21 Elements of Insanity - Ch. 15 Heartbreaker, Life taker

Meanwhile, in Celestia and Luna's castle, the princesses, including Cadence, were discussing the situation going on with the Elements of Insanity. Never did any of them think they'd wind up in such a situation before, and it caught them all off guard. Never would they have expected this of all things to happen...which led them to wonder...how did all of this happen? How could such friendly, innocent ponies all of a sudden become evil and cruel?

"What shall we do, sister?" Luna asked. "We cannot just stand here on our hooves while they destroy Equestria! We should fight!" 

"But Luna, these are our friends." Cadence commented. "And we cannot risk everyponies' safety by risking our own lives."

"Cadence is right, Luna." Celestia said. "Without their princesses, Equestria could fall apart."

"Equestria is already falling apart! Take a look for thyself!" 

Luna held the golden-trimmed curtains apart, allowing the princesses to take a view of Equestria. The sky was a crimson red, dark clouds floated slowly, and all the buildings in Equestria looked broken down and dark. Celestia and Cadence looked at each other before looking back at Luna. Celestia sighed.

"I know, Luna. But do you really think attacking our friends will solve anything?" Celestia asked.

"Yes! We are stronger! We hold the power of friendship, and nothing can destroy that!"

"..."

Celestia, Luna and Cadence were all silent, debating about this in their head.

"Well...Equestria is looking pretty bad." Cadence said, cutting the silence.

"Whatever do you mean? I personally think this is a work of art, what we've done." Lil Miss Rarity said.

The three princesses shot their head around, only to see the six ponies themselves, the Elements of Insanity. The three princesses gasped.

"W-What are thou doing here?!" Luna asked, demanding an answer. 

Brutalight was silent at first, but a small, evil, dark grin slowly appeared on her face. 

"We're here to claim OUR rightful spot on the throne, in OUR castle."

Luna snorted.

"YOUR castle?! YOUR throne?!" Luna said. "Only a fool would think the throne belongs to somepony like you!" 

"And only a fool would stand in our way! So either you move it or lose it! And when I say lose it, I'm talking about your life!" Butchershy said, waving her large butcher knife in the air.

Luna got into a fight stance.

"L-Luna, wait! We cannot battle our friends!" Cadence said, interfering.

'I refuse to give in to these, fiends!" Luna said with anger and determination.

Brutalight smirked.

"Oh? And what will you do to stop us, Luna? You couldn't defeat us before; what makes you think you can defeat us now?" Brutalight asked.

Luna was caught off guard, and had no response to that. Brutalight's reaction was a pure evil laugh of amusement. 

"You should see your face right now, Luna! Such a fool!' Brutalight said. "I preferred you when you were Nightmare Moon, much stronger and much more powerful than this current pathetic form you possess."

"Leave her alone!" Cadence interfered once again.

Brutalight took a step forth.

"Or, what? Care to stop me? Oh that's right, you can't! You're more of a weakling than Luna and Celestia, so what makes YOU think that YOU can stop us? Without my brother, you'd be nothing but a useless waste of time. I'm disappointed that he chose YOU of all ponies as a bride! At least Queen Chrysalis knew what power was!"

Cadence gasped and turned her head away to hide her tears. Celestia stepped forth, looking at Brutalight with anger and disappointment. 

"That is enough, Twilight!" Celestia said. "You've gone too far!"

"Oh, Celestia...you were always the most foolish of them all. You can't defeat Discord alone, Queen Chrysalis alone, and you can't even defeat your own younger sister alone. You might've banished her, but she returned, and guess who brought her truth from back? Guess who stopped Discord? Us! Not you! You're the weakest of them all! So either you admit your failure and stand aside...or let us prove how weak you are…" Brutalight said, an evil grin on her face.

Pinkamena let out a laugh of amusement, while the others gave a threatening or taunting look on their face. Without hesitation, Luna charged at Brutalight and her evil friends.

"Luna, don't!" Cadence said. 

But it was too late. Using her dark magic, Brutalight levitated a nearby glass vase and threw it at Luna's face. The glass broke into pieces as it made contact with her muzzle, and caused Luna to fall back on the floor, blood trickling from her nose. 

"Luna!" Cadence said, running over to her and kneeling beside her. 

Brutalight laughed as Luna groaned in pain. Luna stood back up, and ignored the blood trickling down her chin. Luna then used her magic to grab a nearby rope and wrap it around Brutalight. However, Brutalight smirked and easily turned the rope into a poisonous snake, which slivered its way to Luna. Luna gasped and stood out of the way of the snake, knowing it could harm her if it felt threatened. Brutalight darkly laughed with amusement again as she saw Luna step out of the way. 

