One Last Lesson
At first, Twilight Sparkle laughed nervously. “Kill me? Um, is this a joke?” Trixie shook her head. “Euphemism?” Another shake. “You mean m-murder?”
“Give Celestia’s best student a prize,” Trixie said with heavy sarcasm.
“But that’s—that’s crazy! There hasn’t been a murder in Ponyville in decades!” Twilight realized just how stupid that sounded, like she was reporting news. It was true, though. For that matter, there hadn’t been a murder in Equestria in quite a while, even in the bigger cities such as Fillydelphia or Manehattan. Ponies were taught to honor life; certainly there were deaths, by accident, and there were wars on occasion. Outright homicide was almost unknown; Twilight couldn’t remember the last time it happened in all of the realm. “It’s crazy!” she repeated.
“I know,” Trixie replied. “It is.”
Twilight’s mouth fell open. Trixie sounded sad, devastated. “Trixie, are you being forced to act against your will? Is someone controlling you, like Discord?” Twilight doubted it, but the Spirit of Chaos was capable of anything, even encased in stone—though even Discord had not actually killed anyone.
“No.” Trixie’s mouth curled in a snarl. “You don’t even understand, do you? Of course not. Pure-hearted Twilight Sparkle, Celestia’s pet. Element of Harmony. Defender of Ponyville.” Trixie snorted. “You’ve never had a bad thought in your head, have you?”
I’m having a few at the moment, Twilight mused to herself. “I don’t understand, Trixie,” she said quietly.
“No, you don’t. You’ve never had anything happen to you that has happened to me.” Trixie put her head down, and Twilight braced for either a charge or a spell. “I’d rather not have this fight here, so meet me on the edge of town. Alone.”
“And if I bring my friends?”
Trixie gave her a satanic smile. “Go ahead. Bring Rarity. I’ll shatter her hooves so she'll never sew again. Bring Applejack. I’ll break her hind legs so she’ll never walk again. Bring Rainbow Dash. I’ll rip her wings off so she’ll never fly again. Bring Fluttershy. I’ll tear out her voice so she’ll never sing to her animal friends again. Bring Pinkie Pie, and I’ll snap her spine so she’ll never bounce around again.
“Bring anypony you want, and they’ll die, Twilight Sparkle. I don’t want to, but I’m prepared to kill everypony in Ponyville if that’s what it takes. Be alone, for their sake.” With a puff of smoke, Trixie disappeared. Twilight blinked in shock. Before, Trixie used smoke to cover her retreat, but it was an illusion: she didn’t actually disappear. This time, she had teleported as easily as Twilight herself did it.
Twilight quickly untied Spike. “Spike! Are you all right?”
“I’m—I’m okay, Twilight. She didn’t hurt me.” He was shaking. “Twilight, she’s gone crazy! Do you think she really meant all that? And killing you? That’s beyond bonkers—“
“She meant it, Spike,” Twilight said softly. “Somehow Trixie’s become more powerful than she was before.” Realization dawned. “That’s why she was in the Smoky Mountains! She was training up there!” By Celestia’s Mane, Twilight thought in horror, she’s been planning this ever since she left Ponyville! She didn’t reform at all!
“What do we do?” Spike asked. “I can get the others. We could use the Elements of Harmony to—“
Twilight shook her head. “No, Spike. I have a bad feeling that Trixie wasn’t making an idle boast. If we’re going to be fighting with magic, then the others might end up being alternate targets. There’s no one in Ponyville that could help, really, and Princess Celestia’s in the Crystal Empire…” Twilight put her hooves on Spike’s shoulders. “Spike, wait! Luna! Contact Luna!”
“I don’t know if I can,” Spike replied. “I mean, it’s nighttime, she’s up, but my messages go to the throne room in the palace, not Luna’s quarters or her observatory. It could be hours before she gets it, even if she does!”
“Send her a message anyway.”
“Just wait, Twilight!”
“I can’t, Spike. If Trixie’s gone insane, she might start attacking Ponyville. I’ll do my best.” Before Spike could argue further, Twilight disappeared in a flash of purple light.
Spike felt tears well up in his eyes, then angrily brushed them away. He grabbed a quill and some parchment. “I’ll write the letter, Twilight,” he said to himself, “but I’m still going to tell the others.” He ran out the door, towards the lights of the Carousel Boutique.
The field was wide and level, halfway between the Everfree Forest and Sweet Apple Acres, an equal distance from town. The noise of any magic duel was likely to wake Fluttershy in her cottage and Applejack at the farm, but there was nothing to be done about that, Twilight considered. She wondered if Trixie planned it that way.
As soon as Twilight materialized, Trixie closed her eyes briefly and her horn glowed with blue energy. “That’s an anti-teleportation field,” she explained. “That way you can’t run, and no one can teleport here from Canterlot to interrupt our little fight. Not even Celestia.”
