Twilight and the others raced through the castle halls in a panic,
“She’s okay right? She’s gonna be okay isn’t she?” Spike asked as he tried to keep pace.
“I don’t know, she took a bad hit back there.” Twilight answered,
“But what happened? She was winning, did Nightmare Moon use some kind of magic on her?” Shining asked. Twilight didn’t have an answer, she was only focused on getting to the throne room she needed to help Celestia.
“Twilight!” a voice shouted, Twilight and the others slid to a stop, they looked down the hall and saw Sunset rushing up to them.
“Sunset! You’re here!” Twilight announced hugging her friend,
“Sorry it took so long, it wasn’t easy getting through that barrier.” she explained, Cadence stepped forward and asked.
“Is there anyone else with you? Some of the guards maybe?” Sunset shook her head,
“No, we barely managed to make a hole in the barrier to get just me in here. There wasn’t enough time...but, what’s happening anyway? Was that Princess Celestia outside a minute ago? Who is she fighting?” Spike stepped forward and announced,
“It’s Nightmare Moon! She’s real!!” Sunset looked at Spike for a moment then rolled her eyes,
“Well duh, haven’t any of you been listening to Twilight this past week?” she replied. Spike smacked his forehead in frustration, he wondered if he was the only one who didn’t believe Twilight at this point.
“Come on, we gotta go! Nightmare Moon isn’t going to wait for us!” Shining said they all began to run when Twilight shouted,
“WAIT!” They all turned to look back at Twilight,
“We can’t just go running in there again, last time we tried fighting her head on it didn’t work. We need to be smarter about it this time.” she explained. Sunset walked up to Twilight and asked,
“Okay Twi, what’re you thinking?” Twilight smiled and looked at the rest of her family with a confident grin,
“So here’s my plan...”
Celestia pushed the piece of rubble off of her and slowly stood up, she threw her helmet to the ground. Blood rolled down her face and got into her eye for a moment, she felt a sharp pain in her wing and looked to see blood dripping slowly from the tips of her feathers. She was grounded now, this put her at a disadvantage she thought. She looked at the ground and cursed her carelessness,
“Stupid, Stupid, Stupid Celestia! Losing focus like that...” she said. She tried to focus but all she could think about was that memory, the small blue alicorn sleeping peacefully in her bed. Tears began to form in her eyes, she tried to wipe them away but they kept coming.
“Stop it, Stop thinking about that, that’s not her...that’s not her anymore...she’s gone and you know that!” she wept. The sound of glass shattering quickly caught Celestia’s attention she turned to see Nightmare Moon crashing through the window above the throne. Too fast for Celestia to counter Nightmare tackled her and dragged across the throne room floor, she leapt back and immediately blasted Celestia again her screams drowned out by the sound of the blast. Nightmare stopped and watched as the dust settled to reveal Celestia lying on her side, her body shaking from the pain. She smiled and landed slowly approaching the white alicorn, Celestia looked up to see Nightmare walking towards her she tried to get up but was quickly held down by Nightmare Moon’s hooves.
“At last...I would’ve waited an eternity for this...its over Celestia.” she hissed into her ear. Celestia looked to see the dark magics forming around Nightmare Moon’s horn, she inched closer with a sinister smile, she wanted to guarantee she finished her off. Then, she stumbled as a blue blast of magic struck her from behind. Nightmare turned to see Cadence by the entrance,
“Ha! Catch me if you can you old crow!” she taunted. Cadence blasted one of the windows open and flew outside to the gardens, Nightmare’s screamed in rage and quickly gave chase.
“Cadence don’t! Come back!” Celestia shouted, she tried to stand only to fall over. Celestia cursed her weakness, she couldn’t even stand right now she thought. In a pink flash of magic Twilight appeared in front of her,
“Aha! I knew she’d fall for it!” she said, Twilight turned to look at Celestia and gasped at the sight of her.
“Oh no, look what she did to you!” She walked over and began to cast a spell, Celestia interrupted her grabbing her leg with her hoof.
“Twilight, listen to me! The four of you can’t beat her! You have to get out of here!” she begged. Twilight rolled her eyes,
“Well yeah, that’s why we need you. We’ll win this together, were family remember?” she replied. Celestia had no response all she could do was smile, Twilight cast her spell on her mother. Celestia felt the pain of her injuries slowly fading, she looked up at Twilight.
“I don’t remember teaching you healing magics...” she said, Twilight smiled nervously.
“Sunset and I...we got bored waiting between lesson plans sometimes. So we’d do some extra credit here and there.” Celestia lie on the floor for a moment before speaking to Twilight,
“I’m sorry Twilight...I knew about all of this. The solstice, Nightmare Moon, all of it. I thought if I kept it a secret, kept it from all of you I could deal with this on my own and never get any of you involved. But now, I should’ve asked for your help from the start. Maybe then this wouldn’t have happened.” Twilight didn’t say a word she knew Celestia did this out of love for her family. Instead she simply hugged her mother.
Cadence landed in the garden and looked back, Nightmare Moon followed her as expected.
