“I have returned to bring destruction to your pathetic town!” Bellowed Nightmare Moon as she stood in front of what looked like the entire town of Ponyville.
The costume clad populace was silent for a moment before all stomping their hooves in applause. Some hooted while others screamed ‘I love you princess Luna!’ over the roar of the crowd.
“Well this wasn't exactly what I had in mind for this year’s celebration but it's nice to see you too Luna.” Twilight remarked from atop her pulpit only a few feet to the nightmare’s right.
The alicorn frowned, and stomped her hoof in irritation, making the wooden stage crack under the force of the blow. “Fools! I am not here for your amusement. I am here to destroy you all! You who have bested me once before and have thus earned the wrath of me, Nightmare Moon!” She yelled, her voice silencing the crowd with its volume.
“We heard that part already, whats next?” Shouted somepony in the front row of the crowd.
Nightmare Moon sighed, and pressed a hoof against her forehead. “Well I planned on killing you all, and then setting your town on fire, but I think I’m going to start with strangling you to death!”
“Ooh neat.” Remarked the stallion.
“No not neat. You are going to die!” Nightmare shouted before grabbing the male in her magic and dragging him up to the stage where she began to squeeze his neck with both forehooves.
Instantly the male’s eyes began to bulge and his face to discolor, though he seemed more or less nonplussed by the entire encounter. “You got er- a real tight grip their sport. Feels like I’m r-really dying here.” He choked out.
Nightmare Moon couldn't help but become even more enraged, her hooves squeezing tighter and tighter as the male’s face turned blue. “That's because you are dying! I am Nightmare Moon, the doom of this town and your entire world!” She shouted, before turning to Twilight. “What is wrong with these ponies?”
The unicorn shrugged. “They really, really like Nightmare Night. You would not believe the budget I had for this celebration.” She leaned in close. “Dwarfed the entire budget for both the dam, and the entire year of sanitation services. Its nuts.”
Nightmare Moon’s frown deepened as the male went limp and was dropped to the floor. “Why aren't you afraid then? I just appeared on your stage and strangled one of your ponies to death.”
Twilight took a step back and smirked. “I see, your really sticking to the script then. In that case…” Twilight cleared her throat. “Oh no, the evil Nightmare Moon is back everypony, what am I doing to do?”
Nightmare Moon stood there as the crowd oohed and awed, while also not doing anything about the now deceased pony lying on the stage. “What are you doing?”
“I’m trying to help you with your act.” Twilight hissed before taking a step back and raising her hooves. “Oh no everypony, I think she's going to get me!”
The crowd laughed and cheered while Nightmare Moon continued to stand there. “This is not an act, this stallion is clearly dead. See?” The alicorn raised the lifeless corpse and gave it a shake, causing its head to roll around.
“Yes that is a very scary illusion, but your going to have to do more than that to break my spirit!” Twilight shouted dramatically, half to the audience, half to Nightmare Moon herself.
Who sighed, and tossed the corpse aside, uncaring to the fact that it landed on a random mare, who cried out in pain. “My leg!”
“Look, Sparkle, your a sssm-” Nightmare Moon bit her lip and struggled to utter the rest of her compliment. “Ssssmartass. You should know this isn't an act.”
Twilight Sparkle gasped. “Your right, this is real!”
Nightmare Moon sighed again. “Finally, now if we can start with the screaming and the panic and the running now. That would be great.”
“Your actually her, the real Nightmare Moon!” Twilight screamed. “Your here to destroy us all!”
The alicorn lifted an eyebrow and sniffed the air curiously. “Is there a gas leak in here?”
“Quick everypony, you better give her all your candy or else she's going to gobble you up!” Twilight exclaimed, having turned to the audience.
Nightmare Moon stomped her hoof in anger. “My patience is running thin. How am I going to convince you that this is real? Do I have to kill a few more ponies? Because I was going to do that anyway.”
“I see through all of your illusions with ease Nightmare Moon!” Twilight shouted. “Come on kids, offer a treat quickly, before she gobbles me up too!”
The alicorn was pelted by a short hail of candy, leaving her annoyed, and covered in sugary treats. Spitting out a mouthful of hard candy, Nightmare Moon reached up to her mane and tugged, only to groan. “Really? An entire thing of cotton candy? Who does that?” She muttered in annoyance.
“It worked! Good job foals of Ponyville, you’ve saved me, and the entire town!” Twilight Sparkle shouted to the ground.
Who proceed to laugh and clap, with a few of the foals high fiving one another in celebration.
After purging her mane of the last dregs of cotton candy, Nightmare Moon sat down and began to gently massage her temples while breathing deeply. After a few seconds of silence, she took one final deep breath and stood back up again before turning to Twilight. “Right, let's just get this over with shall we?” She muttered before lighting her horn.
“Oh no, folks, I think ‘Nightmare Moon’ isn't happy with that meagre amount of candy.” Twilight exclaimed, adding air quotes around Nightmare Moon, further annoying her.
