Chapter 54: Sluice Gate
Magpie wasn’t exactly expecting anypony else to attend their little party, but she was proven mistaken as soon as she stepped inside. Silver hadn’t packed the apartment with ponies, that just wasn’t his personality. Instead there were only two others, though she wasn’t sure how they’d gotten there so quickly.
“Princess,” Silver said, levitating the bottle towards her. “Would you like any before I start pouring this for the rest of us?”
Nightmare Moon shook her head once, not even meeting his eyes. “Thank you, Silver, but no.” It was the same refusal she always gave. So far as Magpie knew, she hadn’t indulged in… much of anything, since Magpie had returned to her service. It was hardly like the Nightmare Moon she’d known, who could certainly appreciate a little luxury. She had never been brave enough to ask why.
Silver didn’t skip a beat—even as dense as her husband could sometimes be around other creatures, he’d been hearing that same refusal for centuries now.
“More for us.” Penumbra sat at their kitchen table, which was occupied mostly with a scale model of Dome 3. The rest of the table was covered with blueprints and inventory lists and other things they had watched during the build. It belonged to the princess, but she was here so often she treated it as a second office. Penumbra tapped on the edge of her glass. “Go on, rock horse. Luna is out, that means I’m the oldest.”
He groaned, but obeyed, apparently oblivious to the name. Either that, or he was just pretending to ignore it.
They’d known the princess long enough to get to know her in ways few mortals could, but that didn’t mean they could just disrespect her. Only Penumbra had that right, and only in private.
“That isn’t what they’re called,” Nightmare Moon said, levitating over a cushion and settling into it across from the model. She pulled it close, studying the factory representation for the thousandth time. She opened the service doors, exposing the refinery and factory floor within. “Crystal ponies, Penumbra.”
“I don’t think we know what they’re called,” Penumbra argued, once her glass was half-empty. “That old emperor didn’t invent them; he just used the population he had. Why should he get naming rights?”
Silver ignored her too, flicking on the kitchen lights and fiddling with a few covered trays of food. There was far less of it here than the feast laid out downstairs, but Silver had also probably taken his time. Even after all these years, he’d always taken special care with food. Maybe he thought it would vanish if he left it alone for too long.
“There’s something I thought you should know about,” Magpie said, taking her glass and settling down beside the princess. She wouldn’t even bother asking why the Prime Minister hadn’t come. “After you left, I…”
Nightmare Moon fixed her with one of her intense stares. Her current disguise was a bat with bright red eyes, though nothing she did could make it seem as intimidating as an Alicorn. “I sensed it too, Magpie.” She rose, moving slowly over to the balcony door and pushing it closed with a batwing. “The Nightmare has returned. Don’t fear for the city, it isn’t here for the ponies anymore. Its fury is focused entirely on me.”
Is that what that was? Long ago, Magpie had always known when there were other Voidseekers nearby. More of them together had a certain resonance in an area, a pressure that made them immediately recognizable. It had felt like eyes were watching her.
“How could they get into the city without us knowing?” Silver asked from the kitchen doorway. “There are constables at every airlock, every tunnel. We would know if one went missing.”
Nightmare Moon shook her head. “It doesn’t surprise me that their powers have been forgotten. But the Voidseekers—the Nightmare is controlling them, more directly than ever. They see the contents of every nightmare; they walk between every shadow. They know the fears of Moonrise, and the hopes of Starseed. They know our weakness.”
This was all probably more pressing than what was bothering Magpie. Her companions, returned from their mad trek across the moon’s surface, would not be returning to the city for forgiveness and a new place in the Lunar Court. There was no Lunar Court anymore, and all the prestige of the princess wasn’t even believed.
But it was still important for Nightmare Moon to know. There was no easy way to say it, and beating around the truth wasn’t going to make it any easier for her. “Met a journalist, who shared something with me I hadn’t heard before. Apparently there are creatures who think you don’t exist.”
She watched Nightmare Moon closely for her reaction, but her face was a mask. The magical blessing of Nightmare might’ve left her, but she had kept some of the confidence, the discipline.
“A few more minutes,” Silver announced from the kitchen door. “The princess is here, so I’m not doing bugs, Penumbra. Don’t even ask, I know you don’t really eat.”
She stuck out her tongue. “I can still taste, though. Right now the profound flavor of disappointment.”
He ignored her, slipping back into the kitchen. There were no doors separating their living area, though, and so he would still be able to hear. Good, he needed to know all this.
“It was a… risk we knew we were taking,” the princess eventually said. “I haven’t heard it yet, but… I suspect any creature who admitted as much to the Prime Minister or anyone else on the Assembly might as well be questioning the legitimacy of the state. How widespread do you think this is, Magpie?”
She opened her mouth to answer, but Penumbra was quicker. “More the longer we wait. You can’t keep hiding forever, Princess. What will you do when the next Prime Minister is elected? Even Coattail won’t be in office forever. You’ll give his replacement a heart-attack.”
Nightmare Moon faced her suddenly, snapping the factory doors closed so abruptly that the plastic cracked and the front of the factory fell limply to the table. “That’s not your decision to make, Penumbra. You can’t suffer as I have, or it would kill you. Perhaps you should temper your judgement with understanding.”
Magpie hesitated for a second, then barged on anyway. “Princess, I’m not… trying to order you around. But the longer you remain hidden from Tranquility, the weaker your power becomes. If you keep waiting, there won’t be anywhere when you try to show yourself.”
Silver levitated both trays in, settling them off to one side of the table beside the wine. He removed each one, smiling in satisfaction at his work. “But don’t let me interrupt.”
You better not be taking the princess’s side, Magpie thought, glaring harshly at him. Come on, you know she has to do something about it. We can’t lose control of the country because the princess got camera-shy.
Nightmare Moon settled back into her seat, plate forgotten. Her voice was low and dangerous—the voice she had once used when she was about to dispatch somepony who had been too bold to her. But the days of Nightmare’s disregard for life were long over, and this version of the princess hadn’t killed anypony in centuries now. “You were not listening earlier. Nightmare Moon can’t show herself to the creatures of Moonrise—Nightmare Moon no longer exists.”
To her relief, even Silver couldn’t stay silent through that. He rested one hoof on Magpie’s shoulder, voice shocked. “Princess, what does that mean? You’re right here, clearly there’s no question that you exist.”
“There’s still an Alicorn helping to rule Moonrise from the shadows,” Penumbra said. “But that’s not the same thing as saying Nightmare Moon exists.” She vanished with a puff of smoke, reappearing moments later in the doorway holding a tapestry in one hoof. It was very old, older than the revolution. Maybe it was Penumbra’s own.
It depicted the Nightmare Princess, ruling from her throne in darkness and glory. Her face was not merciful, but it was strong. She was the monster that fought for the ponies of Moonrise, and tolerated no evil against them. “You’re seeing two creatures here, not one. An Alicorn princess who thought the world was bucked and wanted to fix it, and… a demon who promised to help. What’s left after you take Nightmare away?”
Nightmare Moon lowered her head to the table, groaning in embarrassment. “I should have you flogged, or… something. You can’t just tell them that. It was supposed to be secret.”
“It still is,” Penumbra countered, vanishing in another faint puff of smoke. She reappeared in a gloomy corner of the room, no longer holding the ancient relic. “Princess, you’re facing the real threat of assassination, and your ponies don’t even believe you exist anymore. You need to start telling the truth, and these two are exactly the creatures we can trust.”
She lowered her voice in mock-secrecy, without getting nearly quiet enough for Magpie not to hear. “Besides, if it doesn’t go well, you can just shatter them or something.”
Magpie shuttered involuntarily at the joke, even as Silver smiled. Her husband had never known the real Nightmare Moon, only the pale imitation she became as the demon left her. A threat like Penumbra’s would’ve been entirely genuine once.
