Book 1 - The Behemoth came to Canterlot

by Equimorto

Sliver

The sword thrust upwards. Nightmare Moon shrieked, and lost her grip on her magic. Seeing her chance, in that moment Luna struck, pouring all the energy she could manage out from her horn and towards Nightmare Moon. The alicorn was pushed back, the sword digging into her and slicing through her underside. She was sent flying away, bleeding, her coat singed by Luna's magic, and as a last push Luna hurled her halberd towards her, striking clean through one of her wings.

She breathed a brief sigh, aware that she would soon be met unarmed by Nightmare Moon's retaliation, happy for what she'd at least managed to do. It was more damage than she could have hoped for, and though maybe insignificant it was still a success in spirit. A little oddly curious as she was confronted with the inevitability of her demise, she looked on to see what her double from a different world would do.

And, almost out of instinct, she spoke to her. "I have always wondered what things would have been like, had I defeated my sister all those years ago. Frankly, now that I see what I missed, I'm even more glad things went the way they did. And perhaps there's a certain irony to the way you'll be, because you will be, defeated by the ponies that defeated me as well. Perhaps it's a sign of how special Twilight truly is, and my sister was right about her. I'm quite happy to have lived the better of our two lives, and the one that led to the better of our Equestrias."

No words came from Nightmare Moon as a response, nor did the kind of sudden and brutal retaliation Luna expected. The alicorn instead just floated where she was, her wounds bleeding. But what she did do made Luna's blood freeze in her veins. Her shape began to grow almost hazy, indistinct, the air around her warping like above a fire. Her coat became black ichor writhing over her, her eyes pools of shadow, her fangs too sharp and too many to count. Her wounds disappeared, and her wings stretched and grew jagged. She was a nightmare in a dream not meant to house distortions of the sort.

She had not been toying with Luna to that degree. She did not have such control over the dream to trick her so. She was really, truly doing what she displayed. It was no mere illusion either, Luna felt it. Luna felt the nightmare as it twisted into itself within the dream she'd created. The creature before her was far beyond anything a pony could have been. She was beyond what Luna as Nightmare Moon had ever thought herself capable of becoming. A nightmare as living flesh, darker than the night ever could be. Something that should have been impossible.

For the first time during their confrontation, Luna was truly afraid. Not for herself, she'd marched in knowing she may have never come back. She feared for Twilight. She feared for Equestria. She feared for her sister and her ponies. She feared for the whole world. She had to warn them, somehow, but she couldn't, not without unleashing that abomination on them as well by undoing their prison.

All she could do then was try, again, to wound the creature, and hope it would be enough for Harmony to finish the job. She had one shot at it, at most. She had a plan for it. Focusing, she waited for the nightmare to come to her.