1055 AD, December 25th

Normally, walking into one’s office and seeing a delicately wrapped present on one’s desk would incite feelings of wonder and cheerfulness, quick thoughts of, ‘oh my, what kind soul could have left this for me’ and ‘what could it be’?

When Nightmare Moon walked into her office and saw a delicately wrapped present on her desk, she was filled with feelings of suspicion and paranoia, quick thoughts of, ‘who broke in here’ and ‘how large will the explosion be if I opened it up’?

‘Could it be Celestia and Luna’s work?’ Nightmare Moon pondered as she cautiously approached the present like a cat on the prowl, horn glowing as she prepared to throw out a barrier. ‘It seems odd that they would deliver a means to inflict harm upon me by disguising it as a Hearth’s Warming Eve present – they lack that sense of dark irony.’

The present was box-shaped and wrapped in green packaging with red polka dots that were tied together with a red, satin ribbon. It was around the size of a regular pony’s head and reeked of innocence and anticipatory delight.

‘Surely they would know I’d be suspicious?’ Nightmare Moon frowned as she circled her desk like a shark sensing blood. ‘If anything at all inexplicably appeared in my quarters while I was out, then I’d be alarmed – this seems… almost like it’s daring me to open it.’

There was a white tag on the top.

After several more seconds, Nightmare Moon’s curiosity finally won over; she looked rather ridiculous giving an inanimate object the stare-down anyway.

First, she lifted the present with telekinesis, anticipating some sort of backlash.

Nothing.

Then, she physically picked the present up.

More nothing.

Humming suspiciously, she held the box at length and shook it a little.

Something rattled from within – it sounded solid.

Then, she brought it back in to read the tag.

The sender had chosen not to identify themselves.

Her first suspect was Vinyl, but this was a little too subtle for that mare; if Nightmare Moon had come back to her quarters and was set upon by a herd of ponies yelling, ‘surprise’, then that’d be something more along the lines of what Vinyl would do.

Not this… secretive gift-sending.

Nightmare Moon looked over her shoulder, her frown deepening. ‘The windows are still locked. No sign of forced entry. How did…?’

She’d investigate it later, but for now…

Nightmare Moon carefully placed the present down on the desk and s-l-o-w-l-y pulled the ribbon loose with her magic. The knot came undone and fell to the sides, leaving only the packaging to be unwrapped.

And Nightmare Moon did so.

Slowly and carefully, so much so that the sound of the packaging crinkling and tearing was almost louder than the soft crackle and spit of the fireplace. Outside her windows and balcony doors, snow fell across the city silently.

A pleasant Hearth’s Warming Eve all things considered.

‘I could almost forget that we’re at war with the humans.’

Finally, the red and green packaging lay spread out beneath the plain cardboard box – it was utterly unremarkable.

Nightmare Moon blinked at the unassuming nature of the box.

Clearly, whoever sent it wanted her guard to be let down, but she wouldn’t allow it! She was prepared for whatever was within this threateningly unthreatening container!

Assuming a confident stance, Nightmare Moon magically lifted the flaps of the box aside, her eyes narrowing dangerously as the contents of the box was revealed to be…

…

Another wrapped present.

“What.”

Blinking twice, Nightmare Moon used telekinesis to upturn the box and let the present inside slide out to plonk on her desk. It was just as big as the container it came in, but had black packaging with a purple ribbon.

There was a tag attached to it.

Nightmare Moon blinked owlishly. “What in Equestria?”

She was so befuddled that the sound of her door swinging open caused her to jolt.

“Empress…” Ebony strode in and gave a quick salute. “I was going over our ranks and…” She blinked in surprise and pointed to the present. “Is… is that a present?”

Nightmare Moon looked down at the box and then at Ebony. “I… I’m not entirely sure why, but…”

She came around the table and held the present out, mostly because she was still so surprised by how it came to be that she couldn’t think of any other action.

“It’s…” Ebony blinked again and hesitantly took the offered present in her own magical grasp. She read the tag, blinked again, and looked up at Nightmare Moon. “You got this for me?”

