Forests of April
The forest of April awakened from sleep, and flowers unfolded through snow.
Twilight smiled at the beauty of it all. How had she missed this place for so long? She had lived in Canterlot for most of her life, not fifteen minutes’ brisk trot away, but had never come here. Yet Fluttershy, who at the time couldn’t have been to the mountainside city more than once or twice, had found it in less than a day.
A little while ago now, her mother had mentioned some kind of new museum of botany opening up in the capital in one of her letters, so she’d passed the news to her new pegasus friend. Fluttershy had visited, but she apparently hadn’t been impressed.
“Oh, it was nice,” she had said, in typical Fluttershy fashion, “and I’m sure they tried really, really hard making all the exhibits, but...” she trailed off, scratching at the ground with a hoof. “It was nice.”
Fortunately, the day hadn’t been a complete waste for her friend.
“Oh, but I found the most wonderful little patch of woodland, Twilight...” Fluttershy had then went on to speak at length of her discovery, and this time the enthusiasm was real. Twilight had listened, though she eventually had to get a map out because she had no idea which place Fluttershy had been talking about. Curiosity satisfied, she’d then promptly forgotten about Fluttershy’s forest until today, when, during a guilt-induced visit to her parents, the memory resurfaced and she decided to spend the afternoon looking for it.
“This is better than a botany museum,” she said to herself. A part of her felt she was betraying a piece of herself. She’d never learn the names of the plants, or interesting facts about their physiology, how they were discovered, and their role in the wider ecology like she could in a museum. But...
“My dear Twilight, there is more to a young pony's life than studying.”
The forest was lovely. Even if she wasn’t learning much. Besides, she was supposed to be relaxing, wasn’t she? Mother’s orders. In two weeks, she was giving a talk back at the school on the subject of friendship and the Elements of Harmony and fully half the unicorns in the school were expected to attend. Not to mention Princess Celestia and Princess Luna. Her notes were already prepared, the paper was written but that hadn’t stopped her spending all yesterday in her old room drafting and redrafting them when she should have been spending time with her parents.
What would Celestia say? Well, that was obvious, she’d say the talk was good, but would she mean it? Would Twilight just see a mask that hid the princess’s inner regret at all the time she’d wasted on her student? The princess had given her so much over the years: knowledge, wisdom, her understanding and love, it was a debt she could never repay. But she had to keep showing she was trying—
Twilight felt a light impact on her temple, stopping her in her tracks. Had somepony just thrown something at her? Down by her forehooves lay a suspicious, half-rotten walnut shell. Puzzled, Twilight looked about for the perpetrator, noticing that there weren’t any walnut trees in her immediate surroundings.
“Is somepony there?” she asked the forest. She couldn’t see any ponies and there were few possible hiding places that she could—
Another walnut shell bounced off the top of her head. What the?
“Now I know that somepony is there.”
Wait, maybe she should look up? Typical unicorn thinking, forgetting to do that. Rainbow would laugh at her.
Perched on a branch and looking for all the world like it was the most innocent creature in all of the wide, wide world of Equestria, was a large, regal-looking bird with feathers the colour of fire. It burst out in a series of squawks that sounded like laughter, then, to Twilight’s surprise, flew down and landed on her back. Her nostrils filled with a faint scent of ash and smoke.
“Philomena?” Twilight asked. Really, there were only so many possible explanations for phoenix this far north. When the bird squawked an affirmative, she asked: “What are you doing here?”
Philomena squawked a few times in response.
“Um, I don’t think I understood that.”
The phoenix let out a single, frustrated sounding squawk, before before burying her head in her wing. She then repeated the pattern of squawking, but louder and with bigger gaps between the sounds, and raised a wing to point.
“You want to me to go in that direction?” Twilight ventured.
Did birds keep lists of ponies they considered mentally deficient? Twilight suspected she’d just been added to Philomena’s. Nevertheless, she set out in the direction Philomena indicated, and this seemed to satisfy the bird. After a few steps, Philomena took flight again, alighting on a nearby bush and waiting expectantly.
