Twilight's Reign

by Flopinator1976

Prologue

Author's Note:

Thank you so much for reading. This is my first ever fanfiction, so thank you so much for giving it a chance. Constructive criticism is appreciated! This is a prologue to a larger story, and I will post more as soon as I can. I hope you all like it.

Being a princess was hard work. Being a ruler was even harder work. While her friends took on various responsibilities as her fellow members of the Friendship assembly, it was she alone that perched upon a throne that once belonged to her mentor. It was she alone that signed decrees and smiled for photo ops with dignitaries that she barely talked to before being whisked away to another meeting. It was she alone that retired to her chambers, exhausted beyond belief by the duties of her reign. And it was she alone that stood in the mirror, day after day, wondering if Celestia was right when she told Twilight that she was meant to succeed her.

Twilight sighed. Although she knew the importance of her responsibilities to the greater Equestria, she couldn’t help but long for the simpler days, where she and her friends could traverse landscapes for days just to get roped into some wacky adventure. She missed the days when a pile of books could take up her whole week, when she and Spike would bicker on their way to get apples from the market in her adopted small town.

She sighed again, long-ago memories flooding her mind like crashing waves on a rocky shore. Her mind was sharper than those rocks, but the jaggedness was much the same. There were caves on her shore that longed to be explored, rabbit holes that were blocked by the business of her royal schedule. She wanted a break from being Princess Twilight Sparkle, Ruler of Equestria, and just be Twilight.

“Your Majesty, are you decent? I have some changes to your schedule I need to go over.”

Her chief of staff(and best friend) Spike, was knocking on her door, and it was then she noticed the sunlight filtering through her curtains. The curtains were velvety and rich purple hue, perfectly complimenting her starry bedspread and trusty Star-Swirl the Bearded-gifted coronation pillows. Raising the sun, a Celestian duty she once marveled at as a little filly, was automatic now, and it even surprised her sometimes that a sunny day was rising, as her horn seemed to raise the sun on autopilot. However, the simple task of raising the sun and moon each day wasn’t always so ingrained, and it was something she had learned the hard way a few moons ago, when she was faced with one of the worst moments of her royal career.

Twilight became lost in thought even more as she recalled, just a few months ago, how her carelessness as a ruler had caused such a ferocious uproar from the pony public. It was an event so tragic, so unexpected, and so preventable that she could hardly sleep a wink without the horror of that day claiming her even in dreams. As she tried to move on from her mistakes, she was reminded that the stakes were different. The lives of Ponies everywhere depended on her, and their problems were her problems too. She was still trying to become herself again after days of grief and guilt following the disaster. The mood in the castle was still somber, still sad, and still self-destructive.

Her friends and colleagues tried to reason with her that it wasn’t her fault, that sometimes tragedies just happen, but Twilight couldn’t move on, not now, not ever. As she attended memorials for victims and their families, she was faced with the duality of fervent, almost cultist support, and protests that swarmed her carriage wherever she went. The world of Twilight Sparkle was reaching a fever pitch, and she didn’t know if she would ever get to simmer down.

However, another sharp knock on the door broke her out of her daily guilt-fest, and she answered quickly before it was found out again that she was blaming herself. Again.

“Yes Spike! I’m ready. And I’m still Twilight, remember? You don’t need to call me that fancy title!” She answered, her words coming out strained as her voice was not accustomed to the daytime. She was, truthfully, still in her pajamas and slippers. Her mane was frizzy, and the bags under her eyes only seemed to get more pronounced every day. As she rushed to get into her royal garb, Spike came through the door, his scaly self fresh and shiny after one of his legendary seven-hour bubble paths. Twilight rolled her eyes playfully when he grinned sheepishly, picking up on her frazzled mane and eyes.

‘Wow Twi, you look awful. Maybe one of those seven hour bubble-baths will fix-”

His words were cut off as he tripped on the cold crystal floor, which was so shiny Twilight often used it as a mirror. Spike had tripped on a teddy bear that Twilight still had for comfort, a coronation gift from Fluttershy. Spike got up and tossed the bear back onto the bed, and gave a steadying eye to Twilight, keenly aware of the mess she was in, both emotionally and environmentally.

