Midnight of the 1000th Summer Sun Celebration
Ponyville
Nightmare Moon was furious.
Even if a normal pony couldn't see it, changelings like Fluttershy could feel it.
Rage, unrivalled rage and hatred barely contained behind a mask of power.
It was pretty clear, at least to Fluttershy, what was making Nightmare Moon so angry. When she returned the mare in the moon probably expected hundreds of ponies to quiver in fear before her, to shake at the very mention of her name, Nightmare Moon was probably even looking forward to being hated and feared by so many.
Instead, most of the Equestria had simply forgotten about her, those that did know about her only hear of her as an old ponies tale.
Fluttershy herself only knew of Nightmare Moon because of these story's, still if they really were true then Equestria was about to be consumed by... Night time eternal.
Just as it looked like Nightmare Moon was going to attack somepony out of anger, one pony stood forward.
Twilight Sparkle.
Fluttershy should of known that if anypony would know anything about Nightmare Moon beyond the old story it would be the Princesses prized pupil herself. It was clear that Twilight knew a lot to, she didn't say anything that Fluttershy didn't already know, but still Fluttershy hoped that Twilight Sparkle might know even more than what she was letting on.
Like a way to stop the eternal night... and save her hive.
With this hope Fluttershy watched the confrontation. Eventually some of the royal guard ponies attempted to attack Nightmare Moon, only to be blasted back. Nightmare quickly took the opportunity to escape, leaving the Town hall in complete chaos.
Fluttershy however was focused. She watched as Twilight Sparkle galloped away from the town hall towards her home, Fluttershy spread her wings and silently took of in pursuit.
While she quietly followed Twilight Sparkle, Fluttershy took a moment to use the hive mind to check up on her children. Doing this however almost made her fall out of the sky from shock, as the hive mind was simply filled with the sounds of over a hundred changelings
panicking about Nightmare Moon.
The pandemonium was so great that the hive mind itself was being constantly overloaded by the many voices. Fluttershy was forced to disconnect from the Hive mind or else she would simply fall out of the sky from the constant barrage on her mind. So Fluttershy could only hope that her children would be able to restore calm and order to the hive mind by themselves. Still she trusted her children, she also knew that they trusted her to protect them, which meant she would have to catch Twilight and find a way to stop eternal night to save them.
Fluttershy sighed, being a mother was not easy.
Her focus now back on tracking her target, Fluttershy quickly spotted Twilight entering her house, followed unknowingly by Rainbow Dash who was followed by Rarity, Applejack and Pinkie Pie. Fluttershy silently joined them as they entered library.
What happened next happened very fast.
Rainbow Dash rammed Twilight, accusing her of being a spy. After Applejack managed to get Rainbow Dash to stand down Twilight quickly began to reveal everything she knew about Nightmare Moon, which unfortunately didn't include anything about how to stop her... Until Pinkie Pie conveniently discovered a book on the elements of harmony, which turned out to be the only way to stop Nightmare Moon.
Fluttershy had heard of these elements before in ancient stories, though she did not know anything other than they were supposedly just myths. She guessed that if Nightmare Moon was real then It wouldn't be impossible for these elements to be real as well...
'It doesn't matter how unlikely it is that elements are real.' Fluttershy thought, 'If there is even a small chance they can save my hive and my children, ill do anything to get them'.
Even when she discovered that the elements were in the horrifying Everfree Forest, Fluttershy did not falter, She had to succeed no matter the cost.
Suddenly Fluttershy felt a buzz in the back of her mind, signifying that some ling was trying to contact her through the hive mind. Responding to this, Fluttershy reconnected to the hive mind.
This time the connect was stable, while there was clearly some panic that could be felt over the mind the main chaos had stoped and enough stability had been restored to the mind for conversations to be held
"My queen are you alright?" Primrose's message echoed through the mind.
"Your majesty has something happened to you?" The voice of Thunder Hooves came next.
"Mom are you there? I need you to tell the nymphs that you're alright, they won't stop crying." This message was clearly sent by Flora.
"My queen! are you still there? My queen? my queen!" The dramatic flare clearly gave away that this was the voice of Silent wing.
Fluttershy smiled slightly from hearing how much her children cared about her wellbeing. She quickly communicated back.
"I am alright my children, tell me what is the current state of the hive?" Fluttershy swore she could hear a collective sigh of relief from the mind, before Primrose gave an answer.
"When Nightmare Moon showed up the hive went in to complete chaos, luckily we managed to calm them down after enough time. Now all of us are waiting for you to tell us what to do, my queen."
"Well then settle down children, there's a lot for us to do and I have a lot to tell you."
