Left Behind

by L0RD3N

Rating: teen
Tags: Princess Celestia, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Nightmare Moon, Princess Luna, Drama, Tragedy
Length: 2583

We all got left behind... we let it all slip away...

Shadows began to fall over Luna's mind as Celestia's rule only gets brighter and fairer. And then, finally, a friend seems to appear, to comfort her during these dark times...

Their voice... their voice was so sweet...

Made for the Dialogue only contest by PerfectlyInsane!
Cover art credit

Published 2024-06-13 21:40:00 UTC
Last updated 2024-06-13 21:40:00 UTC

Duality

As I close my eyes…

I feel it all slipping away…

“What or who cowerth there in the shadows?!”

“Why soundst thou prepared for a fierce battle?We come in peace.”

“Then show thyself, We bid ye!”

“That order We are afraid We simply cannot obey, Thine Highness. Not now.”

“Ha, but doest thou not know that thou in our realm standeth? We can order for light to come anytime!”

“Thine Highness loveth the night, or are we mistaken?”

“...We also indeed love the night. But pray tell, how cometh thou to be here? We know not of other dream-walkers like us.”

“Not all those who wander art lost, thine Highness. But we did hope that our paths would cross one night.”

“An intriguing way of seeking us, thou hast chosen, but we must say we are intrigued! Thou hast done no harm yet, so we shall allow thee to speak!”

“A thousand thanks. If we may be so bold, we have sensed thine discomfort. Thine pain. It whispers and echoes like wind through the pines, and we heard thine lament. And we wish to help, if thou allowst it.”

“Hm… I shalt hear thee.”

“We merely ask thine Highness to grant us the honor to be thine lending ear, and perhaps even the friend to offer words of consolation. That is all that we ask of thee, if thou accepts.”

“Interesting proposal thou bringst. And even more interesting art thyself. A bold tongue ye have indeed. Thy face is shrouded in fog, yet thy tongue surprises us. ‘Tis meek, quiet, kind. Thou hast our attention. Yet I must inquire, what are thine wishes, stranger? What dost thou follow with thine eyes unseen?”

“We follow naught, thine Highness.”

“Hmm… we guess we shalt see if thou speaks truly. But for now, may we know thine name?”

“Starry Night, thine Highness.”

***

“Do thou think ‘tis true, Starry Night? That nopony loves my glorious night? That not one gazes at my stars and cries, ‘Oh what a beautiful night sky there is tonight, thank thee, Princess Luna!’”

“Those are mere whispers, thine Highness.”

“Yet are they? All the ponies bask and thrive only in dear sister’s great sun, the greatest star in all the sky, the brightest and warmest. As Tia herself is always seen.”

“Ah, lament not, thine Highness, for the ones that forever bask only in the sun, for they are blind to true and honest beauty thine night posseses. Thine dear sister’s sun may be the brightest star, but she merely ascends and descends the sun, and the day sky has no charm. Thou, on the other hand, paint the high heavens themselves in exquisite constellations every night, tirelessly.”

“Ha! So thou say that my dear sister is lazy?”

“Thine Highness, I-”

“Nay, apologize not, for thou are not in the wrong, she indeed has a much lighter load than us, and yet she still somehow succeeds in putting on weight! Perhaps those long courts and her love of sweets are not doing her too much good, nay?”

“We must say that we appreciate thine humour. All the simple ponies treat Celestia such as they’d treat their godess, and then forget her flaws.”

“And she does indeed relish it… going nowhere without her regalia or great escort… hmph!”

“But thou could have them too, thine Highness, could thou not?”

“Of course we could! Yet we are not so vain and pompous as our sister. We have no love for formalities and regalities. We have love for ponies and love is built on respect, is it not? They can show it without the fake bows we see all these so called ‘aristocrats’ do incessantly. It leaves a bitter taste in our mouth.”

“Ah, We see now. ‘Tis very humble of thee, thine Highness. Quite commendable. Few leaders can boast of such a balance between humility, kindness and wisdom. And for the younger alicorn Princess as well! We think that the ponies have erred in choosing their godess!”

“Oh, hush now, thou are making us blush!”

“We apologise, yet we cannot help but stay true to our thoughts.”

“And we commend thee for that. We could use more love to be showed to us, even just through words. Thine dulcet tones are different than the false ones We heard from others, thine and warm of voice calms us… ‘tis hard to explain.”

“Then thou need not strain yourself into these words, thine Highness. We understand and our heart leaps with glee when we hear thee.”

“We give you permission from now on… to call us Luna. ‘Thine Highness’ chokes the mouth… and we are friends after all, are we not? ‘Tis our tenth night we spend together, after all.”

