When she opened them, she saw a deep blue crystal covering her vision.
She felt strange, her bones and muscles ached, and she felt numb all over her body.
Suddenly, the crystal parted in two, and slowly opened, letting her see the interior of a castle, but not the one in Canterlot.
For starters, this place was much colder than Canterlot.
She could feel the icy cold wind dig into her body, increasing the strange pain she felt.
It was a coldness she had never felt before, even in the Crystal Empire.
She slowly stood up, shaking her body to try and alleviate the numbness and getting some heat in her body.
She tried extending her wings, but she couldn’t, and when she looked back, she noticed that her wings were gone.
Twilight looked in her reflection in the crystal, and she saw that not only her wings were gone, she wasn’t an alicorn anymore.
And that wasn’t even the worst part.

She looked old. As old as her mother.

“What happened? Where am I?”

Twilight started to look around, and she found more cocoon-like crystals like the one that was holding her.
She wiped the snow that was building up on one and saw the sleeping form of Applejack inside.

“Applejack!” she tried to open the cocoon, but it didn’t have any fissures that she could pry into, and she didn’t want to blast it with magic in case she wounded her.
Twilight investigated the other cocoons, finding the rest of her friends, even Spike and some of the inhabitants of Ponyville.

“Sparkle!” Called out a voice, a voice that she had not heard in a long time.
She turned around, and her fears where confirmed.

“Nightmare Moon!”

“Yes, it is I.”

“Did you do this?”

“I did.”

“Why?”

“To save them.”

“From what?”

“My mistakes.”

The response confused Twilight, and then she started to look at the alicorn more closely.
Her horn was constantly emanating magic, her posture seemed less menacing and more… tired. In fact, she had bags under her eyes, and even looked malnourished.

“What is happening? Why did Celestia send me here?”

“She didn’t, I did. I woke you up because you wanted the truth.

“What are you talking about?”

“Follow me, it’s easier when I show it to you.”

Twilight followed the villain with caution. She knew this was some sort of trap, or maybe a cruel prank from Discord.
While they walked through the castle, she realized where they were.

“This is the castle of the two sisters.”

“Yes, and I imagine you remember how it used to look like.”

“Used to look like?”

They arrived at a balcony, and Nightmare Moon simply directed her to look over it.
Twilight slowly made her way to the stone railing, and what she saw chilled her bones more than the cold winter air.

If they really where in the castle of the two sisters, she should be able to see the Everfree Forest, but instead of that, she found a barren land.
All the trees had whither and died long ago, covered by a thick blanket of snow.
In the distance she could see Ponyville, or what was left of it.
Houses had been crushed under the weight of tons of snow, and it looked more like a ghost town that what she remembered.
Another thing that she discovered was that the Golden Oak Library wasn’t destroyed, it was one of the only buildings still standing, and the Friendship Castle was nowhere to be seen.
And it didn’t stop there, all she saw in the distance was snow and cold under the night sky.

“What happened?” She asked, confused and horrified.

“I won.” Nightmare responded simply.

“No, we defeated you, with the elements.”

“You didn’t, Twilight. I destroyed the elements, I captured you and your friends, and tried to rule with an eternal night. What a fool I was… am.”

“You are lying,” Said Twilight, pointing an accusatory hoof at the evil alicorn.

“I wish I was, Twilight.” Nightmare Moon looked sadder and sadder with every answer.

“You have to be lying.” Twilight’s voice was more desperate than angered.

“When I stablished my rule, I thought it would all work out, but without the sun, the temperatures got lower and lower. Crops died, ponies started to freeze in their homes and a mass starvation spread through all of Equestria.”

“Then why didn’t you bring back the sun.”

“When I escaped my imprisonment in the moon, I banished my sister to the sun. I thought it was a good vengeance for the millennia I was trapped in the moon but turns out there is a big difference between a rock floating in space and a ball of flames perpetually exploding.”

“What happened?” Asked Twilight fear clear in her voice.

“Celestia died in the flames. And the sun died with her. My reckless act dooming the world to an eternal winter.”

“No, you are lying, Celestia can’t be dead.”

“I wish you were right. I would give anything for you to be right.” Nightmare Moon lowered her head, tears appearing in her eyes.
Twilight was in shock.
Celestia… dead? It couldn’t be possible. It had to be a lie. It had to be.

