Hilarity Ensues when a Hitman tries to foalnap and kill Nyx. Emphasis on "tries". A parody of Nyx Torturefics.
Cruel Knife, the most sadistic of Equestria’s hitponies, is looking forward to his next job: The foalnapping torture and murder of the reincarnated Nightmare Moon, an alicorn demigoddess who is immortal and whose special talent relates to her near indestructibility, and who is rabidly protected by her mother the most magically powerful unic…. wait hold on … run this by me again? There might be a slight flaw to this plan…
Also I could never bring myself to actually read a " Nyx gets tortured" story, so technically I'm parodying a subgenre of stories I have never read. GuysIdontknowwhatimdoing.jpg
Much thanks to my able editor PreytorFenix whose incisive editing made this a much better story. All errors remain my own.
Cruel Knife grimaced happily as his thoughts turned fondly to the instruments of his wicked trade. Sharp knives, maces, brutal aluminum bats, gory gelding devices.
On the sling resting on his back was a large sack, upon which four spells had been placed. The first expanded the carrying capacity of the sack.. expanding it out unto a magically induced pocket dimension which made it bigger on the inside than it seemed from the outside. In fact, two large earth pony stallions could be stashed away without producing a visible bulge.The second spell artificially lightened the weight, making it easy to carry. The third one soundproofed the bag. The fourth was the most important one, for it insulated the sack by disrupting any scrying or locator spells that might be used by anyone attempting to find his victim, as well as stopping any attempts to teleport in or out of the bag.
In the pockets of the cloak he wore Cruel Knife carried several items which, at first glance, appeared to be merely rings, but in reality were powerful magic suppressors that when placed upon a Unicorn’s horn, took away their ability to cast magic.
Cruel Knife was a Unicorn, and he specialized in Unicorns, long viewed by the small bloody fraternity of Equestria’s hit-ponies as the most dangerous game to catch. Even the ruthlessly efficient Icepony preferred not to take hits on Unicorns. All the better then, for the long term profitability of Cruel’s business model.
It was an odd assignment, given to him by what appeared to be a little filly. She had obscured her appearance with a cloak… but she was so obviously young that Cruel was sure she herself was not beyond elementary school. Discord only knew how in Equestria she had tracked him down. But her moneybag was full of real solid gold bits, and that was what mattered. How and where she had obtained it he didn't care, but based on the crown shaped cutie mark he had spotted on her flank when her cloak had momentarily slipped, she probably came from money herself.
Cruel Knife loved his work. He would probably be a serial killer anyways, but he was wise enough to know that if one was good at something you never did it for free. And ending a dispute between two rich fillies –ending it permanently- was something that he could easily do. For the right price, duly paid. Though honestly, his main motivation had never been money but rather power…to hold a pony’s life in his hooves, the begging, the pleading. Cruel licked his lips in anticipation. This little spoiled unicorn would probably have grown up with nannies and servants and a plush spoiled life… oh how her world would turn today.
Cruel waited… he stood on the city’s most elegant avenue,near one of Manehattan’s prime hotels,where his target and her family were staying. The hustle and bustle of the street helped hide him from hotel security or any other set of curious prying eyes. He was a professional and knew how to melt into the endless stream of activity. He awaited his quarry, keeping an eye out for the dragon servant – a dragon servant! Imagine that! Even such a jaded pony as Cruel Knife was had to marvel at such an extravagance.The information he had indicated that at present, the dragon servant and the little white unicorn were running errands together… find the dragon and the target would only be a few paces away.
Suddenly….There!..the dragon..a small one, very young, walking on two feet, and next to him the gleaming white filly.They seemed absorbed in their respective activities and were barely paying attention to their surroundings. It would be easy enough, then, for Cruel Knife to position himself within striking distance.
All he had to do was get his hooves on her, put her in the sack and teleport straight to his lair.Cruel moved quickly through the crowd…inching ever closer and closer.. The dragon was presently consulting a map while the filly barely listened to the dragon, utterly absorbed, as she was, in reading the book that floated in front of her.
In a moment it was all over…
"yel-" *CRACK*.Spike turned around just in time to see Nyx’s book hover in mid air before landing wide open pages down on the street. “Nyx! Nyx!” He called. But in the hustle and bustle of the street, among the endless stream of commerce, Nyx was nowhere to be found. Spike panicked. He had good reason to, for the cracking sound he had just heard was exactly like the sound caused by the sudden collapse of air into the vacuum left behind when a unicorn disapparates through teleportation. Spike had sadly, too much experience with these kinds of situations, since both Twllight and Nyx were frequent targets for kidnappings and attacks by mad cultists, political radicals and the like.
This ever present threat was why the headband Nyx was wearing had been encoded with a special locator spell, a spell that was designed to work through a completely verbal incantation, so as to not require a horn thusly allowing any magical creature to use it. Spike de Draco muttered the incantation perfectly…. Checking first the map of Manehattan he had in his hand, and then the small map of Equestria on the map’s back for the telltale blinking sign that marked Nyx’s location …. But there was nothing.
Don’t panic! He muttered to himself as he looked around and ….there! Whomever took Nyx left behind her saddlebags.He opened them and took out parchment and pen. He began to write
Dear Twilight Sparkle/ Princess Celestia/ Princess Luna/ Princess Cadence/ Prince Shining Armor/ Discord/ any and all of the Elements of Harmony:
Nyx has apparently been kidnapped! Yes. Again.
Yours truly:
Spike De Draco.
“All right” he muttered to himself as he took in breath. When he breathed out, he would release his dragonfire, at which point, the scroll would make eleven copies of itself, plus the original,one of which would then go to each of his twelve addressees. Reinforcements would undoubtedly arrive within seconds.
He breathed out.
What arrived within seconds were twelve scrolls marked “ Return to sender”.
Befuddled, Spike unfurled one of them only to find a note attached to it through a clear plastic tape of a kind that relied on polymer manufacturing technology that could not possibly exist judging from the known technological development of Equestrian industry.
The note read:
Dear Spike De Draco:
Twilight Sparkle/Celestia/Luna/Cadence/Shining Armor/Discord and the Elements of Harmony have, through a series of bewildering coincidences much too contrived for the readers to ever believe- and thus never to be explained or described- been rendered completely unavailable for the remainder of this fanfic. For extra safety’s sake,we have also removed Cheerilee and Big Mac, since certainly at least one of the readers is currently willing you to contact them . The reason is that any of these characters are rather powerful and much too attached to Nyx .