“I didn’t think that could happen,” Silver said. He had served himself last, and like Magpie he didn’t need to eat much. Together their portion might be half the size of what the princess ate. “Correct me if I’m wrong Princess, but I always thought you had made a soul-pact with the Nightmare. Not the same terms obviously, but… like the one that creates Voidseekers.”
“Unbreakable is what they put in books of magical theory to keep foals from getting their muzzles burned off,” Nightmare Moon groaned. Finally she looked up, snatching Penumbra’s wineglass in a sudden burst of strange-looking magic. Her disguise stretched and warped as she did it, glowing from a point down in her throat somewhere. Then the magic stopped, and she drained the entire thing in a few seconds. “Look around you, Silver. Penumbra defies the Nightmare’s will by ransom. Magpie, by transfiguration. For me, the debt is only deferred. Nightmare’s agents will collect on its behalf.”
The princess’s disguise spell faltered for a moment, then dissolved into sparks of orphan magic.
Magpie kept herself quiet, but Silver dropped his plate and gasped in open shock.
The mature, confident mare that concealed the princess didn’t have an even more powerful Alicorn lurking inside. Rather, Nightmare Moon was so short that sitting down her eyes barely crested the table. Her wings and horn were both stubby and immature, and her mane was ratty and tangled from little care.
Almost nothing of either the royal heir or the terrifying demonic Alicorn were left in her. Magpie could see only a faint touch—a dark stain around her cutie mark, a necrosis of her soul left by the Nightmare’s symbiosis.
I bet Silver has more magic than you.
“You see my dilemma,” Nightmare Moon said—or no, that name wasn’t right anymore. Luna? Except… this creature was weaker than she had ever been. Her voice was an immature squeak, and to Magpie it seemed like she was struggling with some of her own pronunciation. “My relationship with Nightmare was even more… intimate than a Voidseeker. Its promise was power for service. Eventually, it deserted me. I thought I would die, but… now I only wish I had.”
Silver rose from his seat, dropping into a bow. It was about as absurd to see as the filly-sized Alicorn, which meant it fit perfectly. “Princess… Luna?” he guessed. When she didn’t object, he continued. “I don’t see what this changes. We’re still fighting together for all the same things. Our accomplishments don’t disappear because you’ve lost some of your magic.”
“Almost all of it!” she snapped, wobbling and slipping backward off her chair. She flopped around on the floor, catching herself and rising to her hooves again. At least in their company she didn’t seem quite so tiny. Only Silver had the stretched proportions of a Lunar pony—Penumbra and Magpie were only older. “At the time I need it most! Nightmare isn’t going to just kill me! He’s going to make me into a Voidseeker, or… whatever an Alicorn version of them would be. He’ll have an Alicorn’s power then, and I won’t be able to resist, because I’ll be dead. Stars only know what he’ll do to Moonrise after that!”
“Nothing,” Penumbra said flatly. She alone had shown neither shock nor amusement, even when Luna fell over. But the princess’s bodyguard was with her almost every moment, so she’d probably seen her refresh the spell. “Because we’ll stop them. I was always the best assassin you had, Princess. I know what they’ll try, and I’ll stop them. If I can beat Aminon with Nightmare trying to crush my mind to dust, I can stop… five of his cronies.”
Luna flopped onto her haunches, staring down at the floor. “You don’t have any idea how strong Nightmare really is. You and Aminon and the others were all just tools to him. But me—I insulted him. I was supposed to be ruling the world for him by now. Demons might seem strange, but pride matters to them even more than it does to ponies. Those five Voidseekers will have powers you can’t even imagine—there’s no telling how much of himself Nightmare has invested in them now. He probably would’ve attacked already, but… like I said, he doesn’t just want to kill me. He wants to get even, and that takes time. But he can afford to wait.”
