It had been a long year since last Celestia stood upon this hill and gazed down at the splendor of Mirrormere as she rose her sun. The memories of standing here, head held high and eyes closed as she basks in the feeling of the warm sunlight, imagining she was there beside her mother still.
She could almost forget.
Almost.
The cold biting sting of the northern winds pulls her from her memories, and back to the horrible reality before her.
Sighing and allowing her horn’s glow to fade away, Celestia opens her eyes and gazes out beyond the hill, down unto the blackened and corrupted sight of the once shining Mirrormere, its streets filled with mind-controlled ponies in armor, silently swaying back and forth as their helmeted gazes stare forward into whatever dark abyss Sombra had cast their minds into.
And then there was that. Her love, the light of her life, Sombra had done this.
She had scarcely believed Radiant when she had teleported into the throne room, exhausted and wide eyed with fear. But the reports of what was happening soon started to trickle in. Then it had become a flood. The border towns had come under attack, other cities and settlements in the Crystal Empire, even some of their neighboring nations in the Griffon and Dragon kingdoms.
Turning around, Celestia sighs as she strides back through the vanguard of their assembled forces, the banner of the First Legion hanging proudly from the bannerstaffs at the forefront. One of her officers, a unicorn mare wearing the laurels of a captain, passes Celestia her helm and poleaxe as she passes, a soft smile and a murmur of thanks is returned before Celestia schools her face and places her helmet back on. Striding forth once more, she pauses only to allow her personal guard to fall in step behind her, their stern faces reminding her so much of her uncle, the measured cadence of their armored hooves bringing a cold comfort to her heart.
Making her way quickly into the heart of the camp, she pauses before the curtains of the large tent that sits in the direct center, the voices within raised and arguing over various matters for the coming assault.
“We should simply charge in, sweep the streets, and take the Sanctuary,” a voice, her sister’s voice, echoes from inside, “be done with it before he can cause more damage.”
“Those are our country ponies in there, Princess,” another voice, stern like a teacher or a scholar, “I shall not have them sacrificed upon the altar of battle for a quick victory.”
“He’s right, lass,” yet another male, “we cannae simply abandon our vows t’them, if it within our power t’save ‘em, we have ta’ try.”
Steeling herself, Celestia pulls back the curtain at the entrance, and strides in as Luna starts to argue.
“Be that as that may, we canno-”
“We can, and we will,” Celestia’s kind, but tight, voice cuts through Luna’s stern objections, “we will not cut through the people of Hope’s final gift. We will not discard Love’s people.” She smiles softly to Luna, who is looking back with her mouth halfway open, “not again, sister. We cannot fail them again.”
“Well said, lass,” the second male voice snorts.
“That doesn’t solve our problem, though,” the first sighs.
Turning to look to the owners of the voices, Celestia’s smile doesn’t slip as she looks over the tall highland pony in the armor of an Imperial Lieutenant and his friend, a green unicorn in what can only be called ‘armor’ in the loosest and most liberal of terms.
“Tartan, Veridian, my sister and I will lead a charge, preferably of the Imperial First and any Imperial Militia that wish to come with us, while the Equestrian forces we have brought continue to keep the city contained,” Celestia offers. “It is direct, like my sister wished, but you and your troops can hopefully disable them, and add to your numbers as you are friendly familiar faces. At the very least, you can keep civilian casualties to a minimum.”
“The Imperial forces are fewer in number, sister,” Luna says softly, turning to her sister, “and we cannot in good conscious, ask them to attack their own families.”
“I will not be asking them to slaughter them, Lulu,” Celestia replies softly, offering a sympathetic smile to her sister, “simply delay them. While we…” Her breath hitches a little, and she has to swallow down the sudden lump in her throat as she looks back to the map of Mirrormere on the table in the center of the group, “take care of the threat.”
“Princess, you don’t hav-” Viridian starts, but is promptly cut off by Tartan putting a hoof on his shoulder.
