The Moon

Death is a powerful thing.

At the same moment that the spear entered Luna's heart, at that exact moment, a crack in the moon appeared. A small one at first, but the interconnected weave of mana that connected all living things to natural forces was strong here in the silence that was the moon. It had to be, for imprisoning any foe for a thousand years imbued the place with real magic, old magic that seeped into the dead bones of the dust and grew roots that ran deep. A matrix of blood like mana bridges ran throughout the entire moon, each a living thing, in a sense. Not in the usual way, since it took real fortutude, or alicorn immortality, to truly live on the moon itself, the barren landscape a harsh mistress to all but the stupid and the brave. But it was alive in another way.

For Starswirl had found ways to teach the alicorns the ways of magic, of connecting themselves to living things, concepts, and the forces of nature. Gods of the Old Equestria. He had hoped that it would run smoothly, as any hypothetical experiment would run, X leading to Y, therefore Z is the result. Cold, calculating, exact.

But living beings are malleable, unpredictable, and, most of all, emotional. And connecting one's mortality to an object, no matter how large or small causes issues for the host. Immortality, like the light of the sun, casts a shadow large on the landscape its tied to, shifting and changing the concept itself.

As Luna felt the spear pierce her chest, she watched Twilight in slow motion, the odd beauty of the small alicorn oddly enchanting in an exotic way. Her bloodstained body, red purple, was not particularly attractive to modern eyes, but the fact that she was stained in her blood, Luna's, and the sheer despair that Twilight had on her face would make the most wondrous of bards to quiver in sheer anticipation of the songs and soliloquies that would be written of this moment.

She glanced up to look at the moon. She could swear, though she doubted it, that for a brief moment it looked like a spear had pierced her own moon, the semi pristine surface being pocked and marked with flecks of black as she fell over writhing in pain. Death hurt, even to immortals, and it never was a pleasant experience, be it death of the psyche, ego death or change, or semi permanent death. Luna could trace the moon's topography like it was the back of her hoof, each runnel and mountain on its surface a life event of some sort, from her first sexual encounter with Somnambula, to falling within the whispers and lies of dark magics held out to her, a promise of equal, if not greater, power than her sister. To be wanted beyond just an afterthought of the crown's power. The dark inner voice had ruined much of her moon's beauty. It had worked its way between the cracks, spun its wicked web and caused earthquakes that had destabilized entire regions of the moon.

In effect, her emotional instability had cracked part of the moon, a large gash in the southern hemisphere, right near where she had been imprisoned, a large canyon that still was semi active in pushing hot, boiling lava to the surface to cool into twisted mountains and low valleys.

She grimaced in pain as Blackthorn twisted the spear, her heart still beating for a moment as he pushed it out of her body and held it up. She watched Twilight wail and scream as she could do nothing.

She died. Died without much of a word. Dying was easy. It was the coming back that defined her- she had not particularly died in a while. If she was a pony who squabbled over such trivialities like 'death' and 'life' and 'change'- then she did die when Twilight had turned the Elements of Harmony on her, had suffered the cleaving in twain of the Luna that had been trapped within the shell of Nightmare Moon. But she didn't die then. She could argue and argue, but in her heart, she felt like she didn't die. The moon held her scars, one by one, and in that state of being in between, she had felt the bright white and rainbow light wash over her and had felt peace for a moment. The briefest of seconds and, yet, an eternity in which she could watch her night be changed to day. And felt the deep scar of Celestia's decision to banish her to the moon, that large dark plain that looked so menacing- the traces of her evil, not go away entirely, for their always would be traces of that, but change to something new.

This death hurt.

She was dead, only hearing the world in passing, muffled screaming, muffled feeling. Dead was boring in a way, like silence. Then she felt the stirrings of change as Twilight's lips met hers. Felt the air being forcibly blown into her lungs, the pain of feeling her ribs crack under Twilight's harsh ministrations and she felt the weirdest emotion as Twilight's tongue briefly entwined with hers, the sensation something she hadn't felt in forever, intimate and intoxicating as she had a point to focus on, a sensation that beat her numbed feelings into a fine point and intensified the flame of passion that she had left somewhat hidden, in brief glances, long nights studying with the purple alicorn, of long talks of this newfangled thing called science, of staring at the alicorn's deepest fears in dreams. In finding somepony so close to her, yet at times so muchlike her sister. A synthesis of two disparate ways of being, of passion and restraint tied so elegantly within one rather tight package. Twilight.

Her passion exploded as she woke up, that one moment enshrined on the moon's surface as a large piece of the moon broke off and glistened with potential energy for a long time, spinning like a top in zero gravity as it sloughed off hunks and pieces of itself, refining the image that Luna had in her mind in that one moment.

In space, sound has no meaning. As the stars shone down on the night, a new formation was formed on the moon's equator, large shifts in the tectonic plates of the celestial being shot up six pointed stars surrounding one large, pure purple star. An imperfect view of one Twilight Sparkle's cutie mark etched upon her moon.

Luna woke up screaming in agony as her moon accepted the new stain on her heart. A reminder to her most of all, that she owed more to that one pony than most realized. Saving her from the nightmare, befriending one who was shunned due to past actions, and showing that a third option existed between life and death.

Change. Friendship. Magic.

Also pain, lots and lots of pain, but Starswirl always said that pain was something not to be feared, but to be accepted and overcome by endurance.

The thing about declarations of love so intense, was that anything could see it writ large upon the billboard of the moon.

***

Ponyville Hospital

"That's gangrene. How in the name of Celestia did a filly get gangrene. . .that's both impressive and horrific." Sunburst peered at the pink filly, slightly taken aback by the advanced case of medical neglect that was staring him right in the face. While he had limited practice in the feel of surgery, he had entire diagrams stacked in his head, humming softly as he flipped through them, too graphic, too safe, too deadly, et cetera, and he settled on one as he stared at his two patients.

Both impressive cases of medical records. And while he hated getting his hooves dirty, he didn't have much to do about it. It wasn't like either of them were the pinnacle of pony health, what with pus and ooze from one, and dried, clotted blood where eyesockets should be and a burned lower jaw on the other.

Moondancer groaned. "Don't you dare look at me."

