A Love Lost in History and Time

by Elusive Belle

Luna's Story

Finding Princess Luna turned out to be much harder than I had initially thought it would be. I started off in the most logical spot she had told me she would be at, but after a simple search through the garden it was evident she either never came here or had already left. Either way I was wasting my time here, and seeing no other option with how late it already was I decided to head back to my room for a much needed rest.

The walk back to my room was quiet, which was something I was actually rather thankful for. It gave me time to think over everything I had learned from Discord tonight. As I thought over my conversation with Discord a few things stood out amongst everything else, but the most prominent thing to stand out was, “History is only written by those who remain to write it.” What did Discord mean by that? This was a troublesome question, and I knew that it was going to plague my thoughts until I figured it out.

Entering my room I opted to head to my bookshelf of Equestrian history rather than to my bed like I had initially planned, fully aware that I would not get sleep until I thought this one out. Pulling my books down I quickly began to skim them for any sort of answer to my current question, there had to be an answer here somewhere. It wasn't until I set the third book aside and I reached for the fourth when my eyes finally caught on to something I was surprised to just be realizing now, every last one of my history books was written by Princess Celestia herself. Thinking about it now it wasn’t just my personal history books here, it was literally every history book ever written. One way or another Celestia had helped write them.

“History is only written by those who remain to write it,” again the comment floated through my mind, was this it? Was it really that simple? With Discord trapped in stone and Luna banished to the moon it does stand to reason that Princess Celestia would have been left with having to write out history on her own for future generations like myself to learn. Not only that, but with a thousand years of Celestia’s history being the accepted history, even if it was wrong, it would be near impossible to change it now. Knowing this now only left and sinking feeling in my stomach, just because she could have done it doesn’t mean she did right? Discord was probably just pointing out the possibility of it just to get to my head, like some sort of prank as usual. What reason would Celestia have to even change history for anyways?

Finally able to file this train of thought in the back of my mind at least until morning I decided to get my long overdue sleep, it didn’t take long to get comfortable and soon enough I could feel my eyes already starting to close and soon I found myself in Luna’s land of dreams. Looking around in my dreamscape I was surprised to find it empty. I was surrounded by nothing but darkness, which was a drastic difference from the usual colorful settings my dreams tended to have.

“Hello again Princess Twilight,” I couldn’t help but jump back in surprise as Discord materialized in front of me much like he had done before. “Your dreams seem far more boring than I expected you know.”

“What are you doing in my dreams Discord?” Looking up to him I was already getting tired of his antics but with a sigh I knew he was just getting started.

“Always so boring and to the point aren’t you? It’s always why are you doing this Discord? Why are you here Discord? What are you doing now Discord? Bah!” Crossing his arms Discord started to laugh again as he picked me up easily launching me over his head before catching me like some little foal. “Why, can’t you just cut loose and forget the whys for once?”

Spreading my wings I caught myself in the air when he tossed me again, easily coasting back to where Discord stood and highly unamused. I wanted to end his antics quickly so before he could continue with whatever crazy idea he had planned next I decided to retort back with my own questions, “Why did you tell me that story of you and Luna? Was any of it even true?”

Discord looked at me a little surprised at first with a raised eyebrow before suddenly throwing himself to the floor in a fit of laughter, “oh how cute, you think I made it up?” Looking up again he just smiled more as he saw how serious I was, “Oh, you’re serious? Allow me to laugh louder!” Sure enough that’s exactly what he did as he rolled around on the floor clutching his gut.

“Discord stop fooling around and answer my questions!” I was already getting annoyed and I knew he knew it, which if I knew Discord was exactly what he was after.

In a flash Discord disappeared and suddenly reappeared on my shoulder now the size of a bird, “You’re a very naïve pony Twilight Sparkle,” Walking forward I could feel Discord pushing his head over to my ear. “You’ve had Celestia in your ear almost all of your life; you believe everything she says without question. Never had you ever even thought of questioning what she says, that is of course until now.” Discord smiled at me in a way I was definitely uncomfortable with, “I’ve planted that seed of doubt in your mind now, and I know you’ve already seen for yourself that everything I have told you has the potential to be true. It’s high time Celestia “loyal” student finally got a mind of her own and found out the truth.”