“Right, you want me to follow you, got it,” Twilight said.
Under Philomena’s guidance, Twilight headed away from the gravel path, deeper into the forest proper. She soon lost sight of the path on the other side of a steep rise, but she wasn’t too worried about getting lost like she might have been in some of the wilder parts of Equestria. This close to Canterlot, there simply wasn’t miles and miles of untamed land to get lost in.
After a few minutes of walking, Twilight became aware of the crashing sound of water on water that seemed to be getting louder, and, as Philomena lead her over the top of a second rise, she found herself looking down into a secluded little pool. It was perhaps only slightly bigger than the Ponyville meeting hall. It was surrounded on three sides by walls of dark, moss covered rock, over which fell the small stream she had heard. Little bits of lingering winter ice clung to the edges of the pool where the rocks provided shade. Above the walls, trees loomed, shielding the basin from everypony who was not flying directly above it.
The pool itself, however, was not the focus of Twilight’s attention. Sitting on a pebble beach before the water, watching the spray from the waterfall, was a large, white, winged mare, whose distinctive multicoloured mane and tail shifted continually as if blown by otherworldly winds. A familiar mare, but today there was something different about Princess Celestia. It was so obvious it took Twilight a moment to work out she wasn’t wearing her usual regalia of golden crown, torc, and shoes.
An avian vocalisation from beside Twilight attracted the princess’s attention. As her mentor’s eyes fell on Twilight, she vaguely felt like she should be panicking, but strangely the feeling never came.
“Twilight,” Princess Celestia greeted her, with the very slightest hint of surprise, “I wasn’t expecting to see you today.”
“Nor I you, Princess, but I guess Philomena had other ideas.” Her laugh at the end of that sentence sounded a little awkward to her ears. Oh well.
“Do come down,” the princess called up.
The route to the bottom was a little steep, and Twilight was no mountain goat. She managed to get only half way down before something under her left forehoof slipped, leaving her precariously balanced and in serious danger of talking an undignified slide to the bottom. She shifted her weight slightly, and promptly slipped forward an inch. A miniature avalanche of tiny stones bounced down onto the beach.
“Ah...” she considered her next move carefully.
To hay with it. She lit her horn and teleported herself down to her mentor’s side.
“It’s a bit tricky to get down here without wings, isn’t it?” the princess said, with that sly smile of hers.
“Um. Yes!” Twilight said, with a slight chuckle. She looked about. “Wow, you wouldn’t think you were anywhere near Canterlot from down here!”
It was indeed the truth. With the high cliffs blocking vision, and the waterfall drowning out any more distant sounds, it really was possible to imagine oneself in the center of some vast, wild forest, rather than a five minute walk from a well maintained public path full of afternoon dog-walkers and parents with foals. The illusion was only slightly spoilt by the intrusion of the top of the white mountain over the treetops.
Princess Celestia had returned to watching the waterfall, and Twilight felt an urge to break the silence. “What are you doing here, Princess? I thought you’d be busy... um...” she floundered. What was it that princesses did all day? “Balancing the tax laws...?” She suspected that, some rather prominent pieces of popular fiction featuring the Princess notwithstanding, ancient tax laws and signing things only formed a small part of Celestia and Luna’s duties. “Not that there’s anything wrong with you being here,” she added hastily.
Damn it, how had she been so self-absorbed and oblivious that she had spent over ten years with Princess Celestia without picking up anything about the specifics of what the princess did?
Wait. Don’t answer that, brain.
Moving on...
Fortunately, she needn't have worried about accidentally offending her mentor, because the princess simply smiled at her, impishly almost. “Ordinarily, yes, but today is one of those rare and wonderful days where there appear to be no disasters unfolding, no foreign dignitaries visiting, and nothing else is happening that needs my immediate attention.”
“So today is your day off?” Twilight asked.
“Just the afternoon, I’m afraid,” the princess replied. “So what are you doing here, Twilight?”
“The same, I guess,” Twilight said. “I was in Canterlot visiting my parents, but Fluttershy said I really needed to have a look at these woods sometime, so here I am.”