Sunburst looked around at the other surgeons, most shades of green or in various states of distress as they had found two cases of something that didn't happen often. Sunburst had done his thesis on medical applications for prosthetics and how mana within a pony's body worked for that reason. Well, besides the sheer fact that it looked rather impressive when others asked. But the main fact was that doctors were adept, if not masterful, at repairing damage when treatment was administered quickly. Less common were doctors who could stare at a rotting stump, realize that it was a lost cause and treat the disease accordingly.

"Moony, I would normally do this myself, but with two ponies, and with no help, its not like I have a choice."

Moondancer rolled her eyes, blood red orbs flashing with unamusement as she picked up a scalpel. "You could have asked Twilight, or Luna, or any number of ponies. You just had to choose me."

Sunburst shrugged. "Twilight seemed kind of out of it. Luna can't pick up a scalpel with magic right now after her fight with whatever those things are. Not to mention that you and I both know that Luna's reference point on 'wound care' would leave a lot to be desired. I'd rather not have medieval healthcare in a modern setting. While very informative, it would be a mess. I mean would she bring out leeches or not?"

Moondancer sighed and picked up the round egg like amethysts and sighed again. "You fucking owe me big time for this."

Sunburst nodded and tied his mane back, letting his horn flash as he ran through a list of disinfectant spells, air quality checks, and protection charms as he dipped his instruments in boiling water and pulled up a graciously donated mask over his snout. While the hospital didn't boast the technical marvels of Canterlot, or the mystical bent of Crystal Medicine, as a representative of an alicorn, and an all around caregiver to another, he knew his way around medicine.

While this was a critical procedure, he didn't have to come up with an unknown alicorn sickness in an unforeseen alicorn foal. He grimaced as he cut into the dead flesh, carefully casting a stasis spell as he did so to lessen the bleeding. The smell hit him immediately and he gagged as the putrefaction filled the room.

***

Silver Spoon let her hooves dangle off the chair as she stared at the clock. It was late and she should probably be asleep, but she couldn't worry about that. Not with Diamond. Not with her sister. She wrapped her hooves around her and leaned back, the antiseptic smell of Ponyville General not comforting at all.

"-Rarity, I get woken up by some loud explosion and you're telling me to stay calm? Roxie told me what happened on my family's farm. How in tarnation do you think I feel. I hated Spoiled Rich, most of us did, and Diamond was a terrible pony to my sister, but it's not like I wanted this to happen."

Silver shivered. She had thought something was up with Diamond last week. And now here she was on the brink of. . .she whispered the worst word she knew and leaned back. If only she had done something beyond just telling Scootaloo about her worries. Had told Twilight. Or Cheerilee. Or some adult. Something at all.

"Yeah, I'm right pissed off. You know exactly what us Apples kept in that shed. I'm not saying that we shouldn't have let the dogs in our houses. Don't you say that. I'm just saying I'm going to have to first wake up Granny, if she hasn't like had a heart attack from being woken up late at night and then tell her the southern shed's been wrecked. That held all my parents' things we couldn't fit in the house and old documents from the family. I'm pissed cause whatever Diamond's shit mother just did, Celestia rest her soul, I guess, wrecked all that."

Silver shrunk away as Applejack stormed out of the waiting room, mixed emotions on her face, anger, sadness, worry, and the farmer glanced at Silver, both of their eyes meeting for a second until they broke away as Applejack walked down the hallway, her hoofsteps echoing in the quiet hospital.

Rarity walked out next and stopped. sighing softly as she picked out a few loose strands of her mane and straightened them. She turned and saw Silver sitting on the chairs and frowned. "Silver, you want to get something to eat? Or drink? While I think hospital food is positively dreadful, I think we could coerce some ponies for something."

Silver nodded and got up from the chair. At least it would give her something to do.

***

Canterlot

Celestia rather disliked being up past the sun, but the day's events had kept her up. She had barely even thought of going to bed- even if Discord was there- with the haphazard reports of Manehattan and Klugetown. Or at least the spotty reports of Manehattan and the deafening silence from Klugetown. She sat back and stared at the walls of her war room, the sparkling crystal caverns serving a dual purpose- protection and, in the case of invasion, defense.

She wiped her eyes as she wrote her signature on the paper in front of her. In billowy prose and cursive loopholes, she set up a series of defensive measures. Armies. Training. Food rationing. And the most difficult one there- natural weather phenomena. A way to keep the borders semi safe for a few months as the weather went into overdrive to reverse millennia of magical alterations, spell matrices, and layers of tradition passed down by the ponies that lived during the Paradise Valley Civilization and the Tambelonian Exile.

"Dear me. I could just sense the sheer worry oozing off you. That and the rather tasty morsels of chaos that were stored on this paper." Celestia stared down to see the words rearrange themselves, their cursive hoofwriting morphing into an ink facsimile of Discord, his words appearing off his lips like little thought bubbles.

"Discord."

Discord smiled, his inky grin black with hints of other inks, reds, blues, and purples as he stepped daintily over the prose trapped on the page. "Sorry. Sorry. Trying to be a rather good draconequus is so rather hard. What with there being so many new things to just revel in. Like how you are tied to the sun, I'm unfortunately tied to chaos and its been a right messy few days. And most of it is tied to one rather order filled alicorn."

Celestia usually loved Discord's more riddle filled talks, but she sadly wasn't in the mood. "And?"

Discord smiled and conjured up a little figure of ink, purple and black. He smiled as he shifted the tone of his voice in a bad imitation of Twilight, the vocal tones shifting up and down quickly as he tried to make his voice more feminine. "I, the humble and weak Twilight Sparkle, have touched so many threads of fate that this mess revolves around me." Discord grinned as he looked up to see Celestia frowning as he pulled out a tiny spyglass. "I mean who else has had their cutie mark burned on the moon? That's so rather humbling. I should write about all my normal adventures and talk about the magic of friendship and probably bone Celly's sister while I'm at it."

Celestia raised an eyebrow at that. "Really? Twilight and Luna? That's ridiculous."

Discord shrugged. "True. But you should know the heart wants what it wants." Discord winked as he stared up at his currently larger marefriend. "And well, Luna hasn't really been forthcoming with her feelings for, what, years? Months? And I just feel a nugget of chaos right around my paw. While I can't deal with love like your niece, who just swims in it like butter, I have a feeling for chaos. And Twilight, for how ordered she is on some things, secretly loves chaos."

