//------------------------------//
// What Cannot Be, Is 
// Story: Welcome to My Nightmare 
// by mbrsart 
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Luna's heart pounded. Her sides and neck were slick with lather. Her chest heaved, gasping for breath. She couldn't stop running. To do so meant death.
Death.
She tried to block the memory out of her mind. Her sister, lying on the floor of the throne room in a pool of her own blood, a look of horror on her lifeless face. It made her sick to her stomach, and she had to stop for just a moment to retch in a nearby bush.
Why was she running? She still didn't know. She should have been able to order the guards to stand down, but no. They were after her head, saying that she had to pay for her crimes.
What crimes? She couldn't let herself believe that they were right, that she had killed Celestia. In her heart, she knew it not to be true.
Her front right hoof caught a rotting log, and she tripped, falling headlong and sliding down the dirt path. She struggled back to her hooves, but she could hear the sounds of the guards closing in. Hiding would do nothing; they were tracking her magic signature. If worst came to worst, she would have to face them.
She tried to gallop, but a searing pain shot up her right front leg, and she crumpled to her knees, tears streaming from her eyes, wailing in agony. She couldn't tell if her cannon bone was broken, and if it was, it was just a superficial fracture, but whatever the case may be, she was going to be stuck there until she could conjure up some spell to heal it. And she didn't have time for that.
Hiding was her last resort. Little by little, ignoring the pain in her leg, she pushed herself toward the side of the road. One of the larger trees would provide shelter from quick glances, and she could further hide herself with brush and magic. She took up a position behind the nearest tree, and she began concealing herself.
But it was too late. The guards rounded the bend, lances at their sides. "There she is!" one shouted, vengeance in his eyes.
"I didn't do it, I swear!" she wailed. "Do you think I would kill my own sister?!"
"I saw it with my own two eyes!" the guard growled, propelling his lance forward with a flash of magic. Luna instinctively closed her eyes and waited for the impact. Whatever pain it would cause, God willing, would be over in only a moment. And then, peace.
But that moment never came.
She opened her eyes, not daring to move any other muscle. Poised millimeters from her muzzle was the keen point of the lance, held in place by a second spell. The guard fought hard to drive the spear home, to bury it in her brain. Beads of sweat ran down his face, and he clenched his teeth so hard that his head began to shake. At last, his strength failed, and he slumped to the ground, unconscious. The lance fell with him.
Luna released the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding. Panting to try and regain normal respiratory rhythm, she shot a gloating look at the other guard, whose lance was still by his side. It was almost as if to dare him to hurl it. And hurl it, he did.
The same unseen source of magic caught the missile just inches from her face, and a sleek, black unicorn stallion came around the bend. The lance snapped in half and flew off into the trees, and the guard turned to look at the unicorn. "Are you mad?!" he bellowed. "She is guilty! She murdered Princess Celestia!"
"Are you so sure of this?" the black unicorn asked.
"My friend here saw it with his own eyes."
"Let the judge decide Luna's fate. Begone."
"But--"
"I said, LEAVE!" snapped the black unicorn. "You've caused enough trouble already."
The guard hefted his unconscious fellow onto his back and loped off toward Canterlot. The black unicorn approached Luna, and her heart jumped. "Thank you!" she gasped, doing her best to prostrate herself at his hooves. "My savior!"
"Savior?" the unicorn asked. "No, no, no, my darling." He bent down close. Luna looked crestfallen up at his large, brown eyes. He put his muzzle to her ear. His breath was like a jet of steam as he whispered, "I'm your worst nightmare."
Before Luna could do aught else, he raised a hoof and brought it down sharply on the back of her head. She collapsed to the ground, and a moment later the world went black.

Luna awoke in the dark. Her head ached, and every move of her front right leg was excruciating. She whimpered as she checked for swelling, but remarkably there was none. Just unbearable pain.
"Help!" she called. "Anypony, please!" Her voice didn't cooperate, and she didn't think it had gone very far. She called out again, but no reply returned.
Her eyes gradually adjusted to the light, and soon she saw that she was deep in the bowels of the disused Canterlot Palace dungeon, locked in some sort of cell. The only light that shone was generated by her own starlit mane, which cast an eerie, wavering glow on the walls.