You see this is a “Nyx gets horribly tortured” story… a subgenre of fanfiction that for reasons the writer will make only too clear in an author filibuster or two is particularly reliant on plot holes, shoddy logic, and contrived circumstances. It is clear and evident that ,If, any of the above characters were in any way shape or form reachable, they would find Nyx and reduce her would-be tormentor into a bloody paste within the time it would take you to finish reading this message. This will not do.
We would also have removed the CMC, but it turns out they actually are relevant to the plot.
Yours Truly, Itsinthescript, Director, Department of Contrived Plots, Only A Northern Song’s Brain.
P.S we just got rid of Spell Nexus as well. I cannot believe we almost forgot him! P.P.S. All your abilities both canonical and fanonical, to go on a growth spurt thus becoming large dangerous and in charge? Yeah we took that away as well. Even you are useless now.
Spike reread the note in panic and confusion several times. So many questions….what in Celestia’s green Equestria was a Fanfic ?... But then suddenly one disheartening realization hit him: No help was coming. The cavalry was not going to arrive any time soon….
Before he was able to realize that in a world mainly inhabited by magical talking horses the cavalry and the infantry would logically be exactly the same thing, Spike became overwhelmed by despair… every reader’s POV became a dramatic overhead crane shot as Spike fell on his knees, raising his skinny fists like ( angry and despairing) antennas to the heavens as he screamed out :
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!
The great Douglas Adams once pointed out that stress is in fact a major health problem throughout the known Universe.
Thus Dear Reader I shall now take a page from Mr. Adams’ book and in the interests of reducing anxiety, inform you that Nyx survives this story in very good shape, suffering from nothing that a few brief therapy sessions won’t successfully deal with.
Of course you should already know this given that Nyx is an immortal Alicorn, a resurrected form of Equestria’s Dark Queen and her special talent is explicitly tied to her near indestructibility. Basically if there is a pony you most definitely do NOT want to physically attack, it would be Nyx .But yet, on the other hand, there seems to be an entire subgenre of Nyx torture fics despite these facts so… here we are.
Cruel apparated with a pop inside his underground workspace. It was cold and sterile with drains scattered throughout the floor to drain away his victim’s precious life fluids as they oozed or gushed from the grievous wounds Cruel would expertly inflict upon their tormented bodies. More importantly it was magically insulated.. unplottable, unscryable, and even if one of his Unicorn victims took off their magical suppressors it would be impossible for them to message for help, let alone teleport out.
The entire place gleamed with malice… electric lights gave the place a dishearteningly sterile glow as the light coldly reflected from the omnipresent metal surfaces. The whole place rather resembled the torture room in David Fincher’s remake of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and not the disheveled and dirty basement of Sugarcube Corner that everyone imagines in situations like this.
Muffled shouts could be heard coming from the sack. Cruel used his magic to ensure the magic suppressant was fully functioning and then, slowly, opened the sack before upending it.
Out tumbled the little white Unicorn.
She wasn’t scared, not yet, that would come later. Cruel knew, that at this moment, this little unicorn would be more angry and outraged than anything else, especially, if, as he believed to be the case, she turned out to be some spoiled noble brat.
“ Let me go” she said in a wavering crystalline voice. “you have made a grave mistake. This kind of has happened to me before. I know this routine all too well” .She ended this proclamation by stomping her little hooves up and down in an adorable little temper tantrum.
Yes, Cruel thought, he would enjoy breaking this one. He would enjoy watching the hope die inside of her long before he saw the life leave those eyes as her blood spilled out unto the floor and down one of the drains…
“This is the end of the road little one” he growled. He looked at her. Despite it all, her hairband still clung to her.
“Let’s take that off” Cruel snarled… his horn lit up ….and his magic utterly failed to grasp the hairband.
That was strange. There seemed to be an enchantment on the headband keeping it on. He tried again. To his satisfaction the unicorn became visibly alarmed when it was clear he intended to take off her hairband. “ No ! leave that on! Leave it alone” She squealed in a Panic.
One last surge of magic and… there! The enchantment broke and the hairband was off….
And then something happened Cruel did not expect…
The pure white coat became mottled and then discolored, as if it were a piece of thin paper placed on top of a large puddle of black ink. The coat gradually changed from a regal white to an equally regal and quite lustrous –indeed the most beautifully lustrous coat Cruel had ever seen- pitch Black.And then quite astoundingly, wings covered in long dark black feathers sprouted from the filly's back.
“You are an Alicorn”… Cruel whispered to himself. Oddly, the feisty personality his victim had displayed as a mere unicorn vanished along with her unicorn disguise.The filly now seemed scared, and was audibly sniffling. She kept her head resolutely down, staring at the floor. Normally Cruel relished when his victims fell into despair,but even his brutish brain thought it odd that a filly would , upon revealing to her captor that she was an alicorn, suddenly become scared. Alicorns were much much stronger than the other pony types combined, he would have expected his prey to use her newly revealed alicorn status in some way, perhaps in an attempt at intimidating him into releasing her.
“ But where are my manners” – Cruel sneered “ what is your name?”
“ Nyx” she wimpered.
“ Look at me Nyx” cruel hissed.
Nyx did not comply.
“ I said LOOK at me .”
Nyx raised her head. Cruel took an involuntary step back.
Her eyes.
She had dragon eyes… turquoise eyes with dragon like slits.
Cruel thought he was seeing things. For a moment his brain told him –correctly– that he was looking at a filly Nightmare Moon. Everything except for the cutie mark was a perfect match. The next moment he thought –incorrectly- that that was an insane thought.