“That’s Princess Celestia to you, Trixie,” Twilight snapped. “Show some respect.”
“Why? What has Celestia ever done for me?” Trixie began to stalk in a slow circle around Twilight, who turned in place, not letting the other unicorn get behind her. “Spared my life? Given me my freedom? But I forgot, you’re Twilight Sparkle. Celestia’s perfect in your eyes. She never, ever makes a mistake!” Trixie spat. “To hell with her.”
Twilight took another tack. She couldn’t believe Trixie had fallen so far so fast. “Trixie, why? Why are you doing this?”
Trixie stopped. “I still can’t believe you don’t understand it. Well, I will tell you, and maybe you’ll finally get it.” Her eyes met Twilight’s. “You ruined me, Twilight. More than that ursa minor, more than even Celestia. Congratulations. You destroyed the Great and Powerful Trixie.”
“How?”
“The first time was bad enough. The news of what happened with the ursa minor spread faster than I could trot. Everyone knew that the Great and Powerful Trixie was just a charlatan, a fake. I wasn’t, but that’s what they thought!” Trixie’s voice rose. “I couldn’t find anypony who wanted to watch my show. I was run out of every town from Appleloosa to Canterlot. I had to work on a rock farm just to eat!
“That’s when I found the Alicorn Amulet in a pawn shop in Las Pegasus. I wanted you to know how I felt, Twilight. I wanted you to know what it was like to be run out. The whole ‘taking over Ponyville’ was the amulet’s influence, but it was acting on my impulse. I wanted…I wanted to know what it felt like to have true power.
“Then after you defeated me with your damned tricks,” Trixie snapped, “I had to run again. It was worse, if that was possible. Before ponies just laughed at me. Now they wanted to hurt me. Some of them wanted to even kill me, I think, for defying your precious Princess. I went hungry, Twilight. For days. I wanted to die. In fact, I even tried to kill myself once or twice. I even failed at that.” She began to cry. “I wished, I begged for death, Twilight! Don’t you understand? I want to die!”
Twilight reached out a hoof. “Trixie, you could’ve come back to Ponyville. I forgave you. I told you that.”
“And Celestia? And your friends?”
“Yes, them too.”
“Even Pinkie Pie? I stole her mouth!”
Twilight risked a smile. “Trixie, Pinkie Pie is the hardest pony in Equestria to offend. She’ll probably throw you a party.”
For a moment, Twilight thought she was getting through. Trixie looked at the ground. “A party…” Then she shook her head angrily. “No! You lie! They hate me!” Tears were running freely now. “Everypony hates me!”
“That’s not true, Trixie.” Twilight took a step forward. “Please, Trixie. This isn’t you.”
“You don’t know anything about me. Don’t pretend like you do.”
“Maybe so. But I’d like to learn.”
Trixie’s eyes burned with rage. “You’ll never learn. Never. I’m going to kill you for what you did to me, but before you do, you’re going to hurt just like I did. I’m going to teach you one last lesson, Twilight.”
“And that will help how?” Twilight pleaded. “You kill me, and Princess Celestia will come after you, like she did with Sombra and Nightmare Moon. Maybe she’ll exile you to the moon or turn you into living stone like Discord. It’ll solve nothing, Trixie! It won’t make things better.”
“You’re right, Twilight. It won’t. But at least I won’t be ashamed anymore.”
Twilight realized what Trixie meant. “You…you’re going to—“
“Stop it!” Trixie stomped her forehooves. “I learned a lot in the Smoky Mountains, Twilight. I found a teacher. He was more than happy to teach anypony who was an enemy of Celestia. Now you better defend yourself, or don’t. It doesn’t matter either way!”
“Trixie—“
Trixie’s horn flared. Three bolts of energy shot from it. Twilight dodged, and two of them missed. The third hit her in the flank, scorching hair and causing her to yelp. She glanced at the wound—it wasn’t bad—then looked around to see another three bolts heading for her. She concentrated, and the missiles sparked against an invisible shield.
Trixie cocked her head to one side in thought, and smiled. This time, she let loose a blast of lightning. The electricity danced across Twilight’s shield. The purple unicorn concentrated even harder, and the lightning abruptly died.
“Not bad,” Trixie remarked. “Shielding yourself and then dissipating my lightning. But you’ll never win on just defense, Twilight.”
