Apocalypse Unbound

by Hustlin Tom

Rating: teen
Tags: Adventure, Princess Celestia, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Sad, Nightmare Moon, Princess Luna
Length: 6957

The titanic battle between Princess Celestia and Nightmare Moon for the fate of all life

The battle that defined history for hundreds of years. It is easy from a modern perspective to assume the outcome was certain; that Princess Celestia would be victorious over the deranged Nightmare Moon. The universal constant of good triumphing over evil is all but set in stone now, but in the battle these titans waged, the future was impenetrably murky. Would the day ever shine its warm rays again, or would cold, dark, unforgiving night rise and never end?

This is an appendix to A Journey Unthought of: A man's life in Equestria, however it can be treated as its own stand alone story that enhances the established canon of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. This story was written before the Season 4 Premiere took place.

Published 2013-01-11 18:50:01 UTC
Last updated 2014-05-01 00:12:38 UTC

Apocalypse Unbound

Princess Celestia sat on her throne in the room of court in the now darkened Everfree Castle. Just an hour ago, she and her subjects had been enjoying the annual Summer Sun Celebration. It had seemed like nothing could possibly ruin a day so full of joy, light, and happiness. But then the sky had darkened. As all the gathered hosts of jovial ponies looked up, the moon, by some mad twist of nature, had appeared alongside the sun, and at the stroke of midday, the moon devoured the bright, glowing body. What was left after the desecration to her vessel in the heavens was a black sphere with an aura of cold, evil light. Some had feared that the sun had died, and that the world was at its end. Panic had filled the nation as ponies had fled for their lives in every direction, and the nation was cast into a dreadful hopelessness never before visited on ponykind.

The Princess knew the assumption of her sun’s demise to be untrue, though, as she could still feel it was present in the skies above. Somehow, the moon had..eclipsed the sun. Even as terror gripped everyone’s hearts, it had seized the Princess’ most of all. She had called for a search for her sister Princess Luna, guardian and keeper of the moon, but the azure alicorn could not be found. Dread filled the Princess as she thought her sister might have been murdered and her powers over the moon usurped. She also feared the eclipse as well; whoever was guiding the moon now knew how to control it, but that also meant they should know that if the sun and moon were too close to each other, their fields of gravity would naturally draw each other in, destroying them and the planet below. Yet this was an inevitability that was being held at bay. The arcane power needed to maintain such an alignment of the three astral bodies in a stationary location would be enormous, and that meant that the Regent of the Sun not only had an enemy who had great knowledge of the laws of nature, but also had the power to hold three massive objects in a specific position of space just to prove that he or she was more powerful than the Princess. She had initially suspected Discord of such a feat, but she had found him still contained in his magical stone prison within her gardens. Nopony had come forth to claim this horrendous act as their own, no demands had been made, and no challenges had been put forth.

The white coated, pink haired alicorn uneasily got up from her seat and walked to a window in in the western wall of the castle. Looking out on what she could see of the city below, she saw that all the homes beneath were locked and shut up. Not a single pony strayed from their homes as they cowered in any safe corner they could find and begged for deliverance from the dead sun. The city appeared and felt as if it was dead. No noise could be heard but for the few wails the inhabitants made; nature seemed to be uncharacteristically silent. It was as if the world were waiting in silent vigil for something to occur; whether for good or evil was anyone’s guess. What sort of a monster, the Princess fumed quietly to herself, would cause her ponies this much fear and pain?

Suddenly, she heard Princess Luna’s urgent voice cry out in her mind Sister, look out!

Princess Celestia was able to turn her head just in time to see a black armored alicorn bearing down on her with a magically constructed broadsword in her telekinetic grip. The hellish mare leapt into the air to cut her down with an overhead vertical strike. The Princess was able to quickly construct a shield of light around herself in time before the sword made physical contact with her. Either the swing was so powerful or her opponent’s magic was very strong, because even though the shield did manage to deflect the assault, her protective barrier was shattered by the impact. Her foe temporarily stunned by her block, Princess Celestia used as much magical knowledge and concentration as she had to create a sword of her own. The weapon she created was constructed of golden energy, and the blade itself was made with a wavy pattern; elegant but useful, as it would allow her to control where her enemy’s blade could go and let her slip her own sword where she needed to when she needed it.

