It Takes A Princess

by Casketbase77

Though Not The One You’re Thinking Of

Princess. The moon mare had called herself a Princess.

Heavy steps padded down the palace hall.

To put a label on something meant you owned it. To revoke a thing’s label meant you ruled it.

Order never much cared for labels. Like names, they were inherently Chaotic in the way they let people and places be differentiated. One pony from one another. One landscape from an adjoining mass. His own sovereign dimension from the moon mare’s parallel one.

Former moon mare, Order corrected himself as his pace slowed down the hall. He’d revoked more than just her label. He’d revoked everything from her, keeping the useful parts and discarding the emptied remainder. Her bluster and determination were only memories now. Impurities that the land had reclaimed, just like her hollowed body.

Right?

For peace of mind, Order paused and laid his paw upon a nearby granite pillar. He breathed deep, feeling the leylines of his planet and the creatures whom they bound. They told him thousands of ponies were mulling about. Some trotted slowly from place to place, most sat still, and all of them were quiet in their proper roles. There was no whiff of the moon mare’s biorhythm. Not from anywhere other than himself, that was. No sign of Creativa either, though that was expected. Harmony ruled now, and not a spark of Chaos remained in a sterilized world. Order dropped his paw from the pillar and sighed quietly. It was a pity she'd been irredeemable. A real and honest pity. Loopa would likely be the same, but Order wouldn’t know until he tried.

The courtyard housing her statue was up ahead. Never let it be said that he was a pessimist.

---

“I never actually been this close to the castle befor-“

“Pipe down or he’ll hear us coming!”

Creativa bit her lip and debated apologizing. Before she could, Nightmare's wings folded back and she dove like a bullet at the palace below. Creativa flapped hard to catch up, landing roughly on the battlements. Nightmare Moon huffed in apprehension, pawing the planks and peeking over the parapet.

“No sign of the brute. Must be indoors. We must find a way in or settle here and hope he leaves. My vote is for settle. I’d forgotten how easily exhausted these mortal lungs can get.”

“Um… concurred,” Creativa managed between heavy breaths of her own. She very rarely flew from place to place, instead walking among her troupe so they could be near her. The reality of them all being gone still hadn’t quite set in, and if Creativa knew of a power higher than Order, she’d pray to it that she’d be able to stay numb a little longer. At least as long as it took for her new companion to make their saving throw. Speaking of which…

“Hey um...Nightmare? What’s our plan exactly?”

“We tear him to shreds as soon as he struts out.”

“That’s not what I meant and you know it. We don’t have any magic.”

“A minor knock against us.”

“I’m being serious!”

Nightmare Moon huffed heavily, and it wasn’t from exhaustion. “I shall charge him from the left and you from the right. Agreeable?”

“Um, no. Not agreeable. What’s to stop him from pinning us to the ground again?”

“Magic cannot restrain creatures who are devoid of any themselves.”

Creativa blinked. “R-really? Is that true?”

"Yes indeed, mi amica. Luna discovered and exploited that trick long ago while scuffling against a certain centa- Story for another time. Villain inbound.”

Flinching while still crouched, Creativa tensed her limbs. No movement was apparent, but Nightmare Moon stiffened to steely attention and staring down over the battlements. A moment or two passed.

"Relax those knees and straighten your back," Nightmare suggested icily. "He's approaching the courtyard from a side hall, but isn't in view yet."

Creativa she did as she was told. "You can sense him coming? I can't feel anything. Must be your residual magic you were talking about, still linked with his. Faust above, if you have a thread of mana spooled off him, we may actually stand a chanc-"

“Non ducor duco. I told you, I'm as empty as you are." Despite the confession, Nightmare Moon was allowing herself a smug smile. "These walls are some fine stonework. Clear and resonant enough to announce an oversized beast lumbering this way."

Breath held and ears strained, Creativa realized Nightmare was right. She heard it now: even, shuffling steps from a creature who had no reason to sneak and nopony to fear.

He thinks he has nopony to fear, anyway.