Celestia laughed. "Discord, Twilight hates anything chaotic. I spent years with her, training her in the ways of magic and I saw firsthoof that she hated being out of control. Which now considering her reaction to her numerous failed experiments and this current headache of a body switch. . ."

Discord laughed and flicked a piece of ink on the desk. "Pure chaos. Though that did give me a headache trying to differentiate between the rather buffoonish Dash and the calming influence of Fluttershy."

Celestia grinned as she fired up her horn and copied the order to the numerous pegasi that handled the weather, letting her magic send each copy to the requisite head pony in each weather team. "Calming influence? On my own personal lord of chaos? I'd never think I'd hear the day when Discord, the mighty spirit of disharmony and who holds a doctorate in chaos would ever say he of all beings liked calming influences." Celestia sunk down to Discord's level and winked.

The ink blushed red as Discord stammered out a slight response. "Did that slip out? I meant just that it felt rather nice not being the center of attention and sadly I stand out like a sore paw when I'm in public."

Celestia tapped her hoof gently. "Well there was that one proposal I offered. I could always try to change you into a stallion of some noble standing for a couple days. Though I wonder what you would even look like if that happened. I mean corralling chaos into order is difficult. And you have rather unique markings. . ."

Discord rolled his eyes and snapped his finger, letting the ink wash off of him as he popped back to normal size, curling around Celestia like a large snake. Laying his head on her ethereal mane, he grumbled. "I'll think about it. But back on tangent, your student marked the moon. Seems like your mostly booksexual student has a way with words. What with Pinkie, and now your sister. Which I feel slightly miffed about. Pinkie was just the right level of chaos. And I could tell since she had that little spark of mine for chaos, like so few ponies do."

Celestia sighed. "Twilight's problem is her own."

Discord slithered his body over Celestia, his tail tickling her gently as he looked at his mare, upside down. "You know Twilight's problems tend to get rather large, dear. Else how would she be so competent at saving the world? I mean she did mess with time once. And the situation I so humbly have been apologizing for. . .let's see. . .about a few years give or take a couple months and some days."

Celestia raised an eyebrow. "Twilight has never messed with time. As far as I know. She would have mentioned it."

Discord laughed. "She has. The hard thing with paradoxes and time corollaries is that there is both one time that she did and one where she didn't. Remember that time she had that rather goofy looking manestyle? That time? The week where she didn't have a friendship problem?"

Celestia narrowed her eyes. "I do. It was oddly out of character for her. But what does it have to do with anything?"

Discord shrugged. "Like a cat in a box, our Twilight is just so good at making things so much more difficult for herself and others. Her actions are like a stone, cast in water, each ripple a multitude of possibilities. In one area, she was never born. That was a real bad timeline. In another, she fused with the Nightmare. Another bad one. And in another, she takes your spot as ruler of Equestria. Rather interesting there, though unlike you, she wears the whole super alicorn body terribly. Looks awkward in it. Though that is deceptively on brand for Twilight. But, in effect, Twilight's little actions, and honestly, all six mares that hold our little Elements are little pools in a larger stream. And time likes stasis. The world in general likes to stay the exact same- barring handsome spirits of chaos- evil versus good. Good versus evil. Light, dark, opposites attract their opposite and in the meeting create something ever so new. So I'm rather miffed that Pinkie is in another orbit to Twilight- complementary, but separate. That was a rather nice timeline. But there was a timeline where things got worse. And that ended so badly, and now we have a chance." Discord touched is chin. "A bad one cause our dear friend the Storm King is a right terrible idiot focused on an ideal. So cliche. But we have one. Just because that little moon up there is new. Very new and full of possibilities. That didn't happen before."

Celestia rolled her eyes. "I appreciate your confidence, even if I don't fully get all the time stuff. Now if you could magic up trained troops, I'd be far more interested in that than your waxing metaphysical. Luna was more of the prophecy type, I liked results far better. . ." Celestia stared out the window towards Canterlot and sighed. After the day she and the nation had, she wanted to rest for a few days. "Now if you could find a few battalions and some help with this problem, I'd be glad."

A tiny lightbulb appeared above Discord's head. "Why not have a mission for the six most important mares in Equestria? I mean, just have Twilight do all the work. She is the Princess of Friendship after all."

Celestia's eyes narrowed. "I don't think that's a good idea. And I could do a ton of things to help out."

Discord smiled. "Of course. But you have leading to do, training, and like boring bureaucratic stuff. Oh and raising the sun so ponies don't die of frost or whatever. And Twilight hasn't failed yet. I mean she's gotten rather close, but due to her continued sense of self righteous order and goodness, I guess it works out. That or the Elements of Harmony like to cheat evil into keeping the status quo. Plus you could call this a 'training experiment' or whatever you did to Twilight in the first place."

Celestia felt a headache coming on as she stared at her smug draconequus. "That was mainly to get her out of Canterlot and have her gain confidence and friends."

Discord shrugged. "A ripple in a pool. Your one rather good natured choice made everything go. Else you'd have a genius unicorn sitting in her tower, bored out of her mind. And you know what that can lead to. Especially with your hoofs on teaching style."

Celestia thought of her past students and sighed. "Fine. I guess I could coax my war council into possibly allowing a winter mission. Though I can't say that you of all things came up with it. I've already had discussions with the Guard about you."

Discord smiled and coiled around Celestia, winking as he did so. "I wouldn't have it any other way." Discord's words appeared in front of the pair and he took a letter or two and bit into them, carefully digesting that sentence and sighed. "A dreadfully half baked idea, but an interesting flavor." He offered a few letters to Celestia who shook her head imperceptibly and Discord shrugged. "More for me then. But Celly, you do have to do something about those mares. We can't just have six angsty mares cooped up when they could be doing good. As a decent test case for your little reformation project, I give it three and a half stars. Needs work, but effective." Discord snapped his fingers and a few stars started floating around his head. "Night, don't stay up too late. You know how you get when you don't get your beauty sleep."

Celestia tried not to smile as she could hear Discord's off rhythm laughs echo through the hallway. She turned back to the pile of papers and sighed, deftly picking up her quill in her magic and pulling out her own personal gold tinted ink for a few special, and rather difficult messages. "So if I move around the planned battalions and add different ponies from around the nation and make up for certain chaotic imperfections, I think I could word these well enough. Though Spitfire has been rather insistent about having a few experienced pegasi, and Pinkie could have been good for morale, and Twilight. . ." Her sentence trailed off as she began to write some of the letters, and magicking up a revised draft of the Element Plan, nixing the use of certain advantages that they had, and creating a rather cunning alternate plan. Celestia smile broadened as she realized the best leader she could think of. Well co-leaders. The white alicorn laughed quietly as she thought of how Luna would take the news of a political mission. "I will have to let the Guard train them though, since I can't just let them go out and run headlong into danger."