“You know, I was serious earlier about the bubble-bath thing, I think it would be great, if you can find time in your schedule, of course”. He said, simultaneously trying to reach a decorative gem on Twilight’s dresser, before he was swatted away with her hoof and she snickered. He had been trying to be sneaky with his claws, but she could see right through him.

“Spike, there’s plenty of gems in the kitchen!”

“I know, but they taste so much better when you aren’t supposed to be eating them!” He whined, before Twilight relented, taking the shiny red, heart-shaped gem off the wall with her magic and floated the object over to Spike, and he happily accepted it with a big smile, before clearing his throat and starting again.

“You know Twi, it’s been a tough time for you lately, what with the Manehattan elections and the Neighagara Falls disaster, and maybe you should, you know….” Spike trailed off, knowing how the word “relax” triggered something in Twilight.

As a ruler, she hated that word. It made her feel guilty, as if she couldn’t spend a moment without benefiting the world. Sometimes she wanted to “relax” to just lie back and read a good book or take a walk in the Castle gardens, but every step she took for her own self-care was rife with thoughts of guilt and shame. She was supposed to serve Equestria, not herself. Right?

Right.

A Few Months Earlier

Some moons ago, Twilight had turned in for an early night, allowing herself just a few minutes to read before her scheduled sleep started. As she had flipped through the pages of the latest Daring Do novel(a long-awaited collaboration between Do and her wife, Shadow Spade), disaster had struck the far North of Equestria, and it was Twilight’s fault. She had been so engrossed in the pages of her book that even her deeply ingrained task of raising the moon had gone unnoticed. She had just finished a chapter involving both Daring Do and Shadow Spade barely escaping a mysterious, probably haunted temple when she felt herself dozing off, and she entered the world of dreams, even as the sun still blazed in the sky. Ponies both within and outside of the castle were confused as to why the Princess hadn’t brought the nightfall, and a clamor of guards raced to her chambers, but the Princess was in a deep sleep, and it was forbidden for anyone but her to enter her room, as it was enchanted with a spell that only Twilight could break. Typically, this afforded her privacy, but unbeknownst to her now, it had brought her isolation from the disaster her unlowered sun was causing.

Many miles away, the famous Neighagara falls was gearing up for another summer season of fun and adventure, and perhaps a little danger. Tourists loved to brave the rushing rainbow water and jagged rocks of the waterfall, and the night time was often the best time to do it, and the reflective, multi-colored water was almost blinding during the day. As the night was raised at a precise time every day, some daring ponies would time their treks to the fall to swim in the waters just as the sun set. It wasn’t illegal, necessarily, but anypony who ventured out to the “nightfall” as the area was called relied on the Princess’s specific timing of raising the moon. That way, the sun would fall as soon as they jumped into the vibrant water, allowing the dark night to illuminate rocks and other cautions, so tourist groups and their guides could swiftly avoid fatalities.

Guides to this spot were specifically trained, down to the second, to give the all-clear. The tourists themselves forked up many bits to attend special safety sessions and classes for the chance to experience the adrenaline rush and natural beauty of one of Equestria’s most breathtaking spots. The tourists also knew the value of time, and the importance of the Princess raising the moon at the same time. One second earlier, and the ponies wouldn’t be able to see where to jump and where to avoid. On this particularly fateful night, guides and ponies jumped, either by themselves, or within inflatable crafts, to ride the waterfall down to the gorgeous lake that pooled below. The timing was so that for the first second, ponies would be blinded by the sun to their surroundings, and then the darkness would envelope the sky, and they would skillfully change course.

This tourist spot was swarmed by crowds every year, and brought in tons of revenue to the small towns that bordered the area. Although Twilight never liked seeing the inevitable photos of ponies’s travels there, she had coordinated with the Equestria Tourism Bureau to implement safety measures for the trendy and picturesque spot. Day after day, the moon rose precisely, and ponies whooped and cheered as their moments had come. The number of visitors to this spot had increased tenfold after Discord himself had made a pilgrimage there, plunging to the murky depths of the colored water before briefly turning everything into cheese(he was permanently banned, but permanently beloved).

On this particular day, Twilight was still wrapped up in her story and her dreams, and she hadn’t heard the knocks at her door and the increasingly frantic voices of her guards and Spike, who unsuccessfully tried to pick the lock with his claws. Eventually, Twilight had woken that fateful day with a pounding headache and a pit in her stomach as she looked at the clock and then outside the window, frantically lowering the moon before opening her door. She hoped that no one had noticed it was a few hours late, but she doubted that was the case. She lowered her head and opened the door.

The first thing she noticed was the color drained from everypony’s faces, as she was rushed to her throne room before one of her most senior advisors trotted up to her with a grim look on his face. It was still the middle of the night, she had thought. What could possibly be so important in the middle of the night on a random summer’s day? She knew it was nothing good.

Her guard carried with him a scroll that looked freshly written and stamped, as if someone had written it in a hurry. She saw the seal that indicated it was from the Northern Territory, and the put in her stomach grew as she remembered what she had messed up.

The moon…

“Your Majesty, a terrible tragedy has occurred at the Neighagara Falls National Park.” Her senior guard hesitated, as he must have known how devastating the news would be for the neurotic princess.

“What happened?” Twilight asked, her voice weak with worry. Somehow, she already knew. Magic works in funny ways, and even her horn seemed to be drained of color.

“Well, um…” the guard stammered, clearly unprepared for the news he was reading from the scroll. “It seems that there have been a high number of fatalities at the waterfall.”
The guard eyed her as he went on, the lines on his weary and aging face seeming to grow deeper every second, and he tried to muster up the specifics of what happened.

“Your Majesty…” He said slowly, as if bracing for impact. “The moon was raised too late.”

The moon was raised too late.

The moon was raised too late.

The moon was raised too late.

The words rang in her eyes as her vision blurred, trying but failing to focus on the rest of what was being said. All she could think about was the little information that could be shared with the pending investigation into the tragedy.

The guard's report haunted her as she could make out only sparse details.
Over a hundred bodies. The waters were so bloodied that rescue teams couldn’t tell survivors from the deceased, and there were even reports of rescuers fainting when they arrived at the scene. The area was entirely evacuated, and the attraction would be closed to the public for the foreseeable future.

All because the moon was “raised too late” in the words of the report.

But Twilight, even in her sleepy and shocked haze, knew what that meant. The statement may have been worded passively, but it certainly wasn’t passive.

She had raised the moon too late.

She had been reading when she should have been working.

She had been careless and selfish, and now she had caused the worst Neigahara Falls disaster in modern Equestrian history.

Twilight had known all along she would make mistakes as a ruler. It was inevitable. But not like this.

Not like this.

Present

In the months since the tragedy, news stations across every city were consumed with it. Stories of survival and demise seemed to be on every screen and in every paper. Tributes were held, and families gave tearful eulogies at the newly erected plaques in the castle’s gardens. Twilight herself gave a public speech, carefully tiptoeing around her own complicity in the tragedy. Since news had broken about Twilight’s unintentional role in the disaster, her public approval had plummeted to levels not seen since her disastrous, drunk appearance at Ponychella, when a few too many royal-box indulgences had prompted her bodyguards to whisk her away, just as Coloratura had started her highly-anticipating evening set.

A night of silly partying had nothing on this horror, though. Twilight was generally well-liked among the public, and even her occasional breaches of royal etiquette only endeared her to the public even more. She was loved Equestria-wide for her authenticity, her fairness, her commitment to justice, and-of course-her friendships with the Mane Six. Together, the group were paragons of their respective, modeling the elements of friendship for a public that was eager to learn. For a while in her tenure as Princess, as Princess Celestria and Luna watched with pride from afar, her public image had remained mostly unscathed.

