It was a peaceful night. A night where the stars were aligned so brilliantly, one could not help but stop and gaze upon them as if they were a beautiful work of art. Not that anypony was awake to see them, that is.

In the past, nights like this would have infuriated Princess Luna, back when she was so preoccupied with her sister's accomplishments, she barely noticed the importance of her own. She was the guardian of the night and an observer of dreams. It was her duty to make certain the creatures of Equestria were safe while they slumbered and that nightmares didn’t plague their minds for too long. She didn’t receive much praise for the duties she performed, but unlike before, she didn’t really think she needed it. She knew many ponies cared about her and truly appreciated the work she did for her kingdom, and that was enough to make her feel satisfied.

Princess Luna was waking herself from the trace she normally put herself under most nights. The dreamscape was unusually calm tonight, meaning very few were having trouble with nightmares. This made the lunar princess very happy. If there were no nightmares, that meant every creature was happy, or at least at ease, with their current place in life.

No stress...no fear...no anxiety…truly a fine night to be alive.

The princess’s eyes opened, revealing her room in all its glory. Like the night sky, it was colored in many shades of dark blue and black, with several astral designs decorating it here and there. Waking here always reminded her of waking up in the evening on old camping trips she used to take with her sister and Starswirl back when they were very young.

Luna yawned and chuckled a little bit. She always found it funny how visiting other creatures’ dreams could make her feel so sleepy. Now was the time for her to rest so Celestia could take over and run the events of the day. She felt she didn’t fully deserve it, doing very little actual work this night, but a good day’s sleep was a welcome award she was always glad to accept.

Luna got up from her bed and walked towards her balcony. There was one thing she still had to do before she got her rest, besides brushing her teeth of course, and that was lowering the moon.

As she reached the railing, she looked up and stared at her beautiful midnight orb. It brought her no shortage of pride to stare at it every night. At risk of sounding narcissistic, she always considered the moon far more glorious than her sister’s sun.

For one thing, it was a far more enchanting color than her sister’s giant burnt orange, plus it was much easier to look at when it brightened up the sky.

Speaking of which…something seemed off about this morning. The sun would normally be peaking over the horizon at this time, in wait for her to lower the moon. Tonight however, there was no such thing. The sun was completely missing from the scene, leaving only Luna’s glorious moon and beautiful night.

Luna raised an eyebrow in confusion, “Perhaps sister is sleeping in again?” She openly questioned. “It wouldn’t be the first time.”

She absentmindedly lowered her head and caught something equally as bewildering, a trio of guards passed out atop each other on the castle wall. Luna tilted her head. The night guards weren’t normally this lazy, and even if they were the day guards getting an early crack at their shifts, they wouldn’t be this tired coming into work.

Her brows furrowed, this required further investigation. Luna unfurled her wings and took off from her balcony towards the castle wall. She then landed and began to look over the guards.

She pushed them over so they laid next to each other rather than on top of one another. Upon further inspection she found they were indeed her night guards like she first surmised. They were breathing deeply, like one would do during slumber, and seemed completely oblivious to the world. Using her magic she opened the eyelids of one of the guards, seeing them to be dilated like one’s would be before becoming adjusted to the light.

“Curious…” Luna murmured. She placed her hooves on the guard closest to her and began to shake him. “Awaken guardsstallion!” She commanded. “An odd occurrence has befallen Canterlot and we require a platoon in case martial action is required.”

The guard wasn’t roused. Princess Luna sighed, it was worse than she feared. This was not a common slumber, the sleep that currently affected the stallions was magically induced. As a practitioner of advanced dream magic she could easily notice many of the signs.

Luna stood up and turned her eyes towards the city. She was certain that the guards were under some kind of spell, but was uncertain of the rest of the capitol. She’d need to look further into this before performing any other form of action. Not only would it allow her to gauge the full severity of the situation, but it would also allow her to decide what form of action to take. If anypony else went unaffected by this spell, then they perhaps could offer some helpful insight into how to dispel it...

