A Return to Form

by dracolord85

Chapter 4: Breakout Plan

Disclaimer – I own none of the cannon characters, settings, or locations contained herein. All ownership credit goes to Hasbro/Lauren Faust respectively.
Chapter 4: Breakout Plan

A timid knock awoke Celestia with a start from her place face down on her desk. Bolting upright on her sitting pillow and silently berating herself for falling asleep at her desk, Celestia saw that indeed, she had not managed to clear any of the paperwork on her desk. With a petition plastered to the side of her face Celestia looked to the doorway to see one of her attendants torn between falling down laughing and begging forgiveness for waking her. As she calmly brushed to overly affectionate document off of her face, she was informed that dinner was ready whenever she was. When questioned if her sister was already up and waiting the attendant was not certain.

As nightfall approached, Celestia began the long walk to the Lunar wing of the royal castle. Luna had skipped dinner with her sister, instead ordering that her meal be sent to her atelier instead. As this was actually common practice lately, Celestia tried not to feel slighted that she had been dodged. Besides, she knew that Luna was expecting her visit anyway. Before making the final turn to Luna’s hall, Celestia stopped in front a large window to take in the setting sun and calm her nerves. Knowing that another visit with Nightmare Moon was waiting had her on edge, despite what her sister claimed about the dark mare’s intent. How could she simply buck one thousand years of hard held beliefs in the course of a few nights? With a resigned sigh, she turned away and rounded the final corner.

A pair of solar guards bowed and magically opened a large set of doors as she approached. Turning into her sisters section of the castle, Celestia was plunged into an environment far dimmer than the rest of the castle. Luna had ordered all of the windows covered in heavy, dark blue, light blocking curtains. The only illumination in this section of the castle was provided by the ornate candelabras and chandeliers hung at intervals along the main hall. The only decorations that depicted the sun were those that also depicted the moon as well. Celestia was aware that anypony that wasn’t nocturnal may find the perpetual feeling of night in this section of the castle unnerving. A small smile graced her lips as she realized that in some small way Nightmare had attained her eternal night, if only in one wing of the castle.

Arriving at the same heavy door into Luna’s atelier, the pair of guards flanking it saluted her before one used a hind hoof to rap on the door several times. Celestia pushed the door open after waiting a minute and felt the same wards from the night before activate as the door was closed behind her. She now understood the precautions her sister had taken, if anypony were to see or hear Nightmare Moon within the castle it would likely end with panicked guards and possibly rioting townsfolk. Standing at a lectern to the side of the room, Luna had her nose buried in a heavy tome, only glancing up momentarily to flash a smile at her sister.

“Good evening sister, the moon again if thou wouldst not mind.” Luna waved a hoof at her sister without looking back up.

Celestia took a moment to examine the way that the spell seal had grown and evolved to cover a fair amount of the room since last she had seen it. Now clear as to why her sister had skipped their evening meal together she had to chuckle lightly to herself. It was like looking at a mirror image of her student Twilight Sparkle. Completely focused, and unwilling to spare any attention to outside factors until she found what she sought. Celestia briefly imagined that the two would likely get along wonderfully if Luna could get over both her current predicament as well as her social awkwardness.

Luna closed her book and strode towards a section of the growing magical seal with a piece of etching chalk floating next to her. As the rhythmic sound of scraping chalk on the floor began, Celestia looked toward to deepening purple sky that the sun had now all but abandoned. Focusing her magic, she nudged the sun beneath the western horizon and turned to face the east. Focusing harder to connect with the celestial body she was not as attuned to, she leaned back on her haunches and raised her forelegs skyward. As the moon crested the horizon, darkness spread from it in a uniform wave to cover the sky, the stars twinkling mutely in the spread.

Lowering her forelegs to the ground to sit normally, Celestia looked upwards through the glass ceiling with a frown. Luna cantered up to stand next to her sister after finishing the additions to her seal.

“I never could get the night sky to look quite right… something always seems off whenever I do it.”

