Mass Hysteria

Chapter 5: Royal Reaction

Celestia had just finished setting the sun when a scroll from Twilight popped into existence right in front of her. Using her magic she held the scroll, opening it slowly as she climbed onto her bed. Once she had read the letter in it's entirety she immediately set to writing a letter to each of the ponies Twilight had mentioned, and within five minutes they were sent off, followed by Celestia quickly running towards Luna's room.

"Sister, we have an emergency!" Celestia said quickly as she burst through the black doors that led to Luna's room, finding her sister with her snout firmly place between the pages of a book.

"What is it this time?" Luna asked, having accompanied Celestia's "emergency"'s with a shortage of cake or fine wine. When Celestia grabbed Luna by the shoulders and spun her around she knew it was something more urgent, and put her book down immediately so she could listen to what had happened.

"Twilight and her friends have been impregnated by some unknown force, yet none of them have had any relation with a stallion!" Celestia blurted out all in one breath, making Luna give her a confused look. It was extremely unlike Celestia to be acting this way, but Luna could somewhat understand why she was acting so erratically. Twilight and the rest of her friends were all very near and dear to Celestia's heart, and whenever they were in danger she would act differently, to the point where she would throw cakes at the servants should she be bored enough.

"Sister, do you have any idea what might have caused something like this to happen?" Luna asked, trying to console her sister so she wouldn't do anything reckless.

"Well, no, to be honest, nothing like this has ever happened before, it would take an extremely powerful Alicorn to-" Celestai froze mid-explanation and looked at Luna with fear in her eyes, "It's her"

"Who is her?" Luna asked, the ominous name given to whomever Celestia was talking about not ringing any bells in her head. For a moment Celestia gave Luna a surprised look, but she quickly remembered that she had spent a thousand years on the moon, completely isolated from the going on's in Equestria. She thought for a moment to think about how to explain things to Luna, but quickly remembered an old story she had heard.

"In times of peace and good, there will always be an evil" Celestia recited, taking a moment to remember the rest of it, "When no evil rises to the challenge, Hysteria will appear"

"Sister what does an old saying have to do with any of this?" Luna asked, the final part of the saying still not helping to make her understand what Celestia was trying to say. Luna continued to look at Celestia in confusion until the name finally clicked. Her shocked expression brought a knowing smile to Celestia's face.

"You couldn't possible mean..." Luna said slowly, watching Celestia's reaction carefully. When Celestia nodded at her she felt a sense of dread come over her. Back before she had become Nightmare Moon her and Celestia had fought against the Alicorn known as Hysteria. At first she was a princess, like them, but over time she began to lose her mine, slowly but surely slipping into madness. Her first actions of madness was to try and enslave the Zebra's of the nearby country of Zebrafica, and then Griffons of Griffonia. Their rulers had stood against her, and within a few weeks Celestia and Luna were made aware of her heinous crimes. As punishment she was ordered to submit to the Elements of Harmony, which would strip her of her extreme powers and abilities, but she resisted. From there Celestia and Luna had to place a trap for her in the old castle in the Everfree forest, and it was there were they had their final fight, locking Hysteria away far beneath the ruins that remained.

"How is it possible that she's returned?" Luna asked, giving Celestia an extremely worried look.

"I believe the Element's hold on her has weakened over time, and now she has become strong enough to reach out of her prison to interact with the ponies around it" Celestia hypothesized, "She may be attempted to distract Twilight and her friends from doing their duty as the bearers of the Elements, thereby allowing her to eventually use her magic to break out"

"How would pregnancy affect the Elements of Harmony?" Luna asked, having been gone during the time when Celestia learned about quite a few things about the Elements, including the affects of them being bound to a mare who is pregnant.

"When a mare is pregnant while she carries the Elements their strength is inversely effected" Celestia explained, "Their power becomes diluted and the effectiveness is lowered dramatically, as the mare's respective Element will begin to manifest itself in the unborn foal"

"So the Elements will end up working at an extremely decreased effectiveness now?" Luna asked, still not understanding what Celestia was trying to explain to her.

"Yes, because the Element manifests in the foal the mother will slowly lose their connection to it" Celestia explained further, "The foal will become an actual living embodiment of the Element, whether that be magic, kindness, honesty, loyalty, laughter, or generosity"

"That means the foals would have to..." Luna trailed off, the explanation finally making sense to her.

"Exactly, but the foals would be too young to use them properly, and as such, Hysteria would be able to break out, eliminating them as well as anypony else that could stand in their way" Celestia sad, followed by Luna and Celestia giving each other a worried look before they both turned to look out over Luna's balcony, right at the Everfree forest.

"This is bad..." Luna said, pausing to look up at her shining moon, "Very bad..."