounded by a multitude shooting stars, streaks of light all soaring toward the larger pink one.

Her familiar raspberry aura blossomed around her horn, and she set to work fixing the problem seemingly effortlessly. All of the surviving parasprites were pulled together into a huge ball and then encased in a crystal shell. A small magic shockwave burst from her horn, and a matching one hit the crystal, sending it hurdling toward the horizon. All of the timberwolves were lifted into the air with her telekinesis and then torn apart. Before they could even begin to reform, each individual piece of wood burst into white hot flames. She dropped them, and they were ashes by the time they hit the ground. The manticore flew up to attack her, but was blasted right back down, now de-aged to a cub. The little furball, jarringly resembling a kitten, save for the scorpion tail and bat wings, scampered away, whimpering.

By then, all that remained of Daring, Applejack, Lyra, and Sweetie in the town were the hoofprints leading into the Everfree.