***

Dash bristled as his parents hugged Fluttershy, their voices not soothing at all as Dash glared at them.

"Honey, while I don't really get why you turned into a stallion, I think its fine. Weird but fine." Windy leaned against a wall carefully on her hooves, head wrapped in bandages and gauze as a dim eye turned to her lost foal. or stallion.

Bow waved a hoof. "That doesn't matter at all. I mean look at them. I told you that she'd be fine.Or is it he now? Whatever. You were all 'my heart is in pain', which mine hurt a little too. Not to lie, but I mean she'd have become like a lowly weather pony and not a Wonderbolt without that."

Dash's eye twitched.

Fluttershy tried to push away the conversation from herself as she had noticed rather early on that Dash was definitely not in the mood to even hear the voices of his parents. The brief glimpses of the memories she had and the years of hearing snippets of Dash's life confirmed it. "Well, I am still a weather lead, so its still not a full time thing yet. But less about me. I mean I haven't seen you in like twenty years. Hey, Shy, how long has it been?"

Dash spoke through gritted teeth. "About twenty years, yeah."

Windy stole a glance at the rather protective stallion that Dash had near him all the time. Seemed familiar to her. Almost too uncanny, though she doubted the mare had a family. And Equestria was full of doppelgangers when it came to ponies. Almost like there was a slight joke to genetics sometimes. "I mean, its a long story. But the short answer is, well, we got held up at Appleloosa. I mean Posey was supposed to wait until we came, it was in the contract and everything. Or at least I think it was. It's been too long and I can't remember if that was in there or not. But when we came to Canterlot, which was a journey in itself, you were gone and Posey left no whereabouts for the train. So we just felt bad for a while and, one thing led to another, and boom, we're the best pony merchants in the South. Though with your father's steering and whatever this sleepy town has been dealing with, I doubt that's going to be useful. You know how expensive a ship is? And we were trying to ship stuff for the Storm King. . ."

Dash's eyelid twitched. "You what?"

Bow raised a hoof at the large, rather miffed, and kind of intimidating yellow stallion. "It's no big deal. We did what we had to do and, well, once the Abyssinian trade route dried up and a new power rose up to meet the border, we weren't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Money is money and. . ."

"And nothing! I just had to see an entire town wiped off the map because of his forces, so I can't believe. . ."

Fluttershy elbowed Dash in the ribs and smiled. "I can't believe we haven't eaten today. Who's hungry? I mean we're all on edge, which like I get, but I always work better after I had something to eat. Helps get the edge off." Fluttershy arched an eyebrow at Dash who was scowling at her parents, her borrowed blue eyes glaring daggers into their souls. "Yeah, so where exactly were we in the catching you two up on me? Cause I just love talking about me. Especially when nervous. . .but, uh, let's see pets, and Wonderbolts, and. . .

***

Rockville

Pinkie stared up at the moon and sighed. She could hear her sisters fighting in the next room as they bickered over what exactly to do. Pinkie had left awhile ago just to get space and some sense of quiet before she had to choose. She had stared up at the ceiling and tried to follow the grain of the wood and she would have actually completed her first board when she felt like she was going to be sick. Which was rather odd since she had rarely been sick before- she could count on her hooves each time and yet this felt slightly different. It wasn't food poisoning or an illness. It was like her Sense was reacting to something so badly that she was ill.

And then she had looked up and realized why.

Pinkie would have normally felt sad or angry or hopeless seeing Twilight's mark on the moon. But she had had such a bad day that she just felt burnt out and tired. Maybe she would feel something tomorrow or the next day. Maybe not. She just wanted to be done with all this. All the lies and half truths and all the things she had read in the little book that her grandmother had wrote from oral legends of the past. She flipped through the tome and sighed, tracing the cursive mouthwriting and trying to figure out all the odd information in the book about anti magic and the end of the world and the whole mess about a whole lot of creatures that she and the girls fought against.

A knock on the door broke her sad reverie. Pinkie turned to see Cheese Sandwich grinning sheepishly in the light of the hallway. She nodded as he walked in and sat down next to her. She didn't say anything as her mind was racing with questions a mile a minute and so silence reigned until he spoke.

"So what are we going to do?"

Pinkie shrugged, laughed a little, and laid back on her bed. "I don't know. And we? I thought this was just a one time thing that your Cheese Sense dragged you out here to do, for whatever reason."

Cheese nodded. "It was. And it usually is. But it's not every day that I get to meet you again. I mean I was going to set up a joke factory nearby, but then poof. Cheese Sense emergency out in the supposed middle of nowhere. Then you appeared out of a dream."

Pinkie shook her head. "More like a nightmare."

Cheese shrugged. "Nightmares are just bad dreams. And those usually turn out okay in the end. Or you wake up. Either way, they don't last forever."

Pinkie sighed and looked at the moon. "Maybe. Maybe not. I don't know where to go now though. This turned out to be a waste of time. I shouldn't have left Ponyville. Maybe my dad and sisters were right."

Cheese laughed. "That's a bad joke. Pinkie. Have you seen your sisters? And no, that's a rhetorical question- you are related, but still. They don't have that spark you have. Whatever Sense you have, whatever that makes you, well, you. . .they don't have that. And if you just existing causes issues, there's at least one pony who is grateful for that."

Pinkie sighed. "From the moon, I guess its not Twilight."

Cheese cocked an eyebrow. "Who's. . .ah, yeah. The princess. Nope, wasn't talking about her. I'm grateful for you deciding to not be out here in this weird, but totally appropriate, compound of boredom. Cause without you showing me how to be the second best party pony in Equestria, I wouldn't be here today. I'd be living a whole other life."

Pinkie smiled. "Are you hitting on me?"

"No, I'm just trying to tell somepony who seems a bit down about themselves that they matter."

Pinkie leaned back and stared up at the ceiling, now uninterested in counting the lines up above her. "Thanks."