Order finally sauntered into view. His coat had slightly darkened, but his face was stern and contemptuous as ever. He progressed past their perch, heading towards some unseen destination in a grove of trees.

Creativa was really doing this. For once, she was the predator, anticipating her hapless prey. With an even more dangerous ally readying to sneak-

"As per the rules of formal combat, I'll announce our grievances and issue my challenge." Nightmare Moon reared up on her hinds, fully visible above the parapet.

"You'll what??" Creativa hissed. But it was too late.

"Petty thief and pretender king!" Nightmare Moon's royal Canterlot voice boomed defiantly over a stagnant world. "We demand satisfaction and the prompt return of Luna's soul!"

Ears full of tinnitus, Creativa peeked desperately down. Order had not turned around from his spot near the grove. He hadn't even flinched.

"YOU INSOLENT FRAUD! RESPOND PER YOUR OBLIGATION!" Openly infuriated now, Nightmare Moon hurled herself down into the courtyard.

"What the hay are you doing!?," Creativa shouted. "I thought we would ambush-"

At the sound of Creativa's voice, Order spun around and blasted. He was a hair too late to hit Creativa, already diving down after her berserking companion. The battlements where she'd just been erupted in a garish conflagrant rainbow, ejecting brick and mortar in all directions. Then the atmosphere's ambient Harmony repaired the damage like a rewinding projector reel. Not that Creativa noticed as she scrambled up from a rough landing in the grass.

"You," Order chuffed with a harder, more unnerved edge to his drone than normal. "How are... you're empty, so how are you still..?"

"I WILL NOT CONTINUE TO BE IGNORED!" Nightmare Moon was foaming at the mouth and charging across the lawn like a mad bull. Order didn't look at her, but he did squint skeptically at Creativa's gaping amazement.

Then his eyes bulged as Nightmare lanced his chest with her horn.

"Awgh!"

The gasp of an injured monster. A bloodied horn extracting from a stabbed sternum. Nightmare Moon whinnied in triumph as Order staggered backward, paw over his injury. He was looking wildly around, everywhere except at the one who'd stabbed him. He fixated on Creativa again.

"You have no magic," he gurgled while trying to stay stern. "How did you do that?"

Creativa opened and closed her mouth a few times, unsure to respond. Nightmare stood by, relatively clearheaded and beginning to realize something was off. Order eyes flickered to where Creativa was staring, then swiped at what his eyes saw as empty space. A paw to the snout sent Nightmare Moon reeling back.

"You're an eternal scourge, Creativa." Order was rubbing his paw and boiling with more anger than she'd ever heard from him before. "I was careless for thinking Chaos would go quietly." He whipped his tail in a defensive arc around him, but Nightmare was still hanging back, hoof to her jaw and eyes clenched in pain. "Whatever unseen devilry you're now performing... it is obviously a last resort. But I'm done taking chances." Another tail whip, another miss. Order raised his free paw, the one not clamped over his wound. "Harmony is too merciful for what needs done to you, so I... I will call upon Chaos to destroy itself. With the Moon Mare's magic, I can command her now." He raised his paw and savored his next command.

"Loopa, kill your sister."

Fingers snapped and movement came from the nearby grove.

"No," Creativa rasped. "No no no no..."

Down from an unseen pedestal, out from the ageless glen, four shambling, fossilized hooves carried a pony-shaped statue on a mission of murder. The thing moved like a petrified puppet. The thing was a petrified puppet, but even without her magic Creativa knew what was dormant inside its granite core. Golem's shape was unmistakable.

"Don't..." The courtyard walls were closing in on Creativa. Her universe was nothing but Order's resolute glare and the mindless, heedless doom trudging towards her. "Loopa, please! it.. it's me..."

Nightmare Moon hoofed Order in the gut with all her might. "Employing an underling to perform your dirty work!? Tramas putidas, I will END you!"

"Gah!" Order stooped to his knees, unable to hear Nightmare Moon, but clearly able to feel her. "Loopa, kill faster!"

