Living Darkness

by vildtiger


How to move on

Note: Part two of the episode 'Luna Eclipse' this happens a few moments after the last chapter.

At the edge of town, Twilight hears Sniper's voice. "I don't see what all the ruckus is about." Looking up, she spots him on top of the nearby roof, unlike the others he isn't dressed up for the festivities. The griffin has dropped the bit torn shirt and sunglasses for tonight, his hat is still on, though, as well as the silver bow. Said griffin eyes Luna with his sharp eyes, seemly pondering about something. "I take you're the princess everyone is thinking as this Nightmare Moon."

"Correct, we regret to inform thy but we were once consumed by the darkness and transformed into Nightmare Moon." Luna explains this griffin, recognizing him as the one her sister hired to aid them against the invasion. "But thanks to Twilight Sparkle, we are again back to our former self."

"Good to hear." Sniper simply says and thinks it is fair to warn this out of time princess. "The others have done their best putting the town's people in the right set of mind. But they are still quite jumpy." Glancing over to where he last saw that hoard of scared children. "and Pinkie is not helping."

"Thanks for the warning Sniper." Twilight thanks him and before she takes Luna into the—what Sniper called it, the jumpy town, she asks him for a bit more help. "Any chance you could set Pinkie straight that Princess Luna means nopony any harm?"

"Engie, and Rarity already on it." Sniper replies simply.

That's good to hear, Engineer is very good at calming people and she is sure Rarity can set Pinkie straight that wilding up the kid with fear is not okay at the moment. Twilight smiles happy for the news and turns to the slightly frowning princess. "Come, princess, let me introduce you to my friend Applejack." And leads the princess inside of Ponyville with the two turned humans close behind.
The town's ponies do freezes up when spotting the princess but fortunately didn't cower. The one pony there did get yelled at Soldier. "Do not cower for the vice president maggot!!" and the pony- apparently liking less getting yelled at Soldier than fearing the princess jumps back on her feet and gives the princess of the night a weak, yet still scared smile.
Passing Soldier who is currently dressed up as what the others called a robot salutes Luna. "Welcome to Ponyville miss Vice President! Sorry for the civilians being a bunch of spineless cowards!"

Luna stares at this for once respect paying pony, although not sure why he called her that name. "What is this... vice president thou name us?" She asks him confused, turning to the light grey unicorn when he speaks in a low voice."Don't question it; it will be waste of time anyway. Just see it as Soldier's way addressing royal." Luna is a bit hesitant but she guesses she can look past the different title because he is the only one paying her proper respect, turning back to the saluting pegasus. "We are grateful for the warm welcome of thy Soldier, but we do not wish forced admiration."

"I will try to be less forceful!" Soldier declares and trots over to yell- quieter at another pony thinking he can cower in fear before the vice president on his watch.

Rolling her eyes of Soldier's way of helping out, must admit his tactic does work... sort of. "He means well, although I wish he would follow your example and volume down." Twilight jokes lightly to the princess before bringing the very taken off guard princess from meeting Soldier over to where Applejack has her games sat up. They find her helping the young foal Pipsqueak not from falling into the barrel filled with water when he tried to grab an apple.

"Careful there, partner." Applejack smiles and sends the foal off to do something a bit more suitable for his size. Turning around, Applejack spots the princess of the night, she knows from Demo that the princess means no harm but it's harder to convince her body that this is not Nightmare Moon and jump in fright. "Heh, sorry about that..." She smiles weakly to the princess, clearing her throat and asks the now good princess of the night. "What can I do for you princess?" It is Twilight there answers, however.
"The princess is looking for a little advice on how to fit in around here." Well, that is an understatement, this is the alicorn there once was the source of all fear for peach sake. But Applejack guesses she can try to make this princess look less... well scary. "Fit in you say, well that's easy! All you gotta do is have the right attitude."

"Yeah, let loose and have some fun!" Scout grins, landing beside them from seemly no-where. The princess gives him a look filled with many emotions— all which he is detecting. The biggest of them is confusions and that makes her asks. "Fun? What is this "fun" thou speaks of?
Scout can't help but laugh at how oblivious this one is, but he will grant this weird speaking pony a helping hand of having fun. "It's easy." He trots over to the game where someone has to throw a toy spider into the web. He grabs one of these spiders and hands it to the dark-winged unicorn. "Here ya go."

