• Published 25th Feb 2012
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Star Gazing - Konseiga

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Princess Celestia sat atop her throne in the middle of her deserted reception hall. She sipped her tea gingerly and sighed.

They will be here soon.

Not ten minutes ago, the Solar Princess had ordered an entire squad of very bewildered-looking guards to lock all of the entrances, and barricade them with any resources they had at their disposal. The guards had hastened to comply, and now Celestia’s hall was complete barricaded in, with pegasus guards keeping watch on the windows.

I had wanted to avoid this conflict, but there’s no avoiding it now…

The air began to distort within the hallway, just a short distance from the foot of Celestia’s throne. Black energy began to crackle through the air as if the air itself was a pane of glass that was being shattered. The entire room filled with static, making Celestia’s coat puff straight up, and the room pitched, leaving seven ponies (five of whom looked ready to vomit) and one dragon (also very green in the face) standing in the middle of the hall.

“My favorite student, Twilight Sparkle,” Celestia said quietly. “I see you’ve brought your friends along with you. And my sister even chose to accompany you. How nice.”

Twilight’s body sank into an overly-sarcastic bow. “Oh, Princess Celestia, I’m so flattered.” Straightening up with a smug look, Twilight-who-was-not-Twilight continued, “Though I am surprised. You seem much less observant than you were a thousand years ago.”

“I know who you are,” Celestia said flatly, tactfully ignoring the six retching figures behind her. “But I have no idea what to call you. You aren’t Nightmare Moon anymore; that much I’m certain of.

Luna quickly scrabbled to her feet and joined her sister’s side. Princess Celestia gave her sister a concerned look. “Lu’, are you alright?”

Luna nodded briskly. “I’m fine.”

Possessed Twilight yawned hugely. “How touching; a family reunion. Of course, I’m glad that your thousand year banishment hasn’t given you a negative disposition towards your sister, Luna. I truly applaud you.”

Luna bristled. “I asked ‘Tia to forgive me, not the other way around, fiend.”

“Whatever. But you do bring up an interesting problem I now face,” Twilight’s body vanished in a flash of purple light, only to reappear next to Celestia. The Princess stiffened. “What do I call myself- hey!”

Twilight’s body moved quickly to avoid getting struck by the lightning that had extended from Celestia’s horn. The white Princess was positively glowing with furious energy.

“You have the nerve to control my student against her will,” Celestia said with cold fury, “you hurt her closest friends, endanger my sister, desecrate my throne room, and then you act like this is a game.” At the word ‘game’, another flash of lightning extended from Celestia’s horn. The possessed Twilight was more than ready for it this time, deflecting it with a casual flick of purple energy.

“Oh, please, Celestia,” her voice was laden with dark amusement, “you’ll have to really shoot to kill if you want to harm me.” She chuckled darkly. “Though, you’d have to destroy Twilight in the process. Could you bring yourself to do that? Perhaps a better question is, are you strong enough to do it?”

Celestia growled and shot another bolt of lightning at Possessed Twilight, who just sighed and reflected it back on the Princess, who dove to the side. The lightning missed Celestia by inches, and it seared her throne, melting some of the gold that it had been cast in.

“That was week, dearest Princess,” Twilight’s ears flicked in annoyance as she heard the soft patter of footsteps from behind her. She turned and glared at the five ponies, attempting to sneak up behind her. “Did you fools really think that would work?”

Rarity’s eyes widened in shock. “But, I even cast a spell to muffle our footsteps…”

“Tough luck,” Possessed Twilight spat. “Guess I’ll just have to cage you up like misbehaving animals.” With a black glow around her horn, five black, rippling cages appeared around Twilight’s five friends. As the cage appeared around Applejack, a black glow enveloped Spike as he was roughly thrown into the cage with the orange pony.

“You can’t keep us in here! That’s no fun!”

“It’s distinctly un-fabulous!”

“When I get out of here, I’m gonna -ow, my wing!”

“C-careful, Rainbow! You’ll agitate it again if y-you keep moving around l-like that…”

“Just stay still, RD, we’ll get outta here soon enough, Ah’m sure.”

“SILENCE!” Possessed Twilight shrieked at her captives, conjuring gags for the lot of them and tying together their limbs. “For the love of the moon, you’re enough to give me a headache.”

“Let them go,” Princess Celestia commanded, warning tones clear in her voice. “You have no quarrel with them.”

Possessed Twilight snorted. “Let go of the Elements of Harmony? Let go the five ponies who are all partly responsible for my defeat a second time? Right. Next, you’ll be telling me to go back to whatever ‘dark abyss’ I came from and never return.”

“What do you even want?” Luna asked.

“Well, that’s a very silly question, Luna,” Possessed Twilight paced back and forth in front of the throne. It would have been an extremely silly scene, had the smaller unicorn not been sparking with black energy.

“Revenge.