“Be not concerned dear sister, it appears well enough to sleep under. It needs not be special so long as it fulfills its purpose right?”

“You may be surprised Lulu. The ponies of this era are different from those that did not give a second thought to the night in eras past. There are several societies and research teams that actively study the night sky to further their understanding of it, as well as many like my student, Twilight Sparkle, who study the night sky as a relaxing past time.”

Luna simply raised an eyebrow and shook her head slowly.

“There is clearly much that I need to adapt to if the ponies of this age take such interest in the night sky. I shall have to make the effort to see the truth of thy words for myself once this mess is behind us. Now let us begin.”

“Lulu, this looks different.” Celestia observed, indicating at the expanded spell seal, “Will you be able to handle whatever this one does in your condition?”

“Worry not dear sister, I am still quite charged from the energy thou hast so generously given me this previous morn. Although, I suppose I should explain a few things about the additions to the spell before we begin.”

Nodding, Celestia sat on a cushion and prepared to listen to her sister’s research.

“The first seal thou witnessed me use yesternight was designed via the collaboration of Nightmare and I. It was designed to take hold of a consciousness without form and swap it with one’s own body for a time. In our case, Nightmare was the target and our current body was swapped for hers.”

Luna paused to make sure that her sister had no pressing concerns to interrupt her with. Seeing her neutral expression Luna decided to press on with her lecture.

“We have augmented the original diagram with our newly developed magi-transformers, which will take our input and ramp it up to a higher level with the aid of natural ambient magic in the atmosphere. The seal that thou can see on the north wall is a mirroring seal within a containment seal. It is binding the first and third seal together while suspending the output within the matrix created by the total array.”

Celestia nodded along with Luna’s explanation although it was slipping further and further from her grasp of understanding as Luna went along. High level diagramed magic was never her strong suit. Although it lacked in raw power, she tended to stick to the common pony method of magic via thought and force of will. Only alicorns could use diagram magic, as the symbols used and the energies drawn upon were only understood by them.

“The third seal is what we believe thou shall enjoy the most sister. It will allow both Nightmare and I to be present for a short while. It has the reverse function of the first seal, but instead of shifting the physical body, it takes the subverted consciousness and provides a projected image of their body along with the sound of their voice! No more soundless mirrors!”

At this point Luna was standing tall and beaming a happy smile, thoroughly satisfied with the genius of her research. Celestia merely sat and stared with a perfectly glazed over look. When lacking an immediate response of impressed praise from her sister, Luna looked at her and frowned.

“I gather thou didst not understand any of that?”

“No no no, I understood Lulu! It was very clever of you to think of something like this!” Celestia hurriedly tried to reassure her sister with very poorly disguised panic written on her face.

“…hmph! Thou hast clearly not advanced thy understanding of the ancient magic in the past thousand years.”

With her nose up in wounded pride, Luna cantered into the magical seal on the floor just like the previous night. Stepping into the center of the array, she sat on her haunches and faced her sister. After receiving a nod from Celestia, she began to channel energy into her horn and fed it slowly into the newly expanded array. The now glowing seals lifted slightly off the ground and glowed faintly, the symbols and diagrams beginning to rotate like a clockwork mechanism.

As before, the shadows in the chamber gathered to a point above Luna’s horn and ignited with dark fire. This time as the fire engulfed Luna’s body and the light continued to fade, the second and third seals began to shimmer a bit brighter. The dark mass in the center grew in size while an isolated section of the array developed a blue haze above it. Rising up from the darkness beneath the main seal the six glowing chains of Harmony stretched forth and wound tightly around Nightmare as she took form from the fire. The blue haze that had formed to the side took equine form and resolved itself into what appeared to be Luna sitting as she had been before with her eyes closed and head raised.

