A Pony's Tale: Equestria's Fall

by Sparrow9642

The Foe

In a sudden flash of light, Celestia and the Mane Six arrived within the Canterlot throne room. All of them, excluding Celestia, were confused on why the matriarch had taken these drastic actions. Rainbow was the first to question.

"What's going on?" questioned Rainbow with sincerity. "Why is Twilight in a bubble of magic?"

Celestia paused, holding back both her rage and tears. The truth of her sister's absence had been assured to her in the most cruel manner possible, and the cold truth had sunk into her heart like a knife. She turned to face Rainbow with a look of uncertainty and sadness, which Rainbow caught quickly as a sign that whatever Celestia had found in Twilight's mind had traumatized her.

"Rainbow, I'm afraid... Twilight has been taken over by whatever has made itself known to Equestria," Celestia muttered. "Her mind is being controlled and her memories are being fogged by some sort of substance that this fiend is able to manifest, which explains why she is unable to remember the events of last night."

The five ponies expressed looks of shock and fear. If this fiend was able to scare Celestia, and make her take drastic actions to assure everypony's safety, that meant that this it had to be intimidating enough to break an almighty alicorn princess. The thought of this foe's capabilities caused everypony to pause.

"What are we going to do to get this thing out of Twilight's mind?!" exclaimed Rainbow out of her anger. "Don't you a spell or something that can just pull that..that...jerk out of Twilight's mind?!"

Rainbow nearly cussed at the amount of anger that had overcome her, but quickly calmed down, knowing that now was not the time to burst out in rage.

"I'm afraid it's not that easy, Rainbow Dash," Celestia assured. "Even if I were to just extract this fiend out of Twilight's mind, it could put all of us in danger. From what I caught of this new evil, I can clearly see that this foe is smart and cunning. It will not go down without a fight, and I believe that none of us are strong enough to even pose as a threat to whatever this creature is. Not even the power of every alicorn in Equestria would pose as a threat to this creature, and to be honest, I think we've only seen a small demonstration of this creature's power."

It was clear Celestia wasn't holding back and was dead serious about everything she had stated. The other five stood scared. A creature that wasn't beatable and hadn't even shown its full potential yet? These facts had caused the encased Twilight to hyperventilate in fear, and had a feeling why this fiend had chosen to take over her mind of all ponies. It wasn't to fog her memories, otherwise Celestia would've been assaulted by the creature. This being had more malicious intentions, which is why Celestia had resorted to closing her in a ball of anti-magic energy.

It was clear that the creature was planning to use Twilight like a puppetmaster. What it planned to do with her was unclear, seeing there was a large number of acts that this unknown being could do with a princess. Considering what this foe had done to make its presence well known, Twilight suspected that it was planning to make her commit murder to the princesses of Equestria, clearly having a murderous nature.

"Close, but not exactly,"a voice suddenly interrupted Twilight's thoughts.

The voice was low, deep, and raspy, just like the one she had heard the night before. Anger overcame her, quickly shouting out in rage to the voice within her mind.

"Get out of my head! Leave me alone!" Twilight shouted, immediately catching the attention of Celestia and her friends.

Twilight violently shook her head, attempting to shake off the voice within her head laughing at her failure.

"Your princess's pathetic attempt at trying to keep you contained won't work, seeing it only works against pony magic. I am no pony, but something beyond your kind. You will soon find out what my intentions are, Miss Sparkle."spoke the voice, as it dissipated to the darker corners of her mind.

"NO! YOU WON'T! I WON'T LET YOU!" Twilight exclaimed with fury.

Celestia along with the others quickly intervened, standing outside of the bubble encasing Twilight. Looks of fear and worry were expressed on their faces, as the young alicorn continued to fight the massive force cluttering her mind.

"Twilight, what is happening?!" questioned Celestia.

"It's... It's him! He's in my head! He's going to hurt all of you!" Twilight exclaimed with fear.

"Him? Who is he?!" asked Celestia.

Twilight continued to shake her head violently, attempting to fight off the creature within her head, but it was no use. The creature was too powerful for her to fight against. She struggled for a moment, then stopped, standing still. She uttered a sinister laugh and expressed a smile that sent chills up the other's spines. The young matriarch rose her head slowly, opening her eyes and revealing piercing green eyes that blazed like a burning fire. They eyed the others with hatred and an ancient evil, opening their mouth to speak.

