Nightmare Rising

by The Brony in Denial

3 The Spell

The train station was busy as usual, ponies from all over coming and going as they pleased, Twilight and her friends boarded the train whilst handing a Ticketmaster their tickets. They took their seats and waited for the train to come to life. They were all silent, rather from excitement or nervousness, none of them, not even Twilight knew what would happen once they arrived in Canterlot.

As the minutes passed more and more ponies entered the train and soon the train was filled with the loud, distracting sounds of conversations.

After a while longer a voice echoed through the train from speakers, the voice belonged to an older colt. "Ladies and gentlecolts the train for Canterlot will be departing in five minutes. Please aboard the train and take your seats.”

“Well gal’s here we go,” Applejack said, the other girls nodded except for Pinkie, she was busy making faces at a baby in a neighboring seat.

“Yes, I just hope this isn't too serious, last thing we need is another threat destroying Equestria.” Rarity added, Nightmare Moon was powerful enough to defeat Princess Celestia and change the forces of nature themselves, if she was to escape somehow, who knows what kind of destruction she could spread across Equestria?

A few minutes later the train’s engine screamed to life, the wheels screeched across the metal of the train tracks, smoke sputtered out of the trains pipes with every slow chug the train made when it slowly sprung itself into action. Within a minute the train picked up speed, and in no time, it was racing down the tracks as its made way to Canterlot.
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A few hours passed before the train made its stop to Canterlot, the train slowly screeched to a halt. It’s engine died down and the doors of the train opened up for the ponies to roam. Twilight and her friends exited the train, the nice breeze of summer welcomed their exit.

The ponies groaned and stretched finally free from the cramp seats they sat on, Twilight sighed, “Well girls, here we are. We better get to the palace as soon as we can.”
“You got that right,” Applejack replied. The girls trotted down the streets of Canterlot, it was its normal self, ponies wearing ridiculous outfits with wigs to go with them, ponies exiting and entering clothing and style stores of all kinds to make sure their looks were up to date, and sitting at restaurants eating food in high value, the life style always seemed alien to that of Ponyville.

The sky was red from the setting sun the ponies silently adored all of the interesting oddities they came across. The stores which had everything you could ever need to make a dress, or throw a party, and the huge libraries which held the information of every spell or potion anypony would need in their lifetime, you name it.

The six ponies had finally reached the gates of the castle, they were greeted by two guards who stood by the gates, they both carried spears by their sides. They were taller than the others, almost towering above them.

One of the guards looked down at Twilight, “Oh, hello Twilight Sparkle, you have business with Princess Celestia I assume.”
Twilight shook her head, “No sir, I have business with Princess Luna.”
The expression of the guards face turned grim, he looked around as if he was being watched. “Of course, please, come on in.” He yelled over to the other side of the gate. “Hey boys, get the gate opened, we have company!” The gates seconds later slowly drew open, the sounds of huffing could be heard from the top of the gates. After a minutes wait the gate was completely open, both guards nodded their go and the six trotted in.

“ Wasn't it a bit odd the way he was acting?” Rainbow Dash asked, the gate slowly crawled to the close behind them.
“Sure was Rainbow Dash, I wonder what's going on around here.” Twilight replied, they all were surprised by the number of guards that crowded the castle once they made it to the grounds. They surrounded the many walls of the castle, the castle grounds, the towers, and the interiors of the castle.

Twilight dashed over to one of the guards asking, “Excuse me, but why are there so many guards here?” The guard turned around, he was a well built stallion, he had a brown coat, and wore royal armor.

“I don’t know, we were all dispatched here by Princess Luna’s request, yet no one really knows why we’re here.” After that answer Twilight understood what the answer was, she thanked him and ran with the rest of the group.

“Ok, we need to get to Luna’s immediately, i’m afraid there’s something bad happening soon.” Twilight alerted her friends, they followed Twilight’s lead up a set of stairs that lead to Luna’s quarters .
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By the time they reached the top of the towers to Luna’s room the sun was only a sliver over the horizon. Twilight reached out her hoof to knock on the towering wooden doors, but the creaked open before she was able to make contact with the door. An eerie dark blue glow lurked in the darkness of the room, followed was a pair of eyes, they were bloodshot and the pupils of the eyes dilated, and then Luna’s head popped completing the picture.
The girls were shocked to see Luna, her mane glew a dimmer color then it usually was, bags formed under her eyes, and she looked like a wreck. She breathed heavily before talking, “You’re late Twilight Sparkle, I do not appreciate that.”

Twilight looked panicked, “I’m sorry, I got here as fast as I could.”
Luna sighed and looked down the the ground, “I apologize, I’m just not myself right now, please follow me.” She opened the door and welcomed them all in, the lights were turned on.

The girls were again surprised, the room was a wreck, the beds curtains and sheets were torn up, crumpled up papers littered the room, a mirror belonging to a dresser was smashed to bits, and on the walls were drawings of Nightmare Moon. Luna sighed and looked around the room like it was normal. “I apologize for the slight mess, I haven’t been able to think straight.”