...She hoped so anyways.

Taking back to the air, Luna dove down into the streets of Canterlot and ducked and weaved around its buildings like an owl in the night.

This was most certainly an odd place…not that he hadn’t seen odder. Despite his age, he had seen many strange planets over the years. He’d seen a frozen world full of working machinery, a kingdom accessible through the use of a magic beanstalk, even a dimension crafted entirely of yarn and fabric that was reachable through use of a magic portal in a sorcerer’s sock.

A world inhabited by multi-colored sleeping ponies and full of medieval architecture and devices seemed rather normal in comparison to all of that. Though the sleeping part may not fully be their fault.

He had been following the nightmare since he noticed his presence return to the Fountain of Dreams. He didn’t know how he did it or how he managed to return, but somehow the nightmare had infected the fountain. It still allowed all the creatures of his home world to dream, but now they could no longer wake up, and judging by their faces he had seen on them before he left, all his fellow beings were trapped in perpetual nightmares.

He was thankful that he had been busy eating late into the night while all this had occurred, otherwise he would be sharing the same fate as many of his friends and loved ones. Even still, he knew the importance of waking them up again, so he had picked up the star rod with the intent of destroying the nightmare once and for all this time. The only issue now was finding him.

He wandered through the streets in search of the nightmare, caringly making time for any downed pony he found on his way who had been taking a midnight stroll before falling flat on their faces due to the spell.

He was curiously checking the eyes of another sleeping pony before hearing the sound of flapping wings descending behind him. He turned to see a large pony, at least in comparison to others he had seen, with wings, a horn, an ethereal mane, and a glossy blue coat.

He tilted his ‘head’ and said the first thing that came to his mind upon seeing her...

“…Poyo?”

Luna blinked in surprise upon seeing the strange new creature in front of her. Of all the things she expected to see tonight, this creature was not one of them.

It was no larger than a filly or colt and appeared almost candy-like with its rounded body and nubby appendages. It was cute and didn’t appear dangerous to her at first. In fact it almost seemed child-like. But living a few millennia in a world populated by creatures like parasprites and pukwudgies had given her experience in not judging animals by their outward appearances.

The creature suddenly ran up to her and gazed up at her like a child meeting a new adult for the first time. Luna briefly wondered if this creature could be the cause of this strange overabundance of sleep, or at least was some kind of residual effect of the spell?
Creatures like this were not commonly seen in Equestria, and for one to suddenly just appear at the same time as this situation seemed too incidental to be coincidence. That being said, Luna saw no maliciousness in the pink thing’s adorable eyes, only curiosity, like it was sharing with her the feeling of seeing something extraordinary for the first time.

Hesitantly, Luna decided to greet the creature, “Hail…young one. We are Princess Luna, diarch of the Kingdom of Equestria, architect of the night, and protector of dreams. To whom may I be speaking?”

The creature blinked at her and answered back in a much simpler manner, “...Kabii!” He shouted excitedly.

The corner of Luna’s mouth turned upwards in confusion, before the other corner rose up to meet it to help her form a smile. The creature was so happy just saying its name. There was no longer any doubt in Luna’s mind that this creature was anything more than an innocent child, and a young one at that, possibly no older than an infant.

She chuckled, “Your name is Kabii then?” The creature shook its head. Luna thought over the name she just was given. “Err...Kirby? Is that correct?” The creature nodded and clapped its nubby hands together over it’s head to show its happiness.

Luna chuckled again, more visibly this time. If she had learned nothing else from this Kirby, then she doubtlessly could say now that it was most certainly an infant. Or perhaps ‘he’ was the more appropriate pronoun? His actions did appear rather boyish in their charm.

A new thought suddenly overtook Luna’s mind. If Kirby was most certainly an infant, regardless of where he came from, he could be in great danger should the caster of the spell still be present within the city. As a princess of Equestria, it was her duty to protect all her subjects, especially ones that were too young to protect themselves. She’d need to get him to safety before continuing her surveyance of the city.

