Chapter 6: One Battle in Many Hearts

Chapter 6

One Battle in Many Hearts

Luna regained consciousness first. Twilight was still gazing upward in what would have seemed to be a stupor, but for the fact that Luna could sense the moon's continued movement. Only their focus on one another had prevented she and Nightmare Moon from noticing it earlier. She had to admire the little unicorn's heart.

“Her mind must be breaking under the strain,” Luna thought.

She could see Nightmare moon lying at the bottom of the staircase that led up to her black throne. The stairs themselves were shattered and rife with cracks, all extending outward from a deep, central crater that marked where she must have impacted. Between Nightmare Moon and herself, furthermore, there was an even larger crater in the floor, and then a long trench of dislodged, upturned, and shattered stones galled out in a line extending from it to where she lay. It took her a moment, but Luna finally realized that it was where her own body had actually dug into the floor as the force of her attack had driven her downwards and backwards.

She could not lift her body. It felt as if all her legs and both her wings were broken. Every breath she drew was agonizing, and each time she exhaled, there was a thin taste of blood in her breath. This told her that her shattered ribs must have punctured at least one of her lungs.

“At least Nightmare Moon must be in worse shape than me,” she rasped.

It was not so. She realized in despair that her old foe was very slowly bringing herself to her hooves. A wound that would have immediately slain any mortal horse gaped in her left side -- the place where Luna's horn had been when she had unleashed her tremendous attack. Through the massive, ragged hole, Luna could see the fragmented remains of Nightmare Moon's ribcage, and even her still-beating heart. The blood loss was catastrophic, and strands of ragged flesh and intestine hung beneath her midriff like vile streamers, glistening red in the slowly intensifying light of the distant sun. Her dark divinity sustained her, however, even in the face of such bodily devastation.

The black mare turned to face Luna, and both of her right legs, the side against which she had impacted, failed her, causing her to tumble forward down the stairs. A moment after she came to rest, she looked up again, and the mindless rage in her turquoise eyes filled Luna with the utmost terror she had ever experienced.

Nightmare Moon very slowly raised herself once more, and stumbled toward the Princess' ruined body. Luna turned her head to try and fire a spell at her enemy, but she was overcome with despair to discover that her horn had been almost totally shattered by the brutality of her own spell. Only a short, jagged stump now protruded from her forehead, which was itself soaked with blood -- not all of it her foe's. She would never be able to direct magical energy with her horn in this condition. It was all she could do to keep Nightmare Moon from negating Twilight Sparkle's feeble push against the moon.

The Nightmare horse noticed her horror, and understanding that Luna was now utterly helpless to stop her, she let loose a sick, gurgling laugh that ended in her violently vomiting blood onto the floor.
“Well,” she said, licking bloody bile away from her lips, “I'll just deal with you after I tend to my more immediate concern.”

The ghastly horror that had once been a regal queen of the night began her twisted, shuffling movement anew, this time turning towards the helpless purple pony who gazed upward, eyes aglow, at the shifting sun.

“No,” Luna barely whispered, coughing as she did so.

Luna was powerless. She watched as the ghoulish horse-thing slowly approached the little unicorn. Luna did not want to see what Nightmare Moon would do, but could not make herself look away. She tried to shout for Twilight to run away, but all that came out was a series of squeaks and sighs.

“You know,” Nightmare Moon hacked. “She's going to die because you brought her here, and her little friends will never, for the rest of their lives, escape from the eternal miseries I've crafted for them all; I love it.” She began to chuckle, and it morphed into a cough. She cleared her throat, and spat a foamy mixture of mucus and blood onto the floor. "All I have to do is finish you off, and then I can take your place -- forever. Cenasolus can have Celestia, and I can have my eternal night."

As she spoke, still advancing towards Twilight, the light slowly crept across the throne room's floor, casting weird shadows of the strange, ornate dome, but Luna knew that the sun would never emerge in time. She felt a tear form at the corner of her eye, and tried to lift herself once more, but it was no use.

“Why?” Luna whispered.

Nightmare Moon was within reach of Twilight now, and by sheer force of will she raised herself to her full height, looming over Twilight's tiny, oblivious form. Luna did not know what Nightmare Moon would do to the unicorn, but she did know that whatever it was, she not want to see it. Finally, by a painful act of will, she shut her eyes.

And another blast rocked the sky.

