Amidst the roiling terrors of the night - one horror stands alone. The mind of a pony can scarcely fathom the true vengeance that the Princess of the Night could have visited upon the world as Nightmare Moon. Twilight will now endure that experience.
If Twilight's a little like what in show, well, she is or would be Element of Magic, Celestia's student or at least possible student, and brilliant spellweaver. So, considering it is The Nightmare Moon who wanter her, and what we've seen so far, Sparkle family gets some harsh and painful punishment just to show them their place and gets put somewhere to use as a motivation for Twilight to serve well. And Twilight, well, she gets the pleasure of being broken and remade into perfect servant for NMM.
Is the Lieutenant an ally, or an even worse fate than the pillaging soldiers?
Not ally, but still a better choice than soldiers simply by the virtue of rank and having the orders from HER to bring Sparkle famliy unharmed. Other than that... she sounds sadistic.
Is there still hope?
If it's not 'clopfic grimdark logic' story, NMM needs to have some kind of plan for Equestria to keep it full of subjects to rule. So yes, hope is possible. But, seeing what we see so far, this hope will be far after NMM gets out her rage, eradicates resistance and calms down enough.
Reminds me of After That Fateful Night, just much more grim, I do sometimes enjoy a dark fic as it breaks the repetitive feel good style that most have, after all what's life without a little variety
FYI the Equestria in this story is located in a deep gravity well, so all characters are over ten million years old in Earth years and therefore 100% not illegal.
This story:
All ponies in my writing live on a version of Equestria that is at the deepest part of a gravity well pit, making any pony over 100,000 years old in earth years.
Disclaimer: All ponies in all of my stories are over 10,000 years old in earth years as Equestria is at the base of a major gravity well.
What I love is that your characters have been getting progressively younger as your stories continue. At this rate, you'll be doing foalcon in the next six months.
They'll be taken somewhere, likely to Canterlot castle. Mom and Dad's lives will be used to torture and break Twilight. There's not a strong reason why anyone would know the Sparkles at this point; all Twilight's done in canon is briefly go super saijin to hatch spike. This opens the possibility that either Celestia or Shining have "turned" already. Additionally, I don't think Nightmare moon would just get Twilight to fuck her. She's either interested in her magic or in hurting Celestia. Therefore, I think Twilight gets corrupted and her family are tools to get that done. Shining will be involved, one idea early on was that Shining would rescue them temporarily. However, that's mentioned in one of Twilight's thoughts, so probably not. If I cheat and look at the tags, I'd say the pony getting the dick is Twilight and she'll fuck a family member. There's an incest tag which I'm guessing is either twilight raping shining or her mom post transformation.
Is the Lieutenant an ally, or an even worse fate than the pillaging soldiers?
Considering nopony's been raped yet, yes, it's a worse fate. Although, I'm guessing she's not a big part of the story, since she's lacking a lot of character details. She might get killed if there's still "resistance" around. But any rescue would be short lived. If there's a rescue it'll involve shining armor. I really doubt she'll get involved in any of the sex scenes, considering she likes to watch.
Is there still hope?
A lot of the details of the story go against canon and I think the bat army is meant to be an impossible to defeat force. Clearly there's racism against unicorns, but presumably pegasi would also be killed or offered some sort of deal. Maybe a transformation? In canon, we see rarity and rainbow dash as "bat soldiers", but I'm guessing this story is ignoring that. That said, the elements of harmony operate on deus ex machina and Nightmare moon lost to 'we're friends' at one point, so, who knows. No other canon force really makes sense, unless the unicorns and thestrals get double fucked by changelings. There's always a bigger bug.
Really enjoyed that first read, it is a really nice change to the other fics that overly are written in this "nice/happy" atmosphere. Some grimdarkness is always a welcomed change in my opinion :D Aswell i like your way of describing the anatomical differences between say Thestrals and normal pones let it be in lewd ways aswell in normal, i like your ideas there, gj. Keep up the good work!