“Ever since we had a schism and split into two different minds, I’ve always found you weak,” Possessed Twilight spat at Luna, who flinched. “You never wanted to use your power for the real reason power exists!”

“Power exists to govern, to maintain order,” Celestia said quietly, “and to help the whole of ponykind.”

“That’s EXACTLY the kind of answer I would expect from you, Celestia. But you’re wrong! The only way to keep order is through the complete domination of the lesser ponies! You should know, of all ponies, since you’ve been in control of Equestria for over a thousand years. How easy has it been to let your dear sister back into the swing of things?”

“It has been my choice to not resume the duties I once had,” Princess Luna hissed.

“Because you’re weak! So I left you, and I found a pony who is even more powerful than both of you PUT TOGETHER!”

“You’re bluffing,” Princess Luna accused, but uncertainty wavered in her voice.

“Am I?” Possessed Twilight asked, a smug look planted on her face. “Are you willing to risk it? And even if you’re right, would you be willing to hurt your ‘beloved’ Twilight?”

“I-I…” Luna stuttered, and Possessed Twilight continued.

“I think it’s high time for the end of your reign, sisters. In fact, I think I should be the one to replace you.” Possessed Twilight frowned, looking down at her own relatively small unicorn body. “But first, I think some changes are in order.”

The caged ponies looked at each other in confusion, and even Princess Luna seemed bewildered; Celestia’s eyes widened in horror, however, and her mouth fell open. “You can’t… you can’t!” she cried.

“’Tia, what’s she planning on doing?”

“A couple of decades ago, one of my most brilliant unicorn spell casters took it upon himself to develop a series of transmutation spells,” Celestia said quietly. “His name was Greymane the Magnificent. For the most part, he succeeded. He developed a method to turn pumpkins into carriages, and mice into mindless stallions. But…”

Luna eyed the now-cackling Possessed Twilight, who was slowly being wrapped in swirling dark energy. “But what?”

“But his last endeavor was his demise. After observing me quietly for a time, he attempted to develop a way for a unicorn to become an alicorn. He tested it on himself, but the change killed him. He was one of the strongest unicorns alive, at the time…”

Luna’s eyes widened. “No…”

“All of his work was put into one book,” Celestia continued sadly, “including the alicorn spell. Twilight studied it while she was here.” Her eyes narrowed at the darkness surrounding Twilight. “And apparently, our old ‘friend’ has access to my students memories.”

Luna stomped her hooves. “Then how do we stop it? We can’t let her kill Twilight!”

Celestia bowed her head, tears glimmering in her eyes. “We can’t,” she said quietly.

“WHAT?!”

“We can’t stop it! If we do, then we kill Twilight for sure! No one can stop the process once it’s started!” Celestia said despairingly. “All we can do is hope Twilight is strong enough to stand it…”

“You don’t need to worry about that!” The darkness had now completely obscured Twilight’s body from view.

The Princesses watched in horror as the darkness swirled around the lavender unicorns laughing body, a miniature tornado of energy. Then the darkness rushed into Twilight’s body, vanishing completely. Twilight’s body convulsed, her eyes rolling up into her head, and began to shimmer. The outlines of her body became smudged, blurred, as if somepony had taken an eraser to her and rubbed lightly, smearing her edges.

Then, Twilight’s body froze, suspended a few inches off the ground.

“What is-“ Luna began.

BOOM.

Twilight’s body exploded in a shock wave of black energy that blew out all the windows of the hall. The caged ponies were thrown against a wall by the force of the blast, and the two Princesses had to brace themselves against Celestia’s throne to avoid being blown backwards.

Twilight’s body lay motionless in a pool of blood as residual black energy swirled around her. Luna made to run to the fallen unicorn, but Celestia held out a hoof.

“Look,” the elder sister said.

Twilight’s body had changed. Her legs were longer, and looked much more graceful. Her body had extended itself, easily doubling that of Applejack’s, and rivaling that of Princess Celestia’s. Her horn had lengthened and had been tapered down to an extremely sharp point, and her mane had grown to cover her longer neck.

And there, hanging from Twilight’s bleeding sides, were a sleek, bloody pair of wings. They looked as if they had erupted violently from the unicorn’s sides. The more Luna looked at them, the more she realized how inherently different they were from either hers or Celestia’s. They were angular, more sharply defined. If Celestia’s wings could be compared to swan wings, it could be said that Twilight had the wings of an eagle.

She’s… gorgeous, Luna realized with a start. It was true. Even though her sides were torn open, and her wings dripping with blood, Twilight was one of the most beautiful creatures that Luna had ever seen.

“Ah can’t believe mah eyes,” Applejack had managed to work the gag out of her mouth with her tongue and was staring in astonishment at Twilight’s body. “I-is she dead?”

“I don’t kn-“ Princess Celestia’s reply was cut of by a raspy breath that escaped Twilight’s mouth.

“Twi’?” Applejack said nervously.

