In the Shadow of the Moon

by DefiantPosition

Seething in the Darkness

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" BAM!!!!

The sound of angry screams and broken porcelain filled the hallways of the Lunar Castle, the new name given to the rebuild Castle of the Two Sisters which now served as the capital of the Lunar Empire.

Rarity was working in her office, even though she was the governess of the Moon Crystal Governorate, the name of the Crystal Empire after it's occupation by the Lunar Empire, she spend most of the time in the Lunar Castle. After all the commotion surrounding Stary Glory and his batpony supremacist insurrection, Nightmare Moon wanted her best friend nearby.

It was already getting late, the sun had set and Rarity was about to call it a day and go to bed. When the sound of the screaming reached the governess she immediately stood up. She recognised the voice as belonging to Nightmare Moon. Rarity quickly left her office to look for the source of the scream. Something had to be terribly wrong for her queen and friend to be so angry.

A quick glance around the hallway confirmed to source of the sound. The hallway was filled with ponies and batponies frozen in place, no-one dared to move, fearful that by doing so that they would somehow become the victim of her wrath. All of their eyes were directed at the doors to the dining hall so Rarity assumed that Nightmare Moon had to be there.

She calmly walked towards the door, Rarity had worked with Nightmare Moon even when she was still Luna and she had joined Nightmare Moon the moment the war began, not because she agreed with a violent solution, far from it, in fact she was the one that tried to convince Luna not to resort to violence.

It was just that after Luna's transformation she couldn't bring herself to abandon Luna, they had spent month's together trying to peacefully support the integration of batponies into Equestrian society, because of this Rarity became as close to Luna as to her other friends. It was a difficult choice to make but in the end her friendship with Luna and her sympathy for the batpony cause won over her friendship with Twilight, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Applejack, Fluttershy, Starlight Glimmer and Spike.

Rarity wondered what happened to her friends, she knew that they most likely hated her for joining Nightmare Moon, but she still cared about them. Starlight Glimmer who had not been involved in the war had moved together with Trixie to Manehattan and we're living a regular life there. However she had no idea what happened to her other friends, military intelligence reported that they fled to the Crystal Empire when Equestria surrendered but when the Crystal Empire fell they hadn't been found.

The territory of the Moon Crystal Governorate was very large and the terrain was exceptionally difficult to traverse so no major search for them had been attempted. Rarity hoped that her friends were still alive somewhere and that one day she would see them again, she could convince them that Nightmare Moon wasn't so bad as they thought and they could all be friends again, though she realised that it would be exceptionally difficult to do that.

The white unicorn was so lost in thought about what might be that she forgot why she was here in the first place.

"Oh right! Nightmare Moon's angry outburst." She sheepishly stated to no-one in particular.

The governess opened the door. Inside she found an absolutely livid black alicorn. Normally her mane would flow like a weak breeze was blowing through it, yet now it was waving like there was a storm going through it. Rarity also swore that there was a faint red flow to Nightmare Moon's mane like it was about to catch fire.

Nightmare Moon herself was standing in the middle of the room, several pieces of food and what remained of a plate decorated the wall next to her and an empty folder and several pictures and papers were spread over the floor. Rarity walked over to her friend.

"What happened?" she investigated.

"My sister happened!" Nightmare Moon spat with soo much venom that Rarity thought that she was trying to kill Celestia with her words alone.

This surprised the white unicorn, Celestia had seemed to be very accepting of her sister's terms, so Rarity couldn't imagine that Celestia would break them, let alone so soon.

"I am sorry that you misjudged Celestia. If it is any consolation I also didn't think that she would rebel against you."

"What are you talking about?! Celestia is following her terms of release just fine and that is exactly the problem, she does exactly what I asked of her and she still manages to one up me!" The black alicorn yelled, the final statement was followed by the slamming of her hooves against the ground, the sound echoed through the room.

At this point Rarity was completely clueless at what was going on.

"What has Celestia done then?"

Nightmare Moon picked up the photo's lying on the ground with her magic and floated them towards Rarity who took them in her own magic to take a closer look. The photographs showed Celestia working in her bakery, nothing seemed out of the ordinary, Celestia was just selling cakes and pies and making small talk with her customers and the rapport mentioned that most of the customers left very happy. However before Rarity could ask what was wrong Nightmare Moon began to speak.

"This is just her first day and she is already stealing MY spotlight. Ponies all over Canterlot are talking about how Celestia's delicacies are brighting up their days and how open she is or how she takes time to talk with all of her customers. I am supposed to bright up their days! I build this country!"

"And I am sure that everypony loves you becau-"

"And her cakes aren't even that good! Just taste this so called cream pie of her that I had one of my spies buy." Nightmare Moon floated over a piece to Rarity "It is absolutely disgusting but just because my sister made it everypony loves it for some reason!"

Rarity took a bit and it tasted absolutely perfect. It didn't surprise her however, with the amount of cakes and pie's that Celestia ate, if anyone knew everything there was about baked delicacies it was her. Nightmare Moon's intense scowl however told Rarity that it was not in her best interest to voice that opinion.

"Yes it tastes totally disgusting, the worst cake I have ever had." Rarity tried her best to appear convincing but she wasn't sure if she managed to pull it off. The heavenly taste of the cream pie was so good that it was difficult to lie about it.

the queen of the Lunar Empire snorted upon hearing Rarity's words and continued her rant.

