Dark Libra

Luna had looked frantically all over Ponyville for Twilight. Her fear was ever growing as determination turned into desperation. She flew to a nearby cloud and landed with such grace that only 1000 years of life can give somepony. Luna figured that if Twilight was still asleep or at least unconscious she could enter in some form a of dream. Luna closed her eyes and entered the plane of dreams. She found herself standing in a central chamber of what looked like the Canterlot throne room. Long hallways with many doors rested on all walls and there were signs above each entrance. The one to Ponyville had only a few doors in it, with good reason thanks to the alarm this morning. She was about to enter it when she saw a new hallway sprout up next to her with the sign saying "Everfree Forest". This hall was up only three days ago and it closed the second she tried to enter last night. The princess decided to leave it, seeing as it just opened. She proceeded to walked down the short hall of Ponyville. There were only three doors in the hall and each had signs saying which dreamer they belonged too. Even greater fear swept over her when she read the names of the doors. Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle were written on the oak signs.

Luna decided to enter them in order starting with Fluttershy. She opened the door and was hit with a flash of light that left her dazed. When the dark blue Alicorn regained her composure she stepped through the void and into the dream. What she saw made Luna uneasy at the fact that she was in the Ponyville Library and Fluttershy was frantically trying to heal something. Something sounds right because whatever she was working on was surrounded by a dark mist on a cot in the corner. Luna looked around and saw the dream versions of Spike wrapping a hurt Twilight on the steps of the stairs.

Focusing on her goal, Luna approached the frantic yellow pegasus and asked in a tender voice. "Fluttershy, what has happened? Are you ok?"

The timid pegasus looked over with a sad expression and replied as she started to burst into tears and fall to the floor, "I failed Princess. I wasn't able to save him. H-he's gone and its my fault."

Luna took a step forward and immediately said, "Dearest Fluttershy, you didn't fail anypony. The thing on the cot isn't real, you are dreaming. There was an explosion and I am trying to find Twilight. Have you seen her before you fell asleep?"

Fluttershy looked at the mist on the cot then pulled herself together. Her sobbing slowed as she got a good look at what was on the cot. It was the shape of a pony but completely blurred out by a black mist.

With a deep breath she said, " The last thing I remember was..."She stopped a moment to think then continued, "Rainbow Dash and Twilight are with me in the park next to the Nightmare Moon statue. I don't know why we are there but we are."

With a large smile Luna gave Fluttershy a hug and said, "Thank you Fluttershy, you have saved me some much time. I will check on the other two then I will head to you three as soon as I'm done here."

Fluttershy nodded with a small smile and walked out of the library and into a black abyss of nothingness. Luna followed but instead of an abyss she was back in the hall. When she closed the door to Fluttershy's dream, the door sank into the ground leaving bare walls.

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The next door lead to Rainbow Dash's dream. Luna thought the rainbow pegasus had some of the best and more adventurous dreams. On one occasion she had stayed up all night and read a Daring Doo book. When she fell asleep, Rainbow Dash dreamt she was Daring Doo trying to steal some treasure from a tomb. The dream ended with her getting caught in quicksand at the end of her run from danger. Well no matter what it was this time, it was going to be entertaining. She opened the door and the same stunning flash of light hit her but it was ever brighter this time around. The now annoyed princess of the night angrily rubbed her eyes with a foreleg in an attempt to clear her vision. Once again she entered the dream door and stepped onto a cloud floating high above in the sky. There was no visible land mass anywhere in sight but the sky was crystal blue and the sun shined brightly. Suddenly a sonic Rainboom erupted in the distance followed a sonic boom milliseconds later. Then, another duet of the two earth shattering detonations appeared, followed by another, then another. In the matter of moments that Luna had entered the sky of this dream, she saw four detonations and two streamers in the sky. One was a rainbow colored stream flying as it swirled around with its counterpart, the source of the sonic boom. A gray stream was side by side with the rainbow one and they were forming a double helix as they flew faster and faster.

"Rainbow Dash!" Luna yelled using the royal Canterlot voice trying to get the rainbow rocket's attention.

It must have worked because both of the streams arced and flew toward her. Rainbow Dash was now visible to Luna, as she approached something seemed wrong. Rainbow Dash had a look of complete terror on her face.

"Run Princess Luna!" hollered the pegasus as she flew past the princess of the night.

