//------------------------------// // 29 -- Discord // Story: A Method to his Madness // by Luna-tic Scientist //------------------------------// Roughly hemispherical, with a brilliant, magnesium-bright coil of white light hanging at the centre, the room was perhaps fifteen metres across. Around the light, features bleached and made monochrome by the intensity, was a ring of ponies, alternating earth, pegasus and unicorn. They were still, but not stationary, standing there with expressions of terror, but were not trying to gallop or jump. Instead, they just stood there, with hooves stuck to the floor, like they had been arranged, like they were an audience. That coil of light twisted and writhed, a fast flickering motion that was horribly hypnotic and made the stationary ponies' shadows bulge and distort. Chirr blinked, looking away from the data feed, watching Nightstorm. The unicorn's ears were flat back, and she stared through the wall to where the coil was. "Suggestions?" he asked, in a strangled tone. I don't know what I expected; his snakeness sitting on a big throne? Nightstorm shook her head. "Can't tell if he's here or not. Too much--" The words broke off with a hiss, and the mare grunted, as if kicked in the gut. "If he's not here, do we still trip the beacon? Can you do anything for these ponies?" He reached back and pulled the slender, fan-ended cylinder out, holding it with the gripper under his muzzle guard. Night walked to the opening and took a hesitant step forward, head bowed like she was walking into a fierce wind. "I don't know... the magic is so strong, but any spell can be broken with a push in the right place." She popped the locks holding her helmet together, letting the muzzle guard hang loose around her throat. She stared up at the light, eyes narrowed against the glare. "Balance is everything; all that power, like a knife standing on its tip..." An orange glow, faint and barely visible, flickered about her horn. The pulsing of the coil started to become regular, matching the beat of Nightstorm's magic. Something reached in and dragged Chirr from his hooves, pulling him into the room and setting him orbiting about the twisting helix. His wings flared, popping out from under their armoured panels, and thrashed, beating as hard as possible, but nothing made any difference to his gentle trajectory. The same had happened to the others -- off to his left and right were Night and Blevie, with Waits on the opposite side of the magical glare. All that was visible of him was the occasional flash of a wing and some loud curses, their meaning distorted by the acoustics in the room.  Here he had a good look at the ponies. Their skin moved and twitched, as if infested with insects, or perhaps like they were nothing more than empty husks, filled to bursting with wriggling, fighting rats. And their eyes. Their eyes were not still. They hunted, searching for a way around the light, but it drew them back, always back to that hypnotic swirl and pulse, like moths to a candle flame. There was awareness in there, the look of a pony able to see all the horrors of a world dissolving into chaos. Blevie's head was swinging from side to side, matched by the frantic crawl of her exoweapons, which clambered around her, completely unaffected by her slow, floating tumble. "Night?" There was meaning in that single word, a whole page of questions and requests; Chirr could dimly feel the depth to the utterance, but had no idea as to the actual content. "Look at their eyes, Blevie; it would be a mercy." Night's reply came out as a strangled scream, but the earth pony only needed the first syllables. Her exos went to full automatic, emptying their magazines then dipping their abdomens into her panniers and asking for more. Apple-sized grenades flicked out from the concealed launcher on her hindquarters, compact packages of destruction that twisted in the air under the influence of bat-winged vanes that popped out of their smooth surfaces, spreading around the whole perimeter of the chamber. Chirr flinched at the sudden thunder, waiting to die and waiting for the walls to be painted red and the floor to be strewn with bodies and parts of them, but nothing happened. The guns continued to fire, but the bullets never arrived at their targets. Instead, they turned into sprays of confetti, streamers, jets of water or live butterflies, which flew about in a confused manner. Blevie cursed, then both exoweapons jumped from her back, extending glittering blades from under their gun-barrel heads, a harsh whine filling the air as the cutting surfaces spun up to speed. The sound cut off with the nasty metallic noise of high velocity parts suddenly encountering immovable objects. His armour's visor went hazy, then black, locking him in a tiny space. Air recycling went next, cutting off the odours from the outside and filling the volume next to his jaw with