"No need for my identity to be said as pronouns anymore. Allow me to introduce myself, weaklings. My name is Viro, and you'd best remember it very clearly."

"What did you do with Twilight, you creep!" exclaimed Rainbow Dash, lunging forward.

Applejack responded quick, grabbing Rainbow's tail with her teeth, before she could make any contact. The creature now-known as "Viro" laughed at Rainbow Dash's anger, as she exclaimed objections towards Applejack.

"She's fine, I assure you," confessed Viro. "She's just sleeping in a dark room right now, until I decide to free her of my control."

All six of the others stared in horror, not knowing if this creature was even speaking the truth or lies.

"Now, let me assure you ponies that I know every single trick that you could ever use against me, along with anything you can use to defend yourselves," Viro stated in a threatening manner, continuing on. "I know every bit of your weaknesses, fears, and talents. Take your pathetic sun princess here for instance, all it took to weaken her to a vulnerable state was the mentioning of her sister perishing in the Misty Mountains, thanks to me. I've been studying all of you for nearly a year now, and know that you use "friendship" as your key weapon against the likes of threats like myself. Your friendship won't work against me, and you'd best memorize those words very well, because soon, your "friendship" will be nothing but an obsolete fragment of the past, turned to nothing but a memory of what "was."

"Just who do you think you are!" Rainbow Dash snapped.

"I'll soon be your overlord, but you'll all have perished by then," replied Viro. "So, on that note, allow me to enlighten you on just how powerful I am, and just what you are up against!"

Almost instantly, the entire room had begun to shake rapidly. The others struggled to keep their balance, noticing Twilight's horn ignite with a magical aura of green. Viro laughed, using Twilight as his vessel to charge up the magical aura to where it nearly blinded the eyes of everypony else present. The false Twilight's horn glowed so bright, it caused the entire throne room to light up with a blinding light, until Viro let out a laugh that shook the room even more. With a sudden burst, the magical aura shattered the anti-magic orb to nothing but magic fragments of what looked like glass shards. A burst of bright light engulfed the room as well, making it nearly impossible to see anything.

All of the sound present within the room had gone mute, and the only noise audible was the sound of everypony's separate heartbeat and rapid breathing. Ringing engulfed everypony's eardrums, hearing the sounds of the panicked screams among the room faintly. It was as if time had stopped, and the only thing that remained was a bright light and muffled screams of the ponies that had survived. Even Celestia had never seen a light so piercing to the eye, and she was the riser of the sun; one of the brightest stars in the entire solar system. Everypony was stunned for a moment, until finally, they all regained their composure.

The false Twilight was gone, immediately causing all six to get into a defensive pose, unaware of just what Viro was capable of. One thing was assured; he wasn't lying or bluffing about the limitations of his magic, due to being able to create a light even mightier than the sun, and being able to break out of an alicorn-casted sphere with only the might of his laughter and a blast of light. That proved alone, that he was more powerful than an alicorn.

Once the ringing finally subsided, everypony listened closely for Viro. He was loose, and based off of what he did to Luna, it was clear what his intentions were, and he had done it very cleverly. The light had caused everypony to become stunned and blind, and all sound had been silenced as well, making warnings from others completely impossible to catch. The strange thing though, was that Viro had not chosen to attack while they were vulnerable. That was unusual, seeing most foes would've taken the offensive.

"Is everypony okay?" asked Applejack.

Everypony gave an assurance that they were not harmed, only shocked and scared.

"What kind of game are you playing, Viro?!" yelled Celestia.

"Oh, trust me, I could've easily disposed of all six of you in that moment of weakness, but that would've been too fast and no fun, so let's see if I can't feed off of your fear some more, by making you as paranoid as any other victim I've pushed to this limit," Viro spoke from among the throne room.

All six stood their ground, watching with their eyes peeled for any sudden movements, and for a moment there was nothing, until a sudden burst of green light manifested only a few feet from in front of them. The false Twilight stared them down, feeling as though they were being provoked by some invisible force.

"Enough games, Viro! What do you want!?" snapped Celestia, fed up with being mocked.

"Isn't it obvious, you fool? What does some creature who has no care for weaklings like you normally want?" provoked Viro.

"Equestria," Celestia replied with mild anger.