“I find it is important to occasionally take some time to renew oneself,” the princess said. “Isn’t that right, Philomena?”
The phoenix, who was now perched, preening herself on a nearby rock, squawked in response.
“It isn’t often I get time to spend time alone without having to worry about other ponies.”
Twilight grimaced. “Oh. Well. If you’d prefer to be alone,” she said, moving to stand. “I’ll just get out of your mane.”
“Nonsense, Twilight,” the princess said, pushing her back down with a gentle hoof. “You’re out here to be alone, I’m out here to be alone,” the impish grin returned, “we might as well be alone together, that way we won’t get lonely.”
Twilight blinked. “I, er, don’t think that made any sense, Princess.”
“It didn’t?” The princess’s expression was perfectly straight.
“No because logically...” Twilight began, but the princess simply laughed, causing Twilight to frown. “Huh?”
“Oh, Twilight, I’ve missed having you around,” the princess said.
A little piece of the lavender unicorn melted. The princess still remembered her and thought of her fondly. She knew this. She really, really did. It was just that sometimes... on dark nights, or when she hit rough times, when nothing was making sense, and Canterlot seemed so far away, and...
It was good to be reminded.
Twilight noticed something else. Like the absence of the regalia, it had been so obvious she’d been missing it. The princess had simply been calling her “Twilight.” Not the more formal “Twilight Sparkle,” as she usually did. Just “Twilight.”
Maybe...
“Celestia,” she chanced. That word, all on its own, felt strange in her mouth. In some ways it was almost thrilling. She should be feeling mortified, perhaps, but out here in the privacy of the little pool she couldn’t be. She stole a glance at Celestia. Well, she didn’t look angry. Wait, now she was raising an eyebrow. What? Oh, right. She’d just said Celestia’s name on its own. ‘Say something, anything.’
“Er, sorry, I think I forgot what I was going to say,” she managed. Stupid, stupid.
If Celestia had noticed anything amiss, she didn’t comment on it. She didn’t seem angry, or anything. The two mares sat in silence for a few minutes.
Eventually, Celestia reached down and began sifting through the pebbles. The action looked purposeful, and Twilight looked on curiously.
“Twilight?” Celestia said. “Has anypony ever taught you how to skip stones?”
“I, er, don’t think so.” Twilight said. “But I think I understand the principles.”
She lit her horn, and levitated a stone, unconsciously biting her lip as she did. Quickly spinning an object that light with magic wasn’t exactly taxing, but it did feel quite awkward and fiddly. She threw the stone with a flick of her head and was rewarded with a rather anticlimactic splosh as it hit the water. A single splosh.
“You could use magic, but I rather think this is one of those things that is more satisfying to do without,” Celestia said. “Let me show you.”
The Alicorn of the Sun selected a flat stone, drew her foreleg across her body, and flicked the it out across the pool. Two splashes.
“Well, that wasn’t very good either,” Celestia remarked. “Your turn.”
Twilight picked up a rock, and tried to emulate Celestia’s posture. Draw a foreleg across the body, flick the stone like it was coming from a sling, simple. The stone traced a parabola up and down and hit the surface at too steep an angle. A single splash.
“Let me try again,” Twilight said. This time she lost grip on the stone too early and it sailed off in completely the wrong direction. Philomena let out a startled squawk and took to the air, flashing Twilight an angry look as she did so.
“Wooops, sorry Philomena, I didn’t mean to do that,” Twilight said. She was never going to get off that list now. The phoenix landed on a boulder directly behind the pair of mares, and resumed her preening.
“I don’t think you are holding your forehoof quite right,” Celestia said, stepped forward. “If you don’t mind?”
Twilight nodded, and Celestia adjusted the way Twilight held the stone, moving her leg forward and backward in slow motion until Twilight had the action down.
“Now try.”
The stone few out. Two splashes.
The two mares spent the next few minutes skipping stones across the water. Twilight got mostly twos, but managed a few threes. Celestia’s own throws tended to result in mostly threes, but Twilight was pleased to note that she seemed to be quickly catching up with Celestia’s track record.
It was relaxing. On another day, Twilight might have felt the urge to fill the silence with questions or perhaps an explanation of some fact she had learned, all with the ulterior motive of letting the princess know that, yes, Twilight Sparkle had been working hard and, yes, Twilight Sparkle still cared. Not today. Today she was simply content to skip stones with Celestia.
At one point Celestia managed a four, after which Twilight heard her let out a little vocalization of elation, half under her breath. It was strange, hearing the princess become excited about something so simple.
“Luna would be laughing at us both, you know,” Celestia said. When Twilight raised an eyebrow, Celestia continued. “She’s really good at this. She claims her record is thirty-six, though the most I’ve ever seen from her is a twenty-nine.”
“Thirty-six?” Twilight said. “Wow, that’s a lot. What’s your record, Celestia?”
Celestia was silent for a moment. Twilight couldn’t be sure, but it almost looked rueful.
“Five,” Celestia admitted at last.
“Five?” Twilight echoed.
“Five.”
Twilight found her shoulders were shaking, and soon she was outright laughing. She wasn’t even sure what was funny. Celestia gave her a flat look, though the corners of her mouth were ever-so-slightly turned up.
“Well I didn’t see you do any better, young mare,” Celestia said, which only caused Twilight to break into a fresh batch of giggles. “And not a word from you,” she added, trying to glare at Philomena, who was guffawing behind a wing.
“Um, sorry,” Twilight said, once she had gotten control of herself again.
“It was fine summer day, a couple of years before the signing of the Dubris Treaty that unified north and south Equestria, if I recall,” Celestia said. “I’d had a particularly frustrating day, though I no longer remember what the problem was, and I just had to get away to have a think. I was flicking stones out over Lacus Ceresius, ah, that would be Lake Latigo in modern Equestrian, and I managed to get five bounces. I was very proud of myself, but,” Celestia shook her head, “nopony was around to see it.”
“Oh well,” Twilight said, “at least I saw your four.”
“That you did.”
Awkward silence. Twilight glanced up at the position of the sun.
“Oh, no. I said I’d be back at my parent’s by five o’clock, so we could have a nice family meal together.”
“Well, you’d best be off then. I, too, should really get back to the palace.”
“Okay, princess.”
“I’ll see you at your presentation. I’m looking forward to it.”
Oh. Right. The presentation.
“Don’t worry, Twilight,” Celestia said. “You’ll do fine. And even if you don’t, I’ll still be proud of you.”
“Really?” asked Twilight, too hopefully.
“Of course I will,” Celestia said. Then, after a moment: “Twilight, do you think less of me now that you know that I am, without doubt, Equestria’s worst stone skipper?”
“No, Princess, of course not,” Twilight replied immediately.
“Oh?” Celestia said, raising an eyebrow. “Why not?”
“Because it’s just some silly stone skipping,” Twilight said, wondering where Celestia was going with this. “What kind of a pony would I be if I cared about that?”
“Then you think so little of me,” Celestia said, “that you believe I would not forgive you as you have just forgiven me?”
A knife twisted in Twilight’s gut. That wasn’t it at all! “What I mean is—” she stammered in protest, but floundered. But this was different! How? But surely—? Maybe from the point of view of—? She closed her mouth.
Checkmate.
She was surrounded on all sides, left unable to escape. She’d been outwitted and outmaneuvered; her only option, the white flag. And she couldn’t be happier to fly it.
“Thank you,” was all she could say.
“If there turns out to be some problems with your new theories,” Celestia said, smiling again, “and I doubt there will be—remember, of the ponies attending, only one is a genuine, living, breathing wielder of the Element of Magic, and she will be giving the talk. But, if there is a problem, then as your mentor, we can work it out together. But as your friend—” Twilight’s breath caught “—I do not give a rotten hay bale about how some talk went. I will be there for you if you need me, never so far away as you might think.”
Twilight basked in the words and the moment, simply allowing herself to be loved just this once, despite all her faults and shortcomings. But like all moments, it had to end.
“I’ll try not to forget that, Princess.” But I will, She thought glumly I’ll try, but I’ll just start worrying again. I’ll convince myself I can’t possibly be good enough for you, or that...
“Twilight,” Celestia said, interrupting her ruminations. “If you ever need to remember today,” Celestia continued, seeming to read her thoughts, “just for some reason, remember this: you can skip stones now, and you couldn’t before.”
Twilight reached down and picked up a small stone. It was undeniably true. She had learned to skip stones.
“See you in two weeks, my faithful student.”
Celestia’s horn briefly glowed a rich gold, and the gleaming white alicorn dissolved into sun-coloured mist, which flowed up and out of the basin. Philomena took to wing and followed, leaving Twilight alone on the pebble beach, holding her stone.
Her doubts and worries crept back over the edges of the basin, ready to gallop down the walls and consume her once more. The afternoon’s events were already seeming a little unreal. Had she really...? Did the princess really name her a...? She drew her foreleg across herself.
She was lazy. Spoilt. A fraud. She didn’t deserve the trust and love she had received. Only dumb luck had prevented her exposure. These things, they were not true. She knew this. She really, really did. She just had to remember. The stone flew out across the water.
One. Two. Three. Four. Five.
Five splashes.
Twilight Sparkle looked about at her completely empty and witnessless surroundings.
"Darn it," she chuckled, clapping her hoof to her face.
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Phew, so that was my first submitted story, and I really hope it was a good one. It's a simple story, I know, but if it in any way made you want to smile, or it brightened an otherwise dreary day by even just a little bit, then I count it a success. Many thanks again to the pre-readers. It's amazing what difference a little feedback can make to the quality. Any remaining gaffs you spot are probably my fault.
This story was actually a bit of an accident. Somepony recently made a blog post saying that someone else should write a story with Twilight and Celestia based around the song "Evermore." I listened to the song, and immediately agreed. Yes, I thought, some sucker really should do that. It's a good song. Unfortunately, I got it stuck in my head. Unfortunately, I ended up having to undertake a four hour car journey with said song stuck in my head. And unfortunately, inspiration struck. So yeah, turns out I'm that sucker. Oh, well. I like the end result.
There's been a live reading of Never So Far Away by the Living Library Society that may be found here.
Really very lovely. Nice work, I loved the simple interactions between Twilight and Celestia here.
Jup you have done well. Nice story!
1871832
Comming from you, on the topic of Twilight and Celestia interacting, that means a lot!
1871878
Glad you liked it.
(Made it though moderation quite quickly, so I guess I'm around for a little while longer).
Excellent. This is the first story I've favorited in long while, there's something to be said in that. Keep up with the good work, you've earned my follow. ^_^
Really Lovely, delicious interaction.
Just think its a typo here:
"what I taught you today" or such?
Wow,this is lovely.
1872166
The creators of this show say they don't ever read fan fiction, because they have their own visions of the characters and they don't want them pulled off track by big sweeping interpretations. Little, perfect and harmless tales like this one show why they really should.
This story just flows so well; the emotion is perfectly captured. Very good writing, sir.
Personally, I'd capitalize 'Mother', or use 'her mother' instead, but other than that I had no issue with this story.
Very good job.
Wow, this is how you truly write a "Slice of Life". Well done, sir/madam.
It's wonderful, but then again, I told you that already.
Oh, and remember when I told you it'd be a good idea if you fanficced? Yes? Well I told you so! 
To any potential readers: Read it. It's heartwarming and cheering and clever.
EDITED TO ADD:
Oh, and another thing -- I'm privileged to know that Powered is working on yet another tale, of audacious adventure and astonishing amazement and other things not necessarily beginning with 'a'. There's not even a title yet[1] but there is a first draft of the first chapter and it is riveting stuff.
[1] Though if he doesn't come up with one soon, I'll start referring to it as Fifty Shades of Purple. Why, yes, I am a bastard. Right there on my profile, people, right after 'verbose.'
I'm sorry, I saw this, and it just SCREAMS WRONG. I couldn't just let it go.
The proper name comes before the pronoun. Hast to hastto hastto. Period.
