A Painful Quandary
“Luna?”
The alicorn turned to the door, looking over the lip of the glasses and up at her sister. “Yes Tia, what is it?”
“May I speak with you alone for a few moments?” She asked hesitantly, glancing at the attendant that stood nearby.
Luna’s eyes narrowed, her gaze lingering down her sister’s tense body and up to the pained expression on her face. She turned to the portly blue and maroon mare standing beside her. “Leave us, we will reconvene on the marrow.”
The attendant nodded once before soundlessly slipping out of the room.
When the door slammed shut Luna dropped her glasses to the table and stood from her seat at her desk and walked over to the small sitting area near the window. “Come, you have much on your mind.”
The elder alicorn sighed, following her sister closely. “More than you can imagine.” She muttered.
Luna’s ears twitched, easily catching the muttered words.
The alicorn of the night sat at her favorite spot at the window, refusing to utilize the small mountains of pillows that were piled high in one corner, preferring to sit directly on the cold marble floor. If she was cold or uncomfortable she did not give such feelings voice and merely looked up at the moon as her sister arranged her pillows into a comfortable spot and sat across from her, glancing only briefly at the bright moon just outside the window.
“It is a beautiful night.” She remarked.
Luna smiled faintly, her gaze lingering on the moon’s cratered surface. “It is indeed.” Her gentle smile fell way and she turned to face her sister. “Though I doubt you have come merely to compliment my night.”
“No, I’m afraid not.” Celestia sighed heavily, her gaze falling to the floor between them. “I am sure you know what today is.”
“How could I forget?” Luna replied dismissively.
“Yes, well.” The elder alicorn began. “I have come to ask you a question I know I should rather not speak of.”
“You wish to know.” Luna stated.
“Yes.” Her shoulders slumped, but her gaze rose, determination flashing in her eyes. “I need to know what I did to you.”
The night princess’ gaze narrowed and her glare seemed to pierce Celestia’s very soul, laying bare her intentions and leaving naked her desires. She tried to resist the urge to tremble under her sister’s piercing gaze but she could not, her body shaking like a leaf as her younger sister looked on, judging her. After several tense moments of silence, the younger sibling softened, her gaze returning to it's normal apathetic look.
“You wish to atone, to assuage your guilt.” The mare scowled, her teeth glinting in the low light. “Your ego shows itself once more Tia.”
Celestia had known such a remark was coming, but that didn't make it's arrival any easier and she recoiled as if struck, clutching her heart. “I know I have no right to ask such a thing but I lay awake at night wondering.” She turned, gazing out the window and up to the moon’s rocky surface. “Was it a slumber, peaceful and quick or was it something darker.”
The younger’s scowl deepened, her jaw clenching tightly. “It was darker then the very void itself Tia. I would advise you cease this line of inquiry post haste, lest you find answers to questions you dare not imagine.”
“Please sister! I must know the consequences of my actions!” She winced. “I know I am no warrior like you but I am not as unversed in pain as you seem to think.”
“Unversed?” The mare exploded to her hooves, her wings flaring. “Sister you do not understand the first thing about pain. You are but a mewling whelp fresh from the teet!”
The elder alicorn’s ears and wings clamped tight against her sides, her entire body squeezing against the floor in an attempt to make her smaller in the face of such opposition. “I do know pain! I have watched thousands die, I have lost limbs, I have born foals, there is no pain that my flesh does not know!”
“Fool!” Luna spat. “Does a foal who stubbed his horn claim to know a mothers pain? Neigh! Neither should you claim as such!”
“Then show me!” She shouted back.
The dark alicorn’s wings wilted, settling against her back. “What did you just say?”
“Show me.” Celestia said softly. “Surely there is some spell, or memory that can make me understand without making you recite the litany of your suffering.”
Luna sat unexpectedly, her gaze going back to the moon. “I don't know what you are talking about.”
“Come now.” Celestia inched a little closer, extending a hoof to her sister. “I may have been a decent mage in my time but I have never been able to grasp the more subtle nuances of spellcasting. Not like you have.”
Her lips trembled, as if words bubbled just behind them, yet Luna refused to give them breath, the alicorn remaining fixed on the sight of the moon. A tense silence hung over them, neither alicorn moving an inch as one stared up at the visual embodiment of her suffering while the other looked across at it.
“Fine.”
“Really?” Celestia sighed. “You have no idea what this means to me. Do you have a memory spell, or perhaps can conjure an image?”
The scowl returned to Luna’s lips, her eyes remaining nailed to the distant celestial body. “During my exile I developed a spell. One that let's the target experience the breadth of my exile in the span of moments.”
A smile slowly spread across Celestia’s lips and she reached out for Luna’s hoof, holding it tightly. “This is wonderful news. Please cast it upon me post haste.”
“You know not what you want.” Her scowl bled away, falling into a slight frown. “I cannot dissuade you from this path can I?”
Celestia smirked. “Never. I’m as stubborn as ever.”
The alicorn snorted and slowly turned, her gaze settling on Celestia’s. “Are you sure? What if this only makes things worse. Understanding breeds misery, always.”