The golem picked up its pace, pounding towards its trembling target while Order threw another blind punch at nothing. Nightmare landed another kick, this one to his ribs, before jumping back and addressing her useless ally.

"Run, you foalish fop! If you aren't going to fight, then run!"

Creativa didn't need to be told twice. She fled like the wind into open palace door, the golem close enough to have been stomping on her tail if it wasn't tucked impotently under her back legs.

Order frowned after her, unsure what to do. He took a few cautious steps after them before Nightmare inflicted another stab to his side.

"Oh if you could only hear my voice," she seethed. "And the many ancient profanities I'd hurl at you right now." She trotted in a wide circle while Order remained doubled over. "Take it from another career tyrant: you may have two souls, but not a heart to be seen. It's so very rare I get to wail on someone who truly deserves it."

Nightmare pivoted pridefully and donkey-kicked Order on the base of the spine. "Sincerely," she continued as she ducked another inaccurate counter punch. "I've bested your counterpart in battle before, and that was without inexplicable invisibility." Order was heaving heavily. Furiously. Nightmare continued her unheard pontificating.

"It's doubtful that Celestia's mopey lookalike has much fight in her. But I do hope I can extract Luna and break your grip on this dull dimension before your granite goon gets back. A few more impales should be sufficient. What say you? If I'm correct about everything, make no response."

"Damn you, Chaos! Damn your defiance in defeat and your cowardly attacks from the shadows!"

The earth under Order rumbled and roiled, so suddenly that Nightmare lost her hoofing.

"I am the authority of this world! I am Harmony incarnate! I.. am... the Elements!"

Six gems, each a different color, blinked into orbit around Order. He roared with abandon as they fired in every direction, scouring hextuplets of laser burns along the walls, the grass, the topiary.

Well wrought destruction corrected itself just as quickly as it appeared. Order peered around blearily for some sign of success. What he got was a hoof to the head as Nightmare swooped down from above.

Another roar. Another frenzy of firing, this time into the sky and with such enraged, frustrated bombast that a distant pony formerly called Twiddle Spiral shivered at her desk.

Nightmare Moon hit the dirt as a stray beam sizzled past her singed mane. She was immune to most magic, but not the Elements Of Harmony.

"Right then," she murmured with considerably less confidence. "Let's see if I can break my two-time losing streak against those vexing, trigger-happy gemstones."

Author's Note:

Hey, what’s with Order's sudden surge in emotion? And why is Nightmare Moon invisible to him? I'm sure there isn't something she lost and he gained that could explain both oddities.

Next installment: Creativa vs Loopa

Comments

[garfan]

there was a story out there that made a comment that Harmony is not Order

[Venerable Ro]

I wonder what Order's Elements represent...

[Nitro Indigo]

He's back! And it's about time!

I've never seen you write action before, so the violence here surprised me with how brutal it was. Not that that's a bad thing.

Also, Nightmare Moon was invisible?

[ShadwSonic]

10900975
Try several. Of course, given how many people still make that mistake on this site, it's no surprise this serpent of stagnation is doing the same.

[Starcat5]

10900975 10901208
Or as I like to say: "Have you MET Pinkie Pie?!?"

[Casketbase77]

10900975
10901208

Dang it all; readers keep predicting plot reveals before they happen. Oh well. Both of you get a Spike Of Distinction for figuring out why the villain is beginning to lose his marbles.

[Thought Prism]

Alright! How I missed this unique adventure.

And since the last chapter, we now have the perfect illustration of Order's personality :

[The Psychopath]

Glad you found time to resume this story. I had genuinely forgotten about it and read through it quite quickly. A few issues in the grammar here and there (and a bit quick paced) but a fun story with an interesting concept nonetheless.

[Moproblems Moharmoney]

Silly order, you can't just put an untested element into a sterlised area.

[Starcat5]

Ok, time to start poking this story with a stick.

[Casketbase77]

11550880
Poke noted. I actually have a chapter and a half written and unpublished. Need to stop lazing around and wrap this fic up.

Gimme a couple weeks.