//------------------------------// // The Beginning of The End // Story: Friends, Forgiveness, and Magic // by Invinsible //------------------------------// Friends, Forgiveness, and Magic The Beginning of the End Princess Nightmare Moon furrowed her brow in concentration as she levitated the bottles of swirling emotions up to her eye level. She opened the bottles up, pulled the emotions out, and pushed them together into a cloud of dark rainbows. “New territory here,” she mumbled to herself as her horn and magical mane touched the cloud of emotions, pouring dark dream magic into Lady Faust’s bottled past. Gilda came up beside her as Nightmare worked. “Well, I just gave Chrysie my share of love. Hopefully she’ll be back on her hooves in a few seconds. What’re you doing with all that?” “I can’t read these emotions like Chrysalis can, so I’m trying to create a daydream out of this mess,” Nightmare answered. Gilda grumbled. “What’s the point of all this info gathering?! I say we get to work on getting back into Equestria and smashing Faust’s face in!” “But we don’t know how to get past Faust’s spell yet,” Nightmare responded. “Until we figure out her weakness, we can’t open a portal to Equestria. And even if we manage that, this is the alicorn who blocked Discord’s and Pinkie’s chaos magic. The mare behind Grogar, Merry Weather, and the Dazzlings brainwashing. It’s going to take everything we have to destroy Lady Faust.” Nightmare smiled as the dark rainbow of emotions changed into a blurry cloud of blue smoke and stars. “Ha, ha! Success! Now, let’s see what other secrets you’re hiding Faust!” Gilda watched as Nightmare pushed her face into the magical daydream. “Well, what do ya see?” “It can’t be…is that Eternal Twilight?!” Nightmare exclaimed. “What the…Eternal Twilight? Princess Twilight Sparkle’s evil self? I thought this was Faust’s past. Are you saying she had something to do with Princess Sparkle going bad?” Gilda asked. “No…no, wait…it’s something else. Dreams can be difficult to follow even at the best of times, but Lady Faust doesn’t seem like she has a good grasp on her own mind. No, that pony is smaller, about the same size as Princess Twilight. But there’s something rotten about her…okay, I’m seeing something else…” Nightmare grumbled as the daydream sputtered out and splashed onto the floor as a rainbow puddle. “Well, I suppose I should be impressed that daydream lasted so long under the circumstances.” Gilda sighed. “So, was any of what you saw actually helpful?” “I discovered one more detail. The name Tulip Secondborn.” Gilda frowned in confusion. “Okay, Tulip is a pretty common pony name. But Secondborn? What kind of name is that?” Nightmare growled at her own lack of success. “A useless clue.” Gilda sighed. “Don’t beat yourself up too bad over all this. Just lemme know if you find a helpful memory.” She heard Chrysalis let out a deep breath and hurried over to her friend’s side. “You okay, Chrysie?” Chrysalis nodded. “I am now, thanks to all of you letting me have some of your love. Nightmare, I saw what you were doing just now. Find anything useful?” Pinkie teleported in between the two of them and held up the golden bottle she found. “Moony is having some tough luck, same as all of us. But THIS cool glowy thing might be just what the doctor ordered!” Chrysalis blinked in surprise at the golden light. “That’s joy. Suppressing her own anger, fear, and sadness makes sense, considering how twisted Faust’s memories are. But why would she want to suppress her own happiness?” Discord shrugged. “No clue. But this bottle is the only container with mostly happiness inside it. Trust me, we counted.” He held up an hourglass with calculators duct tapped to it. The hourglass grew arms and a mouth as it let out an exhausted breath and wiped its brow. “Even if this doesn’t tell us anything new, I really need something to feel happy about,” Chrysalis said. She quickly swiped the bottle from Pinkie and allowed the emotion to fill her mind. From outside of Faust’s memories, Chrysalis’ friends watched the changeling queen calmly watch the vision. Her glowing yellow eyes and blank expression didn’t reveal anything about what she was seeing. Out of nowhere, Chrysalis began to smile. Her smile morphed into a deliriously happy grin as tears started to roll down her eyes. Her face quickly twisted into a scowl and the vision ended. Chrysalis stood up again and shook her head to recover from the rollercoaster of foreign emotions she had been forced to feel. “Well, what did you find? Don’t keep us in suspense!” Trixie said. Chrysalis lightly chuckled. “We should have seen this coming. The answer to our problems is the same as it always is. Use the Elements of Redemption.” “Seriously?! Now you tell us that?!” Gilda rolled her eyes. “Whatever, we’ve finally got our ticket to kicking Faust’s flank! Let’s get this thing started!” Chrysalis gently pulled Gilda’s claw away from the Element of Zeal. “Not quite what I meant, at least not yet. Discord, we need to get to the Cave of Forgiveness.” Discord and Pinkie exchanged surprised glances, before the spirit of chaos snapped his talons and teleported them all to the mysterious cave. The Cave of Forgiveness had undergone some changes since the last time the Element Bearers had seen it. The rainbow coloured crystals that were dotted all over the cave were sparkling even brighter. The crystal statues of various creatures had been refined dramatically. While before the statues could have been of anybody they now clearly depicted Nightmare Moon, Smog, Sunset, Gilda, Discord, Trixie, Chrysalis, Twilight Sparkle, Spike, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie, Rarity, Fluttershy, Celestia, Luna, Sombra, and a few others. In the middle of the cave a beautiful pool sat. While it seemed there was nothing but water in the pool, the liquid sparkled and rippled as if something otherworldly was swimming in it. Smog took a nervous glance around the cave. “I don’t remember if I said this before, but this place creeps me out a little. Not a lot, but you know. A little.” “I’m afraid I can’t agree with you, Smog,” Sunset said as she examined the crystals hanging along the walls. “I’d love nothing more than to break one of these off and see how they work. Except, I’m afraid I might break something else if I did that.” “I’m somewhere in the middle,” Nightmare said. “This cave is beautiful, but also quite alien. It reminds me of my first time seeing the inside of a changeling hive.” “I think it’s really pretty!” Pinkie chirped. She rubbed her forelegs sheepishly and added, “I’m sorry I polluted it with my Seeds of Doubt that one time.” “It is okay, Pinkie Pie. I forgive you.” The heroes all stared at the pool as a dark blue alicorn emerged from the waters and gracefully flew over to them. What looked like a continuously sparkling clone of Nightmare Moon touched down on the ground and smiled at them all. Every Element Bearer who had a horn charged it up with magic, while Gilda and Smog cracked their knuckles. “Changeling?” Nightmare asked Chrysalis. When the changeling queen shook her head, Nightmare’s horn crackled with lightning. “Who are you and why do you look like me?” The Nightmare clone smiled gently. “I am very sorry. It was not my intention to startle you. I do not want to hurt you. I do not want to hurt anyone.” A shimmering cone of light traveled up the clone’s body and turned it into Discord’s mirror image. “Is this form more to your liking?” The other Element Bearers looked a little unsure about what was happening, until Trixie raised her hoof. “Oh! Take Trixie’s form next!” The clone nodded and did just that. Trixie circled her smiling, sparkling image and stared at her in awe. “You’re even more beautiful that my reflection.” “The Great and Powerful Trixie Lulamoon. You are worth far more than your beauty and your skills.” “Um, excuse me?” Sunset raised her hoof. The clone transformed into her next. “Uh, okay. You seem friendly and all, but who are you?” The mysterious creature turned back into Nightmare Moon and nodded gently. “Your caution and wisdom have served you well. However, you have no reason to fear me. Please forgive me for bragging, for as the expression goes ‘To err is mortal, to forgive divine.’ That is who I am.” The beautiful entity spread its wings wide and smiled lovingly at them all. “I am the Divine Spirit of Forgiveness. And I am sorry you had so much trouble getting here.” “I…I don’t understand. How can anypony hate friendship?” Princess Twilight Sparkle cried. Lady Faust frowned at the princess and her friends. “I suppose that’s a new one for you. All your other enemies just wanted to dominate or destroy. They saw friendship as an annoyance or an obstacle at best. As for me? I don’t care about Equestria. I just want to destroy the evil that corrupts it. And friendship is the greatest evil of all.” “Lady, you’re a few apples short of a basket. Scratch that, yer basket’s empty! Friendship ain’t evil!” Applejack declared. “Yeah! It’s like the opposite of evil!” Pinkie Pie said. Fluttershy frowned at Lady Faust. “I think we’ve all had enough of your attitude! I won’t let you call my friends evil, so you listen here, missy…” “Crawling out from the darkest corners of her mind, the pegasus known as Fluttershy was horrified to confront her own assertiveness made flesh and blood.” The sentence was written, and Faust’s spell was cast. Before their eyes a gigantic dark yellow minotaur with bulging muscles, pink hair, a spiked tail, and a pair of dragon wings appeared before them. The Fluttermonster stomped the ground hard and snarled, “YOU BREAK MY HEART, I RIP YOU APART!” With a quick slash of Lady Faust’s horn, the abomination was erased from existence. She glared down at the properly cowed ponies. “You think there’s a difference between being assertive and being mean. You think there’s a difference between friends and minions. I don’t see a difference. Do you?” Fluttershy flinched from Lady Faust’s frosty glare. “Eep!” Lady Faust shook her head. “You’re still not getting it. But to you, I suppose friendship is only the happier smile upon a two-faced monster. What would you call the changeling hive before Queen Chrysalis lost it? What would you call the friendship that she, Tirek, and Cozy Glow have made? Very bad people can still make friends, in fact they do it all the time.” Starlight’s eyes widened. “Wait, what was that about Cozy Glow, Chrysalis, and Tirek?” Twilight shook her head. “You’re wrong, Faust. I don’t know how anypony could-” “Oh, after all this time you still keep saying any PONY? That is an excellent point to make. Does anyone here remember this?” Lady Faust waved her hoof and two illusions popped up. Zecora, wearing a dark cloak and with glowing yellow eyes, and Pinkie Pie doing a weird dance. “Oh, she’s an evil enchantress. She does evil dances!” Pinkie cringed as the memories hit her. “Uh, well-” Lady Faust waved her hoof again and the Pinkie illusion was replaced with an image of Rarity scoffing. “Just look at those strips! So garish!” Rarity cringed too just as the illusions faded away. “I admit that we were acting very foolish at the time…” “Everyone acts foolish at any given time,” Lady Faust grumbled. She stood silently glaring at Twilight and her friends before she asked, “What is the greatest evil in the world? What is the cause of histories greatest tragedies? Is it discrimination? War? Tyranny? My little ponies, the greatest evil of all time is group mentality.” The ponies and dragon stared at her in confusion as Lady Faust continued to talk. “So many societies believe in different things. In the magic of friendship. In the power of the herd. Whether you realize it or not, group mentality is the force that binds us all in chains. When you look at someone – anyone – you pick one trait and you fixate on it. You judge a person by their species, or their gender, or the colour of their mane or coat. You think that just because I am a pony, I MUST have something in common with all ponies. You think because I am a girl, I MUST have something in common with all girls. And when we don’t have something in common with you, when we fail to meet your expectations, you FORCE them on us. When people see something paranormal, the only thing that matters to them is “Us versus her”. That’s how ponies saw Zecora, and it’s how you see me.” “How many times did Twilight Sparkle want to sit in her library and read books? How many times did she want to lecture on a favourite subject or perform magical and scientific experiments?” Lady Faust growled at them. “And how many times did you idiots just roll your eyes and say, ‘Oh Twilight is such an egghead! Drop everything you’re doing and come do what WE want to do! Pinkie is throwing another party because today ends with the letter Y!’” Lady Faust pointed at Pinkie. “Speaking of, what happened to that friendship lesson you learned? What about Cranky Doodle Donkey? What happened to the importance of leaving someone ALONE?!” She sneered at Twilight next. “It’s not a lesson you learned. When Spike pointed out that you used to be a bad friend, you dropped everything to see Minuette, Twinkleshine, Lemon Hearts, and Moondancer. The first few friends who