warm, stale air. Chirr struggled, lips reaching for the controls, but they didn't respond, not even the manual emergency eject. Legs thrashing, he fought and wriggled, futilely trying to shake the helmet off. "Oh, I suppose that's enough." Rich and deep, the words moved through the air like a slick of velvety-black oil over the ocean. They slid and coated every surface, every pore and fibre of Chirr's being, penetrating his ears and making them swivel around within the malfunctioning helmet, then taking a hold of his brain and demanding that he attend the voice this instant. He'd never heard it before, but it could only come from one being. "Discord. So you are here." He relaxed, slowing his breathing and closing his eyes. So this is how it ends. There was a sudden noise, the gentle snick-click of his helmet mounts unlocking. "Oh, come come now, Sergeant! Giving up so soon?" The voice was disappointed, but held a note of amusement. Something gently twisted his helmet, pulling it free. Fresh air gushed in and Chirr coughed, taking deep, gasping breaths. "We'll stop you--" "And that's the first thing you can think of? Did they tell you so little about me? How boring." Whatever force was making Chirr orbit the light -- not normal telekinesis, as there was no glow -- stopped, holding him still. He twisted, trying to catch sight of the source of the voice, then, suddenly, there he was. Long and slender, stretched around the perimeter of the chamber like a furry snake, with afterthoughts of limbs in a variety of shapes. Discord had his head propped up on one foreleg, the one that looked like it had come from a giant gryphon, and was looking on in interest. "Let's get a proper look at you... my last few appearances were so brief and I didn't get much of a chance." Armour ceramic, some of the toughest materials that pony science could manufacture, crazed and broke into gravel, then dissolved into sand that ran down his body and cascaded to the ground, the particles becoming finer and finer until they disappeared altogether. The underharness and attached spellcraft kinetic dampers came next, flying apart as threads and tiny, glittering splinters that circled Chirr like a halo for a moment, then vanished. His wings moved, not pulled apart, but of their own volition, as if he was soaring over some distant, moon-lit landscape. They stretched out to their full extension, great sails of membrane and slender bone casting vague, monstrous shadows against the stone walls. Discord waved a paw in a lazy circle, sending Chirr spinning, then held him upright, nose in the air and tail dangling, legs and wings splayed so he felt like an eight-pointed star. "Even after all I did to her..." The big head made a slow nodding motion, then Chirr's mouth opened and he tilted forwards, letting Discord look down his throat. "...your Luna always was a smart one." Another flip and he was upside down, tail lifting and hind legs splaying themselves wide. "She was a true genius and, since she gave you dominant genetic traits, I'm not even going to need to save a breeding pair. My little bat pony... you have such a fun future ahead of you!" He sighed, the sound of an artist admiring the efforts of another like-minded soul. "I do miss her so... she was always so much more interesting than little Miss Sunshine -- and look at the rest of you! I've never seen an engineered killing machine that was so fluffy!" Discord clasped both forepaws under his muzzle, rich voice going up through the registers until it was mimicking a filly's squeal of delight. "I bet you're ticklish..." Something hard and sharp touched his belly, running through the fur and digging in at all the right places. Chirr twitched, muscles jerking and straining, jaws clamped shut as his body convulsed, trying not to scream at the intensity of the sensations. Diaphragm paralysed and unable to draw a breath, his vision started to go grey, but still the torment continued. After an age, the claws withdrew, and he hung there, gasping and sweating. "This is all just a game to you. Out there, there are ponies with lives you are destroying--" His mouth snapped shut, teeth nipping the very tip of his tongue. Discord waggled a talon, his uneven face looking disappointed. "That's a nasty prejudice you have. I am not so narrow-minded; I am making people's lives more interesting." His whole body moved, contracting until it was no more than twice the length of a pony, then he stood upright on his asymmetric hind legs, body bent like a snake about to strike. "Always so serious with you ponies. Work, work, work and no play. You want to see what all this work gets you? Take that pony, right there." He pointed to an earth pony in the circle, snapping his talons together. "That is Cinnabar -- fine earth pony name, don't you think? You do like your rocks and flowers. Anyway, he has a mate, who misses him terribly... at least she would, if