Luna looked back the to gray figure when it roared. It was a gray pegasus that looked as though it was made of ink. It flew over Luna and was gaining on its prey. Luna made a quick decision and fired a beam of blue energy from her horn. The blast found its mark and detonated leaving the ink creature hovering with a hole in it’s chest. It turned and looked to Luna with its glowing blue eyes. The hole in the ink pegasus began to close and it bared its dagger like teeth at her.

"What is this?" Luna muttered to herself, then the ink pegasus morphed into a blob and reformed to look like Celestia.

"Sister what are you doing here? Why are you tormenting your subjects?" Luna yelled in surprise to at her sister.

"Luna, you attacked me!? So you still are a traitor to all of Equestria! I guess sending you to the moon wasn't enough, so I will kill you here and now!" boomed Celestia's voice angrily as her horn glowed and a beam of sunlight raced from it.

Luna quickly countered with a barrier spell, that reflected the blast in all directions while sending a beam back to Celesta. It struck Celesta in the head causing smoke to erupted from her, burning her face and mane. When the smoke cleared Celestia once again had the face of the ink pegasus. This wasn't her sister but a Nightmare Spawn that found its way into this dream and was corrupting it. This sight destroyed any hesitation Luna may have had and she went on the offensive. She shattered the barrier sending shards of light, ripping through the ink imposter.
The fragments detonated with the light of the moon causing the Nightmare Spawn to cry out in pain. Using her magic to guide the shards, Luna sent them in for another run. At the same time Dash had returned and was leading a flight of her pet Tank or Tanks as the case may be.
The flight of twenty turtles rammed into the Spawn as the shards passed again and again. Luna had stopped the shards and they spun in place making them form a sphere around it, waiting for the command to enter the oozing flesh of the hunter of dreams. With a faint flicker of light from her horn all of the thousands of shards sank deep into the Spawn at once, massing into a ball of light at its very core. Screams from the monstrosity echoed and it detonated, fading from the dream. Luna dropped to her haunches on the cloud and caught her breath. When Rainbow Dash arrived to her side Luna explained what happened to Ponyville and told her to go through the door, but not to wake Twilight up. Dash had done as instructed and left through the door leaving Luna to rest a moment so she could process what had just happened.

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Luna had left Rainbow's dream letting the door sink into the floor as Fluttershy's did. She was about to Enter Twilights dream door when something down the hall caught her attention.
She saw the outline of what looked to be another pony. She was the only one that could enter this realm anymore. Just then Twilights door sank into the floor leaving Luna cursing under her breath at her hesitation. She then trotted after what she seen. As she left the hall to Ponyville the hallway entrance sank into the ground and a stone wall took its place. She exited in time to see the figure walk into the Everfree hall. This must be the dreamer, she wondered. Luna sped up her trot and found the only door had just closed. Luna was in full gallop, determined not to miss this particular door again. The name on the sign was unreadable because it was corroded from old age. This may be due to the Everfree Forest itself being untouchable by the magic of Harmony. The door was in the same state as the rotting wooden sign above it. Luna felt something dark behind the door and it made her of all ponies, scared.

She entered the dream and found she was standing in a field of grass near a crater. The sky was black as night and the only light was her moon. She immediately noticed the mare in the moon was missing and no stars were out. She looked around as saw blackness and only a few trees that sat without leafs.

"What happened here?" Luna asked nopony in particular.

"You don't remember?" a saddened voice called to her.

"Who's there? Show yourself now." Luna demanded as she stiffened and narrowed her eyes to try to see the source.

"I will do no such thing. I don't know if you are one of them. I WILL NOT BE KILLED BY THE LIKES OF YOU!" The voice yelled.

Suddenly a large boulder came into view and was rapidly approaching her. Luna quickly teleported ten feet to the left avoiding the large stone.

"Who are You?" Luna called to the presence in the mist.

There was a only silence before another boulder appeared. Luna shot a beam of energy at it making it evaporate into glittering dust.

"Why do you attack me, I am here to help. Now tell me your name." the princess of the night asked again in a soothing tone.

There was silence once again and no more boulders came at her. Without warning there was maniacal laughter coming from the mist followed by a reply.

"You can't help me, no pony can. How can you help somepony who can't remember anything other than their first name. So tell me who are you and why do all of you want me dead?"

"What is trying to kill you? Do you mean the Nightmare Spawn. I have killed it, you are safe." Luna told the clearly crazed pony in the mist.

"You didn't answer my question." came the voice in the mist.

With a sigh Luna spoke up, " I am Princess Luna of Equestria, Goddess of the Moon and sister to Princess Celestia."