The obsidian alicorn had recovered her stance, but in the meantime the Royal Guard had poured into the court chamber, their pikes and swords pointed at the abominable interloper. The highest ranking guardspony barked to the black mare, “You will identify yourself, sheath your sword, and end hostilities against our Princess!”

The would-be regicidal mare chuckled at the show of force put before her as more and more guardsponies entered the chamber. She looked at each of them in turn, her unnerving draconic eyes roving over every single one of them, “You amuse me with your silly but pathetic show of arms. I will give you one chance to surrender your lives and service to me as your new Princess. After that, should you refuse, I will destroy every single one of you. Your fate is entirely up to you.”

Before Princess Celestia could shout out to her guards to stand down, they charged the black mare as one stallion.

“Pity,” the armored alicorn muttered before she vaulted every single one of the guardsponies into the ceiling. The entire company of the Royal Guard present in the room was crushed and broken against the wooden roof of the court, and all of them met their ends as they fell beaten to the unforgiving stone floor.

Horrified and enraged by the loss of her ponies, Princess Celestia let out a warcry as she herself charged the murderous alicorn. Swinging her sword with a fury she did not know she had, she made several strikes, a few of which made their mark on the black flesh beneath the lavender armor of her opponent. Crying out in pain, the black mare fell to her knees. The Princess deftly laid the edge of her sword against her enemy’s neck.

The two of them breathed heavily for a time, looking into the other’s eyes. Righteous anger filled Princess Celestia’s, and venomous fury filled the obsidian alicorn’s. Her opponent lay before her, smitten by her blade in multiple areas over her body. She had a particular deep rend in her left shoulder, and several shallow cuts along her forelegs.

“Now,” the Princess breathed, “Are you the one responsible for the eclipse?”

“Yes,” the black mare growled deeply.

“To what end?”

“Vengeance.”

“What have you done with my sister?”

Her beaten would-be murderer scoffed, “Of course you wouldn’t know.”

The Princess delicately scratched her enemy’s neck with her sword, causing the mare to quietly gasp, “Don’t play games with me! Where is she?”

At that moment the Regent of the Sun noticed something about her opponent. Blood should have been pouring out of her considerable wounds, but there was none to be seen on the floor at all. Princess Celestia then quickly looked to the wounds themselves, and she saw something fantastic. Out of the gashes of her opponent flowed a silver energy, which was quickly beginning to bind up and mend the wounds themselves from which they left.

The black alicorn chuckled once more, “In all this time, I’ve never seen you act with such ferocity, or so much care for your sister, and now I’ve seen your extremes in just a couple of minutes!” In but a short time, wounds which would have taken months to heal even partially on a normal pony were fully closed, and she began to stand as she restored herself.

The Princess’ sword involuntarily lowered to her side as she looked on wonder. “Who and what are you?” she asked more to herself than anypony.

The mare rose up to her full height once more, and before the Princess could react in time, she shoved her magical blade into the Princess’ chest. Princess Celestia’s mouth opened into an ‘O’ shape of surprise, her sword dissipated, and she slowly fell onto her side in agony.

The dark mare mercilessly removed the blade with a twist and leaned her head down next to the Princess’ ear, “I am a god, dear sister. Just like you.”

Princess Celestia lost comprehension of her physical pain, as she looked on the dark mare with frightful realization, “L-Luna?”

“She’s in here as well. Let me tell you a story while your body knits itself back together.”

The Princess looked down to the gaping hole in her chest only to find a strange light was emanating from her injuries as well; the difference being that her light was golden rather than silver.