“No, lad, she does,” Tartan says softly, “Sombra was her love, wouldn’t be right to let anyone but her try and do what needs be done.”
For a long moment the tent is silent save for the sounds of Celestia shifting from hoof to hoof in her armor and the muted sounds of the soldiers beyond its walls. The depth of it causes Celestia to start to fear her sister won’t back her plan, and the arguing will continue, that Sombra will continue to corrupt the city, and the damage will spread.
“Very well,” Luna states calmly, a hint of worry in her voice, “we shall go with your plan, Tia. But if things go wrong, our forces will need to sweep the city clear.”
“We will accept that,” Tartan offers as he puts his helmet back on, “I’ll rally what remains of the Sanctuary Guards and the First Legion. We’ll get you to Sombra.”
“I’ll go get the militia in order, then,” Viridian states, turning as his makeshift armor clanks, “we won’t be able to press as deep, but we can perhaps get a few of those helmets off of ponies, perhaps get a few of the chained ones free, too.”
As soon as they are gone, Celestia sigh and looks at the map of the Empire’s capital once more, her mind drifting once more to better days and the warmth she so dearly misses right now.
“Are you sure about this, sister?” Luna asks softly, nosing at her sister’s neck, “you do not have to go in. I can lead the charge. Spare you the pain.”
“No, Lulu,” Celestia replies softly, breaking her gaze from the map to gently nuzzle at her sister’s mane, smiling softly as her sister giggles softly as she messes with her mane. “I have to. I owe it to the Empire, to our ponies, to see this through.”
“And to Sombra,” Luna states quietly, stepping back so she can look up at her sister, her worried gaze capturing the older Alicorn’s. “‘Tis not even likely still him, for all the corruption such shadows have doubtlessly caused within him. You owe him nothing.”
“I have to try,” Celestia whispers back, looking away from her sister, “I have to. I won’t lose another… we already lost so many to this. I won’t lose him too… not if I can help it.”
“Very well,” the Lunar Alicorn sighs, “perhaps you do. If for not other reason than to see with your own eyes that your love was lost in the wastes, and the monster that returned is not him.” Taking her helmet and putting it on, Luna turns and goes to the entrance of the tent, waiting for her sister to join her before leaving.
Once they leave, Celestia watches Luna go through her pre-battle rituals, much as the elder alicorn had done before coming to the tent. Watching her sister steel herself, that hard edge entering her eyes, the way she slips into the solid stance of a seasoned swordsmare the instant her blade is taken up in her magic, sends a chill down Celestia’s spine. This was not to be their life. When they were young, they dreamed of being at their parent’s sides, spending their days in peace surrounded by love and family.
Here, instead, they had found themselves in a field of blacked mud and dark sunless days full of hate and bereft of compassion.
But in this field, they might yet preserve hope and find love again.
Striding once more to the hilltop, Luna at her side, Celestia nods to Tartan who has gathered to him the First Legion of the Crystal Empire, their dented and cracked armor shining in the morning sunlight.
“Are you ready?” she asks simply.
“We are, lass,”
Turning her gaze to the city proper, Celestia takes a deep breath and looks towards the Sanctuary at its center. In the stories told by their father on those dark and stormy nights this would be the time for a speech, but Celestia finds no words can properly convey her feelings, nor can she find any that might inspire her troops. Instead, she lifts her weapon, the polished steel of the poleaxe’s blade glinting in her sunlight.
“Order the charge, sister,” Celestia says softly, “it is time for the grim work to be done.”
Raising her blade, Luna turns towards the assembled masses, “You all know what must be done! First Imperial Legion, Seaddle Militia, retake your city while my sister and I put down the foe who has taken it!”
The voices of a thousand weary Crystal Ponies rings out through the air as they all bellow out ‘For Queen Amore! For Crystal Hope!’