The shape of a figure appeared at the edge of the mist. It looked like a Large Pony but its body features were unable to be seen in the poor lighting through the dark mist.

"Luna." the voice began calmly. "Can it truly be you? Something in me said I needed to find you."

"Who are you?" Luna asked quietly.

"I don't know what I am." The voice started. "But, I know that to do." Another voice finished in a dark tone with a bright toothy grin spread across its muzzle.

Luna took a step back feeling a sense of danger and seeing the deranged smile. The mist began to recede to the pony's side. A larger ball began to form with lightning jumping inside of it. Luna began to panic and ran for the door.

"Now, now Luna. We can't have you leave and tell anypony about me." stated the figure with the laughter again.

The door and Luna's only means of escape faded from existence. She stopped and gasped for air as the pony approached her with the orb of death floating above him. The figure was standing near the edge of the crater. As he was about to drop the bomb of darkness on her, Two ghostly pegasi landed in front of her. One was white with a long golden mane and the other was a gray with a long blue mane.

The golden Apparition said, "That's enough Shade, Leave The Princes alone."

The gray apparition stepped forward and said, "Stand down or we will have no choice but to defend her."

The mist covered pony took a step back and the grin became a panicked frown.

With the saddened voice the mist covered pony yelled, "S-Stay away from me! I don't want to die! Get away!"

It hurled the ball at them and ran away in a hurry. The two apportions stood together and a cyan barrier formed around all three of them. Their shield spell grew to meet the ball of black death. The orb hit the edge of the barrier and a flash of light flickered. The orb pushed in, at an attempt break through and destroy all below it. The golden apparition pushed past the transparent Cassius and flew to the edge of the barrier. She stopped and she focused at the point where the orb and barrier met. The light grew brighter and the orb started to shrink. Luna stepped next to her gray sentinel and added her own power to the light. She channeled the light of the moon and created a beam of brilliant blue that fired from the moon itself. The beam cut through the fading ball of darkness. With the combined power of all three entities the barrier grew stronger and the darkness was growing weaker. Eventually the darkness had faded altogether and the barrier was dropped. The golden pegasus flew down and landed next to Luna and her fellow apparition.

"Thank you both for saving me." Luna said as she caught her breath from the exertion of the powerful spell she used.

"We are sorry Princess, but he is not in his right mind." Said the ghostly Cassius.

"Wait I remember you two. H-How is she alive. She is dead." Luna said pointing a hoof at the golden pegasus mare.

"I live here as a memory long forgotten but remembered by another." She spoke with a hint of sadness.

"I am sorry, you have been gone awhile. But..." Luna began "You are also gone from the mortal world, Cassius. How are you here?"

He gave Luna a warm smile and said, "I can't remember Luna, but like I said I am not in the right mind."

Luna looked at the two with wide eyes and asked, "That was you? What happened to him, you, whatever that was."

The transparent Cassius looked at her with sadness in his odd eyes, "Well for starters that was the real me. I am just part of a memory that was unlocked. As for the real Cassius, the time that he was gone he spent here in this plane of existence. He lost all of his memories because of it. He is asleep now and will be back to normal when he wakes up from his nightmare that time created."

Luna looked in the direction of where the real Cassius had run off to.

"Tell me everything you can." Luna finally told the two.

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Twilight awoke to find Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash talking about how they got in the park.

The rainbow maned pegasus looked over to her and asked, "Twilight, how did we get here?"

Twilight rubbed a hoof on her head trying to think. Twilight finally said, "I don't know Dash."

As she got up an intense pain in her side knocked her back to the ground. Fluttershy scooted over to her and sat at her side, looking at the bandages that still sat tightly wrapped around her rib.

After a moment Fluttershy said, "Twilight your rib is broken. We need to get you home."

Both Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash helped the lavender unicorn to her hooves and headed to the library. They looked in awe as every building they saw had its windows broken. By the time they got inside the library Spike had cleaned the mess and Luna was leaning over an old Journal that sat on the center table.

"Princess Luna what are you doing here?" Twilight asked in confusion.

"I'm here to read this book Twilight, but I need a trigger to open it." The princess answered, without looking away from it.

"A trigger?" repeated Rainbow Dash.

Luna looked to them and boldly said, "Yes, I need you to remember."

With that said a flash from Luna's horn illuminated the room and Spike hear the sounds of locks unlocking and hitting the ground.

"And, "Luna continued, "I need the Elements of Harmony to save a friend."