Did Discord just insult me? Looking up to him I really couldn’t tell just how he meant that comment with the stoic expression he was giving me, but I wasn’t ready to just accept everything he was telling me, “I’ll admit you have a point that Princess Celestia could have changed history while you and Luna were away, but what reason would she have for doing so?”

In another flash of light Discord was standing before me again and waved his paw revealing a picture of Shining and Cadance sleeping together back in the Crystal Kingdom, “Would you willingly admit to chasing Cadance off and calling her a monster, which by the way causes your brother to get lonely and depressed to the point that he turns against you forcing you have to banish him to the moon for a thousand years?”

Images of my brother’s wedding flashed before my eyes; how I had treated Cadance under the suspicion she was evil. How I had harassed her constantly trying to prove that I was right. Granted I was right when it turned out to be Chrysalis rather than Cadance, but what if I had been wrong? Would I have been able to live with myself for costing him his true love, and if given the chance would I change history to forget it? I could feel my dream quickly turning to a nightmare as my brain frantically tried to make sense of itself, to find some way to prove Discord wrong. Nothing, I had nothing, could he really be telling the truth?

“Twilight, are you alright?” Looking up suddenly Discord was nowhere to be seen; instead I was looking up to the concerned eyes of Princess Luna.

“Luna, what are you doing here?” Shakily I managed to get to my hooves, having collapsed down at some point during my melt down. I was glad to see Luna though, her presence often helped put my mind at ease when I was stressing over something I couldn’t figure out.

“Your nightmares were calling out to me tonight Twilight, tell me what is plaguing your mind.” Luna continued to look at me with concern as she wrapped her wing around me much like Celestia did when I was smaller.

This was it; this was my chance to question Luna like I had wanted. I just hoped she didn’t run away like before, “I was just thinking really, about something Discord told me about your past.” I could feel Luna’s wing tense around me so I knew I had to tread carefully here. With a small sigh I looked up to Luna prepping myself for my first question, “Is it true that Celestia hated Discord so much?”

Luna sighed but she nodded, “Tia always hated Discord she never trusted him, and in such Discord never liked Tia. I even went as far as to force Discord into promising never to use his chaos to harm a pony or any other creature. Even that wasn't enough for Tia to trust him, she could only see him as a monster that was out to use me.”

My ears flicked at this new information, this was something I was going to have to write down as soon as I got up, “You got Discord to actually promise to not hurt anypony? But he’s known in all my history books for bringing chaos and destruction all over Equestria. What happened to the promise?”

Luna was visibly pained at the question from what I could tell; she was no longer looking to me as she pulled her wing back to her side. “He broke that promise. It’s….. It’s the reason I had to leave him. Turns out Tia was right and he was a monster.”

Now my curiosity was peaked and I was sorely disappointed that I was asleep and couldn't take notes, Discord failed to mention this part, “What did he do exactly?”

Luna let out a sigh as she lowered herself to lie on the floor looking up to nothing in particular, “You are aware of the history behind the holiday Hearts and Hooves Day correct?”

How could I not? Just by mentioning it to the Cutie Mark Crusaders some years ago, the whole town had suffered some sort of damage in one way or another. One pony even had her home moved halfway across town, “It started over a thousand years ago right, because of a love potion?”

Luna nodded to me as she took over, “the story goes that a prince made the potion to win the heart of a princes from a nearby kingdom correct? That’s not exactly what really happened; the real truth is that the Prince had approached Discord for help knowing that he had already succeeded in winning over the heart of a princess. In trying to help Discord gave him the love poison that you know of from history. The poison caused pain and suffering for both kingdoms overnight when both the prince and princess could no longer perform their duties for their kingdoms, hurting hundreds of ponies in the process. It was hard to believe at first, I didn't even want to believe that he had done it, but when I saw the proof I was forced to call things off and break up with Discord. Needless to say Discord was enraged, I’ve never seen him act the way he did when he left. Soon after Tia and I found out he had taken over the two fallen kingdoms and was spreading his chaos all over Equestria.”