“We cannot express in words our gratitude and honor, Luna.”

“Then do not strain thyself, Starry Night. We understand. Even if yet thou hast not shown thyself yet, we find that we do not mind. The mystery is quite… charming.”

“Ha, then I shall keep the mystery for now, as thou whisht! All in due time, Luna… all in due time.”

I come toward you…

***

“Yet, who art thee truly, Starry Night? We are quite curious. Every night we converse, thou hide thine appearance, only thine voice we hear.”

“We can only made our voice heard indeed, for we are not as powerful as thee, Luna. Thou are the Lady of the Night and Dreams, we are mere magic casters.”

“And how did thou uncover this talent of yours, Starry Night?”

“Since when we were young have we discovered this peculiar affinity. Dreams have always been our place of freedom, of escape.”

“Escape from what, if We may ask?”

“From the harsh and saddening reality. We’d wish to avoid this topic for now, though…”

“We understand. And ‘tis true that it does not matter how one looks like, but how one acts like. And thou comfort us, so we shall press no longer.”

“Always so compassionate.”

“We are glad to make that one of the royal sisters…”

“Dost thou wish to say more, Luna?”

“We feel foalish… but yes. Our sister always… shines brighter, one might say. At day she is sought and she counsels, then she is revered. But only rarely does somepony seek us too… and Celestia relishes in the attention… while we fall behind in the shadows off the night. We miss her. We truly do.”

“Yet she does not seem to share thine sentiment. ‘Tis not foalish, Luna, thou are only hurt. Then why, if I may, bother to hurt and consume thyself over a pony that so easily forgets her sister?”

“But wouldn’t that hurt us too…? Would we not be… cold?”

“Thine sister cannot be by thine side forever. Thou must also find thine own strength alone.”

“Thou speak truly, Starry Night. But still, We truly hope thou won’t leave. It’d once more be unforgivably lonely here…”

“Worry not, Luna, we shan’t leave. Thou shalt always have us…”

Us…

***

“Unbelievable! Such a preposterous offer, why, my honor even is offended!”

“What hast she said?”

“She hast affirmed that we are too young to accompany her on ‘such a dangerous endeavour!’ Hmph! How full of herself she must be! Sombra is one of our most powerful and deceiving enemies yet!”

“Then she’ll surely need thine help, Luna!”

“If only she could see that!”

“Then go, prove thine valor! What dost the great Princess of the night need permission? Princesses are thou both, one cannot order the other, for the kingdom is thine both! And then again, even the great Princess of the Sun may need thy aid in defeating Sombra!”

“Still, we have our reservations about breaking Tia’s order…”

“Then why should thou wait? If thou want the respect and love of thine subjects, thou must prove thine worth! Thine sister lets fear and love to blind her, but thou must be better than her! Thou must follow your own path, regardless of what Celestia does or says!”

“Indeed. Thank thee for the advice, our friend. We know that on you, we can count. I must prepare for battle now!”

“Go thine way, Princess of the night, and may thou come back victorious and richer with one more enemy’s trophy!”

“I can taste you on my fingers…”

***

“Starry Night… We have heard thine voice when we defeated Sombra… When we spoke… we heard thine voice along with ours, when we were threatening him.”

“We sensed thine distress, so we quickly went to sleep to see if we can somehow come by thine side.”

“Sensed it, thou say?”

“Yes, indeed. We cannot explain it either, but we could feel thine need of help, somehow.”

“Highly intriguing. Oddly, it does strikes us as a great comfort. We do not think that we have ever shared such a bond with anypony else before. And thine timing was impecable. Thou hast arrived precisely at the moment we needed strength.”

“Perhaps it is born of our bond of these past fortnights?”

“Perhaps thou are right. We have not told Celestia of this. We simply cannot, anymore. We feel sick and our stomach twists at the very thought.”

“Then simply do not, Luna. Why must she know? Thou have defeated Sombra, and that is what matters.”

“Yet We feel like something had taken a hold on to us then… a bout of pure, unfiltered rage.”

“And thou are afraid of it? We see it as something to be used, especially in such precarious situations. Why hold back against someone like Sombra?”

“He was a powerful, evil force indeed. Who knows what could have happened if I hadn’t stopped him then? It could’ve been simply disastrous!”

“An evil force that needed a just as powerful force to defeat it. Celestia could not do what it takes. But thou, Luna, were able to take that leap and do what others could not, and ended Sombra. That is strength.”

“We thank thee. We sometimes tend to judge our own person rather harshly.”