As Nightmare's physical body formed, Celestia took the time to notice several things that she did not in her initial panic the last time. Most obvious now were the glowing chains that bound her body, sharply in contrast to her pitch black coat. A light blue chain was wound around her midsection, binding her wings to her body. Pink and Yellow chains restrained her fore legs, while white and orange links bound her hind legs. Finally, a purple restraint looped around her neck before snaking out to a small ring around the base of her horn. Each chain met and attached to a large, golden harness settled round the base of her neck. Continuing from their attachment point around the harness, each chain sunk back down into the darkness beneath the spell seal.

Celestia also noticed that Nightmare wore no armor, revealing her sleek and toned solid black body. As the dark fire cleared Nightmare opened her teal, draconic eyes and glanced to her side to see Luna looking back at her with a grin. Nightmare smiled kindly in return and moved to stand closer to Luna. The chains binding her body went taut after only a few paces and she looked back to where they sank into the seal with a frown. As Luna closed the distance to stand beside her, Nightmare sat on her haunches to ease the burden of her shackles.

“It would appear our calculations were correct, how is the virtualization responsiveness?”

“Tis not bad, output delay is well within the expected values. And it would appear that the visual feedback and vocal output is working splendidly. How is the mental echo suppression?”

“Perfect. I can’t hear any overlap at all.”

“Huzzah! It would appear we are exactly as brilliant as we suspected!”

At the sound of a throat being cleared behind them both mares turned from their conversation to see Celestia standing by impatiently. With a scowl, Nightmare shuffled in place to turn and face the white alicorn. For her part Celestia moved into the circle to stand nearer to her sister.

"Celestia."

"Nightmare."

"Not planning to attack a bound and wounded mare again are you?"

"Don't give me a reason and I won't."

"Why you evil, self-centered-"

"ENOUGH!" Luna interjected focefully, "The both of you are making things needlessly difficult! No progress shall be made amidst thy pointless bickering."

"Luna, I said I would try to be open minded, but you can't expect me to make peace with one of my greatest enemies at the drop of a hat." Celestia defended resolutely.

"I can, you will, and we will all move on. Unless of course you don't love me enough to make the effort..."

"Luna you wouldn't..."

"Don’t you love me enough to try big sister?"

Luna sniffled a bit and looked up at Celestia with wide shimmering eyes. The power of that look sent Celestia into a tailspin. There could be no resistance against such a guilt inducing gaze, though she still felt the need to complain about it.

"Luna that is not fair!"

Nightmare sat back and listened gleefully as Celestia caved in to the overwhelming force that was Luna's guilt trip. Her wide smile a testament to how much she enjoyed seeing the almighty Celestia bent to Luna's will. Perhaps they should have employed the irresistible force of Luna’s guilt trip those thousand years ago! If there was one thing Luna knew about her sister it was where and how to hit her weak points. What Nightmare overheard next however, immediately traded her joy for pure horror.

"You shall prove thy intentions by giving Nightmare a big, friendly hug, and an apology for your first interaction. Nightmare, you shall also attempt to make amends for our actions a thousand years ago."

"You can't be serious!" both Nightmare and Celestia exclaimed in unison.

The two larger alicorns turned to face each other with a glare. Suddenly, Nightmare was giving that same fanged grin that made the instinctual side of Celestia uneasy.

"Oh Luna, you know I would give big sister Celly a hug, but these chains do restrict my movements oh so much. I can't use my wings and my fore legs only move so far, see?"

Nightmare made a show of rattling the chains binding her wings and lifting her fore hooves to show the chains shackling her two limbs close to the ground. Her wide smile betrayed her relief at having seemingly outsmarted Luna's good will plan. Her mirth was destined to fade again as Luna calmly countered her.

“Thy mobility shall not be a hindrance. Celestia is free to embrace thee, and thou to accept it.”

With a stricken look, Nightmare once again turned to look at Celestia. Both had a slightly queasy look as they prepared themselves for the inevitable. They both subconsciously knew that they had bigger concerns to address, and that this was simply a stepping stone across the river of mistrust and towards the path of cooperation. Both however, also knew that this was yet another masterfully executed tactic from Luna's sharp mind. Luna's plan being that in their shared discomfort towards this experience perhaps some bonds may yet form. With a dour look, Nightmare was the first to acquiesce.