The elder mare’s jaw set and she nodded. “Nothing could be worse than not knowing.”
“Fool that you are.” Luna sighed, opening her forelegs and ushering the other mare close. “Come, sit close to me.”
Celestia nodded and did as she was told, slipping in close to her younger sister, who wrapped a hoof over the larger mare’s barrel and the other under, supporting her. “I can sit on my own you know.” Celestia quipped.
“You do not understand, but you will.” Luna frowned, her brow creasing as she stared into her sister’s eyes with her usual intensity. “I will set the spell for only ten seconds.” She held a hoof to Celestia’s lips, silencing her complaint before she could breathe it. “And ten seconds only. If you really want to go back to that abyss after those ten seconds I will cast the full spell.”
The mare grinned. “Of course dear sister.” She set her jaw and loosened her posture. “I am ready.”
“You are not, yet we will continue regardless.” A bright glow emanated from Luna’s horn, numerous circles appearing above it and extending upwards several feet. “Remember Tia, you asked for this.”
The alicorn opened her mouth to speak but found herself hurtling through the void, her body no longer her own. A cursory evaluation told her that she was now in the memory of her sister’s, her pure white coat replaced by the midnight black of nightmare moon, only slightly distorted, as if the nightmare’s body was stretched somehow. This must be the moment she was banished. Curious, there is no pain. Though she could not move her head she could see the wall of rainbow colors that surrounded her.
Beyond that she could see the emptiness of space, and beyond even that tiny stars twinkling in the distance. In the forefront was the moon itself, it's surface clean, devoid of the series of craters that would be come to be known as the mare on the moon.
Senses slowly returned as the spell finished it's task. Her sense of smell was first to come back. Gifting the alicorn with the distinct smell that came when one was too close to the casting of a powerful spell, the mana expulsion reminding her of burnt ash and cinder. Her hearing returned next, filling her head with the scream of wind that whipped past her body, though she knew that should not be as there was no air in space. Flavor suddenly exploded across her tongue, reminding her of the blow she had delivered to Nightmare Moon’s lip, cracking it and filling the nightmare’s mouth with blood. The taste of copper was heavy and there was something even more unpleasant about the nightmare’s blood that made it stand out, making it taste almost like sulfur. Nothing so disconcerting that Celestia couldn't handle, of course.
Up until now she had hardly even noticed the fact that she could not feel her new body, merely assuming that the spell had merely blocked that part out or perhaps the elements had disconnected such a sense out of mercy. When feeling filled her body, any such notion of mercy was destroyed.
Pain the likes of which she had never experienced tore through her body like a jagged razor through every inch of her flesh. She wanted to scream, but found that her vocal cords extended over ten times the surface area they were meant to. Her very soul felt as though it was being stretched beyond it's normal confines, her body being forced to do the same. The slight distortion she had noticed earlier suddenly made sense, as it was not her vision that was distorted, but her very body and spirit.
Her every pore and millimeter of her body was alive with this terrible agony.. It was white hot, burning everything from the tip of her horn to the tip of her tail with such an intensity that would have wondered if her flesh had immolated, if she was capable of such a thought. More than pain it was the twisted experienced that most disturbed her. The alicorn had not known what it was like to have your every organ pulled apart then roasted by the hottest of fire and still somehow live, until this moment. She tried to focus on the destination that lay ahead of her, the moon growing larger by the second until it dominated her field of view.
The pain was far too imense to merely be ignored though, and it lay upon her thoughts like a great wyrm, having taken roost in her mind and burning away all thoughts that did not begin and end with her suffering. Years seemed to pass as she flew towards the moon, time stretching on into infinity as all became agony. She felt the very definition of pain turn within her mind, taking on new facet with each year that passed.
But it had not been years, it had not even been more than three seconds before the pain had begun, and ended.
Her arrival upon the moon was a terrifying one, her entire body impacting the surface of the celestial body with such force as to liquify her organs and turn her bones to paste. Yet despite the fact that she should be dead, having been reduced to a completely liquid state, the universe refused to end her suffering and her body reformed on the moon’s surface a second later. Though it felt more like she was in the deepest bowels of the satellite with how much freedom she was allowed.
Tight chains wrapped around every inch of her body, biting into her soul just as easily as it tore through her flesh. The definition of pain was revised once more as she realized just how helpless she truly was. Though Celestia was in the back seat of the memory, her driver twisted this way and that, testing her restraints. Every movement, no matter how tiny was met with a fresh surge agony each different from the last, ensuring there would be no getting used to it.
A twist of the right foreleg made it feel as though she had sheared through skin and muscle, her shredded flesh hanging loose from the ravaged limb. An activation of her horn was met with a spike of pain ramming into her brain with such force that Celestia wondered if someone had actually driven a stake into her skull, somehow managing to keep her alive in the process. Even the slight intake of breath was met with a thousand tiny spikes exploding through her lungs, piercing every last inch of the organ and filling her airways with blood. No matter how much she bled, no matter the fact that her lungs tasted no oxygen, she was forced to cling to life.
