Next Nightmare Night chapter still in progress · 11:37pm Jan 5th, 2020
It’s going to be a big one, with 9400 words already written and several sections still to write or complete. If it gets too big I’ll break it up again, but for now, it remains intact. I will be attempting to get it ready for release in time for next weekend or sooner. In the meantime? Everyone’s been patient, so here’s a teaser. I promised this would be the climactic confrontation between Nightmarity and Eclipse, and here’s the immediate lead up its final action:
“It’s all right. Stand down, Cyber Belle,” Eclipse told her, helping her back to her hooves, casting a fresh spell of her own to help correct her corrupted programming. “I’ve got this, so keep your weapons sheathed. Be assured that by the power of friendship itself, I will get your sister back.”
“You will…?” she said dubiously, then turned her head to scan Eclipse. “Your blood pressure, respiratory rate and perspiration activity are unchanged from earlier. This indicates no lie detected,” she acknowledged, retracting the remains of her arsenal. “I estimate an 84.62% chance you are truthful. So I will give you the chance to prove it,” she decided. “Very well, Queen Eclipse. If you can also free my sister without harming her… then I and all my descendants will swear loyalty to you.”
“Then I shall do my best to be deserving of it,” Eclipse smiled, then turned her attention back to the increasingly isolated and angry Nightmare.
“So what was that you were saying about checkmate, demon?” she mocked. “You’ve lost not only your army but any chance at victory, so I suggest you leave Rarity while you can.”
Instead of surrendering, she sneered. “You win a battle, nothing more, Twilight Sparkle! For in the end, you have won nothing! Using the power of the curse and my own corruptive magic, I can make another army quickly, and having seen your spells and tactics, I will make sure you cannot usurp it! As long as I hold Rarity, you cannot touch me, so I believe I will take my leave now…” She zapped a mirror behind her to open a fresh portal. “Who knows? Perchance I will go to the Crystal Empire and corrupt your brother to make a fresh start!”
Eclipse’s expression instantly went icy as a series of snarls and hisses were heard around her. “You won’t touch him or anypony else. In fact, you’re not leaving here alive, Nightmare.” She blocked the other pony’s egress with a shield spell.
“Oh, really?” The Nightmare mocked as Blueblood and even Opalescence stepped back from her, her control over them broken. “So you intend to kill your friend, Twilight Sparkle?”
“Not at all.” An unperturbed Eclipse stepped to the forefront of her new army, facing down the now-abandoned Nightmare. “I did my research on you here as well, Demon. If you will not leave voluntarily, there are in fact four ways to sever your connection to your host. The first is, of course, to kill the host, which I would never do.”
“Speak for yourself!” Pinkamena snarled, looking somehow ready to simultaneously both rut and kill. “Just be grateful Rarity’s my friend, Nightmare.”
“Be patient, and you’ll get your chance, my lovely and lethal Pinkamena,” Eclipse called back. “The second is to activate the Elements of Harmony, but unfortunately, in appropriating Rarity, you deny me that ability… though I could have the human bearers do it instead,” she mused aloud, causing an initially smug Nightmarity’s expression to drop. “Then there’s an ancient Steedgyptian soul-splitting ritual I studied, effective against demonic possessions; one that requires a great deal of magical power and some Steedgyptian substances… all of which I just happen to have.”
“Oh, really?” An angry Spike called out. “In that case, want me to get them for you?” he offered like he was her scribe again.
“The offer is appreciated, my new and strapping young Dragon Lord. But in truth, even that is not necessary. In fact, Nightmare… I’m going to free Rarity without laying so much as a single spell or hoof on you. For the fourth way is for the host to rise up and overthrow you from within!”
“Ha!” Nightmare boasted. “And how do you plan to do that, darling, when Rarity is so deeply buried she is aware of little else but what I allow her?”
“I believe it was the Sun Master who once said that the greatest of all military arts was to win without fighting,” Eclipse mused as her swollen army slowly edged forward to hem The Nightmare in, surrounding her. “And since your first takeover of Rarity, I have given a great deal of thought as to how I would induce each of my friends to expunge you, should you possess them.”
“You’re bluffing!”
“Am I? Let’s find out...”
The title of the Chapter is “Nightmare Eclipsed”. I’m quite proud of what I’ve come up with so far, but that is not the only attraction! I will try to have at least one more update out before chapter launch, in a week or less.
Sweetie Belle is particularly amazing in this one. Get hyped guys!
Edit: Nightmare/Eclipse pays off very handsomely as well. Inspired chapter.
It's fitting that Twilight would be prepared in case the Nightmare managed to posess another pony again. I'm also wondering how Cyber Belle and Spike got into the palace.
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Very much appreciated! Here's hoping I can pull it all together, now. Have to say, this chapter's been giving me more trouble than most.
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Twilight/Eclipse is nothing if not overprepared for everything, and it's a little beyond belief to me that she wouldn't do her homework and develop contingencies to potential threats instead of always getting surprised by them as she was in the show. In my view, planning for a takeover of one of her friends by the Nightmare would rank pretty high on the list given it already happened once.
Those questions have answers, and be assured you'll get them in the course of the chapter.