Chapter 3
Sharing the Night: Chapter 3
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Twilight Sparkle’s eyes were solid black; even Celestia thought it was creepy—though she didn’t say so. “What do you see?” She probed her young student, who sat next to her on the balcony outside her chambers a while after dusk.
“It’s night,” the younger alicorn told her. “The sky is empty and black. I’m floating in a still ocean full of stars. The ocean and stars go on forever. It feels... calm.”
“It should,” Celestia nodded, unseen by her pupil. “You said you’re floating in an ocean... can you see your tail?”
“Of course I–” Twilight started, then a look of confusion passed over her unseeing face. “I... no, I can’t.”
“How about your mane?” Celestia continued knowingly.
“No... wait, yes!” Twilight responded, her countenance brightening. “It’s... My mane and tail are there, but they look like Luna’s; like they’re a liquid slice of the night sky. My mane is... longer. I can’t find the end of it; it just flows down into... the... water.”
A smirk found its way to Celestia’s lips, but she didn’t let it enter her voice. “Perhaps then, you would like to amend your original statement?”
“I...” the lavender alicorn started, but she had no words for the enormity of this implication. “I’m floating in an ocean of magic—my magic—and it’s full of stars?” she suggested, but the description still seemed... off.
The princess of the sun nodded to herself, then continued on to explain. “Not exactly. An alicorn is more than an immortal pony with the magic to control celestial bodies. We don’t know how or why, but from the moment you became an alicorn–”
“Luna said–” Twilight interrupted with an unsteady squeak. “She called it a piece of her soul. She meant it literally.”
Celestia shifted in place uncomfortably; she had been trying to get Twilight’s attention away from the princess of the moon. With a sigh, she nodded, “Yes. For all intents and purposes... You are the stars now, Twilight; this is what it means to be eternal. I told you that you would have been fine falling off the castle, and while that is true of any Pegasus, it would be true of you even were you lacking that particular magic. The stars will not die from simply falling off a mountain.”
Twilight said nothing at first; if the look in her eyes could have gotten any more distant, it would have. The elder alicorn understood her pupil’s mind was racing to fit this new piece of information into the puzzle she had been given, and sat patiently.
“But–” Twilight started suddenly as Celestia could almost see the gears in her student’s mind jam on something incongruous. “You said you didn’t know the last generation of alicorns; that implies there was a last generation—and something happened to them! If you’re the sun itself, how is that even possible? If that’s true... What kind of power—what kind of catastrophe could destroy something like that? I know you said you were born into the reign of Discord... but I don’t think it could have been him.”
There was a long pause as Celestia sighed and leaned over to rest her head on top of Twilight’s; her student had become so very good at asking all the hard questions. “I wish I knew. You are right, of course, it is not Discord’s style.” Celestia frowned, wondering if that was really all she could contribute; it felt hollow. “Luna and I are only in our second millenniums... I know we must seem so old to you, but compared to the age of the world... we are all children wandering blindly through this life with no idea what came before. That—I think—was Discord’s greatest crime; the incidental murder of history performed with cotton-candy clouds and show tunes.”
Twilight frowned; the black pits of her eyes making the expression look downright dreadful. “If what came before Discord... killed... the last sun—or at least the sun’s soul since we still have a sun though I suppose it could be a new sun–” she said, rambling as she tried to wrap her mind around the concept of being a celestial body and that celestial body dying. “–maybe... maybe he did us a favor,” she suggested weakly. “I mean, I want to know, but at the same time...” she sighed, trying to put her feelings into words. “I don’t. I really don’t. I think... I’m afraid knowing would change everything.”
Celestia said nothing, and the two of them simply sat there leaning on each other as Luna’s moon crawled higher into the empty sky. Twilight was right, of course. If there was a power like that somewhere dormant in Equestria, Celestia really didn’t want to know either—but it was time she had to try to find out anyway.
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Eventually, Twilight felt a wash of cool night air rush in where Celestia’s head had lain and heard her mentor stretch. She felt obligated to follow suit, but floating there in the sea of stars that was... herself... she found it unnecessary. The feeling of calm she felt surrounded by the ocean of her magic was almost addictive for somepony like her; staying calm was not something she was especially good at, as recent events had proven. Celestia seemed to recognize this, as she gave a polite princessly cough to break Twilight out of her reverie.
“Come on now, Twilight,” she said chidingly, with a hint of amusement in her tone. “The stars are not going to raise themselves.”
In her own little world, Twilight facehooved.
“That was a joke,” the elder alicorn stated with some disappointment. “–because you see the stars—that is to say, you—are going to–”
“–yeah, uhh... I got that. Thanks, princess,” she said in a flat, unamused tone. An awkward silence filled the balcony for a brief moment, and Twilight thought that if she could see Celestia, she would have had that sad, disappointed look of hers, but she wasn’t sure why. She must have been mistaken though, because soon enough the elder alicorn continued on in her scholarly tone.
“Now, you may recall that the legend of the ‘mare in the moon’ states that Luna and I use our ‘Unicorn Powers’ to raise the sun and moon; you know enough now to realize this is incorrect, but not why or how.” Twilight nodded at this, listening intently as she heard her mentor walk behind her as she spoke. “The reason this is incorrect is that you will not be using your magic at all to bring out the stars; not in any way recognizable as ‘Unicorn Magic’ and certainly not any kind of telekinesis.”
Twilight quietly digested this information for a moment and frowned. “–but Princess,” she interjected, “when you raise the sun at the Summer Sun Celebration, your horn glows; I’ve seen it!”
“Good,” Celestia answered, a bit of pride in her student showing through in her voice, “Yes, and that is likely where the mistake originates, but that magic is not for raising the sun—not directly.”
