A Thousand Years

by unizxbra

Rating: everyone
Tags: Nightmare Moon, Princess Luna, Drama, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Twilight Sparkle, Princess Celestia, Alternate Universe
Length: 1617

After a thousand years on the moon, Nightmare Moon has finally escaped, capturing her sister. What she doesn't know, though, is that Celestia's student is one of the new bearers of the elements of harmony.

Cancelled, but I may revisit this idea another time.

Luna had always been jealous of her sister. The final straw was when the two ruled together in supposed "harmony." Everyone loved Celestia. Everyone loved the sun. After she cast a particularly evil spell, Luna became Nightmare moon, but her reign was cut short after Celestia banished her to the moon for a thousand years.

After her thousand-year imprisonment was finally over, her first action was to kidnap and entrap Celestia so she could not get in the way of her plan once more. What she doesn't know is that Celestia's protégé, Twilight Sparkle, is one of the new bearers of the elements of harmony—even if the unicorn doesn't realize it yet. She must do what she can to keep Twilight on her side.

Alternate take on the first two episodes of MLP, also features a brief backstory to Luna's transformation into Nightmare Moon. Doesn't directly follow MLP's canon!

Cover art by me

Published 2020-04-20 21:00:02 UTC
Last updated 2020-04-20 21:00:02 UTC

Before the Storm

Thousands of years ago, Luna received her cutie mark.

She had raised the moon successfully alongside her teacher, Starswirl, and as exhausting as it had been, she was full of energy once more at the sight of that mark on her flank. It was incredible, she thought, and others thought the same—everyone celebrated with glee. Not long after, Celestia realized that she had a similar ability, raising the sun, and received her cutie mark. As quick as Luna’s glory came to her, it left. All attention was on Celestia now.

It was nothing new.

When Celestia became an alicorn, she thought it would be different. Luna would be the second to earn her wings, so her own transformation should give the spotlight from Celestia to her instead, right? However, nothing changed after her promotion from unicorn to alicorn—nothing except for her new wings, of course, and her new title as a princess. Apparently, it just wasn't as exciting the second time.

Now, it had been exactly one year since the defeat of Discord. She and Celestia turned him to stone and returned harmony to Equestria. To celebrate the one-year streak of keeping the peace, a party was thrown at the castle, prompting an abundance of ponies, including royalty from other nations, to visit. Celestia trotted about the main room wearing a gorgeous gown, which fitted perfectly to her body and was made of fine, beautiful material, decorated elegantly and shining ever so slightly in the soft light. Her mane was styled and put up beautifully, too. As she mingled, she caught the attention and praise of most ponies in the room. They openly complimented her, admiring her raw beauty.

Luna was nothing short of displeased. She smiled, as it was polite, but anger boiled inside. Luna put just as much work into her appearance, if not more. She received many polite compliments, as one would expect at this occasion where everyone would dress so formally, but most of the company had taken more to her sister instead. She was more popular, after all. Celestia raised the sun. Ponies loved the sun. Ponies loved Celestia. It wasn't fair.

A mare from the group of ponies with Celestia gestured for Luna to join them. She smiled, but this time it was a real smile instead of a polite one—had they finally recognized her? Do they actually like her? She made her way towards them and joined in the crowd, all eyes on her. "So, Luna," the mare said, "Celestia was just telling us about you!"

"Oh?" Luna looked at Celestia uncertainly.

"Oh, yes! She says that she wishes her duties were as easy as yours." The mare chuckled and raised a hoof to her face. "Surely you know how hard she works during the day? Oh, what I'd give to trade your royal duties for mine,"

Her eye twitched as she forced a laugh. "No, Miss, my nights are just as long and difficult as my sister's days."

The mare waved dismissively. "Oh, that can't be for certain, Princess! Walking in other ponies dreams just sounds like, well, a dream!" The crowd laughed at her lame joke, but Luna was growing increasingly irritated. She was already fed up before, but now she was losing her patience. She snorted and scowled.

"You know not the stresses of reigning over the night!" she shouted bitterly. Celestia was about to say something before Luna stormed off, throwing her dress to the side and marching to her room. The crowd gasped in unison in shock at the behavior of the royal pony. Celestia immediately apologized on her behalf. All Luna could hear as she made her way to her door was Celestia explaining, "We just have a some normal sibling rivalry, that's all," and a lot of phrases involving "Please excuse my sister."