accepted you back into the herd, you immediately forgot about. Just some more friends to add to your collection. But Moondancer was the one who got away. You wouldn’t leave her alone until she finally decided to put her books away and kick a stupid ball around. Proving once and for all that you didn’t befriend Moondancer for her sake… “You did it for your own. To satisfy your own ego. You couldn’t let anyone know that the Princess of Friendship was a bad friend.” Twilight shook her head in distress. “That’s not true at all! Friends aren’t trophies to be collected! Friends are-” Lady Faust’s horn flared up and she glared down at Twilight with a scowl. “I wasted my childhood by listening to friendship lectures like yours. No. More. Debate. I’m going to destroy this world and every friendship-spewing pony in it.” She lifted her head back up and said “The Princess of Friendship could ” “WAIT!” Pinkie shouted at the top of her lungs. “What was the other answer?!” The other ponies and dragon all turned their attention on her. “Pinkie, what are you doing?” Rainbow asked. “You said there were two answers you’d accept. If we gave the one you wanted to hear, you’d undo all the bad thingies you’ve done and let everyone go. So, what was that answer?” Twilight winced as she noticed the frustrated look Lady Faust was shooting at her friend. “Pinkie, I don’t think-” “Twilight Sparkle,” Lady Faust said. “Y-yes?” “That was the answer. Twilight Sparkle. The name you used to have.” Twilight blinked in confusion. “B-but that doesn’t make any sense. You asked me what I am without my friends. I’m still Twilight Spar-” “No, you’re not,” Lady Faust snapped. “Your name is Princess of Friendship. That’s ALL you are now, princess. That brilliant, kindhearted, beautiful mare? You destroyed her, princess. Twilight Sparkle is dead and you’re the one who killed her, princess!” Lady Faust waved her hoof and a filly version of Twilight Sparkle appeared. “Well, I read ahead too Moondancer and I’m sure it said sodium chloride first.” Lady Faust waved her hoof again and the illusion changed to an older Twilight Sparkle galloping away from three other ponies. “I think she’s more interested in books than friends,” one of them scoffed. The illusion changed once more, this time focusing on Twilight alone. “I am her student and I’ll do my royal duty but the fate of Equestria does not rest on me making friends.” The illusion then smiled and said, “Thank you sirs” before it vanished. Lady Faust snorted as she saw the disbelief on the princess of friendship’s face. “I know you’re not going to listen to a ghost, princess. But Twilight Sparkle was right. You didn’t need to make friends to save Equestria.” Spike spoke up. “I’ve been with Twilight since the beginning. Trust me, she couldn’t have done all the amazing things she’s done alone.” “She never tried!” Lady Faust snapped back. “Starlight here was able to create an almost perfect mind control spell, just by finding some spells in a library and mashing them together. Twilight could have done that too! Why didn’t she just brainwash all those villains into becoming better people?” “What I did was wrong! You can’t use magic to force someone to be good!” Starlight said. “Isn’t that one of the primary functions of the Elements of Harmony? Both Nightmare and Sunset Shimmer?” Lady Faust shook her head. “Why am I even bothering? In this world morality only works on your terms, princess! You won’t even consider the fact that you might be wrong!” Rainbow frowned. “Just because you never had any friends-” “Oh, but I did, Dashie!” Lady Faust said with an angry, wild smile. “I had dozens of friends when I was your age! And I hated all of them!” Lady Faust took a deep breath as streams of magic flowed out of her horn and into her head. “But this isn’t just about me. This is about all the people that society scorns. The losers, the bookworms, the social rejects. The introverts, the basement-dwellers, the hikikomori. When children grow up, they often hear that one person can make a difference in the world. Many people, ponies or otherwise, saw the difference Twilight Sparkle made. She cared more about her books than her friends, but she was still a hero. She was polite, hardworking, intelligent, talented, and loyal. People were inspired by you, before you became a princess. Before you even came to Ponyville.” Lady Faust hissed. “And you threw us all away. Destiny