Twilight felt queasy. “–but that’s what got me interested in magic in the first place!” she balked indignantly. “Watching you raise the sun... It was just a filly fantasy, but I thought it would be the best thing ever if I could do something like that.” She felt almost betrayed; lied to. It didn’t change the fact that she liked magic, but she still felt like she’d just been told out of the blue that Starswirl the Bearded wasn’t real.
While Twilight despaired, the clopping of Celestia’s hooves around her had stopped momentarily. “Really?” the princess asked with distinct interest. “I am flattered, Twilight, but this is a rather curious turn of events, don’t you think?” The sound of Celestia’s hooves resumed their pacing behind her. “You earned your Cutie Mark—six stars, I might add—as a direct result of trying to emulate my raising of the sun; and now here you are fulfilling almost that very filly fantasy.”
Twilight blinked. She hadn’t thought of it like that. In fact, she hadn’t thought about having wanted to raise the sun as a filly at all since this whole thing started. She’d been complaining about how unfair all of this was since the beginning, saying that she’d never asked for this, that it was all some giant mistake, when it really was a literal dream come true for her. She hadn’t said outright that it wasn’t her fault, but that was what she meant every time she apologized. That was why Luna was so mad, she remembered. They hadn’t been real apologies at all, just Twilight whining her way out of the blame.
‘Ungrateful whelp,’ she pictured the moon princess snarling at her. Ungratefulness; that was her new guilt. She set it next to the others—soul-stealing and insensitivity—and moved on in her lesson with a sigh.
“If the magic you use at the Summer Sun Celebration isn’t for raising the sun, what is it for? Do you use levitation to match your ascent with the sun?” she suggested.
“No, after a thousand years of the celebration, I have that part of it well enough practiced. Rather, recall for me what it took for you to enter this state you are in, where you can see and feel your celestial form.”
Understanding dawned on Twilight immediately; she had spent over half an hour trying to recover her calm enough to see the stars again, and that was with Celestia by her side and encouraging her. It was no wonder she’d been unable to fix things on her own. “You use a spell to get like this?” she suggested.
“Not directly, but yes,” her mentor answered. “It is a simple spell of calming tuned precisely to what is needed to enter the celestial state.”
Twilight remembered her own thoughts about the state being so addictive and couldn’t help but wonder if she hadn’t just heard some great state secret; what was Celestia known for, if not her Eternal Calm? What if it wasn’t real? She imagined this putting a final nail in the coffin of her filly fantasies about magic, but the word ‘ungrateful’ loomed over her thoughts; her filly fantasies were alive and bucking. Bucking her, specifically. In the head. She didn’t have time to dwell on it any further as Celestia continued explaining the raising of a celestial body.
“Once the celestial state is achieved,” Celestia lectured, “the raising—of the sun in my case—is more like learning to move an appendage you haven’t had before rather than any sort of telekinesis; if you have too much difficulty, you may find it useful to think back to the recent experiences you’ve had learning to move your wings.”
Dryly and a tiny bit bitter, Twilight imagined telling her mentor that her flying was the last thing she wanted to emulate. The first time she’d tried to use her wings, she’d crashed into Luna’s dresser and then the moon princess herself soon after. Who knew what would happen if she botched raising the stars like that? She’d seen the damage a single fallen star could do—what if she dropped a bunch of them? What if she dropped them on the Griffin Kingdom? She could start a war—or end one, she supposed. It didn’t go unnoticed to her that while her unnatural calm kept her from panicking over the prospect, it didn’t seem to do much for her mood; her thoughts were getting a little dark.
The lavender alicorn shook her head, doing her best to focus on the puzzles at hand rather than the pile she was making for herself. “Wait—I sort of understand that—but if that’s the case then how did you bring out the night for the last thousand years? The moon and stars aren’t part of... of you,” she asked, perplexed.
“It was not easy," Celestia sighed a little sadly; the subject of Luna’s banishment still seemed to be a difficult subject for her. “Remember again, that I could not raise the sun at all while she refused to put away the night.”
Twilight’s brow furrowed. "If you couldn’t raise the sun with the night in the way... but you could once Luna was... gone... wait–” she paused to look blindly incredulous at the starry space in her vision where she thought the princess was. “Do you mean to tell me that you haven’t been bringing out the night all this time? –that you’ve just been pushing it around with the sun?”
“Do not tell Luna,” the elder alicorn whispered, tickling Twilight’s ear with her sudden close presence, “but she is exceptionally heavy.”
Twilight—again—facehooved in her private little world of stars. “–and,” she started, a certain resignation in her voice, “–the story of Hearth’s Warming Eve? How did the unicorns do it?”
There was a rustling next to Twilight as Celestia shook her head. “I don’t know, Twilight. The story of Hearth’s Warming Eve was old when I was a filly. I can only presume that it took place in a time when there were no alicorns for the sun or moon, and no Discord, who liked to cycle day and night at random. Clearly though, the presence of Windigos in the story implies that chaos was on the rise.”
Twilight sighed. Every time her mentor said those words—’I don’t know’—it disturbed her.
“Now,” Celestia instructed. “Let me see you bring out the stars.”
Twilight was about to object when she was surprised to realize that she felt like she actually could—maybe—feel the vastness around her as something resembling a part of her. She gave it a little nudge, and the entire ocean of stars... tilted, as did Twilight’s stomach. Scrambling to right herself—forgetting that the whole ocean of magic was ‘herself’—she only managed to flop over and lose herself beneath the churning surface. There was a brief moment as she drifted that she felt there was no up or down, no here or there—then everything seemed to right itself. Unsure of where she was in the sea of stars, she cracked her eyes open to check, then widened them with a gasp. The surface was right there—below her—and beyond it, Equestria stretched out as far as the eye could see.