Using the hive mind Fluttershy told her children of everything that had transpired in the last few minutes. Then she told them of what she was planning to do next.
Going in to the Everfree forest to get some magical jewels to defeat the embodiment of night.
Understandably her children were quite worried, but they knew that their mother was doing this for them so they could not argue. That did not however stop them from wanting to help
"My queen you know this is dangerous, you should take some of the hive with you."
"Hm that could help... tell me Thunder Hooves, how many of your brothers and sisters are of fighting age?"
"There are one hundred and twenty four changlings who can take to the field of battle, my queen I recommend you take at least half the hive with yo-"
"No I won't. Nightmare moon will not be focused on me, if we're lucky she won't even know we're coming. She may however decided to attack the town nearest to her castle in the Everfree, if she does you need to be able to defend yourselves. So I'll take fifteen of my stealthiest children to follow me in secret. The rest of you must stay back to defend the hive. Am I clear?"
Fluttershy did not like putting pressure on her children like this, but she needed them to be ready to repel such a large threat like Nightmare Moon.
"...As you command my queen, I'll ready some changelings to keep a look out for Nightmare Moon... Just be careful alright?
"Of course my child, now I must focus on what lies ahead."
Finally Fluttershy and company arrived at the entrance to the Everfree forest. With five ponies by her side and fifteen of her children following them up, she strengthened her resolved and stepped forward in to the forest...
Of course you know what happened next. Fluttershy and her friends demonstrated their ability's of honesty, kindness, generosity, laughter and loyalty. Making it past all of Nightmare Moons tricks and traps and making it all the way to her castle.
What you may not know is what happened while they were occupied.
Nightmare Moon laughed a deep dark menacing laugh. While the six ponies who dared think they could stop her were occupied by her fiendish traps, Nightmare Moon was free to do as she pleased.
She focused her dark powers and reached into a plain of formless monstrosities. She began to conjure nightmare after nightmare in to the waking world, each of these creature were dark beings that glowed dimly with starlight, they barely held on to pony like forms that constantly shifted into globs of darkness then back to ponies again.
She was summoning monsters of the dream world to do her biding.
Eventually she succeeded in summoning over fifty of them, a small army that was more than enough to complete her plan.
With a powerful yell she ordered " Go forth my nightmares and conquer Ponyville in my name!" The nightmares quickly began charging forward like maddened animals, ragging towards the defenceless village.
Well almost defenceless....
Beneath the village inside dimly light twisting tunnels, one hundred and nine changelings were prepared to face the oncoming onslaught.
Well actually only one of them was.
Upon hearing of these twisted abominations approaching most of the changelings began to cower, afraid of what these horrifying beasts could do to them. What they did not realise was that the point of the nightmares was to inspire fear then feed on that fear, so their want to hide and run away only made their enemies stronger.
Only one changeling did not cower.
Upon seeing his brothers and sisters back down Thunder Hooves did nothing but sigh, he had honestly in some part of him mind expected this, their queen was no fighter and by extension they were no fighters. While Thunder Hooves was confident in his own fighting abilities he knew that he would surely fail, so he did the one thing he could do against such odds.
He climbed out of the tunnels, armed with nothing but his determination (they had no weapons) and faced towards the oncoming monsters head on...
And he began to sing.
"La la la-la la-la, La la-la la-la."*Stomp stomp*
There were no words to his song, it was gruff, plain, simple and confident.
"La la la-la la-la, La la-la la-la."*Stomp stomp*
Nightmare Moon watched in confusion as one strange pony like creature stood against her unstoppable army, only to do something as stupid as sing.
Well it wasn't stupid.
Because soon he wasn't singing alone.
"La la la-la la-la, La la-la la-la."*Stomp stomp*
"La la la-la la-la, La la-la la-la."*Stomp stomp*
Thunder Hooves brothers and sisters began to leave the tunnels, they sung with him, inspired by his courage and his declaration of determination.
"La la la-la la-la, La la-la la-la."*Stomp stomp*
"La la la-la la-la, La la-la la-la."*Stomp stomp*
"La la la-la la-la, La la-la la-la."*Stomp stomp*
Soon the entire army of changelings was out there, one hundred and nine strong. stomping, singing and ready to fight to protect each other.
"La la la-la la-la, La la-la la-la."*Stomp stomp*
"La la la-la la-la, La la-la la-la."*Stomp stomp*
"La la la-la la-la, La la-la la-la."*Stomp stomp*
"CHARGE! for queen and hive!" Thunder hooves yelled as he barrelled forward, followed by a determined wave of changelings behind him.