Sibling rivalry, she repeated bitterly in her head, slamming her door and hanging her head low as tears ran down her face. Luna let down her hair with a sigh. She loathed them in a way she couldn't quite understand. She began to feel anger towards her own subjects, too, for even they could not see just how great of a ruler she was or even so much as appreciate the night for its beauty. Celestia ruled her subjects and raised the sun and in turn, they loved her, adored her, and Luna was hardly recognized. She raised the moon, brought the gorgeous night sky, and tried her best to rule her own subjects, but it was hard when there were none to rule as all of Equestria slept. Even in their dreams, they hardly thanked her for the deeds she did them in driving away their darkest nightmares. If she hadn't been an alicorn, she wondered if her subjects would even recognize her as one of the princesses of Equestria. As far as everyone else was concerned, Celestia was the princess, with Luna as more of a sidekick than a real ruler, like her sister. They were supposed to rule together as equals.

Supposed to.

In her scornful thoughts, she hardly noticed the breeze picking up until her mane was flowing directly into her face. She was snapped out of her angry thoughts and turned her attention to her window, but it was shut. She had no time to ponder where it was coming from before a dark blue smoke arose, spinning until it was all around her, obstructing her vision.

"Poor Princess Luna,” a voice from it hissed, “living forever in the shadow of her sister."

“Wh- who are you?” she stammered, backing up before being met once again with the wall of smoke. It was surprisingly solid. She looked around for a face in the smoke, but found nopony—and no creature—within it.

"I am the one who shall make you powerful! Don't you hate your sister? Aren't you dissatisfied with the treatment from your own subjects?”

She flattened her ears with guilt. Admittedly, it didn't sound quite as bad in her head. The anger, however, started to rise again within her.

“Do not fret, for things will soon change. Trust in me and gain immense power through a brand new form in which you may change everything.”

"How?”

"When the dawn is to rise and you must lower your beautiful sphere of light, refuse, and instead, cast a spell that will set it in place for as long as you desire. Show everyone just how glorious and beautiful your night can be. Expose Celestia for her tyranny and do not make way for the sun. Once your moon is enchanted, then and only then can we merge into one being with power that knows no limits nor bounds. Your subjects will come to appreciate you."

The thought intrigued her greatly. “As good of a plan that is, how can I trust you? And just how, exactly, are you going to make me more powerful?”

“Cast the spell and you shall see. Soon you will possess the power you seek.” The smoke whirled and circled her faster and faster until, all at once, it disappeared, leaving nothing but a book in its wake, flipped open to a page she couldn't make out from the distance. Luna approached it slowly, outstretching a shaky hoof to it in fear, as if the dusty old thing would snap shut and bite her. She sighed, scolding her hesitation and picked it up, examining the book. It was very old, she noted, as the cover barely held together all of the damaged and beaten up pages, yellowed with age. She could have sworn she'd seen the book before, perhaps in the restricted section of the royal library, but why? Curiosity got the better of her as she turned back to the page it was on.

It was fairly hard to read. The pages were in Old Ponish, which she was a bit rusty on, and if that wasn't difficult enough, it was written in what appeared to be flat-out chicken-scratch. She struggled to read it but recognized it as a spell nonetheless. More than likely, this was the enchantment she was supposed to place on the moon to somehow become more powerful. She bookmarked the page and used her magic to flip through more of the book, all of the writing being in Old Ponish, accompanied occasionally by illustrations which far outmatched the writer's actual writing in terms of neatness. Each page interested her, but her mind seemed to keep drifting to the bookmarked spell out of pure curiosity. Maybe it would work after all, but the only way to find out was to cast it, and she wasn't sure yet if she wanted to do that. After all, what would it do? As much as she hated Celestia, she didn't want to bring physical harm to her. Luna shook her head briskly and placed the book into her bedside drawer.

She removed her regal attire and got into her bed with a sigh. She closed her eyes and let herself drift off to sleep, but all she could think about that night, even in her dreams, was the book.

Perhaps she would read it tomorrow.

Author's Note

aaaand that concludes chapter one! feel free to critique it, as it's my first real upload here

also, this is part of my own timeline and "alternate universe" of sorts, so some things may be different! for example, in this AU, luna and celestia are step siblings, and their designs are a bit different

it'll be a bit of a retelling of the first two episodes

i know it's relatively short, but i hope everyone enjoyed it regardless :twilightblush: