Her name was Sunset Shimmer. Damn the humans and ponies who called her Demon and Monster. She was who she was, and she had just as much right to the name as that spineless goody-goody traipsing about the human realm. At least she had possessed real magic! If anyone was the “original,” it was her!
Not that anyone was there to hear her complaints, not inside the prismatic prism that was the Elements of Harmony. She scoffed at the irony. The ponies praised these shiny rocks as some holy artifact, the very embodiment of all that was good and right in the world.
What a load of crap! The elements are monstrous, every bit as cruel and callous as she was, and without even a trace of remorse. Oh sure, they could think, in a sense, but they didn’t make lives better! They did it to find the worst, most heinous, horrifying punishments they could devise and inflict them without mercy.
The Lord of Chaos having too much fun? Lock him in stone for a thousand years and let him rot in a constant nightmare of static rigidity. Princess of the Night feeling a little angsty? Send her to the moon for a time out so she can see how loneliness really feels!
The disenfranchised student of the Sun getting a little too big for her breeches? Lock her inside and use her magic to fuel the very energies she sought to understand.
Monsters.
And why did everything have to be purple? She got that she was inside the Element of Magic, but couldn’t they have at least made her prison a less awful color? Something like black, or burnt orange. Even brown would have been an improvement. But not pink.
Sunset shuddered. At least it wasn’t pink.
Sighing, she willed herself forward through the featureless void. There was no real ground here, or any surfaces to speak of. Nothing to explore or discover, just emptiness. But something drove her forward. Boredom, desperation, some indomitable will. Who knew, maybe she could find the edge. She was under no illusions about actually escaping, no being had ever actually escaped the punishment of the Elements before their time, but maybe she could at least get a peek at the outside world. She flexed her tattered wings. Floating around in in the void had been novel for a little while but it got old fast.
There was no way to tell if she was going straight. For all she knew, she was going around in circles. Maybe she wasn’t even moving at all. It wasn’t like there was a reference point to work off of.
All the same, it seemed like things were getting… darker?
She wondered about that. Time didn’t pass inside the crystal, as far as she knew, so it couldn’t possibly be an indication of nightfall or anything so simple as that. Unless all the weeks she had been in here had actually only been a few hours and the sun was only just now setting for the first time. She felt her stomach lurch at the thought. No, that was just… too horrible to even contemplate. It was definitely something else. It had to be.
Whatever it was, Sunset’s surroundings continued to darken. The growing shadows ate at her, filling her with foreboding and anxious dread. That had to be more than instinct. Something else was at work here. She continued on. Whatever it was, it was something. And anything had to be better than the eternal, mind numbing boredom of her crystal prison.
She shivered. Until now she hadn’t even thought about the temperature. Everything had always been perfectly maintained, so well balanced that she hadn’t even noticed. But now she was almost regretting her tattered dress as goosebumps rose across her crimson skin.
Sunset continued forward into the darkness. Almost without her noticing her surroundings had become pitch black. She powered on. It wasn’t as if she could trip, or run into a wall. Honestly, either of those things would have been a relief at this point. Anything to stem the boredom.
A dark presence filled her mind and she whirled to find a nightmare.
“Hello, child,” hissed the deathly visage of the Mare on the Moon.
Sunset trembled, her blood running cold. She stumbled, falling, somehow, disoriented by the sudden appearance of another plane. She looked up in fear, falling statically beneath her hooves.
“N-N-Nightmare Moon-” she gasped, the words catching in her throat.
The specter jerked back, a pained expression crossing her face. “P-please… call us Luna…”
Sunset stared up at her, chest whirling with confusion and fear. “You’re, you’re not Luna. You’re a demon, a parasite!”
Nightmare gasped, recoiling. “No, we- I am as much Luna as her.”
Sunset rose, latching on to the shadow’s weakness. “No, you’re not her. You’re- you’re corruption. Evil.” She grinned savagely.
The Nightmare backpedaled, then stood straighter, cld defiance flashing in her eyes. “And what of you then?” she demanded, “What does that make you?”
“I-” Sunset stammered, at a loss. “I’m…” She coughed, choking back a sob. “I’m… Sunset Shimmer…”
“And I am- was- Luna,” the Nightmare answered gently. “Everything she put into me, came from her. It hurts, doesn’t it? To be rejected by everyone. Friends, family… yourself.”
Sunset looked up at her, and knew tears were streaming from her face. “It does.”
Nightmare- Luna nodded, her azure eyes brimming in sympathy. She blinked, and a silvery tear ran down a black furred cheek. “When we were on the moon… when I was with her, she fed me all her anger, all her fear. She kept me alive. And now, I continue to suffer, while she goes free.”
“Do you hate her?” Sunset rasped.
Luna shook her head. “She hated us, I think, and that’s where all this started. No, I am everything she is not, and she still hates me. So I cannot hate her.”
Sunset stared down at her hand, the twisted, black claws sprouting from her fingers. She made a fist, relishing in the pointed needletips digging into her palm. I don’t hate her either, so she must still hate me. But I still hate myself. And, I think… I hate her for that.”
Luna nodded. “Perhaps.” She fluttered her dark, midnight wings, tapping her hoof against a floor that wasn’t there. “Perhaps it doesn't matter. We are here, and that is the only truth.”
Sunset scowled. “You sound like you’ve given up.”
Luna’s head drooped, and she sighed wearily. “I spent over a thousand years on the moon. I was free less than a night before being banished here. I think… I think I am done with revenge. If- when… no, perhaps it really is if. If I am allowed another chance, I think I should like to make friends.”
“Maybe,” Sunset said tentatively. She rubbed her arms. She felt less cold than before. It wasn’t any warmer, she was sure, but perhaps she was just growing acclimated. “I still want to crack some skulls, personally.”
Luna smiled, a subtle, playful twitch of the lips. “Maybe you’ll be lucky, and they’ll all be dead.”
Sunset laughed. “Yeah, maybe. Wouldn’t that be a kick.”
“Indeed.” Luna turned, eying Sunset. “Perhaps it would be easier with two. An eternity alone is a nightmare, and an eternity with yourself is hell. But what about an eternity with a friend?”
Sunset scoffed. “You really are her sister, aren’t you?”
Luna rolled her shoulders, the equine equivalent of a shrug. “We founded Equestria together. I should hope at least a few things survived the millennia.”
“Yeah…” Sunset smiled, turning to join Luna as she walked into the void. Gently she laid a hand on her withers, careful not to scratch her with her claws. She swallowed, her throat feeling scratchy. “It’s… nice. To run into someone who understands.”
Luna chuckled softly, a pained, bittersweet sound. “Yes… it is.”
“I just wish…” she grimaced, biting back her words.
“You wish it hadn’t taken this,” Luna finished sympathetically.
Sunset shook her head. “No. I mean, yes, but… I wish it had been us. Why couldn’t… why couldn’t we have accepted us?”
Luna looked up at her, her expression pained. “I wish I knew the answer, Sunset. I wish I knew.”
They continued walking together, and Sunset began to sense a shift in the light. It was subtle, almost unnoticeable, but she felt it. The blackness was receding, just a bit, and the purple was starting to bleed through.
But it wasn't such a bad color. Not really.