Luna's imagination began to come alive. The shadows played tricks on her. She saw horrific, grotesque creatures coming to devour her, creatures that would vanish whenever she looked at them. She whimpered as her breath grew faster. The creatures multiplied and rushed at her, and looking at them was the only way to turn them back into shadows. "Help me!" she squealed, tears flowing, heart pounding. When her cries went unanswered, she dropped her head to the floor of the cell and covered it with her good leg, shutting her eyes tightly.
Silence. Silence, except for the pounding of her heart in her ears. Silence, except for her uncontrollable panting. Silence and stillness that helped her to calm down. Finally she stopped hyperventilating. Finally she was able to convince herself that the shadows were just that and not horrible creatures coming to devour her. When she was able to do this, her exhaustion took hold, and she slept.
She awoke again in darkness. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the wavering light cast by her mane and tail. She tried to use magic to pick the lock, but it was protected by wards, probably set by that mysterious black unicorn. She tried evoking the teleportation spell, which she had once mastered, but nothing came from her horn but the tiniest of sparks. She couldn't even generate a werelight, one of the most basic spells any magician could cast. Again, she dropped her head to the floor in shame and despair.
"Magic isn't going to help you here, Princess," said the voice of the black unicorn. She hated that voice now; it was the voice of her damnation.
Somewhere in the room, a candle wick combusted spontaneously, followed by another and another, until she could actually see where she was. She was deeper beneath Canterlot than she had initially thought, in the very lowest level of the dungeon. "Who art thou?" she demanded, using the Royal Canterlot Voice to try and intimidate him.
"I am Inspector Pipesmoke," the voice replied. "And I don't exist. Neither does the agency of which I am director. You wonder why you are here...or do you? I think we both know why you're here."
"I didn't kill my sister," Luna growled. The thought brought tears to her eyes, and they rolled hot down her cheeks. "Why wouldst thou think such a thing?"
"The evidence against you is strong, Princess. Upon review, one of two things will happen. Either you will be executed for your crimes, or you will be exonerated. But that doesn't change the fact that the sun will never rise again, does it?"
"The sun will rise," Luna said through gritted teeth, losing the edge in her voice. "Because Celestia is not dead."
"Oh, but she is. Impaled in the neck by a long, sharp object. The murder weapon was not found at the scene, but that's probably because it traveled with the murderer."
"What are you insinuating, Pipesmoke?" Luna stammered.
"You have no idea, do you? The dried blood coating your horn? We already took a sample of it for analysis, but I don't think much analysis is needed."
Luna strained her eyes to see her horn. She could see just the tiniest bit of it, but it was indeed stained crimson. "No," she gasped. "I couldn't have!"
"Again, your fate will be determined by the evidence. What do you remember?"
"Nothing," she replied. "All I remember is walking into the throne room and finding...." She couldn't bring herself to say it.
"Finding your sister's body," Pipesmoke finished.
Luna bit her lip as the memory returned, vivid in her mind's eye.

She had awoken an hour earlier than normal, three hours before moonrise. She had tried to get back to sleep, but to no avail. The sun was still sinking below the horizon, so she knew that Celestia would still be up and would have time to talk, something that she wished would happen more.
She made her way to the throne room, where Celestia sat sleepily on her cushion, paging through what appeared to be the dessert section of a cookbook. "Sister?" Luna greeted. Celestia shut the book and stuffed it under the cushion.
"Luna," greeted the elder princess. "You're up early."
"I couldn't sleep," she replied. "Something woke me up; I don't know what."
"Come, take a seat," Celestia invited, shuffling over and patting the cushion. "I'm about to paint the sunset. Have you ever watched me?"
"Once or twice," Luna replied. "But I've never gotten a front-row seat. And I don't know how you do it, either."
"This has always been my favorite part," the elder princess explained. "You can't start too early, or the sunlight blots out all your work. And if you start too late, then the masterpiece will never be seen. There's a fire deep in the Everfree Forest, and it's been filling the air with a thin haze of smoke. That always gives me the best canvas."
Celestia's horn glowed, and a palette of various oranges, reds, purples, blues and yellows floated over and came to rest on the dais, next to the cushion. The colors were not paints, but the seeds of light-spells, and the palette had been passed down through the generations, from the very first alicorn queen. Luna had always been jealous of Celestia's artistic abilities, and had wanted to paint a sunset of her own, but the laws dictated that it would not be so.
Celestia touched the tip of her horn to a fiery red, and as the disk of the sun was maybe halfway below the horizon, she took a deep breath, and she gently blew toward the star. The sky around it reddened slowly, and at the same time, the rest of the sky darkened. Next, she added a series of blues and purples, along with some streaks of bright pink.
