Part the Second
Luna collapsed to the floor, howling with laughter.
"Your Highness," said Shining Armor, squeezing his eyes shut in irritation.
"Yes, yes, of course," said Luna, getting her hooves under her and wiping away a tear or two. "Let's begin exorcising your demons."
"Shiny," said the phantasmal Princess Celestia in his phantasmal bed, "what's going on over—" and this is as far as she got before she was smacked in the face by a bolt of coherent blue-white energy from Luna's horn. Celestia let out a sharp, surprised yelp and promptly evaporated. Nothing remained of her but a wisp of sparkling smoke.
Silence ruled the bedchamber. Luna's eyes were wide and gleaming.
"Well!" she said, eventually. "I guess that's done!"
"I guess so," said Shining Armor, uneasily eyeing Luna's expression.
"So this is a recurring nightmare, yes?" Luna asked, her face unnervingly keen. "Have it every night, do you?"
"This is only the second time, but—"
"Wonderful!" Luna exclaimed, leaping on Shining's words as though she wanted to eat them. "You just keep having this dream, and I shall show up every time you shriek for help! Then I will blast my sister in the face and everything will be fine. You have nothing to worry about!"
Shining edged backward toward the bedroom wall, not at all sure about the factual truth of that last part. "Um, sure," he said. "Your Highness. If I might ask, though, isn't there something where you're supposed to teach me some life-lesson so the nightmare actually goes away?"
"Yes, you're right, of course," muttered Luna, squeezing her eyes shut and pressing her hoof to her face. "Duties." She cleared her throat. "Shining Armor, hast thou any unresolved issues in thy life that might have sparked this terrible dream?"
"I thought you could peer into the past of ponies' waking lives."
"There were complaints," said Luna, briskly. "Now we must rely on the subjective reports of the victimized. So, anything?"
Shining glanced floorwards for a moment.
"This is in strict confidence, right?"
"Of course!" Luna bellowed, knocking over an imaginary lamp.
"Well..." said Shining. "Lately, Cady has been acting a little... strange. Nothing I could put my hoof on before today."
"Strange how?" Luna asked, leaning forward.
Shining faltered, made a few false starts, and then decided to call a spade a spade. "She's starting to act like Princess Celestia."
Luna's eyes narrowed. "I see," she intoned, tapping at her muzzle with one silver-shod hoof.
Shining found himself waiting for laughter that was not immediately forthcoming. Steeling himself, he dedcided to bring on the pain sooner rather than later. "Silly, right?"
"Not at all, subject," said Luna, pensively. "Indeed, 'tis a matter of ponderous import. These personality changes suggest that young Cadance is beginning to bloom into full alicorn flower. Your spouse, dear Shining, is experiencing Alicorn Pubescence."
"That sounds... icky."
"Far from it, Shining Armor. It is a beautiful, natural process that must be navigated very carefully."
"So it's beautiful and natural, but dangerous?"
"Yes, Not unlike a stretch of class five rapids. Possibly terminating in a picturesque waterfall." Luna frowned. "More there is to say, but there is no time for it now. Meet me in my old observatory above the Castle of the Two Sisters."
"Respectfully, ma'am... can't you tell me now?" Shining squinted away a sudden migraine, and lifted a hoof to rub an aching shoulder.
"I fear not, Shining Armor," said Luna, as the wall began to waver behind her. "This dream fades quickly."
"What? Wait!" Shining cried, as the walls of his bedroom began to stretch and elongate.
"No time!" Luna said, fading into the distance. "Seek me in Everfree! Seek me in Everfreeeee..."
Shining grappled at the fabric of the dream as the world dissolved into a tunnel of spun colors that pulled him forward towards an increasingly brilliant white light that grew closer and closer and
* * *
Shining Armor woke. This time, he did not scream, for he had a purpose.
* * *
The morning sun was bright and pitiless through the glinting walls of the Crystal Citadel's Winter Garden. Her Royal Highness Princess Cadance was busily tending the Empire's encyclopedic collection of delicate subarctic flowers, the lolling, babbling form of Her Royal Highness Princess Flurry Heart strapped securely to her back in a brightly-colored Mommy's First Saddle. The Empire's winter garden operated on a principle inverse to most other winter gardens one might encounter. Instead of sheltering delicate warm-weather plants from the bitter cold, the Empire's garden served as carefully-regulated cold-house for the frost lilies and ice irises and all other sorts of tundra flowers that could not otherwise withstand the blistering gentle warmth being spat out by the Crystal Heart. She sang quietly to herself as she tended the wabe surrounding an odd, spiky-looking sundial installed at the center of the garden.
"You've come... such a long, long way..."