Luna is still very confused what she is supposed to do with this toy spider. "Pray tell, what purpose do these serve?"

"You throw it at the web over there; like this." Scout grabs a spider and throws it onto the spider web. The winged unicorn copies him, at first she misses, the next spider lands right beside Scout, which does impress him. "Hey, for a beginner that was nice throw." He grins.

"Scout, do not insult the princess." Heavy lectures the speedster, Scout blinks and gives him a startled look. "She's a princess?" Turning wide-eyed to the alicorn there doesn't notice the startled look Scout gives her. "Your princess enjoys this "fun"!" and she turns her attention back to Twilight and Applejack, asking. "In what other ways may we experience it?"
Twilight beams hearing this.

Meanwhile, that group is busy showing princess Luna the meaning of fun. Miss Pauling is trying to get a hold on one of the mercenaries. She finds Demoman and Soldier having some sort of playfight which seems to be a great amusement for the surrounding ponies. Miss Pauling is split of going over and tell the two to stop fraternizing with one another or leave them be as those two have finally made peace with one another again after Helen pitted them against each other when she found out they have become friends.
She decides to look past it this time and moves on.
She finds the BLU Engineer at one of the many cafes and is baffled to see that Demoman and Soldier weren't the only of the mercenaries being on friendly terms to the opposite team. Engineer is sharing a drink and a laugh with RED Sniper, what they are talking about she does not know. She decides to step in on this breach of the rule the two teams aren't supposed to fraternize with one another. "Engie, Sniper, I know this isn't the war games but—" She catches their attention, making both men look at her a bit confused, she inwardly groans at them not seeing what is wrong with this picture. "RED and BLU aren't allowed to fraternize with one another."

The two look once at one another, then Sniper turns back to Miss Pauling, she just has to ruin it huh? "Yeah, and so what?" He asks annoyed.
Engineer nods in agreement with the griffin. "We can't let the war games affect us here, it's not fair for the ponies."
Miss Pauling stares at them in disbelief, but they are not done.
"And with that invasion, it is clear we need to work together." Sniper says, again with Engineer nodding in agreement, adding calmly. "It's not like we know when we will get back."

Good news then, "I spoke with the princess, she said a pathway will open for us to get home this summer." The two blinks, then hum with Engineer saying. "Well, it was fun as long it lasted."
This time Sniper nodding in agreement.
... She did not except them feeling bad for leaving. "Not as excitedly as I hoped." She muses dryly as she cannot see anything fun being stuck here as a pony.

"Don't get us wrong miss, we want to go home but—" Engineer turns his eyes to where the Twilight and friends are currently encouraging that second princess the fun in hurling with pumpkins. Twilight said they share a connection the six mares through the Elements of Harmony, and he is starting to think he knows who he will be partnered with. He just hasn't found shared ground with her and reinforced their link to the element, and it seems like now; it does not really matter. "This place has been awfully welcoming to the bunch of us."

"It's nice really, and bloody weird." Sniper remarks, thinking it is typical they need to leave just when he has gotten used to the ponies welcoming attitude. Just then, lightning strike right above them, making all three jump startled. Sniper is the first to recover and glares up to the rolling in laugher on the thundercloud Rainbow Dash. Usually, he would just throw a wide array of insults at whoever there has pranked him, but he has gotten on quite good terms with this rainbow mane pony plus she has pranked him one too many times. "That's it! I'm gonna tan you bloody hide!" And takes to the sky, chasing the evil laughing Rainbow Dash.

In disbelief that some pony managed to make Sniper— who is one most hard to let loose now is chasing that pony in a game of tag, Quote Miss Pauling doing a face-palm, forgetting she does not have hands. "Ow..." She moans in pain from having hit herself with a harden hoof instead of a softer hand, wondering if they have ended up in Pyro's world. "This place is more insane than I thought..."

"Nah, it's just how they are." Engineer laughs and if she wants to see insanity; she should meet Pinkie. Speaking about pink pony, he has taken notice that she and Scout has become friends really close, then again, that mare makes friends faster than he can put up a dispenser.
His attention returns back to Soldier and Demo, chuckling seeing the two now laughing their asses off from finishing their small playfight.

