Chapter 4-The End of Pretending
Rainbow flew toward Twilight's house, worried. Starlight and her were supposed to hang out at the race track on Cloudsdale about 3 hours ago. But, she hadn't seen him since yesterday. Rainbow knew that Starlight was busy, but he was never late to anything without at least arriving and explaining if he would have to cancel. “I bet Twilight roped him into doing some magic experiments.” she fumed. “And he's so considerate that he won't ask to leave.” Rainbow shook her head. “He's like Fluttershy, except that he looks like a human and carries a sword.” As Twilight's house came into view, she shot toward it.
Landing, she knocked on the door, Twilight answering. “Hello, Rainbow. What's going on?”
Rainbow slightly tilted her head. “Hey, Twi. Is the prince here?”
Twilight shook her head, “Nope, he left with Princess Luna after I had a little “incident' with Trixie.”
Rainbow turned around, thinking. “Why such a big deal, Dash? You act like you have to know where he is all the time.”
“What makes you think that?” Rainbow asked, whipping around to face Twilight.
“Well,” Twilight slightly hesitated. “Ever since what happened with Gilda, you're with him all the time.”
Rainbow paled, hoping her friend didn't notice. “I-I just like to hang out with him.”
“Are you sure it isn't anything else?” Twilight asked with a smile.
“No.” Rainbow said as calm as she could. “Sorry to rush Twilight, but I need to go. See you later.” She lifted off and flew in the direction of Cloudsdale.
…
Twilight shook her head as the pegasus flew off. “There's something she's not telling about her and Starlight, but it's not my business.” Shutting the door, she turned to return to her book when she heard a knock today. “Hmm, wonder why I'm so popular today.” she said. Opening the door, she saw Trixie standing there. “Oh, hello Trixie.”
“Surely you haven't forgotten our outing today, Twilight.” The blue unicorn said. “You said that you would help me gather some herbs in the Everfree Forest to use for my magic.”
Twilight inwardly sighed, remembering that she had indeed said that. Now Twilight was still upset with Trixie for what had happened with Spike, but she never broke her word. “Sure, Trixie. Are you ready to go?”
“Yes!”, she exclaimed. “Let's head out to the forest!” Twilight quickly checked on Spike, who was sleeping and left the house with Trixie.
…
Princess Luna was sitting with her sister, Celesta in the dining room. “So, were you able to diffuse the situation in Ponyville?” Celestia asked.
Luna nodded. “Starlight had it taken care of before I arrived. He passed out from the strain, so I gave him a little of my power.”
Celestia nodded as they sat in silence for a while. “Sister, Starlight is not immortal, is he?”
Celestia nodded as Luna continued. “Then it is as worse as I thought. I've been having, nightmares. About me....letting her back in.”
“Don't worry.” Celestia said. “That will never happen again. Starlight can more then handle her.”
“Stop putting everything on him!” Luna suddenly snapped. Celesta’s eyes widened, but she remained quiet. “We are expecting too much of him! He even told me today how he doesn't understand how he is supposed to be so strong! We should be the ones fighting Nightmare, not Starlight! He needs time to mature his magic.”
“Are we sure that is isn't already mature?” Celestia asked softly, knowing how Luna could be when she was upset. “You've seen what he can do.”
“You can't look at him in a fight and honestly think that he planned every spell he was going to use.” Luna said. “He was still in panic mode for all of the marks he had! This isn't fair to him!” As Celestia looked at her with love, the princess of the night looked down.
“Luna.” Celestia said, walking over and hugging her sister. “I want nothing more then for Starlight to be safe.”
“Then why isn't he here?” Luna asked. “We are here, we could keep him safe.” A realization suddenly came to her. “It's me, isn't it? You're afraid that if I tried to fight Nightmare, I would give in again.”
Celestia took a deep breath and looking into the eyes of her sister. “Luna, I was never sure how much of Nightmare's influence was left on you when the Elements of Harmony freed you. I couldn't think of anyway to keep you safe.”
Luna sighed. “Don't worry about me sister. We need to give Starlight the choice to where he wants to be. Putting him virtually on the front lines isn't truly fair.”
“That was a mistake on my part.” Celestia said. “I need to tell him the truth. I will go write a letter to Twilight....”
Suddenly all the lights in the room went out, then lit back up with a strange blue tone. A swirling cloud of darkness appeared in front of the two princesses then dispersed, revealing none other then Nightmare Moon. As the two sisters gasped and prepared to blast Nightmare into oblivion, she stopped them by holding up her hoof. “Unless you wish to never see your brother again, you probably should calm your magic.”
Celestia barely stopped her spell as Luna's spell shot forward and struck the dark alicorn in the shoulder. Nightmare yawned, “Hmm, I'll have to hurt your brother for that one.”
“Where is he?!” Luna yelled.
“Oh you relax.” Nightmare said, sitting. “He's fine...for now. I really came to talk to you two.”
“What could you want?” Celestia said, barely keeping her composure.
“Well, I could go on about how I want eternal night and all that, but I want something different. You see, night is good and all but I've been finding myself rather enjoying the daytime. So, I want you and Luna over there to give up your positions as rulers and hand it over to me.” Nightmare explained
“You can't really believe that would happen.” Luna scoffed. “Besides, you don't have the strength to raise the sun.”
“I might not, but I believe little Starlight does. Or maybe it was my imagination that saw the sun on his hand? Kinda looks like that.” At this, she pointed at Celesta’s cutie mark.
“He doesn’t know how to use it.” Celesta said, struggling.
“He will.” Nightmare turned her back on the alicorns. “Oh by the way..” she started. “In case you're thinking that he'll just be able to escape me, remember this. You two might be immortal, but I don't think that Starlight's there yet.” Laughing, the dark clouds swirled around her and she disappeared.
Luna unfurled her wings. “We need to go help him, sister!”
Celestia nodded, “Stay here, Luna. I will go help him.”
Luna quickly flew out the door before Celestia reached it. “No. Ponies will wonder if you suddenly just leave the castle. It won't be a problem if I go and take care of this.”
Celestia slowly nodded. “Good luck, Luna.” As her sister flew off, Celestia ran toward her room. She needed to write a letter.