she wasn't letting that pegasus friend of his rut her brains out, right at this very minute. I thought I'd let him watch as a favour, but he doesn't seem to be particularly grateful." Discord pouted, then smiled. "Plenty more things to see... I let all my volunteers watch the outcome of their efforts. They enjoy it, I'm sure. It gives them a connection with their friends." "Anyway, two point four foals back in Canterlot, blah blah blah. Always working so hard -- especially now." The talons snapped again and the stallion fell over, crumpling to the ground like a puppet with cut strings. He didn't move, but seemed to shrink into the rock like sugar dissolving into water. "They don't last so long, these modern ponies; too soft." Discord spun around, a huge grin exposing uneven canine teeth, gesturing at Blevie. "Which is why I'm so glad Luna sent me these presents; they even come with their own wrapping." The mare's armour dissolved and she drifted downwards, settling in the space left by the stallion.  Her throat worked, like she was trying to speak, but no sound came out. "Always the problem with live food -- too much noise," Discord said, claws up as if making a secret comment. The fight drained out of Blevie, fury replaced by a slow-dawning horror, and she just stood there as if rooted into the rock, tremors running up her legs and eyes held captive by the light. "She's a strong one; excellent. Let's see... I don't need you; got plenty of gryphons to play with already." Waits was pulled from his orbit and tumbled to the floor. Moving weakly, one hindleg dragging limply, he tried to crawl away, but was picked up and spun around to face inwards. Discord reached up and plucked a strand of fur from his own head, shaking the hair until it grew to giant size, turned to a shiny metal rod the length of a spear. In one quick motion he plunged it through Waits' back, just behind the ribs, and deep into the rock floor. The gryphon let out a sharp gasp, foreclaws reaching back to grasp the smooth metal. Eyes bulging, he let out a whimper. "You are here as a witness! No shirking your civic duty; what would your mother say?" Discord made a tutting sound, then turned back to the still floating ponies. Chirr watched Wait's impalement out of one eye, unable to turn his head. Discord was still talking, but he'd stopped listening some time ago. Now the snake-monster had turned to Nightstorm, sinking one set of claws through the unicorn's head, paw twitching like he was working some complex machine in the depths of her brain, and he tried to close his eyes to avoid the wordless expression of horror on her face. Instead, a slight movement attracted his attention.  Waits was still moving, but no longer the directionless twitches of a bug speared through its vitals. Muscles on his shoulders tensed and flexed, the gryphon pushing up against the ground, drawing his body through the metal spike. His eyes bulged, beak opening in a silent scream. "So why do all this, Discord?" Chirr said loudly. "Princess Luna said you were just a creature that lives for destruction, but I don't buy it. This is way too complicated -- what do you really want from all this?" The heavy head with its uneven yellow eyes moved with the speed of a striking snake, suddenly appearing in front of him. "Well, I am easily bored, and you ponies did have me locked up for a very long time..." He looked thoughtful, head cocked and a frown twisting his muzzle. "A long time for you, anyway. No, it isn't all revenge." "I knew it!" Chirr did his best to inject a note of smugness into his voice, carefully suppressing the urge to scream invective at the monster. Treat him like a drunk unicorn; terribly powerful and not very logical. If I can be enough of a distraction... Off to one side, Waits had pulled himself a little along the sloping metal spike, working forwards towards a slender cylinder lodged between two rough flagstones. The beacon had fallen there when Chirr had been snatched into the air, forgotten amid the general clutter of their discarded gear. Discord eyed him speculatively. "You are remarkably sanguine about all this... she really did build you well. I want out, Sergeant Fluffy. Out of this trap of a universe that contains nothing more than a single sun, a planet and a pawful of floating rocks." "What? How can you leave, this is all there is!?" A drunk super unicorn, spouting rubbish from some weird magical theory. "Bah! You really think this is it? I can feel the other universes out there, pressing against the brane walls that hold us trapped here. There is an infinity of interesting things out there, and your Princesses won't let me go!" A slight whine entered his voice, but it sounded more like a parody than any real emotion. "You've got the power; why not just go?" Waits had moved another painful quarter-metre along the spike and was stretching out for the beacon, still just beyond his claw-tips. "Because if I open the walls it will change the fundamental constants, and I doubt you'd have the same sorts of atoms again." Discord paced, throwing his arms in the air. "After all I did for you ponies, right at the start of all of this. You've had a good run, the best part of twenty thousand years; surely it's my turn now? So selfish!"  