“Trixie, don’t make me do this—“
“Oh, shut up.” Trixie reared on her hind legs, then dropped back to all fours, unleashing a ray of pure sunlight that lit up the trees around them. Twilight braced for it; the shield held, but she could feel the heat leaking through. Then she suddenly had to shift her shield to the right, as two trees were uprooted and flung against the shield; Twilight was barely able to change her shield from one of pure energy to something more solid. The trees shattered, but she felt pain erupt from her temples. As she turned back to face Trixie, three crystals appeared around the other unicorn and shot towards Twilight. She brought the shield back, too late: all three sliced into her, one cutting across her shins, another her flank, and the third across her cutie mark, leaving trails of blood. Twilight gasped in pain. Three more blades struck in quick succession, drawing more blood from her withers and her face. The shield flared and died.
“How was that?” Trixie asked, the taunting tone in her voice that Twilight recognized all too well. “Does it hurt, Twilight Sparkle? Good. I want it to hurt. I want it to hurt a lot.”
“How…are you able to do that?” Twilight gritted her teeth. The cuts were thin and not deep, designed to inflict pain more than kill. “You were never this powerful!”
“Oh, I was. I just didn’t know how to use it. Here I was, wasting my time on cute little party favors like fireworks and illusions.” Trixie began her stalking again. “I learned, though. Didn’t Celestia teach you offensive spells, Twilight? I guess not. A bookworm, devoted to reading books. Pampered and soft. You didn’t grow up like I did, digging in the dirt. I didn’t have a warm palace to live in!”
“That’s it. That does it.” Twilight faced her. “You want a fight, Trixie? You got one.”
“Show me.” Trixie did not smile.
Twilight lowered her head and stamped her hoof. Trixie looked surprised. “You’re going to try to charge me? That’s kind of—“
Instead, a blast of energy fired from Twilight’s horn, a focused blast that let out a whine of superheated air. Trixie barely moved her head to one side, turning what would’ve been a devastating blow to a graze, but she couldn’t stop a scream of agony as it left a deep burn across her temple. “You…that would’ve killed me!” Trixie sounded surprised.
In actuality, Twilight had not aimed to kill, but she had aimed to take off one of Trixie’s ears. To her own surprise, Twilight realized that she wouldn’t have minded if the bolt had hit Trixie right between the eyes and blown her brains out. Now she was angry. “If I wanted to kill you, you’d be dead,” Twilight snarled. “That was a warning. You’d better give up, because if you don’t, you’ll find out just what Princess Celestia taught me.”
Trixie let out a unpony-like growl of frustration and let loose more lightning. Twilight leapt to one side, conjured her own razors—four of them, unlike Trixie’s three—and cut all four of Trixie’s legs. Now both ponies were bleeding. Trixie sucked in her breath, clenching her teeth, not wanting to show pain. Their horns and eyes were glowing with magic now.
I need to end this, Twilight thought, looking for an opening. The noise would’ve woken everypony in town by now, ponies would be running towards the noise—she had a brief horrible vision of fillies like Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom--and she suspected that Trixie would stop at nothing now, even hurting foals. The other unicorn had nothing to lose. Twilight reared back, lifted her gaze to the night sky, breathed a prayer, and summoned the most powerful spell she knew.
A comet flared to life above the Everfree Forest and streaked towards Trixie. Twilight knew that there was no magic shield that could stop it, and aimed it at Trixie’s forehooves; it would explode there, hurt the other pony, probably knock her out, possibly kill her. Twilight was beyond caring. The duel needed to end, now.
Trixie, to Twilight’s surprise, only smiled. She spoke one word: “Deflection.”
Without warning, the comet snapped downwards, knocked off course. Trixie’s timing was off: instead of blasting Twilight, it landed between them. The ground exploded, leaving a deep crater, but while Trixie absorbed the blast with a shield spell, Twilight went flying backwards—but rolled on landing, to her hooves.
Trixie threw her a sardonic salute, and Twilight couldn’t resist a wry smile. Not bad, Twi, she thought. Who would’ve thought all those gymnastics Pinkie made me do would come in handy? I didn’t even think! I just did it! Then she staggered and fell. The adrenaline abruptly wore off and she could feel the deep bruises stones and earth left on her body.
“Get on your hooves,” Trixie snapped. “I want you on them when you die.”
Twilight had a very Rainbow Dash-like thought. “Bite me, Trixie.” She shakily got to her hooves, then shot a fireball at her enemy.
“Fireball? Well, well.” Trixie’s shield was still up, but Twilight anticipated that. The flaming sphere suddenly vanished in a purple flare. “Nice try,” the other unicorn said, and her shield disappeared, only to appear behind her. “I knew you were shoot it behind me.”
“Wrong,” Twilight replied. The fireball appeared directly in front of Trixie once more and exploded. Twilight heard her scream, but then the fire flashed to steam. Trixie stepped through the curtain, her fur scorched and smoking. Now it was she who was shaking; Twilight could see that the burns were deep. Trixie had to be in terrible pain, but she was still up. The ice sphere she had conjured around her bubbled to water.