Cruel had been in prison during the time when Nightmare Moon returned,took over Equestria, and declared eternal night… for a couple of weeks. The whole episode was Equestrian history by the time he got out. And Equestria, alas, was not known for the efficacy of its history teachers. Cruel Knife did not know where Nightmare Moon was, imprisoned somewhere probably. Could this be Nightmare Moon’s daughter? - He thought- the Alicorn filly looked much too old for that…but who knew… maybe alicorns aged differently?…
Cruel loved to taunt his victims. To play with them.. to drag it all out. He loved the omnipotence he felt over them. But though he hated to admit it to himself, the truth was that he was becoming increasingly worried. The cloaked filly who had hired him had warned him that his target was powerful… but there were many unicorns that could be called powerful, and there were so many different ways in which such unicorns could be seen as powerful, some much less worrisome than other. But this… an alicorn, any alicorn ,would be phenomenally powerful by themselves , and what is more, would most definitively have phenomenally powerful friends.. This one did not seem to wield any great powers, or if she did she was in no hurry to display them.. but all the alicorns Cruel knew of where royalty… so the friends issue was most definitely still at play.
Best to get this over with quickly. He would make sure to add extra acid to the vat to get rid of this body.
He looked over towards the black alicorn filly, and noted, that she just stood there, unmoving, stock still, sniffling, yes, but still showing enough defiance to stare at him. Most of his victims ,by this point, were running all over the place frantically searching for a way out, but not the little black alicorn filly. She was either really really naïve or…
“ Enough” Cruel growled in the way that one dimensional plot devices in crappy fanfics are wont to. Cruel grasped his bag of tools with his unicorn magic. He walked to a nearby table, keeping his eyes on the alicorn filly. He took out his instruments, wrapped in a cloth,and smiled as he unfurled the cloth. Upon his instruments of death the electric lights brightly gleamed.
“ You, ..Nyx was it? Come here” he hissed in an ever expanding attempt to become a cartoonish cliché.
“You aren’t, you are not afraid of me??” A hushed voice floated over from the alicorn,“...strangers usually are” .
She had said it in the softest sweetest voice… yet Cruel could not help but interpret it as a threat. He could think of no reason anyone would be scared of some snotty little rich filly... and yet he himself could not deny that the little alicorn, not much older than a mere foal, rather unnerved him.
He grabbed her in in his magic, not heeding her calls for him to put her down. She levitated her to a nearby wall… ropes came down from sockets in the corners of the room and attached themselves to her legs, surrounding them in tight loops and forcibly spreading her legs apart... No, reader, that is most definitely NOT where this is going… bad reader, bad bad reader… she was now helpless and vulnerable with arteries and veins exposed and ready to be cut.
Nyx alternated between desperate squealing pleas to be let go and controlled stern demands to be let go that seemed rather imbued with authority for such a small filly. Then again, one does not spend a few weeks as God Empress of Ponykind, however reluctantly, without learning how to demand things. Cruel of course, had no knowledge of that fact. Too bad for him.
“Silence! “Cruel roared, hoping to silence the little filly. But to no avail. Cruel grasped his sharpest scalpel in his magic. Death by a thousand cuts should silence her… or at least turn her whining demands into the much more pleasant gasps and moans of suffering and pain… or the delicious sound of a terrified pony pleading for her life.
The scalpel moved towards one of her creepy-weepy dragon eyes. Nyx flinched at the last second but Cruel Knife's scalpel still managed to dig a good chunk out of one of her eyebrows. She wimpered in pain. Cruel was pleased to see drops of blood splatter unto the white linoleum floor. He grasped her head with his magic and moved closer to look at his handiwork. There was the wound. But then to his utter astonishment the wound closed up… as if an invisible zipper had just sealed itself up. Once again Cruel slashed, leaving a gash across Nyx’s face… but it sealed right up and within a minute the scar itself had disappeared completely.
Cruel was … discomfited… though he was not about to reveal this to his victim.
Cruel moved closer to Nyx. With a quick flick of Cruel's magic a throwing dagger flew towards Nyx’s head. Even for an alicorn, there simply was no time to duck or move. The blade firmly planted itself in her forehead just below her horn …she made no sound.
There was no sound at all.
…except for the sound of the knife clanging onto the floor. Nyx’s forehead was intact. No wound. Cruel could not believe his eyes.. it appeared the young filly’s body had pushed out the blade and closed the wound!
Cruel checked the suppressor. It was still on her horn and still working. There was something in her alicorn nature that made it possible for her to still access her magic.There would be no more playing around. Cruel was done goofing off. Time to finish her off.
With his magic he levitated a pair of magical forceps. With them he forced one of Nyx’s eyes open, the forceps holding the eyelids apart. He then reached with his magical grasp and found a particularly vicious serrated knife with a razor sharp point. Slowly, using the center of the Dragon-slitted iris as his target, he brought the knife to bear against Nyx’s eyeball, intending to skewer through it and onwards to her brain. The little filly strained against her restraints… finally the blade neared the eye.. its sharp cruel form reflected on the glistening eyeball.. it made contact with the cornea.. and the blade-made of reinforced steel-bent outward like a limp noodle. It caused not even the smallest dent on the eye itself.
Cruel was dumbstruck. So dumbstruck that he did not notice Nyx’s eyes begin to glow white, or her eyelids crumble the metal forceps like it was made of paper.
Nor did Cruel Knife notice that her mane began to ebb and flow like it was underwater, pulsating with currents of ethereal energy. What Cruel did not know (nor Nyx for that matter) was that Princess Luna had installed a “ fail safe” within the spell she had used to de-power Nyx. Knowing full well that the former Nightmare Moon would become a walking target, the spell would temporarily and partially revert itself if Nyx was in Mortal danger, thus allowing her to access her powers in order to defend herself.
“ENOUGH!!!!!!!” Nyx thundered in the Royal Canterlot Voice, stunning herself, to say nothing of Cruel Knife who was staring at her with full rapt open mouthed attention.
. At that precise moment her bindings decided to spontaneously catch fire… molten liquid metal dripping to the floor. Finally she floated unto the middle of the room and gently put herself on the ground. She disapparated with a *Pop*, because to Tartarus with anti-apparition wards and unscryable locations that were magically sealed… they meant nothing to a pissed off and terrified little Alicorn Demigoddess.
Ten Days Later, Nyx and Spike walked the streets of Ponyville, en route to Sweet Apple Acre, where they would check on Apple Bloom. Despite the fact that all the adult relatives out to the third degree of the Elements of Harmony had mysteriously disappeared , there was no panic,nor even increased security patrols. Why? Because the writer of this story is lazy and wants to get on with it.