Growling, Nightmare Moon quickly finished her spell and unleashed it upon Twilight Sparkle who was immediately engulfed in bright, unnatural flames. “There! Now your on fire! What do you say to that huh?” Taunted Nightmare Moon
“Nice illusion, but I’ve seen better.” Twilight yelled over the roaring flames that were even now consuming her flesh and burning away her hair.
“Seen better?” Nightmare Moon screeched. “You're literally about to burn to death! This must be enormously painful.”
“Oh yeah, it totally is, but I was casting phantom pain spells for fun since I was ten!” Twilight shouted, only to fall forward when her eyeballs started to melt out of her head. “Oh and you even get the blindness spell down too, neat!”
Nightmare blinked several times, watching as the unicorn did nothing until her vocal cords stopped working, and her lungs were turned black. At that point she could only lay there as the fires consumed her body in short order, the magical blue flames turning her into little more than a pile of dust in under a minute. Noticing that the crowd was now silent, Nightmare Moon cleared her throat and stomped her way up to the front of the stage.
“There! One of your elements of harmony now lie dead at my hooves! What do you say to that ponies of Ponyville?” Nightmare Moon bellowed, the alicorn flashing her sharp teeth and grinning madly.
There was a moment of silence before the crowd erupted not in panic, but more applause. This time it was louder than ever, with a few ponies whistling, or shouting their praise for such a wonderful act. This continued for almost a full minute, while Nightmare Moon sat there, so baffled that she couldn't even move.
“How did you do it?” One pony yelled over the crowd, revealing themselves to be a light blue unicorn mare with a star studded hat, and a magician’s cape.
“I used an immolate spell to strike her dead.” Nightmare Moon muttered, pointing to the small pile of ash next to the podium. “See?”
“Yes, yes, you take your stage persona very seriously, Trixie understands this but how did you do it?” She asked again, before smirking. “You replaced her with a dummy when you cast the spell right? Classic.”
“But she was talking.” Nightmare Moon pointed out.
The mare scoffed. “And it was a fairly good ventriloquist spell at that, but not a perfect one. The great and powerful Trixie could have done better.”
Nightmare Moon closed her eyes, and pressed her hooves against her eyelids. “I hate this town, so much.”
“So did I get it right?” Yelled the same mare.
“Yes, you did. Now you get to disappear.” Nightmare declared, before rising to her full height once more and lighting her horn.
The pony excitedly pranced in place before elbowing a pony next to her who was dressed up like an enormous sausage. “Ooh this is so exciting Starlight, I wonder how-” Was all she managed to say before she was crushed by an invisible block of force so powerful that she was instantly turned into a pink mist of blood and crushed bone.
The crowd all gasped in shock before almost immediately clapping their hooves or pounding the ground. The sausage clad pony laughed and pointed down to the bloody mess that used to be her friend. “Trixie was in on this too? No way! Ponyville is awesome.” She exclaimed.
“I know right?” Exclaimed a short green dragon whom was dressed up like a pony.
“I don't know how you managed to do it, but you took the fun out of murder.” Nightmare Moon muttered before letting out a long breath of air and running a hoof through her mane. “I guess we’ll just skip the running and the panicking part and get straight to the killing then.”
The crowd gasped, and watched in rapt silence as Nightmare Moon cast her next spell. When it was complete, an entire section of the crowd was turned to stone, the ponies locked in an expression of close attention. This act was met with a slightly smaller, but no less enthusiastic round of applause and stomping, with a few ponies even beginning to chant ‘Nightmare Moon’ over and over again.
“I wonder if this is what a stroke feels like?” Nightmare Moon muttered as her horn began to glow once more and she cast another spell.
This time a bolt of lightning erupted from the pony’s horn and shot directly at the pony dressed as a sausage. Instantly frying her before the electricity arced off her body and spread to the creatures around her. Who dropped like flies, their flesh smoking, and their bodies having been utterly cooked from the inside out.
The next round of applause made Nightmare Moon begin to ponder the possibility that she had well and truly lost her mind, and this was all a fever dream. On the off chance it wasn't, she continued to cast spell after spell into the crowd, killing great swathes of the population with ease. Some were turned into inanimate objects while others were liquified, stabbed by summoned swords, choked to death on thick orange gas, or strangled by black tentacles made from concentrated darkness.
Cackling loudly, Nightmare Moon unleashed every last spell she knew, killing the last members of the crowd before taking wing and beginning to rain destruction down on the remaining population. All of whom seemed to be unbothered by the death and destruction around them, further enraging the already maddened alicorn. “Fear me you fools!” She bellowed before tossing a certain pink pony dressed as an even larger, somehow even pinker pony into the sky at around mach three.
Rather then be terrified by this, the pony just screamed “Wheeeeee” as their costume tore off from the g force and they vanished into the night sky.