“Soldiers of Equestria! Make sure none leave the city, nor any reinforcements break our lines! We leave this most important task to you! Listen to your officers, and we shall see the moon rise yet!” The response from their troops is immediate, the ground shaking beneath their hooves and the air trembling with their war cries. Even a few warhorns split the air.
“Ponies of the Empire,” Luna says one last time, turning her gaze towards Tartan, “With us!” She then points her blades towards the city, “Charge!”
The charge down the hill becomes a blur after the first few steps, her eyes locked onto the Sanctuary’s darkened spires as she charges just behind the standard bearer of the First Legion, the landscape rushing past her in the thunderous stampede she is in the center of. Vaguely, she is aware that her sister is to her left, blades drawn and face split in the raucous grin she always wears in the heat of battle, as if she is enjoying the fight just a bit too much.
For a split second, as they enter the city and the shadow of a building passes over them, Celestia swears she can see Luna with fangs and glowing draconic eyes.
The battle is joined quickly, only three or four blocks in, forcing the two alicorns to take to the air, barely avoiding the pikes and lances of the mind controlled soldiers that are currently being tackled and subdued by their counterparts. Their quick ascent brings them under assault from arrows and spells flung from behind the lines, forcing both to quickly bring up shields to deflect the deadly assault as they fly with all due haste towards the Sanctuary.
Their flight takes them high above the battle, and for a moment as they circle to gain altitude, Celestia allows herself to look down at the ponies fighting in the streets. She sends a silent prayer that Tartan and his troops are able to subdue more than they’re forced to kill, but in her heart she knows there will be many a funeral tomorrow.
Her attention is drawn back to the task at hoof as the shadow of the Sanctuary passes over them, and Luna takes a sharp turn to the left and towards a window that Celestia knows leads to the throne room. Making a sharp turn herself, she picks up speed before folding her wings in front of her and empowering them with her magic. The sound of the glass shattering fills her ears the second after her brain recognizes the window she’s passing through as a memorial to Crystal Hope.
Landing on the floor of the throne room with a resounding boom, the crystal actually cracking slightly beneath the force of her and her sister’s entrance, Celestia perks her ears forward, breath coming out in great steaming plumes as she holds her polearm ready for the attack that surely is coming. Yet, the only sound she can hear over the pounding of her heart is the musical tinkling of the glass hitting the floor around them.
“Sombra!” Luna shouts, her voice rattling the windows, “show yourself, coward!”
“Coward?” Sombra’s echoing answer comes from nowhere, yet everywhere, “Luna, my dear, you wound me.”
“Come within reach of my blade, and I may yet wound you more,” Luna growls as both her and Celestia start circling in their little shafts of light from the shattered windows.
“And what say you, my love?” Sombra whispers, so close that Celestia swears his breath tickles her ear. “Do you think me a coward?”
“I think you a shadow of the love I have lost,” Celestia replies sternly, turning quickly to try and catch a glimpse of her foe.
“My dear sweet Sun,” Sombra chuckles darkly, “I am the same stallion you fell in love with. The same stallion that charged headlong at the Black Dragons, and ended their threat by your side.”
“Lies,” Celestia growls, “my love is lost to the snow and shadows. You are the evil that has simply taken his shape.”
“Is that so?” Sombra chuckles darkly, the sound echoing around the throne room in a deep twisted bass. Then, the shadows gather inward before Celestia, and the figure of her love in his armor strides out of them.
For a moment the Alicorn of the Sun’s blade wavers in her magic, her breath heavy as she stares at the smiling face of Sombra, her heart hammering in her ears.
“Hold, Sister!” Luna’s distant voice barely registering in her ear, “it is a foul trick of the shadows! Tis not your love!”
“My love,” Sombra says softly, his voice caring as his ears lower and one hoof raises towards her, hoof held upward, “please… don’t turn your back on me.”