“ It is truly strange” Nyx remarked “It has been ten days since my latest kidnapping attempt and the simultaneous dissappeareance of the elements , my school teacher, and most of the families of two of my closest friends.. and somehow it is only today that we decided we should go collect Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle and have them stay with us In the Library until... whatever this is ...is dealt with,.”
“ Yeah it Is odd isn’t it” Spike concurred “ like the idea didn’t even cross our minds until this morning”. Nyx frowned before speaking. “ Come to think of it Spike, we have been acting rather oddly..I am starting to think there may have been something in those pastries you found the day after my most recent kidnapping You know, at Sugarcube Corner, when you were looking for Pinkie Pie”?
“ Oh you mean the Idiot Balls, Nyx?”
“ Yes Those! Precisely! They were rather delicious… but I wonder if they were laced with something” “Yeah" Spike concurred," it probably wasn’t my best idea to start eating pastries that I found in Pinkie’s bedroom immeadiately after Pinkie herself had mysteriously vanished”
“ You know the other thing” Nyx continued, for as the last of the Idiot Balls were metabolized out of her system , her mental faculties, which given both her unique origin and home environment were rather prodigious, sharpened by the moment, “The other thing that strikes me as odd is that no one seems to be panicking. According to the letters you received, both Princess Celestia and Princess Luna are unable to communicate with anyone...and as far as we know no one has in fact heard from them, yet there is no panic or in fact any acknowledgement what so ever that anything is out of the ordinary.’
“I guess it is because the sun and the moon are keeping to the schedules posted in the Earth Pony Almanac which probably means that Celestia and Luna are still in control of them. Odd that they still have control of them but cannot communicate with us in any way…”Spike said.
"Well I suppose that is true” Nyx said.. “ but it cannot possibly be the case that the population has failed to notice that Miss Cherilee is missing, or Rarity, or mom for that matter.
'I had a bad dream last night.I dreamt that I was a character stuck in a badly written story. The basic premise was something totally ridiculous.. I don’t remember what it was… but like nothing made sense… like the writer did not fully consider all the consequences of the main events of the story… and instead of working them out, he claimed that his story was very “ meta” and so the lack of logic was “humorous” as long as he made it clear to his readers that he was aware of the problems in his story, instead of actually doing anything to remedy…”
... “ Look we are almost there” Spike interrupted, Indeed, Exposition Lane ( for that was the name of the road that led to Sweet Apple Acres) was soon reaching its end… one final turn and the farmhouse would be in view.
And there it was. Nyx’s breath caught in her throat the moment she saw the farmhouse… there were no signs of life… and what was worse the front door had been wrenched clean off of its hedges and deposited many feet away.It was a clear clean break. No earth pony could kick it off so cleanly, no this was the work of a magically powerful unicorn well versed in offensive magic. Nyx was now running ever faster and faster … frantically yelling out Apple Bloom’s name… she scrambled towards the stairs noting in passing that the kitchen was a complete shambles... the living room was sacked… even the little office where Big Macintosh kept track of the farm’s finances was a mess. Nyx rushed up the stairs. She burst into Apple Bloom’s bedroom… What Nyx saw there caused her blood to freeze in her veins. Finally she walked towards the bed…
Right in the middle of Appleblooms bed, a massive and very familiar looking serrated knife was planted smack dab in the middle of the top mattress. Impaled on the knife was an envelope. Even though the hilt of the knife obscured some of the details, Nyx could make out the black spiky writing on the envelope.
Nobody could say that Cruel Knife did not do his job. Nobody could say he shirked his duties. He was a good hitpony, and thorough. Most others would have fled at the prospect of killing an alicorn. Not him.
It could be done. It was possible. It was all a question of hitting them fast… hitting them hard… hitting them from all sides simultaneously, so as to overwhelm the extremely powerful regenerative and restorative magic that granted them their near indestructibility. Trap them inside a booby trapped house full of high explosives for example. Or perhaps spear them with a lance made of some sort of ultra high velocity continuously reforming stream of molten metal.
The Problem was that anything that could take down an Alicorn also took down everything around them for quite a large radius, turning the hit job into a suicide mission. Cruel Knife was a professional, not a fanatic. He was not into suicide missions. There was, perhaps, another way. Ponies, especially young ones, often lost control of their magic if placed under immense emotional stress. Overload the young Alicorn filly with emotional suffering, and her magical powers may go on the fritz, leaving her vulnerable.
Cruel Knife was thorough. He did his research. He travelled to Canterlot to visit the massive archives of the Equestrian Government. There he found Nyx’s identity card. It listed her address as the Golden Branches Library, Ponyville. A cross check of that address revealed that Golden Branches had a live in librarian, who, it further turned out, was none other than Twilight Sparkle.
That certainly complicated things. Cruel was not into politics or history.. but he knew enough to know that Twilight Sparkle was very close to Princess Celestia… and he had heard rumors that she was the most magically powerful unicorn in Equestria… perhaps even the third most magically powerful Pony- just a cut below the Royal Sisters themselves. It was clear that if his plans were to work, Nyx had to be separated from Twilight.
Cruel Went to the Equestrian National Library, a few blocks from the Archives. There he looked up archived copies of The Ponyville Gazette, a once every 2 weeks local interest newspaper that covered Ponyville events, usually farmer’s markets, school fairs and other matters that seem trivial to outsiders but form the lifeblood of tight-knit small communities. He looked up every issue Since Luna’s Return, on the theory that any Pony that lived with Twilight Sparkle, would show up standing next to her in a photograph at some point.
Cruel took out a pencil, levitating it to the note pad he had brought with him. He wrote down “Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom, and Scootaloo”. Now he knew how to separate Nyx from Twilight Sparkle. Now he knew how to get her to come to him. Now he knew just how he would break her.
Apple Bloom strained at her restraints, not for the first time. Being an earth pony who led a life of exercise and physical labor, she was extremely strong for such a young filly. And yet this time, like all the times before when she had attempted this, the restraints budged not a millimeter.
Next to her was Sweetie Belle, straining at her own bounds while looking forlornly at the tip of her horn, where the magic suppressor that Cruel Knife had fitted on her rested, mocking her by its very existence. Gags had been placed across both their mouths after Sweetie Belle’s attempts at lifting their spirits through singing had gotten on Cruel Knife’s nerves. Apple Bloom's warnings to Cruel had been a factor as well, though on the whole Cruel was thankful for the revelations put forth through the little earth pony’s bravado. She kept telling him that Nyx was the most loyal of friends. That she would track them down and rescue her. That Nyx would happily place her life at risk to defend her friends. Perfect.