Nightmare Moon shook her head and turned to gesture to the original box. “No, it came from… from…”

There was no sign of the present on her desk.

No box. No packaging. No ribbon.

Nothing.

Nightmare Moon cocked her head; she had to admit that she was somewhat at a loss in that instance. She didn’t look away until she heard tearing packaging and turned in time to see Ebony open her present and gasp.

“Empress, it’s…” Ebony blushed deeply as she grinned like a lunatic; there was a disconcerting heat in her eyes when she looked back at Nightmare Moon. “I can’t believe you would do something like this!”

“Wh-what?” Nightmare Moon furrowed her brow. “What was inside it?”

“Oh, you know…” Ebony giggled – giggled – and revealed what she had pulled out from the box.

It was a wooden photo frame.

Inside it was a photo.

That photo was of Nightmare Moon in a very provocative pose while holding a rose between her teeth.

‘To my favourite mare ;]’ was written across the bottom-right corner of the frame.

Nightmare Moon’s mind went blank. “Bwuh?”

“Oh Faust, I’m so embarrassed, but…!” Ebony squealed in unrestrained delight and held the photo close to her chest while prancing in place. “I-I’ll keep this in my room and I won’t tell a single soul! Oh my gosh, I can’t believe…! Eee!!”

“Bwuh?”

Nightmare Moon could only stare dumbly as Ebony danced out of the room and down the corridor, her giggles and squeals slowly fading out of her hearing range.

“… Bwuh?”

Nightmare Moon didn’t…!

She would never…!

That photo was fake! It… Somepony was messing with her; she would never, ever agree to pose in such a manner for anypony, even if they were her most loyal!

And what the hell was with that present she received?!

Nightmare Moon turned around.

The box was back on her desk, unopened.

Immediately, she lunged at it, grabbed it with her magic, and rushed out of her room to chase Ebony down.

“Ebony, I would never gift you such a thing!” She howled, her mighty hooves crashing against the floor and down a set of stairs leading to the floor below her; Ebony’s room wasn’t too far, she would catch that mare and demand that humiliating thing back! “It was this accursed box that held your so-called ‘present’; I had nothing to do with-”

She slipped.

To be fair, she was in too much of a rage to spare time for such things as observing where her hooves were going.

Nightmare Moon tumbled down the last few steps and face-planted, hard. A split-second later, five objects bounced off her flank and skull.

‘Ow.’

Peeling her muzzle from the floor, she looked up and saw five more presents sitting there, mocking her with their colourful wrappings.
The original box was nowhere to be seen.

Snarling ferociously, she stood up and prepared to crush the presents beneath her-

“Whoa, are these for us?”

A blur of colour swept by and whisked the presents away.

Nightmare Moon blinked and looked to the side, her stomach dropping as she saw Fade hand out three of the presents to Haze, Veil, Lightning Dust, and Miasma. “You’re kidding. You’re kidding, right?”

Fade opened his the fastest. “Aw, no way!” He lifted a poster from the box with a surprised laugh of joy. “The Limited Edition poster for Scythe Crucify autographed by the lead actress?! Fans breaking into her house and holding her up with water guns couldn’t get this! Thanks, boss!”

Nightmare Moon’s right eye twitched. ‘At least it’s not another photo of me…’

“A jar of feather preening oils?” Lightning Dust cried. She pulled the cork out and took a whiff. “Hot shit – this is genuine Cloudsdale oil, too! This stuff costs a fortune.”

“Oh my…” Haze pressed a hoof against his trembling lips as he levitated a plastic-wrapped box of grooming tools. “Are these… polished silver from the remaining descendants of the Princess Platinum bloodline? You can’t even… barter for…” He sniffled, eyes wet. “I will allow myself to shed tears, just this once – gentlepony rules be damned.”