"Indeed. It is just like back when I first transformed into this form a thousand years ago. Everypony loved Celestia and ignored me, it didn't matter what I did. If I tried to tell a story I was ignored by everypony but if she told the exact same stories then they would all listen to her intensely. She would relish in all the attention and then she would have the nerve to tell me that being in the spotlight wasn't important and that ponies cared about me too! Well excuse me sister but I never had the luxury of being naturally loved by everypony!"

Nightmare Moon was fuming with anger again at this point, her blood boiled and all of the memories and traumas from the past resurfaced, being left in the dark while Celestia bathed in the spotlights. The feeling of loneliness, that no creature cared about what she thought. Rarity seeing her friend was about to explode thought that it would be best to calm her done before she would do something rash.

"Don't worry too much about it, so what if Celestia manages to make her customers happy, you are still the one in charge
and when it comes to matters of the state you are the one ponies will turn to for guidance. You ended the discrimination of the batponies when Celestia couldn't. Your sister can never take those things away from you."

The dark alicorn seemed to contemplate Rarity's words, slowly the gears in her head were turning, trying to come up with a way to turn these words into something concrete. When she did an evil smile appeared on Nightmare Moon's face.

"You are right my friend, I have succeeded where my she failed and she may be able to take some of MY ponies away from me but she can never take my successes away from me, I have build a better society than she ever could, our armies are stronger then they ever were under Celestia's rule and I have turned our nation from a weak agricultural society into a strong industrialised one. But do you know what I can do Rarity?"

The queens smile was so sinister at this point that it actually began to frighten Rarity. Nightmare Moon however paid no attention to her friend, she was too busy monologuing.

"I can take my sisters successes away from her! I will take Celestia's biggest success and reform it in my image. Then it will be clear to everypony that my sister is nothing but a weak failure and I shall be the favourite sister!"

She didn't show it but Rarity was becoming quite scared by Nightmare Moon's words. Everypony of course knew about Luna's and her alter ego's history, but to see the effect it had on Nightmare Moon, how it affected the way she perceived the world, that was something else entirely. She was afraid to ask it but it felt like she had no choice.

"What is it that you plan on taking away from Celestia!"

Nightmare Moon stepped closer to Rarity, her expression being a combination of excitement and malice.

"I am going to take away that what she cares about the most. Her friends! You're friends! You are going back to the Moon Crystal Governorate and you will track them down and capture them, alive! And then I will sway them to join our cause and my dear sister will be all alone."

The white unicorn definitely wasn't a fan of this approach, most of all because it humiliating Celestia wouldn't solve the issues between the sisters. But even if it would, getting the remaining elements of harmony to join Nightmare Moon would be almost impossible, and that is if she could even find them. She had tried it right after taking power but there were simply too many hiding places in the mountains. However Rarity wasn't going to say no to her best friend and queen, especially not when she was in a state like this.

"Sure... But there is still the major problem of having to find them first. The crystal wastelands are big with an almost infinite hiding places and the Moon Crystal army simply isn't big enough to search everywhere. I would need like an additional hundred thousand soldiers to even begin a proper search."

"Then it is settled. I will give you five hundred thousand of my soldiers to bolster the Moon Crystal Army."

Rarity just blinked, surely she misheard that right, that would be almost half of the Lunar Army.

"Isn't that a bit too much?"

"If you say that you need a hundred thousand then I will give you five times more. I will also send construction units to build extra supply depots and two air fleets of transport aircraft. That way you will have all the troops and supplies that you need and you will have no more excuses for failure, if they are still hiding there you will find them. Is that clear?"

Rarity gulped nervously. She had never seen Nightmare Moon like this.

"Crystal clear."

With that Rarity left, no doubt heading straight to the Moon Crystal Governorate to begin the search. Nightmare Moon didn't pay it much attention, she was too busy looking through one of the windows in the dining room, her sight was firmly directed at Canterlot.

"My dear dear sister, you have outshined me for the last time."

Author's Note:

The plot thickens. I have to say that writing an angry Nightmare Moon is one of the funniest things to write.

Comments

[Admiral Q Ponyform]

Really, going nuts over cake? I thought better of this Nightmare. I think I will skip this story

[DefiantPosition]

10588612
Nightmare Moon is partly the product of Luna's jealousy of Celestia. The cake merely symbolises how ponies prefer Celestia over Nightmare Moon, Celestia can start a bakery and become immediately popular. This would enrage Nightmare Moon because of how much jealousy is a part of her being. So she isn't angry just because of the cake, the cake represents all the feelings of uncertainty that Nightmare Moon feels.

[PonyDragon]

After all the commotion surrounding Stary Glory and his batpony supremacist insurrection, Nightmare Moon wanted her best friend nearby.

Speaking of, what is Stars Whirl doing these days?
(Also, its Starry Glory.)

Starlight Glimmer who had not been involved in the war had moved together with Trixie to Manehattan and we're living a regular life there.

This detail may become important once the Changelings arrive.

"I can take my sisters successes away from her! I will take Celestia's biggest success and reform it in my image. Then it will be clear to everypony that my sister is nothing but a weak failure and I shall be the favourite sister!"

She wants to open her own bakery and outperform her?
Nightmare Moon: "I have all variants of Moon Pie you can imagine, and even some you can not imagine!"

"If you say that you need a hundred thousand then I will give you five times more. I will also send construction units to build extra supply depots and two air fleets of transport aircraft. That way you will have all the troops and supplies that you need and you will have no more excuses for failure, if they are still hiding there you will find them. Is that clear?"

Chrysalis: "I approve this idea! And to make sure our border is safe I will add three of my soldiers for every one you relocate to make sure it will never unguarded."
Nightmare Moon: "It's great to have such nice and understanding neighbors. I don't understand why those deer are always complaining about her."