He had kidnapped Both Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom with ease. Upon learning of their close relations with two of the Elements of Magic, he had set out to track them and then wait for an opportune moment in which to ambush them. But strangely, their families were nowhere to be seen. Upon seeing that both of the fillies seemed to spend much of their time eating a type of pastry that was apparently called “Idiot balls", Cruel procured a box of the treats from an apparently abandoned pastry shop and laid out a trail of them to trap first one filly and then the other .
He then went to both Sweet Apple Acres and Carousel Boutique and left behind written detailed instructions for Nyx. She was to come here, alone. The letters had an embedded teleportation spell that when activated, would instantly transport Nyx to his subterranean torture room… but only if she spoke the spell aloud while alone in a room. This was an attempt to stop her from bringing anyone else along. Cruel had no way of knowing whether or not Twilight Sparkle could subvert such a protection, but he figured the answer was “probably” so there were also highly descriptive threats of what would happen to her friends if she did not go along and come alone.
Cruel had woven one last spell into the notes. It would tell him when somepony was using magic to read the note or activate the spell, thus giving him time to set the trap. The moment Nyx arrived he would begin torturing the other fillies in front of her, hopefully causing her to breakdown, giving him his chance to strike.
His end of the portkey was inside a steel cage lined with anti-teleportation spells. The young alicorn had already showed her ability to somehow break through these spells, but this was a feat that would probably demand a great deal of concentration from such a young filly. Cruel was thorough, and knew this was probably the most dangerous hit of his career… and thus it would be his greatest. He had taken precautions. Aimed at the spot the filly would appear was a magical detector that would be able to measure the amount of magical output that would emanate from her. A slow continuous buildup might indicate she was about to attack or escape ,but what Cruel was looking for was a wild fluctuation... a sign the filly had lost control.
Either way there was a button in a table very close to cruel that he would push if he detected an imminent attack, escape or loss of control. It was marked “detonate”. Pushing it would simultaneously detonate the six shape charges that surrounded each side of the cage, its top and its bottom, filling the space of the cage with crisscrossing streams of hot molten metal travelling at supersonic speed.. hopefully enough to overwhelm the young alicorn.
Between the booby trapped cage and Cruel was a pane of clear, nearly invisible reinforced Crystal he had obtained at great cost from a specialized manufacturer in the Crystal Empire. It would be strong enough to stop magical blasts and to protect Cruel from shrapnel from the expected blast.. yet allow sound through. And sound and vision were vital, for it was crucial that Nyx witnessed the suffering Cruel would visit upon her friends. Only by watching Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom suffer, would Nyx enter the level of despair that would cause her to lose control of her magic making her vulnerable, making her mortal.
A small alarm went off, informing Cruel that the magic detector had detected a change… turning he saw the portkey in the cage had begun to glow… meaning the other one was being activated. His target would soon be here.
It had not been easy for Nyx to convince Spike to stay behind. But the lives of two of her closest anddearest friends were at stake.
Nyx owed so much to Apple Bloom Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. They had taken her in during those first early days at school. Then stood by her side when she revealed her Alicorn nature to them. But most crucially, they had reached out to her at the moment she needed it most. They had risked life and limb to get to her, when she had been in Nightstone Castle, a lonely queen on her cold lifeless throne. Those three fillies motivated solely by love for their friend, smuggled themselves into probably the most dangerous place in Equestria at the time, into the manticore’s den, into the very heart of the beast, just to visit her. To see her. To be with her. And most importantly, to offer her a choice.
It was, of course, the same choice that Celestia had laid out to her while her neck was on the line, literally an inch from the wrong end of Nightmare Moon’s mystical sword. Even Twilight, who Nyx loved more than any other pony, to whom she owed her ultimate loyalty, couldn’t get her to see this choice, despite her constant pleading. After all, Twilight and Celestia were Nightmare Moon’s natural enemies, of course they would try to do everything possible to remove Equestria’s Dark Queen from her throne.
But these girls? They were no one’s enemies. They were Nyx’s Friends. And they got through. They punched through the wall. With their love and their loyalty and their unbridled curiosity. Sure an armor piercing question regarding her cutie mark had helped… but it was their very presence that really did it. Just by being there they had reminded her of a simple stunning fact. She already had had everything Nightmare Moon had ever wanted. She was loved, respected, seen as her own mare. As Luna , Nightmare Moon had not been able to step out of the shadow Celestia cast. But as Nyx, exorcised from Luna, given her own body, given a second chance, she had been able to make true friends. She had been granted a choice,a profoundly ironic choice: she could act like Nightmare Moon, behave in the way she was expected to and by doing so prevent herself from ever being truly loved, or, if the possibility were somehow still available, she could go back to being little Nyx, and by doing so actually achieve all the things that Nightmare Moon had truly wanted, to fulfill those emotional needs that had caused Luna to create Nightmare Moon in the first place, to finally achieve fulfillment in the most thorough way: by living out her very reason for being. But she could only do this, by shedding the mantle, the name, and the claims of Nightmare Moon.
It had been an amazing turn of events really, Nightmare Moon reborn, given a second chance, raised as a daughter by the loving hooves of the very pony who had led the team of extraordinary mares that had exorcised her from Luna. But Twilight was nowhere to be found now. Neither was Rarity, whom Nyx viewed as almost an Aunt, nor any of the other Elements . Nor was her actual Aunt, Cadance, available, or for that matter Luna or Celestia. No, for all Nyx could see the only pony in all of Equestria that had any chance of rescuing Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom was Nyx herself. She was going in. Even though she knew full well she was heading straight into a trap.
Apple Bloom fretted . She couldn’t talk since she had been gagged. She idly wondered, whether or not should have been clearer when she had been able to talk. She told their attacker that he would be sorry.She knew he was trying to lure Nyx in for some reason or other. Apple Bloom wondered… should she have told him that Nyx was Nightmare Moon? Would that have stopped him? No Apple Bloom concluded. Nyx’s former Identity had caused her to become a walking target in the past. If their captor did not already know Nyx was Nightmare Moon giving him that piece of information would probably only make him more determined to hurt her.