It was into this scene that Shining Armor stepped, a frown of determination fixed on his muzzle. He walked grimly toward his wife and infant daughter, hooves crunching against icy crystalline gravel.
"Honey," said Shining Armor, "we need to talk."
"Certainly, My Faithful Husband," said Cadance, smiling at him with reserved, calculated warmth. She continued to polish the sundial's odd red-and-black gnomon with a chamois held gently in her telekinetic aura. "And I've watched you... from that very first day..." she absently sang.
The garden feature caught Shining's eye and he struggled to remain on-message. "I, um, just had a chat with Her Royal Highness Princess Luna."
"Oh, Lulu!" said Cadance, delightedly, causing Shining to twitch. "How is she?"
"She seems fine, but listen, something's come up. We need to make a lightning trip to Ponyville."
Cadance turned around, startled. Her sudden movement caused Flurry Heart to loll in the saddle, putting her in hoofreach of the sundial. The heir apparent to the Crystal Throne instantly began inspecting the sundial for things she could put into her mouth.
"Ponyville? But I have machinations to attend to here! I can't possibly spare the time!"
For a moment, Shining nearly relented. There was in Cadance's words enough of her Royal Canterlot Wife Voice to fill Shining with proper husbandly terror.
"Well," he hedged, "I mean, we could look at the calendar. Put it on the schedule..."
"Bah," Flurry Heart advised. Her tiny questing hoof brushed against the gnomon of the sundial. There came a sickening green-black flash, and the baby's eyes glowed red. "Buh," she intoned in an unnervingly stentorian manner.
"Honey...?" Shining asked, as his daughter pulled her hoof away with a confused expression on her face. "What's... what's that on the sundial?"
"Oh, that?" replied Cadance, pivoting around. "That's King Sombra's horn, from after I exploded him. The Long Scouts discovered it on one of their patrols." She frowned. "Did I forget to inform you or anyone else that that happened?"
Shining clenched his jaw. "Why is it sitting in the middle of our garden?"
"Oh! I thought it might be a good idea to install a physical remnant of a defeated major adversary in the middle of a popular public space without even a word of either explanation or warning. After all, what harm could possibly—"
"Ponyville," said Shining Armor. "Now."
"But—"
"Now," he repeated, igniting his horn. In a flash of arcane energy, he encased his wife and daughter in a transparent pinkish force globe. Ignoring the twinge of headache that always accompanied any over-extension of his power, Shining squinted his eyes and poured everything he could into the shield, fully expecting some form of magical retaliation from his god-tier alicorn bride.
After a few moments, he unsquinted his eyes. Cadance was just... standing there? She didn't exactly seem to enjoy the experience of being encased in Shining's force field, but neither was she moving to try and dispel it.
"Darn it! I've been rendered completely powerless and helpless all of a sudden! I mean, I know I protect the Crystal Empire and am personally responsible for the administration of the power of love throughout all Equestria, but this is a force field!" She sighed, heavily. "Welp, guess I'm beaten."
"Bah," said Flurry Heart, casually annihilating Shining's force globe. Shining frowned. The Fledgling's Forbearance incantation that Official Royal Crystaller Sunburst had prescribed for Flurry Heart had worked like a literal charm at first, dampening the foal's particularly problematic magical surges. Unfortunately, in recent days, its intensity had been creeping up to the point that it had begun to wipe out magical auras and spell effects from the baby's immediate surroundings, not just from the baby herself. Prior to today, this had been entry #1 on the list of weird and concerning magical things happening to his immediate family, but it had recently been bumped down to #2. Shining lifted the filly off his wife's back, placed her gently on a bed of lamb-ear, and reestablished the globe.
"Ponyville," Shining repeated.
"Oh, well!" Cadance babbled, as Shiny began to drag her out of the garden. "I suppose it has been a long time since I've checked up on Twilight and all her studies..."
"Justify it however you want, but we clearly need this trip." And then, quitting the conservatory, he added, "My future sanity depends on it."
All was quiet in the Winter Garden for five minutes.
Then Shining galloped back in, plucked his baby up from the lamb-ear, and galloped back out.
He had a train to catch.
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...
Ahem...
IT LIVES!
Hah! So many little things in here that are wonderfully comedic! Well done!
Heh, this is gonna get really good. I can tell.
Glad to see this still has a pulse. <chuckles> And it's always fun to see Shining Armor losing it in tiny, whimpering, bits.
Shining, try to give her a Snickers. It usually works
derpicdn.net/img/2015/3/14/849446/large.png
Somepony has a lot of repressed rage
67.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mcttm4eO9y1r3k1m8o1_500.png
She's too far gone to save
I think these shouldn't be called parts, but rather, fits.