‘This isn’t some vision or dream,’ Twilight realized, all her troubles forgotten. ‘This is real. This is now. I’m looking down on Equestria from the stars... because I am the stars.’ Suddenly it all felt so real. She searched the landscape below and found Castle Canterlot; she found the wing where the the princess’ chambers were; she found the balcony where she and Celestia had sat down to have their lesson... and they were still there. Not only that but the empty black pools of her eyes looked really creepy—she thought—which brought her to realize that she could see it all clearly from her place miles or more up in the sky. She wasn’t really sure how high up the stars were, actually, and they stretched on forever behind her; in front of her was Equestria and she was just... everything else. She had no sense of scale, it all just was.
Her special talent may have been Magic—or being the stars maybe, she supposed she didn’t even know for sure any more—but her methodology was Science, and the first scientific method anypony learned was simple: poke it. She looked down to where her body was, and she reached out as if to touch her cheek. At first she felt a tickle of magic under her hoof as it passed through her face and she thought she must be intangible, it was a queer feeling, and she couldn’t help but giggle. She pulled the hoof back and the giggle caught in her throat. There was a hole in her face where it had dissolved under her hoof like so much stardust. Worse: the hole was spreading; its edge dissolving like a sugar cube in hot tea. In the blink of an eye, the rest of the body was gone with a sedate, glittering sparkle.
Twilight’s heart beat wildly in panic; what had she just done? Then, she realized she had a heart that could beat wildly, which was good. Immediately after, she realized she had gravity, and crashed down onto the marble balcony with a soft thud and a kerfuffle of feathers. “What–” she squeaked, scrambling to look up at Celestia in cold, clawing fear. “What in the bucking hay was that?!” she gasped. "That wasn’t teleportation! My body just... dissolved! In front of me! I watched it happen!”
Celestia reached her hooves around her student and hugged her tight. “Shh... Calm down, Twilight.” she cooed, stroking the young alicorn’s mane which had retained its starry appearance after being cut from the sky. “Yes; a small, vestigial part of you turned to stardust and starlight when you re-manifested here and it was no longer needed. It has now gone to rejoin the rest of you in your sky—which I must say is beautiful, Twilight.”
Momentarily distracted, Twilight’s spirits rose in expectation as she turned and realized that yes, she had done it; she had brought out the stars. Look, right there is—wait—suddenly her eyes widened and her stomach sank. She dropped back onto her flank as she stared up into the sky in utter despair. "The–the–” she stuttered, crying out “The stars are wrong!”
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“They are all wrong!” bemoaned the navy-blue alicorn who was staring up at the night sky with nothing short of horror. “What didst that treacherous filly do to my stars?” She wasn’t sure ‘treacherous’ was truly the right word for Twilight Sparkle, but it was how she felt, and the moon princess was if nothing else, a creature of emotion.
She had sensed the magic of the lavender alicorn fill the sky as she abruptly flooded night with stars. All of Luna’s life, it had been herself filling the entire night sky; last night, she’d been alone, a tiny moon in a yawning empty void; now, Twilight Sparkle filled her world. The princess of the moon had come out onto her balcony expecting to see her familiar stars cradled in someone else’s magic; instead, she felt as if a crowd of strangers stared back at her from the sky. “What happened?” she shouted at the night sky; it didn’t answer, it didn’t know either.
Stomping back to her chambers with a scoff of disgust, she threw herself down on an antique fainting couch with midnight-blue upholstery. It was all just too much for her; she didn’t understand and she didn’t want to understand. She wanted it fixed. The thoughts in her head sounded like those of a petulant child and only served to make her angrier.
It didn’t help that this was hardly the first time she’d thought those words since her return and she was even beginning to tune them out herself. Why did ponies have to speak differently now? What was the point? Why had they done away with the abacus? It was a perfectly serviceable tool. What was the point of building another castle? Wasn’t the old one good enough?
Wasn’t she good enough?
Bitterly, she marveled frustratedly that she could feel so old and yet act so childish about it. She almost missed being Nightmare Moon. Where was the cold hate; the diabolical mischievousness; the mad vision that had coined the word ‘Lunacy’? She had told Twilight on Nightmare Night that the loss of her ‘dark powers’ was a good thing—and it was—but she couldn’t shake the feeling that she’d lost more than that. She felt so tediously, mind-numbingly sane, and now sanity just would not shut up about her incessant whining.
Yes, she was the princess of the moon. Yes, she’d always thought about herself that way; always felt the moon was the seat of her consciousness—but that didn’t mean the stars weren’t a part of her! It didn’t mean they didn’t matter to her! If they weren’t, she wouldn’t be so upset! If they didn’t, she wouldn’t feel like she’d lost everything she’d ever cared about! This was how she felt and nothing would change that. The moon was herself, but she’d loved the stars more than anything.
‘So go back outside and enjoy them,’ said the whisper of a voice named sanity.
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“No, no, no, no, no!” Celestia’s student shouted. “Argh!.”
Twilight had promptly forgotten all about the apparent destruction of her mortal body and now shook her hooves in vexation at her stars. She’d demanded Celestia teach her the calming spell immediately; it wasn’t working. In fact, it was probably doing her more harm than good.
A flash of magical light splashed out of the young alicorn’s horn and her eyes went black again. “You! You look sort of like Polaris! You go over—AUGH!” Another flash of light, followed by another exasperated cry of frustration, “GRAH!”
Celestia wanted to tell her student that the spell was for helping calm her mind—not to replace the need for it—but Twilight knew exactly why the stars kept slipping out of her grasp. It didn’t help her calm down or get the stars where she was actually trying to direct them.