A screaming came across the room. It had happened before, but only when the device was being tested.
This was not a test. This was the real deal.
Cruel Knife stared intently at the trap. There was nothing in the cage yet, but the magic detector sitting next to it was blaring its alarm. It meant the spell was being read and the little black alicorn was incoming. Then suddenly a swirling mist appeared within the trap… and then, finally, with a small flash of light and a pop the Alicorn Filly appeared within the trap. She stomped her hooves most adorably within the trap.. then slammed herself against the bars.. but all to no avail.
Cruel summoned the form of the bound white Unicorn near him. He placed her near the crystal wall..to make sure the little alicorn would have a clear view of what he was about to do to her.
The table with his instruments of death hovered near.Cruel used his magic to call a hacksaw to him.Unicorn horns were very sensitive. slowly sawing off this little filly’s unicorn would cause her untold amounts of pain.Sweetie Belle’s eyes looked at him in utter terror as he put the hacksaw at the base of the little filly’s horn and drew its full length across its base once.. just enough for the teeth to penetrate the base of the horn. Sweetie was bound and gagged, but anyone seeing her facial contortions would be in no doubt of the amount of pain she was experiencing.
SHRREEEEEEEEEEEE … The magical alarm blared. There had been an enormous surge of magic in the trap. Nyx had already lost control... time to detonate. The alicorn had to die first. Not much fun, but she was too dangerous not to kill quickly. He would have his fun later with the alicorn’s friends.
Cruel looked at his table of instruments, only to realize he had left the detonator behind. It now lay near the orange farmer filly. Cruel looked in that direction and grasped the detonator with his magic. He turned around to look at the trap as he depressed the button… but it was too late.
The bars of the cage were bent outward, something having clearly burst its way out of it. Cruel wondered where the alicorn filly had gone.
Suddenly, the crystal wall went opaque. What appeared to be a mass of swirling purple smoke completely covered the wall. The vapor condensed in the corner closest to where Sweetie Belle lay bound. A circular spot in the crystal wall, right where the fog was densest began to glow… and before Cruel’s uncomprehending eyes, the crystal itself began to melt, pooling around the floor, until a hole just big enough for an adult pony was created, melted right out of the wall itself.
Moving at blinding speed the smoke wrapped around Sweetie Belle and in a blink of an eye left Sweetie unbound and free. The Smoke whipped around Cruel and headed towards the earth pony farmer filly. In a moment it enveloped her and then whipped away. Like Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom was now also free of all her restraints.
The smoke then whipped towards Cruel. Like an arrow it headed straight towards the befuddled hitpony whose mind totally lacked the most rudimentary comprehension of what he was seeing. He didn’t even think of teleporting away.
The cloud of ethereal energy connected with his chin like a punch from the hoof of a championship boxer, Lifting Cruel up for four or five feet and splaying him backwards. Cruel landed on his back and blacked out for perhaps ten seconds. Upon awakening he scrambled to his hooves. He ran for the hole in the crystal wall and squeezed through it. Once he was past it and had put a few pony body lengths between him and the wall, He stopped. He caught his breath and turned around… only to see the purple smoke go right through the hole and to his side of the wall. Cruel just followed the smoke with his eyes until it settled maybe a pony body length in front of him.
The smoke coalesced into a form and finally solidified into the little black alicorn, Nyx.
Cruel had been aware, as a sterile dispassionate academic thought, that the smoke was the alicorn. But to see the smoke become her in the flesh right in front of him reduced whatever minuscule part of his brain had somehow still been working to mush. Not tasty cinammon-accented apple mush mind you, but the most bland and flavorless gruel imaginable, utterly incapable of rational thought. Nor for that matter, capable of any sort of succinct, apposite verbal communication.
“ How .. how did you do that”.. the smoke.. the melting of the crystal... How?!?!?!” Cruel Knife spluttered.
“ I don’t Know” Nyx panted out.. always eager to answer a question from an adult , even in these circumstances…” To be honest, normally I have to concentrate just to lift a spoon or a book with my magic… I am not supposed to be able to do that. Not anymore”.
“ Anymore ???? what the hay do you mean anymore !”
It was absurd! Judging from her size and her friends there was no way the alicorn that stood before him was out of elementary school. And what the hay was with the smoke! Cruel couldn’t think of anything or anyone that could turn into smoke .
But then he remembered that wasn't quite true...he had once read in a particularly fanciful story contained within a book of Old Mare’s Tales that Nightmare Mo…..
If it Looks just like the Dark Demigoddess.
And it Quacks like the Dark Demigoddess..
And it has the Powers of the Dark Demigoddess..
Then it must be…..
And so the cog turned in Cruel’s Brain, and the last piece slammed into place.
“Nightmare Moon”!!! he shrieked pointing his hoof at Nyx.
“Sigh” Nyx sighed. Which was the closest she was going to get to admitting that the cat was pretty much out of the bag.
Cruel tried to calm himself and focus. Okay so this was .. Nightmare Moon…somehow. That means she was not a mystery. She could now be handled. She had to break her..the only way was to attack her ..just after killing her friends in front of her. Kill her friends, then immeadiately attack her. The psychological pain would buy him time… if perhaps only a second.
Cruel floated his instruments of death through the hole in the crystal wall.
Then he grabbed the squealing form of Sweetie Bell…
Only to lose his grasp when the sobbing little Nightmare Moon headbutted him in the chest.
“ Leave My Friends alone!!” Nyx squealed furiously.
“I ‘ll deal with you yet Nightmare” Cruel said while trying again to magically grasp one of the two ponies beyond the wall… but the little black ball of angry dark demigoddess wouldn’t stop hitting him, poking him with her horn or flapping her wings in his face so he could barely see. Finally frustrated Cruel just Bolted. He ran for it, ran for the hole in order to get to the little ponies on the other side. He would worry about his tools later.
Bad Move.
“ STAY AWAY FROM THEM” Nyx roared, scaring and startling herself with this unexpected eruption of the maelstrom of sound known as the Royal Canterlot Voice. Nyx would, later on, when questioned, find herself unable to explain exactly what happened next, except that somehow she just willed that Cruel Knife be as far away from her friends as possible.
