"...and you know what the worst of it is?" Rainbow Dash muttered towards the cosmos as she lay casually on her back along the bow of the Jury. "It's not the over-one-hundred dead Lerringtons. It's not how traumatized Kera is. It's not how unhappy my friends and I have been as of late." She gulped before saying, "Earlier today, while nearly crashing into the Frozen Sea from a dizzy spell, I could have sworn I heard a voice..." Her jaw grew tight. "Axan's voice..."
"Just like the manner in which thou heard her at the battlefield between the Ledomaritans and the Xonans?"
Rainbow Dash nodded. "It was a reminder that someway—somehow—she is following me. Keeping an eye out on me. Observing everything that happens to me with her ancient... erm... dragon tingling or something."
"Without a doubt. Considering what thou hast done to free her sister from suffering, the Divine hath taken a great interest in thee."
"But, your Highness, it's way m-more than that!" Rainbow Dash sat up. "Axan nearly killed me. For all intents and purposes, she did kill me. The only thing that made her spare my pathetic flesh is the fact that she figured out I was this 'Austraeoh' crap." Nostrils flaring, Rainbow glared down into the cold waters lying in the darkness beneath the Jury. "Now she's heck-bent on making sure I make this trip east, as if it's something that was prophesied or what-crap. So that got me to thinking... why didn't she intervene at Lerris?" The pegasus winced, her voice taking on a squeaking tone. "What makes her think that what Shell did to so many innocent ponies and to the ones I care about was... s-somehow necessary?" She brought a pair of hooves to her face, groaning. "And then the shape-shifters and the doppelganger of Lasairfion who knew my name and... and..."
"We can only imagine that thou feeleth remarkably overwhelmed, Rainbow Dash."
"Nnnnngh... you have no idea. Feels like the further I fly east, the less and less control I have over what happens—both good and bad. But m-mostly the bad."
Silence.
Rainbow lowered her hooves from her face, sighing. "And... and I've taken it out on my friends, all the while pretending to be protecting them. I figured that my loyalty is the one thing hurting them. In a lot of ways, it kind of is, at least in the way I see it."
"When stuck in the pits of despair, it is undeniably easy to see every element of thy life as a flaw. While this typically can be the signature of a wise and noble sentry, it too can act as a veil, under the shadow of which our greatest enemies travaileth to undermine that which maketh us strong."
"Yeah, well..." Rainbow Dash grumbled aside. "I've got a crapton of enemies, it seems."
"We art no strangers to malevolent shape shifters, Rainbow Dash."
"Oh?"
"In ancient times, before even the utilization of the Elements of Harmony, three older siblings retreated deep into the mountains of Equestria. There, they fed off the caverns of crystals that they found in hiding..."
"Wait... older siblings?" Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow. "You mean... like alicorns?"
"A brother and two sisters. At one time, they would properly have been called alicorns, but they sacrificed their station as guardians of Equestria for the sake of selfish persuits. They were drawn to the magically imbued minerals located deep below modern day Canterlot. The enchanted properties of the crystals granted immense power and improved magical prowess. These alicorns were so addicted to the riches of this plane, that they forsook harmony for any sensation that the substances gave them. Eventually, Celestia, ourself, and the other alicorns at the time had to intervene. We succeeded in driving the three out of the mountains, but the caves had been stripped bare, and the consequences of the magical consumption had taken their effect on those whom we once trusted as our own flesh and blood.
"The two sisters, Chrysalis and Tchern, were driven to the far corners of Equestria. They took with them scores upon scores of ponies—minions who tragically shared in the curse that the crystals had brought upon them. They could no longer harbor emotions like the naturally born ponies of this plane. Instead, they had to mimic others in order to feed off of feelings of love, passion, and distress. The sisters became queens of a nomadic brood, and they telepathically lorded over the mutated ponies who pledged their undying allegiance to them. The only way the mortals could now survive was by operating under a hive mind with Chyrsalis and Tchern at the center. The last time we ever saw them, they had fled to the dark side of the world, where undoubtedly they had constructed a kingdom of malevolence where no sunlight or moonlight can be glimpsed... to remind them of the true love that they have forsaken.
"Our brother, Sombra, was even worst off. To evade our harmonic touch, he sacrificed his wings, his mind, even his own corporeal form to become one with shadow. He fled to the frozen north beyond the borders of Equestria, and there he enslaved countless thousands of crystal ponies, harvesting their very essence in order to satisfy the hunger that his dark soul had become dependent on. We and Celestia discovered him centuries later, and the battle we had was devastating. We had succeeded in vanquishing him from this plane, but tragically he took the entirety of the Crystal Empire with him, burying himself and thousands of innocent ponies in shadow. It was a terrible price to pay for ridding this land of his wicknedness, and there isn't a day that goes by when it doesn't dwell upon our conscience."