I'm not entirely sure if you could get away with just pronouns in this case, seeing as it's a new paragraph, but regardless here's how I'd rephrase the sentence:
Oh that's just wonderfully phrased.
Fantastic story, have a thumb and a watch, and it will be going up on my user page list of recommended one shots.
I can rest content knowing I've skipped six, with witnesses.
1874064
Yup, I agree. I'll get that changed.
1873223
Rule 6 of this guide? I'll get that fixed.
I really, truly love stories that delve into the relationship between Twilight and her mentor. It's kind of a shame we don't see more of it in the show itself. Just little snippets. Ah, only Twilight could think she isn't good enough after saving Equestria, repeatedly, solving problems that even Celestia had been unable to, and giving Celestia back her sister. That in particular likely has Celestia feeling that she has the debt that can't be repaid.
I wonder. What was Celestia thinking in this story? What did this series of events look like from her POV?
1875441
Now that's an interesting question. If I ever feel like coming back to this, I might have a go at that. But I can actually tell you one thing Twilight did for Celestia during the story, without even realising it, that probably meant a lot to the princess. She at no point brought up her questions and worries [1] about her presentation, at least not until Celestia brought it up for her. She recognised that this was a rare moment when Celestia was taking a break from dealing with the cares of others to renew herself, and she respected that. I think this is why Celestia is happy to spend her "alone time" with Twilight here.
[1] I mean work-related questions like "does X magical theory make sense" or "do you know a citation for Y" etc.
loved it, i don't usually read one shots anymore, but repeated exposure finally caught me.
Interesting.. that's a pretty well told one shot right here.
Well, that was a lovely, sweet little one shot. I do believe you have just earned yourself a watch and a fave. Congratulations.
THIS is your first submitted fic? Wonderful! I really hope you do keep writing, because this piece made me smile a lot.
The pacing is nice and slow, and the interplay between all three characters has a natural and playful feel. Your addition of Twilight's anxiety added a nice tension, and Celestia's admission was a great insight into the character.
I saw a few small errors- in the paragraph where Twilight comes to the pool, you have an extra word, "down into over a...", and the sentence after that 'Ponyville' has an extra 'l'.
After that, I was to drawn into the story for my eye to notice anything, but I don't think there's anything else.
Beautiful, I can't come up with much else to say!
Cute.
Truly beautiful. I hope this makes the feature box as it surely deserves so!
This is amazing.
If I've ever read a better slice-of-life story, I can't remember it. The characters are as in-character as I've ever seen them, Celestia gets a bit of downtime, and Twilight learns to relax and love
the bombskipping stones, and maybe even see that Celestia doesn't have unrealistic expectations of her.I went through it in full grammar nazi mode and found a couple of errors:
"some kind of new museum"
"your record"
"would be Lake Latigo"
There may be more (I've never been a good grammar nazi), but I figure every little bit helps.
This came highly recommended by a certain, well regarded ghost. You didn't disappoint.
I'm really thrilled by the response this is getting. Seriously, my neutral expression has been defaulting to "grin" for the last day or so. I knew I'd written something I was proud of, but I wasn't expecting such a bit response!
1876696 1878667
Okay, those mistakes should be fixed now. Thanks for pointing them out!
1872044
I just noticed the company you decided to put "Never So Far Away" with. That's very flattering.
1872171
:)
1872265
I've heard there may be legal reasons too. I can kind of understand though, if you respond too strongly to your fans, you'll end up with a show full of self-references and in-jokes. Perhaps when the show has finally run it's course, they can take a look at what people were creating?
1872849
It's kind of hard to tell if the emotion you're feeling when writing something has been captured in the text, so I'm pleased to hear it worked.
1873295
Strangely enough, I tend to have a fondness for adventures in what I read. I have a whole bunch of half-finished [adventure] stuff in my gdocs. Speaking of which
1873309
*Facehoof*. Just to be clear, the story that Ghost has decided to call Fifty Shades of Purple will be rated "Everyone", or at the very worst, "Teen" for—how would the ratings agencies put this?— scenes of mild peril.