“A princess in a certain land once thought that her subjects were good, caring, and decent to all they met. Upon finding out such was not the case, she swiftly made to change things for the better, but she was spurned not only by her own herd, but her arrogant, pompous, and stagnant elder sister. All your dear little Luna ever wanted was for life to be fair for everypony in the land of Equestria. But when the nobility and the narrow-minded commonponies saw she intended suffrage for the races the populace irrationally feared and mistrusted, they rejected her and called her ‘meddlesome’, ‘a witch’, and ‘faux princess’. Then I came along, and I offered her consolation when your herd murdered and drove away anypony she cared about, and together we helped her realize that life isn’t fair, and that it never will be.” The cold black alicorn began to lazily flick her magically constructed sword in her mental grip, “I’m everything she never could show to the world for shame to herself. I am the greatest part of her darkness, and now that I have control of hers and my body, I have humiliated you, I will destroy you as I’ve already destroyed the nobles, and in a short while, I will end you as I did them. Now, get up.” The black mare kicked the Princess into an upright position with her right forehoof, “I want you to fight for your life before I kill you,” and she turned and walked a couple of paces away.

The Sun Princess slowly got to her hooves as her self-restorative energies finished mending her chest wound, “Luna, please let me help you.”

The dark mare turned to her mortal enemy, “Yes, of course. Now that I’ve told you I’ll end your life, you offer up your aid under severe duress. You truly want to help your sister?”

“Yes,” the Princess nodded resolutely.

The black alicorn raised her sword and ran toward the Princess. “Then make this last a while! We want plenty of sword practice!” Princess Celestia backed away as she conjured her sword again, and she parried blow after blow that the dark mare rained down on her.

The two alicorns had lived an enormous span of time in their Everfree Castle, so they each had a photographic memory of the many rooms that lay throughout the castle. With each strike of her opponent, Princess Celestia gave ground as she led their battle into the less public areas of the castle so that no more of her ponies would become collaterally slaughtered. The black mare saw through her actions, but allowed the Princess to lead her on; she didn’t really care where the battle took place so long as it continued.

“Please, Luna!” the Princess entreated while ducking a high horizontal slice which would have felled a good sized tree in one blow, “I don’t want to fight you!”

“That’s because you know you’ll lose,” the dark mare shouted which she followed up with a couple of jabs of her sword. She cackled as she saw the Princess parrying and dancing around her blade with a look of fear in her eyes. They finally locked blades, but the Princess’ magical strength was weakening rapidly as she continued to reluctantly defend herself. “You are a failure and a weakling, dear sister! I will drown out your precious little Sun, and veil the land in my glorious unending darkness! All shall love me and despair! Tremble before the might of Nightmare Moon!” the mare grinned madly the entire time she delivered her boast.

“I don’t care what you do to me,” the Princess said, quickly twisting her blade downward out of the lock, causing the black mare to stumble and lose her balance. Taking a large, thick tapestry from the wall, she wound it around the mad alicorn’s form with her magic, “I will not let you hurt our ponies,” and in the blink of an eye, the Sun Princess teleported away. She rematerialized several hundred feet up in the skies above the town outside of Everfree Castle. Summoning up the Royal Voice of Declaration, she boomed down to the houses below. “ATTENTION PONIES! THIS IS PRINCESS CELESTIA! ABANDON YOUR HOMES! EVERFREE CASTLE IS NOT SAFE! FLEE FOR YOUR LIVES!” House doors burst open as families quickly realized who was talking to them. “I REPEAT! FLEE FOR YOUR LIVES! THE CASTLE IS NO LONGER SAFE AND NEITHER IS THE TOWN! ABANDON YOUR HOMES!” The townsponies fled for the nearest gateways of the town, just as the Princess had commanded of them. The streets were packed full of citizens of all races and ages, each trying to escape, while the skies were full of Pegasi attempting to carry some of the smaller ponies and foals on their backs or in their forehooves out of the town.

From the corner of her eye, the Princess saw a shadow flying at impossible speeds directly toward her an instant before it slammed into her side. She spun out of control as she fell to the city below, spiraling towards the center of the town, where the public watering fountain was. She saw the form of Nightmare Moon plummeting right beside her, when the armored alicorn deliberately collided with her again, kicking her into the path of the large centerpiece of the fountain. The white alicorn crashed into the ornate granite structure of an earthen pony shaped sculpture head on, smashing it to pieces against her naturally and magically reinforced cranium. Her limp form bashed through the edge of the fountain, causing it to spill its contents into the street. She finally came to a halt when she burst through the front of a two story thatched roof cobbled dwelling. The obsidian form of Nightmare Moon pulled into a dive that shot her back up towards the sky, from which she glided gracefully down towards the momentary resting place of her rival to the throne.