“You… should be honored…” the voice that emanated from Twilight’s mouth was drastically different from earlier. It was, on the surface, still Twilight’s voice. But underneath it ran a current of what Princess Luna could only describe as raw power.

The new alicorn slowly picked herself up off the ground. Black energy ran like electricity from the top of her horn and across her body, making her glow with a sinister light. It flowed down to her hooves, forming inky black slippers. Slowly, a black armor began to form across the purple alicorn’s body, pulsing as if it were alive.

Princess Celestia visibly stiffened. “And what,” she said, her voice cold as ice, “should we be honored for?”

“You just witnessed the birth of a goddess,” the purple alicorn rasped. “And her name is Shadow Star.” The alicorn paused, rolling the name around. “You know, I think I like that name. It has a nice ring to it. Not a huge leap from ‘Twilight Sparkle’, either. Shadows exist in the twilight, and I have ascended beyond a mere sparkle.”

“You’re sick,” Luna whispered.

“What was that, now?”

“YOU’RE SICK!” Luna screamed. “YOU ALMOST KILLED TWILIGHT, JUST SO YOU COULD CHANGE THE WAY YOU LOOKED? TO CHANGE YOUR STUPID NAME? HOW COU-“

Luna never finished her rant. Her entire body was flung across the room, hitting the wall loudly and collapsing in a heap.

“Luna!”

“Quiet,” the newly christened Shadow Star said softly, horn glowing. Celestia’s mouth closed with a snap, a startled look appearing in her eyes. “I really grow tired of all the ponies shouting in here. It’s becoming quite irritating.”

Celestia’s jaw worked furiously as she tried to free herself from her invisible muzzle. Her horn glowed a bright yellow, and beads of sweat lined her forehead.

Shadow Star rolled her eyes. “You really don’t get it, do you? You think this change was just for looks?” The purple alicorn cackled. “You fool. There was vast, untouched stores of power in this little unicorn, reservoirs that even you, in all your infinite wisdom, didn’t find. And it doesn’t take a genius to realize that alicorns are the most powerful beings in Equestria.”

Celestia glared at Shadow Star as the dark pony continued. “And you couldn’t even beat me when my body was a unicorn. What makes you think, in that feeble little brain of yours, that you could ever stand a chance against me now?”

Shadow turned and gazed at the caged ponies, saying, “You can’t even use the Elements of Harmony to defeat me. They’re useless without the spark. And guess who controls Magic?”

Celestia slammed a hoof against the ground in frustration. “Oh, right. I guess you can talk now, just as long as you promise not to scream.”

The white alicorn sighed with relief as the magic was released. “You could have destroyed me when you first recovered from your transformation,” she whispered quietly. “You’ve had multiple opportunities to exact revenge on both my sister and me. Why haven’t you?”

“To put it simply, Celestia,” Shadow calmly walked up to the Princess of the Sun, removing the blood from her wings as she walked, “you’re just too much fun.”

Celestia gritted her teeth in anger, but did nothing. “You’re beyond cruel.”

“I know. Isn’t it lovely? I worked on it for a thousand years, you know.” Shadow Star had situated herself on Celestia’s throne. “You know, I truly think I pull this off better than you.” With a flash of black light, the five cages appeared behind the throne, their residents groaning as teleportation nausea hit them again.

“Hmmm. How will I entertain myself now…” Shadow Star mused to herself, taking in the hall. “I could have you clean this entire place, but that would be letting you off too easy. Without magic? No, that isn’t inventive enough.”

Suddenly, the purple alicorn straightened, with a mad gleam in her eyes. Celestia felt herself shudder at the sight.

“Luna! Quit stalling, pick yourself up, and get over here!” Shadow Star shouted. Ignoring the alicorn’s colorful protests, Shadow picked Luna up by a hoof and dragged her thrashing body across the floor, dumping her next to her sister.

“How dare you handle me in such a way?” Luna snarled, flying to her feet. “I will NOT be tr-“

“Oh, shut up,” Shadow said briskly, “and listen closely to what I have to say.”

Anger sparked in Luna’s eyes, but she closed her mouth and listened.

“To keep me from destroying the entire city of Canterlot,” Shadow paused, grinning at the squeak that came from Fluttershy, “and believe me, little pegasus, I can do it.” Fluttershy cowered against the corner of her cage. Shadow laughed and continued, “To keep me from destroying this entire city, we’re going to have the grandest of all battles.”

Luna and Celestia both froze as an insane giggle came from Shadow. “That’s right, Princesses. A no holds barred fight to the death between the two most powerful creatures in Equestria, aside from me.”

Silence.

“You can’t expect me to fight my sister!” Celestia and Luna shouted in unison. “We were just reunited!”

“You WILL fight,” Shadow commanded, all traces of amusement fleeing from her voice, “or I start killing the Elements of Harmony, starting with…” Shadow Star gazed evenly at the cages, silently making a decision. “…the yellow pegasus.”