1874259
See my response to Blue_Paladin42 for what I think this line meant. However, that response not part of the text, so you're free to interpret however you like.
1874781
I feel like something whooshed over my head there. If it's to do with the last few episodes, I'm actually a little behind on watching them. I was under a lot of stress lately (which is over now) and missed a few, so I guess I'm saving them up for one, glorious, pony-watching binge now.
1875837
I tend to read mostly long [adventure]s too. I always assumed my first submitted fic would be about Luna and Twilight saving the world or something. I blame Skywriter and his music collection for this
1876026
I'm glad you liked it. As I've said, the response has been making me grin like an idiot.
1876690
Thanks, I'm glad you liked it.
1876926
Thanks.
1877163
I think I shot myself in the foot with regards to that. I submitted on a Saturday because I finished it and just wanted to get it out there, and it hit the front page about the same time as the new episode came out (I don't live in the US, so I don't know the exact scedual the hub uses). Note to any potential authors: careful about this sort of thing.
1877776
Thank you for the kind words.
1880151
Ghost helped out quite a bit by pointing out many show-don't-tell issues. He's generally very good at making you feel good about what you've done, making you want to do even better, and providing suggestions about how to do that.
1880541
I've gotten one more stone skipped then Celestia's ever gotten.
And it makes me feel special.
1881004
My approximate thought process: Six? Mane six? Thefirewarde sipped past the mane six? Is this an episode reference? I'm confused... and so on. Dammit, brain, you're thinking about things too hard.
Should I be worried that I associate the number six with the mane six so closely that this sort of confusion happens?
1880696 Hmm develop friendships with powerful people?
Epic Twilestia friendshipping. And skipping. A very sweet piece. Thank you for it.
Okay, so, I had some pretentious-sounding stuff here (well, in my head) about how some good fics are this, and some are that, and I suspect some being this other, and this sentence doesn't make sense anymore so I'm not going to try.
I can't seem to continue this without alluding to or rehashing what that pretentious stuff was. I think the point was, before it started to get lost in the pretentious verbiage, that there some great fics that do Big Things; and that this isn't one of them, but it's still a great fic for completely other reasons.
That's still not very clear, is it?
I don't have one of those applause reaction gifs handy, or I'd post it for you. This deserves it like nothing else I've seen.
Rather than continue to short-circuit myself in roundabout ways, I'm just going to try to be direct: This is excellent in ways I'm finding myself unable to adequately describe. Bravo.
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Indeed a great writer who's opinion I hold in fairly high regard and who's writings rarely disappoint. You're fortunate to have him as a friend though I would point out that this fiction isn't his, it's yours. He and the others who helped just pointed out how to make it better and you took their advice. Most of the credit, for both the good and the bad, goes to you and it seems fortunate that this is some good credit to your name.
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I've spent a bit of time in academia, and one of the things that gets beaten into you right from the beginning is to always, always, always cite and acknowledge the help of others. That, and, it's just good form to do so. Between you and me though, the response to this story has been a massive (and much-needed) ego boost. I've been wandering around thinking thoughts such as: "People seem to really like it. I did good. Yay." in the privacy of my own mind.
As with everyone else who has read it, I enjoyed this fic very much, but I do have one small error to point out.
Should be a startled squark.
Other than that. Very good job. I award thee with a moustache
use it wisely.
Hmm... looking over the rest of the comments, it seems this is the first moustache you have received. I guess I'm the only one here with enough unoriginality to do such a thing.
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Thanks, that should be fixed now, as well as a few squawk's that were missing their "w". I will put the moustache on my dragon familiar to give him a +2 circumstance bonus to diplomacy, bluff, and intimidate checks. Also, it looks cute. See:
Ah, friendshipping is best shipping.
Ahhhh, this is refreshing. It's amazing, seeing as I recently had a discussion about how Twilight, in the show, thinks so little of Celestia that she would go so far as to banish her, send her back to kindergarten or whatever else should she buck up in any way shape or form.