***

Klugetown

Capper slunk through the burned out husk of Klugetown. The cinders had fallen back down to the ground and, to him, it looked like gray snow covering what felt like miles in the now cold desert. He pulled his cape around him and thanked whatever magitech designer had designed his armor, the sleek metal conforming to his body, and with just a flick of his wrist, a bit of magic surged out of his claws. He felt much warmer as the battery amplified his mana. He looked up at the stars and wondered exactly what he was doing here. Surrounded by reptiles who were as varied as the cats back home in some ways- some extremely spiny, some long and without limbs, some wet, some poisonous. Ziggy had tried to introduce him to each of the clans in some kind of ritualistic greeting, the large komodo dragon towering over most of his subjects. Capper had tried to keep up but once the talk about what differentiates talking snakes, and frogs, and whatever dregs of society the desert clans were, the feline had just wanted to bask in the sun and sleep. Unlike his mother, he just didn't care about the social norms of a place. He was more of a city cat, slinking up and down the alleys of northern Abyssinia, the capital of Panthera with its multileveled houses and tight squeezes, the labyrinthine walkways and deceptive dead ends a better challenge than this overfilled litter box of a place. He had liked Klugetown for what it was. He sat down and looked at the stars, carefully tracing the Minx, the Panther, and the Leopard as he did.

He heard the claws behind him and he stared up to Ziggy, who got on all fours and walked around him, his black tail dragging in the now cooler sand. His voice was a low growl as he spoke. "Cat, you don't want to stay out here too long. Night hunters love the cold desert and with the moon so high in the sky, its almost early morning."

Capper flicked a paw. "No worries. I'm turning in soon. And seriously, cats love sleep. Just today was. . .something else."

Ziggy narrowed his eyes as he tried to think. "We won. No reason to feel bad. Especially with the ponies."

Capper rolled his eyes. He had wished he had been sent to Mount Aris or anywhere else, since here he was debating ethics with a komodo dragon, possibly last of his kind, and trying to say that maybe he felt some kind of guilt over this wreck of burnt homes, burnt bodies, burnt sand. "Yeah. Give me five minutes. Be in soon."

Ziggy nodded and left, sinking into the black night. Capper sat and waited trying to tell when the large lizard had left. He counted down from sixty, letting the numbers ooze out into the night and surround him a sort of mewling mantra, letting his mind slip into a trance as he did so. He purred softly as he sat on his sand dune, letting the world go around him, little spiders and salamanders crawling nearby. He let the world rush by, centering himself in the near silence and let his situation assail him slightly, letting the weeks of just being here, nowhere, and stuck in the now instead of the past.

He clenched his paws as he saw his old friend Chummer, the grayish black stripes mixing with the soot and smoke in the boiler room of the little Abyssinian ship. The paws running over the dials and switches. His own trying to. . .he blinked as he felt slight wet patches on his fur. Well he was here now and his mother was likely nowhere to be seen. Chummer was probably dead or something. And here he was just sitting on a rock, trying desperately to recall his mother's teachings about magical cats and how rather important disguising yourself was. Names were power and he was just here lying to one and all about his motives. A traitor in the midst of what seemed like a rebellion.

A mammal in a den of snakes.

He prayed softly to Bast for his mother's safety and stalked back into Klugetown, the bombed out town hiding a bustling and thriving series of burrows and dens and mud tunnels stretching miles and miles.

For all the things that changed, at least he felt most at home in the tunnels.

***

Griffonstone

Gilda walked through the gloomy halls of the Eyrie, the hard stone walls muffling her steps, the dim torches lighting her way to her sister's lab. She hated going near her sister, the years of training under Gustave Le Grand giving her sister Gabrielle, or Gigi as some gryphons called her, a distinct Prench affectation to her way of speech and manner. Gilda pushed open the doors and was met by a wave of light as Gabrielle sat lounging on a chair, her paws folded as she plucked out a pinkish feather and stared at it. She clicked her tongue and tossed the offending feather, suddenly seeing Gilda in the midst of the room and smiling a catty smile as she stood up, her height slightly intimidating to Gilda as she had to look up at her older sister.

"Ah, c'est magnifique, Gilda, I was just thinking about you."

Gilda shrugged, acting cool to hide her slight worry. She had too many bad memories of being Gigi's pet hamster, testing out her sister's newest idea for a laugh and a few scraps of food. "I hope it was a good thought."

Gabrielle nodded, twirling a talon in Gilda's direction, letting a bit of magic twine a few pieces of paper off her desk. "Well, it doesn't involve a test or two on your part, though that just gives me the heartache, yes? I mean you were such a good partner, but alas, my ideas, and mother's necessities, have outstripped your testing ability. But I have a real conundrum on my claws and I'd like to see if you have an idea on how to fix my oopsie." Gabrielle floated over her diagrams and Gilda took a quick look and wanted to vomit as she realized what was sketched in the margins in her sister's notes.

"Looks nice." Gilda cringed as she closed her eyes, the image of a perfectly vivisected dead gryphon, it's sexual organs on full display, its eggs malformed and broken, half baked young twisted and multilimbed, some with two heads, three eyes, hearts on the outside, numerous malformations and birth defects in subject after subject.

Gabrielle shrugged. "A pity. I've been trying to get mother's plans out of the nest so to speak and pumping in a mix of pheromones and magic enhancers has caused some unforeseen difficulties as of late. I mean, I like a good rut or two in the Prench way, but the feral mating, the enlarged eggs, the overbreeding, and worst of all, the cannibalism. It's just so wasteful." Gabrielle shook her head and sharpened a talon.

"They are eating the young?"

Gabrielle hummed to herself a little ditty and looked at her sister. "The young, the old, the weak. It's inefficient. Effective, but inefficient. It's stabilized, but you should have seen the first few hours after my idea came to fruition. Birds were bursting from strain, eating each other. A feeding frenzy to create the perfect hunters. Weed out the poison that Celestia infected us with by cooking our eggs so long ago. Streamline the next generation."

"That's wonderful." Gilda deadpanned as she looked into the cold eyes of her sister.

Gigi shrugged. "Planning to work out the kinks by. . .snowfall? Few months, maybe." She swirled her tea and smiled, unflinching as she took in Gilda. "Oh, I think you should know. We got Manehattan."

Gilda cocked her head. "You sure? Cause I've been in Manehattan and that place is like a fortress. A pastel, plush fortress, but still, a fortress."