The Princess’ body was utterly broken. No ordinary pony would have survived the initial impact with the unforgivingly hard sculpture, much less the rest of what she made contact with, yet somehow her body still managed to draw breath. Golden points of light flew around her as her shoulders and wings were relocated, her broken skull fused back together, and her leg bones set and repaired themselves. Her spinal column repositioned itself with many loud cracks, and her fractured ribs and pelvis returned to their customary positions as they healed. Nightmare Moon waited patiently outside the house as she watched on, marveling to herself at how well alicorn physiology could so quickly and perfectly repair itself.

“That’s right,” she said, as Princess Celestia picked herself up shakily, “Come back for second helpings. You were never this much fun before, dear sister! Now, let’s try killing you again.”

Reconjured and at the ready, Nightmare Moon's sword came down to try and bisect the Princess down the middle. A force slammed against her weapon, holding it in place mere inches above the Princess’ head. Princess Celestia's horn was flaring with golden light, and her eyes now flashed white. Her hair, which normally laid down across her neck, began to blow in a breeze of her own making as she summoned power from the earth and skies. Clouds began to form as magic cascaded off the Sun Princess.

“You have endangered my subjects and every inhabitant of this planet with your cheap parlor trick up above. Now that they’re out of the way, I am through holding back,” a thunderbolt arced down from the clouds above, and struck the Princess’ horn. Applying just a touch of her magic, she redirected the pink and golden chained lightning directly into her enemy’s face, “And my sister’s name is Luna, not Nightmare Moon!”

The black alicorn flew back through multiply houses, smashing into the market district two streets down from town square. Princess Celestia leapt into the sky, her wings guiding and stabilizing her jump as she landed right on top of the momentarily paralyzed Nightmare Moon. Crushed and twitching uncontrollably, the ghoulish mare laughed as her body already began to rejuvenate her brutalized form even under the Sun Princess’ crushing hooves, “Using all those desserts you ate to your advantage, aren’t you Celestia?” As the Princess unconsciously changed her body stance while trying to process the insult related to her eating habits, Nightmare Moon telekinetically grabbed her by the hindleg and threw her against a nearby house.

Regaining her footing and maintaining her hold, the Nightmare Moon began to swing her opponent by the leg, popping the hip out of its socket. Princess Celestia howled in pain as she haphazardly tried to escape the immaterial grip around her leg with both her wings and her magic. “While you were busy doing whatever it is privileged ponies like you do, I was fighting monsters in the Everfree Forest and dragons along our northeastern border. Here, let me show you one of my particular favorite maneuvers!” Punctuating her last sentence, she released her grip on Princess Celestia, timing her angle of trajectory so that the object with which the Princess would collide was the closest tower of Everfree Castle. The Princess slammed through the cobble and mortar wall of the second floor of the astronomy tower and fell through the wooden floors to the basement far below. The structure had suffered so severe of a blow that the upper levels began to groan and collapse onto the levels beneath, each crashing down onto the lower floor, until all that was left of the tower was boulders, splintered wood, and dust.

Nightmare Moon flew to the now demolished portion of Castle Everfree and landed just a couple of horselengths from the desolate pile. She waited a minute. Three minutes. Five. Even after a full ten minutes, the mound did not stir with her sister’s revived body. A part of her twisted, dark mind wanted it to simply be done and walk away from the newly christened burial ground. It was a part of her mind she silenced immediately; a Princess will not dead be, until the body is found by thee, she silently mused. Ripping up several tons of rock and broken timber at a time with her magic, she did not stop until she saw the edge of a broken pale white leg buried beneath a particularly large section of tower wall. Triumph gleamed in her eyes as she smiled a hellish grin. The Princess was dead!