Mad, completely mad. Chirr coughed, unable to think of anything to say to that last outburst, trying to cover the sound of Waits hooking a claw-tip over the end of the beacon and dragging it towards him.  "Anyway, as I've said to a few other ponies recently, that's enough from me. Now it is your turn. That clever moon filly made some drastic changes to your brain, and your kind are not catching my little meme. As much as it's been fun to watch them 'hold the line', or some other nonsense, I really should do something about that." Chirr floated towards Discord, tipping forwards until he was level. "Now I have one of you here, I can add you to my circle of friends." The paw made a vague gesture, and all the ponies shuffled around slightly, opening up a space for him. "You'll get to see all that you have missed by being on that aircarrier of yours." Chirr tried to struggle, but nothing below his neck obeyed commands. "You'll never win; the Princess will stop you," he spat, glaring at Discord. He likes to talk and needs an audience for his clever schemes; something more than these poor ponies. "Ha! A challenge! I like a challenge." A furry arm tipped in a lion's paw folded over Chirr's shoulder, giving him a brotherly squeeze. "You want to see how things are going for 'the Princess'? Or perhaps on the Friendship Express?" He turned slightly, manoeuvring the chiropt like he was a balloon, winking at the gryphon. Waits froze, his claws wrapped around the beacon. "Go on, push the button; I want to see what it does." Claws trembling and slick with blood, Waits worked at the cap, then the cylinder slipped from his grasp, skittering out of reach. "Oh for--" Discord sighed, making the device float back to Waits, gently helping the gryphon until he managed to prise off the cap and twist the control beneath. A small red light started to flash on the base, but nothing else. Waits groaned, a sudden spasm making his foreclaws open and drop the beacon to the floor. "How disappointing," Discord said, cocking his head and looking at the spellcraft device, "I had hoped for some heroic sacrifice; perhaps one of those nuclear bombs you gryphons set so much store by." He gave the beacon a flick, sending it spinning away. "I guess I'll just have to wait until you start using them on Equestrian cities." Halfway between them and the twisting coil of light, a flat disk of absolute darkness opened up, as if a monster had just opened its eye. Colours spiralled across it, building up an image, full of chaotic motion and flashes of brilliant light. At the centre were two dots, one light, the other dark, weaving around each other in a complex dance. The point of view rushed forwards, centring on the dark spot and getting close enough that Chirr could count the individual hairs on the pony's coat. It was Luna, but not the indestructible, unchanging icon from the centuries before he was born, but more like the Nightmare after her final battle. Battered and bloody, dusky blue fur scored with the black streaks of burns, the Princess twisted and turned within a wavering globe of darkness. A bright flash impacted on the barrier, making it wobble and flicker, Luna flinching in time with the pulse. "Oh dear. I think that Princess of yours has lost some of that killer instinct that made her so interesting, back when I had a chance to play with her. Celestia looks like she means business, this time." Discord shook his head sadly. "Soon there will be no mare in the moon for your kind to call out to." "Lies -- I don't believe anything you could show me, Discord," Chirr said, but the anger had gone, replaced by a terrible fear. "Perhaps not, but you will soon enough. I'll let Celestia tell you herself; she'll probably want someone to talk to after I've lifted her enchantment. Killing your own sister and having to watch your nation fall apart will do that to a--" Discord's expression became uncertain, then his head flicked up, looking at something through the rocky wall of the chamber. "That almost feels like... why, you clever little ponies." He clapped his mismatched forelimbs together and laughed with apparent pleasure. The image on the black mirror changed, showing a chaotic swirl of cloud and rain, shot through with intense lightning. At the centre of all this was the Express, smoke pouring out of several rents in one flank and the bright arc-welder flare of a superconductor electrical fire in her tail. She was low and apparently sinking, belly nearly within the reach of the jagged, knife-edged ridges she was flying over. A