//------------------------------//
// Chapter 12 
// Story: MLP: Darkest Night 
// by kurusagi16 
//------------------------------//

Chapter 12




After regaining their strength, and checking to see if the coast was clear, Nightshade and Eve continued on their journey. Eve was beginning to despair a little, that all their journeying was pointless. They could both be stuck wandering the Garden of Shadows for all they knew! And if that was true, what was the point of continuing. Then she thought of the girls, her friends were here too, and they were probably looking for her too. She couldn't just give up now! She needed to keep going! After all...she was responsible for all of this. She looked up ahead and spotted something. A large mass of some sort.

"What...what is that?!" she asked in shock. She galloped toward the mass.

"Hey, wait up!" called Nightshade as he followed after her. Eve let out a horrified gasp as she drew closer. The mass was a horrible cloud that surrounded the forms of Starlight and Sunset, giving them each bad dreams. Their faces contorted and they groaned as each faced their most horrible fears.

"The Tenebris must've gotten to them." said Eve. "We have to help them!" 

"But what can we do?" asked Nightshade. "They're already trapped under a spell, how are we supposed to break it?" Eve's shoulder's slumped and she lowered her head.

"Sigh! You're right. But I can't just leave them here like this!" Eve felt so useless and helpless. She'd been searching for the girls, and now that she found them, they were stuck in such an awful state. 'What should I do? None of this wouldn't have happened if I...' 

"Eve?! Is that you?!" Eve lifted her head toward the familiar voice. She couldn't help but break into a relieved smile as Fluttershy came bounding toward her. The girls threw their arms around one another.

"Thank goodness you're okay!" they both said in unison. Eve pulled away.

"You won't believe all that we've been through." said Eve. She looked over her shoulder to introduce Nightshade to Fluttershy, only o find that he'd mysteriously disappeared. 

"Oh my! What happened to Starlight and Sunset?!" asked Fluttershy worriedly. She was about to reach out to them when Eve smacked her hoof away.

"Don't touch them! You might end up affected too." she warned. 

"Can't you help them?" asked Fluttershy. "Nightmares are supposed to get rid of bad dreams, right? Isn't there some way you could help?" Eve looked down at them, there was one way...

"I could try entering their dreams, but I don't know if it'll work. It's been so long..."

"You have to at least try." pleaded Fluttershy. Eve took a deep breath.

"Alright. But don't be too disappointed if it doesn't work." she said. She concentrated and turned her body into a soft light. She then let her light form penetrate the dark mass and entered into Starlight and Sunset's thoughts. 






Sunset and Starlight had been reduced down to tears, as they both confronted their worst fears. Sunset's new friends at CHS no longer wanted to be friends with her, all they saw when they looked at her was the she-demon she'd turned into.

"NO! Girls, listen, that's not me!" cried out Sunset. Her friends were leaving her, she was all alone.

"You brought this upon yourself Sunset." Sunset whirled around to see her old Mentor, Princess Celestia, standing over her.

"Princess...I..."

"You've been a big disappointment. No matter, Twilight has proven to be a much better student than you ever were. She's far superior in every way." Celestia said cruelly.

"Princess Celestia...sob...why are you saying all this...?" asked Sunset tearfully.

"Because, you need to be punished for what you've done. You don't deserve forgiveness from anypony." said Celestia as she turned her back on Sunset. 

"Celestia! Wait! I can change!" Sunset pleaded.

"Change? Into what? An even more horrible demon than you already are? I don't have time for the likes of you. There are ponies who aren't you that are more worthy of my attention." Sunset continued to cry out, to Celestia, to her friends, asking them to come back. To see she'd changed. 

Starlight was no better. She found herself faced to face with a disgusted Twilight.

"After everything you did to me and my friends, after you nearly tore apart all of Equestria, you expect me to call you, much less consider you a friend?" asked Twilight. "Well sorry to disappoint, but I want nothing to do with somepony as evil or as cruel as you." Starlight reached out as Twilight turned her back and trotted away.

"Twilight! Wait! Don't go!"

"You've been really busy, haven't you?" Starlight gasped when she heard the familiar voice. She turned, and saw her old friend, now older.

"Sunburst!" Starlight cried, somewhat happy to see him. But Sunburst didn't look happy in the slightest. 

"What kind of friend are you?" he asked with a sneer. Starlight frowned.

"W-what do you mean?" she asked.

"You called us friends, but after I got my cutie mark, you abandoned me." he said coldly. Starlight shook her head violently.

"No! You don't understand!"