Propping up the fallen tower wall, she feasted her eyes on the broken and lifeless form of her sister. In the bowels of her mind, Nightmare Moon felt the semi-conscious mind of Princess Luna wailing in deep regret. “Be silent,” she verbally spoke to her subdued persona, “this is what you wanted when we agreed to this pact of vengeance.” Suddenly, she saw a golden glow coming from the body of the departed Princess Celestia, and in but an instant it rose into the air and burst into golden stardust. The alicorn was confused as the particles fizzled into nothingness. This did not feel like a powerful being departing the mortal plane, the dark mare thought with frustration. It felt as if a powerful enchantment had dissipated, just..like.. an illusion spell. “Clever girl,” Nightmare Moon grimaced with frustration and admiration before her head was crushed between two titanic boulders.

Princess Celestia appeared several feet away from her deranged sister, shedding her light based invisibility from her form. She split the rocks encasing her opponent’s head away from each other, only to smash them against her head again. She repeated the same process once more, hoping it would have some effect on the deranged alicorn. Nightmare Moon forcefully fragmented the rocks her head was encased in from the inside out, spreading shrapnel all around the newly created battlefield of the southern portion of the castle. Shaking her head and body free of the tiny bits of rubble, she looked toward the white alicorn with her serpentine eyes. “It seems we won’t be so easily rid of each other as we thought,” the black mare angrily commented. Princess Celestia remained silent as she slowly began to stride toward her enemy. “Oh come now, Celestia, don’t insult me! You could at least put some effort into pretending you still have some chance of beating me!”

No sound passed the Princess’ lips to acknowledge her opponent’s goading.

Growling in irritation at not receiving a reaction of any kind, the dark alicorn ripped multiple large rocks and flung them towards her steadily approaching target. The Princess didn’t even blink as she magically slapped as many of the large rocks to her side as she could. One large shard of solid mortar grazed her cheek, and in five seconds time the gash was healed by golden energy.

“SAY SOMETHING, FOR THE LOVE OF THE STARS!” Nightmare Moon roared in fury and confusion at the grim pony now but three feet away from her.

“You took my sister from me,” the Sun Princess growled in a low tone as she slammed her golden regal horse shoe against the dark mare’s face.

“You filled her head with twisted venomous words,” she struck her stunned opponent with another blow of her foreleg.

“I may not have been everything she needed,” the Princess turned her back on her opponent and leaned forward, “but I loved her, and I want my Luna back!” and with her last exclamation she bucked her hind legs, the sole focus of impact being the dark mare’s chest. Nightmare Moon flew from the force of the strike. Propelled through the air, she slammed through a stone wall, flying deeper into the castle.

The Princess followed her path of unintentional destruction through the wall she had knocked down. The room that she found herself in was pitch black. She wasn’t certain, but she believed it had to be the kitchens from the faint but wonderful smells of spices and sauces that crossed her nose. The room’s darkness was oppressive and muggy, the normally roaring cooking fires had been hastily doused by the cooks fleeing the castle several minutes earlier, and even the little light from the outside twilight created by the eclipse barely penetrated the blackness located within the room.

“Where are you?” Princess Celestia demanded to the humid air, “Show yourself!”

She took several steps further into the room. She did not notice the hole in the wall she had used as her new doorway to the large room had become covered over with creeping shadow.

“You and I both know this has to end soon,” the Princess called out to her hidden opponent, “This world is connected to us through our power and the magic from the Elements. The more we fight, the more this planet rips itself apart! Can you not feel the floods or the earthquakes running roughshod across our world? I’m not as connected to nature as you are, and even in your state you must feel it deep in the back of your mind! If we don’t end this now, our sun and moon will invariably toss us out to the blackness beyond our rightful place in the universe. Nothing can survive that!”

“Nothing but us,” the disembodied voice of the insane Nightmare Moon chuckled. “Everything would freeze back into the jagged, primal ice we once delivered this world from when we recreated it. All the races of the earth would perish in a matter of hours, and I could start anew.”

“You’d be a ruler of corpses,” the Princess declared as she turned her head about this way and that, trying to locate her enemy with her heightened senses.

“Exactly. I want you all to die for what you did to me. I am alone already, so what does it matter how many lives I have to take to receive my restitution from life itself?”