Luna lowered herself and tucked her legs under her body in order to speak to Kirby at his eye level. “Kirby, we don’t know how you got here nor how you managed to avoid the effects of the sleeping spell, but what we do know is it is not safe to be out in the streets at this time.” She spoke softly and in a manner she normally used to soothe ponies when curing them of their nightmares. “Please allow us to take you back to Canterlot Castle. You will be safe there while we are out dealing with matter. After which, we will personally come back and help you find your home and family, okay?”

Kirby only stared at her in confusion, as if what she said was the strangest course of action he could ever take. Luna just chalked it up to a childish mind wanting to play childish games. She assumed he probably wanted to accompany her and search for the evil sorcerer who had cursed these ponies in some form of grand adventure. He didn’t realize the danger, and if Luna had anything to say about it, he wouldn’t have to face it in the first place.

Luna smiled, “Just climb onto our back, and we will-”

She was suddenly cut off as a large gust of wind blew past them and a shadow blotted out the night sky. They both looked upwards and saw the tail end of something flying over the tops of the buildings. There was no doubt in Luna’s mind that whatever had caused this was connected to that flying creature, and though it worried her greatly to have to leave Kirby alone, she couldn’t risk allowing it to escape.

She got back to her hooves and glared at Kirby with the expression of a serious parent, “Kirby follow this street and make no turns.” She commanded. “When you see a large building in the distance, head towards it as fast as you can, okay?” Kirby didn’t answer, but Luna didn’t have time to wait for him to. “The drawbridge is down, so you should have easy access to the castle…” Her voice became much more severe, “…and if you see that creature flying over your head again, you hide as soon as possible, do you understand?” Again, Kirby didn’t reply.

Luna took to the air, “We will come and meet you there as soon as we can. Stay safe.” Luna then soared over the rooftops in pursuit of the creature, leaving Kirby alone in the alleyway.

Kirby looked left and right and considered Luna’s commands. He glanced at the night sky, he vaguely remembered that silhouette from his past and immediately knew Luna was in great danger. He also remembered having the weapon needed to defeat that danger and that Luna didn’t have it. If Luna was to survive, she would need that weapon...and his help.

Kirby furrowed his brows and sucked in a great deal of air, puffing himself up like an over inflated balloon, before flapping his arms to ascend into the night sky.

The nightmare flew over the city to look upon his handiwork. It filled him with a sense of pride knowing he was able to curse so many ponies in less than an hour. Soon he would do the same to the rest of this world and his allies in the dreamscape would reap the benefits by feasting on their nightmares.

He chuckled to himself as he rose up in front of the moon, “This is going far better than I ever could have imagined.” He began to survey the horizon for the closest settlement he could attack next, “And the best part of it is, there are no star warriors around to get in my way this time.”

A sudden blue beam of light quickly cut him off from his current train of thought as it shot under his nose and onwards into oblivion in the distant night sky. He turned, his expression filled with surprise. He saw a lone awake pony land on a building several rooftops away and his expression slowly shifted into a scowl, “It would appear I have spoken too soon…”

Luna stood upon her rooftop in a heroic battle-ready stance that mimicked the covers of most children’s adventure books. Her goal was to intimidate her foe before addressing him, but judging by his own ghastly appearance, her current methods may have been ineffective.

The beast that floated in front of her was like no creature she had ever seen before, even more so than Kirby. It was a vaguely humanoid creature, or at least how she assumed humans looked based on Princess Twilight’s description, with large silver pauldrons and a tall horned helmet with glasses that obscured his eyes. His head was crescent-shaped with an extremely defined cleft chin and long hooked nose. His body meanwhile was cloaked in a large cape of black fabric with stars decorating it. The cloak seemed to shift oddly as if the creature was housing a small tornado underneath it.

To Luna, this creature was truly hideous and could be considered nothing more than a nightmare given flesh. Thankfully she had much experience in banishing nightmares so dealing with the retch should prove no issue.
“Monster!” She shouted in her Royal Canterlot Voice, “I am Princess Luna, a ruler of Equestria and protector of its citizens! We find you guilty of the direct misuse of a sleeping spell!. How do you plead?!”