“I did not get those for you!” Nightmare Moon growled. “Somepony sent a present to my room and when I opened it-”

“Empress!” Ebony darted to her side, furiously blushing. “I don’t think you should discuss such a private thing so publicly. Unless… you’re open to that sort of thing?”

“What?! No!” Nightmare Moon pulled a face in disgust. “I was just going to tell them that…” She blinked as something suddenly occurred to her. “Ebony… aren’t you supposed to be in a coffin for your lichdom?”

The smaller mare looked to the side and smiled happily. “Aw, you even got Veil that book about the dumbest ponies in history.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“Now whenever I feel sympathy and hope for my fellow pony, I can always look inside this.” Veil sighed in content as she hugged the book tightly.

Miasma hugged a plush, pink elephant, joy evident in her dull eyes and flat expression. “Thank you for this gift, Empress – I’m so pleased.”

Nightmare Moon shouted in frustration and stomped her forehooves, shaking the entire hallway. “I didn’t do this! I have far more important things to do than go around buying presents for everypony! What, did you expect me to hand out presents and hang up decorations?”

“But there are decorations.” Fade replied.

Nightmare Moon’s eyes went wide. “What?”

He gestured to the walls. “The entire castle is decorated, yeah?”

Nightmare Moon looked – actually looked around and a cold lance went through her.

“No…”

Red, white, green all over – decorations lit up the hallway with exuberant festivity; they stretched across the walls and ceiling and all the way down around the corners, infecting the rest of the castle with Hearth’s Warming cheer.

Nightmare Moon had never seen a more unnerving sight.

But she would not be intimidated!

With a furious shake of her head, Nightmare Moon puffed herself up and spread her wings with a cyclonic rush of wind that knocked a nearby wreath to the carpet.

“Enough! This madness shall end by my hooves!”

With a tremendous leap, Nightmare Moon soared over the heads of her Praetorian Guard and flew through the castle’s winding hallways, driven with determination to find the source of this madness.

She had a good idea on who it was, too.

Discord.

No other being could cause such chaos in such a short span of time; when Nightmare Moon had been walking up to her quarters, everything was fine and non-festive, she was certain of it!

But now… now everything was wrong.

The servants and guards she flew over on her way to Discord’s prison ducked and dived and dodged and cheered and-

Wait, ‘cheered’?

“Thanks, Empress!

“Happy Hearth’s Warming, Empress!”

“It’s just what I always wanted!”

Nightmare Moon spread her wings to slow down and hover in place as she turned around, her jaw dropping as ponies opened the colourful presents that were inexplicably scattered across the floor.

“Where did you…?” She shook her in confusion and adjusted her grip on the box. “How did these get…?”

Nightmare Moon jolted and brought the plain cardboard box in her forehooves up to eye level.

It was upside-down, so a single present slid out and plopped into the waiting forelegs of a maid. She eagerly popped it open and laughed in delight.

“Ha ha! Usurper Nightmare Moon has given an empty box for me to cherish and care for! I shall place so many things inside; it makes my head spin with joy and vertigo!”

Nightmare Moon screamed with rage and threw the box as hard as she could, causing it to strike the head of another servant and spit out another present.

She flew away from it all – from the cheers, the joy, the slurred cry of the servant as he thanked her for the bottle of aspirin; she needed logic and common sense and she needed it now.

And like most things in life, she would get it by beating the snot out of someone else.

At this speed, it only took her another thirty seconds before the heavy metal door leading into Discord’s chamber came into view; the two guards stationed there went ashen-faced as she zoomed towards them and violently landed on the floor, mere feet from just crushing them beneath her.

They lightened up considerably when two presents sailed over Nightmare Moon’s head and into their clutches, however.

Nightmare Moon turned and aimed a scorching glare at the open box precariously balanced on her back. “Guards – open the door.”

“Empress, how did you know that I needed a new sweater?”

“Open the door, you fool!!”

She used her magic to grab the box and hold it in front of her as she walked forwards once the door was open; she didn’t even bother telling the guards to close it as she threw the box against the floor, watching it skid and bump into the base of Discord’s stone-imprisoned form.