Luna's eyes flung open in surprise, and she saw that Nightmare Moon had once more been brought to the floor, and now lay some distance from Twilight Sparkle. A long, wide swath of blood gave testament to the fact that she had slid most of that distance on her ruined side. To the Princess' surprise, a pale blue pegasus with a rainbow mane and tail stood between the unicorn and the downed horse, rolling her head to crack her neck and blinking her eyes with a look of decided discomfort. A long, straight rainbow faded in the distance directly behind her.

“Ouch,” said Rainbow Dash.

Luna sighed deeply in her relief, but her heart still pounded in her chest. Nightmare Moon would be up again soon, and Rainbow Dash alone would stand no chance against her. Suddenly, her ears caught the sound of something below her, faint at first, but growing in volume. It was the sound of hoofbeats on the stairs below. After a few moments, Applejack burst into the the throne room with a customary “Whoa, Nelly!”

Luna began to feel her first moments of hope since regaining consciousness, and even as she did so, she heard wings beating, followed by the click of horseshoes on stone. Fluttershy soon stood beside her.

“Are you okay?” Fluttershy looked her over. “Oh, dear; no, you're not.” the yellow pegasus said softly, stroking Luna's mane.

More hoofbeats came from the stairs, and suddenly Pinkie Pie and Rarity dashed into view.

“We're here to help,” said Pinkie. “Just let us catch our breath!” She dropped her head, huffing and puffing.

“Oh, I don't need a breath,” said Rarity, and a sharp fragment of stone lifted up beside her, glowing pale blue-white with her telekinetic influence.

Luna focused all of her willpower to draw in a breath, and gave a raspy, tremulous shout: “You have to keep her away from Twilight Sparkle, no matter what. She has to finish... She has to finish.” She lay her head back onto the floor and struggled to breath. Luna looked up at Fluttershy, her vision blurring and splitting into multiple images. By some miracle, she managed to retain her consciousness

Nightmare Moon finally stirred.

“I am getting tired of this SHIT!” She levered herself to her full height, and looked around. Her eyes spread open so far they threatened to burst from her skull.

“How can you be here!? Those dreams should have been the closest thing to hell any of you have ever experienced. They were inescapable!”

Rarity strode slowly forward, speaking through gritted teeth, the force of her words slinging spittle onto the polished, black stone floor. “Right on the first point, wrong on the second!”

The unicorn's chosen missile shone brightly for a moment, and flung towards the horse's head. Before it struck home, it glowed black-purple, and crumbled into dust, producing a contemptuous “Hmph” from Nightmare Moon's bleeding lips.

“Proud of yourself, are you?” Rarity's voice was brimming with venom. “That was a decoy, you insufferable BITCH!” Another rock, glowing blue with Rarity's telekinesis and several times larger than the last, flew in from Nightmare Moon's right and smashed into the side of her face, briefly painting the air with a horizontal geyser of blood and teeth.

Nightmare Moon threw her left foreleg out wide to catch herself, but was still taken badly off-balance and obviously dazed. Applejack took full advantage of her loss of equilibrium, running in to hammer at the black alicorn's right flank with both of her rear hooves. Nightmare's pelvis gave out simultaneously a pair of loud, sharp, cracks, and she let out a roar of agony and hatred as her hindquarters collapsed from under her.

“Should I hit her, too?” asked Fluttershy. “I'd really rather not, if I don't have to. She's already really bloody.”

Rainbow Dash looked across the courtyard at her yellow friend, her mouth hanging open.

“Hell yeah, you should hit her! She was trying to kill Twilight!”

“WHAT!?” Fluttershy arced into a yellow-pink streak, and slammed into the black alicorn's right shoulder. In a flash, her forelegs had the much larger equine in a vice-like headlock, and her teeth were dug deeply into an ear, which she wrenched her head in an obvious attempt to remove from Nightmare Moon's skull. The other ponies were so stunned by Fluttershy's maddened assault that they were all compelled to back away from the locus of her violence.

Nightmare Moon somehow found the strength to lift herself on her shattered frame, and bucked forward so violently that her horn scraped stone. Fluttershy was thrown forward, but rolled over in the air. She beat her wings furiously, halting her momentum and reversing her direction to come in at Nightmare Moon for a second attack.

The moments that it took her to realign herself, however, gave Nightmare time enough to take aim and charge a spell at the tip of her horn. Seeing the spell beginning to charge, and totally aware that Fluttershy was beyond reasonable communication, Rainbow Dash zipped in and put her shoulder into the horse's shattered ribcage. The impact caused Nightmare Moon to stumble, but she still managed to release her spell. A bolt of force rippled through the air, visibly warping space as it traveled. It no doubt would have shattered Fluttershy's skull if its aim had been true. As it was, the yellow pegasus caught a glancing blow, and was deflected to the ground. She rolled and then skidded to a stop at Nightmare Moon's hooves, and let out a soft, sere moan.