“Nightmare might be able to wait, but this food won’t,” Silver said gently. “Princess, we didn’t build Moonrise in a day. We don’t have to save it in one either. Do yourself a favor and finish eating. Then… maybe you should borrow our facilities. My wife has all kinds of fancy, uh… soaps.”
Luna’s head snapped up, and she glowered at him. “I’ll flog you too,” she said, though the threat only came off as more adorable. She shoved the chair back into a standing position, then returned to her food with vigor.
Magpie waited until she was sure that the princess wouldn’t stop to get back to her self-loathing. “I wish you’d told us sooner, Penumbra,” she began. “I could probably get the Prime Minister to get ready for something without even mentioning Luna.”
“If you think you can get him to take the danger seriously, go right ahead. He won’t quite tell me to my face that the Voidseekers don’t exist, since I still have all the important powers. But he is confident that they’ve probably died out on the surface somewhere.” Penumbra lowered her voice into a decent impression of Coattail. “‘If Nightmare Moon’s old enemies were going to resurface, they would have done so by now. The best preparation we can make for an attack is to keep the Constabulary strong and the infrastructure of Moonrise well-maintained.’”
She had been thinking of Coattail. There were plenty of old weapons left over from the invasion that never happened, and many would work against Voidseekers when properly used. But Moonrise never kept more than the minimum-security force to keep up with petty crime. Only a small number even knew how to use real guns, most just used stun spells and plastic clubs.
“I have a gun,” Silver said, glancing subconsciously towards the bedroom. He kept it hidden there, in a hollow beneath the mattress. “I could give it to you, Penumbra.”
“You can’t.” Luna stared down at her empty plate, wearing the same perpetual pout she had been since her disguise failed. “Not while you’re alive. Even if you tripped off your balcony and shattered, Penumbra could never shoot it. She’s still a Voidseeker.”
“What about you, Princess?”
The princess giggled, though only for a few seconds. Long enough to realize what she was doing and shove the side of her hoof into her mouth. She held it there until she’d stopped laughing. “I’m tainted too, Silver. And I don’t think Magpie will let you die either way.”
“No,” she said flatly, wrapping one hoof around his neck and pulling him close. Penumbra twitched involuntarily, looking away from them. She pretended not to notice. “But it seems good for you to be close, Silver. I think you should take a vacation from the resource office to spend more time with the princess. Armed.”
He nodded. Silver knew far more about running a city than he’d ever learned about fighting, but for once Magpie wasn’t too worried. The alien rifle required little skill to operate. It wanted to kill monsters so badly that the pony using it barely even mattered.
“Backup plan, then. I’ll look through the Armory, and find something we can use to keep Voidseekers out. Vanaheimr could kill us, so there’s no reason Starseed and Moonrise couldn’t too.”
Penumbra whistled. “You really want to go back there? Honestly I’d take my chances against Voidseekers over robbing Polestar twice.”
“Not robbing,” she countered. “Just… physically persuading. It’s not the same thing. Besides, now that there are research teams all over that place, it shouldn’t be hard to go unnoticed. Just get in, poke around, and… get out again. Simple.”
Silver nodded. He seemed about as unhappy about the idea as Penumbra, though he knew better than to argue. Two creatures couldn’t stay together for centuries without learning each other’s boundaries. “And I think you should stay the way you are in the meantime, Princess,” he said. “I might not understand magic like you, but I know that keeping an active illusion spell can’t be helping you recover your power. Nopony knows who you are anyway, right? I have a granddaughter who does manes, she can probably hide your horn.”
Luna only groaned in reply.
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i.ibb.co/bLzB4Z5/W2D98LN.jpg
Nightmare is a he now? This plot is getting a bit weird.
might be time to look for some good old fashioned harmony magic since the nightmares now gone from Luna solution to her problem
We have Woona now? Didn't see that one coming.
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Unless they're willing to use illusions, they're probably gonna have a tough time convincing people that she's actually Nightmare Moon.