"Is there a place I can speak in peace with all of you?" Miss Pauling asks, thinking she will prefer telling the mercenaries about them soon coming home at the same time.
Engineer ponders about it for a moment. "Hm, you could always ask Twilight if it's alright we borrow her home."
And she has in mind of doing just that. Miss Pauling trots off to find said purple unicorn and find her along with several others of the mercenaries showing Princess Luna how to have fun with this form of Halloween.
Miss Pauling taps Twilight on the shoulder, asking her. "Could we borrow your home for a while?"
Twilight turns to her with a confused look on her face. "Um sure, but why?"

Miss Pauling answers simply. "I have finally gotten a date when we can get back to our own world. I wish to inform this to... the others all at once."

"You're leaving?" Applejack asks, making Heavy, Medic, and Scout turn around hearing this. Applejack feels quite disappointed that these new friends and one of them her fellow Element bearer soon will leave. She has been enjoying having these stallions around, and it is nice having a fellow bearer of her element around as well. "Aw shucks... I know we haven't known you fellas for long but..."

"We are going to miss you." Twilight finishes for her, the country pony nods in agreement.

Miss Pauling is quite caught off guard hearing that, why would they miss her when they barely know her, it soon shows that the two had been speaking to the mercenaries, which is a surprise as well.

"Yeah, but hey, it was fun while it lasted right?" Scout smiles to the two mares, he must admit that being here has been really fun and interesting. He sure heck is going to miss these wings, but he thinks he can live without this emotion detector inside of him. And besides, "If you going to miss us too much, we can always ask Ignis to transport us here again."

“I wouldn’t mind it, but I would prefer being able coming here on my own accord.” Medic remarks, Heavy chuckles of that very idea.

Miss Pauling on the other hand. "Don't give Ignis any ideas..." It was bad enough he kidnapped her and threw her into this world along with the others. And she can also do without Scout's new ability to sense emotions for him actually being able to draw in his ego without she having to tell him. He hasn't tried to flirt with her once since her arrival to town and that is getting really strange.

Twilight really wants to argue about the turned human leaving now they have realized the connection they share with the Elements of Harmony. But she knows that will just be selfish of her to make them stay in a world they do not belong in the first place. So instead she will ask them. "When the time comes: could we do a small goodbye party?"

Medic is very touched by this gesture, more so when he has realized that he has come to care for these ponies. "We will very much like that." Twilight nods and turns to Miss Pauling, saying: "You can use the library."

She thanks her and asks three here to get the other mercenaries to their meeting spot.
About an hour later, the whole team is gathered inside the Golden Oak Library. Here Miss Pauling informs them that they will be able to return home this summer. Again their reaction isn't as happy as she expected, in fact:

"I must admit that I would like staying here in a longer timespan; this world’s magic is quite fascinating." Medic says disappointed he does not have more time to study up on this new and very interesting topic.

"What about us being connected to the Elements of Harmony?" Demo asks and does think that there must be a reason why they got a twin to some of the elements. "They might need us here in the future."

They have been here too long it seems, Miss Pauling thinks and has to remind, Demo- all of them. "This is not our world, we have no reason helping them out. We need to get back so—"

"We can fight a senseless war against our missing souls over worthless lands." Spy says dryly. Scout sends him a look from sensing his true emotions of sorrow and anger, Spy pretends he doesn't notice.

Miss Pauling blinks of a subtle hint of anger coming from the usual calm and collected Spy. "That was what you were hired to do, yes." She replies and decides to confront him about his sudden anger. "If you have anything to say Spy; say it." but all she gets from him is a grumble. Miss Pauling decides to ignore Spy, he has been acting rather weird ever since that wedding. "The princess said a pathway will open for us this summer, it's quite the wait but until then; we will search for both the pyro's and try not kill everyone." The mercenaries send her an offended stare, taking her a bit by surprise. What? She thinks confused, most of the time when sending one of the teams- mainly RED out on missions, causalities has always been a problem. Well, that's mostly because she and Helen told them not to leave any witnesses behind. Before she can tell them anything else, the screaming of ponies makes the whole group of mercenaries hurry outside and search for whatever is making the whole town go into a wild panic.
It proves to have been the princess, and Miss Pauling is pretty sure that the princess of the night accidentally used her loud voice again.