The elder alicorn couldn’t contain her desire to sigh; it had been going so well. She’d had Twilight calm and collected, and all it had taken was... well, it had taken reverting to their well-practiced roles of mentor and student. Inwardly, she resented it a little. It was a step backwards, but a necessary evil, she told herself. Necessary, maybe, but she couldn’t help but feel a little bitter after she’d tried to lighten the mood with a joke and got a ‘Yes, princess,’ in return. Maybe her humor needed work, but the coldness of the response was an unexpected barb.
Maybe it was a mistake not to declare the newborn alicorn a princess right off the bat. No one would have thought it strange at all—in fact, sending her back to be Ponyville’s librarian again would turn more heads—but no, she couldn’t do that to Twilight. Right now, Twilight needed desperately to be in control of her life, not be told what to do.
A little niggling voice in the back of Celestia’s mind pointed out that given control of her life, Twilight had wanted to be told what to do—but she told herself that this was different; this was familiar in ways that wouldn’t last if Twilight were forced to return to the castle and presented at court like some long-lost daughter. Twilight’s general insignificance had protected her from politics as a filly; it would be a disservice to her to change that now just because Celestia wanted her to be more familiar.
She waffled long and hard in her head about her manic student. Eventually, after a long while Celestia realized that the sounds of said student’s mad cursing had gone curiously missing. A quick glance at the sky revealed that the stars were no longer darting clumsily this way and that at Twilight’s insistence, and the elder alicorn dared hope that her student had actually fallen asleep; she was disappointed, but only slightly.
Twilight was breathing hard and her eyes were not the flat black of the night sky, but merely their usual violet color. Further, those eyes were not tightened in distress, but merely squinting blearily at the sky as if she didn’t recognize it—which Celestia supposed she didn’t, since it was still far removed from how Luna’s sky had looked even to the casual eye; stars clumped together in strings and clumps that would be unfamiliar to anyone who had ever seen Luna’s delicate, evenly spaced night sky. Briefly, Celestia considered simply fetching a blanket from her chambers and letting the younger alicorn nod off with her, but she dismissed the idea as selfish; better to get her home while she was pliable.
“Twilight,” she said in her most serene voice, trying her best not to startle the sleep deprived mare.
“Gah!” It didn’t work.
“Twilight, look at yourself... Or rather, stop looking at yourself. Do you recall what we spoke about earlier? About Ponyville? You’ve brought out your stars and they are fine; you need to go home and get some–”
“Ponyville!” Twilight interrupted with a shriek. “Of course! I just bought that special twenty-one-volume uranographers’-edition of ‘The Stars, the Universe and Everything’ to replace the ‘Astronomical Astronomer’s Almanac to all things Astronomy’ that Spike ruined! I can use that for reference!” Before Celestia could say anything, Twilight’s horn flashed, her eyes went black and she immediately became stardust that fwomph’d to the floor like a bucket of sand before blowing away in the cool night air. Celestia had to cover her face to avoid getting faithful student in her eyes, and by the time it was gone... well, it was gone, obviously.
The elder alicorn shook her head, wondering if she could call that success or not, though in the end she supposed it wouldn’t really make a difference. She couldn’t easily follow Twilight to Ponyville until dawn unless she took a carriage or winged it herself, so she resigned herself to letting her neurotic student wind down on her own. Twilight was flagging, she assured herself. She couldn’t last too much longer, and would probably wake up tomorrow to find she’d drooled all over volume two of the compilation she’d mentioned. As for the stars... Celestia was quite sure said compilation catalogued well over two million stars; the alicorn of the stars would get bored trying to reproduce Luna’s night eventually... right?
Well okay no, she wouldn’t, but it was Twilight’s prerogative to do what she liked with her stars; Celestia wouldn’t say anything, even if trying to make yourself pass as somepony else would have been considered vaguely creepy for a normal pony. In the end, the truth was that the new alicorn didn’t really have anything to worry about now. A few days in Ponyville with her friends would help her realize that.
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Though her body had dissolved into stardust—and quite abruptly at that—Twilight had not yet manifested back at the library. The moment she’d decided she no longer needed to be at the Castle, her body had disappeared; now she was just the stars. She had no body to distract her—and the idea of that derailed her train of thought completely. For the moment, she forgot entirely that the stars were supposedly wrong; that she was wrong.
The oddness of that thought would have stuck in her mind if she was having it, but she wasn’t. The sleep-deprived mare of stars was finding herself looking wonderingly down on Ponyville. Specifically, she was wondering where exactly the library was; she knew it had to be there somewhere but just this moment that somewhere seemed to escape her—like she’d been reading for several pages, only to look back and realize none of it had actually gotten past her eyes.
The stars twinkled as she giggled at the idea applied to a town. It really was like she didn’t even recognize Ponyville; like she’d never been there before. It probably ought to have concerned her more, but the fact was that the whole thing had a strange novelty to it and she was distracted by the sheer beauty of the town she was seeing as if for the first time.
She had looked down on Ponyville from Canterlot before and had enjoyed how the clear winter nights would make the distance seem to vanish and the lights sparkle like a tiny fairy village sat just beyond her tower window. This was like that, but there was no tower window; there was no Twilight; there was just the great big sparkling night over Ponyville which twinkled again as she giggled in understanding of why Celestia had often found reason to refer to her subjects as ‘her little ponies.’
They really were kind of cute.
The stars twinkled some more and she lost track of time just watching them walking around their little town until slowly the streets emptied and things grew quiet.
As her gaze drifted on over the silent streets, Twilight realized the town looked even more fanciful and magical than it ought to have. There were no impenetrable shadows, no stark outlines. She could see every dark alley and corner with sparkling clarity—all at once—and the darkness held nothing to fear. In contrast, streets that were lit by pony means seemed to have an extra unearthly glow that made everything look misty and dreamlike.