Rainbow Dash was still reeling from her own impact against the big mare's side, but Nightmare moon had recovered her footing, and recognizing her as the greater threat of the two pegasi, quickly turned and delivered a sharp, quick blast of energy into her chest. It sent Rainbow Dash rolling, and she ended up lying on her side next to Applejack, who responded by sprinting once more into the fray.

“Hang on, Fluttershy,” called the orange pony, prompting a quick glance and a cruel smirk from Nightmare Moon, as she began to unsteadily rear upward on her damaged hind legs.

Rarity, also seeing Fluttershy's predicament, galloped forward meaning to drag her away from the looming mare, but before she or Applejack could even arrive, Nightmare Moon brought both of her forehooves down onto Fluttershy's supine body. There was the distinct crack of one of Fluttershy's wings breaking, and a yowl of agony from the little pegasus.

Applejack quickened her pace, fully intending to knock Nightmare Moon's head off of her shoulders, and Rarity, as she too continued her charge, levitated every fragment of rock within twenty paces into a swirling stone cloud she meant to hurl into Nightmare Moon's body. Rainbow Dash came off of the ground as if from a sprinter's stance, hurling herself forward by both wing and hoof, so that it seemed as if she would impact the enormous mare at almost the same moment as Applejack, despite her late start. Before any of the three could deliver her blow, however, the air was torn asunder by a blood-freezing screech, barely intelligible as Fluttershy's name. It was so terrible to hear that every single combatant froze in her tracks out of pure shock.

The source of the cacophony was a pink blur that ripped toward the black goddess. The impetus behind the assault was such that Nightmare Moon was turned over completely onto her back as Pinkie Pie latched onto her throat with her teeth, crushing her windpipe and ripping into her carotid artery. The resultant exsanguination painted Pinkie's face a little redder with each throb of Nightmare Moon's racing heart.

Applejack shuddered at the sound of Pinkie's teeth sinking into Nightmare Moon's neck, repulsed by its similarity to the sound of biting into an apple. “That's a little more... direct... than the old party cannon,” she mumbled.

Rainbow Dash, now standing beside her, rubbed at a blackened, smoldering patch of fur on her chest, and nodded silently in wide-eyed agreement.

Rarity dropped all of her gathered weapons to the ground, visibly nauseated by the sight.

Nightmare Moon, glassy-eyed and listless, put both of her forehooves against Pinkie's chest and pried her away from her throat. She summoned up her strength, and kicked the berserk earth pony as far away from herself as she could. Pinkie, however, refused to release her death grip, and as she was finally thrown clear, a chunk of black-furred flesh came away with her, still clenched in her teeth.

Unable to fly on her shattered wings, Nightmare Moon levitated her body upward magically, taking her out of reach of Pinkie Pie's dreadful psychosis. As she floated into the air she shoved a hoof into a gaping hole in her throat in an effort to stymie the flow of blood. Her effort was only partially successful, and thin runnels of her blood continued to dribble rhythmically from the ugly wound beneath her hoof..

Pinkie spat onto the ground, producing a vile-looking pool of black hairs, blood, and saliva. A chunk of black-furred hide lay at its center, and noticing this fact, Rarity finally gave in to her nausea.

“Damn, she's hard to kill," said Pinkie through a reddened, dripping, and half-mad grin, as she surveyed the floating horse's ruined form. "Seriously," she continued, licking NIghtmare Moon's blood from her lips, "How much HP does this bitch have?"

“She's a deity,” said Rarity, coughing out the last of the vomit elicited by Pinkie's barbarism. "What do you expect?" She cleared her throat. "And what the hell is 'HP'?"

“Rarity, check Fluttershy!” shouted Applejack. “Dash, get Queen Thundercunt back down here where Pinkie and me can help you finish KILLING her!”

Rarity ran to Fluttershy's side, and was relieved to see that, while teary-eyed and bleeding from several cuts and scrapes, she was still lucid.

“Come on, Fluttershy. Get up. We have to get you away from here.”

Fluttershy was breathing rapidly, sucking air through clenched teeth. “My wing is broken,” she said, “and my leg.” She nodded towards her left hind leg. Rarity saw a sharp fragment of bone was actually protruding through the skin of Fluttershy's wing, and the indicated leg was turned in a direction it was never meant to turn.

