They're EVERYWHERE!

65536: 3

Even Luna must admit that she has significantly less control over the dream realm than anypony would expect from an alicorn whose aspect dreams are. What they fail to understand is that other alicorns are only specialized in certain aspects of the real world while she has an entire reality, or a mix of realities, to oversee. If the full extent of Luna's powers could transfer into the real world, she would easily be able to achieve things far beyond the capabilities of any reality warper throughout history.

What, however, is true is that she possesses the greatest understanding of the dreamscape and all the chaos within. Tonight, though, the dreamscape is almost still, stable and solid as a rock as the collective dreams of Canterlot ponies are locked on one and only one thing.

Collective nightmares, to be accurate.

"That's not your beloved!" Luna calls out, her voice muffled as a stallion kisses a changeling before collapsing, green mist coming off of him and feeding the creature.

Before she can stabilize the situation, it shifts, revealing the stallion awake and screaming inside a cocoon hanging from a Canterlot street lamp. There are hundreds of thousands more hanging everywhere, lying in the streets, or glued to the walls of dark buildings.

Luna was expecting this when she finally delved back into the dream realm, the second night after the invasion. Canterlot ponies survived a trauma beyond anything they encountered before and it was bound to leave mental scars. What she wasn't expecting was how powerful and raw everything would be when put together.

Changelings are swarming everywhere, hunting down screaming survivors and aided by mind-controlled ponies now addicted to changeling venom or... other ministrations.

"Yep... some of the captured ponies got rather interesting fantasies implanted in them," Luna, hovering above the city, winces, "Oh my, that looks like their queen, judging by the size of her... everything. Is that an edible thong made of cake- SISTER?!"

"YOUSAWNOTHING!"

Somewhere in the real castle, Celestia bolts upright in her bed, sweat dripping from her forehead.

"I'll never hear the end of this..." she sighs with absolute certainty.

Luna shakes her head but can't help smirking as that particular vision vanishes. It's not as if her sister is the only one with a dream like that right now. She should probably leave these fantasies alone for now and focus on the ones with claws and teeth... all hundreds of thousands of them. Her horn lights up and she starts blasting her way through the twisting and shifting version of Canterlot swarming with variations of changelings from the imagination of all the terrified ponies.

***

65536 yawns, its headache mostly gone, leaving behind only dull throbbing and some new words and concepts. Well, not exactly new, more like refreshed and recalled. The sleepy rectangle is a bed, the smaller head rectangle is a pillow, and the warm cover it's tightly wrapped in is called a blanket. Blue- no, Luna is sleeping next to it, sometimes twitching, kicking, and gasping. After a rather powerful, full-body spasm, 65536 sits up, untangles itself from the blanket, shuffles over the treacherously soft bed to Luna's neck, and nuzzles it.

"Don't wake her up," a new voice says something it can't understand. Upon examination, it belongs to a grey pony with purple mane, yellow eyes, and wings that look like they belong to those creatures back in the hive that roost on the ceiling. 65536 can't recall names or anything but some colors seem to be back. The headache grows worse again so the drone stops trying to focus on things that aren't obvious.