Cruel gasped as a magic lifted him up bodily and slammed him straight across the room. In the middle of the room the arc of his path intersected with the metal remains of his explosive laden trap. And then the mess of hitpony, metal and explosives buried itself in the basement wall on the far end drilling itself several pony lengths deep into the soil.
After a few seconds, because there is No Kill Like Overkill, the now unstable explosives in the trap detonated .
Nyx saw a column of fire and debris shoot out of the impact crater on the far end of the wall. In less than a tenth of a second she erected a magical barrier stretching from the floor to the ceiling protecting Nyx and her friends from the debris and the shrapnel.
This magical exertion depleted her reserves. And a few seconds after the smoke cleared, Nyx unceremoniously passed out.
Nyx opened her eyes. Hovering over here where Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle. Apple Bloom’s face was strained with concern. Upon seeing Nyx come to Apple Bloom’s joy was so palpable that Nyx swore she saw a visible wave of relief break over her features.
Then Nyx looked at Sweetie Belle. She bore a warm smile though rings of stress circled her eyes. Then just below Sweetie's horn, Nyx saw matted dried blood and Nyx remembered what had happened to Sweetie at Cruel Knifes Hooves.
“ Sweetie”! your Horn! Does it hurt. Here hold still”. Nyx’s horn glowed as a basic healing spell tended to Sweetie’s wound. It wasn’t much but it helped comfort Sweetie.
Sweetie smiled. “ Nyx thanks, but.. it is only a very shallow cut..”
“ Oh I am going to kick that unicorn’s flank until next week” growled Nyx, “where is he? Girls! WHERE IS HE? Watch out He is dangerous and ..”
“Ah wouldn’t worry about him Nyx”…chirped Apple Bloom pointing behind them.Nyx turned around following Apple Bloom’s Hoof. She saw the hole in the wall. Some smoke and the occasional cinder fell from it.
And then it hit her. Nyx’s face paled and went ashen.
“I killed him” Said Nyx “ oh my Celestia I killed him!” I killed a pony! Ikilledihikilledhimikilledhimkilledhim”
“ Calm Down” said Sweetie belle” calm down or you will hyperventilate… do the breathing exercise Twilight taught you”
Reflexively Nyx began taking deep breaths humming slowly with each exhale, drawing out each exhale as long as possible while making each inhale as deep as possible. It was a breathing exercise Celestia had taught Twilight in order to calm her down. Twilight in turn had passed it down to her daughter, just like she had passed down Smarty Pants. Or for that matter, just like she had passed down the anxious and hyper-excitable temperament that made the breathing exercise so useful in the first place.
“ breathe..breathe,, you will be fine Nyx”
“ Pinkie promise that YOU will be fine Sweetie” “ of course… I promise I will be fine” “ pinkie promise it” “'Cross My Heart, Hope to Fly, Stick a Cupcake in my Eye!”
“Good Sweetie, that means you will watch out and you will take care of yourself, and you will be careful , because you know Pinkie promises cannot be broken. They last … “FOREVER!! Oh hi girls!” Said a maniacally grinning pink ball of energy bouncing around the killing floor of a now deceased serial killer's torture room.
The appearance of said ball of pink poofy mania instantly snapped Nyx out of her fugue state. “ Pinkie! How, how did you get here?!”
“ Oh silly, I felt a tingling around my neck and that always means that someone is about to do a pinkie promise and pinkie promises are serious business so I always have to go and make sure that the parties involved know and are aware of the perpetually binding nature of said oral contract!” Pinkie said in one single breath.
“But Pinkie” Nyx puzzled out loud “ How did you get here… and where have you been”?
“ Oh see there was a really weird moment where I was in Sugarcube corner just mixing together some cake batter and wammo..! suddenly I was in some kind of immaterial plane with Luna and Celestia and all the girls and even Discord was there and we thought it was all Discords fault and but even he was confused but since he was there he started doing magic tricks and it was so funny… but we all kind of worried for a bit and then all of a sudden I noticed that somebody was doing a pinkie Promise so I came over through the swirling vortex of terror and now I can see that all of you look like you have not taken a bath in two weeks and I can feel the end of my tail getting frizzy and you all know what that means? Well of course you don’t because you are not me! so let me tell you when the end of my tail gets frizzy it means that I have recently been subjected to a time distorsion field so even though it felt like five hours it was clearly a lot longer and Oh my! Twilight! hold on Girls…”
Pinkie walked out to the middle of the room.. Nyx looked up and noticed that on the roof directly above where Pinkie was now standing there was now a swirling hole or aperture of some kind with what appeared to be clouds swirling on its edges which was mighty odd since the whole thing was barely wider than a pony. Clearly this was the “ swirling vortex of terror” Pinkie referred to.
Pinkie looked up into the vortex and called out “ Girls! I found a way home!” Then she bent her knees and jumped straight up perfectly perpendicular to the floor, so that the path she traveled upwards formed a 90 degree angle to the floor, and to reality… and to the laws of physics… because Pinkie Pie. She disappeared up and into the vortex. Then about a minute later the vortex bulged, as if something massive was trying to get out through it… and then it opened and disgorged , in one mass, all of the superpowered entities that Spike had tried to contact earlier in this fanfic.
No one interrupted Rarity as she hugged and shook and sobbed over Sweetie Belle.
No one interrupted Applejack as she hugged and sobbed over Apple Bloom.
But above all, the very idea of interrupting a certain purple unicorn as she hugged and sobbed and fretted over her daughter did not even begin to speculate about the mere possibility of crossing the mind of anyone present.
All seemed well. Wounds were being treated. Everyone now sat basking in the warm hearth that burned in the antechamber of Celestia’s private quarters, the antechamber where she entertained her most private visitors, her inner circle, which at this moment included apart from Celestia herself, the elements of Harmony, and two alicorns.. both of whom had once responded to the name of Nightmare Moon… and had long since grown to despise anything associated with that name.