“After realizing that I couldn’t fix my mistake. I put everypony in one of those sleep pods to protect them from the cold and the hunger. And kept them in a perpetual dream.”

“Are you saying that…”

“All of your life after my supposed defeat has been a dream, Twilight.”

A shiver, not from cold, washed over Twilight. No, it couldn’t be. It was ridiculous. All her life was a lie? It must be a sick joke from Discord.
At any moment, he would snap his fingers and she would be back in her castle.

“No one is coming to save you Twilight.”

“You don’t know that!” she screamed.

“I know. I wish as much as you do that it wasn’t true. But this is the reality we live in.”

“If that were the truth, which it isn’t, I would blast you right now! So, tell me what’s really happening!”

“Blast me if you want, Twilight, you will only wake up the rest of your friends into this cold wasteland. And all the magic I spend every hour of every day to rise the temperature of the Equestria even a little bit will banish. You will all freeze to death.”

“I saw you win when Starlight used her time travel, you didn’t destroy the world in that timeline.”

“A hopeful dream. One impossible to achieve.”

“Not with that attitude, we will find a solution to this, we will- “

“-find a way to bring back Celestia? Use Starlight’s time travel spell to fix everything? Use the elements? Discord? We have tried and failed, every time.”

“What do you mean every time?”

“Do you think this is the first time that you woke up into reality?”

Twilight’s blood run cold, her brain trying to process the implications of the question.

“You have awakened a total of eleven times. In one of them, we spent two decades trying different methods to fix the world at least a little bit. All have failed. We can’t fix my mistake.”

“No. No no no no no. There must be a way! If not us, then Discord or Starswill-”

“you don’t get it Twilight; you never do at first.”

“What am I not getting?!”

“Everything, my defeat, the defeat of Discord, Chrysalis, Sombra, Tirek, your ascension to an alicorn, everything has been just a dream I created so you could be happy along with your friends and everypony I condemned to this frozen world.”

“You mean that… “

“Discord, and his reality-bending powers, doesn’t exist. Starlight, with her time-manipulating magic, doesn’t exist. The pillars of Equestria returning to the present time, never happened.”

“No… you are lying!”

“Do you remember you brother before his wedding?”

“Of course.”

“how was he growing up?”

“He… he was…”

“Your only memories of him were the ones I invented for you.”

“And Cadence?” Twilight asked, tears rolling through her face.

“I made her too. And Moon Dancer too.”

“No… no! My life isn’t a lie! It isn’t a dream! You don’t control it!” she screamed, hitting the stone floor with her hooves repeatedly.

“I’m afraid it is. And it made you happy, but the truth is… you were never in control of it.”

“No… there has to be something that we can do to fix it.”

“I’m afraid there’s nothing we can do. The only thing we can do is enjoy dreams of what could have been and be happy with the lies.”

“All my life… all the things I have done… all the friendship lessons… every friend I have made… It’s a lie. I failed the first task that Celestia gave me. I failed her. I failed everyone. I’m not the princess of friendship. I’m a failure.”

Twilight fell to the ground, screaming and sobbing, banging her head against the stone floor with guilt for her failures.

“If it helps, I’m sure that you would have made your dream come true if you had defeated me at the beginning. You are quite the capable mare.”

Twilight looked at her with desperation, hugging the alicorns leg.

“I want to go back! I want to see Celestia! I want to hug Spike! I want to see my friends! I want to forget this nightmare!” she begged, and the alicorn looked at her with pity.

“I know, Twilight. This has already happened many times. You will sleep and start your journey all over again. Until you realize the truth once again.”

Nightmare Moon lowered her horn, touching Twilight’s, and the unicorn fell asleep, still crying and sobbing.
The alicorn send a little beam towards Twilight’s head, and she slowly stopped crying, the memories of their conversation banishing from her mind, giving her peace... for a time.”

Nightmare Moon carried her towards her sleep pod, seeing it shut close and sending her towards her fantasy world.
The alicorn walked away, but she felt a sharp pain coursing through her body, making her stumble.
With all the magic and energy she was spending to keep the little balance that existed in the world, she was getting weaker every year, and soon she would be too tired to continue.
But she had to. It was her punishment, and her debt to the ponies and her sister.
She would keep them happy for as long as she could.

Even if it killed her.

Author's Note

I'm pretty sure im not the first to write something like this. Hell, surely someone has made it better than me.
But like my first story, this was one idea writen in sleepless hours.

Hope you like it.

I will be watching you.