A shimmering golden light surrounded them, and as it dissipated, the three ponies found themselves in a massive stone temple, instead of the private chambers they expected.
“Oh, it has been eons,” Celestia said in a tone of wonder as she looked around. “The fortress!”
Tempest, a unicorn with a dark purple coat and a broken horn, looked around with a faint air of amusement, her armor giving her the appearance of a pony turned tank.
“I expected to be attacked immediately. You said Khorne is the god of blood and combat?”
“Among other things,” Celestia agreed, as a shimmering golden light started collecting around her, making her coat glow.
“Um… Celly?” Cadance, a pink alicorn who had once been Celestia’s student, asked as she pointed at the golden particles.
“Technically I am at the source of my power right now,” Celestia said happily. “This is the Chaos Fortress, the first world I ever helped create.”
A hissing hoarse voice came from the shadows, startling Cadance and Tempest.
“Ssssister…. You return, after sssso long.”
“Tzeentch!” Celestia said, sounding for all the world as though she was overjoyed. “My brother, where are you, what body do you have this time?”
A small shape stirred from behind a pillar, and strode out into the open. A human woman in a cloak which shifted slowly between colors and textures. She looked like she was in pain, tattered greasy black hair stuck to her cheeks.
“It’s…. Sssister, now.”
“Well, sister, you clearly are in some discomfort,” Celestia said, walking forward and lighting her horn, pulling back Tzeentch’s hood and tending to her hair.
The woman winced, her warped multifaceted eyes focusing first on Celestia and then on the other two ponies once she realized Celestia would not stop using her magic to clean her hair and tie it back.
“How am I unsurprised that you would make your race so saccharine. These are your warriors to confront Khorne? Why not bring your other shards with you?”
“Because if Nurgle decides to take revenge for my past actions, and destroys me, my remaining shards could reconstitute me, or at least lead my ponies,” Celestia shrugged.
Cadance and Tempest shared a glance, distinctly aware that if Celestia was destroyed, they had no way home. But they had signed up for a truly dangerous mission. Maybe they should have asked more questions.
“Nurgle is not so brave,” Tzeench laughed, her shrill voice echoing in the massive hall. “I’m sure that he will wait until you’ve tried and failed to stop the war, to attack you.”
Something in Celestia’s eyes shifted, her expression growing cold like a mask before a burst of magic surged out from her and pinned Tzeench to the floor. The human-looking woman gasped in pain and shock, squirming under Celestia’s grasp.
The sounds of a horrible roiling storm began in the distance, howling wind outside of the fortress, cracks of thunder reverberating through the stone walls.
“Do not Speak Lies into my Truth,” Celestia said calmly as Cadance and Tempest approached nervously.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I do not Speak them! I unspeak them! You Will Stop The War!” Tzeench said frantically.
Finally, Celestia released the squirming woman, and allowed her to stand.
“We had an agreement, back when the world was new,” Tzeench gasped, holding her throat. “I wish to renew it.”
“You do not include me in your plans, and I do not bring my righteousness and control to bear against you,” Celestia said simply.
“I agree,” Tzeench said, and then in a swirl of multicolored cloak, she was gone.
“We shall not bow to thee, oh glittering star! Fie upon thy name and symbol, but a mockery unto harmony!” Princess Luna roared across the great hall, standing between the two shattered thrones of equestria, black wisps of magic sliding over her body like beguiling fingers.
“Thy grasp of harmony so firm this night, sister mine?!” Celestia shouted in reply, flames flickering across her coat, illuminating the floor and walls nearest to her. “Oh pray tell then, ever-wise, we take these shapes, we take upon us this bastard culture, and for what? No reward to be given? Thine own chambers we shall note, gilded in silks and silver!”
“Oh, the price of silver to be bartered against thy sheafs of gold leaf, please, spare us thine vainglorious simpering, sister!” Luna replied, her laugh half a cackle.
“Even now, a lie to thine own ears, how can it not be?” Celestia insisted. “Sister, itself, a falsehood! We are one, and evermore shall be, no matter our quarrel! My own spirit given fle--”
A spear, decorative and draped in crimson tassels, plunged through Celestia’s throat to definitively cut off her words.
“Sister,” Luna said, scowling. “Be sister mine, or be no more, wraith of Pride.”
The spear melted, and burned, and fell away as magic reformed shattered flash, Celestia’s pale red eyes fixed on Luna’s teal, the rage in them beyond measure.
“Why…. dost thou… insist…. on falsifying history?” Celestia choked out through blood filled lungs.
Luna stepped down from the thrones, slowly.
“Be sister mine, or be no more,” she said simply a second time.