shell of rainbow light was rippling from nose to tail, a rapidly building flicker that soon overwhelmed the lightning, then vanished. In that instant the rainbow was here, filling the chamber and making the hypnotic swirl of Discord's magic falter. All around, the ring of captive ponies swayed, shaking their heads as if waking from an overly long sleep, then the skeins of colour vanished and the magnesium flare-bright coil returned to full strength. "See, all that effort for nothing!" The ponies returned to their places, eyes once more fixed on the magic, but now they were not silent. Little whimpers came from a multitude of throats, a sourceless keening like the wind over a taut wire, and tears were running down many cheeks. Please, no! Chirr's heart sank and he resumed his struggles, but it was like his spine had been cut. Slowly, but surely, he settled into his place within the circle. === The bead of plasma, held together with magnetic fields so strong that they could only be generated by the application of magic, flashed by under Luna's hooves, so close that she thought it was within touching distance. Heat, and not a few X-rays, radiated out from the weapon, the infrared making the fur of her already scorched fetlocks shrivel a little more. She pushed another fraction of her dwindling reserves into the shield, skewing the exotic physics that converted photons to neutrinos towards the higher frequencies.  "It's not like a little more heat will make much difference." Luna giggled, high and hysterical, the sweat plastering her dark fur flat and coating it with a thick layer of lather. Little foamy drops flew from the matted tips of her primary feathers, vaporising the instant they crossed the boundary between her shield and the incandescent outside world. With a grunt, she reached down and bent space-time, twisting it into a tight little knot of potential and flicking it out as hard as she could. All around was nothing but light, a hard white that shaded toward the blue, but she hadn't used the optical bands since the early part of this fight. Her weapon moved at a respectable multiple of the speed of sound, trackable by the sharp eddies it left in its gravitational wake, curving under the influence of her power towards the brightest point in the incandescent sky. More little packets of plasma moved in the other direction, and Luna steered her weapon into their path, expending some of her strength to disrupt the field lines holding them together. X-rays flared, the signature of air heated to beyond endurance as stored energy was liberated without control, flash-bulb pops that would smite the land below with heat and yet more light. Far below, the mountain range, its jagged peaks and knife-edged ridges already crumbling under the continuous battering of shockwaves, was devoid of snow for hundreds of kilometres. Lit by the harsh light of the fight, monstrous shadows danced and wavered, casting black silhouettes through the pall of smoke rising up from the burning forests in the high valleys. Craters littered the landscape; circular ones where Celestia's focused plasma had been diverted into rock, and great linear furrows marking the passage of Luna's own particular style of destruction. She kept moving, flying great loops and random arcs to keep from the centre of the sun's power. Celestia had moved it, throwing the world into chaos but allowing her to use the same burning-glass magic she'd used to drive Luna from the Friendship Express. The focus tracked her, always a few hundred metres behind, so she could never remain still to really concentrate. In its wake, rock glowed and slumped, the hills and mountainsides clawed with fresh basalt and glassy obsidian. Celestia had stopped firing back, the focus of the magical lens opening out as she diverted her strength to defence; through feedback from her weapon, Luna could feel her sister's efforts to disrupt the knot of folded space-time, unpicking the magic that held the ersatz mass together. Mind singing with the effort, Luna reinforced the arcane patterns, preparing to release the magic early, if it looked like Celestia would fail to stop it herself. Something reached in and flattened her weapon, a sudden hammer of power that smoothed over the tortured volume as if it had never existed. The stored energy bled away as sharp pulses of gravity waves focussed back towards Luna, sending the Princess tumbling as randomised force vectors threatened to pull her extremities off. That magic had a different taste to it; not just Celestia, but Celestia plus the Elements. She's getting to grips with them, I can feel it. More X-ray bright pinpoints arched out and the sun overhead brightened, so Luna opened a teleport terminus, reaching for a spot a few hundred kilometres and several mountain-thicknesses of rock further away-- ~~~discontinuity~~~ --heat and a blinding light. The spall of stripped nuclei