The magical feel of the scene left her wondering if there was a more esoteric side to her being a part of the night. Was she just a pony who happened to also be the stars in the night sky, or would she also have powers over shadows, dreams and the creatures of the night? Would she hear ponies wishing on her stars? No, she told herself; the princesses had never had those kinds of silly powers. Celestia had told her once that she had magic related to her special talent like any normal unicorn, and she simply possessed the power and experience to bend it to almost any need. With this in mind, it didn’t take long for Twilight to think she understood the phenomenon.
Starlight. That was the answer. Wherever her starlight touched, she could see. It was weak, but ever present, shining down from every point in the sky. Every pinprick of light was like another eye and the clarity of her vision seemed to be proportional to the amount of her starlight something received. She could see inside some buildings, but only just. The interiors were fuzzier and fuzzier the more her light had to bounce, even—or rather, especially—in bright lamplight, which seemed to somehow provide its own interference. It occurred to her somewhat belatedly as her gaze wandered over sleeping ponies that she was invading their privacy and probably ought to stop—and only then did she realize that her drifting attention had brought her to look in on a most peculiar scene taking place in none other than the library she’d been looking for.
It was difficult to make out since the library tree was not deciduous and the leafy cover was quite good at catching and blocking her light even in winter, but it appeared to be Spike, Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy sitting around a card table... playing poker.
Or trying to, anyway.
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Spike and Rainbow Dash were too busy arguing over poker rules to notice when the starry black circle of sky visible through one of the library’s round windows seemed to push into the room and quietly settle down at the table. Fluttershy may have noticed, but she was too polite to say anything if she did.
“Everypony in Cloudsdale knows it’s supposed to be ‘Ten, Jack, Queen, King, Ace,’ Spike, stop trying to be difficult!” complained Rainbow Dash.
“That doesn’t even make any sense!” Spike retorted with equal fervor. "A jack is a male donkey; it doesn’t belong in a royal flush! Look, I’m dealing, so it’s Canterlot deck and Canterlot rules; ‘Ten, Prince, Princess, Princess, Ace. The princesses are interchangeable—but you can’t use one twice in a straight.”
“Nnnnggghh!” Rainbow Dash grunted, trying to express how wrong that was and failing. “Look. First, that’s racist; second, the Jack is a Gryphon thing or something, okay? The whole world plays with the standard deck, why does the stupid Canterlot nobility have to be different? –and why is Twilight even on the ace for that matter?”
Spike just rolled his eyes and started dealing four hands around the table. “There’s this law that says the likeness of anypony who works for the government is in the public domain,” he recited exactly as Twilight no doubt had explained to him many many times. “–and Twilight is the Princess’ Ace, so there; deal with it. In another month when all this gets out, it’ll probably be changed to princess, princess, princess, and everyone will have to get new decks—again—so we’re gonna use this one while we still can.”
Rainbow Dash grumbled, scooping up her cards with a hoof and placing them in the cardholder in front of her with her teeth a little awkwardly. Like most Pegasi, Dash was used to just sticking them in clouds, so the earth-pony contraption was a little clumsy for her. Surveying her hand, Dash stooped to bend her head down onto the table to look closely at one of the cards. “Well they could have at least done a better job on it then; it doesn’t even really look like her. I can’t put my hoof on it, but...” the blue pegasus looked back and forth between the card and the mare across the table from her a few times, comparing them.
A heartbeat passed, then there was a tumultuous clatter as Rainbow Dash jumped and scrambled back away from the table with a “Wah!” startling everyone in the room but Twilight, who she’d just realized was sitting at the table with them. “Holy—bucking—hay—Twilight!” she said between gasps as her heart ran away without her. “When did you—how did you–” she started, then squinted as she finally actually took in Twilight’s appearance. “Did... did you use Celestia’s shampoo or something?”
Twilight—for her part—looked quizzically at Rainbow Dash as if she had no idea what was going on, then looked down and realized she had a body. “Oh! Oh hey,” she giggled. “I’m here! That is so weird,” she beamed in happy amusement, “I don’t feel like I’m here.”
Spike, Rainbow Dash and Flutteryshy all looked at each other in concern. “...Twilight? Hey, Twilight, are you okay?” Spike probed. When she didn’t respond, he carefully set down the deck of cards and got up to nudge her in the ribs.
The sleep deprived alicorn’s only response to being poked was to fall out of her chair giggling, clutching her side, “Hee—hehe—hahaha!” she laughed, then got distracted looking at something on the ceiling.
“Oh. Oh my.” Fluttershy waved a hoof slowly in front of Twilight’s eyes, watching as the sleep deprived mare tracked it... poorly. “She looks... delirious. Does anypony know if she got any sleep last night?”
Spike looked away guiltily, “I, uhh... I dunno. We had an argument and I went to bed early. I sleep longer than her, so...”
Fluttershy studied the floorboards for a moment, then met Rainbow Dash’s eyes knowingly. The two of them had left their friend with a guilt trip, but now it was coming back to bite them.
“Maybe the princesses were just sharing the royal moonshine?” Rainbow Dash suggested halfheartedly, distinctly uncomfortable with the idea that she’d been anything but attentive of their friend. “I mean, who knows what they do after hours up there?”
Fluttershy bent over to sniff at Twilight’s breath—sending the prone mare into another fit of ticklish giggles as their noses touched—and shook her head. “Let’s just get her up to bed,” she said, rolling Twilight over so she could pick her up from behind and fly her up the stairs to her bedroom. The door closed after her with a click, and after a moment there was a surprised, muffled squeak from the butter-yellow pegasus.
“Wait!” Rainbow Dash shouted up the stairs. "What about the bet? –and the hair! Is nopony else wondering what’s up with her hair? There are stars or dandruff or something in it! She might need a shower!” There was no response. She stood there awkwardly for a few minutes before it was clear that Fluttershy had elected to watch over their sleeping friend and wasn’t coming back out.
