The cruel fate of time marched on from that day. Every week Celestia would try to reach the part of Nightmare Moon that was still Luna, only to fail and the nightmare would continue. Despite failure, Celestia still had hopes for saving her sister, and through the course of time, kept a close watch on her subjects. Watching, and waiting in hope for the ones that could succeed where she failed.
In the dreamscape, Celestia tried to convince her sister to let go of the anger, in hopes still of being her salvation. Yet as her attempts failed time and again, she found herself trying less, and less. Her focus instead drew herself more to finding others that could do what she could not. It was by chance that she found a clan of honest hard working ponies selling seeds, and granted them land by the Everfree Forest, after that pieces seemed to fall into place. As if somehow they were guided by an unseen hoof.
The eldest daughter of the Smith clan, discovered the legendary Zap Apple tree, once apart of Castle Everfree's royal gardens, and with her discovery, ponies from miles around settled in on the land near the farm. From what was once a dangerous part of Everfree Forest, came the village of Ponyville.
A prominent family of unicorns, that long ago claimed the proud linage of being descendants of Princess Platinum herself, donated what remained of their fortune to the budding village. Forced into near poverty, what was left of the small clan dropped away from Canterlot elite to live out the simple life as merchants in Ponyville.
One of her sentry guards, was caught in a scandal and accused of being disloyal to the crown. Even as he begged to the court his case, it was through the act of kindness of a lone mare that saved him from banishment from Equestria entirely. Shamed, he left to live out his days in Cloudsdale as a weather pony. For generations to come, his descendants would hear about how important loyalty is from the old pony until his dying day.
The mare that showed him kindness, became one of his few friends in life, leading to one of the longest family friendships ever to be recorded by any family. Celestia took note in these unusual ponies, and watched their descendants carefully.
It was nearly a decade before the thousandth year, and Celestia carefully followed the lineage of her former student Sunrise. Hoping that the elusive element of magic would grace one of her descendants. Sunrise's daughter, Daylight was an earth pony, and was a prominent historian in her time. Her son, was another earth pony named Daylight Special, who went down in history as the inventor of what became known as time zones, to help organize the ever expanding railroad services. His Daughter, Sunset Shimmer, the first unicorn since Sunrise, was automatically accepted as Celestia's private pupil without much thought.
It was five years in her tutelage when she proved a disappointment by choosing a darker path. Eventually choosing to turn away from her teacher to live a life in an entirely different world.
There were only five years left until it was times up, and despite how closely Celestia tracked ponies that seemed to give off certain attributes, she could only make vague guess work, and even if her hunch was right, there were still no obvious signs for anypony to take on the future roll of the bearer of either Laughter, or Magic.
Then the sonic rainboom happened.
It was as if fate had favored her once again, and signs pointed to six very distinct fillies all at the same time, four of which came from families she had been following for almost two hundred years. Yet two came as a compete surprise to Celestia, the daughter of a rock farmer becoming a high candidate for the element of laughter was a surprise that she never expected. But for a potential bearer of the element of magic to come to her as an ordinary student for her school, she had to train this one herself.
Finally, it was time. The stage was set, and every single pony that Celestia had believed would become a bearer of an element was living, or working in Ponyville, thanks to circumstances even she couldn't believe, or through careful manipulation. All except for one.
Princess Celestia frowned deeply at the usual pile of paperwork before her, looking over not only the same sets of bills, propositions, and taxes that always seem to make their way back to her, but also she was looking over the names of ponies involved in this years Summer Sun Celebration.
"I think I'll bring Thunderstriker and Aquilinus with me," she mumbled to herself as she looked over the list of potential guards for the next day's events. As she looked over the guards she casually sipped her favorite tea, and sighed.
"Your majesty, is something the matter?" Her secretary asked from her desk across the room.
Celestia simply gave off her best smile to the mare and shook her head, "Everything's fine. I just have a lot going on is all." She looked back down at the stack of papers and quickly stamped a few of them. Then, the green mist of dragons breath carrying a letter, floated in the window. "What's this about?" Celestia wondered aloud before breaking the seal and reading the letter from Twilight Sparkle.
After a few moments, the mask of a smile that had grown comfortable on her face broke slightly, and a flicker of hope shone through. "My faithful student, I should have expected you would find out." She chuckled slightly as she began to write a letter to her student. "I knew that just a few choice books placed in your library would get your attention." She said the words with a light laugh, almost giddy with anticipation as she set quill to paper and began to write, My dearest, most faithful student Twilight, you know that I value your diligence, and I trust you completely...
Nightmare Moon stared off into the darkness ahead of her. It has been a long time since she had moved from this particular rock. All she did was stare upwards at the sky, watching and waiting for the stars that would aid in her escape. "They are almost upon us." She mumbled, more to herself than anyone else that was with her.
"We shall be free." Luna said softly. "Free from you, and this prison you brought upon us."
"Free from dreams, from memory. Free to live again." Nightmare Moon spoke again, she looked behind her, and saw the ghosts of her mother and Luna standing behind her, fading away into the nothingness. "Free from myself."
The stars continued to move, they were nearly upon her, yet still too far to be of any use. Don't get too excited. This may be another of her tricks.
The earth above flickered slightly, as the light of the stars began to fade away one by one. Nightmare Moon closed her eyes at last and smiled. "Let the dream end, and my sister's cruelty be known. Let her harsh light and tyranny come to an end!" The world around her disappeared in a flash, leaving nothing but a blank void of nothingness.
How long she fell through the void, she did not know. There was no air, no ground or sky. No up or down whatsoever. Nightmare Moon did the only thing that could come to her mind, and let out a primeval yell as she continued to fall into the waking world.
Princess Celestia was quite alone in the private room given to her by the mayor of Ponyville. It wasn't anything too fancy, just a comfortable room with sparse furnishings a short distance from the balcony within the town hall building.
In less than an hour, she would have to raise the sun from the horizon, and yet she cared not for the event before her. All that mattered was what lay out the window. She stared upward at the glowing white globe in the sky, and stared intently at it, watching the stars get ever closer to their goal.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the stars made it to their goal and in a flash, disappeared. The face of her sister gone from the surface of the moon. Celestia stood and turned away from the window as she heard the bird choir begin to sing. There was a knock on her door, and a pony simply said, "Three minutes your highness." Then galloped away to make sure that everything else was going smoothly.
Celestia nodded and began to exit, when a cloud of stars swiftly blocked her path. She backed away as the cloud quickly took the form of a pony she both expected, and hated. The form that stole her sister from her all those years ago, now stood before her ready to strike.
Celestia began to speak, only for Nightmare Moon to hold out a hoof. "You know all to well that I have never been one to mince words, especially when time is running short. Goodbye." Celestia vanished in an instant, sent to the center of the sun. "A worthy revenge for a worthy opponent." Nightmare Moon muttered as she heard the fanfare announce her sister, and went to go meet her new subjects.
The rest as they say, is history.
The End