Princess Celestia could not believe her ears at the utterly evil words coming from what had once been her sister’s lips. Clarity hit her like a sudden bright ray of sunlight; this wasn’t just simple vengeance on those who may or may not have hurt Nightmare Moon, it was plain as day that the monster her sister had become intended pure and unquestioned omnicide. In the deepest corner of her mind, she heard a tiny but firm voice speak to her; It is your duty in this moment to end this evil. If you don’t, all hope is genuinely lost for every race of this world. There is no alternative.

“I am going to stop you,” the Princess firmly said to the shadows, “even if I have to bend the heavens and the powers of Tartarus to my will, I will find a way to keep you from annihilating all life.”

“I’m afraid your fate is already sealed,” the blackness said to her, and at last the Princess realized that the very darkness she stood in was alive and malevolent. She tried to run for the hole that led out of the dark miasma of shadows to the safe but eerie twilight outside, but she could not remove her feet from the floor, nor could she even see where she had come from. Quickly she glancing down, and she found that the darkness encased her hooves in frozen shadow, which was slowly creeping up her body. She struggled as best as she could, but the shadows continued climbing onto her body and consuming her in utter darkness. When physical strength abandoned her, she turned to her innate magical abilities. Alighting her horn with a golden glow, she focused all of her magic into fundamentally changing her body from matter into energy. In a few seconds time, Princess Celestia had shed her body’s natural physical state, and instead had become a bundle of bright pink light and pure flame.

The darkness that had once encased her fled into the corners of the room, and not even the shadow that she would have cast on the floor could be found. With the visibility of the room now returned to her senses, she saw that the dark alicorn was running up the servant’s staircase. She galloped across the room, leaving behind an ethereal trail of pink light and fire, and began her own ascension of the stone stairs. As she cleared the last step of the staircase, she felt her enemy was leading her to a causeway only a little ways off, and so she teleported to the hallway, materializing right in front of the dark mare. Having no time to slow her charging pace down the hallway, Nightmare Moon transformed into a gaseous dark fog that flew right through the Princess. Rising up to the ceiling above, the cloud oozed through the timbered roof of the castle, and continued on to the skies above. Wasting no time at all, the white alicorn pursued her foe by becoming a thin spectral trail of pink light, which soared upward and burned through the ceiling with ease.

Into the stratosphere did their battle take them, their paths crossing this way and that as they frequently exchanged roles of pursuer and prey. The clouds that formed earlier in their skirmish began to boil into large thunder heads and wall clouds. Lightning forked all around as they clashed into each other, their physical strikes created shockwaves that excited the atmosphere around them to create electrical discharges, and low pressure environments began the formation of miniature cyclones. Hail beat down onto the lands below that was the size of softballs for several minutes, but in the ensuing chaos was soon replaced by the cleared but darkened skies of the eclipse. Every lightning strike broadcast an afterimage of the progress of the battle, the storm clouds acting as the stage for the entire world to see the titanomachy that was being created by the two warring personified aspects of nature itself.

The battle moved even beyond the borders of Equestria, as the two gods fought for the very fate of the planet. The volcanic canyons and basaltic spires of the southwest greeted the both of them as they careened around the now active fiery mountains that spewed forth ash and belched forth molten rock and glass. The fight had descended from the traditional unicorn sword combat at its beginning to brute force of magic and now to the primal use of hoof stomps, beating and blinding each other with their wings, and biting. No exchange of words was made as each combatant fought the other; each was too consumed in the next action and result of the heat of battle. A hoof strike above the wing socket, a buck of the hind legs to a vulnerable underbelly, crashing a pillar of solid rock down on the other, biting anywhere on the body with either a regular horse mouth or one magically altered to grow incisors. Blow after blow after blow, each combatant would rise again from fatal wounds to inflict similar if not greater wounds on the other. Princess Celestia would divert flying molten magma into her enemy’s path, only for Nightmare Moon to draw meteors from low orbit to do the same to her.

In spite of what Nightmare Moon had believed of her magical supremacy over the Princess, the both of them could see that each could match the other in some way the other was not necessarily as strong in. The Princess’ brute strength and fury was greater than that of her enemy, but the dark alicorn had a greater magical aptitude and versatility than she did. The stalemate of power could not last forever; and the both of them knew there was only one thing on the planet to irrevocably tip the balance to determine full and unquestioned victory; The Elements of Creation.