spilling out from tight weaves of thaumomagnetic containment that had somehow jumped with her, emerging from their own termini a fraction of a second later. She was waiting for me. The thought was fleeting and Luna accelerated madly, her protective bubble of darkness collapsing inwards under the unexpected onslaught. A mountain peak was in her way but she didn't slow, just shouldering the granite aside like it was an ephemeral mass of foam. The spray of smashed rock saved her, exploding under the impact of magnified sunlight and hypervelocity packets of plasma. Shockwaves, enhanced by the dense, incandescent rock vapour, swept over her, carrying with them a supersonic pyroclastic flow to reflect from the mountains beneath. Her shield, still optimised to damp the ionising rip of X rays, faltered, letting some measure of the appalling heat through. The sweat and lather soaking her coat flashed away in a moment, carrying most of the energy with it, but it wasn't enough. The fur on her flank disappeared under a wave of flame and choking white smoke, the flesh underneath blistering and burning. The pain stabbed in her chest, but distantly, like she was some machine just receiving a warning of damage. Spells, long since cast and charged with power before she'd confronted her sister, felt the unconscious call and fired, crash-cooling the still burning tissues and sweeping away the pain. More magic released, locking muscles solid under the iron grip of telekinesis and stopping bones from shattering as the laggard shockwave, force nearly spent, was transmitted through her shield. For a moment, Luna passed out, then consciousness returned and she was seized in a brutal grip. Celestia was right there, eyes a solid white and wings burning with ephemeral flames, a spinning halo of six solar orbs circling her head. === The black globe covering Luna wasn't as opaque as it looked. At certain frequencies it was hazy, revealing the twisting shape at its centre, and by shadow sight it wasn't dark at all. To Celestia's enhanced vision it glowed, pulsing with the near ultraviolet hue of her sister's magic like the core of some gryphon nuclear reactor, drowned deep below metres of water. "You can't get away from me!" she screamed, but even that magically augmented bellow was lost in the roar of the slipstream that folded around her defences. Fresh spikes of anger washed over her, in time with Luna's avoidance of her latest attack. Traitor! I've dealt with you before, and I'll deal with you again. This can only end one way. The thrust and parry of magic and physics continued, and Celestia narrowed the focus of her solar influence, concentrating the redirected sunlight still further and sending it after her sister. Under that lethal point the land burned; rock exploded or slumped at yellow heat, while what remained of the forested valleys turned into instant firestorms, lofting immense columns of ash high into the air. Grinding her teeth at her inability to pin down that little evasive pip of darkness, Celestia sent another flurry of accelerated plasma on a range of trajectories, trying to confine Luna's possible escape routes. Something at the back of her head protested, a continuous muttering of disquiet that all this was wrong, but Celestia pushed it aside and shifted the lens focus once more. Slippery little nag is trying to get inside my head... well it won't work. A pocket of distortion leaped away from Luna, only visible where it bent the light from the rocks behind it, but brilliant through shadow sight where compact, folded space was held in strained and complex shapes by powerful magic. Celestia reached for it, but Luna actively fought her efforts to disrupt the weapon. Mild stirrings of panic bloomed in her mind; the requirements of the burning-glass, multiple plasma bolides and her own defences had split her attention too much. Reaching in, she dropped her control of the weapons, hunting for the familiar-and-strange feeling of the Elements. Those complex objects were singularities within the arcane space; seemingly infinitely bright and dark at the same time. There was a trick to controlling them, but it required a great deal of skill and focus, something that had not been in great supply during this confrontation. One mind wasn't really enough, as she'd found out the only other time she'd been forced to use them alone. Fighting the Nightmare to a standstill had been a challenging task, and controlling all of the Elements to cure Luna had been impossible; the only solution was banishment. Not this time; I don't need that level of finesse. Celestia tried again, holding the slippery patterns of the strange objects and moulding them to her will, forcing them to unlock their power in the precise shapes she desired. Abruptly, a whole new mental vista opened out before her, the singularities inverting to reveal a fractal landscape that seemed to extend