"Well played Luna. Celestia let us get this over with and move on, there is much to do."

Nodding her head slowly, Celestia moved forward until she stood directly before Nightmare. Before closing the distance, she looked over at Luna searchingly. Luna waved a fore hoof, indicating her forward.

"For my sisters sake and nothing else. Don't try anything funny." Celestia whispered to Nightmare with a serious stare.

"Maybe on our next date princess." Nightmare flashed her sharp smile with a waggle of her eyebrows.

Finally moving forward after a hesitating step, Celestia intertwined her neck with Nightmare. All the while she made sure not to make too much contact with the chains as they seemed to give off a static electricity effect where she came in contact with them. She started a bit when she felt Nightmare lean closer and the fangs protruding from her muzzle brush her neck slightly. After holding their position for a short while, Celestia disengaged and stepped back.

"There, can you forgive me for attacking you Nightmare?"

With a painfully stretched silence, Nightmare regarded the mare before her. Looking to Luna who bore a hope filled look in her eyes, Nightmare finally sighed and bowed her head.

"Though your attack was easily one of the more painful things I have experienced in my time, I can see the sincerity in your request. I forgive you Celestia, and seek your forgiveness for the actions that resulted from my ill conceived counsel so long ago. I wish nopony harm, I only want to help Luna."

"Then that makes two of us. You have my forgiveness just as my sister has. Prove your intentions by your actions, and gain my trust." Celestia confirmed with a small smile.

Stepping back between the lunar alicorns, Celestia settled herself to begin planning for the safety of her sister. She had already formed an idea herself about how to fix the situation and was eager to present it to her sister. As the elder sister she always had a plan for everything, leading most ponies to believe her to be all knowing, a false portrayal that she was loath to relinquish for the fear it induced in those that would do her country wrong.

"Tia, let us hear your thoughts first, as you undoubtedly already have an idea."

"Indeed I do. I propose we call forth the bearers of Harmony once more and through the power of the Elements, undo what they have done. We can guide their actions with close instruction and their feelings should sway the Elements to work as we need them to."

With a proud smile, Celestia sat back and waited for the anticipated agreement from her sister. After a minute passed by an not a single word was uttered, she looked to her sister and Nightmare to see looks of blank shock.

"She must be kidding right? That was supposed to be funny right?" Nightmare deadpanned.

"Sister, I think that perhaps that is one of the worst plans I have ever heard." Luna shook her head slowly.

Now indignant at the outright rejection of her plan Celestia pressed the other two for an explanation.

"And just what is wrong with my idea? If the Elements formed this lock, then surely they should also form the key to undoing it as well." She exclaimed with an indignant huff.

"So by that logic, could it not also be said that since they formed the lock and chains they could not complete the process with another pass?" Luna rebutted her sister with a raised eyebrow.

"Seems to me like dear Celestia relies entirely too much on the Elements to solve her problems." Nightmare jabbed with a snarky smile.

"Ok then smartypants, what is your idea?"

"We have two ideas naturally. Neither of which involve nearly so much catastrophic risk." Nightmare explained with a triumphant smile.

Luna gave her sister a sympathetic look and attempted to smooth things over between Nightmare and her sister. Just because they were talking didn't mean that they couldn't develop animosity over a few carelessly placed and poorly received words. Not to mention that if she didn't step in and provide some mediation, the two would just dig their hooves in and not get anywhere.

“Be at ease sister, Nightmare does not often temper her tongue as she should, but she means no real harm. There are two options as I see it. I already know you will outright reject the first without a second thought.”

“And what would that be?”

“We shall invite our brother, Terra, to the castle, that he may lend us his strength. Between the three of us I believe that we can break the chains of Harmony without needing to reach the limits of our power.”

“Well, you guessed right. I refuse to cooperate with him, much less allow him in my castle.”

“OUR castle sister… you are clearly still being childish about that whole incident so many thousands of years ago.”

