The three princesses and the dragon watched as the once magnificent city that was once Canterlot burn to the ground. A pillar of black, billowing smoke rose from the center where the castle had been located, and faint screeches could be heard from the city. "All the guards, the maids, everyone was infected with it. It only took a Moon for it all to settle in. All those ponies..." Celestia grieved. It wasn't her fault, she couldn't have known. Neither could Luna or Twilight... though Twilight known seemed more possible, she had been under the spell of the virus, which seemed to have disappeared.

Luna put her hoof over her back and looked just as shook. With tears in her eyes as she thought of her ever-so-loyal Night Guard. Twilight, even with an eye patch, gave a sniffle and looked to Spike who was openly crying as they thought of their friends stationed in Canterlot. "Well... Tears shed, over blood bled, we won't sleep 'til we all go to bed." Twilight said. While the adage was old, it was clear. 'No use in fussing over the dead.' Twilight turned towards the town of Ponyville and saw all the ponies gathering in front of the castle. She looked down from the balcony, and adressed them all. "Citizens of Ponyville! You all come here for a reason, and I... have a feeling I know what it is. Recently I have been given a physical report that was full of different things. One of which was an incense, and that incense is VERY special. It has the ability to ward of specific monsters. I will light above my door, and in a SINGLE FILE LINE, you all will come inside of the castle. Anyone found not being able to cross the doorway... I'm sorry." This caught the attention of everypony, seeing as she suspected others of being monsters.

"It would be highly advised to clean that body in room Twilight, I doubt having ponies see one of their own mangled like that will help you." Luna whispered making Twilight nod grimly. She walked back inside, and Celestia and Luna tried to bring order to the imminent panic that was going to ensue, and luckily no one saw Canterlot from ground level. Spike watched as ponies, from Granny Smith to Old Mister Pots lined up at the door, silently waiting for their Princess to open the door. After an agonizing twenty or so minutes, she came out with a small lantern and hung next to the entryway.

"Everypony ready?" She asked into the crowd and everyone gave a nod. She struck the match and lit the lantern. "The test is simple, if you can smell the incense, you can't come in and have to stay inside your houses. If you don't smell the incense, you're free to use the castle as safe house of sorts. I'm well aware that Ponyville is a larger settlement, but the thankfully I thought ahead and made the supplies here magically restock themselves in 6 hour intervals. Four meals a day, for everypony." She held the lantern high and swallowed thickly. "Begin."

The first pony, Granny Smith, went to the lantern, and gave it whiff. She smelled nothing, and breathed a sigh of relief. "Enter." Twilight said one by one, ponies were coming inside of the castle and Twilight was slowly beginning to have more and more hope. Then it was her friends' turn. Rarity and Applejack both sighed in relief as they went inside of the castle, and Pinkie and Fluttershy closed their eyes and walked by lantern without a problem.

"Okay everypony," Rainbow said to the ponies standing behind her, "watch this!" She said confidently strolling to the door... only to have her nose wrinkle in disgust. "Jeez, this stuff reeks, right Twi?" Twilight said nothing. "Right?" She looked at the other princesses. The ponies behind her were slowly backing away, fear showing in their eyes. "Hey c'mon I ain't sick!" She took a step forward and the crowd jumped back. "Tell 'em Twi, I'm not sick."

Twilight had tears flowing from her good eye. "I'm sorry, Rainbow." Rainbow shook her head. "I'm so, so, sorry. Rainbow, this incense is designed to ward off monsters, and those who would become those monsters. Those who can't smell it are uninfected. You can smell it, which means you are infected. I'm sorry..." Rainbow just looked down and with a blank expression she stepped out of the way of the others. Five other ponies were also caught to be able smell the sweetly sick aroma of the incense, and they stood by Rainbow with similar expressions.

Celestia and Luna came forth to the six ponies sitting in exile. "You six have been deemed infected by this test. We don't know how long it will take you to fully give in to this sickness, but when you do... May Faust and The Deep One* have mercy on you." Celestia said gravely. The six being Rainbow Dash, Spoiled Rich, Mr. To-Do, Lacquered Board, Stargazer, and Double Dare, all sat and listened to the fate they would be subjugated to.

Luna stared at these ponies. "Over time, your senses will leave you and you'll loose everything. I've seen these beasts with my own eyes. These are all the things I noticed and these all the things that will happen to you." She said grimly. "For now, I suggest you use your time wisely, for it took a little over a moon for th--" She put of hoof over her mouth before her eyes went wide. She looked back to her fellow monarchs and cleared her throat. "I have said too much already. Please, return to your homes, and try to be at peace with your time." She said before hastily running back to the others and Celestia teleported them away. The door to the castle shut tightly, and the lock thunked into place.