"Is that the best you got?!" Brutalight taunted.

Luna spread out her wings and flew into the air, then charged at Brutalight with an electric-sapphire blue force field surrounding her. Brutalight, without moving an inch, used her magic to form electric-dark purple spears and throw it at Luna. Oddly and surprisingly, the spears easily shot through her force field and shot through her skin. Luna gasped as one spear went into her hind leg, causing her to fall down onto the ground. Cadence was now fully in tears. 

"LUNA!" Cadence yelled in panic in her voice.

Celestia stood in front of Luna, making sure not another spear was thrown at her sister, while Cadence rushed to get the guards.

"Stop hurting my sister!" Celestia said.

"T-Tia…" Luna said, weakly.

The rest of the Elements of Insanity prepared to charge at Celestia, but quickly the guards barged in and stood in front of the princesses.

"Halt!" They all said together. 

Brutalight smirked as some of the guards trembled with fear, while others got into a fighting stance with determination on their faces.

"Get them." Brutalight said.

Almost immediately, the Elements of Insanity charged at the soldiers. Guts, blood and unimaginable gore flew all over the place as the princesses watched with fear and horror, their eyes widening. Celestia carried Luna on her back, and all three princesses ran out of the Main Room towards the balcony. Some of the soldiers ran away in fear, but not many of them made it out. While the brave soldiers managed to fight well, the Elements of Insanity always ended up slitting their throat, slicing them in half, cutting off their heads or some other gorey way of handling them.

    The princesses attempted to fly away from the balcony, but Brutalight appeared out of nowhere behind them. 

    "And where do you think you're going?" Brutalight asked, taunting them. 

    Celestia and Cadence attempted to fly away, Luna still on Celestia's back. Brutalight evilly grinned and used her dark magic to pull them back, and slam them onto the balcony ground, causing the floor to crack. They all groaned in pain.

    "We're not done yet." Brutalight said.

    Cadence looked up at Brutalight, tears rushing down her face.

    "T-Twilight, why? Why must you do this?" Cadence asked, sorrow in her voice.

    Brutalight stared at Cadence with an emotionless look on her face, but then that emotionless face slowly transformed into a smirk. 

    "Because it amuses me to watch you suffer." Brutalight said.

    Luna, with newfound strength, stood up and brushed off the pain. She breathed heavily, trembling with fear yet bravery. 

    "Y-You leave us be!" Luna demanded, angrily.

    "And if I don't?" Brutalight asked.

    "T-Than you'll be sorry!"

    Brutalight laughed darkly, amused. This was almost too funny for her to handle.

    "Even your threats are amusing!" Brutalight said.

    Brutalight summoned more electric-dark purple spears, and prepared to attack Luna, but Cadence quickly stood in the way. Literally. 

    "I won't let you do this!" Cadence said.

    Brutalight smirked.

    "Luna, Celestia, fly away! Hurry! You must warn everypony else, and get them out of Equestria immediately!" Cadence said.

    "B-But-"

    "Now!" Cadence said, cutting Celestia off.

    "Cadence, i will not let you do-"

    "There is no time, Celestia! Please, go!"

    Celestia sighed. She knew what she must do to save everypony.

    "You've very brave, Cadence…" Celestia said. 

    Celestia carried Luna on her back and flew away, leaving Brutalight and Cadence alone. Brutalight watched Celestia fly away with her sister, then directed her attention back to Cadence.

    "Do you really think you can stop me?" Brutalight teased. 

    "Maybe, maybe not...but I can buy them in time to help everypony from the likes of you!" Cadence said.

    Brutalight smirked and used her magic to levitate nearby boulders from the ground, which circled both of them in a taunting manner.

    "Very well. What an amusing sacrifice." Brutalight said.

    Before the boulders could reach Cadence, Cadence flew off the balcony and onto the ground, dodging all the heavy chunks of rock thrown at her. She carefully used some magic of her own to make a large, pink shield, which had actually worked for a second, for when Brutalight threw the boulders onto the shield, they instantly broke into pieces. Frowning, Brutalight lifted a very large boulder and threw it at the shield, they instantly broke into pieces. Frowning, Brutalight lifted a very large boulder and threw it at the shield, instantly breaking the glowing pink shield.

    "Eep-!" Cadence said, flying away from the small broken pieces of rock flying everywhere.

    "Please, sister, stop this!" Cadence begged Brutalight.