The both of them looked to each other in the same instant, and they knew that the other warrior had come to the same tactical conclusion. Both of them shot off at speeds well above the threshold of sound, shattering the brittle and volatile environment around them in the hopes of reaching Everfree Castle before the other. They kicked out at each other in midair, as they both did anything to shorten the distance between them and their target, teleporting around objects or blasting right over or through them. The walls of the castle rushed into each of their views in a microsecond, and they both hit the structure at the same time, leveling a large chunk of the castle from the force of entry and the aftershock of the sonic boom created from their flight.

The cathedral-like room where the Elements were stored no longer had a roof, the stained glass all around was shattered into dust but for some of the more stubborn chunks that remained in their frames. Bodies crushed to a pulp, not a single bone unbroken, they slowly began to reconstitute their forms and hobble toward the pedestal where the Elements were kept.

The most holy artifacts in Equine history, each a perfect geometric sphere without fault, the Elements of Creation held a single but rich color locked in their crystalline shells. Amethyst, Emerald, Topaz, Ruby, Sapphire, and Lavender. They seemed just like ordinary gems in appearance, but looks can be so very deceiving. Caged within each of these primordial stones was the power to create life from nothing but poisoned ice and earth, as the Princess’ had done only four hundred years previous. Now, these holy tools for bringing life were up for gamble as the most massively destructive weapons ever known to any race.

“Mine,” Nightmare Moon slurred as her jaw began to rejoin itself to her skull, “They’re mine!”

Princess Celestia’s legs had healed faster than her opponents, but she was temporarily paralyzed from the front legs back as she scooted across the stone floor on her useless behind, grunted in the act of exerting herself through enormous amounts of pain.

They both reached out with their magic to seize the Elements in their grip simultaneously. The spheres lurched from their pedestals towards the area between the Princess of the Sun and the fallen Princess of the Night, but they were too closely matched even then for one to fully take the Elements from the other. Both now fully restored, the bitter opponents stood on opposite sides of the room, bracing their hooves as best as they could against the smoothly polished stone floor.

“The Elements are mine!” Nightmare Moon roared.

“They were never meant for this, but I will use them as I can to make sure you lose!” the Princess yelled over the growing gusts that now filled the chapel.

Their magic flowed even more into their attempts to seize the six gems. The arcane energy that filled the air was practically breathable, and small traces of golden and bluish purple light moved lazily about the chamber in slow but beautiful patterns. The warring spells began to rebound back onto each other, and bolts of chaotic energy flew all around. The walls of Everfree castle groaned, the rafters creaked and snapped. The magic continued to rebound and grow at an alarming rate, until the walls of the entire castle quaked and gave way. As the mystic lightning struck the large falling chunks of the castle, they slowly began to float into the air. Entire hallways and rooms of the castle, still untouched from the battle, rose higher and higher into the sky, as did the two alicorns.

The dueling forces of magic roared like a ferocious hurricane. The planet could not take much more of the conflict, and neither could the planet’s orbit. Time was very quickly running out for everyone. Princess Celestia did not know what else to do; her mind was utterly exhausted of any useful ideas but to hang on to the Elements of Creation with a mental death grip. But then inspiration came to her from that little voice in her head once more. She knew what she had to do, and she also knew that once she started, she could not stop.

Nightmare Moon felt the shift of the magic field almost as soon as it happened. The Sun Princess opened up her forelegs and held her head high; she had made her own body a ready and waiting conduit. The Elements’ power flared, and the energy released from the crystals slowly began to flow into the awaiting form of Princess Celestia.

“No! NO!” the black alicorn shrieked in fury. A seed of fear and desperation grew in her heart, and she tried to also absorb the power of the Elements. With a force she had not expected, the Elements shut her out from the connection the three of them shared, and they repulsed her away, causing her to roll end over end before she recovered her flight a few dozen feet above the ground.

