New Moon Rising

by Lighthawk

Prologue

The door to her bedchamber opening woke Princess Luna. She blinked her eyes tiredly, her mind groggy from being roused so suddenly. She quickly quashed some rather uncouth thoughts before they could make their way to her mouth to be voiced. Surely nopony would so boldly enter her quarters unannounced without a dire reason to do so.

The Princess of the Night sat up even as light filled the room, stabbing unkindly at her eyes. She squinted towards the doorway, but her vision showed her only a trio of indistinct forms.

“Pray thou has a suitable explanation for this intrusion,” Luna groused. She groaned as the light brightened, and gave up on waiting for her eyes to adjust naturally. A quick spell to shade her gaze from the worst of the glare flowed from her horn, and the details of her unexpected guests sprang into clear focus.

“Sister, I do apologize, but we must hurry!” Celestia told her in a near frantic tone. If the unfamiliar emotion in her sister’s voice was not sufficient, the Sun Princess’s appearance was certainly enough to banish all thoughts of sleep from Luna’s head.

“Sister, what has happened to thou?” Luna inquired, trying to take in all that she was seeing. Celestia was a mess, her mane and tail disheveled, her normally luminescent coat dulled and ruffled. Worst of all was the horrible black mark upon her horn that looked as if she had been badly burned. A pair of royal guards stood beside Celestia, looking as battered as their ward, with great dents visible upon their armor.

“No time!” Celestia barked. “Canterlot is under attack!"

“What!” Luna yelped, leaping from her bed. “But the shield…”

“Has fallen, quickly now, we must rally the guard!”

Princess Luna did not waste time on further words. Her gaze snapped over to where her regalia sat upon her dresser. There was no time for the entire ensemble, but she used her magic to snatch her crown from the cushion it rested upon. It more than anything else was the symbol of her authority.

“Hurry!” Celestia commanded, and Luna rushed to her sister’s side even as she jammed the tiara down on her head. The Sun Princess moved to give Luna a clear line to the door, and she took the opening without hesitation.

She barely felt the spell form before it struck her full upon the horn, and blinding pain flashed through the spiraling length to stab cruelly into her mind. She must have blacked out for a moment, because when her eyes snapped back open Luna found herself sprawled upon the floor just outside her bedroom, but she could not recall falling.

She tried to move, but agony kept her pinned to the ground as spots of color flashed across her vision. Her heart was thundering in her ears, and a nauseating, burning scent was attacking her nose.

“See, simple. Just as I said it would be,” Celestia’s voice drifted into her ears from some great distance, the words tinted with a self-congratulatory smugness.

Luna’s mind whirled as she tried to understand, but the magical strike at her horn had left her brain woefully out of sorts. Celestia had attacked her, had used her trust to catch her unawares and unprepared, and struck at her in as debilitating a manner as possible short of killing her. It didn’t make any sense, and her thoughts just refused to move beyond demanding to know why.

“Gather her up now,” Celestia’s voice ordered, and Luna felt herself being lifted. She hung limply, her limbs impossibly heavy as she was hoisted unceremoniously between the two guards. “Hurry now, I’d like to get her sent off before she can recover.”

Luna felt her mouth open to demand, to ask, to beg even to know why, but the words came out so garbled even she wasn’t certain what she had tried to say. Her addled mind however finally managed to find something to latch onto. She was being sent away. Celestia was getting rid of her, was going to take her and…

Memories flooded her mind, the nightmare that so often woke her, the terrible existence that had been her life for a millennium. Desolate, barren rock and dirt that burned with agonizing brilliance, that froze with awful darkness. The endless loneliness, her ears empty of any sound, her nose void of any scent, her lungs straining for a breath that could not come. The poison that screamed in her mind and fed her terrible images of vengeance and madness.

“No!” Luna screamed, the word distorted but strong. “I won’t go back!” She thrashed in sudden panic, straining against the guards holding her. She sucked in a heavy breath, and put everything she had into her Voice. “I WON’T GO BACK!”

The guards flinched away from her in pain, staggering as they tried to raise hooves to bleeding ears. The lanterns upon the walls shattered, flaming oil falling into blazing trails to pool upon the stone floor. The dancing light sent wild shadows racing across the walls and filled the air with acrid fumes.

Before her Luna saw Celestia pushing herself off a wall, her face dazed and surprised. Her eyes turned towards her sister, and a pulse of sickly green power flared up her horn. The Princess of the Night didn’t pause to wonder at the oddity of the aura’s color, but struck fast.

Her own horn was still too raw, too freshly injured to risk battle magic with, but she had always known better than to rely on her magic for everything. The first thing anypony would do if they sought to fight her would be to strike at her horn. She was no unicorn though, to be rendered helpless without her magic. She was an alicorn, and was possessed of the best of all the pony races. And at that moment it was the strength of the earth that was to best serve her.

Luna spun, planting her front hooves firmly, and lashed out with her rear legs in a pair of savage kicks. One hoof caught Celestia upon the shoulder, no doubt painful but unlikely to be debilitating. The other however caught her in the ribs with a very satisfying crack, and the aura of magic around Celestia’s horn flickered out as she collapsed.