The nightmares and the changeling collided just outside of Ponyville, the nightmares were far stronger and more vicious than the changelings, they had no trouble when it came to beating a changeling in a fair fight...
Then again since when did changelings fight fair?
Any lings who could cast offensive spells stayed back and began hurling magical projectiles at the oncoming horde. The frailer lings took to the air and began barraging the nightmares with any heavy objects they could find. Those left continued to charge the nightmares directly, using superior numbers to their advantage to surround weakened nightmares and take them down.
The battle went on for a while, nightmares falling left and right while injured changelings were dragged from the battle field via levitation to receive medical attention.
Nightmare Moon watched from a hill top, she was furious, how could her nightmare army be defeated by an army of unknown bug ponies! She was just about to jump in and intervene when she realised something.
Her last magic trick had just been dispelled.
Meaning that the six ponies who were trying to stop her were very close to the elements.
With an angry snarl Nightmare Moon abandoned her now practically demolished army and retreated back to her castle.
A few seconds later the last Nightmare fell.
The changelings had won.
But it was not a clean victory.
Many changelings were injured, some minor scrapes that barely hurt. While others had large green gashes across their chitin.
One of the most badly injured was Thunder Hooves.
The changelings, Victorious but Broken, carried their injured back to the hive, knowing deep in their hearts that many of their brothers and sisters would not survive their injuries to see the next day.
Still, they had brought their queen precious time.
After passing many tricks and traps Fluttershy and her friends had finally found the elements. Now all Fluttershy needed to do was give Twilight some time to figure out how they worked and her children would finally be safe.
Just to make sure her children were in fact safe she contacted them over the hive mind, what she found however was not what she wanted to find.
Her fears had come true.
Her children had been attacked by Nightmare Moon and while none of them had died. She could tell it was only a matter of time until some of them passed away from their wounds.
Fluttershy now had a new mission, she would make sure that when her and her friends dealt with Nightmare Moon,
They would have to glue her back together in Tartarus.
Mothers are very protective of their children.
Unfortunately Fluttershy was so distracted by this that she was unable to stop Nightmare Moon when she came and took the elements... and Twilight Sparkle.
Quickly one of her fifteen children who were hiding in the shadows pointed out where Nightmare Moon most likely would have gone.
The tall spiral tower with energy spilling out.
It was a bit of a give away.
Fluttershy and her friends climbed the tower. Only to find Twilight seemingly in a fight with Nightmare Moon.
Suddenly Twilight began talking about the journey they'd all had together and how each of them represented part of the elements.
Rainbow dash was loyalty.
Applejack was honesty.
Rarity was generosity.
Pinkie pie was laughter.
And Fluttershy was kindness.
Leaving Twilight to find the last element within herself, the element of magic.
A burst of powerful magical energy surged forward from each of their elements, joining together in an overwhelmingly powerful rainbow laser. This magical force surrounded Nightmare Moon as she screamed,
"NOOOOO!"
Fluttershy blacked out
Darkness...
Fluttershy was surrounded by darkness.
She floated in an endless oblivion without sound or light.
"How interesting" A voice spoke from the darkness.
Suddenly a pink glow illuminated the area revealing the element of kindness...
Speaking to Fluttershy
"For thousands of years we have represent the forces of harmony, yet never before have the elements been wielded by any creature other that a pony." The element continued.
"Your unique, I like that. Not only that but you have those that you care for." An image of some of Fluttershy's children materialised.
"Currently we are conversing within your unconscious mind. When you wake up, you will be with your friends, and I will of solved many of your problems..."
"But know this, a darkness is coming and no one will come out of it unscathed..."
"This won't be the last time we talk, until then I will give you a gift, for you and your children.
The light from the element faded, leaving Fluttershy floating in her mind's abyss again.
Until a burst of energy filled the hive mind...
Over one hundred changelings waited in the bowels of the Hive.
Eighty-six of them were injured.
Forty-four of them had severe injuries.
Twenty-one of them would die in the next few hours.
The stench of depression filled the Hive mind as the changelings prepared to morn the dying...
Till a burst of incredible energy flowed from their queens mind.
Wounds began to close, bruises began to fade. In only a few seconds even the most life threatening injuries had disappeared as if they were never their.
There was also something else that happened that was even more amazing.
For the first time in all their lives, the entire hive was completely fed.
No one was hungry.
The changeling immediately went from sombre to overjoyed.
In happiness they cheered loud and proud.
"MOTHER! *stomp-stomp* MOTHER! *stomp stomp* Mother!"
And their cheers carried on in merry celebration, until the dawn finally came...