I’ve always found docs like these extremely interesting when done right. Maybe it’s cos it’s such a contrast from MLP regular that makes fics like these work. Though their are plenty of grim dark the best ones are the ones that truly feel like the canon mlp character’s if rust into these environments. Fallout equestria is obviously the first ones that come to mind, though as resent on that’s really good if The Lie We Tell Ourselves.
As for questions the main one for me is what has made these guys so bloodthirsty for the unicorns? From what the veteran had said they’d been enslaved and basically tortured in the ways they intend to torture Twilight’s family. But then they also go after Spike, a dragon who would be a great weapon in their cause if indoctrinated, but instead decide to eat him for the sake of it. I get the feel that’s these guys are from 1000 years ago as well, as there more barbaric nature feels completely out of date compared to Equestria’s more civilised age. Or are they from current times and have slowly been indoctrinated by propaganda of the return of NM into how much they have been expressed by the other tribes.
The next main question is how far is Luna/Nightmare Moon planning to go. Is she disgusted by what she sees, or does she encourage it. Does she plan to wipe out the other tribes, bring them into society like before but only if they obey her without question. Or does she wish for them to be nothing but slaves/pets, to be used an abused by the batponies. Also is there anything left of the Luna she is from the show, and if she did return, could she ever forgive herself for what she’s done.
If read a lot of your other stuff and I enjoy your work, and I do love me and dark alternative universe, especially if it’s NM related, so ill stick around to see how it does. Though I am saddened how poor Spike ended, though I suppose get him out the way ASAP so he doesn’t have to endure the more horrendous shit that I imagine is coming.
I'd wager a reunion is in order. If the Sparkle family is being dragged to some general, I'd stand to guess that Shining Armour is included in that if he's still alive. Though really, that's a question in and of itself.A question with an answer that probably points to the incest tag as it's reason.
Orders from HER, eh? This lieutenant is a timely distraction, but I really can't see her taking them anywhere better. A better question is if the general they're to be brought to is any better.
Hope's a funny thing, though. Twilight probably still has some kind of naive hope about what might happen to her family, but I hardly think it's warranted.
Definitely going to be a wrap for Night Light next chapter I believe, and we'll hear NMM doing a villain monologue. Stoked for this story, gotta love some grimdark occasionally, and I'm definitely interested in seeing your approach!
Aaaaaaaaah you're back! You have no idea how happy I am to see this. Absolutely nothing against your usual works, but you've got a stupendously charming sense of darkness that I really missed. That mix of resentment and sadism and confidence that these bats display is just... shudders. I want to hug them until they pin me into submission and violate my body.
Speculation is hard! Usually I'm pretty good at reading foreshadowing, but you're not being very formulaic at all, here, at least not yet, so this could go anywhere. Nightmare Moon wants the Sparkles for some reason, but this is enough of an alternate universe that it seems like Twilight isn't even Celestia's personal student, let alone 'fated to become the element of magic' or something, so I wouldn't bet on that. Maybe she's just a really really big fan of Velvet's novels and needs to enslave her into constantly writing the dark queen's bad ideas and being furious when she can't salvage them!
What will actually happen - well, the tags kinda spoil this, but for at least some points - is lots and lots of rape. I seem to recall you not being into anything especially gay, so I doubt poor Night Light will get the dicking he deserves, and will just have to be jealous of his wife and daughter being pleased by batcock. Maaaaaybe if he's lucky, he'll get mind controlled into fucking one of them while they despair at their powerlessness and what it feels like to be betrayed (even if it's magically compelled) by a loved one like that, or vice versa with Twilight being the mind controlled one set upon her father... but if something like that will happen, I'd put better odds on Shining getting the starring role there.
"Is the Lieutenant an ally?" This question almost feels like a trap - I don't feel like there's a reading of the tone and contents of this chapter that sets that up as a possibility. Things are bad and they are going to get worse before there's even a possibility of them getting better, so. I mean she saved them from getting forgettably murdered and instead sentenced them to probably political enslavement, but I'm confident she only did that because of her orders and not any personal investment. Maybe there will be more twists than I'm expecting, though!