As she fell, the Sun Princess was suddenly engulfed in brilliant green flames, and Luna made a quick retreat. The same witch fire blazed around the guards, and what emerged from the unnatural inferno was not her sister or her guards.

They were not ponies, even if they shared similar form and stature. An eerie black carapace encase them, with angrily humming wings and fang filled mouths. The faux Celestia was of a size to match the genuine article, but thinner, longer necked, with a wickedly hooked horn and an unhealthy looking mane.

“Get her!” The imposter princess screamed, her horn blazing with power. Luna ducked as a blast of energy shot her way, blowing a hoof sized hole through the wall as it streaked right by her head. The former guards launched themselves at her, droning like the oversized insects they resembled.

Luna quickly decided that this was a fight she wanted no part of. She turned and ran, doing her best to ignore the persistent throbbing pain that flared in her skull with each step. Another bolt of magical energy flashed by her, so close it left an burning trail across her flank. She started in panic, her skin crawling as she realized what a target she was presenting in the long hallway that lead from her quarters. She’d never make it to the end, not before she was brought down by magic or physical force.

‘Stop reacting, start thinking!’ Luna’s mind screamed at her, her thoughts racing, trying to dig up any and all memories she could of battle. She and Celestia had not grown up in peaceful times. Equestria had not always been a tame and carefree land, and more than a few wars had consumed the fledging kingdom before it had been united under the royal sisters’ rule. The soft times of the current age had made her let her guard down, but she was not going to just roll over and give up after everything she’d endured to permit such a peaceful age to exist in the first place.

‘Think, plan…’ Luna’s thoughts crystalized, taking in her situation, her surroundings, her enemies, and her own state of being. ‘…act.’

She skidded to a sudden halt, spinning on two hooves and dropping low. A bolt of emerald power cut through the air where her head had been a half second ago, followed closely by the pony sized monstrosities. Too closely in fact, her unexpected reversal catching them off guard. They reacted as any flying creature would when presented with the sudden realization of an immediate impact, and strained to change course around the obstacle.

Luna was happy to assist them with the maneuver. The faster of the two dove to her left, just barely managing to squeeze between her and the wall. Her wing snapped out the instant he passed alongside her, pushing him away with a firm but entirely harmless shove. His impact into the wall however was anything but harmless, especially at his current speed. The first thud of his crash was swiftly followed by several others as he bounced and rolled his way down the hall.

The second pursuer tried to swerve to her right, but she lowered her head and shifted into his path, swinging her head hard. She caught him with the side of her horn, an impact that made her see spots as fresh pain lanced through her skull, but she ignored it. She put all her weight and strength into the blow, and almost laughed as her aim turned out to be true. The creature was flung from her horn, and smashed gracelessly through the window Luna had tossed him towards.

“No no no!” The injured creature screamed from the end of the hallway, flinging more power her way, but it was too late. Luna leapt through the opening, her wings snapping open and back. She dove for speed, the wind quickly reaching a roaring rush in her ears as she slowly leveled out in a long, swallow arc.

A momentary exhilaration bubbled up in her chest, the thrill of survival, of coming out of a contest of life and death still breathing. It was quickly quashed however as she surveyed the outside of the castle. Shining Armor’s protection shield was gone, and in its place was a swarm of creatures just like those she had just escaped. The gleeful rush of victory turned into a leaden weight around her heart as she saw the creatures diving into the city streets, smashing their way into homes and shops as they chased after frightened and fleeing ponies.

"...what did I miss?" Luna asked in bewilderment at the spectacle. Part of her was raging to fling herself into the fray, to lash out at the monsters that had dared to attack her beloved kingdom, to save the innocent ponies that looked up to her and her sister for guidance and protection.

The more practical part heartlessly pointed out that saving a few ponies and cracking a few skulls would not save Canterlot from this invasion. Even if she had been at full strength, she could not take on an entire army herself. She had to think of the bigger picture, the cold, logical, heart ripping bigger picture. She needed help. She needed to find Celestia and as many of the guard as she could rally if they were to drive their enemy from the city.

As much as it pained her to do so, Luna turned a deaf ear to the cries echoing through the streets, turned a blind eye to the panicked figures running for their lives. She locked her heart away to embrace the clear, clean, terrible logic the situation called for.

"Forgive me children." She dipped a wing, turning towards the royal palace, and hoped she could find the aid she needed swiftly.

Comments

[BradtheBrony]

Wasn't expecting you to come up with a new story this quickly after putting "The Herd" on hiatus. And I must say, what a throughly exciting way to begin a new tale! If you keep up this level of professionalism and detail, I suspect a well deserved "Featured" for you in the future (which in turn will have MORE people checking out the awesomeness of "The Herd"). Cannot wait for the next chapter!

Edit: Also seems I am first to comment on this... huh, that's never happened lol. ACHIEVEMENTS EARNED: Top of the Pile; Cliched "First" Winner, Overdone Achievement Meme.

[Lighthawk]

1496109

Thank you for the kind words. I think I got this out fast simply by being excited to try something new. I'm going to do what I can to keep people from waiting too long between chapters. Hope you keep enjoying.