“What is this?”

A pregnant moment where Discord’s grey, unmoving face stared at her.

“Why, it appears to be a present.”

Nightmare Moon shook her head with a growl. “No, it’s a…”

The box had been replaced with a wrapped present.

“Is… Are you giving me a gift?”

Something inside Nightmare Moon snapped.

She tensed and lunged at Discord with enough momentum to send them both crashing to the floor. She saw red as she bared her teeth and shredded cheeks at Discord’s face, speckling the surface with blood and spit.

“Don’t play dumb with me, fool! I know you’re the cause of this! Are you trying to drive me crazy? Because that won’t work – the only thing you’re accomplishing is making me angry!”

“I’m… imprisoned in stone, Blanky,” Discord said with a measure of hesitance. “If I could still use my powers, then I wouldn’t waste time playing you. Tartarus, I’d go straight for the neck. Nobody hurts Fluttershy.”

He sounded… sincere.

But… but that couldn’t be!

He was the only one that had the power to do something like this! If… if it wasn’t him, then who could-

Suddenly, music filled the chamber.

Nightmare Moon turned her head in horror. “No…”

Where the present should have been, there was now a bright blue plastic radio that spat out a familiar and horrifying tune – it sat in the shredded remains of the packaging it came in.

“No…”

“Ooh, I love this song!” Discord chuckled. “Ah, a reprieve from the tedious monotony of this chamber – it’s the perfect Hearth’s Warming Eve gift for an old spirit like myself. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but… thank you, Nightmare Moon.”

Nightmare Moon shook her head vehemently. “No…”

The music looped its energetic tune, and Discord’s disembodied voice accompanied it in a nightmarish din.

“My name is Pinkie Pie – but not really – and I am here to say – though not with my lips – I’m gonna make you smile and I will brighten up your daaaay~”

Nightmare Moon howled in dismay and flew out the chamber.

“How did her song even reach all the way to Canterlooooooot?!”

Nightmare Moon wasn’t entirely sure of what happened after that.

When she finally took her hooves away from her ears and opened her eyes, she found herself in the city and heading straight towards a snowpony being built by a couple of foals.

‘Ugh… maybe destroying this will calm my thoughts.’

She bust through it with a pomf and an explosion of powdery snow; she kept on going and ended up crashing into a snow dune, her head popping out the other end, much to the shock of the couple that just so happened to be walking by.

Nightmare Moon sighed. ‘Nope.’

“Dear me, is that you, Star- er, I mean, Empress?” The stallion of the couple said with a minute adjustment of his monocle.

Nightmare Moon blinked a few times in surprise. “Fancypants? Fleur?” Once she looked past the thick jackets and garish scarves – newest trend, apparently – and saw that it was indeed them, she stood back up, shaking her wings to remove snow. “I wasn’t expecting to see you two today; it feels like you’ve been gone for half the year.”

“We’re both busy ponies,” Fancypants said with a tip of his top hat. “You have a country to rule and my dear wife’s been swamped with all the festive-themed clothing the designers are heaping upon her.”

“And Fancypants has been dealing with some disgruntled workers,” Fleur added. “They always get a little… odd around this time.”

Immediately after she said that, a scratchy voice jeered from the side. Nightmare Moon glanced in that direction to see a stallion in ragged clothing hissing and booing while carting a sign saying, ‘Fancypants is a scrooge’.

“Force me to work Hearth’s Warming Eve, eh, ya cheap bugger?!”

“I gave you time off to spend the holiday with your family, Rusty, my boy!” Fancypants retorted.

“And you cut our pay!”

“I’m fairly certain I gave you a bonus, old chap!”

“Can’t even afford to feed the lads at the orphanage!”

“Those are students at the school for gifted unicorns; I’m fairly certain they told you not to come onto their campus anymore.”

“Yer a horrible boss, ya overpaying muppet!” The stallion shook his hoof as he stomped off. “Ya deny me my right to complain by making the workplace a safe environment again and I’ll praise you so hard you’ll never want me to work there any longer, ya understanding scrooge! See you next week!”

