“Only you made it this far?” Twilight froze at the sound of Nightmare Moon’s voice. She turned to look at the speaker, but the alicorn was faster, whirling Twilight around as she swooped past her and got between the unicorn and the tree. “How…disappointing…” She spread her wings, forming an imposing barrier as she frowned at the unicorn before her. “I was hoping to have a little fun before I destroyed you.”
“What about the fifth task?” Twilight asked, backing up slightly, “You said five!”
“Foal.” Nightmare Moon sniggered, her voice echoing oddly, as if it was not only one pony speaking, “I am the final task!”
Suddenly Twilight was both very glad that she had not brought the others in with her and wished that she had some backup. “Oh…” She managed, wondering how in Celestia’s name she was going to win this fight.
“What’s the matter, little Princess?” The alicorn sneered at her, “Afraid?”
“No. I’ll never be afraid of you!” Twilight shook her head, standing tall and proud, staring the possessed Goddess in the eyes, refusing to tremble or bow before her. If she was going to fail here, it would not be in a manner that made Celestia ashamed of her. Not if she had any say in the matter, “And why do you keep calling me Princess?”
“You don’t remember.” It was a statement rather than a question and it seemed to amuse the Alicorn of the Moon far too much for Twilight to be comfortable. “You really don’t remember.”
“Remember what?” Twilight demanded, Nightmare Moon’s amusement frustrating her.
“You were not always so weak, little Princess.” The darkness around her seemed to whisper in her ears as Nightmare Moon watched her with a smug smirk, “We knew you before, five thousand years ago. When you thought you could seal us away for all eternity…” Twilight let out a startled yelp and dropped the Elements, causing them to crash to the ground as the unicorn was picked up by the Goddess’s magic and tossed across the courtyard, slamming into the doorframe she had come through. “Well guess what. Eternity doesn’t last forever.”
“I…I sealed you?” Twilight asked, shaking slightly as she picked herself up, pain shooting down her back as she moved, “But I’m not an alicorn, I couldn’t…” She trailed off, her eyes widening as a thought hit her.
“Now you’re beginning to understand, little Princess.” The darkness hissed at her, “You’re not an alicorn now, but you were and we thought you destroyed when you ripped your soul in two and gave your life to try and get rid of us. Turns out you’re as hard to eliminate as we are. Shame that won’t save you now.”
Twilight did not get a chance to respond before she was in the air again, tumbling across the ground and slamming into the base of the silver tree.
“You must have sealed your alicorn powers away with half of your soul when you locked us away. Left yourself with little more than a unicorn’s form and strength.” The darkness cackled, “But we had an ace in the hole, a Princess of our own, a mare from the lands that spawned us and she has worked tirelessly for all this time to free us. It’s a shame you won’t be around to meet her. She has a lot she wants to say to you.”
“Wh…who says, it ends here?” Twilight demanded as she got up, the puzzle glowing, its golden glow pulsing in time with Twilight’s normal purple magic which was wrapped around the Elements of Harmony, trying to activate them, even as she stumbled, barely able to get to her feet, “I might only be a…part time Princess, but I am not…letting it end here.”
“You do not know who you are dealing with,” Nightmare Moon snorted. “You may be my sister’s student, but I am the stronger sister and I will destroy you!” Nightmare Moon tried to use her magic again, but Twilight was ready, calling up a small brown fuzzball from her deck with green hands and feet and sharp claws that leapt at the possessed Princess and exploded on contact.
The explosion pushed Nightmare Moon back, giving Twilight a chance to push a little more of her magic into the Elements, desperately hoping that that was the spark she needed and that she could use them to protect her friends. It certainly did something as the unicorn saw the marble spheres start to change colour, taking on the shades that she had seen in the book.
“No!” The Shadows and the Princess both screamed as the Elements started glowing, “No! We will not allow this to be!”
“Wha…aah!” Twilight cried out as hooves connected with her side and she went skidding across the floor, her magic cutting out as the dark possessed Princess used her powers to slam the unicorn into a wall so hard that the real brick work, the crumbling, decrepit, ancient brickwork, cracked and tumbled down, burying the filly.
“Finally!” Nightmare Moon snarled as she stalked towards the glowing elements, pausing before she stamped her hoof and unleashed a wave of Shadows that sucked up every drop of energy within the glowing spheres. The five orbs started cracking as something behind Nightmare Moon started moving.
The alicorn turned to stare at the sound when she realised that it was the sound of the rubble shifting and falling, her eyes widening when she saw Twilight pick herself out of the fallen bits out castle, her wings twitching a little to dislodge the fragments of stone and her ruby red eyes narrowed and focused on Nightmare Moon. Her own Shadows were flaring up like black flames around her as she moved out of the pile of black rubbish and stood in front of the possessed alicorn. “Do not write me off yet.” She growled out before shaking herself off, getting rid of some of the dust lightening her coat to an almost lavender-white.