Spike had vanished, leaving his ridiculous deck of cards on the table; awkwardly, Rainbow Dash looked at the front door and considered going home, but sighed in resignation. It wouldn’t mean as much as it would have yesterday, but she could sleep on the couch for one night to be there for Twilight. Resigned to her fate, she walked over to the familiar shelf of Daring Do books and hoofed one down; being the loyalest of friends was hard work.
☾ ☾ ☾
“Is the filly gone?” Luna asked with a sour petulance as she heard hoofsteps that could only be Celestia clop quietly into the moon princess’ chambers.
“She is,” came her sister’s simple, aloof reply. That was Celestia, never rising to the bait. The clopping stopped as the older sister lowered herself next to Luna’s couch and gave her a nuzzle.
“Good. I do not think I could have sat with her at breakfast; not even for those ‘waffles’ the chef makes,” she stated dourly. Celestia gave a light chuckle at that, prompting Luna to crane her neck to look at her in confusion.
Celestia gave a wry smile. “Oh, I very much doubt Twilight will be awake for breakfast—even your afternoon breakfast. Knowing her, she’ll be out for at least sixteen hours; she hasn’t slept, you know,” she mentioned without much subtlety.
Luna frowned, unamused. “Thou art trying to excuse her actions by implying she was not of a right mind; it is not going to work.” It didn’t work, she told herself, though given a fair chance she might have felt a tiny bit guilty for yelling the filly off the roof. “She is an adult and will have to learn to take responsibility for her actions, deprived of sleep or not.”
“–an adult, you say?” Celestia smirked. “I was under the impression you thought of her as a troublesome filly now; quite the change of opinion from last night.”
“She is a an alicorn filly; it necessitates a certain maturity,” she groused unconvincingly. She’d walked right into that one.
“Now that you mention ‘her actions’, though,” Celestia started in a tone that clearly declared she needed no such prompting, “Since she left, I’ve been thinking. You see, she and I talked a bit about how she got her cutie mark.”
Luna craned her neck again to look at her older sister; she couldn’t help but be a little interested in the ungraceful change of subject, even if she’d rather not think about her right now. The japes were over; this was what her sister had really come in to talk about.
“It seems she got her cutie mark from wanting to raise the sun,” Celestia offered wonderingly.
“Congratulations, thy student of ten years loves and idolizes thee,” replied the bitter midnight blue mare. “I shall get the pink one to throw thee a party.”
“Don’t you think it’s rather interesting?” Celestia suggested. “You see—and I haven’t mentioned this to her yet—I don’t think this all happened just yesterday afternoon; I think it’s been going on longer than any of us realized.”
Luna furrowed her brow. “I do not see what thou art getting at, Tia. I had the stars still when I put them away yesterday.”
“Perhaps,” her older sister observed cryptically. “–but... That’s why I have to ask. What did it mean, ‘The stars shall aid in her escape?’”
“...thou shouldst not put so much stock in the wording of prophecies,” Luna asserted carefully after a pause, but the brilliant white alicorn refused to be deflected.
“Lulu... just tell me; did you—specifically you—regain control of the stars or otherwise arrange for them to be in a position to break you free?”
Luna was hesitant to answer. “I do not like what you are suggesting,” she stated.
“Luna,” Celestia insisted.
“...no,” she finally admitted. “–but that doesn’t mean anything; it was bound to happen eventually. As it is, it took a thousand years for them to align by chance.”
Celestia shook her head. “I don’t think they did; I think that through the act of anticipating it, she set you free.”
✶ ✶ ✶
That night, Twilight fell into the deepest kind of sleep that only ponies who’ve spent the last thirty-six hours awake can achieve; not only that, but she was doubly blessed with the unexpected warm, happy contentedness of having somepony wrapped up in her arms.
It was a great disappointment when—in the middle of the night—she felt that pony squirming to get free and she reluctantly moved herself to oblige them before drifting back into her coma-like state. This was a source of considerable confusion when she finally awoke and found her arms wrapped around Fluttershy; Fluttershy was the wrong pony. Still half asleep, she looked around the bedroom, blearily searching for somepony white, round and with a mass of roughly eighty quintillion tons.
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Author's Notes
And then there was exposition.
Hopefully the additions in this chapter only continue to provide unique flavor and don't seem too hamhanded. Lots of Alicorn!Twilights are proper immortal (unkillable) anyway
Pretty much all the setup is done with this, so things can start actually happening. Next chapter will be a bit more down-to-earth in ponyville to even things out
Edit: Oh, and just to alleviate any concerns about talk of killing suns and whatnot—no, this story is not going 'over 9000.' No (living) OCs will be introduced (not counting regular NPCs) and that part of the plot will progress pretty much as implied: some investigation on the side. I didn't even mark this as adventure, since I've basically given the alicorns free reign to go where they want (during their part of the day) and be back for supper. Basically, if you've liked it so far, it's my intention that nothing after this chapter should change that.
Delirious!Alicorn!Twilight is best Twilight.
I don't have any criticism, constructive or otherwise, so I will just say "great chapter and keep up the good work!"
Great chapter and keep up the good work!
Ahhh, so this is TwiLestia by the looks of things?
Who else is white and weighs eighty quintillion tons?
Very nice! This has easily moved to one of my top favorite Alicorn!Twilight stories, which I am a sucker for. A very unique take on it, too. I approve.
Also, WorldSmith is right, "Delirious!Alicorn!Twilight is best Twilight."
she set you free.
i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/210/119/+_2acc5a8841f8752904d37f90a8014829.png?1322693145
376223
You might call this chapter Twilestia, but their relationship isn't going to change much. The story at large is—as mentioned—more about Twiluna which has been thoroughly sabotaged up till now to give them room to drama.