Rarity curled her snout in a mixture of empathy and disgust. “Well, that looks excruciating,” she said. Then, as an afterthought, she stroked Fluttershy's side in an effort to calm the pegasus' hyperventilations.

Rarity glanced toward the commotion of the ongoing fight. Applejack and Pinkie Pie were slowly circling below Nightmare Moon like a pair of sharks, while Rainbow Dash zigged and zagged around the levitating alicorn, who continually hurled all manner of lightning, fire, and pure, rippling force at the nimble pegasus.

“I'm sorry about this Fluttershy, but I have to get you away from this.” Rarity Hooked a foreleg under one of Fluttershy's and began to drag her towards where Twilight was still staring upward, eyes agape and glowing intensely. Fluttershy whimpered and moaned as her fractured limbs were dragged across the stone floor.

“Don't worry, Fluttershy. You'll be back to normal when we wake up,” said Rarity, approaching the other unicorn.

“No,” mumbled Twilight, as Rarity placed Fluttershy carefully beside her. “This... This is real.”

Rarity's eyes lit up with mild panic, and she turned to shout at her friends.

“Be careful!" she screamed. "Somehow, this is apparently for keeps!”

“GOOD!” shouted Pinkie, as she leapt upward, her crimson teeth snapping audibly at Nightmare Moon's dangling hooves.

As Rarity moved towards the battle, the collection of sharp rocks she had earlier amassed once again began to swirl around her in space, and more and more sunlight continued to creep across the tower.

Rarity hurled the first of her many stones at Nightmare Moon, and its spearhead-like tip buried itself deep in the huge mare's right thigh. Nightmare Moon yelped in surprise and pain, then spun in place to find the source of this new assault. More rocks were already headed in her direction, and while she managed to disintegrate a few of them, she was still pelted all across her body by at least half a dozen, two of which managed to imbed themselves deeply in her midriff.

She responded by launching a fireball directly towards the unicorn. Rarity turned and made to dodge, but screamed in shock and torment as it caught her in the left flank. The fireball bore enough impetus that it spun Rarity's hindquarters around her forelegs, twisting both of them so sharply that both knees and both shoulders were severely and painfully sprained. She collapsed forward, then went down onto her uninjured side. Groaning through gritted teeth, she looked back to see her flank and thigh. The fur, cutie mark included, was completely burned away, along with much of her skin, and blisters were slowly raising all over the bared hide. Her whole, wrecked flank smouldered like a dying bonfire. Despite her sprained forelegs, she tried to stand, but found that the fireball's impact had broken her hip.

Rainbow Dash, livid at Nightmare Moon's continued abuse of her friends, dove in like a hawk and smashed both of her rear hooves into the alicorn's shoulder. The impact caused Nightmare Moon to lose altitude, and Pinkie Pie saw an opportunity.

“Applejack! Alley oop!” Pinkie Lowered herself to her belly, just below Nightmare Moon's position. Applejack ran forward and used her friend's shoulders as a stepping stone to launch herself toward the black mare, an action which Pinkie assisted by bucking upwards as Applejack leapt.

Applejack struck hard against the alicorn's back, and hooked her forelegs over her black wings. The sudden distraction caused Nightmare Moon to once again lose sight of Rainbow Dash, who delivered a vicious headbutt directly into her exposed belly. All three of the embroiled combatants tumbled to the stone floor, and Pinkie Pie dove into the resulting pile.

A wild, free-wheeling melee burst out on the stone, and somehow, amidst the deadly wrestling match, Nightmare Moon managed to thrust her horn so deeply into Applejack's abdominal cavity that it's tip actually emerged from her back, right beside her spine. Applejack snarled like a wounded wolf, and pushed herself off of the cruel, magical instrument by kicking hard into Nightmare Moon's face and forehead, crashing one hoof into an eye.

Nightmare Moon yelped, and Applejack rolled, cursing, across the tower's roof, coming to a stop on her back. She could feel her own blood beginning to pool around her lower back.

As she sat up to examine her wound, Applejack felt her mutilated abdominal muscles tear even further under the strain. There was a ragged hole half the diameter of her own hoof just below her ribcage. Unable to continue straining, she fell backward, her hat flattening beneath her head, and stared upward.

She could see the sun.