    Brutalight's frown deepened, and she used a massive amount of her dark magic to make the land beneath her crack into an earthquake which was heading towards Cadence. Cadence gasped, and easily flew into the sky to avoid the earthquake. Brutalight smirked as she fell for her trap. Brutalight lifted a large boulder with her levitation, while Cadence was distracted, and threw it at Cadence.

It hit Cadence hard, making her yelp and fall right into the large crack in the ground that the earthquake formed when the land cracked and separated from each other. Cadence tried holding onto the edge of the crack, fresh tears rolling down her cheeks. Brutalight calmly walked up to Cadence, frowning down on her. 

"S-Sister, p-please, help me…" Cadence begged.

Brutalight, still staring down at her with a frown on her face spoke.

"You're, not, my sister." Brutalight said darkly.

Brutalight used her magic to push her hooves off the edge, making her fall into the dark bottom pit of the crack in the earthquake. The last thing heard from Cadence was a loud, echoing, high-pitched scream.

***

Celestia quickly flew through Ponyville, while her and her sister yelled out to everypony, warning them of their fate if they stayed. Ponies of all kinds began screaming and running around in fear, while the wiser ones quickly packed only the things they needed and tried escaping Ponyville. Luna, eventually, gained enough strength to hop off of Celestia's back, causing Celestia to land on the ground beside her.

    "Sister? Are you alright?" Celestia asked.

    Luna trembled in fear.

    "N-No, sis. I cannot feel Cadence's power!" Luna said.

    As the princesses of Equestria, they all sense one another's power...unless their power is no longer coursing through them, meaning they no longer possess the power.

    "That could only mean...No!" Luna said. "I refuse to believe that those fiends destroyed Cadence!" 

    Luna flew off quickly back to the castle, while Celestia reached out to her.

    "Luna, don't!" Celestia yelled. 

    But it was too late. Celestia watched as Luna flew to her fate, but there was nothing she could do about it. A tear released from Celestia's eye, as she turned away to save the rest of the ponies.

***

Luna landed in the Everfree Forest, only to see Brutalight appear right in front of her, as if she was there before already. Brutalight stared down at the ground with an emotionless expression on her face, as if she was a machine of some sort which just turned off after being active. Luna frowned deeply and growled, a look of hatred and anger on her face as her rage began to rise.

    "Twilight, you fool! Do you realize what you are doing?!" Luna snapped, not liking her disturbing physical appearance one bit.

    "..."

    "Answer me, damn you!" Luna said.

    Luna was familiar with the curse words, and promised herself she'd never say them for the sake of everypony. But her anger overcame her emotions, and she expressed them through words.

    "..."

    Brutalight - after a moment of long silence - looked up at Luna, an evil grin crossing her face.

    "You still possess some of Nightmare Moon's powers...interesting." Brutalight said.

"Foul language didn't come from Nightmare Moon, it came from the evil which lies within you, fiend!"

Luna charged at Brutalight, only to cause her target to smirk and a dark purple glow emitted from Brutalight's horn. Brutalight shot dark purple lasers from her horn at Luna, which Luna easily dodged, causing the lasers to make craters in the dark soil of the Everfree Forest. Luna flew over and passed Brutalight's lasers, and soon Luna's horn glowed as well. Luna used her power to teleport behind Brutalight, then she tried to literally stab her back with her horn.

Burtalight saw this, and teleported behind Luna, successfully stabbing her back with her horn, unlike Luna. Luna gasped, but quickly shot herself away from Butalight, a gash now in her back. Luna flew in the air, tears forming in her eyes.

"H-How dare you stab-"

Luna gasped as a laser almost shot at Luna, but missed and hit a tree. That caused the tree to immediately catch on fire, which then moved to the next, and the next. A wild fire started in the forest as Luna continued dodging all of Brutalight's lasers, the gash in her back becoming extremely painful. She began to grow weak as her wings nearly gave out on her.

Eventually, Luna managed to fly away from Brutalight and land in a tree, trying to find something to cover up the gash in her back. But, Brutalight wouldn't let her recover as a laser shot into Luna. Luna screamed out in pain as dark purple electricity shot through her body. Luna landed on the ground, her body twitching and shaking as she began to lose her life. Her eyes began to water as Brutalight hovered over her.

"Like I said, I prefer you when you were Nightmare Moon." Brutalight said. "But, since I enjoyed defeating you more than Cadence, I won't kill you…"

Brutalight smirked as she walked away, a large tree about to fall on Luna. 

"B-Burn in hell, Twilight!" Luna screamed, tears now rushing down her blue skin.

Twilight darkly grinned.

"After you, your highness." Brutalight said.

The burning tree of flames then tipped over, and fell on Luna, crushing her now lifeless body.