Twilight rolled onto her side and pulled the covers tightly around her with her teeth, creating a cocoon of fabric with which to shut out the outside world. Why couldn't she sleep? Surely going through a series of trials meant that she could catch at least a few minutes of rest. She huffed angrily and threw the covers aside, adding in a few petulant kicks for added measure. She let out a frustrating groan and dragged herself off the bed, her hooves landed on the crystalline floor with a loud clink-clop.
I hate this castle.
Golden Oaks was a part of the land, a living thing full that provided her with warmth and a sense of belonging. It'd been her home, the sight of some of the best moments of her life, at least until Lord Tirek obliterated it. The castle, on the hoof, was artificial and lifeless. In spite of its admittedly impressive architecture, it was ultimately a hollow shell, a cold, pretty reminder of what Twilight had lost. Her foul mood increased as she trudged through the glimmering hallways.
"What the...?"
Twilight paused and backtracked to peer at her reflection in the iridescent wall. Her eyes were a brilliant cyan that glowed devilishly in the overcast shadows. She slammed her eyes shut and reluctantly reopened them, only to see her regular violet pupils staring back at her. Chalking it up to sleep deprivation, she soon found herself in the map room and sagged onto her throne. Muttering incoherently into her hooves, Twilight rubbed her face irritably and groaned aloud.
"You're fine, Twilight. You're just a little...stressed, that's all."
"Oh, it's a tad more than that, child."
In a flash, Twilight was on her hooves, her horn burning with magic.
"Who said that? Show yourself!"
That voice...no, it couldn't be...
"Yes, it's me."
She spun and froze at the sight of the mare standing in the doorway.
"That's impossible! We destroyed you!"
"Did you now? Huh, that doesn't sound especially harmonious."
A raspberry bolt struck the empty space where the mare had just been standing. Mocking laughter echoed from all sides of the room, sending a series of chills down Twilight's spine. She crouched low, eyes scanning her surroundings as her aura lightly hummed with energy. No, this was impossible! This had to be a dream, the result of sleeplessness and stress.
"Ha ha ha, I assure you, I'm quite real."
Twilight's eyes widened as the mare's voice changed in mid-speech. A dark blue violet mist seeped into the room, gradually coalescing into a pony-shaped mass. It looked like...her. The faux-Twilight's pupil-less eyes were orbs of burning cyan light, a streak of light carving into her face to form a sardonic grin.
"Oh, what's the matter? You look like you've seen a ghost."
"You...you were in the voice in my head all along!"
"Look who finally figured it out," Faux-Twilight stated mockingly. If she could roll her eyes, she would.
"What do you want?"
"Oh, you know, the usual: vengeance, the throne of Equestria, all of ponykind bowing before me." The mare then began to close the distance between them, mist crawling up to wrap around Twilight's horn and limbs like steel fetters. "But first...I need you."
Twilight's shrieks reverberated throughout the castle's halls and were just as quickly silenced.
~*~
"A little to the left...a little more...a little mooooore..."
"Pinkie," Applejack grunted, "If this thing goes anymore left, then we won't be able ta walk through tha door."
"Perfect!"
Applejack slid down the side of the jukebox and panted heavily. She wiped her brow and took a moment to assess the decor. Mulberry, purple and raspberry balloons and streamers decorated Sugarcube Corner's exterior while several long tables with violet table clothes were arranged in horizontal rows. To top it all off, a violet banner reading, "WE LOVE YOU, TWILIGHT!" proudly towered above the bakery. She had to admit it, Pinkie and the others really came through.
Not that there was any doubt.
Rainbow Dash finished wrapping streamers around the banner's posts as Fluttershy practiced with her bird choir. Spike helped Rarity arrange the plastic silverware into folded up napkins displaying Twilight's cutie mark, tying them off with ribbons that were coiled up at the ends. A blue-maned unicorn set up her DJ equipment while an earth pony mare readjusted the strings on her cello. The cross-eyed mailmare and that weird inventor stallion finished setting up the bouncy castle as the three flower mares readied the refreshments table.
"Great work, everypony. Now let's get tha guest o' honor an' get this party started!"
There was an eruption of cyan light that temporarily blinded everypony. Once the discombobulation wore off, they all turned to find the source. Although the mare resembled the Twilight Sparkle they all knew and loved, there were several details that separated the pair. Her wild rose, violet and sapphire-blue mane stood straight up and pulsated like a crackling fire, a matching untamed tail flowing from her hindquarters. A glowing cyan vein ran through the pair of dark black-violet wings upon her back and a twisted horn corkscrewed from her head. The mare's mulberry eyes were pinpricks, adrift in the glowing cyan of her scleroses and two illuminated cyan wing-shaped ornaments adorned the edges of her eyes.
"Oh, there's no need for that. I've already arrived."
"Twilight?" Spike gasped, only for the newcomer to chuckle cruelly.