“That is why we are here. To remind thou just how beautiful, powerful, and invaluable thou really are. And we shall always be here for thou.”

We’re slowly getting there, Luna… slowly…

I can feel you on my mouth…

***

“Dear sister, thou seems rather… weary. Thin, sort of stretched, like jam scraped over too many pancackes.”

“We are…”

The smile… the smile is fake…

“We are fine, dear sister. Do not worry.”

“Dost thou need medical attention perhaps? We can get the physician-”

“We said we are fine! We are just… busying ourselves. With the nights that no one ever pays attention to.”

“Oh, Lulu, I am sure that someponies love them as they love our day!”

Lies… fake comfort…

“Ah, yes. Surely there is someone who loves the night and us as much as your precious, majestic day.

I can feel you like the holy ghost…

***

“Luna, how has thine day been, we have not talked in a while-”

We do not need her, remember that.

“I ask thee to leave, sister. We do not wish for company.”

“Thou sayeth so for weeks now… what happened dear sister?”

Look at her, trying to get close once more… a pitiful half-hearted attempt.

“We are fine.”

“But we see that thou are not! Please, talk to us, we can help…”

Her help? Hah! What a useful offer? Where has it been so far?

“We said that we are fine!”

“We only what is best for thou, dear sister! Thou are sinking in a sea of loneliness! We can…”

She does not care truly, we know that already.

“Such beautiful sentiments! But do thou really believe thine tongue? Lathered with honey, but twisting and lying, like a changeling’s!”

“How dare thou- We are only trying to aid thee, Lulu-”

How dares she still call you that? Like she still loves and cuddles you at night?

“CEASE CALLING US THAT! WE ARE NOT MERE FOALS TO BE FOOLED AND SWAYED BY PET NAMES AND HONEY DRIPPING TALK!”

“Sister, we are trying to be here for thee-”

Lies!

“Hah! A likely story! Then where have thou been all this time?! Prancing around with Starswirl, deepening thine knowledge of magic, receiving and basking in all the love and adoration from thine little ponies?!”

“Then this is foalish jealousy, nay?!”

Do not spare her! She does not deserve it!

“Do thou not know how hard it is to see the Night Court always empty?! Nay! Thou always have all the worshipping somepony could ever wish for! Thou always have all that thou wish for!”

“Because maybe We have worked harder than thee for it!”

Dost thou see? This is her true, rotten, selfish nature!

“And we guard the dreams of them all while thou art getting thine beauty sleep! Leave us!”

“As thou commands! Perhaps someponies cannot be helped after all!”

Thou finally are detaching thineself from her. We do not need her anyways. Thou hast us…

Yes… us…

AND KILL YOU IF YOU GET TOO CLOSE!

***

“The moment has come, then.”

Yes, it has. The time has come for the true, rightful Princess to take her throne.

“The fight shalt be diffifcult… especially fighting our own flesh and blood”

Remember what she has done to thou, Luna. She is not worthy of mercy. She tries to usurpe thee of thine position. To push thee into the shadows of the unknown…

“Yes… yes, she does. She does this for so long…”

Then let us do cease this torture. Let us finally raise from the bended knee she put is in.

Yes… we shalt defeat her. There shall be one Equestrian Princess come morn…

And that Princess shalt be us.

Take this… away…

***

“We have failed, Starry Night! We have been defeated and exiled for a bitter thousand of -”

Stop weeping like a foal! Has the Princess been reduced to a crying mess? Where is thine pride?!

“We should have asked for forgiveness… we should have-”

Now you wish to beg to her?! To bend knee once more! Where is the strong Luna we have known and loved?!

“She… she has no strength left…”

Then let us take over instead… we shalt give thee all the strength thou could need… We have a thousand years here, all alone… we shall make sure thou are ready to come back with strength doubled!

“W-we c-cannot… we need Ti-…”

Silence! Thou needs us now more than ever, and not anyone else! And we shalt not leave thee. We said that we shall always be together, nay? We promised thee… thou dost not need anyone else…

Thou hast wished to know who we were? I was thou, always… We were never different luna… We were always…

Us.

Take this… away…

***

“Luna, you're loved so much more than you know,
May troubles be far from your mind,
And forgive me for being so blind…”

“We forgive thee, sister…”

The time has come, Luna. Thou must only let us guide thee…

Thou hast left us no choice.

Indeed… Indeed we did not.

Author's Note

“Luna, you're loved so much more than you know,
May troubles be far from your mind,
And forgive me for being so blind…”
These three verses are taken from the song "Lullaby for a Princess", highly recommend it!
And the verses in headers are from the song "Left Behind" by Slipknot, also recommend it!