Luna, horrified watching every pony run away from her and crashing the whole place just to do so finally throws her over the edge, she tried to be nice, tried to have some fun but all of that work crashed down when she got too excited by transfigured the toy spiders into real ones there would crawl over onto the net and by accident used her royal voice again. It seems they will forever fear her and in that case:"BE STILL!!"She bellows out with the royal voice, so loud and demanding that everypony throw themselves onto the ground, but at least they've stopped running.

Twilight is the first to recover and urges the princess to remember not using her royal voice. "Watch the screaming...!"

But Luna will not stop using the royal voice, for her next command needs to be heard and obeyed. "No, Twilight Sparkle! We must use the traditional royal Canterlot voice for what we are about to say!!" She tells the young unicorn, her eyes glowing white in response to her putting magic into her voice. Turning back to the citizens of Ponyville, Luna takes to the sky, yelling out the anger she feels. "Since you choose to fear your princess rather than love her, and dishonor her with this insulting celebration, we decree that Nightmare Night shall be canceled! Forever!!" and with that said, she leaves the town as she refuses to show the common ponies how hurt she truly feels from being treated with fear.

Trotting over to his fellow Element bearer, Demo asks Applejack a bit confused over the princess hash command of canceling this holiday. "Ey, what happened?"
Applejack explains him and the other mercenaries that several of the towns-ponies got really scared when Luna accidentally used her magic on the toy spiders and used her loud voice. The orange mare sighs. "Accidents like that do happens... but, ah shoot. We had everything going so well. Luna was happy, everypony in town was happy, now look at them." Nodding over to many of the foals crying that there won't be a Nightmare Night next year. She too must admit that it is quite sad.

"Aw man, that sucks." Scout muses disappointed, he knows this is not his world but thinking about how it would be in their world without Halloween, which is many people's favorite time- minus Smissmas of course. "Do you think there is a way for us to make her change her mind?" He asks the others.

"She seemed set on keeping it canceled," Sniper remarks and isn't as bummed out about this as most, but he does understand their disappointment in losing this holiday.

Well, it seems like Twilight needs to set the princess straight how important Nightmare Night is. "I am going to speak with her and do what I do best: Lecture her!"

"The princess doesn't stand a chance." Spy remarks to the purple pony, Twilight former determination is replaced with a sheepish laugh.
Medic giggles in agreement to his remark. "oh yes, you, Twilight Sparkle is very good at lecturing others. Well, shall we?" he gestures to where Luna went. Twilight snaps out of her small embarrassment and once again determent, the two head out to find the princess of the night.
Medic and Twilight find Luna walking heartbroken away from town, Twilight stops her but the princess of the night isn’t up to the company. “Leave me be, Twilight Sparkle.” But Twilight won’t, not before she has told Luna how important this night is for everypony. “I'm sorry it hasn't worked out how we wanted. But you have to believe me when I tell you that Nightmare Night is one of the most popular celebrations we have.”

Luna is far from convinced, though. “Yes. I can tell. By all the adoring shrieks of the children as they run away.” Away from her because of her past mistake. She leaves, starting to consider taking up Prince Blueblood suggestion on that spa, at least he isn’t scared of her…

“Princess...” Twilight calls sadly but is at a loss of how to fix this problem. She turns to Medic, noticing that he has the eyes of somepony there can relate. Oh yes, he must have scared a lot of ponies with his twisted sense of humor. She nudges him, asking. “What’s on your mind?” Medic looks away, when he meets her gaze again, it is not a reply on her question, but instead. “What is her story?” So Twilight has to tell him the brief story about that Luna turned evil and had to be banished for a thousand years and when she returned, she and her friends had to defeat her with the newly acquired Elements of Harmony. Medic frowns deeply when she finishes the story. “You can turn people good just like that here?” He asks, sounding quite confused. Twilight is about to answer yes, but when thinking about it, she gets the idea that the Elements doesn’t zap ponies good, instead: “I think the Elements simply removes the darkness tainting a pony.” It does explain Sniper and Spy’s behavior, they were still them just… their worst selves. “Nightmare Moon was Princess Luna’s worst self- her darkness.”