Until now, that is.

The funerals and tributes were only the start. After the investigation revealed that it was indeed the unlowered sun that had caused ponies to plummet to their deaths, all eyes were on the Princess. She paced in her chambers with Spike at her side, away from the eyes and ears of her guards, some of whom had quit in protest after her mistake.

“I’m telling you, Twi. It wasn’t your fault! It was a mistake, alright!” Spike yelled, an uncharacteristic moment of intensity from him. Noticing Twilight’s widened, almost shell shocked eyes, his voice softened.

“What I mean is, I think taking a moment for yourself would be a good thing! Take a bath, go for a walk, or literally do anything that doesn’t involve meetings and ceremonies!” Spike’s big eyes were almost filled with tears as he tried to comfort the mare that had raised him.

“I’m telling you Spike, it might have been a mistake, but it was my fault!” She shot back, her fuzzied mane and bloodshot eyes making her look almost deranged as she started to cry.

Twilight couldn’t believe she had gotten to this point as she paced around her room, Spike following, giving encouragement that might have well have never been said at all. She couldn’t ignore the guilt that was so palpable it almost seemed to spill out of her body with her tears. It was as if there was so much sadness and negativity in her that it couldn’t even fit inside, and she half-expected some ghostly configuration of herself to rise out of her, tears and anger and all.

Her much-too-large room was decorated with pictures of her friends and family. Her large, four poster bed was in one corner, a desk and lamp near the floor-to-ceiling window, looking out into the gardens, where the plaques of ponies, visible from her room, almost taunted her. There was a plush carpet beneath her hooves, giving her a brief reprieve of the cold floor that took up most of the room. Sunlight filtered through the room. Her sunlight. Casting everything in a glow that reminded her of the beauty she was surrounded with while the outside world grew increasingly ugly. Polaroids adored the walls, and bookshelves were built into the walls, although nowadays she rarely had time to read for herself, her personal collection overlooked in favor of official documents and the occasional wayward manifesto.

There was a housing crisis in Canterlot, as ponies flocked to the dazzling city for increasingly smaller homes for increasingly larger prices. Neigahara Falls was still reeling from the horror of what happened, and the once tourist-swarmed towns that surrounded it were somber and prone to unrest. Manehatten’s contentious election for mayor had prompted riots, and the city had come under increased scrutiny for its pollution. Las Pegasus, the city that never seemed to stop partying, had been prone to increasing corruption within its resorts, as the Flim-Flam brothers continued their monopoly on the area which had once been a thriving place for small businesses and local markets. Phillydelphia and San Ponio seemed to be doing well, if you took out their ever-increasing storefront vacancies and the rising wealth gap. Even Ponyville was more chaotic than ever before. Even the castle itself seemed to sigh with relief as day turned to night, grateful for a chance to rest after the issues that seemed to envelop every day with increasing intensity.

All in all, Twilight was at the center of a swirling storm of controversy and corruption, of progress and pitfalls, of support and dislike. Most days, she could barely get through her duties without breaking down. She wondered how Celestia and Luna made it through for so long.

Then again, it used to be easier, didn’t it?

Now more than ever, Twilight needed to become herself again.

Comments

[DarkSnowGaming]

Well this story went from 0 to 100 during the middle of the story very fast.

I feel like the story should have a gore tag.

Also Celestia ruled Equestria alone for 1000 years, surley she has some advice for Twilight? I think they should have a conversation.

[Flopinator1976]

I thought I had put a tag for "violence" on this fanfic but as I look now I see that it wasn't there. That one description of death is a single instance; there will be no other instances of gore in the fanfiction as it goes on. There will be some minor depictions of violence, but nothing at all graphic or anything. I will of course still add that tag for this scene, and I sincerely apologize for failing to provide said tag when I posted this chapter. Thank you for alerting me to this issue and I appreciate your comment.