Is there any hope? There had better be plenty of hope! that's what really brings out the richness of the story, and you'e already demonstrated some of that. Without the victims having some level of investment, of life, and hope to fight and pray for a better outcome, their suffering really starts to dry up and become rote. When the story's finally over, will there be a "Good Ending", where evil is triumphed overed, though? That feels like a definite no. At least one of the Sparkles will be a probably completely broken and content sex slave, though! That sounds pretty good to me! Spike already hit the 'brutal meaningless death' quota, so it might even be more than one!
Bonus question! Will we see the rest of the mane six: I don't think so. For one they aren't tagged, and if you left the story status as complete, I doubt you have plans to update the characters as you go. For two you mentioned you've already written it all, and to go over all the cast in a situation like this would be a gigantic, so it seems unlikely for you to have prewritten that much. I don't think you'd arbitrarily pull them into a late scene all together without set up, either. I could see Applejack or Fluttershy making a small appearance to suffer later on, but something limited like that is about all I predict.
I'm really curious about how much of what the bats were talking about, with the mines and implied oppression, will be gone into. You're definitely setting things up so that Equestria isn't nearly as idyllic or civilized as the common status quo would suggest, and that Celestia and ponies at large aren't entirely innocent in this. At least on a societal scale, I mean, I'm sure very few of the Canterlotians who got raped and slaughtered deserved it.
Edited: Oh my Luna, I just reread the first paragpraph and you're totally going to pull the 'it was all a bad dream' bullshit. One caused by Nightmare Moon, still trapped on the moon, probably, which (inadvertently?) helps inspire Twilight to research the legend of Nightmare Moon more later in her life and contributes to her defeat and Luna's return, thusly inverting the whole thing, and changing the answer to 'is there hope'. Totally fair, sure. The rest of the answers should still be valid towards the actual story, ignoring the meta-framework.
Don't read too much into the first paragraph, I wanted it to be there as an escape ejection seat for readers... Hinting at maybe going down the road you mention, but also not doing it either... Enough of a sword of Damocles to keep savvy readers unsure if that's what will happen or if that's just another twig of hope.
10115631 It was my bad, it is complete, I just haven't published all the chapters yet. A friend told me this isn't the way to use the 'complete' tag... I should only put complete once they are all published. Have updated it now.
>What will happen next to Twilight and her family? Either they'll be brought in front of nightmare moon, or the Lieutenant has other plans first. Whatever happens next I doubt they have a say in the matter.
>Is the Lieutenant an ally, or an even worse fate than the pillaging soldiers? All I'm saying is based on the end of that chapter, I bet I know who the futa is...
>Is there still hope? Well to name the obvious stuff, spike could still escape. If we're talking season 1 he's a bit more competent than Twilight at that time. Also Chrysalis probably won't take kindly to the destruction of her food supply, or Discord might get bored after a while. The other elements are presumably still alive at this point and Nightmare Moon might be daft enough to bring them together, since she seems to want Twilight Sparkle in her presence
On another level though... life is a disease with a 100% mortality rate. All we are and all we build eventually turns to dust. If life were about the destination we'd all kill ourselves. But it's not; we are beings on an infinite journey, doomed to failure anyways, but we can run from that and enjoy what time we have, or we can face it head-on, and aim to become our best selves, so when the end comes we will have no regrets. No one can take that decision from you: whatever horrible things exist in the external world, whatever terrible wrongs befall you, you can still make the very best of your circumstances. With years of training, it is possible for a Buddhist monk to meditate in a state of perfect calm contentment even as they fall from a plane without a parachute.
Pretty good first chapter. Have to read more before I make any real judgments cruelty was there seems a little over the top for an army to be run in this way definitely to be organized in this way
This will be an interesting adventure.
My morbid curiosity is telling me yes.
But everything else...
Everything else is telling me noooo
If Twilight's a little like what in show, well, she is or would be Element of Magic, Celestia's student or at least possible student, and brilliant spellweaver. So, considering it is The Nightmare Moon who wanter her, and what we've seen so far, Sparkle family gets some harsh and painful punishment just to show them their place and gets put somewhere to use as a motivation for Twilight to serve well. And Twilight, well, she gets the pleasure of being broken and remade into perfect servant for NMM.