The blast of heat which burned through the ceiling and destroyed the floor shattered every window in the building at once, every tapestry charring and curling with delicate flames as the light faded, revealing Luna in a sphere of protective darkness, smoking.
“Then a sister I shall find in others,” Luna said bitterly, as the shadows around them deepened, and Celestia felt fear for the first time in eons.
The tendrils grasped at Celestia, and scorched her like no fire ever could.
“Pray caution now, Darkness,” Celestia gasped. “This spar is not with thine troops, and our magicks tear at souls!”
“A shame,” Luna said coldly. “Thy soul would have been useful unmoored.”
A blast of sunlight roared down on them again, this time giving Celestia enough grace to leap and soar into the sky, as the moon itself began chasing the sun, intent on blotting it out.
“What hast thou passions seized upon so firmly that this is thine answer?!” Celestia asked as she was chased.
“Thou shalt lord over this race, this world, half tyrant, half mother, and thy abuse shall not stay silent forever!” Luna screamed. “We cannot remain distinct and godly, in amongst beings more harmonious than we!”
A lance of black sliced through Celestia’s leg, which Celestia responded to in kind, an explosion of force battering Luna and possibly hurting her, but Celestia was not ready for Luna to physically slam into her, knocking her out of the sky and bombarding her with dozens of attacks.
Celestia hit the floor of the great hall, cracking the stone beneath. But as she stood to confront Luna again, the moon obscuring the sun and leaving her plunged into darkness, cut off from her source of power, she saw a glimmer of light from under her hooves.
A chamber underneath the throne room floor, which Luna had built with Celestia’s blessing. A chamber to hold Luna’s pride and joy.
The Elements of Harmony, three made by Luna, three made by Celestia, which they had grown carefully from the harmony of the race they had built together. The weapon they had used to defeat Discord.
She realized that Luna was right, in the same moment that Luna gave up on harmony, ever being the answer to life’s problems again. Tears poured down Celestia, and she gave up her past. She was no god, she was just a very old pony, who was very tired, and had been so very wrong.
She unearthed the Elements from the rubble of the throne room they had built together, and she turned her eyes to the fractured sky, heart set in stone.
Interesting chapter here.
10149518
Showing more of Celestia's flaws and how she might have dealt with her siblings in the past, her bravado will not last forever, but it keeps her strong against mind games.
10122032
Um... That doesn't really answer my question. Or do I just need to read the story?
10149590
I bet... although she doesn't have bio yet I have another OC who's the daughter of a TFP Unicron that isn't evil nor Primus' enemy and a long time after her original purpose was complete as her universe was being destroyed her "father" gave her his power and I've imagined her in the 40K universe and she does not who she calls the "False Ones and their servants" (which you can guess who they are and why they're called that) and should any of them step foot upon the world where her material form slumbers they're not leaving at all and of course if she was in this story (using an avatar) she'd take interest in Celestia and her shards.
10149641
Sorry, let me try again to answer.
"How exactly do these guys get reformed and still not want to fight against the forces that want to destroy them?"
They do want to fight. Reformation does not mean that you don't fight back against being hurt or attacked, it just means that you no longer obsess over an endless war, over doing harm to others for no reason, or being cruel.
10149590
Let me guess you know who she calls the "False Ones and their servants" are right? And speaking of which she'd take any opportunity to spite them or throw a wrench into their plans of course she wouldn't limit herself to them though though for the latter it'd be because she's bored and needs to amuse herself which the conversation with a non servant generally goes like the following.
"Why are doing this?" alt "Why did you do that?" alt "What was that for?"
"Because I'm bored."
"You can't be serious."
*shrug* "Girls gotta entertain and amuse herself somehow especially since it tends to get boring waiting for the universe to enter the final stages of its death."
10149709
Yup! I think you'll enjoy my plans for Sombra in this setting, lol
10149712
Okay. Did the conversation amuse you though TBH most of the time she's mostly asleep as there's one who'll try and destroy the universe with the optional remake it their image which angers her and she'll deal with whoever it is but when someone decides to blow up a planet or two (makes her job a bit easier) she could care less unless that someone is targeting the planet where her main material form slumbers then she promptly destroys them same with conquering and enslaving the universe.
10149853
I make it a policy of mine never to critique people who comment on my stories. It sort of makes it less like they're reading my story, and more like we're trading stories, which isn't good, because then I have to maintain a relationship with each commenter in order to maintain fans or readers on my own story. My general response is that we each need to write our own stories, and over time improve. But that's not a personal response, which is what you're looking for.
10149886
Fair enough though you could PM me it to prevent it from taking up space in the comments.
Can't wait to see how Equestria handles Orks.
Flesh?
10931369
Celestia's neck