“I don't care what his reasons were, trying to make a mortal pony immortal is not something that can be taken lightly. Not to mention his radical views on the governance of nature and politics, now what is our second option?”

With a sad frown Luna realized that the broken bond between her elder sister and brother had not mended in a thousand years time. She no longer cared what he had done and had disagreed with her sister when she had cast him out of their former home in Everfree Castle. Silently she resolved to at least attempt to find him and renew their family relationship on her part once this was over.

“Very well then, the second option will be much more intensive on you and I, and has the slight chance of inciting a panic amongst the populace. That being said, the second option as I see it would be to harness both our power sources at their peak by causing a solar eclipse. Harnessing such power would allow Nightmare to channel much more strength than usual through our link, that I might be able to help you break her bonds.”

“Luna, it has been over fifteen hundred years since we last performed an eclipse together. And the last one in recorded history was when Nightmare tried to block the sun from rising. Although I can see how it would help you can Nightmare not help us herself?”

"Neigh sister, the binds of Harmony prevent her from using all but the most basic flickers of magic. Most of what she can do is to send me a slow trickle of power through our link."

"Much as I would love to help out in getting Luna restored, not even an eclipse would allow me to break out from within. What we suggest is to apply accelerated corrosion and stress on the chains while they are physically present. While it is a neat trick to be able to summon me from Luna's mind, our true objective was to make the chains binding me physical so that we could work against them."

Nightmare stood by to allow Celestia to process their plan. It was important that the two lunar alicorns stood unified in their plan, should any dissonance be detected Celestia would surely sweep in and propose anything that did not involve such dramatic actions involving her baby sister.

"What we propose sister is to use the differing polarity effects of our natural energy signatures to pass waves of alternating energy over the entire array of chains. In so doing we shall be able to wear down their magic and break them as one would any other material."

"Like bending a paper clip back and forth until it snaps then." Celestia's eyes lit up with her realization.

"Aye sister, provided this 'paper clip' thou speakest of is a metallic object." Luna questioned her sister with a tilt of her head.

"Yes Lulu, sorry for using an example you are unfamiliar with. Your plan sounds surprisingly simple for such a problem." Celestia smiled lightly.

"But the best solutions are always the most simple dear sister!" Luna exclaimed happily.

Both sisters looked over with a start as they heard a groan and a loud rattle of chains next to them. Nightmare had collapsed to her belly under the weight of her burden and was panting slightly. Luna rushed to hear side although there was not much she could do since she had no physical presence. Celestia joined her sister and attempted to make sure that Nightmare was not suffering too much.

"The hour grows late upon our plight sister. Now is the time for action, how soon dost thou think an eclipse can be arranged?"

“I will make the announcement tomorrow at court. I will give the populace two days to make arrangements, and to try to prevent any undo panic at such a rare event. In the mean time I would appreciate it if you would get some rest for yourself, if we are to do this then we will need all the strength you can muster. Nightmare, can you hold out in the meantime?”

"Do not underestimate my power Celestia. If you need two more days to make your preparations, then I will endure. These damned chains will not defeat me quite yet." Nightmare wheezed out between deep breaths.

With a concerned look, Celestia bid her sister to begin the shutdown of her spell. There was much to be done and accounted for in the following days, and everything needed to be just perfect for this all to be pulled off. Nightmare seemed genuine in her sentiments, and that was something Celestia could appreciated despite her sharp wit. Their plan, while simple, seemed like the best option available. Stubborn pride would not allow her to reach out to her brother for help, and that meant that this process would likely require all of her available power and then some. In her mind, a great mental checklist was being drawn up. After all, it had been a thousand years since she or anypony else had experienced an eclipse.

Comments

[Attemborough]

I really enjoy this story. ^^

Royal Sisters' brother who tried to make a normal pony to immortal one?
It reminds me another advanture fim-fiction.
That does not matter.

The writings about the chains (sounds like karma) bond to NMM is great.

I'll keep reading. GJ!

[CommanderX5]

I must agree with Nightmare on one think, Celestia sure count on elements to solve all of her problems.