While the older ponies, Mr. To-Do and Lacquered Board, made their peace already, the other three were in a panicked state. Double Dare was in denial and began banging on the door, demanding to be let in. Stargazer and Spoiled began to go into hysterics, one crying about her career and the other about her family. The odd mare out was Rainbow Dash who seemed to be feeling a lot of emotions at the same time. Fear, anger, sadness... Betrayal. Her jaw clenched, and she let out a small yipe of pain. She tasted her own blood in her mouth; she bit her tongue. Her brow creased, and immediately something was wrong.

"Ponies can't bite their tongues..." She whispered and ran into the Carousel Boutique. She opened her mouth and saw a truly frightening sight. Fangs had grown mouth, canines and other sharp teeth began show in her maw. She noticed that her eyes were more predatory as well, showing a more lupine look rather than her equine look. "No..." She backed up until her back hit the wall and she slowly slid down, hitting her rump. Her wing tingled and she blistering pain in her hooves. Claws, malformed and sharp, burst from her frogs and hoof tips, her wings elongated and snaked out as they almost touched the ground. The tears from her eyes turned red as her jaw unhinged and her back straightened giving her an upright appearance. In what little sanity she had left she went back the mirror to her visage. To some, she would look like a harpy, to others she looked like monster. Regardless, she knew what she was. She was loyal, through and through, but something was driving her mad. Her new heightened senses caught wind of something, it smelled sickly sweet.

In the mirror, it showed all. Her teeth were blackened, she back legs bent odd, claws that could rip even a manticore to shreds. Her wings while longer and bigger, leaked a red liquid. Her jaw unhinged and she screamed into the air, a roar that would haunt the rest of Ponyville forever.

Meanwhile back in Canterlot, chaos had consumed the whole city. Strange little beasts hopped up and down like rabbits chasing after ponies, and tearing them to shreds. Bigger more ferocious beasts hunted in alleyways, pouncing on ponies who were hiding or had their guard down. Some flew, others dug underground, some were just plain faster than Tartarus. "Hold the line! We can't let them pass through here!" One of the last guards said to his team. Twenty against all of Canterlot, and their enemies were closing fast. The last of the Night Guard had holed up in the Castle where they were killing the last of beasts. Dream Mender stomped the last beasts head before turning towards the shrinking Day Guards.

"C'MON! THE CASTLES CLEAR! GET IN NOW!" She yelled as the Day Guards retreated back into the castle. Some weren't lucky though, falling or being pounced just before the entry way. "Damn it! Shut the door!" She commanded and the guards slammed, locked, and began to barricade the door. The room was silent save for their heavy breathing, when a bright light caught them by surprise. Dream Mender immediately dived towards them, dagger in hoof.

"CORPORAL DREAM MENDER UNHOOF MY SISTER THIS INSTANT!" Luna barked in the Canterlot Voice. Dreams red vision cleared and saw she had Celestia by the mane ready to strike. She made a small gasp and dropped her dagger.

"I'm sorry Princess, I didn't mean to do--- Well I did, but not like that! I thought you were one of--!" Dream began to stumble over herself. "I-- I thought you... were..." Dreams' eyes rolled back and she passed out on the floor.

Celestia looked at the Day Guards, who nodded in return and took the down bat into the infirmary. The other Night and Day guards looked to Twilight and bowed in respect. "Where is the remains of the Dusk Guard. I wish to speak with them." The guards said nothing, only looking at each other before turning to Twilight.

"Ma'am, there is no more Dusk Guard. All the attacks that have happened are from former Dusk Guards. All of them turned into monsters. We're sorry." The Day Guard said. He was gauging Twilight's reaction before she just sighed.

"Yes, I... I thought so. The whole of the Dusk Guard was infected the moment they came into contact with..." her one eye teared up again, and she hiccuped along with Spike on her back. Seeing their princess like this was difficult, seeing her like this made them think of all the ones they lost.

"Sister, we need to be out there helping our subjects!" Celestia said before Luna stopped her. "how would we defend ourselves? How would we be their for the ponies if this, scourge, for a lack of a better word, were to infect us, Celestia?" She said now whispering in her ear. "You saw what happened to Twilight, you saw the body too, I know. She was insane, she kept talking about 'Him', who 'He' is."