...Should Cadance beware the Jabberwock?
7739182
I think that, lacking a vorpal sword, that's pretty much all you can do with a jabberwock.
Did... did Flurry Heart just get possessed by Sombra?
Or did Sombra just get entrapped by Flurry Heart like that one episode of Angel where they thought that boy was possessed by a demon but it turned out the demon just wanted to get out becasue that boy was like MAJOR nuts even by demon standards and when they let him out he was glad to have Angel decapitate him or am I reading far too much into this?
Who care, either way it's all going to end basically the same way...
In hilarity. (Well, not for Shining maybe...)
My god... she's not just acting like Celestia...
She has become...
MEGA-FLANDERIZED CELESTIA! THE MOST EVIL CELESTIA OF THEM ALL!
7739423
Exactly.
7739423
Bonus points, she is already pink.
7739476
Additionally, she is also capable of flying to the castle.
I don't know why but your cover art annoys me xD
Well, I can surely see you really are having fun with this... Yoda Luna? Whats next, Darth Vader Sombra? Dragonborn Pinkie? How about Super sayian Rarity? Spider-man chrysalis? Dr. Evil Celestia? Why not throw in a couple idiotic gyphons with a time machine or a alien invasion of mutated potato cyborgs for the heck of it!
...you know, I was actually joking but just realized how horrifying all of the above would be in a single fanfic if such a unholy creation were to ever be birthed into the world
You seem awfully eager to blow your sister up, Luna. Do I need to speak to your therapist again?
I really did wonder for a second there if Shining was really going to leave Flurry Heart in the Winter Garden.
7739730
I'm sure it's just some lingering unresolved feelings...nothing major.
7739680
"I shall call
himher, 'Mini Me!'" said Celestia."Buh!" interjected Flurry Heart.
Why is there a dash in Shining's name?
God, that killed me. That really has to be like Christmas for her.
7740338
I think that crept in there when I was trying to fix a different typo on a mobile device. Fixed now, thanks.
"So this is a recurring nightmare, yes?" Luna asked, her face unnervingly keen. "Have it every night, do you?"
"This is only the second time, but—"
"Wonderful!" Luna exclaimed, leaping on Shining's words as though she wanted to eat them. "You just keep having this dream, and I shall show up every time you shriek for help! Then I will blast my sister in the face and everything will be fine.
And upgraded to Favorites.
Also, to be fair to Celestia, her garden worked fine for a thousand years until the Cutie Mark Crusaders showed up. Clearly they surpass all logical expectations.
7740872
Canonized.
And this story finally gets an update.
Oh dear. I fear Flurry's gone Cromartie Heart. No good can come of that, but right now, it'll have to take a backseat to Cadence's psychotic/pubescent episode.
...
Wait a second, does this mean that Celestia's actually a perpetual adolescent and Luna's the mature one? You know, aside from sibling head explosion therapy.
In any case, disturbing and intriguing developments all around. I can only imagine where it will go from here.
Are you talking about Celestia's idea to put Discord in a public place?
Sounds good. We should do that.
Nice chapter.
I'm curious what happens next.
7741526
That's exactly what I'm riffing on, yes.
7741275
GlacierClear writes some exceptionally funny and exceptionally wrong Royal Family, no?
So since cadence is starting to act like celestia, is she going slowly start looking like celestia? like she starts eating so much cake she gets some more junk in the trunk, and her fur starts turning white?
7742060
Read and find out, I guess?
7742650
I like to be at least a little instructive amidst all the tremendous stupidity and farcical character assassinations.
7740635 on the other hand celestia coulf have just been pouring magical cement ontop of him every 100 years or so and luna showing up made her forget and bam crack.
7747784
That's the thing about nemeses. They require such constant maintenance.
7740635
Honestly, I at least would have tried feeding him into a gravel grinder at least once. Let's see him come back from that.
7767575
You would have made many husbando-seekers cry.
7767575
It probably wouldn't have worked, but it might have been therapeutic.
Ah, spoken with the subtle, delicate care of a true therapist. Good ol' Luna.
I died.
7855487
7855487 because that worked so well with discord
7884452
Is that perchance a reference to the comics?
7884579 Reference to the insane troll logic that Celestia did in the show by putting discord in her garden.....Better yet this whole story is one big insane troll logic for Celestia
7884588
Ohhh you meant the bit about Celestia, not Luna. Silly me.
Celestia's wisdom is so grand it only looks like stupidity.
7884604 so it's so insane it goes back to being sane...Like 1960s Batman
7884620
Exactly.
So let me get this straight. Skywriter's OC was Celestia all along?
8279692
I'm just going to go ahead and say yes, that was the point.