Now came the crackling blast of a lighting bolt, and Applejack craned her neck just in time to see Pinkie Pie hurtling backward through the air, blue arcs of electricity flitting about her body. She sailed upward and crashed into one of the iron supports of the dome, striking it squarely with the small of her back. The impact sounded like a wet towel being dropped on a tile floor. Pinkie Pie toppled downward, and landed on her side. To her credit, she immediately tried to stand and rejoin the fight, but her hind legs would not move. The blow had broken her back.

Rainbow Dash had somehow managed to straddle Nightmare Moon's chest, and was repeatedly pounding her forehooves into the black horse's face with such force that each blow actually caused Nightmare Moon's head to bounce off the stone beneath her. Finally, Nightmare Moon telekinetically withdrew the rock that Rarity had earlier lodged in her thigh, and smashed it into the blue pegasus' left temple, opening a deep gash that quickly painted the side of her blue face with tiny, twisting rivers of red. Rainbow Dash was rocked to the side by this impact, and visibly dazed. Nightmare Moon drew back a hoof, and slammed it into Rainbow's jaw, dismounting the Pegasus from her own body. Then, she slowly managed to bring herself once more to her hooves, and stomped down into the little pony's abdomen, prompting a gagged squeak.

As Rainbow Dash rolled over to cover her injured belly, Nightmare Moon stomped down twice more, shattering both of her wings. Rainbow Dash screamed in agony at each impact, then went silent as she was kicked in the same side of the head that had borne the previous blows.

The big alicorn once again lifted herself skyward, and began to laugh. It was a grotesque, gurgling sound that came less from her mouth than from the bloody hole in her throat. The light seemed to drain out of the space around her horn, and space itself seemed to visibly warp inward toward its tip.

“Now,” she gurgled, “You will all learn...” She stopped short, interrupted by the sound of a hoarse, liquid laugh; Luna's laugh.

“Have you lost your mind, you foolish little nag?” Nightmare moon rasped from beneath the slowly growing orb of energy.

Luna stifled her coughing, wheezing mirth just long enough to say “Look behind you.”

A shudder rocked Nightmare Moon's body, and she turned her head rapidly to see what – to see whom -- she feared might be there.

Indeed she was.

“Really?” asked Celestia, her face and voice soaked with contempt as she slowly beat her wings to hover in midair behind and above the black mare's ragged body. She took a moment to look over Nightmare Moon's many grievous wounds. “They're just six little ponies.”

The glow faded from Twilight Sparkle's eyes. She smiled slightly, and then collapsed to the side as Celestia cut loose a ray of pure, white light that drove Nightmare Moon downward like a meteor.

The Princess slowly descended to stand over the torn, broken body of the black alicorn, maintaining the beam of brilliant energy as she did so. Nightmare Moon struggled beneath its battering, but in her weakened state, she simply could not compete with the raw strength of Celestia's magic.

“Did you ladies bring those pretty necklaces for show, or are you planning to use them?”

Twilight Sparkle's eyes did not open, but the talisman of the element of magic glowed brightly. The ragged bodies of the six ponies lifted into the sky in a rough circle around Nightmare Moon. Then, there was a brilliant flash.

* * *

Celestia awoke first, and she was actually amused by the scene of the six little ponies all asleep around her. She smiled calmly as she noticed the gentle expansion and contraction of her sister's warm body behind her. It reminded her of how Luna had often sneaked into her room to lay beside her when she'd had a bad dream as a filly

Celestia recalled how, in those days so long ago, Luna had told her that she never had a nightmare once she could feel her sister next to her in the night.

Then, she felt the wet, warm, stickiness of Luna's blood.

Her spine tingled, and Celestia rolled over quickly, to find herself face-to-face with Luna, who was slowly beginning to awaken, and had begun to gasp for air. Her horn had split into at least a dozen fragments that lay in a rough approximation of their former shape on the pillow. All of the wounds she had received in the battle were opening back up one by one, and Celestia could actually hear the sounds of her sister's bones breaking beneath her skin.

Luna, now conscious enough to be aware of what was happening, looked at her sister's face in agonized desperation, and spoke. “Send... for help.” Her eyes went wide and wild. “Before they start waking up!”

It was too late. Applejack yelped from beyond the foot of the bed, and another chill ran up Celestia's spine. That sensation catapulted the big mare to her hooves. She looked down, and saw the Earth pony doubled up into a fetal position and clutching her stomach. A gaping wound in her belly and a smaller one in her back were spilling blood onto the rug.

“Just hold on," said Celestia, gently touching Applejack's left temple, "I'll send a guard for the castle doctor!”