"Close. Think back to your first adventure as friends. I was the one that brought you all together in the first place." She then grinned. "Seems only fitting that I will be the one to tear you all apart."
"Nightmare Moon," Applejack muttered in disbelief.
The mare smirked. "Call me Midnight Sparkle."
Rainbow Dash was livid. "Give Twilight back to us or else!"
"'Or else?'" Midnight let loose a high-pitched cackle. "Really? Because from where I'm standing, it seems as though you lack the power to back up your threat."
With a rebellious yell, Rainbow launched herself full-speed at the mare, intending to knock her off her hooves and demand the return of her friend. A pale, light grayish cyan beam snatched Rainbow from the sky and knocked her back to terra firma. She winced at the pain in her back and felt something twitching wildly. A glance in a nearby window revealed the source: two tiny feathery extensions took the space where her proud wings once rested.
"M-my wings! She took my wings!"
Midnight Sparkle shot her a toothy grin. "Just be thankful that's all I took. Your new queen is quite merciful."
"'New queen'?" Fluttershy echoed, and then winced when Midnight appeared right in front of her.
"Yes, me: Midnight Sparkle, the Queen of Magic!" She then frowned at the whimpering pegasus. "Ugh, you're so cowardly. For once in your life, stop being such a cry-baby!"
"Leave her alone!"
Midnight turned to Rainbow. "Ah yes, the so-called 'Element of Loyalty.' When was the last time you ever stuck by any of us instead of pursuing your own selfish goals? Why should we care about some mare that doesn't even care about us?"
"That is enough!" Rarity yelled. "There's no need to be so cruel!"
"Me? Cruel? The only cruel thing is the fact that we keep you around." Midnight circled Rarity like a hungry shark. "I was the brains, Applejack the brawns. Even wimpy Fluttershy's Stare is useful. What do you do besides babble on about fashion and behave like a prissy little weakling?" Rarity's face scrunched up, tears flowing down her ivory cheeks. "You know, I was thinking of possessing you, feeding on all of your insecurities but you're more trouble than you're worth."
Applejack growled, "Ya don't talk that way ta mah friends!"
Midnight took a step back, placing a hoof on her chest in a show of mock surprise. "But Applejack, I thought you valued honesty?" Her face took on a more sadistic visage. "Here's some honesty for you: your parents would still be around if it wasn't for you."
Applejack's eyes widened. "Wh-ha are ya-..?"
"If you hadn't pretended to be sick just to get out of going to that apple cider convention, then your folks wouldn't have taken that detour to pick you up that medicine and Applebloom would've grown up knowing her parents."
The farm pony tilted her stetson down, her chest heaving as she silently wept. Satisfied, Midnight turned to Spike. "And you, my Number One Assistant," she chided in a childish tone. "You're always bending over backwards to please me, always clinging to me like a wart. So desperate to find a parental figure, aren't you? It'd be funny if it wasn't so pathetic."
Spike's eyes filled up with tears. "You...you're not Twilight. She'd never say such horrible things."
"Not to your face."
Suddenly, Midnight rapidly shook her head, her eyes once more violet.
"G-guys, I'm so sorry! Please help me-..."
She grunted, her head twisting around on her neck. Violet switched back to cyan eyes.
"Mmm, she's a feisty one. Anyway, where was I? Ah yes, the hatchling crying out for somepony to kiss his boo-boos and tell him that he matters."
"Stop making my friends cry!" Pinkie wrapped her forelegs around Spike. "Stop it right now!"
Midnight snorted derisively. "Why so serious? I thought you were supposed to be the clown? You know, the one we can all point and laugh at. What, you thought ponies actually liked you? All those weird things you can do and the stupid parties you throw in a foalish attempt to make friends? Ha! Why would anypony want a freak as their friend?"
Pinkie's bottom lip trembled, her poofy mane now lying lifeless against one side of her face. She gripped Spike tightly and began to weep into his shoulder, causing the dragon to begin comforting her. The bystanders stood by in abject shock at the events unfolding around them. How could Twilight be so heartless towards those that she called her friends?
"As much fun as this has been, I have places to go," Midnight yawned as if bored with her own handiwork. "Seeing as this is a party, why don't I give you some party favors?"
Her twisted horn pulsated with crackling power before she fired it at her brokenhearted friends. When the magic subsided, Applejack found an ancient, gray-maned mare in Rarity's place, hunched over atop wobbling limbs. Rainbow Dash was clutching a crying filly that resembled a miniature Fluttershy. Pinkie's mane remained straight, only now her expression was one of dead-eyed disinterest. Applejack frowned, wondering why she was next to Pinkie all of a sudden.
"Now if you'll excuse me, I have a kingdom to take over! Toodle-loo!"
One crackling sphere later and she was gone.
"Whoa nelly, Ah've got such a killer migraine!"
"Spike," Pinkie stated monotonously. "Why are you talking like Applejack?"
"What do ya mean...?"