(And the moon has a mass of 80 quintillion tons, or 161 sextillion pounds. The sun is way more
)
376223
Nope it's got to be a Twi-Luna!
The moon weighs 74 quintillion metric tons or 81 quintillion US tons
The sun is ~ 15000 times that mass.
Plus the sun is YELLOW and the moon is WHITE (as seen from earth/Equstria)
BTW Caryatid thanks for another great chapter.
376223
Or da Moon perhaps?
376370
376386
Well, I feel silly now...
TwiLuna works as well! Those two are super cute together.
Its a great story so far Cast-Iron! Also, that cover art is awesome. Props to the artist.
And Luna's frustration could be heard from Low Orbit.
Poor, poor Luna.
376223
Hopefully that changes. I mean, I like Twilestia and all, but I came here for some best ship Twiluna.
Celestia should deinitely go on a diet, eighty quintillion is a bit heavy considering the sun's weight to be estimated at: 1.9891×10^30 kg.
Still heavy but I believe 80 quintillion tons is a tiny bit more than that....
And I won't even try to word that weight.
oh dear, this just seems to be getting better and better!!!
Really enjoying this story. I can't wait for the next chapter.
376456
That is not Celestia. It is Luna's other body.
Huzzah! Awesome chapter again. I'm really enjoying this and loving every update
Woot! I LOVE reading this! Keep it up author!!
Needs more weight jokes about Celestia and Luna. Preferably to their faces.
376436
Re: Cover Art: Haha, thanks? Or maybe you should be complementing someone at Studio B, since it's just a tracing of Twilight on the ground from episode 1x02 with a bunch of tweaking, I've done a bit of graphics work in my time ^^
376456
Nah, Quintillion is only 10^18, maybe you're thinking of Quindecillion, which is apparently 10^48? (And for the sun, 10^30 is Nonillion)
376223
@Mister Morden
Actually, the sun is about twenty nonillion. It's the moon that's over eighty quintillion. Although to be more accurate it's about seventy-five sextillion. That's using U.S. short scale. Although I guess Equestria could have a smaller moon than Earth.
So, probably TwiLuna. :P
@Cast-Iron Caryatid
As for the story itself, write it faster! I want more!
That aside, I really like where it's going and the pacing is great. It's very well written and you've captured the characters well in my opinion. Keep it up! :D
Im confused. What happened to Twilights mane?
377173
Celestia reached her hooves around her student and hugged her tight. “Shh... Calm down, Twilight.” she cooed, stroking the young alicorn’s mane which had retained its starry appearance after being cut from the sky.
Sorry if it wasn't prominent enough, but she kind of had more important things to worry about at the time so it was hard to bring attention to exactly then, hence the strong reminder for the reader from Rainbow Dash. Maybe Dash should have also (re)explained what it looked like
Basically, her mane looks as it was described in her little world of stars now (and as it's depicted in the cover art) only with it's normal length since it's no longer 'physically' connected to her stars/magic.
(I can't say "like Luna's" because Luna's is now devoid of stars
)
Up at 2:00AM.
Read chapter.
Regret NOTHING.
Really covering all your bases;
It's just so interesting to see this story's take on alicorn Twilight
becoming celestial bodies,
meaning behind her cutie mark,
being Luna's savior for other reasons as well,
etc
" ‘Astronomical Astronomer’s Almanac to all things Astronomy’ that Spike ruined!"
I see what you did there.
I love that song. Jeffthestrider & Makkon are amazing
You'd get a thumbs up and a favourite if I hadn't already done so last chapters
Looking forward to the next installment
Still awesome.
I particularly loved the poker game and the explanations you used there.
The final scene with Celestia and Luna was amazing as well, perfectly thrilling and in the context of your story it felt like it made so much Sense.
The stars will set her free indeed.
I'm really loving this story. The slow development helps to detail a lot more of the ideas being brought in, and leaves room for guesswork as much as it gives a finite answer. (If that even makes sense.) I really can't wait for the shipping to start though. Luna is my favourite pony and TwiLuna is my favourite ship, so I'm looking forward to seeing it in such a well-written story. Kudos to you, Sir or Madam!
377439
While that is a nice song, this and that are merely both referencing the book Spike charbroils at the beginning of Owls Well That Ends Well (episode 1x24)
377481
I love things that make Sense
377482
For the record, I am a sir. My nick is a reference to Greek Caryatids and the fact that I often write for or play (In pen and paper rpgs) female characters. That is, since caryatids are only stone despite their appearance 
Thanks
So, umm, yeah
377872 Hehe that's alright then. I was going to say Sir and leave it at that, but then I thought it best to add Madam just in case. That's a pretty cool reference, actually. Doesn't make it any easier to tell your gender though.
It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance, sir! *curtsies*
awesome, i really love these kind of stories, and this one is not like the others; but that only serves to make it better since its almost entirely new
376370
that last part about the moon in your comment really was nececcery, i thought you were talking about the sun in the last part of the story, besides; isn't the moon more grey? that would clear up it up a bit i think
376451
The weight thing is either the moon or Celestia really let herself go.
377961
Well, the intent was that she was 'cuddling' the real moon in her sleep (not as part of some dream) which she was forced to stop doing at dawn when the moon had to set. That kind of makes it impossible for it to be the sun, but I guess that wasn't clear to a lot of people.
I'm going to leave it for now though, since it'll probably be clearer once the next chapter is out.
378102 I thought it was clear.
lol i think when rarity finds out that twilight is now a princess shes gonna react somthing like this....
