//------------------------------//
// Darkness 
// Story: Once Bitten 
// by Damaged 
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"Where did he go?!" Thorax glared around the sky, her horn boiling with power. "Was that the monster who made— made us?" She didn't realize how worked up and furious she was, until Princess Luna's worried look at her made Thorax reflect on her emotions.

Turning the purest of anger against itself, Thorax calmed down as best she could, and turned her attention to Shining Armor. Reduced back to her changeling nymph form, Shining was groaning on the ground. Leaning down to her drone, Thorax saw the dark, jagged shapes worked into Shining's little, curved horn.

Every time Shining tried to work magic, she felt a crackle of discordant pain in her horn. Even trying to shift her form was met only with pain, rather than the crackle of changeling fire. "What did he do to my horn?"

Princess Celestia walked up to Thorax, and lowered her head to Shining underneath her. "He uses old, dark magic. We have things to talk of, and I think we need Twilight Sparkle here to hear it too." Celestia prepared her magic to remove the crystals, when yet more green fire boiled along the ground, and Chrysalis stepped onto the crowded balcony.

Every part of Chrysalis burned with hatred and anger. She seethed with the need to crush Celestia and Luna. "Y-Your Highnesses." The words cost her much to say, and her rage tried to burn higher still.

"Step back, Chrysalis. Let us protect you again." Thorax braced herself, stepping to put herself between Shining Armor and Chrysalis, like a mother hen facing a wolf. Bright and colorful, she nonetheless started to bring the seething ocean of power that Cadance and Shining had fed her to the fore.

"Stop!" Chrysalis was choking on everything. Dark emotions being thrust onto her by Sombra, magic that tasted so good but—she felt—would neutralize most of what made her, her. She shook her head and lowered it. "I can feel his power urging me to fall upon you all. It wants me to destroy and break you apart. I have felt it so long I thought it was mine."

"You are fighting it." Luna stepped forward, her own experience as Nightmare Moon foremost in her mind. "Keep fighting it. You are a good pony, Amore."

The name was like a key, and Chrysalis felt it open a door to the core of her being. She locked eyes with Princess Luna, and watched as the other mare breathed. She matched her own breath to Luna's, and felt herself calm by inches. It was like throwing a bucket of water onto a firestorm, but each breath was another bucket, and each bucket made the next easier to throw.

"You are a lost sister to us, but still a sister." Her face betraying a warm smile, Luna stepped forward and nuzzled Chrysalis' neck. "And you need to feed. Please, gain some strength." Luna stood still, and kept as neutral look as she could. A cool pressure seemed to swell around her, and she fixed her attention on Chrysalis.

Chrysalis didn't realize how hungry she had been. Her ploy at the wedding had been a massive use of energy, and she had just broken out of two powerful shields, then teleported. Her anger whispered ideas into her head, 'Luna has bared her throat,' and, 'Just reach into her and take everything.'

"It's hard to resist, isn't it, Amore?" Luna saw Chrysalis' eyes narrow at the use of her name. "I trust you to fight this. After all you did, Amore, you don't lack willpower or the ability to plan. Use that, use all your tricks, Amore, to fight him."

Each mention of her old name fueled Chrysalis. She directed the anger away from Luna, and away from herself. For a thousand years or more Chrysalis had been fed Sombra's fury; she was used to it, used to the feel of it, and how to use it. She pointed all the anger back at its source.

Luna felt the chill leave her, and knew Chrysalis had ceased feeding. "You are still a good pony, Amore." The name, spoken again, seemed like a trigger. Chrysalis leapt upon Luna, and wrapped her forelegs around Luna's neck. 

Tears poured down Chrysalis' cheeks, and she buried her face in Luna's mane. Clinging to Luna, she kept fighting at the anger that tried to incite her to fight and kill. She closed her eyes and wept long and hard.

Soft wings folded around Chrysalis, and she surrendered to her tears. She wept, and sobbed, and couldn't pull herself back. A never-ending parade of ponies that her drones captured paraded in her mind. The ponies stopped being ponies at some point, and just became fodder. "I'm so sorry."

The three words were like a hammer in Chrysalis' mind. It wasn't what Sombra had done to her that broke down her will to harbor his anger, but her sorrow for every pony she had changed.

"I understand Captain Shining Armor has taken your honor under his own,"—Luna smiled a little at the wordplay—"wing?" Luna didn't release her grip on Chrysalis until she felt a gentle tug.

Pulling her head back from the damp stain she had left on Luna's shoulder and mane, Chrysalis realized that they were alone on the balcony. There was no sight of Shining, Thorax, or Princess Celestia. "How did you get free?"

"Twilight Sparkle. The mare you thought was no threat at all." Luna used her magic to carefully run part of her own mane along each of Chrysalis' cheeks—drying them. "That mare and her friends used the Elements of Harmony. We need to talk about this more, there are too many parallels in our stories for it to be coincidence."

The words sobered Chrysalis, and bent the scheming, planning part of her mind to the problem. "If it were Sombra that corrupted you, too—"

"Then he may have other things planned." Luna kept one wing on Chrysalis' back and drew her forward. "Sister will call on Twilight Sparkle, and I am sure Twilight and her friends will be just as effective as they were on myself, but I think we need to look at what Sombra has done, and try to see if there is more we can do, to undo."