“Insolent child!” she shouted as she fired a magic blast at Cadence who ducked barely dodging the attack. The blast struck the statue behind her breaking it to pieces, Cadence looked back and gasped. She pointed to the statue and glared back shouting,
“That was a statue of Snowdrop!!! The pony who invented snowflakes! You monster!” Nightmare looked at the statue pausing for a moment, but then screamed and launched another attack, Cadence rolled out of the way as the blast destroyed the remainder of the statue. Cadence groaned in anger,
“I really hate you right now!!” then she quickly rushed into the hedge maze. Nightmare followed Cadence into the maze but couldn’t see her anywhere. She slowly crept through the maze looking around she knew this was a trap. Then she was struck from behind, she turned to see Shining standing there a confident grin on his face before he turned and ran around a corner of the maze. She rushed around to the corner to see he’d vanished, then she was struck from behind falling forward. She growled in anger and stood to her hooves turning to see Cadence running around a corner at the far end of the maze laughing as she did.
“You think I’m just going to stay here and play your little game!? Did you forget who I am!?” she shouted before leaping into the air. She began to fly above the hedge maze when suddenly something grabbed her hind legs stopping her mid-flight. She looked to see a pair of red chains around her legs, and a yellow Unicorn standing in the maze below a smile on her face.
“You fell for it...” she said, a green light illuminated the sky as Nightmare turned to see a massive ball of fire collide with her. The explosion rocked the gardens as Nightmare crashed against the ground,
“Wow...” Nightmare looked up to see the yellow unicorn again.
“I cannot believe Twilight mistook you for a threat.” she taunted, Nightmare Moon stood in a rage but Sunset quickly ran away disappearing from her sight. Pieces of her helmet chipped and fell to the ground, a trail of blood ran down her face, she’d taken that tiny dragon’s fireball full force she thought. She reached up and threw her helmet to the ground, she stood breathing heavy, she was sick of these games. She was supposed to destroy Celestia, then have her eternal night, every pony was going to worship her like she deserved, instead these children were making a mockery of her.
“No more...” she snarled, green flames erupting from all around her.
Celestia stood up slowly, Twilight helping,
“Phew…studying healing magic is one thing, casting it is exhausting though.” Twilght said, Celestia moved her wings and checked her legs, she wasn’t back to one hundred percent like she wanted but Twilight had healed her enough to fight at least.
“You did a wonderful job Twilight, maybe when this is over I’ll teach you and Sunset some of the more advanced healing magics from the restricted section.” Twilight’s face lit up with excitement,
“Really?!” she squealed. A massive explosion rocked the throne room, Celestia shielded Twilight with her wings as dust and debris flew past them. Then Cadence, Spike, Shining, and Sunset were thrown into the room sliding across the floor to a slow stop. Twilight tried to rush to them but Celestia grabbed her,
“Wait Twilight.” The smoke parted with a gust of wind to reveal Nightmare Moon, the castle gardens behind her engulfed in flames, her face full of rage, her armor cracked, blood dripping down her face. She slowly walked past the injured ponies and dragon towards Celestia,
“I...am...done...” she growled, Celestia stepped forward.
“This doesn’t have to end in fighting, we can still make this right without a battle.” she said, Nightmare grinned and said.
“I agree...no more fighting...” the shadows swirled around her hooves and suddenly Twilight rose up out of the shadows in front of her floating helplessly. Celestia gasped and looked behind her to confirm Twilight was gone, she looked back when she heard the sounds of Twilight screaming in pain. Dark magic poured out from her horn like lightning shocking Twilight,
“Stop it!” Celestia shouted, Nightmare simply chuckled,
“Then stay right there...” She fired a magic blast across the room striking Celestia’s shoulder causing her to stumble but stay standing, she looked back at Nightmare angrily, Nightmare laughed in response and began to relentlessly fire blasts of magic at Celestia hitting her again and again until finally she fell over.
“Stop! Stop hurting her!” Twilight begged, dark magics shocked Twilight again in response,
“Hush pet...you’re only here to watch.” Nightmare taunted as she shocked Twilight again.
“STOP THAT NOW!!!” Celestia screamed, every creature in the room looked up at Celestia as she struggled to stand. Tears could be seen dripping from her face,
“Please...please...stop hurting my family...” she begged. A silence gripped Nightmare for a moment, she looked at Twilight then to Celestia her rage instantly returning.
“Family? FAMILY!?” she shouted, she threw Twilight behind her and marched towards Celestia angrily,
“You!?! Care about family!? You don’t fool me for one minute Celestia!” she shouted blasting Celestia again knocking her down.
“You care nothing for family! All you’ve ever loved was your throne! Your coveted seat of power! The adoration every pony ever gave you!!” she continued to scream blasting Celestia again and again.
“If you really cared about family, then where was your love for me!?! Where?! Tell me, oh dearest sister of mine!!!” Cadence gasped in shock at Nightmare’s words,
“Wait, they're sisters?” Sunset asked.
“I don’t see the resemblance.” Spike quipped. Shining looked at Twilight and asked,
“Twilight did you know about that?” Twilight shook her head and looked back at her brother,
“No, I never found anything like that in my research...it just said they ruled Equestria together...” Twilight answered, she looked over to see Cadence still looking in shock.
“Cadence? What’s wrong?” Cadence didn’t answer instead she lunged forward stopping just in front of Twilight, blue magics flowed around her horn turning into a small heart just above her horn as Cadence cast her spell. Nightmare Moon was too distracted screaming at Celestia to notice as the magic glided across the room and struck her. She gasped and stood upright, a sudden look of awe on her face. Celestia looked at Cadence who stood nervously, then she looked back at Nightmare Moon still frozen in shock. Celestia cautiously stood up, she looked at her face and was shocked to see her eyes change to that of a normal pony. She slowly reached for her face gently putting her hoof on her cheek and making her look at her. A small flicker of hope was in Celestia as she looked at Nightmare and whispered, “Luna?...”