It was the most beautiful sunset Luna had ever seen. She complimented Celestia, but the elder princess seemed to sense her jealousy. "Sunsets aren't the only thing that can be painted," Celestia explained. "You have a palette of your own."
"You mean the Milky Way," Luna scoffed.
"No. If you prearrange it with Cloudsdale, you can create something of your own. They're called noctilucent clouds. I'll show you how to paint them tomorrow."

And that was the last moment she remembered of her sister's life. Her next memory was her coming to the throne room for the changing of the guard and finding Celestia's lifeless body. Tears running freely, she pounded her good hoof, cursing whatever fiend robbed her of her dearest friend.
"Princess, are you listening?" asked Pipesmoke, snapping her back to reality. "Our initial investigation reveals data corruption in the camera footage when the actual murder occurred. But you were without a doubt the last pony to see your sister alive. And the first to be seen with her body. Damning evidence, wouldn't you say?"
"I've been framed," was all she could muster. "I don't know who did it, but somepony framed me." A sudden rage welled up inside her, and she leaped to her three good hooves and roared, "And when I find whomever is responsible, I will tear their head from their shoulders! I swear it on my sister's grave!"
"Do you seek to intimidate me?" Pipesmoke shouted back. "I am currently the most powerful stallion in Equestria! All I have to do is say the word and a hundred lances will impale you where you stand!" His horn glowed red, and he tugged on Luna's mane, pulling her to the bars, where her head impacted painfully. "I swear to you on your sister's grave that YOU will be brought to justice!"
"Thou askest whether we seek to intimidate thou, when thou hast attempted to do the same. Dost thou expect this to succeed? I have never heard such tripe!" She mustered her magic, drawing upon every source of energy she could sense, and she engulfed herself in a ball of light. One moment later, she appeared on the other side of Pipesmoke, and she took off at full gallop toward the stairs, ignoring the pain in her leg.
Then she saw a red glow form around her front right leg and knew what was going to happen. It snapped with a hideous *crunch*, and she crumpled to the ground. She hit so hard that her diadem left its place atop her head and clattered on the stone before her.
Surprisingly, her leg didn't hurt. On the contrary, it was almost completely numb. She mustered her magic again to try and fix it, but Pipesmoke was already upon her, approaching slowly, head lowered, poised to lunge forward and impale her with his horn. "You can't escape the law, Princess." His voice was cold and harsh.
"I am innocent," she replied. His horn glowed, and her broken leg moved. Hot spikes of pain ran through her veins, through her bones, through her very soul, forcing wails of agony from her throat.
"I can fix this in mere moments. But you have to give me a confession."
"Never!" she said, spitting on his front hooves.
"Very well." He moved her broken leg again. "I'm going to have to set this regardless of whether you confess or not. But only giving me what I need will make the pain go away." He moved her leg again.
"Please, stop!" she pleaded through her tears. "I am innocent, damn you!"
"Damn me?" He laughed. "It is your fate, o Princess, that you should be concerned about. You see, I don't care one way or another what happens to me. Haven't you forgotten? I. Don't. Exist." He punctuated every word for effect. "I can do whatever I want to whomever I want with complete impunity."
By this time, he was in range. She had to act. She lashed out with her hind legs, striking him in the throat. He crumpled to the ground, gasping for air, and she tried to muster enough magic to heal the fracture. It almost took too long, but she was able to at least set the bone so that it could bear weight. But the pain still shot up her side when she stood or tried to walk.
Stair by stair, she climbed out of the dungeon, taking time every so often to cast a loose stone or two down at Pipesmoke. Had he wings, he would have caught her. But fortunately for her, he was only a unicorn.
And he was waiting for her at the top of the stairs.
"You're not the only one who can use that trick," he growled. He spun around and kicked her hard in the chest, knocking the wind out of her. She tumbled down the dungeon stairs, hitting her head several times and landing hard on one of her wings. Amongst the stars she saw, Pipesmoke materialized next to her. He pushed her back into the cell. After a small spark from his horn, the bars began to glow with a pale light. "Your magic is now useless. Try 'til your brain explodes if you want, but you won't be able to leave this cell without my permission."
He walked up the stairs and slammed the door, and all the candles in the room extinguished, leaving Luna once again in near darkness. Some sort of liquid began to run down her face and drip off her nose. A few drops touched her lips, and, fearful of what it could be, she licked the viscous liquid off.
Sure enough, it was blood.