"You want to know everything about him." Chrysalis, her mind now completely focused on a problem, like her old self. Not just her old changeling self, either, but like she had other princesses she could rely on. "Sombra was…"





I looked out from the balcony of my castle. I could see nearly two-thirds of the Crystal Empire from where I stood, and it was breathtaking. Gazing out over the land, I felt the Heart send gentle pulses to me, and begged it to wait. Too early or too late, and Equestria wouldn't receive the pulse of love and support that the magic of the Crystal Heart could give.

"Soon. Soon we can—" My soft whispering was cut short by the clanging of pots. "What is going on?" Turning around, I stomped back into my castle to see foals running amok. The clanging sound came from two, each with large pots and a soup ladle. I couldn't help but chuckle at the thought of my bravest new Crystal Guard. "Attention!"

Every foal in the room spun around to face me, but I fixed my gaze on the two "knights." Stepping closer, I could barely see their wide eyes under the edges of the pots. "What do the Crystal Guard have to report?"

My heart nearly broke with love when one sketched a perfect salute—with the wrong hoof. "Captain General Sombra reporting for duty! Nothing to report, Your Imperial Majesty!"

"Highness." The softest tone came from the other pot, and as it tilted up more I could see the nose of a filly poke out. 

"Of course she's the highest!" Sombra's shrill tone should have been cute and adorable, but the blood in my veins chilled.

A sudden grip of ice clutched around my heart, and I stared at the foal. The Heart's magic shoved between me and the premonition, and I welcomed it. As the last of the premonition's power played out, I saw the Crystal Heart pulse, and little Sombra was destroyed.





"The heart can destroy him, then." The information was important, though Luna could see the pain even on Chrysalis' alien-seeming features. "That is a last resort, but it is one we must entertain. You are the last princess of the Crystal Empire, can you activate the Crystal Heart?"

"I would have said yes if this was anything but a thousand years. And what is worse, I don't know if I could even touch it now, it might annihilate me." Chrysalis looked at the largest hole in her left forehoof. "He ripped out everything in me that would resonate with the Crystal Heart."

"Tell me if this sounds familiar." Lifting a cup of coffee up to her lips, Luna sipped the darkest of brews in preparation for sleep lost that, if they all failed, would never be made up.





High in my own tower, I looked out at the dark night and sighed. "Why do you do this, Tia?"





"You didn't speak like that!" Chrysalis giggled. "You were all 'thee' and 'thou' and all that!"

"I adapted, and besides, I prefer the mare I am now. I am stronger." Luna cleared her throat. "Where was I?"





My sister had done it again. Another Summer Sun Celebration was coming, and she had—just like the previous year—decided it should be a big deal. Melancholy and a little sad, I kept my eyes on my lovely moon.

"You should have your own celebration."

The voice startled me. I looked around the room. "Who was that?" Stomping around to all the good hiding spots, I found not a mouse. "Show yourse—" I didn't manage to finish my demand.

The night sky bled blue-black stars and shapes. They poured down from the depths of the evening and started to flow into the shape of a pony. She was so beautiful, as her form became more solid, that I took a step towards her. "Luna. Princess of the Moon and Night. Lady of Darkness. Hunter of Bad Dreams. Sister to the Wonderful Princess Celestia of the Sun."

The titles had warmed me as she spoke them, in the same voice I had heard a moment earlier, but when she got to the last my smile broke. "I don't care about her."

"And why not? Why don't you care what she wants, what she thinks is best for you?" The words were like honey, tempting me, and coming now from the night mare's mouth.

"I…" Closing my mouth, I thought about her question some more. "She is my sister. I should stand by her side." My words were hollow, empty, lacking all weight and any effectiveness. I slumped.

"Why not do something else, just for a night?" The night mare's words were so easy to listen to, and they made perfect sense. What Celestia asked me to do, what I had always done, was guard the night. "Come for a ride."

I didn't say anything, I leaned forward, and the night poured around me.





"Nightmare Moon. That was after my time." Chrysalis had a foreleg around Princess Luna's withers, hugging the mare who had called her sister. "A slippery slope."

"Very slippery. One night we just flew around, ignoring the dreams of ponies. That was fun for a month. Then we started slipping into dreams and playing with them. The ponies dreamed of Celestia's sun, we eclipsed it." Luna leaned into Chrysalis, there was nothing else for it, not when it was the first time she had ever told her story.

Chrysalis knew what was coming. "And then?"





"We could do more, you know." The night mare's words were always tasty in my ears—I turned both to face her. "Come kiss me, night-sister, and I will show you something much more exciting."

Exciting was something sorely lacking. It had been a year since she had started visiting, and once again the Summer Sun Celebration was here. My heart beat faster, and I stepped closer to the night. Leaning forward, I closed my eyes and smiled.

The moment of contact was like burning ice. I screamed as, instead of the night mare entering me, she ripped from me instead. I was torn from the world and plunged into inky darkness. Anger at my sister's constant betrayal of my night was the biggest part of my time like that, and it found fertile ground to grow.

Daytime came and went, and when the moon rose, so did I. Tearing a hole back into reality, I could see no moon in the sky. "This year,"—I turned my armored head up to the sky, and ripped the moon from its rest—"there will be no more sun!"





"And then Celestia found me. My sister was smart, but she alone wasn't strong enough to wield all the Elements of Harmony, but she tried. It took a lot out of her, and they barely had the energy to shove me away again. If Twilight Sparkle had been there, I have no doubt that Nightmare Moon would have been ended that very day." Luna found not only was she leaning against Chrysalis, but that Chrysalis was leaning against her.

"It sounds familiar. After Sombra ripped me apart, I…" Chrysalis took a deep breath. "I was left without a sister to save me from myself. The darkness and anger wrapped around me, and I went mad."