Her sister smiled. "Would our brother lie?" She gripped a piece of parchment and tossed it to Gilda.

Gilda skimmed the letter, seeing the trademark doodles and sketches that usually dotted Gallus' letters. She could pick out little in the mass of doodles, some running on others, through others, a mishmash of thoughts and feelings. So very unlike her usual letters from the blue gryphon. So she knew something was wrong- not physically, since he mentioned near the bottom that he was fine, but mentally. "Looks like he's fine," she mumbled.

Gabrielle shrugged. "He's fine. But mother wanted him to test himself, to get some of the weak imperfections she could see in his personality ironed out. As she did with herself, as grandfather did, as great-grandfather." She curled a talon and dug it into the nearby stone, scratching into the rock ever so slightly as she spoke. "He has to start somewhere. Unlike your failed venture. How is the cunt who so destroyed your will to live?"

Gilda shivered, thinking of Dash at that moment. "She's fine. Haven't talked to her in a while. Probably just busy."

The pink gryphon clicked her tongue and shook her head. "Shame. If only you had been more forceful in, what what it? The undefinable nature of "friendship" the je ne sais quoi of togetherness. All because you snapped and had that little tantrum because some pastel pony was teasing you. It's almost like Celestia never taught you shit. Almost like grandfather filled your head of your importance and the ponies never saw you as one of them. The pitiful one."

Gilda bristled. "That's not. . ." She remembered Dash at Flight School, the one pony who had tried to connect with her, the brash pegasus walking in and not caring that she had a target on her back. Not caring that she was a pastel nightmare with every color of the rainbow as a mane. Not caring about the new bird who just wanted to fit in somewhere, the quiet whispers of distant foals tinged with words like birdbrain, dodo, and half breed. Rainbow had been the one friend that she had ever had in Equestria. And she had messed it up by walking into that little hamlet. Discovering that Dash had moved on, built a life for herself, while she had stagnated. Gilda yelled at her sister, screeching bloody murder as she tried to relax, the months of cruel, little torments like pinpricks on her heart. Gilda leapt at her pompous sister.

Gabrielle flicked her claw, firing up a neat little levitation spell and rose from her chair. She walked ever so slowly, slinking around cattily as she ran a claw over Gilda. "Seems like somebird doesn't like what I said. Did I hurt your little feelings by bringing up a sore spot? Or did you want to screw the little pony instead of hunt it like a real gryphon?" Gabrielle slid her face close to Gilda, her breath cloyingly sweet as she stood there. "Interesting. Maybe, when we win, I can get mother to keep that one alive. Wouldn't that be just wonderful? A little fucktoy for my magicless baby sister. Don't say that I am heartless, no?" Gabrielle whistled as she left the room, letting the spell wink out once she was out of range of Gilda's rage.

***

Twilight awkwardly stared at the gathered mass of creatures that were packed into her castle. Deer rubbed the crystal walls and clacked through the halls, their mud leaving tracks in the pristine floor. Twilight cringed as she thought of the work she would have to do, the cleaning, the disinfecting, the reorganizing of things touched. Luna sighed as she watched the festivities, quietly locking the door to the outside.

"I think we have some explanations in order, especially why you have brought a dead subject into the midst of a town full of our loyal subjects. And with those. . .how did you explain them, Twilight? Flower ponies, knocking upon thine palace walls crying out for justice, I think, Aspen why?"

Aspen clicked his hooves on the table, quietly studying the map of Equestria, pulling in and out of focus as he brought Ironhoof into view. "Well, this Roseluck ran away from us. Into a stream. And to show a modicum of faith in these proceedings, I brought her to you. A bargaining chip to show our willingness to treat you better than you treated our homeland." Aspen touched the hole that was Ironhoof, his hoof clacking on the table as the hologram blinked for a moment.

Twilight fiddled in the seat. "Well, I appreciate it. We'll bury her in the morning. After all today's madness is sorted through."

Blackthorn rolled his eyes, his helmet glinting in the torchlight. "Wonderful, more ceremonies, more tricks."

Luna glared at him for a moment. "Your deer shot me full of arrows and you stabbed me in the chest."

Blackthorn shrugged. "You got better, it seems. Only damaged your pride. And your height." He laughed and patted Luna's mane. "And the moon. Never thought that was possible."

Twilight glanced at Luna and took a blue hoof in hers. "Well, we'll figure that out. But let's get one thing straight. Moondancer didn't destroy the town, not exactly. Long story, but I guess we have all night. I'll put the coffee on. Or tea? What do you deer drink. There isn't a lot on your race."

Blackthorn grinned. "The blood of our enemies."

Aspen closed his eyes and rubbed his face, his bells tinkling as he did so. "Thorny, please be civil. Tea is fine. Alcohol is fine for my bucks as well."

Twilight stared at the gathered mass of deer. "I think I still have some cider from the Apples. I'd have to check due to some recent situations and all."

***

The stench of death permeated the surgery area and all Sunburst could do was to breath through his mouth and almost gag at the unforeseen difficulties of a surgery like this. Sunburst looked at Moondancer who was holding up, he thought, rather well. Or her black coat hid some of the green that colored his own. Picking up a foreceps, he dug around and picked out fragments of bone, partially eaten, from the filly's leg. Looking at the devastation that an untreated medical emergency wrought on her body, he wracked his brain for alternatives. The bones were too rotten, too nonexistent to foster an easy bone growth spell. Those needed a bit of health, a root, to attach to, and after an hour of grueling and focused work, he had found no takers. The knee was bent the opposite way, so he had needed to twist it carefully in place, sure not to tear tendons any more than they already were. He could save that. But then that made him worry about aftercare- he knew far too well the dangers of infection and disease and then the prosthesis industry was a fledgling one due to infrequent wars.

He deftly cut a flap of skin to wrap around the knee joint and, in a flash, stanched the bleeding and stitched up the wound. He stood back to admire his gruesome work and turned to Moondancer who was sickened but curious at the results.

"Next patient. And Moondancer, I'm surprised you've been so quiet. What was the whole 'I torture Changelings for breakfast' routine. Is the archmage of Canterlot a bit squeamish about blood?"