"Yeesh, Your Highness." Rainbow Dash winced. "I knew you've battled nasty-nasties in the past, but I had no idea..." She gulped. "Your own brothers and sisters? That's really tough."
"Indeed, but not as distressing as knowing the fate of every pony that blindly followed Chrysalis and Tchern to the ends of the earth... nor the crystal ponies who fell into shadow along with Sombra. But they art hardly the worse that this plane has to offer."
"Oh...?"
"When we succumbed to the darkness ourselves... when we became Nightmare Moon, we too brought doom upon thousands of innocent ponies."
"Come on, Luna..." Rainbow smiled weakly. "It... it c-couldn't have been that horrible."
"Alas, it was. Thousands of unicorns marched to our evil cause, and even more sarosians flew in the shadow of our dark wings. We brought war and cruelty to the land of Equestria, blanketing the countryside in eternal night, until every corner of the world was covered in darkness. The worst part is that it wasn't the initial banishment to the moon that cleansed us, but rather the revitalization of the Elements of Harmony over a thousand years later."
"Yeah... but... it all worked out in the end, didn't it?" Rainbow meekly asked. "When Twilight and the gang..." She fidgeted. "When we gave you the zap, you were cleansed of all that nasty Nightmare Moon junk right?"
"Yes, but it still hath not taken away the scars that we hath caused, the generations upon generations of persecuted sarosians, the unicorns who died attempting to defend a malevolent dictator who was banished centuries ago."
"Ouch." Rainbow Dash grimaced. "I... I-I don't know what to say, Luna. I mean, from the way I hear it, y-you're totally a good alicorn in spite of all that."
"Indeed, we are cleansed of the horrible taint, and we hath endeavored to raise the sun and moon with unwavering diligence. Thou must realize, Rainbow Dash, that in this age—just as in ages previous—evil always finds a place to bring anguish and torment. But where there is evil, there is always the opportunity to bring about good. While Chrysalis and Tchern morphed into horrible mimics of their past selves, it taught the rest of the alicorns the dangers of crystalline addiction, so that we could better protect the mortal populace. While Sombra enslaved thousands of ponies, his reign was put to a vicious end before he could grow powerful enough to corrupt millions. And while Discord nearly managed to convert the entire world to chaos..."
"Yeah, I hear ya..." Rainbow Dash muttered. She nervously rubbed a hoof across her pendant, sighing. "While I'm glad that dude kicked the bucket, I'm not all that happy with what it took to do it."
"Nor can we expect thee to comprehend—much less appreciate the good that hath come out of thy adventures as of late. While it pains us to hear of Nevlamas' passing, we are pleased to know that she was stopped before she could bring corruption to the entirety of the realm beneath the world. And it would seem, Rainbow Dash, that Chrysalis and Tchern have not entirely left the light side as we thought. Regardless, thine intervention in Xona has assured the end of a great and costly war—one that could have grown to excessively murderous lengths had you not flown through the air of that landscape whatsoever."
"But..." Rainbow Dash sniffled, her eyes growing moist as she gazed across the Frozen Sea. "What of Lerris? What good could possibly come out of what Shell did... and what I-I had to do to stop him? Honestly, Luna, it f-feels that no matter what good I do for these lands, I end up doing a whole lot worse in the end, and I-I don't like what it's turning me into." She shuddered and sighed. "It's like I'm becoming just as monsterous as the siblings you had to drive out of the mountains to begin with..."
"We highly doubt that. A monster hath no conscience, Rainbow Dash, much less ponies whom one can practice loyalty with."
"Yeah, well, I'm a bit out of practice, if you ask me."
"We could equally feel the same. We hath felt the same, repeatedly, with seemingly no outlet for our grief."
"Then just what makes you go on? How do you raise the sun and moon every day without fail?"
"Because we have to. Because so many ponies depend on us. And because we knoweth that to give into despair—if even for a moment—would mean giving the victory to our enemies, even if our greatest foe is ourselves."
"Yeah, but I killed Shell. He's gone for good."
"He is never dead, Rainbow Dash, so long as thou willeth his corruption to endure through the acceptance of thy defeat. He will resurface, like the will of Chrysalis and Tchern, or like the shadow of Sombra, so long as thou becometh so despondent that though giveth him a vessel through yourself."
Rainbow Dash bit her lips.
"We accept with a heavy heart the possibility that there'll come a full moon when thou wilt no longer be alive to reply to us, Rainbow Dash. Please, we beseech thee, do not let a day come when the pegasus on the other end of the communication spell is voiced by a spirit far darker than yours."
Rainbow sighed. "I won't become another Nightmare Moon, your Highness." She smiled bitterly. "Besides... I'd look like a total lame-o in that balding helm thing you were sporting."
"We shall pretend to understand that and smile."
"Works for me..."