down to an infinite depth. Power and an endless feeling of possibility; the realisation that she could change the tune that made the world dance. This she knew, this was what she and Luna had felt during their first capture of Discord, and what she'd felt when she'd battled Luna alone. The knot of space-time unravelled under the pressure of her will, its bound energy blasting backwards along the direction of travel. Luna's magic wavered, shield shrinking, and Celestia redoubled her assault. Soon, I will have you soon. The magic changed, building into a teleport, but slowly and clumsily. New insight traced the route of the wormhole, and Celestia opened her own portals, pushing the still accelerating plasma through to where Luna would emerge. That quiet voice of discontent became louder and, just for a moment, Celestia hesitated. She really hasn't actually done anything, just refused to follow along. She shook her head, trying to rid herself of that irritating whisper, then let her own portal enfold her. Explosions and a building mushroom cloud of burning-hot dust and ash greeted her as she appeared. Under that roiling torus, sun temporarily obscured and replaced by a sullen red heat that came from all corners of the sky, she found Luna. The mare was limp, just starting to move her head in the confused way of the recently struck, so Celestia wrapped her with bands of force, holding her up above the sizzling ground. She coughed, red liquid trickling down her chin, and opened one eye, blinking to clear it of pulverised rock. "What's it going to be? Another thousand years locked in my room?" Little coils of light started to condense around her horn, but that was easily suppressed. "Not this time, sister," Celestia said, ears flat back against her skull, "you keep making the same mistakes, time and time again. It is obvious I can never trust you for long. Ponies would be better off if you'd never existed." Luna's eyes widened as she spoke, starting to struggle against the forces holding her still, but the slightest extra effort tightened the magical grip and she gasped, staying still. "I never could win a fight against you. So that's it, then. Ten thousand years, and this is how it ends, at the hooves of my only remaining flesh and blood." Luna offered her a twisted smile. "What was it you said last time, when our situations were reversed?" You think I wanted this? Any of this? You are all the family I have left! The memory, of that small space behind the auditorium in the small village she'd picked for the confrontation, of words spoken to the twisted parody of Luna, hit and made her concentration falter, then her heart hardened. "You were a murderous psychopath; I said anything I could to distract you," she snapped. Luna flinched as if struck, giving out a little whimper. "I was a monster, but it wasn't my fault--" "No, it never was, was it? Always someone else made you do it." Celestia prodded the Elements, then realised that, against a helpless pony, there really was no need for them. A twist of magnetism appeared a dozen meters away, clamping down on a point of suddenly star-hot air. The light, hard and bright, lit them both from the side, the radiant heat making Luna shrink away. "Please, for the sake of our world, don't give in to this madness. Kill me if you must, if that is what it takes to bring you to your senses, but this isn't you, this isn't the pony I fought for all those years." Tears glistened in her eyes, and she kept turning her head to glance at the actinic brilliance. The voice in her head became a wail, a high-pitched cry of horror, and Celestia hesitated, a little of the anger and determination fading. At the same moment, something else was there, a little flash of distant magic, oh-so-similar to the Elements, but fainter and without the purity. How can that be? Distracted, she sent part of her will hunting for that trace, then staggered when a stiletto spike of magic punched straight through defences built to withstand any amount of physical attack.  It was a slender thing, scarcely more than a feather's touch, but Celestia reacted instinctively, throwing Luna away and slamming her across the rocky slope. She made to send the plasma bolus as well, to blast whatever remained to ash and pulverised bone, but hesitated, transfixed by the trail of dark feathers leading to the still shape. "Luna?" she asked tentatively, all anger gone. Her mind whirled, surrounding her with memories of the last couple of days. The plasma ball vanished, thrown away with a supersonic crack, then blasted a crater in an adjacent mountainside as Celestia's grip on its containment field faltered. About her head the Elements went dark, turning to smooth grey spheres and falling to land amid the rubble. "Luna?" Celestia's voice became high and brittle and, in her head, the wail became louder. This time she didn't push it back. This time she let it out.