The stone spheres continued to crack as Nightmare Moon laughed, a high pitched, slightly hysterical, psychotic laugh as the Elements shattered into a million little fragments, “You could not defeat us before, when you were whole! You’ll never do it now, wounded and pathetic as you are. Especially not alone! Your strength comes from Unity, it always has! And now your backup, your precious Elements of Harmony are gone, destroyed, forever!”
“The spheres may be gone, but my friends are always with me,” Twilight snapped back, her wings half opening as she tried to spread them in a display of dominance, “I will defeat you!”
“You? Defeat me?!” The alicorn laughed, her shadow taking the form of a twisted dragonic creature and spreading up the wall. Its shape shifting and changing as it grew, revealing wings with holes in and three rows of sharp teeth, “I have had many forms over the Millennia,” The darkness crowed through Nightmare Moon as the shadow changed again, becoming a huge unicorn with a barbed horn. “Equigypt, your country, was just the first. This time, this time your entire world will pay and there’s nothing you can do to stop me! Because poor Princess Twilight was stupid enough to come all this way without managing to protect a single one of her friends!”
“You’re wrong.” The alicorn Princess smirked, “My friends are safe. I figured out your game and protected myself from your dark mist. You can’t fight fair, you have to weaken us before we get to you, but guess what? I remember enough to remember that a Challenge always has to be fair. You might have weakened me, weakened my friends and destroyed the physical forms of the Elements, but I still have a chance.”
“What chance could you possibly have?” Nightmare Moon demanded, “What possible hope? You are nothing compared to me, nothing!”
“Twilight!” The purple Princess’s smirk turned to an honest, bright smile as her friends piled into the courtyard and stopped by the entrance, staring at the tableau before them. They looked tired and ill still but they still stood there, glaring at Nightmare Moon or giving her a relieved look, as if they had been worried about her.
“There’s my hope, my chance. My friends.” Twilight told the Night Goddess, feeling her strength grow and her magic increase exponentially as the puzzle reacted to their presence, “They’re my strength and they’re so much more than that. Those Elements you destroyed? They’re just stone, Harmony is within everypony if you know where to look for it and I’ve found it within those five ponies that you see before you.”
“You cannot be serious? You honestly believe that you can defeat me with the power of friendship?” The alicorn cackled.
“There’s not just my friends, each of them embodies an Element.” Twilight informed her, “Pinkie Pie, who scared off the wolves that you sent after us by giggling at them, embodies the Element of Laughter!” As she spoke, the shards of the sphere of Laughter started glowing the same pink as Pinkie Pie’s coat and started swirling around her like glitter, shimmering in the moonlight.
“Oooh, pretty!” Pinkie Pie bounced on the spot, looking delighted.
“Wh…what?!” Nightmare Moon yelped, backing up in her confusion as she watched it happen.
“Rainbow Dash, who fought your summoned pegasi even when it could have cost her her life and refused to join up with them even when they flattered her, represents the Element of Loyalty!” The second sphere did the same, this time glowing with the same pale blue as Rainbow’s coat.
“Too cool!” Dash crowed.
“Oh no, no, no!” Nightmare Moon snarled, trying to blast the five by the door with a spell, only for Twilight to draw from her deck and set a trap that caused her attack to reflect back off of it and strike the alicorn, making her crash into the silver tree in the courtyard’s centre.
“Fluttershy,” Twilight continued as the possessed alicorn picked herself up, a look of vague panic on her features as she realised that she was in deep trouble, “Who protected Nightingale from me and helped her even after she fought against us, represents the Element of Kindness!”
“I was just doing what any pony would have done.” Fluttershy whispered as the shards of the corresponding element glowed a pale yellow colour and circled her.
“Applejack, who waylaid my fears about my transformation by telling me the truth, embodies the Element of Honesty!” The part-time Princess informed the possessed one, smirking as her theory was confirmed. The Element of Honesty swirled around Applejack like amber, glowing like a flame.
“You can’t do this, you can’t drive me back into the dark, I will not allow it!” Nightmare Moon snarled, launching herself at Twilight. The alicorn narrowly dodged, causing the Moon Goddess to go crashing to the floor behind her.
“And last but not least, Rarity, who tamed the dragon by selflessly offering her jewels, making her own work difficult in the process and promising to help him find his horde again, is the Element of Generosity!”
The last Element lit up and joined those already swirling around Twilight’s other friends. “I wonder if I could make something that shimmered like this for ponies to wear…” Rarity mused as she beheld the pretty lights.