"He will help us..." a sickly voice said. Everyone turned to see would might as well have been a rotting corpse crawling his way towards them. "He will help us, to see him better... The Formless One... Oden... He will make us one with blood, and the blood be one with us... Hrk! *gasp* Hahahaha~" And just like the pony was gone in an instant, seeming only to have had enough strength to deliver the message.

Celestia, Luna, and Twilight all stared at this rotting pony has it seemed to have taken its last breath. The blood it was leaking seemed to boil and this time it rose from it spot, blood still boiling and a sharp cry cut through the air, making everyone flatten their ears. Looking back at the pony, all three saw spider legs shoot out from its mouth some sort of creature crawl forth from the decayed carcass, sporting it as its body. Eyes were looking out of the top head, and it screeched at them, jumping in the air and sticking to the ceiling. Celestia narrowed her eyes and sent a spark of flames hitting the monster in leg. It screeched in pain and desperately tried to snuff out the fire.

Celestia walked up to the beast and held it firm. "You come in here and ruin my city," She began to pull off a leg. "Kill my people, my subjects," And another two. "TRY TO HARM SISTER! MY STUDENT!" She pulled off four more. Now with only one leg, it tried to crawl away. She stomped up to it and crushed its last leg under her hoof. It screeched in pain before she pulled it body from the leg. Now staring directly into all eight of its eyes, it saw the unending fury behind the pink eyes of the Sun Monarch. Her fury was starting to heat up the room, to the point that Luna had told the other to quickly leave the room. "You try to harm me, The Immortal Sun? The Bane of Monsters? Well..." She said as her eyes closed and opened to reveal them as a harsh glowing gold. Her mane rose into a pillar of flames and coat turned slightly more yellow. "I WILL GIVE THE FULL TREATMENT!"

Luna barely managed to get out of the way of the door as flames exploded out of the room destroying the windows, the doors, and the beasts on the other side of the locked door. "I might have the look of Daybreaker, but I am nothing like her. I CHOOSE this power by my own volition and I choose it to SLAY ALL OF YOU BEASTS!" Celestia roared outside to the other beasts. All of them had stopped at the being made of fire, and all ran away. Her flames faded, and her eyes and coat turned to normal. "Run before me, you monsters, neigh, YOU COWARDS!" She called out to them...

Only for the ground to shake around her. She stumbled slightly, and looked around to see where the shaking was coming from. She took one step back before a large Ape-like beast came falling in front of her, and roared in her face. While she could easily turn back into Daybreaker, she had to admit that it would be hard to fight something that was already on fire. It had four arms and two pairs of different legs, equine and ape. The moose-like antlers were sharpened and ready to gorge and maim, and this flaming beast was ready to kill the Sun Princess. Well, he would've had it not been for the blinding blue bolt that knocked him down into the fountain. Celestia looked in shock as she saw the blue feathers fall from the sky, catching just a small glimpse, but it was enough for her to know exactly who it was.

"Rainbow..." She said breathlessly. The Harpy turned back and within her blackened eyes, a soft magenta glow confirmed it was indeed Rainbow Dash. The Flaming Beast stood back up and regained his senses, and roared in rage as Rainbow gave one her own, and somehow when it came from her tiny frame it was even louder. They circled each other for good solid minute, before they launched at each other. The Flaming beast was quick with its swipes but Rainbows naturally small size and speed made dodging them no more a challenge as much as it was a chore. With precise aiming, she clawed behind its knees, its wrists, and its neck. As a final coup de grace, she slashed it eyes, and fell down clutching it face. Her claw twitched and she punched into now useless eye hole. The Flaming Beast roared in pain, and began to slowly reach for her before she tore out her hand through its face.

The beasts head launched back before it slumped back and disappeared in the same red mist as Spear and Stout. Only this time, Rainbow stood inside the cloud and inhaled as deeply as she could, sucking in the bloody mist. She let out a long sigh, and turned back to Celestia. She could see the soft magenta through the rest of mist, and just as she was about to call out to her, Rainbow took off into the night sky.

"......Night?" Celestia said, and she saw that her Sun was now gone from the sky and a large Moon hung in the air. This moon was NOT Equestria's moon. What was happening to her land?

Author's Note

*The Deep One is reference to Craig McCracken, the husband of Lauren Faust, most prominently his last name as the Kraken of Deep Crag (Which will also have a chapter in-and-of itself)