Moondancer glowered. "No, just hits a little too close to home." Her hoof flitted over her crimson gem heart. "No matter how impressive you are at this, and I have to begrudgingly respect you for that, I still can't get over the violation that Starlight did to me. I died. You ever know what death feels like? It felt like nothing. One moment I was in a huge dark wood, unfamiliar and foreign, and then your crazy bitch of a friend drags me back to the living and I don't know which was worse. At least dead felt nicer. Cause I don't have to deal with ponies thinking I'm a monster."

Starburst stepped back. "Uh, thanks. And on the Starlight question, we'll reach that hill when we get there or whatever. Just know that I'd expect the royals to use the full extent of the myriad laws of both the Crystal Empire and Equestria to punish her accordingly. Since all this," he gestured at the patients and their surrounding space. "all this was kind of her fault or my fault. And I am trying to deal with that by, you know, helping here." Starburst coughed. "But, yeah next patient. Ocular implants are rather difficult to perform, especially with how bad the acid burns are. Skin grafts, all that. So I'm just going to say, after this, first round of drinks are on me. Maybe two or three. But first, fix the problem here."

Moondancer nodded.

***

Rarity looked over the filly that was currently trying to stomach any kind of slop that the hospital had at this dreadful hour. She wrinkled her nose at the options presented- a cobbler, half burnt and hours old; a pudding cup, and a bag of chips. Rarity shook her head and thanked Celestia that due to her exhaustive health regimen and impeccably timed doctor visits, that she was a pinnacle of health. Because, if not, she would waste away to nothing in this food desert that was a hospital. She gripped the chips and gracefully opened them with her magic, passing them to Silver with nary a second thought. She tried to figure out what even to say in this situation, the dire oddness, and her inability to talk to foals mixing into a melange of sheer ineptitude in matters of this kind of thing. "Diamond Tiara is going to be fine. Or mostly fine. And your sister? Didn't even know you had one, though I think that was more a mix of Sweetie not liking you all that much and me just being rather busy. She'll be fine too."

Silver sighed and ate a couple chips, the crunch breaking the silence of the dead hospital. "I guess, though I thought it looked like that doctor didn't look hopeful. Aren't doctors supposed to fix everything?"

Rarity daintily moved her shoulders in response. "I'd think it depends on the situation. And well, this is rather new to probably a lot of ponies. I mean I could list every time Rainbow Dash was here and even then she was able to get back up due to immediate treatment."

Silver slumped. "So they aren't going to be fixed."

The white unicorn cursed her wording, trying to come up with alternatives. "I mean they will be fixed, just not in the way I'd think ponies would normally think of as fixing. They'll be alive and that's what counts."

Silver nodded, slightly out of it. "But not more than that. So everypony will hate them then."

Rarity didn't exactly know where this was going. "Uh, what? I mean, to be honest, Diamond hasn't done much favors for herself in that regard. Though that might have been. . ." Rarity stopped as she completed the sentence in her head, putting most of the blame of Diamond's rather abrasive and horrid personality on Spoiled Rich. Rarity felt her hair rise at the thought that she was dead. "Its, well, going to be okay."

Silver silently rocked back and forth. "No its not, my dad tells me all the time about the disabled ponies he saw in the mines before he got his own shop. He doesn't go into much detail, but have you ever seen a pony with a problem?"

Rarity was stumped for a moment. It was rather a peculiar happenstance of events that brought a disabled pony into the world. Twilight once said it was a roll of the dice sometimes with birth defects and the like. And with magic fixing most of the sprains and breaks, toothaches, and other maladies, she hadn't put much thought into seeing a pony like that. Canterlot didn't have a big population of those types. And the ones that did, didn't tend to go into her shop or where she tended to hang out. Ponyville was smaller so she could probably pick out a few. . .like possibly Scootaloo, who had some issues. "Can't count many ponies like that. Though that's probably just cause Celestia has made Equestria so peaceful."

Silver looked down at the floor. "Dad said lame miners were sent to the glue factory. To make glue. And that they never left."

Rarity wanted to almost laugh at the sheer childlike fear of that kind of thing. "Darling, they aren't going to make glue. And if somepony comes, I guess we'll just have to stand around the pair of them and wait until they leave. Cause even if there's a problem with Diamond and your sister, I doubt Twilight would allow that."

Silver somewhat relaxed. "Good, cause he also said a few towns killed them if they got to be a drain on society. I didn't get most of that and I didn't want to ask Miss Cheerilee about that in case it was really bad, but I don't want that to happen. And I know Diamond and I did some bad things, but I don't want Diamond run out of town cause of something she didn't do."

Rarity tried to lighten the mood. "Well, I'm glad you'd only let her be run out of town for the right reasons." She didn't hear Silver laugh, so she moved on. Comedy wasn't her strong suit. That was Pinkie's domain and she was currently Celestia knew where. "But I doubt Ponyville would ostracize a pony just because of this."

***

Shy cautiously opened the door to the little cottage that housed both her and Dash. The walk from the hospital had been relatively silent, with Dash barely speaking as her parents ogled the town, their excitement all over them. The dinner hadn't been much better, with Dash playing more with her food as she glared daggers at them, running them through with her stare, her body taught with anger and rage, and her hoof tapping offbeat as she ate.

Fluttershy closed the door, silently, so as to not wake up her two guests and turned to the perturbed mare. "Dash."

Rainbow looked up at Fluttershy, her blue eyes distant and cold in the motes of light that were leaking in through the blinds. "What?"

"I can read what you are thinking on your face. Hard to hide when I know my own face rather well." Shy crept up and ran a blue hoof over Dash's mouth, letting it sculpt each hill and valley that emotions tended to settle in. "And if I was blind, I could read you like a book. I mean you don't usually clam up like this."

Dash leaned into the brief touch and sighed. "I know, but Tartarus damn it. I've spent years building up my parents. Over and over, I made them these cold, emotionless things. They tossed me aside for, what, fame, money? And then they appear now, of all times, so. . ." Dash groped for the words. "normal. Too supportive. It just throws me off. And here I am, unable to say anything cause they think you are me."

Fluttershy quietly laughed at the predicament. "I can see the problem there."

Dash stroked her pink mane. "Right? I can't just come out and say that they messed up my life. . ." Dash hesitated. "I mean, uh, no offense, Shy, because I wouldn't have been where I am now, with you here and all, but. . ."

Fluttershy raised a hoof. "I understand."