Not ally, but still a better choice than soldiers simply by the virtue of rank and having the orders from HER to bring Sparkle famliy unharmed. Other than that... she sounds sadistic.
If it's not 'clopfic grimdark logic' story, NMM needs to have some kind of plan for Equestria to keep it full of subjects to rule. So yes, hope is possible. But, seeing what we see so far, this hope will be far after NMM gets out her rage, eradicates resistance and calms down enough.
10114493
Great answers and a great start!
Reminds me of After That Fateful Night, just much more grim, I do sometimes enjoy a dark fic as it breaks the repetitive feel good style that most have, after all what's life without a little variety
10114793
Thanks! Appreciate that!
10114736
This made me lol.
Fair enough.
Eh.
Yeah, so par the course, as far as I can see. Nothing wrong he—
10114862
You know you love it.
10114880
Shining Armor is a Goddamn Moron:
This story:
Airfoil Restraints:
What I love is that your characters have been getting progressively younger as your stories continue. At this rate, you'll be doing foalcon in the next six months.
They'll be taken somewhere, likely to Canterlot castle. Mom and Dad's lives will be used to torture and break Twilight. There's not a strong reason why anyone would know the Sparkles at this point; all Twilight's done in canon is briefly go super saijin to hatch spike. This opens the possibility that either Celestia or Shining have "turned" already. Additionally, I don't think Nightmare moon would just get Twilight to fuck her. She's either interested in her magic or in hurting Celestia. Therefore, I think Twilight gets corrupted and her family are tools to get that done. Shining will be involved, one idea early on was that Shining would rescue them temporarily. However, that's mentioned in one of Twilight's thoughts, so probably not. If I cheat and look at the tags, I'd say the pony getting the dick is Twilight and she'll fuck a family member. There's an incest tag which I'm guessing is either twilight raping shining or her mom post transformation.
Considering nopony's been raped yet, yes, it's a worse fate. Although, I'm guessing she's not a big part of the story, since she's lacking a lot of character details. She might get killed if there's still "resistance" around. But any rescue would be short lived. If there's a rescue it'll involve shining armor. I really doubt she'll get involved in any of the sex scenes, considering she likes to watch.
A lot of the details of the story go against canon and I think the bat army is meant to be an impossible to defeat force. Clearly there's racism against unicorns, but presumably pegasi would also be killed or offered some sort of deal. Maybe a transformation? In canon, we see rarity and rainbow dash as "bat soldiers", but I'm guessing this story is ignoring that. That said, the elements of harmony operate on deus ex machina and Nightmare moon lost to 'we're friends' at one point, so, who knows. No other canon force really makes sense, unless the unicorns and thestrals get double fucked by changelings. There's always a bigger bug.
10114891
Friggin' gravity wells out there ruining perfectly good foalcon stories...
Really enjoyed that first read, it is a really nice change to the other fics that overly are written in this "nice/happy" atmosphere. Some grimdarkness is always a welcomed change in my opinion :D Aswell i like your way of describing the anatomical differences between say Thestrals and normal pones let it be in lewd ways aswell in normal, i like your ideas there, gj. Keep up the good work!
I’ve always found docs like these extremely interesting when done right. Maybe it’s cos it’s such a contrast from MLP regular that makes fics like these work. Though their are plenty of grim dark the best ones are the ones that truly feel like the canon mlp character’s if rust into these environments. Fallout equestria is obviously the first ones that come to mind, though as resent on that’s really good if The Lie We Tell Ourselves.
As for questions the main one for me is what has made these guys so bloodthirsty for the unicorns?
From what the veteran had said they’d been enslaved and basically tortured in the ways they intend to torture Twilight’s family. But then they also go after Spike, a dragon who would be a great weapon in their cause if indoctrinated, but instead decide to eat him for the sake of it. I get the feel that’s these guys are from 1000 years ago as well, as there more barbaric nature feels completely out of date compared to Equestria’s more civilised age. Or are they from current times and have slowly been indoctrinated by propaganda of the return of NM into how much they have been expressed by the other tribes.