Nightmare Moon screamed in rage and unleashed more spells before wading into a group of foals and kicking and punching them with reckless abandon. “I always wanted to be in a mosh pit.” Exclaimed a small, white coated colt wearing a doctor's outfit, before getting his head crushed under the hoof of Nightmare Moon.
“Fear me, fools!” She screamed.
“Hey aren't you supposed to be Nightmare Moon?” Asked one filly dressed as a windmill of all things. “Cus that was a quote from Dracula.”
Another slightly pudgier unicorn filly dressed as a thesaurus nodded. “You really need to work on your act lady.”
Nightmare Moon’s eye twitched and she grabbed the windmill filly before tearing her in half and inadvertently covering herself in blood. The thesaurus filly gasped and leaned towards her friend who looked like a mini Rainbow Dash, elbowing her in the midsection. “This is just like Canterlot Chainsaw Massacre three.” She whispered.
The other filly scoffed. “Nah, this is totally more like four, the illusions spells are way better.”
Nightmare Moon screamed incomprehensibly in rage before tearing open a hole in reality, and throwing both fillies into the nightmare dimension. “I will make you fear me! This I swear!” She shouted before taking wing once more and continuing her reign of terror over the streets of Ponyville.
As the nightmare creature continued to butcher the helpless ponies of Ponyville, Luna looked down from her concealed position atop the lone cloud in the sky. She tossed back another hoof full of popcorn and chewed noisily as she watched the nightmare continue to go mad. The alicorn chuckled as the darker alicorn pulled the leg off a stallion dressed as a black knight only for him to scoff and declare it to be little more than a scratch.
“Heh.” Luna chuckled as the nightmare pulled the remaining limbs from the stallion, only for him to continue to hop forward and attempt to bite her ankles.
“You know, some would consider this a tad morbid.” Remarked a familiar voice that came from Luna’s right.
Blinking, the night alicorn looked down to find that she was joined on her cloud by a goose with a wavy mane not unlike the one her sister sported. “Still haven't mastered dream projection yet eh?” Luna asked, pointing to the goose.
Who sighed, and extended a wing in frustration. “Yes, well, some of us are not gifted in that regard.” Remarked the goose.
“At least you got your mane right this time.” Luna pointed out.
“Yes, that I did.” Celestia murmured. “Though the experience of having a cloaca is not a pleasant one.”
“Yeah that is kinda fucked the first dozen times.” Luna muttered. “So, to what do I owe the pleasure of your goosey visit?”
Celestia fluffed her little goose wings and settled down on the edge of the cloud. “Merely checking on the newest addition to my statue garden. Can't have any equine rights abuses you know.”
Luna raised an eyebrow and was about to say something only to notice the look in her sister’s eye. “You almost got me that time.”
Celestia chuckled, though her bill made the sound come out slightly wrong. “And your getting better at spotting one of my classic jests.”
Luna grumbled, and looked over the edge of her cloud and down to where Nightmare Moon was burning a school down while physically crushing ever peice of playground equipment with her own hooves. “So how long is this petrification thing supposed to last? Cus I am so okay with torturing her for a few centuries or so.” Luna murmured.
Celestia sighed. “The spell only lasts about a thousand years but now that we are on the subject, I was hoping to ask what you wished to do with her long term.”
“If your asking if I want to try and rehabilitate her, your asking the wrong pony. That evil bitch stole my body for an entire flipping millenia.” Luna remarked with an irritable snort.
Celestia rolled her little goose eyes. “No, I mean to permanently deal with her.”
Luna blinked and looked over at her sister. “What, like throw her into the sun?”
“Ew no, I don't want her anywhere near my sun!” Celestia replied in disgust.
“Then how else do we get rid of her permanently? Nothing on Equiss can kill a spirit of her calibre.” Luna remarked.
“Simple. We don't use something from Equis.” Celestia answered with a smirk.
Luna lifted an eyebrow and eyed her sister carefully. “What did you have in mind?”
“In about a hundred years a black hole will pass relatively close to us.” Celestia began. “If we toss her into it, we should be able to be rid of her forever.”
Luna frowned, and scratched the side of her head. “And how exactly does putting her in a hole get rid of her?”
“It’s not just any hole. Its a space hole.” Celestia corrected.
Luna rolled her eyes. “How does putting her in a space hole help us, exactly?”
“Oh, it would tear her apart on an atomic level.” Celestia explained. “Killing her forever.”
“Atoms, those are the tiny orbs that make up everything right?” Luna asked.
“Yes, and no. It's complicated.”
Luna snorted. “That much is obvious. I liked it when everything was made up of various levels of the four elements. Everything made sense then!”
“You mean when bloodletting was the only treatment for like… anything?” Celestia deadpanned.
“Yes, then! It was so simple. Got a cold? Leeches. Got a headache? Leeches. Gangrene? You guessed it, leeches.” Luna declared with a confident nod.
Celestia sighed. “Remind me to take you on a tour of a hospital sometime soon.”
“Why? Do they have leeches there?” Luna asked rather giddily.
Celestia groaned.
Author's Note
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