Fancypants gave an unsure smile. “I’m… very confused. All the time.”

Nightmare Moon snorted. “Bah – humbug. You’re not the only one dealing with idiocy, though; I’m being pestered by some sort of eldritch being that has taken the form of a plain box that spews out presents in such a way that it makes it seem as if I had bought them of my own willpower.”

“It’s making you look good to make you look bad?” Fleur blinked. “My, how dastardly.”

The fact that she said it so unironically weirded Nightmare Moon out.

“And of course, it disappears when I try to point it out, so I just appear crazy in addition to being benevolent,” Nightmare Moon continued, slapping a hoof to her face in exasperation. “Ugh, I won’t even dare to imagine how this day could get any stupider.”

“I came to kick butt and be heroic!”

“Oh, I just had to say that, didn’t I?”

The sight of Knight Enforcer Caed and a bunch of his knights stepping out of a Fracture just down the street filled her more with irritation than outright anger. Hell, the ponies walking around didn’t even seem scared – they just stared at the human like he was one of those creepy mascots dancing outside fast food establishments and quickened their pace to get away.

Clearly, the insanity haunting Nightmare Moon had already spread into the city.

“And I’m all out of heroism!” Caed twirled his glaive with a confident grin before his head finally caught up with his mouth. “Oh, uh… I mean… And I’m all out of kicking butt! No, wait… Can we go back through the Fracture so I can try again?”

Cross-dimensional insanity – the newest force to drive Nightmare Moon into an anger-induced coma.

“No, but you can go back through the Fracture and stay there,” She growled. “I’m busy dealing with some sort of hostile entity and I’m not…”

She trailed off once she realized that the box in question was directly at her feet; she got the feeling of anticipating emanating from it and realized what it wanted.

“No.”

The box did nothing.

“I refuse.”

The box did nothing.

“This is stupid.”

The box did nothing.

Caed cleared his throat in annoyance. “Hey, I’m right here! Come and fight me, my nemesis! Or are you afraid? In that case, allow me to list off the reasons why that is an appropriate response…”

Nightmare Moon groaned miserably and opened the box with her magic. “And today started off so normally, too…”

Inside was a present with golden wrapping and a red bow; it slipped out of her magic when she tried to pick it up, seemingly made from the same magic-resistant nature of the human’s universe, so she used her mouth to do it instead and tossed it over with a jerk of her head.

“Here – Happy Hearth’s Warming Eve, you overgrown monkey.”

Caed’s long-winded speech came to an abrupt stop as the present landed by his feet; he flickered in a sudden blur of motion too fast to follow and the next second the wrapping had been cleanly shredded.

“Ha! Your pre-emptive attack accomplished nothing! This harmless box will never-”

“Look in the box, idiot.”

“Oh?”

Caed kneeled and opened the box. Almost immediately, his jaw dropped and his lips quivered.

“It’s… I…”

“Knight Enforcer?” One of his knights questioned worriedly. “Are you okay?”

Caed scooped up what was inside the container and twirled to face his soldiers. “Look, Esther! Look what the magical flying horse has given me!”

“We’re ponies!”

Esther leaned in to read the title of the book. “‘One Hundred and One ways to Inspire your Friends and Demoralize the Enemy with Words: Special Edition – Now 20% more Linguistic’.”

“This is perfect!” Caed laughed giddily and turned back around. “I… Thank you for this wonderful gift, my most hated enemy! I’m… Oh, but I have nothing to give you in return.”

“You could not attack. At least for today,” Nightmare Moon grumbled. “I’m so angry that I’m tired.”

Caed pointed to the sky dramatically. “Done! Knights – lay down your weapons and let us examine this strange white substance falling from the heavens!”

“Knight Enforcer, we wasted quite a bit of energy by opening this-”

“Come frolic with me, Esther!”

Esther sighed and dropped her sword and shield before taking Caed’s hand. “Only because it’s you, Caed.”