For a moment, Celestia’s own hoof raises, shakily reaching towards his, but then her eyes flick towards his, and in them she sees no love as they glow a sickly green and purple.
“No,” Celestia whispers, as she retracts her hoof, the magic surrounding her blade flaring, “you are not him. My love is dead.”
“So be it,” Sombra chuckles cruelly, his smile changing from one of love to a fang-filled look of malice. “I had wanted you at my right hoof, the Empress to my Empire. The crown jewel of the new world.” As he speaks the shadows once more swirl behind him, as echoing whispers fill the air. “But if I cannot have you. None shall.”
Celestia raises her weapon in time for a strike from her left, the sounds of battle suddenly rushing to her ears and causing her to look over towards her sister, who is currently embattled with tendrils of darkness herself, and from the brief glance Celestia gets of her eyes she has been for the entire time she’d been talking to Sombra.
Turning her attention back to Sombra, who simply calls forth a blade of shadow and dark crystals as he waits, Celestia steels her heart once more.
Then she rushes forward with an anguished cry, and joins the battle in full.
Celestia’s first few strikes are deftly parried by the shadow of her love, his wicked smile only growing in intensity with each rattling strike of blade against blade. And with each strike Celestia pours in more of her power, as with each time the blades spark against each other she sees her love’s face, and her heart cries out in fury.
Soon fury overtakes her and she swings her poleaxe hard enough that instead of simply being deflected it cascades down in a shower of sparks past Sombra’s face and into the crystal floor beneath her with a resounding and terrible pearl of thunder. The blade wedged deep into the floor, Celestia is unable to pull it free in time to deflect a blow from her foe, and before she knows it her vision is full of stars and she is tumbling, then sliding, across the floor. Grimacing against the pain and trying desperately to catch her breath, Celestia props herself up on one hoof, her magic reaching out to her blade again, only to have her head struck just beside her horn by Sombra’s own blade.
“None of that, my dear,” Sombra chuckles as he raises his blade, crystals forming around Celestia’s legs and horn. “Be good, and hold still.”
Time seems to slow down as Celestia desperately pours magic into her horn, only for it to spark and fizzle as the crystals absorb it. As the blade comes down, Celestia’s ears fold down against her head as tears fill her eyes, her only cold comfort in knowing she’ll be with her love soon.
As the blade is about to strike, her vision is suddenly filled with blue and the sound of steel on steel.
“You forget she is not alone, Shadow,” Luna growls, the shadows seeming to flinch away from her as she strides towards both of them, the magical blade holding off Sombra’s own weapon glowing almost casually.
“Far be it for me to assume she is alone, dear Luna,” Sombra rumbles, pulling his blade back to assume a more guarded stance, “I am surprised that you would defend the source of all that scorns your charge.”
Leaving a copy of her blade behind to guard Celestia, Luna frowns, “My charge is the safety of this world, of which you are a threat to.”
“Ahhh, but what of your precious night? Surely a fellow creature of the sunless hours should want the sun to not rise again. Your sister controls it, just let me end her, and let the shadows spread,”
“The Moon does not shine without the sun,” Luna says softly, “but you are right on account. I am the mistress of the midnight hours, and you are but a foal playing with fire.”
Luna takes another step forward at that, and once more the battle is joined. Shadows fill the room, as Sombra attempts to fight Luna from all sides, and Luna pushes them back with her magic. Flashes of steel on steel breaking through the shadows to give Celestia glimpses of the combat within, along with the scowling faces of her sister and Sombra. The flow of battle seems to hover in a stalemate for a while, but slowly it starts to shift towards Luna.
And as it does, Celestia swears she can see her sister’s eyes become those draconic eyes once more, framed by a fang-filled smile.
Then all at once, Luna’s blades find their mark and the shadows explode outward, leaving just Luna and Sombra in the center of the room just below the throne.