The creature only smiled at her with his wicked rows of sharp teeth, “Guilty as charged~” He smugly called back.

Luna’s brows furrowed, “Explain yourself!” She demanded. “Who are you and for what purpose are you attacking our ponies?!”

The creature snicked, “So it’s story time you want? Fine, it’s story time you’ll get. I am Nightmare, a wizard from far beyond the reaches of your galaxy. It is my desire, nay, my purpose, to spread fear and darkness all across the universe by subjecting pitiful worlds like this one to horrible nightmares.”

Luna scoffed at the clear signs of villainous bravado, she thought she had escaped this after the last time she helped defeat King Sombra, “Very up front, aren't you?” Luna mocked. “Regardless, we have heard similar claims made before by countless fiends before you, and they have all fallen just the same. What makes you think your attack will be any different?”

Nightmare laughed madly, “Because, my little pony, there is no possible way you can defeat me. I am a being of nightmares, nothing save for one special weapon can ever hope to harm me.”

Luna glowered at her enemy, “We shall see about that.”

The princess of the night took to the air and began firing lasers from her horn in rapid succession. All the blasts either flew past Nightmare as he tried to avoid them or were harmlessly dissipated by his cloak. Luna was aghast, the wizard only smirked at her.

“Didn’t I tell you?” Two bony arms slowly came out from Nightmare’s cloak, revealing to Luna’s shock that her assumptions were correct and a small tornado took the place of Nightmare’s body. He pointed his index fingers at his enemy, “Now this is what happens to naughty little princesses that don’t listen!”

Glowing rings shaped like stars suddenly began firing off Nightmare's fingertips. Luna’s eyes widened before she started darting in all directions to avoid the enemy fire. She was so distracted avoiding the incoming attacks that she barely noticed that Nightmare had teleported from his previous location to floating right behind her. Luna quickly pushed back just as Nightmare took a swipe at her with his bony hand.

Luna heaved with her breath as the strenuous exercise of avoiding with her enemies attacks caught up with her. “You're quick for a winged equine,” Nightmare mocked, “not that you have much competition, considering all the rest of your kind is asleep.” He broke out into booming laughter. Luna felt infuriated.

“They will be free soon enough, Nightmare!” Luna shouted with her Royal Canterlot Voice again, “Just as soon as I finish with you!”

“And how do you hope to do that Princess?” The tornado under his cloak began to whirl more violently. “Because the way I see it,” His cloak began to fly out around him like a collar as the winds became as violent as a cyclone, “you are completely outclassed!”

He launched himself at Luna and tried to dice her up with his razor sharp winds. But Luna thought quickly and teleported before he could touch her.

Nightmare paused in surprise, he wasn’t aware ponies could teleport like he could. A bright flash suddenly appeared out of the corner of his eye and he turned to see Luna standing back on the rooftops again. She charged up her horn and fired for the twister underneath his cloak, and for a brief moment Nightmare’s eyes widened in disbelief.

The blast hit true, sending a ripple up Nightmare’s body, but more importantly, caused the wizard to scream out in pain. Luna smirked, “It would seem you aren’t as invincible as you claim, Nightmare!”

Nightmare’s cloak fell back down to cover his body, “So you figured out I was lying, it matters little. Alone you are still no match for me!”

“Poyo!”

Nightmare suddenly froze as that familiar battle cry hit his ears. He turned, a feeling of pure rage suddenly coming over him, “YOU!”

Luna’s eyes widened as she saw Kirby run across the rooftops towards then. A sudden feeling of worry overtook her, “Kirby no! Get away from here! It’s too dangerous!”

Kirby didn’t listen and instead stopped at the foot of where Nightmare was floating. Much to Luna’s confusion, he was staring at Kirby with a hatred that she had only seen on the bitterest of enemies. She cocked a brow, how was it possible Kirby could incite such a reaction from this monster?