Because of course things can't go well for extended periods of time.
Kind of curious what its plan is. It'd be interesting if instead of attacking Luna it went for the ponies of Starseed, hurting her by attacking those she ostensibly loves. Or perhaps by instigating a revolt, getting at her with a very forceful reminder that she doesn't matter, that the ponies she once tried to protect have turned on/betrayed her.
I'm not entirely sure what this is referring to. Ransom of what?
Huh, filly Luna. Were Luna's powers so entangled with the Nightmare's that when it left it took her power with it?
And wow Magpie has guts, going for some more stuff from the Armory.
Bringing more ponies into the conspiracy!
Woona? Yee.
Looks like the final arc will be Luna and the Moon Ponies vs. The Voidseekers. That or Woona vs. The Hairbrush of Doom. Either way, me hyped.
I am very amused by little luna with mind of regular sized luna.
Ah, love how this is going. This is my Saturday morning cartoons. I always look foward to it.
Hmm. Normal ponies have nothing to fear from Polestar... they should have integrated its location into a backup habitat.
Tbh, I waited when Voidseekers will return.
10226451
They should have repaired/patched the domes to make the place livable again.
Woona could just use mane styling plus a illusion on the horn only to keep hidden. She will have to deal with being cooed and having her cheeks pinched by adults much younger than her assuming she is a kid though.
Squatpony Luna!
Given Magpie also permanently tainted her soul to eat french fries in space, I wonder if the other Voidseekers have their own hobbies they do in their spare time?
Got tired of making new characters, so made the latest two live long enough for the rest of the duration of the storyIt's interesting that so few ponies know how to use guns by this point. I figured that at least some sort of public police force would be kept around for peace, but I guess not, or at least just not with easy murder weapons.
I have concerns if Luna is full Luna or if she still has some of the Nightmare left in her. Not sure what Penumbra is doing to keep freedom from the Nightmare though; maybe I forgot something from earlier.
10225294
Well, she is a biological alicorn. Might go far enough to convince some, or could be spun into a new political agenda something along the lines of a new lineage of rulers, though I doubt ponies would go from their form of democracy or parliamentary democracy to monarchy or a constitutional monarchy. I doubt Luna would settle for a constitutional monarchy, so it's a murky issue.
10225374
To be fair, being purged of the NIghtmare in the show did the same thing, so it's not far fetched.
10231243
Possibly? I've seen comments claiming both that it was intentional and that it was just an artistic change in later episodes, and I have no idea which one is more accurate.
10231276
That was originally supposed to be her design, but Hasbro wanted her to be less night coloured or something alongwhich is why she wasn't seen until Luna Eclipsed which has her very night themed, which is ironic considering the original intentions as well as the discontinuity growth spurt she had.
I consider it to be logical enough to say she was just crippled by the Nightmare hence the small size she was at.
This Is Amazing
10231426
Huh, TIL. Thanks for explaining!
This story is almost a year old.
Which does raise the question of how the Empire's population came to be crystallized. A gift from the mineral life forms?
I honestly love this take on that blotch. Very nice touch.
And... yeah, no amount of mythic exaggeration claims will convince the populace that a Woona-sized alicorn was the Great and Terrible Nightmare. This is going to be tricky. Especially if the true Nightmare continues its whisper campaign.
10225374
Hey now, things have gone well for centuries. It's just that they're not allowed to go well on camera.
10235197
inb4 next chapter we see Luna looking over a shattered Dome 3 a hundred years after the events of this chapter
But yeah, you have a point. Chapter after chapter of "everything's fine here, move alone" probably would get old fairly quickly.
Oh right, the Voidseeker problem.
Yeah, that's what I was thinking last chapter.
They've surely been in the inner circle for a century or two by now, might as well tell them the rest of the secrets.
Hmn. Not sure if Woona or just normal S1 Luna who is short compared to the moon ponies.
That does seem like a bad scenario.
Hey, sure.