So the Elements only allows the person to get a second chance in reconsidering their actions, that makes more sense than just making them good. Medic sure hell wouldn’t like it if he didn’t have a choice, that’s how he went insane and lost his sympathy for others in the first place. He’s not sure he is currently getting his second chance now- not sure he deserves it, but he can relate with Luna on dealing with mistakes so big from the past that it keeps haunting her. Without a word, Medic follows the princess, not really taking notice that Twilight is following but keeping her distance. Finding the princess at the edge of town, Medic hesitates. It took him a moment, but he has realized how weird this is getting to him. He- an insane doctor who glee over tormenting people on the surgery table- is going to help someone else by giving them advice how to become better. The world truly has gone crazy.
He lets out a sigh, but even though he would like to just leave as that is easier, he tells Luna in a matter of fact. “I know how hard it is by been shunned away from anyone for something you did in the past.” Luna stops and turns to him, blinking a bit confused. She hesitates but after has turned fully to him, she asks; “And how did you solve it?”
Medic looks away, he does not think his past mistake can ever be fixed. His mind is too broken and he honestly doubts that he has enough time in life to ever change that he is a cruel person, less so when he is too curious for his own good and cannot shake off the sense he has too much fun playing with people's body parts. But… well, he has sort of becoming toleratable thanks to the team. But unlike him, this Luna has all time in the world to work on her shortcomings. “I do not have the time to fix my mistakes. But you have, so through hard work and having good pe- ponies around, you should be getting somewhere.” He replies after a moment of silence. She can get better while he... well, now that he thinks about it, Medic must admit that he has become slightly better thanks to a certain brute patience and long talks with him. It reminds him how thankful he is to Heavy for having improved just enough that he only had to worry about the RED’s and people still sour about the war wanting him dead. Brushing those thoughts aside, Medic turns to the dark-colored alicorn. “I won’t deny that ponies will fear you, but over time you should find ponies there can bring the best out from you.”

A bit caught off guard by this unicorn’s advice and having a tone that he truly knows what he is talking about through experience, Luna is willing to endure the common ponies fear a bit longer if the wait will bring her friends. “Thank you.” She nods to him, blinking in wonder when this unicorn looks very awkward from being shown gratitude.

Twilight Sparkle joins them there, giving both a small smile before turning to Luna, asking hopefully. “Ready to try again?” Luna hesitates but agrees that she is willing to give this ‘getting on good terms with Ponnyville’ another go.

After having spoken with her friends of what the best choice of action should be, it does not take Twilight long to make the needed preparations for this second attempt on making Ponyville- the foals mostly to like their princess of the night. Zecora, Derpy, Scout, and Applejack gather all the disappointed and sad children, bringing them to where the statue of Nightmare Moon is with the promise that Nightmare Night is not over just yet. Scout guides the kids to offer the statue some of their own candy, he does take a few snacks from the small pile, not at all afraid the stature or that quite awesome princess to Luna will gobble him up for it.

Pipsqueak offers the stature his candy, sighing sadly, "Goodbye, Nightmare Night. Forever..." But when he turns around to leave, the wind suddenly starts blowing and Nightmare Moon voice boom over them. "Citizens of Ponyville! You were wise to bring this candy to me. I am pleased with your offering!"
Pipsqueak, along with the other foals look around for the source while doing so he notices that even the adults are a bit nervous, turning back to the stature. Pipsqueak finally finds the source and stare scared up to the now alive stature of Nightmare Moon. "So pleased that I may just eat it... instead of eating you!" He and the children scream in fear and take the run for it. When they have gotten decent distance from Nightmare Moon, they stop and realizes it was just Luna in a very cool disguise. Turning to the other foals Pipsqueak tells them. "I wish she could do this again next year." For even though he got really scared, it was really fun too.
Scootaloo, dressed up as a werewolf steps over to him, suggesting. "Well, maybe we should ask her." He thinks that is a good idea and without asking the others if they would speak with her. Pipsqueak trots carefully over to the princess, hearing her asks sadly "—For... for them to scream some more?" He gets her attention by pulling her always flowing mane. "Um... Princess Luna." He quickly lets go of it and asks her carefully as he still hasn't fully recovered from that good scare she gave them. "I know there's not gonna be any more Nightmare Night, but do you suppose maybe you could come back next year and scare us again anyway?" He asks, now voice more certain and happy, for he really wants to be scared like this again next Nightmare Night.