Applejack whispered to Fluttershy, “Slight mess? It looks like a group of bulls rampaged through here,” Fluttershy nodded in agreement. Meanwhile Luna tried to focus on a spell to clean up the room, her horn faintly glew before she collapsed on one leg sweating.

Twilight ran over to Luna and helped her up, “Princess, you shouldn’t be wearing yourself out like this, I’ll take care of it.” Twilight quickly returned the room to normal in a quick whip of magic. Luna stood on her own and walked over to one of the walls.

She played with the bricks embedded in the wall until one of them drove into the wall, the bricks by where she was began to shake and then began to also drive into the wall, creating the shape of an arch. Dust embedded on the wall fell to the ground and then the rumbling stopped.

Luna looked to Twilight, “This way.” Luna walked into the pathway and disappeared from sight Twilight looked to the others and then walked down, the others began to follow before they heard Luna’s voice, “No one else can come, only Twilight.”

The girls looked to Twilight with concern, she gave a slight smile to them and said, “I’ll be fine girls, don’t worry. Everything will be fine.” She turned around and mumbled to herself, “I hope.” Suddenly the walls behind closed, and the room was consumed in darkness.
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Twilight quickly used her magic to make her horn shine to allow light into the tunnel, long flights of stairs welcomed her. She slowly walked down the stairs, each step she made hauntingly echoed throughout the tunnel.

The walls surrounding her were covered in cobwebs and cracks, they looked as if they had been built and forgotten, and that one false move and the entire thing would collapse and the smell of rotted wood and mold filled her lungs. Every step she made would leave dust imprints behind her, the walk was long and tiresome.

When she made her way to the bottom reaching small corridor, she made her way through and when she reached the end she was amazed. She was in a large library in the shape of a dome, every wall to the top was filled with book upon book. The floor too had pews that also contained books.

She walked around, gazing at the lines of books, all of them were spells. “Wow, this is amazing, so many spells!” She called out.
“This is the room of forbidden spells,” Luna’s voice replied, echoing off the shelves of the library. “A hidden room only known to the royal family that was built generations ago. It was to hold spells that were considered unstable or too dangerous if fallen in the wrong ponies hands.”

Twilight looked to the source of the voice and found Luna browsing the shelves, as if she was looking for something.

Twilight ran up to Luna, she looked at the shelves she was peeking at and then back to Luna. “Uhm, what exactly are you looking for?” Twilight asked. Luna simple ignored her and keep looking, she examined the bindings of each book until eventually she pulled out a book.

“Here it is.” She said to herself, she levitated the book with her magic and walked away to the center of the Library, where she dropped the book on the ground. Twilight followed suit, she looked down to the ground and saw a simple sun, moon, and star carved into the ground all overlapping each other.

She scanned the cover of the book, it had markings of which she wasn't familiar with, on the binding was a golden pin with the face of StarSwirl the Bearded embedded on it. “This book is StarSwirl’s forbidden spells. They were created by him during his training with Celestia, but they had to be locked away. For they were considered too risky or dangerous for the well being of ponies. So they spend their life down here with all the others.”

Luna used her magic to flip through the pages, mumbling “No” to herself until she soon shouted out, “A-ha!” Twilight read the title of the page, “Mind Portal” below it was an illustration that depicted two ponies laying on the ground, above one of them was the silhouette of one of the ponies.

“What is this?” Twilight asked, intrigued.
“This is the spell we will be using to get rid of Nightmare Moon.”
“What does it do?”
“It allows for another pony to enter the mind of another, which is what you will be doing.”
Twilight jumped back and yelled, “What! You sa.id these spells were too dangerous, and you expect me to just go along with this!?”
“Yes, it’s the only way, rather this or the end. Your choice.” Luna answered.
Twilight kept quiet and gulped, “Well, I guess you’re right, here goes.”

Luna stepped back from the book and laid on the ground, Twilight did the same. “For this spell you must keep your eyes closed and have full attention, or the consequences will be dire.” Luna announced. Twilight closed her eyes and nodded her head. She heard Luna begin to read.

“Life cannot be seen through only an eye, the truth settles in a ponies mind. Open the gate, allow for the eye to see all, transfer Twilight’s eyes into ones mind!”

The last thing Twilight heard before she blacked out was the sound of crackling.

Author's Note:

Note: I apologize sincerely to all my fans (All 7 of them) for this chapter taking so long, writers block had the best of me for about a month, for some reason I just can’t get small details that drag a story on too well. Thankfully one of my friends took care of that for me, he has an account, you should check his stuff out here: http://www.fimfiction.net/user/gamezoid123

Chapter 4 full stem ahead, expect it early next week.

Comments

[The_Mechanic]

Don't worry about it to much, just write at your own pace.

Stories are like muffins, if you take your time and are careful, the rewards are worth the effort.

[Johnyapple]

I wouldn't blame you for writer block, the TRUE bane of fan fiction. It's just good to see you writing again.

[The Brony in Denial]

@critfist
Thanks, its good ta be back, I have the first half of chapter 4 written out, and trust me. This is where the fun begins