“It is done,” Luna intones softly, digging her blade deeper into Sombra’s chest, her visage once more the one Celestia saw every day. As the blade digs deeper, Sombra coughs, and his magic fails him, the crystals around the throne room shattering, including the ones holding Celestia down.
As soon as her legs are free, Celestia is on her hooves, rushing forward to catch Sombra as his own legs fail him, and he collapses to the floor. Cradling him in her own magic, Celestia pulls her helmet off, her pink mane cascading down around both of them.
“I know that face,” Sombra whispers softly before coughing and smiling, the dark magic dissipating from his eyes.
“I’m here, my love,” Celestia says gently, brushing some of his mane from his face, “you’re safe. The shadows cannot harm you now. I’ll save you.”
“You already have,” Sombra chuckles, “you and your sister both.”
“No, no the magic is gone, we can-” Celestia starts, her horn glowing brightly.
“It’s too late,” Sombra coughs, “and… and for what I’ve done, for what I’ve seen… let me pass, Tia.”
“I can’t,” Celestia whispers, “I won’t!”
Leaning up with what must be the last of his strength, Sombra kisses Celestia’s cheek, “Goodbye, my beautiful sunshine.”
Pushing more magic into her horn, Celestia scans Sombra as his eyes start to dim, her magic finding that his injuries are far beyond anything she knows how to heal. Desperately, she tries, and earns nothing more than a painted whimper from the stallion she is holding onto as he starts to slip away faster. Finding no other recourse, she pours more power into her horn, the light of it causing the entire room to be filled with power strong enough to cause even the farthest shadows to roll and boil, and Luna to raise a wing to shield her eyes.
The light fades as Sombra breathes his last, and Celestia collapses across his still form sobbing.
For a long moment, nothing echoes through the room save for Celestia’s distraught sobbing. Then, a rumble starts to shake the ground, causing Luna to raise her blades again and get into a guarded stance above her sister. However, no foe comes forward and instead the rumbling grows as the crystal around them starts to crack.
“What sorcery is this?” Luna shouts over the sound of breaking glass and shattering crystal. “Sister, the city is coming apart! We must flee!”
“I can’t leave him!” Celestia cries.
“You must!” Luna growls, grabbing her sister by the back of her barding and hauling her to her hooves, “We must rally the civilians and our troops! They have lost enough leaders this day, we cannot leave them without our guidance!” She picks up Celestia’s helm, then wrenches free her polearm from the floor with a flourish of her magic, “Now! Take up thy blade and thy helm and leave the dead where they lie! They are already saved, let us save now the living who yet need us!”
Celestia blinks for a moment, then nods and takes up her helm and blade again before spreading her wings and launching into the air to leave the way she had come in. Luna follows suit behind her, and they’re soon out into the chaotic air beyond the Mirrormere Sanctuary. The city beyond is breaking much like the inside of the Sanctuary, great cracks extending from the center of the city as screams fill the air and ponies try desperately to flee.
Banking down towards the streets, both the celestial sisters attempt to levitate or teleport as many as they can to safety, but after the battle against Sombra both are drained and their minds and magic weakened. By the time they reach the outskirts of the city to deposit the few they’ve levitated, the city has all but broken into dust, and they are forced to watch as with a pearl of thunder the entire city of Mirrormere ceases to be as a massive blizzard seems to explode outward from where the city once was, the howling winds biting through their armor and the warm clothing beneath.
For a long moment, they all just stand there, Alicorns and the ponies they’ve rescued alike, staring at the terrible maelstrom where the city once was. Then, with one last silent sob, Celestia rises and silently starts walking towards where the Equestrian lines had been, her back to the city.
Luna soon rises as well, gathering the survivors they had rescued, and follows behind her sister.
The next few hours are filled with them searching for survivors once they reach the Equestrian lines, and ends in disappointment and mourning as how few have made it out.
In the end, the Equestrian Legions march south, a scant few hundred of the civilians of the Crystal Empire in tow, to mourn the loss of the shining city.