Nightmare Moon stared blankly as the two humans proceeded to frolic through the snow while the other knights made snow-angels and threw snowballs, eventually enticing the ponies standing around to join in.

‘Maybe I actually died when Celestia hit me with that beam of sunlight and now I’m in Tartarus. Certainly feels like it…’

“Hey, Wolf! Hey, Fancypants and Fleur!”

Nightmare Moon blinked and looked to the side to see Vinyl and Octavia walking up to them, both also wearing garish scarves. “Oh… hello.”

“Happy Hearth’s Warming, my dears.” Fancypants greeted while Fleur nodded politely.

Vinyl took one look at the humans and ponies playing and her eyebrows quirked over the rim of her shades. “Huh – there’s something you don’t see every Hearth’s Warming.”

“The amount of ‘crazy’ in this area will no doubt tear the fabric of reality asunder, but at the very least it’s a ceasefire. For now,” Nightmare Moon shook her head with a sigh. “I feel like I’m trapped in some dream; if it weren’t for the fact that I’ve already felt pain, then I would bite myself to wake up.”

Vinyl shrugged. “Eh, there are worse dreams if that’s the case, right?”

“I suppose…”

Nightmare Moon looked down at her hooves again. The box was still there, and again, she heard the unsaid suggestion.

She looked at Vinyl.

“… Hm.”

Using her magic, she levitated four presents out of the box. Nopony around her seemed to acknowledge it; they didn’t even blink until she handed them out.

“Here.”

“Really? Sweet!” Vinyl quipped cheerfully, also not even acknowledging where Nightmare Moon got the presents in the first place.

Fancypants admired a smart-looking top hat that sparkled in the light – “genuine stitching from Crystal Empire tailors” – while Fleur got another scarf to replace the one she was wearing; she almost cried in joy as she cast the garish thing aside.

Octavia shyly signed, ‘thank you’ as she held a beautifully crafted bow made from what was no doubt a rare type of wood and Vinyl whooped as she levitated a sleek pair of headphones.

“Dude, this brand doesn’t even come out until next year! How’d you get them?”

“If I’d known they existed, then probably through the threat of eating the president of whatever company makes them,” Nightmare Moon shrugged, feeling… warm at everyone’s reaction.

“Aw, jeez, Wolf! Now, I…” Vinyl swore in sudden dismay. “The present I got for you sucks compared to yours! I gotta go buy a new one!”

Fancypants’s eyes went wide. “So do I! Quick – I know of a store that will grant us special access! Follow me!”

Nightmare Moon’s right eyebrow rose as her four f-friends dashed off in a panic towards the ‘special access’ store. They were making impressive headway and she had to applaud their perseverance and drive when they steamrolled over random bystanders.

“Huh…”

At some inner urge, she glanced down at the box again and saw that it had opened by itself and the duke blue of a bow was peeking out of it.

“Ugh, look – I’m grateful that you gave me those presents, but you’ve possible permanently ruined my reputation. Now, everypony’s going to think I’m sort of ruler that goes around hoofing out presents; they’re going to expect this every year, you know that?”

She sighed and lifted the present.

“What further humiliation do you wish to…?”

“…”

After some tearing and opening, Nightmare Moon was left staring at a framed picture of her and Vinyl standing together. Vinyl was beaming happily at the camera while Nightmare Moon was…

Also looking quite happy.

It was fake, though; Nightmare Moon didn’t recall ever posing for a picture next to Vinyl, at least not without her Star Secret disguise. Still…

Still, she liked it.

Nightmare Moon’s lips twitched into a small smile. “Happy Hearth’s Warming Eve, Vinyl.”

Author's Notes:

Note 1: It's been almost two years since I first posted this story and I've recieved so much feedback for it. Thank you to everyone who has followed it or even just glanced at it once and moved on - I wish you all the best in 2017 and I hope you've all had a great Christmas.

Note 2: I love making Nightmare Moon the only sane individual in these types of scenarios.