Dash blushed. "Yeah, but like a 'you ruined my life' kind of way. Abandoning me to fend for myself with money. Having a life on the outskirts of Equestria, something I'd dreamed of in the few books Twilight gave me. They got to live their life to the fullest while I was just. . .floundering and trying to make sense of why. Just why." Dash felt tears form silently on her coat and she quickly wiped them away.

Fluttershy wrapped her small blue hooves around her marefriend's neck and hugged her close. "Ssh, it's okay. Let it out if you need to. And I don't feel like sleeping anyway, so if you want, I could stay up and listen to you."

Dash leaned his head down and nodded slowly, letting his head rest on top of his stallion's. "I'd like that."

***

Twilight stared up at the moon, her mind wandering with the possibilities. She cantered through the halls, careful not to step on any deer, since they were strewn about like confetti after a party, all over the few bits of furniture, some lounging on the Crystal Map, some on top of a chandelier or two- though she had no clue how that was possible. She shook a slight buzz from her mind- alicorn physiology made it rather difficult for them to get fully drunk, and walked into her bedchamber.

Luna picked her head up and closed the novel she was reading, carefully marking the spot with a tiny crease. "Interesting literature, Twilight, I'd have never expected you to be into erotica. Though my sister usually says it is the quiet ones that have the most intense passions. Which led me to conducting my own research into the lands of dream. I spent months trying to decipher dreams of all kinds and I just didn't find enough reason to say one way or the other if it was a true statement. Though they are rather up there in depravity. Seems like with the peaceful times, the unbridled passions had to have an outlet." She smiled as she crossed her hooves and waited.

Twilight groaned as she saw the book Luna was reading. Six Shades of Hay. "It's nothing. Rarity mentioned it and I had to check out if it fit better in the restricted section. What I really have to ask you is why my cutie mark is on the moon."

Luna blushed. "'Tis not thine."

Twilight drew her lips together and frowned. "Luna, you are speaking in Mid Canterlotian dialect, which is kind of your tell. I know today has been rather. . ." Twilight stumbled over what exactly to term the day. Catastrophic? Horrible? Interesting? "-a day. And I'm tired. Too tired to perform mental gymnastics to figure out a hypothesis of how my cutie mark. Cause it is my cutie mark. Hard to not know that with it being on my own body and all. Even if I think I could have some improvements here and there."

Luna blushed harder. "Thy body is immaculate."

Twilight pointed at the blue alicorn. "Aha, I was ri- wait what?" Twilight stopped, trying to compute the idea that Luna complemented her on a non-academic front. "Luna, are you hitting on me?"

Luna, realizing what she had said, hid her face in the blankets of Twilight's bed, quickly hating that decision as she could smell the faint scent of the purple alicorn on the sheets. She wished she could have been not so exposed, without her full alicorn powers she felt small and oddly outmatched when she looked at Twilight. The purple alicorn stood there watching her, her head half cocked, her mind turning, and all Luna could see, in all the slight imperfections, was a rather cute pony wrapped in a soft and welcoming exterior. "Oh aether. No? I promise, Twilight, that I am definitely not, not at all, hitting on you."

Twilight stopped, tried to parse that sentence and sighed. "Luna, I don't know if you used a double negative or not, but it sure sounded like it. And by how you are currently wrapped up in my blankets, I'm highly suspect that you might have a feeling." Twilight bent down and pressed a hoof on the bed, which made Luna's tail tremble as she felt imminent heat and pressure right near her head. "I'm way too tired for this." Twilight yawned and carefully unwrapped the other alicorn from her blankets with a flick of her magic. Luna, for her part, tried to latch onto a corner of the bedding, but due to her lack of magic and now smaller size, she was horribly outmatched. Twilight fluffed one of her pillows and covered herself in her blankets, letting her wings push out to their full extent, feeling the purple feathers brush against Luna's side.

Luna's eyes bugged out in wonder and fear as she felt that, almost jumping out of Twilight's bed out of sheer principle. "Twilight, what are you doing?"

Twilight yawned. "Going to bed. This is my bedroom."

Luna blanched at that. "But I'm currently in here too."

Twilight shrugged. "I'm tired. It's after midnight, I've been up all day, and the town almost exploded cause stuff always happens at the worst times. I don't care if you are in here or not. And judging by the moon, you don't either."

"But aren't you in a relationship with Pinkie?"

Twilight didn't answer for what felt like a minute. "Maybe. Maybe not. But for right now, I seem to have a pony that almost died today. And she's currently far closer than wherever Pinkie is. Luna, either go to bed or do whatever you want. I'm emotionally drained, sore, and had to set like five broken bones with my magic. The moon has my cutie mark which, by all accounts, has never happened before. And I know how alicorns kind of work, being one and all. A bad one, but one."

Luna sat there, unsure of what to do. She tried to come up with reasons to leave, to run away, and just compartmentalize this as a nightmare or a dream or something she could just write off as a fantasy. Then she felt a light hoof wrap around her own and she knew that it was real.

Luna felt her heart leap out of her chest as she snuggled closer to Twilight, the now larger mare letting her sink into her side. The blue alicorn shivered, unsure of what this meant, uncovering feelings that she hadn't felt since Somnambula. She popped her head out of her cove of Twilight scented blankets and said the first thing on her mind. "So are we a pair?"

Twilight popped open an eye and, in the darkness, stared up at the ceiling, her voice coming out slow and lethargic as she was on the cusp of sleep. "I don't know. We'll talk about this in the morning. I'm too tired to actually freak out over the sheer horror of this or not." Twilight rolled over, her breathing slowing as she fell fully into sleep.

Checking that all was okay, Luna ran a hoof over the purple fur of Twilight, feeling the heat radiate off of the mare. She carefully dodged any rather intimate areas, the principle of it just seeming wrong to take advantage of this. Luna quietly pinched herself to make sure that she was awake, carefully checking under the bed for any Tantabi, and, finding none, breathed a sigh of relief. Luna snuggled closer to Twilight, letting a purple wing drape over her as she drifted off to sleep. She promised, to herself, that she would try and keep Twilight's own dreams free of any nightmares that might creep upon the edges of the purple alicorn's mind. And with a blink, she was into the lands of dream, letting the flights of fancy swoop her into the dreams of Equestria, a small corner of it, now far less gloomy than it had been before.

Author's Note

End Act 1: Bad Moon Rising