"While that may seem tempting, that's not what I want. No, I am after something more... precious," explained Viro.

Celestia was immediately confused. What could be more precious to a foe than Equestria? That's when she remembered that Viro had the urge to kill Spike, solely to set Twilight off into a state where she couldn't control her emotions. He didn't want Equestria. He wanted to destroy what held Equestria together; friendship and harmony.

"I see you've caught on," Viro stated with a chuckle. "You see, I'm only a fraction of what you have to fear, because the fall of this pathetic land is approaching. Your own ponykind will soon start to turn against each other because of their fear and insecurity, including all six of you. Soon, lands will burn, hope will be diminished, and your harmony and friendship will be nothing but an obsolete fraction of the past."

"ENOUGH!" Celestia growled, charging up her horn and pointing it at the false Twilight.

"Princess! Wait!" shouted Applejack, but she was too late.

Celestia shot the magic blast at the false Twilight, hitting her with a massive force and lunging her across the room. It didn't take long for Celestia to realize the horrid mistake she had made, hearing Twilight mutter out moans of pain and suffering from the adjacent side of the throne room.

"Oh no... TWILIGHT!" Celestia exclaimed, feeling tears escape her eyes at the sight of her horribly injured student, squirming on the floor.

Viro laughed from some unknown area within the room, no longer in Twilight's body, as Celestia continued weep and express a glare of anger.

"You fiend!" Celestia snapped. "If you are so eager to destroy us, then why don't you strike?!"

"Because, my job is done. I was sent to kill the baby dragon and deliver a clear message. Let it be known, soon you all shall see this world fall to nothing but a land of fear and paranoia. All of your harmony will be broken."

"I won't let that happen, Viro!" Celestia stated with might. "You will never succeed in your plan to break the harmony that holds Equestria together!"

"Foolish princess, it's already started. Look at what you've done. You've let your anger get the better of you, resulting in your most faithful student paying the price," Viro stated.

Celestia froze, realizing Viro was correct. As much as she didn't want to accept it, she had let her anger overcome her senses, and because of it, Twilight was now horribly injured, and slowly beginning to bleed to death.

"Farewell for now, ponies. Enjoy your freedom for now, because when I return, there will be no escape!" Viro spoke, and almost instantly, the heaviness within the room lifted, giving Celestia and the others assurance that it was safe to approach Twilight.

Wasting no time, Celestia and the others quickly rushed to Twilight's aid, immediately noticing the severe damage that had been done. Celestia wanted to throw up at the horrid sight. Twilight's entire body was burned horribly from the magic blast, and her sides were covered with deep lacerations, seeping blood and forming a puddle.

"Is she going to be ok!?" asked Fluttershy, tears escaping her eyes.

Celestia examined Twilight closely, lifting her from the ground with her magic.

"Twilight needs medical attention immediately. This is beyond my power," Celestia stated bluntly.

"Isn't there just a healing spell you can cast?" Rainbow questioned, attempting to hide her tears.

"There is, but I'm afraid to cast any spells on her in this condition. It could do more harm than good," Celestia explained.

"Understood, princess," Applejack spoke. "Let's just focus on getting Twi' better, and hopefully be prepared for Viro's next assault, whenever that may come."

Celestia nodded her head, resting Twilight upon her back.

"For now, Applejack, it's probably best that you five stick together. I'll get Twilight the help she needs, while you five remain here. I'm not taking any chances in leaving the castle defenseless, and am giving all five of you access to anything you may need to protect the castle. Can I count on all of you to guard the castle, until I return?"

"You have our word, princess," Applejack agreed.

The other four nodded as well, assuring Celestia further.

Celestia smiled, turning from them.

"I'll be back as soon as I can. Good luck to all of you, and stay safe!"

The five ponies all nodded their heads, watching as Celestia rushed out of the throne room with great haste. There was no telling how long they had before Viro's return, and deep down, all five of them knew that time was not on their side. Unless they were prepared for the next assault, Viro would easily succeed in his plans. A fact they all kept in mind as they gathered together to formulate a solution.

Comments

[TheDevilDogLeader1987]

I hope the rest of the story isn't cancelled, I've been enjoying just reading the chapters that are already published.

[Sparrow9642]

9173587
No, just busy with stuff, so it takes me longer to update it

[TheDevilDogLeader1987]

Thank Celestia.