Take the Crystal Episode, for instance. Twilight goes into her throne room, drops a bunch of scrolls on the floor and immediately drops on the ground yelling "Sorry! Sorry!". That's the extent of their relationship right now. Honestly? I would love to see an episode in which something like your fic happens. Preferably from Celestia's point of view.
And this is why Twilestia is bestia. Look at how much they have to work out before they even consider themselves to be friends!
Great fic. I'd love to see more from you.
That was cute and it gave me a smile thanks a lot!
I claim the spot of the 200th like!
But seriously, that was a beautiful story!
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So I kind of rambled here, stream of conciousness style, but you gave me an opening to talk about one of my favourite pony-topics.
Yeah, the relationship between Twilight and Celestia [1] always struck me as being really fascinating. It manages to be both loving and dysfunctional at the same time. There's something very heartbreaking about the way Twilight's only wish at the Gala was to spent time with Celestia.
It's going to be so special, as she takes time just for me.
Yeah, that.
Anyway, I always felt it was a little strange whenever I see Twilight announce that Celestia was "like a second mother" or similar [2]. I don't know about you, but my relationship with my mother isn't anything like Twilight-Celestia. And mother-daughter is still an asymmetric relationship, which is why I feel friend-friend is more powerful (especially given the themes of the show). If you can get to friend-friend, it almost doesn't matter if they go on to adopt each other as mother and daughter or start making out Twiestia style. Of course, I only really hinted at friend-friend here; it takes 159,827 pony-words, words that I could never hope to match, to get there.
[1] It's funny, we tend to rank ponies from best to worst as a kind of in-joke, but I think it's equally interesting (or more so) to look relationships (that's in a wider sense, not necessarily in the sense of shipping) between the ponies. In why case my best pairs of ponies are Twilight-Celestia, Celestia-Luna, Twilight-Spike and Rarity-Sweetie. I also have a weakness for Rarjack just because of the potential for hilariousness.
[2] Another aside: if anypony has the right to regard Celestia as an adopted mother (in my opinion anyway) it's Spike. Yes, everyone forgets about Spike! But during Lesson Zero, who was completely confident Celestia wasn't going to be mad about her late report? Even Twilight's pony-friends were briefly convinced Twilight was destined for magic-kindergarten but Spike knew better. Also, I think Lauren Faust is on record as saying that Celestia raised Spike herself because ponies didn't know much about dragons and Twilight would have been far too young. If I ever write something where Celestia and Spike interact, they'll be much more casual and relaxed with each other in a way that Twilight and Celestia are not.
What a wonderful story! I feel that your portrayal of the characters here are spot-on, more so than most other pony fics! It was very refreshing. You've put good effort into fleshing out these characters and their relationship, and it shows! Bravo!
Haven't started reading it yet, but as soon as I saw the first few words, this song started playing in my head. Manly tears were shed before I even read this story
(I miss ya gramps...)
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Yes, there's quite a bit to say about Twilight's supposed "best night ever". What pains me is that Twilight is pretty obvious, and Celestia, being the nigh all-knowing character-reading pony I headcannon her to be, has got to see this. My question is : How could Celestia let this happen?
The only thing I can think of is that Celestia, erh, molded Twilight to defeat NMM[1][2]. And that's it. It was only ever a far shot that she could find the EoH and actually defeat her, so she never really thought of a long-term relationship between them. 'Tis a delicate situation and I can understand Celestia for using tact. The ball is on Twilight's side... but a little push and shove from 'Tia couldn't hurt!
[1] As slightly explored in Ponies Make War. Twilight resented her for it.
[2] I don't really use footnotes. Oops!
Great sweet story, also like your comments in the comment section. Nice to read your insights. Greenthumbed!
How did I ever miss this? This is one of the finest Slice of Life stories I have read. It is not often that we see a fic that shows the Mentor/Student relationship between Celestia and Twilight and you have done well with that. Also showing the imperfections of Celestia adds to the story even if it is something as simple as not being able to skip stones. You have done well, and as Admin of the Protect Celestia Group I do deem this story excellent and appropriate for inclusion into the group archives. Thank you for sharing this.
Celestia's Paladin