The next main question is how far is Luna/Nightmare Moon planning to go. Is she disgusted by what she sees, or does she encourage it. Does she plan to wipe out the other tribes, bring them into society like before but only if they obey her without question. Or does she wish for them to be nothing but slaves/pets, to be used an abused by the batponies.
Also is there anything left of the Luna she is from the show, and if she did return, could she ever forgive herself for what she’s done.
If read a lot of your other stuff and I enjoy your work, and I do love me and dark alternative universe, especially if it’s NM related, so ill stick around to see how it does. Though I am saddened how poor Spike ended, though I suppose get him out the way ASAP so he doesn’t have to endure the more horrendous shit that I imagine is coming.
Technically... 'Cannibalism' is where you feast on a being that's the same speices as you are
My point... Spike is a Dragon, and they are Ponies
10115066
O boy, went a bit overboard with this one
You did know that the cock vore guy in that /mlp/ thread was just shitposting, right?
10114891
Gravity is a fickle mistress.
10114893
Lovely comment! Definitely added to the discussion, thank you! You've got some good ideas there.
10115066
Good points, the thestral question will be addressed in upcoming chapters.
Glad you like the different flavor!
10115126
Lol, so you were there when I dropped in? I had actually written this already when I did that.
I'd wager a reunion is in order. If the Sparkle family is being dragged to some general, I'd stand to guess that Shining Armour is included in that if he's still alive. Though really, that's a question in and of itself.A question with an answer that probably points to the incest tag as it's reason.
Orders from HER, eh? This lieutenant is a timely distraction, but I really can't see her taking them anywhere better. A better question is if the general they're to be brought to is any better.
Hope's a funny thing, though. Twilight probably still has some kind of naive hope about what might happen to her family, but I hardly think it's warranted.
Definitely going to be a wrap for Night Light next chapter I believe, and we'll hear NMM doing a villain monologue.
Stoked for this story, gotta love some grimdark occasionally, and I'm definitely interested in seeing your approach!
Aaaaaaaaah you're back! You have no idea how happy I am to see this. Absolutely nothing against your usual works, but you've got a stupendously charming sense of darkness that I really missed. That mix of resentment and sadism and confidence that these bats display is just... shudders. I want to hug them until they pin me into submission and violate my body.
Speculation is hard! Usually I'm pretty good at reading foreshadowing, but you're not being very formulaic at all, here, at least not yet, so this could go anywhere. Nightmare Moon wants the Sparkles for some reason, but this is enough of an alternate universe that it seems like Twilight isn't even Celestia's personal student, let alone 'fated to become the element of magic' or something, so I wouldn't bet on that. Maybe she's just a really really big fan of Velvet's novels and needs to enslave her into constantly writing the dark queen's bad ideas and being furious when she can't salvage them!
What will actually happen - well, the tags kinda spoil this, but for at least some points - is lots and lots of rape. I seem to recall you not being into anything especially gay, so I doubt poor Night Light will get the dicking he deserves, and will just have to be jealous of his wife and daughter being pleased by batcock. Maaaaaybe if he's lucky, he'll get mind controlled into fucking one of them while they despair at their powerlessness and what it feels like to be betrayed (even if it's magically compelled) by a loved one like that, or vice versa with Twilight being the mind controlled one set upon her father... but if something like that will happen, I'd put better odds on Shining getting the starring role there.
"Is the Lieutenant an ally?" This question almost feels like a trap - I don't feel like there's a reading of the tone and contents of this chapter that sets that up as a possibility. Things are bad and they are going to get worse before there's even a possibility of them getting better, so. I mean she saved them from getting forgettably murdered and instead sentenced them to probably political enslavement, but I'm confident she only did that because of her orders and not any personal investment. Maybe there will be more twists than I'm expecting, though!
Is there any hope? There had better be plenty of hope! that's what really brings out the richness of the story, and you'e already demonstrated some of that. Without the victims having some level of investment, of life, and hope to fight and pray for a better outcome, their suffering really starts to dry up and become rote. When the story's finally over, will there be a "Good Ending", where evil is triumphed overed, though? That feels like a definite no. At least one of the Sparkles will be a probably completely broken and content sex slave, though! That sounds pretty good to me! Spike already hit the 'brutal meaningless death' quota, so it might even be more than one!