She wasn't sure if any of this was true, whether her lungs were truly torn apart, or her limbs ripped to shreds as she could not tell for certain but that was what it felt like and Celestia trusted her unnaturally sharp senses. Her eyes twitched, having finally reformed and adjusted to the darkness of the moon, allowing her to perceive her corner of hail
The second her eyes opened she felt a twin spikes pierce them, every twitch and movemetn no matter how tiny drove them deeper into her sockets until it felt as though it had pierced her very skull. A scream built in her throat yet despite her very being crying out in pain, nothing emerged from her cracked and bloody lips. Her ruptured lungs felt no kiss of oxygen and her tongue felt no caress of wind, making her realize the true nature of the void she now inhabited.
Seconds blurred together, she tried not to think about it, tried to focus on something, anything else. Equestria below them was pain to look at, attempting to breathe was pain, the very act of thinking was met with a similar stab of pain. Her world became agony, suffering and torment that seemed depthless in it's cruelty.
Torment became her everything until even her sense of time was torn from her.
It could have been minutes, days or even centuries that she stared up at Equestria below her. Eyes wide, unable to look away from the glowing orb she had left behind. Hopelessness unlike anything she had experienced coursed through the alicorn’s veins and in that moment she forgot herself.
All was agony, all was ruin, all was pain.
Until it wasn't.
Her lungs heaved, filling with oxygen as her limbs hung limp at her sides. She could not move them, could not think, could not feel. She dared not tempt whatever devil had put the pain into her soul, she would give him a reason to renew such suffering with something as petty as thought.
“Tia, you're home now.” A voice like quiet thunder whispered.
The words exploded in her head, against the backdrop of the void even the hushed voice sounded like the most horrific of cacophony.
Realizing her lungs were whole once more and that her body heeded her call, the alicorn turned her head to the sound of the voice, amazed to find that her muscles actually responded. The face before her was like her own, a deep blue color with twin pools of absolute calm that extended outwards into her very being.
“Who-” She started, only for the blue alicorn to put a hoof to her lips, silencing her question.
“Lay still, dear sister.” The blue one commanded in a calm and patient tone.
The words no longer echoed in her head like the first had, though the voice was still loud enough to be deafening in the confines of her empty mind.
The soft patter of something wet striking something hard, drew the being’s attention downwards, where she saw a small puddle of something forming on the ground beneath her. A drop extended from her face and fell to the ground, joining it's brethren on the marble floor. A shaky hoof slowly reached up to her cheek, as if at any moment the pain would return and she would once more be reprimanded for having the gall to try and move a body that she no longer owned.
The hoof was cold, damp, and when she pulled back her hoof she realized that the wetness had come from her.
With pain no longer dominating her thoughts her mind wandered for the first time in what felt like forever.
Who am I? Where am I? What happened? Where was the pain?
She felt something soft and gentle touch her mane, making her recoil, fearing the worst. The blue one’s hooves held firm despite her panic and she could not get far before the touch returned, starting from the top of her head and going to down to her neck before starting all over.
Time passed and slowly things began to return to the alicorn.
She knew that her name was Celestia, she was in her sister’s chambers and she had just asked for a curse she would now bear for the rest of eternity.
“I’m so-”
Once more she found her words cut off by a careful blue hoof against her lips. “Do not apologize, it was not you that did this to me, but rather harmony itself.”
“Harmony? But why would it do something so… monstrous?” Celestia spat.
Luna smirked. “Harmony does not care about you or I. All it wants is balance between order and chaos. It is not called harmony for nothing dear sister.”
The white alicorn tucked her quaking limbs closer against her body, her mind going back to the moon. “How did you survive such torment?”
“I didn't.” Luna stated.
“What do you mean?”
Luna sighed, her gaze drawn once more to the moon, her hoof falling still on Celestia’s back. “The Luna you knew is gone. Burnt away by harmony’s cruel touch. I know not what I am, but I know that I am either something entirely new, or I have been altered beyond recognition, for nothing could survive that.” She shrugged. “It matters little to me.”
“Do not speak such madness! You are my sister.” Celestia stated, though even she felt the words ring hallow. The alicorn reached out and gripped her sister’s limbs with all the desperation of a drowning pony. “You are my sister!”
A faint smile creeped into the blue alicorn’s face. “That is nice to hear, but we both know that Luna died up there.” Celestia opened her mouth to refute the claim, but felt her will falter. “Hush now, Tia. You have suffered greatly this day.” Her horn lit and a familiar sleep spell washed over the white alicorn, causing her to slump to the floor, the dream world already threatening to claim her. “Let your suffering become a memory so distant you forget it's existence.”
The creature that had once been Luna smiled faintly as it watched Celestia’s eyes close, her body falling slack in it’s grip.
For a moment it remained motionless, holding the alicorn close to it’s chest as it stared down at it’s sister’s slumbering form.
It’s silent reverie broken by a single glittering jewel that fell from her cheek and landed upon it’s sister’s. Curious, the creature lifted a hoof to it’s cheek, feeling the bizarre sensation of tears caressing her cheeks.
Her hoof trembled as she pulled it back, her eyes unable to comprehend what she was seeing.
“Could it be?”