She spun on her hind legs, and very nearly fell over as she reared upward to avoid stepping on the thing she'd least expected to see: Nightmare Moon's twisted, barely conscious form, gurgling and wheezing in a swelling, crimson pool created by the wounds she had been dealt in the dream, some of which were still reopening in explosive exsanguinations.

Whatever spell Luna had cast to draw the Nightmare horse into reality along with her, it had worked.

Celestia was so taken aback by the sight that she actually paused for a moment, uncertain of what to do. Finally, she cast a sleep spell to keep Nightmare Moon from adding any more trouble to what was already a lethally urgent situation. The black mare's wounds continued to open and expand, but unlike Luna and Applejack, she did not fully awaken.

Finding this satisfactory, Celestia telekinetically flung open the door, and charged into the hallway. It just so happened, by some accident of fortune, that a patrolling guard rounded a nearby corner.

“Princess Celestia!? You're better!” The cheer in the armored unicorn's voice was bizarrely incongruous with the dire situation, and his eyes went briefly wide in shock as Celestia very nearly galloped down the hallway, stopping in front of him.

“Go get the castle doctor, and bring him back here. And every medic or any unicorn you spot who knows any healing magic at all. We have wounded.”

“I don't,” the guard stammered, but realizing the urgency in the Princess' voice, he cut himself off. “I'm going!”

As he turned to run down the hall, Celestia likewise wheeled on her rear hooves and made for the open door of her chamber. A piercing shriek tore out of that selfsame portal, and Celestia felt her heart fall into her stomach as came into the room.

It was Rarity; awake now, and moaning through gritted teeth, tears slowly forcing themselves out through eyelids squeezed tightly shut, so that small runnels of mascara and eyeliner were flowing down both her cheeks. A huge burn was spreading over her flank, despite the total absence of fire.

Rainbow Dash did not make any vocal noise, but Celestia knew that she was beginning to awaken by the chorus of cracks she heard coming from her wings and by the gash that suddenly split open in the left side of her head. Only a weak moan gave any clue that she had returned to consciousness.

Pinkie Pie was the next to awaken, and she did so with a chorus of “SHIT, SHIT, SHIT, SHIT!” as a single, sharp snap echoed out from the middle of her back. Not two seconds later, Fluttershy's eyes opened just as a bone in her wing split apart, and ripped through the skin. She cut loose a yowl of pain and surprise.

Celestia knew healing magic, of course, and some of it was quite powerful, but not even she could handle this amount of trauma on her own. That was why she was pleased to hear Twilight's voice.

“Princess...” Her relief was quickly muted by the doubt and fear that echoed in her student's words.

“It's alright, Twilight. Help is on the way. If you're not too badly injured, I need you to...”

“Princess,” Twilight cut her off, real panic entering into her words. “I can't stand. I think I dislocated my... AHHH!” Twilight's scream was accompanied by the sound of a crunch.

Celestia whirled to see Twilight. The unicorn sat upright on the couch next to Fluttershy. Her eyes were open, but she was staring straight ahead and feeling around blindly for the floor with a hoof.

“It's hard... It's hard to breath,” said Twilight, causing Celestia to take note of a single shard of rib protruding from the unicorn's side. “And my eyes hurt -- a lot.”

“Twilight, how long did you stare at the sun?”

“I couldn't focus without...”

“I know; Just lie back down, and don't move. I won't leave you, understand?”

“Okay,” came Twilight's shaky reply, and she slowly lowered herself back onto the couch next to Fluttershy, who winced as Twilight's tail brushed her twisted leg.

“Who's the worst?” Celestia took a quick look around the room and assessed the ponies' conditions, one by one. When she noticed her again, she started instinctively towards Luna, but then realized that her sister could withstand her wounds, severe though they were, much better and longer than any of the mangled ponies.

“Sorry, Luna, but the head wound comes first,” she finally said, stepping toward Rainbow Dash. Then she nodded her head once towards Applejack. “Then the impalement.”

“No hurry,” Luna rasped. “I'm just now getting comfortable.”

“So, this is what it takes to rate ahead of royalty,” sputtered Applejack.

“If the two of you have enough strength to make jokes,” Celestia said, touching the tip of her glowing horn to Rainbow Dash's bleeding temple and holding it there, “then I'm just going to move you both to the bottom of the list.”

Pinkie Pie giggled through a sob. “Princess, you are a grade-A troll.” She sniveled once. “Also, I can't feel two of my legs.”