The holy gems began to slowly revolve around the form of Princess Celestia, and her features began to change. Her long, pink hair began to flow as if it was being tossed in a serene wind. Multicolored fire consumed her mane and tail, and what now replaced the Princess’ pink colors was a mixture of pink, cerulean, and aquamarine. Her mane and tail flowed like the corona of the sun, as if her hair reflected the solar storms created by her signature astral body. Her eyes were bright with enormous power, and she looked down on her enemy not as a Princess saving the world, but as a harbinger of balance and order.

“NIGHTMARE MOON,” Princess Celestia’s voice boomed with the deepness of an earthquake, “THERE IS NO PLACE IN THIS WORLD FOR YOUR EVIL.”

Terrified, the black alicorn could only gawk at what her opponent had become.

The Princess roared down from her position in the sky as a furious cloud of rainbow fire. Striking her opponent, the Princess carried the dark alicorn farther up into the air, climbing higher and higher. The light and pure energy burned Nightmare Moon in a way she had never felt before; it was a cold fire, one created from unbelievable and unknowably powerful magic. She bellowed in pain and fury as the Princess flew them both up past the upper edges of the atmosphere. The silence that accosted them both upon escaping orbit was absolute, and altogether terrifying.

Tia, the Princess heard a small voice call out to her mind. The Princess had had her eyes closed to spare her the sight of what she was doing. She opened them now, and it stopped her heart.

Nightmare Moon was looking down at her through the cone of arcane energy propelling her through the vacuum of space. The intimidating armored alicorn stared down at her for an instant not with the eyes of a murderous lost pony, but with the eyes of the sister she had known and loved for all their lives. Tia, the small voice of Princess Luna said, as if she was slowly falling back to sleep from a small interruption of her dreams, Thank you. The Princess grimaced and her tears flew away into the blackness of nothing, as she called back to her sister, Oh Luna, I’m so sorry.

The moon was just out in front of them now, it’s dark side quickly approaching, ready to receive its first ever pony visitors. The Princess softly landed on the surface of the little heavenly body. It was strange to think that something that she had seen almost every night and could take for granted could be so alien when looked at from a different angle. She momentarily looked back to where they had come from, and the sight that fell on her eyes would have caught her breath if there had been air around her. A blue orb, majestic in its simplicity, serenely floated under the shadow of the moon itself.

It took her a moment to let her mind realize that the fight was now over. As that thought began to sink in, she also knew there was still something that needed to be done about her enemy. Nightmare Moon looked up to her victorious enemy. Even with no wind in their uninhabitable surroundings, Princess Celestia mane and tail continued to flow as if a soft wind played across the stark lunar surface.

This isn’t over. The dark alicorn said matter-of-factly through her telepathic broadcast.

I know. The Princess nodded her head.

In one thousand years to this very date, the stars will align and aid my escape, and when that day comes, I will make my promise come true, and then the world will end.

That day may come, the white alicorn shrugged, but the world’s end won’t be either of our doing. For now, you will sleep. The Princess’ horn glowed with golden energy one last time, and she broke her sister’s form into tiny particles of purple dust, scattering the pile above herself.

With the deed done, the Princess of the Sun set out to return the cosmos to their natural order. Taking up the role of Princess of the Night, Princess Celestia commanded the moon to move, and obeying its new mistress’ wishes, the moon was lowered. As the moon moved to the other side of the planet, unobscuring the sun, she was startled to notice that the purple dust that was Nightmare Moon had formed into the shape of her likeness on the surface of her former vassal. It seemed that with one last act, the former bringer of darkness had hoped to continue to terrify the races that slept beneath her moon for generations to come.

Princess Celestia did not change the pattern. She needed to be reminded that some things were more important than any kingdom; that when her sister had needed her most, she had failed to respond because of her own desires to make the whole of Equestria happy, rather than starting from her own circle of family and friends and working outward. At all times, she also needed to be reminded of one very crucial fact; she had bought her nation and all others one thousand years of borrowed time. Equestria needed to change in radical ways, and she was the only one who could do it. The Princess glided through the empty backdrop of blackness back to the beautiful blue orb below, silently promising to herself that she would never again fail to act in some way when trouble of any kind arose in her lands from within or without. Never again.

Epilogue - The Nightmare That Almost Was

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