Twilight braced herself, throwing up her own shield when she saw Trixie’s horn spark. No bolts of energy or lightning came at her; rather the ground itself erupted, boulders blasting through the soil all around her, collapsing the earth. Twilight levitated as much as she could, which was not much, but enough to escape.
Trixie, she could see, could not take much more. Twilight felt exhausted, but Trixie was bleeding from her nose and eyes. She’s consuming herself, Twilight saw in horror. She’s using herself like a battery. Even if I don't kill her, she’s going to kill herself.
“Trixie,” Twilight gasped, “for the love of Equestria! You’ve got to stop this. You’re going to die!”
“Just die!” Trixie shrieked, and let fly with a fireball much as Twilight had. It burned its way towards the other pony at supersonic speed.
Except Twilight was no longer there. With a purple flash, she vanished a split-second before the fireball would’ve consumed her, and reappeared right next to Trixie. At this range, Twilight could hardly miss: she summoned a hammer of wind that sent Trixie flying into a tree. Even over the roar of the fireball exploding against a rock and her thumping heart, Twilight could hear ribs snap. Trixie went down and stayed there.
Slowly, painfully, Twilight limped over to her. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see that other ponies had finally arrived: the mayor, Octavia, Vinyl Scratch, the Cakes, even Derpy. In front of everypony were her friends: Rarity with Spike, Fluttershy, Applejack, and Rainbow Dash, leaving a rainbow trail as she arrived from her floating home. Twilight idly wondered why some details stood out even amidst all the destruction, through the haze of pain: Rarity had her robe on backwards.
Trixie was barely breathing, her eyes a sliver of white. Blood flecked her mouth in a pink froth; Twilight knew that meant a lung was punctured. She weakly motioned with her hooves, and her horn gave a final, defiant glow. “Please, Trixie,” Twilight pleaded. “Please. It’s over.”
“Not…yet.” Her eyes flew open, fixed on Twilight, and her horn became blinding. A single disintegrating beam blasted outwards, but Twilight anticipated it and teleported behind her. The beam harmlessly went into the night.
“I knew you’d do that!” Twilight shouted. “Dammit, stop!”
Trixie turned and looked back over her flank. “I knew that you would do that, Twilight.”
“Do…what…” Twilight realized that she was suddenly frozen. She could not move, just like when she had been turned to stone by the cockatrice.
Trixie struggled to her hooves. Her breath came in ragged, bloody gasps, but she chuckled. “Delayed action…hold spell. Cast behind me. You can’t move.”
Twilight’s ears flicked backwards. The spell was already wearing off. “Not for long, Trixie. You can’t hold me for long. You don’t have the strength.”
Trixie nodded. “You’re right, Twilight. I’ve got enough…one more spell. Guess I’d better make it…a doozy, huh?” She glanced back. The other ponies had stopped: Rarity with her hooves at her mouth in shock; Fluttershy splayed on the ground, screaming in terror; Pinkie Pie, looking around frantically, unable to decide on what to do; Applejack, hesitating, afraid to get any closer. Rainbow Dash had stopped as well, but both unicorns could see she was getting ready for a high speed run at Trixie. “I told you…I’d kill them too…if they interfered…”
“Rainbow!” Twilight shouted. “Stay back!” It stopped Rainbow before her charge began. “Trixie, one more spell will kill you!”
“Yes…I know.” Trixie was crying, tears mixed with blood. She coughed. “The last of my power. The Great and Powerful Trixie will go out…with quite the bang.”
Twilight realized what the other unicorn was going to do. “Mother of Celestia, NO!” Trixie began to glow. Twilight looked at her friends. “Run! Leave me and RUN!”
“Too late,” Trixie whispered. “Too late. This will kill me, Twilight Sparkle. It’ll kill me…you…everyone within a mile. Disintegration…” She sobbed. “And now the show ends…”
Twilight’s world filled with black light. The disintegration spell formed a globe of pure destruction, spreading outwards faster than even Rainbow Dash could fly.
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I really like Blood On the Moon. It's very well written and I found myself very entertained by it. Y'know, 'cause I have an incredibly morbid sense of humor.
Hell, this goes deep. Please don't kill all of them though, that would be a havoc to your story.
2836433
Hey, I laughed at the movie Clockers, which showed real dead bodies, don't even go there.
You're not writing this one as Char's Counterattack...
Mugetsu much?
Nooooo! A Cliffhanger! Love it, but you better update again soon!
2836601
No, sorry. I've never seen Char's Counterattack, so I couldn't do the story justice.
no no no no on no no no for the love of celestia no!!!!!
awesome...st-story so far cant wait to read more
2836474 Nice. I haven't had the chance to see that movie, but I've heard it's really good.
I notice a similarity between Trixie and Deidara (from Naruto). This has just raised my liking for those characters even more. Good work.
You killed Sombra twice....
Damn it I lost again...