Applejack stared down at her hooves. No, claws.
"Guys, I feel really weird," Spike groaned and then stared at Applejack.
"We're in each other's bodies!" They both screamed.
"This is dreadful!" Rarity wheezed. "Hold on, I need to sit down. My legs are killing me."
Rainbow Dash stared down at the pink-maned filly. "Fluttershy?"
The filly babbled something and then, realizing her predicament, let out an agitated whine.
"What do we do now?" Pinkie droned. Oddly enough, she was behaving exactly like her sister Maud.
Applejack took a breath, composing herself. "Let's not lose our heads now."
"Don't lose our heads?!" Rainbow barked incredulously. "I don't have my wings, you're stuck as Spike, Rarity is older than dirt-..."
"Hey!"
"...-Spike's in your body, Fluttershy is a foal, Pinkie is, well, not Pinkie and Twilight has been taken over by Nightmare Moon. How in the hay can you expect any of us to not lose our heads?!"
Applejack held up a claw then shut her mouth. "Ah...Ah don't know." She gazed out into the distance.
"Ah just don't know."
~*~
Twilight's eyes flickered open and slowly she began to rise. She was in a circular stone room, around a hundred feet in diameter, one that lacked torches but was somehow still lit, albeit dimly by an unknown source. Where was she? The last thing she that remembered was-
Nightmare Moon! She was back!
How could I have been so foolish! It was Nightmare all along!
A twinkling on the other side of the room caught her attention and with leaden hooves, she approached it, discovering that it was a oval glass window big enough to theoretically fit her head through. Peering through it, she found herself somehow looking down at the floors of the map room before the environment outside the window swiveled to stare at a pair of purple hooves. Puzzled, Twilight lifted up her own hooves and to her shock, found them to be an exact match. The other hooves turned as the window shifted, as though Twilight were watching somepony else inspecting them. Clopping sounds echoed as Twilight watched the wall approaching her until a shape appeared in the crystalline wall, one that resembled her.
"Well now, who is that pretty mare in the mirror there?"
Twilight yipped in surprise and launched herself backwards, tumbling onto her back at the sound of her voice, or rather, one that sounded like hers. This voice, however, was slightly deeper, more silky but possessing a coldness to it. Finally, all the pieces clicked into place. Nightmare Moon had taken her over and locked her inside her own head!
"Nightmare, let me out!"
She was met with giddy, borderline psychotic laughter. "Let you out? After all of our time together? I'm afraid that's just not possible." Twilight, or Nightmare rather, continued to inspect her reflection, running a hoof over her chest and stomach. "Hmm, a bit pudgy in the middle and a tad fat in the flank but overall, not bad. Yes, this'll do quite nicely."
"Nightmare, please-...!"
"Ugh, 'Nightmare Moon' just doesn't work anymore, does it? Hmm, neither does this form, at least, not without some cosmetic changes. I think it's time for a makeover."
A pale blue glow encapsulated the mare and Twilight recoiled at the final result.
"Say hello to Midnight Sparkle."
Twilight could only watch in horror as Nightmare, or "Midnight" as she preferred, tormented her friends, attacking them at their emotional and mental weak spots with accurate cruelty. Judging by the prowess with which she did so gave the imprisoned alicorn some idea as to the full confrontation between Princess Celestia and Nightmare Moon a millennium ago. She banged on the window with all of her might, pounding on it with her hooves, screaming for Midnight to leave her friends alone. Her magic refused to work so she resorted to kicking at the window, slowly creating a cobweb of cracks. Her hooves finally broke through the glass, propelling her back in control.
For about five seconds before being violently shoved out, sending her tumbling headfirst into an inky abyss. She found herself once more inside the circular stone room, which had greatly shrunken in the brief space of her absence, now being only thirty feet. The window was back, except now it was thicker, like a wall of blue ice. She tapped it lightly, finding it possessing a hard, diamond-like texture. Midnight wasn't taking any risks now that she knew Twilight would fight back.
Outside, Midnight continued to toy with her friends, even using her magic to change them, reducing Rarity to an elderly mare and Fluttershy into a foal. Rainbow Dash lost her wings, something that no pegasus should ever have to go through twice. Applejack and Spike has swapped bodies while Pinkie Pie was an emotionless husk of her former self. Twilight struck at the window harder than before but failed to make even a single scratch. A teleportation spell had been cast and now Midnight was in the Everfree Forest, standing in front of the ruinous remains of the Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters.
"It's just like coming home," Midnight sighed almost nostalgically. "My, have I missed this."
"Why did you do this? To get back at me and my friends?"
"You and your friends?" Midnight scoffed. "Believe me, as thoroughly enjoyable as that was, don't think yourself that important. This goes well beyond six meddling mares and their dumb dragon."
"Then why?!" Twilight was pleading at this point. "Why are you doing this?!"
"Let's just say that I have a long-overdue talk to have with the 'Royal Sisters.'"