Twilight could not help the amused smile that crossed her face at the other unicorn’s comment even as Nightmare Moon snarled at her, “You still haven’t gotten the sixth Element and without your precious true name, the final key to the seal you used on me, you’ll never unlock your full potential and destroy me!”
“You’re wrong,” Twilight informed her, feeling smug that she knew something that the other Princess did not and trying to ignore the jab about her name, “The spark I felt when I realised that no matter how hard I try to push you away, you’ll always be my friends?” She asked her friends, looking at them with a smile, “That’s when I realised something. The final spark resides within the heart of all of us, and that spark is Magic!”
She let out a startled gasp as power erupted from the tree in the middle of the courtyard and formed a star like the one in the centre of her cutie mark in the middle of the air.
“This cannot be allowed!” Nightmare Moon protested, launching a wave of Shadows at Twilight and her friends, only for the dark magic to hit the spinning fragments of glittering gems and wash aside, protecting the group by the door.
The purple alicorn barely managed to raise a shield in time to ensure her own safety. For a few moments she strained against the tidal wave of Shadows then the star floating over the tree shattered into tiny shards and dove down. They wrapped around the Princess, glowing with an odd purple that was somewhere between the two shades of Twilight’s coat and their brilliance drove the surge of magic back.
The light only continued to grow, each set of glittering shards erupting in a blaze of glory that cocooned the pony they had been circling. Nightmare Moon could do nothing but watch in stunned horror as the Elemental gems and the ponies who represented them joined forces. The glow surrounding the five by the door shrank in until it was only around their necks. The Elements flashed brightly before dying out completely to reveal golden necklaces with a gem that looked like their cutie mark resting in the centre, but in the colours of the Elements.
Meanwhile the Element of Magic coated Twilight in a layer of magic which seemed to sink into not only her, but her puzzle too, filling the cracks with a purple glow. The final piece, the one that had been shaped like her cutie mark, started pulsing with the same purple as the Element.
“You won’t win.” Twilight informed the slightly panicking Shadow possessed Princess as she stared her down, able to feel the power surrounding them as a golden crown formed on her brown. It looked less like the crowns of Equestria and more like a diadum with Equigyptian patterns etched into the golden metal, though an amethyst purple star featured in the centre at the front of it. “I might not be able to destroy you, but I can save Princess Luna from you and bring back the Sun.”
“We’ll be back, we’ll always be back,” The Shadows spat at her, the odd echo in the possessed alicorn’s voice distorting in their anger, “We will break free from your final lock and when we do, we will destroy you and everything you hold dear.”
“You’ll have to get through us first, right girls?” Rarity asked, not quite sure what was going on but understanding that Twilight would need their backup.
“That’s right.” Rainbow Dash agreed, flaring her wings, standing tall and proud and refusing to back down here anymore than had against the trio of pegasi.
“We’ll be there to stop yer before you can even get to ‘er!” Applejack nodded, stamping her hoof and glaring at the tainted Goddess. “Yer won’t even get into Ponyville.”
“Yeah! No meanies allowed!” Pinkie agreed with a bright laugh despite the seriousness of the situation.
“We’ll all do our best to stop you.” Fluttershy agreed, her voice soft but determined as she watched Twilight’s magic glow even brighter as they confirmed their friendship and unity with each other.
“See?” Twilight asked, her wings half extended as she stepped towards the alicorn, “You can’t win, because I am never alone, I have my friends. Now, get out of Princess Luna and bring back Princess Celestia!”
“No.” The Shadows hissed, launching a fresh wave of darkness that did nothing against the protection of the Elements, but gave them a chance to get their stolen form airborne, “No, we won’t, your precious Sun Goddess can rot, souless in her cell for…” They cut off, choking slightly and losing a couple of foot as, for a moment the blue coat that was so dark it was almost black, flickered to a slightly lighter midnight blue and her narrow, almost catlike green eyes widened to a more normal shape for a few moments before the darkness regained control.
It gave the ground bound Princess below a chance to cast a spell that trapped the almost-black alicorn in a magical circle that stopped her from going anywhere.
“I don’t think your host likes that idea.” Twilight smirked, pleased to see there was some sign of Princess Luna still being within the dark creature before them and still fighting. “Last chance.”
“Never.” Nightmare Moon spat. “I will never leave!”
“Yes, you will.” The part-time Princess told her, the Elements reacting to her desire and the desire of her friends to free Princess Luna and bring back the sun. The gems of all six Elements glowed brightly from within their settings, along with an aura that surrounded each of the ponies, while the golden glow of the puzzle mixed with the purple of the Element of Magic. Then all seven sources of power sent bright lights rocketing skywards where they twisted and joined together, swirling around and around at high speeds as they plummeted down again, forming a rainbow of colour and power as they struck the possessed Princess who screamed in pain as the power drove the dark intelligence out of her.