"Oh, I understand. You never made any attempt of contacting me, of writing to me from school. You didn't even ask my family about me. No, instead, you blamed it all on cutie marks of all things. You tried to brainwash ponies with your half-baked philosophy on equality, and took away what made them special." Starlight was silent, trying to fumble around for the words she wanted to say.

"But you didn't stop there did you? Oh no, you decided to take away everypony's happiness from them, doomed the world to Tartarus dozens of times over. And what did you blame it on? Cutie marks. But that's what you fooled yourself into thinking, because the truth you've been trying to blot out of your mind is..."

"Sunburst, please!"

"It was all because of you! It was your fault! You abandoned me, jealous because I'd found something special that I could do, and you couldn't stand it. You were so jealous that you turned yourself away from me, stopped being my friend, and left me all alone to make new friends."

"No! I...I..."

"I'm actually glad that we're no longer friends. Because I don't think I could ever be friends with such a jealous, selfish little pony like you, who didn't think of what would happen to the ponies around here. You don't deserve my friendship. Or any for that matter." Sunburst then started to fade away into oblivion, saying one last word that jabbed into Starlight's heart.

"I hate you."

Starlight put a hoof to her chest and collapsed into tears.

"Sunburst...no! I didn't...I didn't want...I just wanted us..to be friends again." 

Then, something pierced through the darkness. A shaft of pale light, like a star in the heavens. Sunset and Starlight looked up, part of the illusion had been broken and they could see them selves.

"Sunset!"

"Starlight!"

From the light, floated down Eve, she landed firmly one what could be considered the ground of this nightmare realm and looked between the two Unicorns.

"Eve!" they cried in unison.

"I came to get you out of here." said Eve. "You've fallen into one of the Tenebris' traps, your negative feelings and nightmares are being sucked up and are what's keeping you here."

"Then what's the point in leaving?" asked Sunset.

"This is our punishment." said Starlight, her head hung low. "We deserve this."

"No, you don't." said Eve. "I've heard and seen the illusions you've been shown. I'm sure you've done some awful things in the past, but you're no longer the same ponies you used to be. You've already learned your lessons, you've been punished enough."

"And how would you know?!" asked Starlight Glimmer through upset tears.

"Yeah! What have you ever done that makes you think you understand us?!" asked Sunset. 

"Because it's my fault!" cried Eve. Sunset and Starlight were silent. Eve sighed.

"The reason the Tenebris are free, is because of me. I went into the Garden of Shadows, where they fed off of me, and in doing so, I gave them the power to return. It's my fault that the Nightmares are in danger, that your lives are in danger. Because I was so selfish and stupid." Eve's eyes watered and she looked down at the ground.

"Eve." said Sunset. 

"But, that isn't what's important anymore. You two have reminded me of something important that I almost forgotten." said Eve, wiping the tears from her eyes. "After all we've done, we still have our friends. Those who forgive us despite our misdeeds, who give us a second chance. That is what's important." 

Sunset and Starlight were stunned at first, and then they nodded, understanding what Eve was saying. They then remembered what their new friends, especially Twilight, had shown them. The power of friendship, and how she'd shown them this warm and comforting power, reaching out to them when they needed it most. Eve rose up from the ground, holding out her hooves to them.

"Let's go back." she said. "And save our friends." Sunset and Starlight each took Eve's hooves, and were carried upward, toward the light and out of the darkness. 







Fluttershy had waited patiently, watching and waiting for Eve to return. What was going on inside of their heads? Were they alright? Then, the black mass faded off of Sunset and Starlight, a light came out of both of them, and reformed into Eve. Eve smiled at them, as the Unicorns regained consciousness. They smiled gratefully at Eve.

"Thank you Eve." said Sunset. 

"You're a real life saver." said Starlight. Eve batted a hoof like it was nothing.

"Just doing what Nightmares do." she said. 

"Girls!" cried Fluttershy, as she tackled them in a group hug. "You're alright!" 

"Fluttershy? What are you doing here?" asked Sunset.

"When you went through the portal, one of the Tenebris managed to pull me in. But that doesn't matter right now. What does matter is that Twilight and Discord need your help."

"What happened?!" asked Sunset, jumping to her hooves.

"Two Tenebris attacked us, they used some kind of fog to trap them in an illusion." said Fluttershy. "I managed to get away and went looking for you girls." 

"Do you remember where it was?" asked Starlight. Fluttershy nodded.

"Then let's go and rescue them!" said Sunset. "Those Tenebris are going to pay for what they've done."

"Lead the way Fluttershy." said Starlight. As the girls followed Fluttershy, Eve couldn't help but be plagued by a few questions. What happened to Nightshade? Where did he go? Did he even exist? What's more, just what would happen to Eve and her friends next? 'Hang on Twilight, Discord, we're coming to help you.'