Luna is truly dumbfounded getting such a request from the youngest of all the foals, more so when scanning the area, she sees that all the other foals, although keeping their distance is watching her with hopeful although some of them scared eyes. Did they like she scared them? "Child. Art thou saying that thou... like me to scare you?" The foal nods, telling her. "It's really fun! Scary, but fun!" That does not make much sense for her, how can something scary be fun? The foal continues, "Nightmare Night is my favorite night of the year." Well in that case: "We shall have to bring—" and in her excitement hearing this, forgets not to use the royal voice when she declared. "-Nightmare Night back!" The foal got blown a bit away but he quickly recovers, telling her happy "You're my favorite princess ever!" and runs happily back to the others. "She said yes, guys!" and the foals cheers in joy, now happy of the continue of Nightmare Night, they return back to Ponyville. Luna watches them leave, still rather dumbfounded about this turn of event.

Twilight beams from the idea she and her friends made so Luna can get some positive reaction from the town's ponies. "See? They really do like you, princess."

"Can it be true?" Luna asks quietly, realizing the common people do like her, she steers and again forgets not to use the royal voice "Oh, most wonderful of—" then remembers and tune it down. "I mean... Oh, most wonderful of nights." She turns to the adults and the grey cross-eyed pegasus walking over to her. "Come, Princess, let us enjoy the last hours of the festivities in your name." and that Luna is more than happy to agree on and follows them back to Ponyville.

Twilight smiles watching Luna have somewhat finally figured out how to be around the other ponies and get a laugh herself when the princess managed to scare Scout by appearing from the water in the bobbing apple game. He does quickly recover and along with the princess and surrounding ponies laugh of the rather good scare from Luna. Twilight is very happy of this turn of event and decides to write Celestia about how her sister is doing.
Just as she finished, Medic walks up to her, remarking with a grin. "Of all the Halloween's I have been attending on this team, I will admit that this has been the weirdest." He takes a seat beside her. "I think I would prefer fighting against zombie visions of the team over this. A crazy doctor handing out the advice of life lessons is too weird for my taste."
Twilight eyes him, wondering why he found that weird. "I don't see why you find that strange. You have a lot of knowledge on certain subjects, and you are one of the few ponies I know there can keep up with me." And that is saying something when Medic's special talent is not magic and yet he can still cast spells only higher level unicorns can perform.

"I have never been the man stepping back from a good challenge." Medic smiles down at this young pony. "And considering your age, you are a very good teacher." Twilight blushes slightly of the praise.

That's because Medic is an easy student, he is curious and rarely hesitates to learn new spells. Twilight might try to teach other when she is a bit older, but for now, she is just happy teaching this unicorn. Oh right, there was something that Medic said to Luna there caught her attention. "When you spoke to Luna, I noticed you said; you do not have time to fix your past mistakes." Which confuses her a bit, for her Medic does not look much older than her parents and they have plenty of years ahead of them. "How long do humans live?"

He should've known she caught up on that, no matter, better she knows that he and the other mercenaries won't live that long. "A human's life expectancy is around the seventy, but unless we manage to regain a complete soul, then I probably won't live more than three years or so." Medic explains.

Hearing this is very startling, Twilight wasn't aware humans didn't live very long. The humans she and her friends have befriended have even lesser time and yet; "You sound awfully calm about it." She softly remarks.
Medic chuckles, but this time devoted of his usual joy. "If you knew what I have been through, then you would understand why."

"What have you been through?"

"It's best you never know." Medic muses, unlike others, he did not want to scare Twilight away. He will certainly do that if he ever tells her what kind of monster he is because of what happened to him in his youth.

Twilight can't help but fear what kind of dark secret this unicorn holds but she has a feeling that it has something to do with these War Games he and the others at times talk about. And knowing these humans have been stuck in a circle of death and war for years, she can sort of understand his reluctance in talking about it to someone Soldier calls a civilian. "Okay." Twilight muses, wishing she can help but she has no knowledge how to recover from war. All she can is accept that the turned humans are dealing with some heavy stuff and leave it at that.
She did not know how grateful Medic is that she did not push him to explain about his past. What she did notice but didn't really see anything weird that Medic caress his chest from some sort of ache.