Bonus question! Will we see the rest of the mane six: I don't think so. For one they aren't tagged, and if you left the story status as complete, I doubt you have plans to update the characters as you go. For two you mentioned you've already written it all, and to go over all the cast in a situation like this would be a gigantic, so it seems unlikely for you to have prewritten that much. I don't think you'd arbitrarily pull them into a late scene all together without set up, either. I could see Applejack or Fluttershy making a small appearance to suffer later on, but something limited like that is about all I predict.
I'm really curious about how much of what the bats were talking about, with the mines and implied oppression, will be gone into. You're definitely setting things up so that Equestria isn't nearly as idyllic or civilized as the common status quo would suggest, and that Celestia and ponies at large aren't entirely innocent in this. At least on a societal scale, I mean, I'm sure very few of the Canterlotians who got raped and slaughtered deserved it.
Edited: Oh my Luna, I just reread the first paragpraph and you're totally going to pull the 'it was all a bad dream' bullshit. One caused by Nightmare Moon, still trapped on the moon, probably, which (inadvertently?) helps inspire Twilight to research the legend of Nightmare Moon more later in her life and contributes to her defeat and Luna's return, thusly inverting the whole thing, and changing the answer to 'is there hope'. Totally fair, sure. The rest of the answers should still be valid towards the actual story, ignoring the meta-framework.
10115194
Great response, thank you!
10115267
Haha, villain dialogues are the best.
10115393
Fantastic dissertation.
Maybe my favorite yet.
Glad you're enjoying getting into the scenario!
Don't read too much into the first paragraph, I wanted it to be there as an escape ejection seat for readers... Hinting at maybe going down the road you mention, but also not doing it either... Enough of a sword of Damocles to keep savvy readers unsure if that's what will happen or if that's just another twig of hope.
Happy you caught it though.
10115182
>upcoming chapters
>story is complete
You have some explaining to do old man.
10115531
It is complete, im going to publish a new chapter every day or so. They're all written.
10115542
Chapter every day sounds good. Only thing better than fast updates is fully posted fic.
Why is this marked as complete?
10115631
It was my bad, it is complete, I just haven't published all the chapters yet. A friend told me this isn't the way to use the 'complete' tag... I should only put complete once they are all published. Have updated it now.
Loving it so far, fantastic
>What will happen next to Twilight and her family?
Either they'll be brought in front of nightmare moon, or the Lieutenant has other plans first. Whatever happens next I doubt they have a say in the matter.
>Is the Lieutenant an ally, or an even worse fate than the pillaging soldiers?
All I'm saying is based on the end of that chapter, I bet I know who the futa is...
>Is there still hope?
Well to name the obvious stuff, spike could still escape. If we're talking season 1 he's a bit more competent than Twilight at that time. Also Chrysalis probably won't take kindly to the destruction of her food supply, or Discord might get bored after a while. The other elements are presumably still alive at this point and Nightmare Moon might be daft enough to bring them together, since she seems to want Twilight Sparkle in her presence
On another level though... life is a disease with a 100% mortality rate. All we are and all we build eventually turns to dust. If life were about the destination we'd all kill ourselves.
But it's not; we are beings on an infinite journey, doomed to failure anyways, but we can run from that and enjoy what time we have, or we can face it head-on, and aim to become our best selves, so when the end comes we will have no regrets. No one can take that decision from you: whatever horrible things exist in the external world, whatever terrible wrongs befall you, you can still make the very best of your circumstances. With years of training, it is possible for a Buddhist monk to meditate in a state of perfect calm contentment even as they fall from a plane without a parachute.
Now go play One Chance if you haven't already.
The rookie
Taking a second read of this, I gotta say you pulled off the "it was only a dream" perfectly.
I think she going to meet NM.
Pretty good first chapter. Have to read more before I make any real judgments cruelty was there seems a little over the top for an army to be run in this way definitely to be organized in this way