Nightmare released a deep angry growl, “So you did follow me then.”

Kirby nodded in affirmation, “Poyo!”

“I should have thought as much. After our last bout, I should have realized how much of a thorn in my side you would become if I ever did return.” Nightmare sighed, “But I suppose that was just me being optimistic. I hoped you would be one of the countless victims I put to sleep when I committed my second attack on the Fountain of Dreams. I also hoped you wouldn’t notice the attack until after I had made my escape, so you wouldn't know where to find me.”

Kirby suddenly spit out something that resembled a birthday candle. A pink and white striped rod with a glowing star on the end of it. Kirby picked it up and pointed it at Nightmare.

The wizard growled, “And you brought the star rod with you. How…clever.” The venom on Nightmare’s words was so thick it almost poisoned the air. Then a sudden burst of confidence returned to his voice, “But that won’t be enough to save you this time, Kirby.”

Kirby tilted his head and looked confused, “Aren’t you wondering how I managed to return, Kirby? After all, I’m sure you thought you destroyed me the last time we fought.” A wide wicked smirk soon spread across Nightmare’s lips. “An ally of mine has raised me, Kirby, an ally you don’t even know. He spoke to me after my destruction, and offered me a place in his court. The next thing I knew, I was lying in that crater you made on Popstar’s moon almost as if I had just woken up from a dream. You see Kirby, he feeds on nightmares just like me and now he is planning to monopolize on the dreams of all living creatures.”

Luna had heard enough, “Who are you talking about, monster?! What are you planning?!”

Nightmare chuckled, “You’ll see soon enough. In the meantime, I have plenty more dreams to harvest, so I don’t have time to fool around with the likes of you.”

He snapped his bony fingers and suddenly a portal opened above them. It resembled a cloud in shape with a swirling vortex of prismic colors swirling outwards from its center. It almost appeared soothing in its simple design, almost like a colitiscope, but because of Nightmare’s evil intentions for it, all those feelings were lost.

“If either of you wish to follow me, please know the moment you do, you will be trapped in an endless nightmare that neither of you will ever wake up from. My allies in the dreamscape will see to that!” With one final chortle, he shot upwards and into the portal and vanished completely in the sea of brilliant colors above them.

Luna blinked and stared in disbelief at the adorable creature that managed to scare off her much stronger adversary. She had many questions to ask him, not that he would be able to answer, but currently more pressing issues were racking her brain. Specifically, the threats Nightmare made towards the waking world.

His words greatly worried her. Whatever it was he and his allies were planning, it obviously didn’t bode well from the living creatures of the world. Whatever was going on had to be stopped, she was certain of it, and with no one else around to take charge and deal with the situation, she felt that responsibility fell on to her.

She looked towards Kirby and watched as he swallowed the weapon known as the star rod again. She wasn’t sure why Nightmare was afraid of this creature, but clearly it was for good reason considering how powerful he was. Maybe she didn’t have to go on this journey alone?

Luna knelt down and placed her legs under her body again. Kirby turned towards her in confusion while Luna only smiled in reply. She decided to finish what she was going to say to Kirby back when they first met, “Climb onto our back, and we will take you where we need to go.”

Kirby smiled and jumped around like a colt getting presents on his birthday. It warmed her heart to see him so excited to get a ride on her, and it grew even warmer when he plopped himself right between her wings.

Perhaps what they were about to do wouldn’t be as much of an ordeal as Luna thought. Danger surely waited for them, no doubt, but if she stayed positive like Kirby, no threat would ever keep her down for long.

Luna furrowed her brows and took off towards the sky, and with this new sense of determination flowing in her heart, she knew nothing could hope to stand in their way. The two soon broke through the surface of the portal and disappeared from sight.

The portal soon closed behind them, leaving the world one princess and one star warrior short. Almost as if they had never been there in the first place, and their presence in Equestria had been all but a dream.

Author's Note

My second attempt at a multi-franchise crossover, hope you guys enjoy it.