Tears were starting to form in Luna’s eyes as she told me this, now it was my turn to wrap a wing around her while my mind worked to remember as much of this as possible. “Is that when you and Celestia turned him to stone?”

“He was going to propose you know, I found the ring after we had set him to stone. Truth is I would have said yes had he not broken my promise.” Luna cried softly as I held her with my wing, it wasn’t until sometime later that she finally spoke up again, “you know, Hearts and Hooves day isn’t the only holiday Discord invented. This is something nopony but Discord and I know.”

Now I was very curious, something only Discord and Luna knew about? This had to be big, “what about Princess Celestia? Does she not know?”

“Tia does not know, when I changed into Nightmare Moon everypony assumed it was just a form I took when the darkness consumed me…. That’s not actually true. Nightmare Moon was created by Discord, just not meant to be what it is now.”

My brain shattered once again as I took this in, “Discord created Nightmare Moon? But, how? Why?”

“When Discord came to me with the idea of Nightmare Moon it was a gift for our fifty seventh anniversary. He had planned it to be closer to what it is today, a prank of sorts to scare little fillies and colts. Nothing too harmful mind you, just a simple scare.” Luna actually smiled as she thought about it, as if she was remembering a fond memory, “It wasn’t until after I was banished to the moon that Tia took the idea of Nightmare Moon and made a sort of holiday about it.”

Could this be why Discord was upset? Had Celestia inadvertently stolen something that was his? Something he had created for Luna and then turned it into something ponies now fear? I still needed more answers, “Luna, if I may ask how did Nightmare Moon become something to fear is she was meant only as a prank.”

Almost instantly I could see Luna’s smile fade as she tensed up again, “When Tia and I sentenced Discord to stone, I was left feeling lost and lonely. I hadn’t realized it at the time but my time with Discord had severed my relationship with the common pony, they all saw me a the reclusive princess who wanted to rule from a comfortable distance unlike Celestia who walked among them as their friend. They all loved Tia but were weary of me, so without Discord I found myself lost and alone. With nopony else to turn to, I let that loneliness and depression take over and I reached out for something, anything to reconnect me with Discord in some way. So I became the one thing he created specifically for me, Nightmare Moon.”

By losing Discord, Luna had become Nightmare moon, suddenly Discord and Celestia feud made more sense. “Would you willingly admit to chasing Cadance off and calling her a monster, which by the way causes your brother to get lonely and depressed to the point that he turns against you forcing you have to banish him to the moon for a thousand years?” Again Discord’s words floated through my mind, I think I finally figured out what Discord was trying to get me to see. He blamed Celestia, not for his own banishment, but for Luna’s. This thought however did not bring me comfort.

I could feel my dream world starting to waver now so I knew I was going to wake up soon, but I still had many more questions. I knew I only had the chance for one more so I threw out the first one that came to mind, “Do you still love him?” I don't know why that was the first question to come to mind, but it was what I asked.

Luna looked to me with saddened eyes as she started to fade from my dream, “I fear his feelings for me are long gone. Despite how I feel he wont feel the same, not anymore.” Her words were fading with each word she said until they and herself floated away entirely.

And with that I woke up.

Author's Note:

I hope this does a bit of a better job of explaining Discord's willingness to share in chapter one, as well as provide a bit more details that Discord left out.

Again I probably left tons of mistakes and I apologize for the ahead of time, also comments are greatly appreciated!

Comments

[1st Lieutenant Dave]

hmm i think i missed the part where she passed out

[thewaffler]

I really like this story so far. It's a good atmosphere and some decent suspense.

“History is only written by those who remain to write it.”

I'm more of a fan of the similar saying: "History is written by the victors."

[Elusive Belle]

3194480
Glad you like it!

That was the general concept I was going with in this, just reworded to fit better to the story

[keam]

Poor, Poor Luna and Discord!

[Moviestar]

I will continue with the: Lunacord! Yay!