handed you friends on a silver platter and you turned your back on everything you learned in Canterlot. You made it look SO easy to make friends; to find people who could love you. But we can’t all be heroes. And making friends is NOT easy. Not a true friend. Not somebody you can trust or confide in.” Lady Faust turned away from them. “Tartarus is other people, princess.” Twilight sighed. “I’m sorry you felt so alone, but you-” Twilight cut off her own speech and gulped as Lady Faust’s horn flared with power. “You’re not listening. After all these years, NONE of you EVER listen.” Lady Faust turned back to them as her horn glowed blindingly bright. “For the last time: I want to be left alone.” But before Lady Faust could unleash her spell, a rainbow wave of magic burst out of the ground and knocked her off her hooves. The tentacles of magic that had been restraining Twilight and her friends vanished and they gasped in awe as their savior emerged from the ground. “Do not listen to this monster’s lies Twilight Sparkle!” a sparkling spirit that looked and sounded like the princess of friendship declared. “This heartless fiend does not belong in this world!” “Oh, I am well aware of that,” Lady Faust hissed as she floated back onto her hooves. “The Tree of Harmony,” she spat with more hate in her voice than Twilight had ever heard in her life. “You know, in another world King Sombra obliterated you. It looked really fun.” “Stepping on my roots and alerting me to your presence was a grave mistake,” the Tree of Harmony said. “Your revenge stops here! I will not allow you to hurt anypony else!” Lady Faust grinned wildly. “What joy, I get to call out your hypocrisy too! Tell me, if it’s so wrong for me to kill fictional characters that don’t actually exist, why is it okay for you to do the same thing? Or have you already forgotten about those clones you melted?!” “What the hay is going on?” Applejack asked. “Why’s there a sparkly version of Twilight? What clones?” “Those clones were minions of Queen Chrysalis, created out of dark magic! I was defending myself from soulless monsters, just as I do now!” the Tree of Harmony declared. “Oh, a ginger joke? How original!” Lady Faust spat sarcastically as she brushed her red mane out of her eyes. “What do you consider to have a soul? What about when you kidnapped six students and traumatized them?! Remember Gallus and Silverstream? Were they soulless? Oh, how benevolent of you to torture people with claustrophobia and thoughts of invasion!” “They chose what they saw in my roots, not me,” the Tree of Harmony said in defense. “They didn’t choose what they were afraid of! Nobody does! What gives you the right to judge our hearts?!” Lady Faust screamed. “What gives you the right to justify your failures as an excuse for destruction?” the Tree of Harmony shot back. Lady Faust’s posture suddenly went very stiff. “Explain,” she said as the ground beneath her hooves froze. “Friendship is within your nature. It is within everypony’s nature. The world is not to blame for your misery. Everything bad that has happened to you is your fault.” Lady Faust was silent at that declaration. The anger drained from her face and she stared at the ground in thought. “If that’s what you think...maybe I should have stayed in my room today.” The Tree of Harmony’s horn flashed and the Elements of Harmony appeared on Twilight and the other bearers. “Twilight Sparkle, this villain cannot be reasoned with. For the safety of everyone in Equestria, you must use the Elements of Harmony!” The Tree of Harmony floated up and behind Twilight and her friends. The six heroes smiled and linked hooves with each other as the Elements activated. “Maybe the Equalizer was right about me,” Lady Faust said to herself. For some unfathomable reason, she smiled calmly at the wave of power that was building up. “Or perhaps this is what I’ve longed for. To see if I am the villain or the victim.” Lady Faust let out a giggle as the magic of friendship came hurtling towards her. “No matter what happens…this is where I win.” The magic struck Lady Faust and an explosion of light enveloped the whole area. When the light faded away Princess Twilight was overjoyed to see Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, Princess Cadance, Prince Shining Armor, and Discord all smiling at her. “Princess Twilight Sparkle. I knew you could do it,” Celestia said proudly. “Thank