3.bp.blogspot.com/-tDl2MAk7f28/T3IsKabnDyI/AAAAAAAAkKk/75EAxADCc4o/s1600/rarity_used_tackle_by_cluttercluster-d4ttid0.png
.....I really hope that Luna forgives Twilight. Also I figure that this is a LunaXTwilight story but I cant help but wonder if it is a CelestiaXTwilight instead?
378279
i disagree, when twilight was talking to luna before she knew that twilight was the new alicorn of the stars luna seemed to imply that she was really fond of twi (when twilight thought luna already knew about her little "theft" and misunderstood)
I really want to see Twiluna progression now! can't wait for it! give it to us! now!
I just want to see how Luna reacts to the star-hug she was getting for most of the night...
>Well, the intent was that she was 'cuddling' the real moon in her sleep (not as part of some dream) which she was forced to stop doing at dawn when the moon had to set.
That's what I assumed, although it does make me wonder if that means the stars will still be out during the day, until Twi puts them away...
378234
Having it be both Twiluna and Twilesta would be very very interesting though. It could be one of those 'fighting over love' stories, I've never seen one of those were Luna and Celestia fight over Twilight's love, but it sounds very interesting.
Also, great and long chapters, thanks!
380043
I now wonder if Luna noticed the star hug as well.
376223...Perhaps the Moon? Seeing as it is also "White, Round, and weighs about eighty quintillion tons".
381133
I have been corrected by quite a few people... my brain decided to forget that the sun is really, REALLY big!
The moon, not so much. Though I wouldn't call it white. Silver is the color I think of it as. I thought Celestia because she has a white coat, in direct contrast to Luna's dark blue coat.
TwiLuna though! The very first ship I ever read! This story is going good so far. I am looking forward to the next update.
380967 doesnt care, 3 chapters posted within a week
I say leave it as is since I felt it was very clear Twilight was thinking about hugging the moon. Never even occurred to me to think otherwise.
This story is very amusing and I can't wait to see what happens next. I'm also curious to where sailors and the like will be directing their complaints about losing their navigational references in the near future.
390632 I say there are too many things in mythology that turn others to stone with their gaze...
Regarding the status of the next update, it's getting there. I spent a ridiculous amount of time posting about the site changes when I could have been writing, so bad me
I know a lot of people want to see definite TwiLuna already and we'll see, but like I said the next chapter is a break from Canterlot, so try not to get too many hopes up 
Err, whoops, responded to the wrong post because... the one I meant to respond to seems to have gone?
To whoever asked about Twilight's cuddling being a sign of sudden unfounded feelings for Luna:
Trying not to answer all the questions about the absolute state of things, but I want to assure you that no, that's not my idea of shipping. As mentioned, she's not dreaming of Luna, she's just literally sleeping with her. It's less an indication of affection so much as an opportunity to develop... if not affection, at least an awareness of her. You're right in that Twilight up till now hasn't shown any particular feelings for Luna (depending on your interpretation of chapter one
).
Now, Luna's another matter...
390632
391183
Ah, my bad, thanks for catching that. Basilisks and cockatrices are actually basically the same legend. According to my reference, basilisks were the older legend, originally primarily serpentine and totally responsible for the middle eastern desert because they were just that deadly. You carried around a cockerel's head to ward them off, which turned into the basilisks having cockerel heads themselves because... I dunno? I guess because it makes sense to look like you're carrying around someone's family to scare them off. The cockatrice on the other hand was a medieval european legend and just to be difficult, some versions apparently had a second head on the end of their tail (because it wouldn't do to think you could sneak up on them I guess).
...I feel weird not going to Wikipedia for that
But yeah, I'll fix it... umm, eventually
I actually got a question for once
Will you be going into why Luna is nocturnal, like is it a personal choice or is it because she is the Alicorn of the Moon?
If it is because she is the Alicorn of the Moon, that would necessitate that Twilight will develop to being more nocturnal like Luna...
391574
Well, Twilight seems capable of sleeping through her night, it's safe to assume Luna is too. Whether Twilight will want to continue sleeping 'in public,' with Luna and missing their night... Yeeeeah, draw your own conclusions
Moon hug achieved. I await the next installment with bated breath.
You somehow bypassed the champion level and went straight to the ultimate level!
The fact I made that quote scares me. But it seems to fit since this somehow jumped to one of my all time favorite stories in this chapter.
I LOVE how you did the imortaility thing, it's actually a concept i've been playing with in a few of my own stories, tying your existance to a concept or body so large as to be indestructable, I mean. My stories are weird.
I can see this going somewhere scary and dark, what with the potential threat of alicorn killing, but I can't even tell you how much I appriciate how your setting up the twiluna here. Setting up an interaction between celestial bodies as a way to help a relationship? I know that's absolutely a first in anything I've read, and it's so mind blowingly awesome that only a rainbow dash can properly do it justice.
Please keep up the awesome work! Can't wait for the next chapter!
Great fic some fresh look on Ali Twilight. I just hope that Twilight parents will take some role in this too they are always just skiped mostly by other writers. Well so far so good
.
It's been a week since the last chapter went up. I was hoping to have chapter 4 for you all today, but Applejack is being stubborn and I still have a few scenes to go.
Sorry, but you were warned! 
399165
Originally (pre-2x04), Luna bucked her off instead—I guess that would have been a 300 reference? Not consciously but hey, death of the author and all that 
Well she did shout her off a mountain
402474
There's a lot in your post I really shouldn't respond to, I'm sorry 
The slow reveal of just how everything works is a part of the story that's best told by the story. I did say in an earlier post though, that the talk of killing suns isn't foreshadowing any epic threats out of nowhere, so if you want sad/dark/epic you'll have to write it yourself 
Let me know if you do though—I'll read it!
Thanks a lot for the praise
403538
Twilight's parents won't be completely ignored... played for humor, maybe, but not ignored