The younger of these Alicorns sat nearest to the hearth next to her mother. To Celestia’s surprise, Twilight left Nyx’s side and trotted towards her . As she passed Celestia, heading towards where the other Elements clustered on the far side of the room, Twilight slightly bowed her head towards the Alicorn of the Sun and whispered.. “she wants to talk to you”. Celestia simply nodded towards Twilight and then looked at Nyx, who stared at her, sniffling. Celestia kept her regal bearing as she trotted over, but she was surprised. Nyx and Celestia’s relationship was hardly warm and conducive to heart to heart soul bearing conversations. “ Polite” was the way Celestia had once described it to Luna. Nyx respected Celestia ( after all few understood the hidden complexities of Celestia’s job better than Nyx!) but for reasons that Celestia understood only too well there was a distance between them. After all it is hard to develop a warm friendship with an adult authority figure that once had you dragged out of your house and away from your mother, even if you understand that said authority figure meant well. Thus it was doubly surprising for Celestia when Nyx looked up at her with a hopeful gaze, that somehow let Celestia know that Nyx looked forward to this conversation, perhaps not in a true feeling of friendship but at the very least in one of necessity.
Celestia extended a protective wing over Nyx , and to the pleased surprise of the Princess of the Sun, Nyx buried her head into her chest, in the way so many ponies had before, but in a way Celestia had secretly feared Nyx might never do. “ What is the problem , My Little Pony?” she spoke in her warm practiced maternal voice.
“ I killed him”… “ Now Nyx, you couldn’t really help it.. ”
“ No listen to me…. When I was ..well Nightmare Moon, I did everything I possibly could not to kill anyone. I had all my possessed advisors telling me to assault this very castle in a “glorious” full frontal assault… Guards who would tell me how they wished to die in glorious battle for the eternal night… and all I wanted to say was … I don’t want anyone to die. Not a one. But I Didn’t say it… I just overruled Spell Nexus and the others… and did it my way. And of course when I was impersonating all the volunteers I befriended hundreds of Royal Guards, and I was fascinated by all the stories they would tell me about their hometowns and their lives and their families… and not only did I not want to harm them, but I vowed secretly to myself that.. when I was queen and they where under my command, I would do everything to keep them safe, to always place myself in harm’s way first, because I was stronger… because I could take it. And then of course when the monsters invaded Ponyville.. I tried to not even kill the monsters!.. but I killed him! The Ponynapper! There must have been some other way I could have defended my friends and spared his life… I failed Princess… I failed..”
“ Nyx, now it is your turn to listen to me” Celestia Interrupted “ There is no sin in killing if you are saving your life or the life of someone else. Now of course if you neutralize the enemy and you then kill him or her that is a different matter altogether.. but as long as there was an imminent threat any force you use that is reasonable is justified… and when the imminent threat is the threat of death then the kind of force that can result in death is itself justified. Now tell me Nyx, did you intend to kill this pony ?
“ No”
“ what did you intend?”
“I just wanted him to be as far away from my friends as possible”. “ Well there you are. You acted without malice. You acted with nothing but the noble desire to protect your friends. You seem to think that you have betrayed your cutie mark, your purpose. But I don’t see it that way. Quite the contrary. You probably saved your friend’s lives. Yet again. You should feel proud of yourself my little pony”.
Dear Princess Celestia:
Thank you.
Nyx
Dear Princess Luna:
Mom says that after a big event, or a new lesson, it always helps her to understand things better ,if she writes or talks to Princess Celestia. Something big just happened to me, as you know, and I need to understand it better myself. Mom told me I should write to you instead of your sister. Because of how much you and I share in common.
Mom says we share a " common identity". She means that you and I share a common name, a common title. A common image. It is not an image you like . I know I don't like it. We wish we could get rid of, well, her, just as easily as the caterpillars in Fluttershy's garden get rid of their old skins and turn into beautiful butterflies.
But I know it is not that easy. Because there are ponies who won't forget. Mom says they have "vested interests" in seeing the two of us,meaning you and me your highness, in a particular way, and that they get angry if we don't act that way.I don't know what vests have to do with it, but I think I know what mother means.
You see, I know this filly in school. She is the daughter of one of the two richest families in town. My friend Apple Bloom and I , we used to be in the same class as her. They did not get along. This filly always said Apple Bloom "doesn't know her place". I thought that meant she looked down on Apple Bloom, but one day my mother told me that actually that wasn't what she really meant.
See, Apple Bloom's family, the Apples, well as it turns out, they are the other richest family in Ponyville. They founded the place, actually.
This filly, she always thought that being rich meant that she could bully others and treat them bad. That it was her right to do so. But my mom says Apple Bloom is actually just as rich, but instead of being mean and snotty like the other filly, Apple Bloom is humble and nice and sweet and lives in a wooden farmhouse and helps her family with the farm chores. Mom says that this filly hates Apple Bloom because she " exposes her pretensions". I am not sure I know what that means, but I think it means that the fact that Apple Bloom is such a good friend, and so kind and funny makes Diamo this filly look bad, because it takes away her excuse for being so mean.
She doesn't like me either, this filly. Mom says that it is mostly for the same reason as why she doesn't like Apple Bloom. The filly liked to pretend she was nobility, which mom says worked as long as no nobles lived in town.
But apparently I count as a noble,now I don't want to be a noble or a royal or whatever and if you could do something about that I would really appreciate it,because I was once a queen, even though I never wanted to be . And being an alicorn like yourself and Princess Celestia and Aunt Cadence, well apparently those ponies with the vests will force me to be royalty. Mom says I am nobility in the eyes of Dia the filly , and that is why she hates me. Because she always said she acted the way she acts because that is how Nobility acts. But I don't act that way. So I " belie her claim" my mom says.
If I acted more like her, if I was mean and cold and looked down on others, then the filly might like me more. But I am not going to act like she wants me to. I am going to be me.
You know I never thanked you enough, for giving me a second chance. But also you know, for creating Her. Us. Nightmare Moon. Me. I get tongue tied just talking about her. Me .Us.Pronouns fail me. It may sound odd for me to thank you for creating the nightmare, but of course if you had not, I would not exist.
I know you created her, all those years ago, In a fit of madness, because you believed no one truly appreciated you for you. And as Nyx, I have been blessed with everything that I am told you wanted, all those years ago. Friends, love, affection, acceptance, not by all, but definitely by those who matter to me . I don't know whether you are truly happy these days. But I promise you Princess, that I will do everything I can to make you as happy as you have let me become.
Your faithful future student and even more faithful future friend,