you, Princess Celestia. But it wasn’t easy. I feel like Lady Faust has tested us harder than anypony else.” “Oh, come now. I thought I was a much more threatening villain,” Discord scoffed. He sheepishly added, “Not that I’m proud of it, of course.” “So…what do we do with her now?” Starlight asked as she pointed to the huge crater and the alicorn lying in the center of it. Twilight approached Lady Faust and looked down at her. “You will never destroy Equestria. Any power you may have is nothing compared to the magic of friendship. I am truly sorry that you felt abandoned in the past, but this is your second chance. This time, you can make friends who will never let you down. Or you can forever be alone. The choice is yours.” “…If it’s all the same to you, I’ll take the second option.” The ponies blinked in surprise as Lady Faust flapped her wings and hovered out of the crater. She was viciously wounded, looking more damaged than any creature Celestia had ever seen. Long, red scratches criss crossed over black and dark purple bruises that covered her white coat. Both of her eyes looked like they had been smashed in with a hammer and her grin had several teeth missing. But the worst of all her injuries, were the three sixth-degree burn marks running in a vertical line up her chest. Then Lady Faust flapped her wings again and all her injuries vanished. Her horn flared up with power as her grin got wider. “Look at that. Friendship tried to kill me again.” Floating back out of from where it was hiding, the Tree of Harmony’s avatar gasped in shock. “But that’s impossible! Friendship is the greatest magic of all! Friendship is-” Her sentence was cut off as a blast from Lady Faust struck the tree’s avatar and made it explode into a shower of sparkles. Lady Faust tilted her head and the physical Tree of Harmony appeared in the air, completely uprooted and looking slightly gray. With another blast from her horn, the Tree of Harmony collapsed into a pile of dust that was blown away with a flap of Lady Faust’s wings. “Friendship is dead,” Lady Faust said with a victorious smile. “No…NO!” Twilight and her friends cried. Lady Faust gave them one last look and said: “The Princess of Friendship could do nothing but watch in horror as a colossal wave of power erupted from my horn and washed over Equestria, destroying everything and everybody.” And what she said came to pass. Rainbow tried to fly her friends away, but she wasn’t fast enough. Discord, Starlight, and the alicorns tried to teleport them all away, but they weren’t fast enough. A shockwave of deadly light exploded outward and obliterated the princesses and their friends and family. Every pony, every creature, and every thing burst into dust as the shockwave hit them. Ponyville, the Everfree Forest, Cloudsdale, Canterlot, Appleloosa, Manehattan, Rockville, Dodge Junction, Fillydelphia, Las Pegasus, Baltimare, Vanhoover, Somnambula, Trottingham…all gone. Everything was wiped off the map. Within seconds, the planet itself was gone too. There was nothing left behind except a white void floating in space…and Lady Faust. “…It’s over…” … … … “It’s finally over…” … … … Lady Faust closed her eyes and sank to the nonexistent floor, letting out an exhausted sigh. She spread out her front hooves and a pile of books appeared in front of her. She hugged all the books tightly to her chest and quietly wept. Her tears ran down her face and over her happy smile. “…I’m finally alone. Thank goodness. Thank heaven.” … … … Lady Faust opened her eyes. She looked back and forth, as if expecting someone to jump out and startle her. When nobody came, she opened up one of the books with a gleeful smile and began to read. … … … … … … … … … … … … THE END … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … A portal opened up behind Lady Faust. She spun around in bewilderment just before a stretchy eagle claw and a pink hoof grabbed her by the neck and pulled her in. “No! NO! Leave me alone! FOR GOODNESS SAKE, JUST LEAVE ME ALONE!” But the two limbs were unrelenting as they pulled Lady Faust out of one universe and into another. She pulled herself off the ground as the portal closed behind her and looked up in shock. The Elements of Redemption all glared back at her. The alicorn of forgiveness flashed her fangs at the Goddess of Equestria. “Greetings, Lady Faust. My name is Princess Nightmare Moon, mistress of the night. Welcome to Everfree.”